Welcome Everyone! So, with everything we discussed in here, we will now deploy VGC's own "Report Card" Thread for next generation gaming graphics. That means all throughout Gen 9, this thread can be the area you use to benchmark the results. Basically, do games look as good as what I show? Better? Worse? As the generation progresses (mainly for the PS5, Xbox Series X, and PC), we'll use this thread. The reason I'm doing this is to see if you guys desires were met and if the advanced techniques I share from the strict 3D/Artists community is being followed by the Gaming Community. So, I'll try to present a new piece of Art as often as possible to see how things are going. 

2018

1. The first is a character of my own. I've spent the last few months trying to get her as close to graphical satisfaction that I could (8K res Warning)
2. The second character is by a fellow Artist by the name of Hellboy and rendered on my PC (8K res Warning)
3. The third is of an example scene in Unity, using the last pieces of technology (such as megascans) to bring its world to life (1440p Render)

On the Moderation Side of things, I'm going to be blunt - this is NOT a place for you to tell us what games you liked/didn't like or any other pointless argument! I won't even engage posts like them or any others that are clearly designed to derail the topic. They will just be handed Moderations so the flow of the thread isn't lost. This is for Educational and Engagement purposes, so opinions are welcome, but it will not be used as a means to trash on anything or anyone. Again, I mean this in the strictest sense, so if you choose to ignore it, and are then moderated, that will be all on you.

With all of that "mean" stuff out of the way, I very much look forward to some good discussions and for the graphics junkies to participate. If anyone has trouble seeing the higher res images (sorry, PC and all that ), I can downsample them to 4K or 1440p if need be. If you need lower, I can also do 1080, but 1440 should be the lowest if you want to see the best quality. 

Bring those discussions here! Enjoy everyone!

Her Name is MACY

Info: Each render took about 30 minutes. The key things here are cloth, how liquid reacts to cloth, lighting, and skin, and highly detailed hair maps (of which no current game has to such a degree). I use three engines to render (Iray, Octane, Arnold - in Maya). She's crafted in Zbrush and her textures were created through Substance and Photoshop. She is my largest character project to date and she will continue to evolve along side 9th Generation games. Will update more info soon.

Meet DOLB

Info: Believe it or not, he took no where near as long to render as Macy. The purpose of his inclusion is to prepare you for what many fantasy-style characters are headed for, detail wise, in the 9th Generation. Hellboy Modeled him in Zbrush. Rendered on my PC, in 8K, using Iray.

Book of the Dead (Real-time Demo)

Info: This was running on my PC at about 95-103fps, in 1440p. I've never seen a more detailed game world than this. It is the best of the current best and certainly what you can expect from early-to-mid next gen titles. Running on Unity Engine. I'll update with more later in the thread.

So, what we have in these images are much of what I heard everyone wanted. Much more advanced lighting, advanced AF (Anisotropic filtering), Advanced SSS (Sub-surface Scattering), Modern Texture Filtering, Movie-quality Depth of Field, etc, etc... I'll now open the thread to responses. Thanks everyone for your patience!

The forest looks fantastic in both the lighting, and the detail on the smaller plants. Are the plants no longer just collections of alphamaps, but their own 3D objects now? Tree bark also looking great. I assume we are no longer relying on bumpmaps for things like bark/pebbles, but rather straight up modeling the details in.

The drinking character looks, a little better than what I've seen in current gen games like the Witcher 3. Still a nice improvement, and noticable, but not otherworldly. Well unless you compare it to your old next gen witcher model that you did a while back. Massive personal improvement there.

Not really a fan of the design choices for the fantasy character. I see the SSS, and high detail textures and all, but it does nothing for me, because IMO the design of the character falls flat.

I'd like to see something like a Legiana from MHW with extreme levels of SSS going on. Would look great on the wings.

Edit: It'll be nice when everything finallly makes its way to 8K. After that the human eye can't see anymore detail. So at least the resolution wars will be over. :P

https://www.pcgamesn.com/both-nvidia-and-amd-are-preparing-for-8k-for-the-human-eye-that-resolution-is-close-to-perfection

I like the forest, minus DoF which I disable by default in all games that allow for it (hopefully that's standard in next gen).
Of course, for me, next gen dream would be if axe goes into any of those trees for them to behave as real trees...

I'm with you, @HoloDust. I want real deformation on stuff like rocks, bark, wood, etc, etc... We're slowly getting there, but I want next gen stuff to really "behave" like next gen.

Thanks a lot for this Thread CGI, really appreciated.

What I'm expecting from Next Gen is much more advanced physics, animations, system collision and AI. "Graphics", in terms of higher resolution, more geometry, details, draw distance, better textures, lighting, etc, is going well gen after gen, and with new hardware update, but what is really missing is a real step forward in the above mentioned physics, animations, system collision and AI; this would really help to have a more credible gameplay and more exciting experience, like indeed Sony has already shown us as an appetizer in the Last of Us Part II. Talking about PS5, just to make an example, I'm quiet sure Sony will deliver everything, as they are working closely with AMD to release a fantastic piece of hardware, capable of True Next Gen Image quality and also a significant jump in the features already mentioned. Same for the Next XBox. About Nintendo, it's always a big surprise, but lately never in terms of "high specs".

I would like to know the specs of your PC, so I can get a good idea of what it takes to run things like this. Again, the forest scene is amazing, and the best improvement in graphics I've seen for over ten years. Legitimately impressed by that scene.