Pixar: Games quality is catching cinema

Tim Ingham Jun 25 2008, 10:57am

Production exec at animated film studio praises gaming’s evolution – but says stories need work

A leading production exec at animated movie studio Pixar has praised gaming’s evolution – and admitted that the quality of visual technology is “catching up” with cinemas.

However, Ralph Eggleston, production designer behind Pixar’s upcoming movie, Wall-E, added that video games still lacked a “strong narrative story” – and predicted that there may never be the market for one to emerge.

“I’ve seen games catching up with us,” he told Edge. “The games based on our films need such large lead times that we aren’t necessarily settled on the look of the film when they start.

“So we give them some conceptual images and I’m not only surprised but sometimes jealous at how fast they can work and how quickly their realtime rendering engines seem to move things along.

We sometimes wish we could have something like that to move things along early in production.”

He later added:

“The big thing lacking in video games, and I haven’t seen one that has done this for me, is how you involve a strong narrative story.

“Not just a set-up that you jump in to, but a narrative story in which the player is an active participant. I’ve had this conversation with friends now for almost a decade on how you could actually do that with a video game.

“Unfortunately, although I think there would be a market for that, I don’t think the market would be large enough.”

PIC: MUSEUM OF MODERN ART

http://www.mcvuk.com/news/30977/Pixar-Games-quality-is-catching-cinema

If only games could have the strong, thought-provoking story that Wall-E has...

So Pixar thinks that games are cathing movies in terms of graphics, but will never approach film in terms of narration?

I totally agree. Games will kick movies' butt in terms of interactivity, though.

Are they talking about visual effects quality (CG) or in terms of cinematography and composition of scenes? I don't think the former is the proper way to judge this.

Cinema has a long way to go in terms of gameplay too.

I would agree with them. Playing Ratchet and Clank now and it looks like earlier pixar movies (not as good as wall-E, or newer pixar and dreamworks movies). But as long as gamers keep hailing MGS4 and GTA4 as oscar winning productions there won't ever really be a need for strong narrative.

That's a ridiculous statement to make. Cinema never will be interactive because it is an established medium with a clear focus. Games however should and must include storylines on par with cinema in the fiuture if they want to be taken seriously as far as their artistic, social and philosophical merits are concerned. Now that VG visuals are on par with cinema it is only logical for that graphical power to be used in order to promote the interactive movie aspect of video games.

Wall-E is gonna fucking rule.

Well, not to crash on Pixar's parade but Videogames and Movies shouldn't have the same type of storytelling/narration, which is common sense if we were to compare different forms of medium (we never compare Narration of Books and Movies, do we?)

As for the Videogame Stories needing work: Bullshit! We have games stories that are as deep and complex as any movie (Planescape: Torment, Deus Ex); stories that make you enjoy every bit of action (Half-Life, Bioshock/System Shock); simple stories that make you feel warm inside (Grim Fandango), Great Comedies (Curse of the Monkey Island, Sam & Max), Gritty Stories (Fallout 1 & 2, S.T.A.L.K.E.R.), etc...

For every Great Movie Story, there's always a Videogame Counterpart.

No, they should use the resources to promote the videogame aspect of videogames. Interactive Movies have died a long time ago.