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PC Games (Games) Media Television

G4TV To Preview Half-Life 2 Expansion 73

Posted by Zonk from the it-was-screensavers,-dangit dept.
Voodoo Extreme has word that new technology for the Steam engine, as well as a HL2 expansion entitled 'The Lost Coast', will be shown off on G4TV's Attack of the Show (formerly The ScreenSavers). From the article: "On Wednesday's show, Valve's Doug Lombardi will give an exclusive demonstration of the previously unseen 'The Lost Coast,' an upcoming expansion that utilizes a brand-new technology that Valve is implementing into the Source engine. Called 'high-dynamic range lighting,' this new technology enables a leap in lighting realism from even the current high benchmark set by Half-Life 2 and the existing Source engine."
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G4TV To Preview Half-Life 2 Expansion More

G4TV To Preview Half-Life 2 Expansion

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  • This was mentioned in the steam news system, a long time ago, I remember valve said that it would be a graphics intensive level, designed only for high-end systems

    • Re:Old News (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Ford Prefect ( 8777 )
      First announced in early February, yes, but I think this'll be the first we see of it beyond some rough concept sketches [hlfallout.net].

      I'm intrigued as to what the Source engine will be able to do when given room to breathe - Half-Life 2's maps were highly optimised, with just about every unnecessary surface made invisible or clipped-off to make the physics simpler. The seemingly huge, far-reaching environments usually weren't, but instead were clever simulations thereof. Okay, so it did mean it could run pretty well on
      • I am indeed looking forward to the new level (but not to having to uprgade my x300 :( ) Also a bit of-topic, but those environments in your sig look beautiful, even if the text is somewhat cryptic
    • You know, not everyone has Steam.

      I'd love to get the game - and will, once I can afford to run it - but I don't have Steam on any of my machines because I don't have any Valve software at the moment.

      First I've heard of it, if nothing else.

  • G4 (Score:1, Insightful)

    by Bootle ( 816136 )
    God I hate G4TV and their borg-like consumption of the greener pastures of the one and only techtv

    I never watched the show, don't watch any TV and I don't need someone showing me how to plug in an ethernet cable, but the shows were still great fun.

    Now I catch a couple minutes of G4 and I want to die (or kill them). How's that for media-induced violent tendencies? I hope the channel sinks like a rock!

    • Don't you see what's happened, the video games and video game programs are amking you suicidal and violent, just like the media said they would

    • Re:G4 (Score:2)

      by Grand ( 152636 )
      The screensavers should be renamed "Useless crap we found on the internet" They have slowly taken out any useful information on anything "Tech".
    • I never watched the show, don't watch any TV and I don't need someone showing me how to plug in an ethernet cable, but the shows were still great fun.

      How would you know if the shows were great fun or not... you never saw it.

      Did you just have great fun hearing other people talk about the show? Where is the lie, did you watch the show, and therefore watch tv and are a mindless brainless zombie like the rest of us, who you are trying to act superior to with your "I don't watch tv statements"?

      Just won

  • High dy-whaty? (Score:3, Informative)

    by The-Bus ( 138060 ) on Friday March 25, 2005 @09:52AM (#12045822)
    nVidia Guru David Kirk Answers Your Questions [extremetech.com]

    Paul Debevec Executive Producer, Graphics Research Research Assistant Professor, USC [debevec.org], who has a LOT of information on the subject.

    And the intro to the presentation for SIGGRAPH2004:

    Current display devices can display a limited range of contrast and colors, which is one of the main reasons that most image acquisition, processing, and display techniques use no more than eight bits per color channel. This course outlines recent advances in high-dynamic-range imaging, from capture to display, that remove this restriction, thereby enabling images to represent the color gamut and dynamic range of the original scene rather than the limited subspace imposed by current monitor technology. This hands-on course teaches how high-dynamic-range images can be captured, the file formats available to store them, and the algorithms required to prepare them for display on low-dynamic-range display devices. The trade-offs at each stage, from capture to display, are assessed, allowing attendees to make informed choices about data-capture techniques, file formats, and tone-reproduction operators. The course also covers recent advances in image-based lighting, in which HDR images can be used to illuminate CG objects and realistically integrate them into real-world scenes. Through practical examples taken from photography and the film industry, it shows the vast improvements in image fidelity afforded by high-dynamic-range imaging. [more] [siggraph.org]

  • High Benchmark (Score:3, Insightful)

    by fozzmeister ( 160968 ) on Friday March 25, 2005 @09:59AM (#12045888) Homepage
    Yeh HL2 is superb, but there is nothing new about it really, the Lighting is not even dynamic except shadows of objects. All the standard lighting is there because it uses the same sortof radiant technology that was in Quake1-Q3 (although at higher detail levels). Yeh sure it looks great, probably mostly because of High Polygon count and High Res textures, and some nifty effects (reflection et al).

    If you want to see the "Benchmark" Technology, look at Doom3, Sure its got low polygon count, and low (in comparison) texture quality, But the whole world is lighted at run-time.

    In summary, HL2 looks great, and probably as good as Doom3, but its doing nothing new or revolutionary. The future has to be engines like Doom3 even though the computers of today are maybe not quite upto the point of realising that potential.
    • Agreed. The shadows (which aren't cut off by surfaces--notice how the magnet casts a shadow through the opaque steel box? Take a close look if you can [absoluteinsight.net]) are hardly as good as Doom3's.

      A game with HL2's detail, reflections, and normals, and Doom3's shadowing, will make me want to go to a store, buy it, and give the vendor a 50% tip (I got HL2 with the ATI offer [atihl2offer.com] with a card I bought, and via Steam).

    • Re:High Benchmark (Score:2, Informative)

      by chris_oat ( 5511 )
      I have to disagree. The lighting is by no means standard and is far more advanced than Quake1-Q3 lighting. Valve uses a directional radiosity basis for storing light on static scene surfaceses which makes it work very nicely with normal maps (standard light maps don't have this property). Valve also stores volumetric lighting using what they call an "ambient cube" basis, this is a lot like the irradiance volume [cornell.edu] which is used for accelerating offline rendering and has no equivalent in any Quake or Doom.

      • Re:High Benchmark (Score:3, Informative)

        by Ford Prefect ( 8777 )
        Yup. Half-Life 2's lighting system is startlingly advanced in places, but a lot of its more interesting effects are a bit ... Subtle.

        I'm admittedly not too keen on the (rather crude) dynamic shadows from model entities - if the shadows took account of nearby bright lights then things wouldn't be so bad - but I really like a lot of the other aspects, such as those directional lightmaps and lighting on models which is gloriously subtle and realistic.

        I'm intrigued as to what Valve will do with HDR. I got Far
      • Yeh, I take your point HL2 is revolutionary in its own way. It's got a load of new, beautiful stuff added to it, some of which is very good looking (and probably not done before), But It's of it is all an expansion of old ways, rather than revelutionary.

        Doom3 on the other hand, while you say that these things aren't new, they are new in games, but (to my knowledge) it's the first total real time lighting model in a game, which absolutely has to be the way of the future, the fact that they are stencil shado
      • Eh, and radiosity has been used occasionally since early Voodoo-based games. Both games heavily tweaked already existing lighting approaches.

        Plenty of other videogames use normal mapped characters with light maps and manage to make it look great. Not many games manage to pull off the dynamic lighting of Doom3 yet...
    • There's already a HL2 mod out that adds a HDR Bloom effect.
      Its made by Studio Radi-8, who are working on a mod called neotokyo.

      http://forum.neotokyohq.com/viewtopic.php?p=6486#6 486 [neotokyohq.com]
    • I wonder if the lower tech lighting in HL2 is an engine restriction, or a developer decision. I would hope that dynamic lighting capabilities are part of the Source engine, and Valve simply didn't use them in HL2 for the sake of playability.

      It would be very short sighted of Valve to NOT include next-gen capabilities into their next-gen engine.

      Anyone know for sure?
  • Althoguh I never "finished" the game, I came pretty close to it, and I'll definately play it through a second time just for the expansion.
    • I doubt I got even close; I suffered HL2 fatigue after some save states disappeared. I hope this expansion doesn't start after the end, 'cause I'm not playing through the progress I lost. College makes me a bit busier.
    • I never could finish HL2. The part where we got to the giant spiders and the bungie racer was giving me way too much chills. I was getting uncomfortable staring at insects for that long. My game is a waste now.

      • A pity that you stopped there - you missed some of the best levels in the game... including the beach racer levels, IMHO.
    • Gee... I played the game all the way through and didn't "finish" it either. Still, it did provide 10 hours of entertainment.
    • DONT!

      As soon as you get to the citadel don'tcontinue on, even if you want to. It's the worst part of the game, the ending sucks and the only thing worth while in the ending theme... just find a torrent for the sound track and skip the crap.. you'll respect the game more for what you missed.

  • Nerdgasm (Score:3, Funny)

    by uglysad ( 867575 ) on Friday March 25, 2005 @10:09AM (#12045971)
    Playing my PSP and I saw this article. I just suffered a nerdgasm

  • Does anyone watch/care about G4TV? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by HycoWhit ( 833923 ) on Friday March 25, 2005 @11:43AM (#12046875)
    The Screen Savers used to be great. Tried to watch the G4TV version but in the end I saved myself $350 buck a year and canceled the digital tier of cable. TechTV was the only thing worthwhile and G4 ruined it. Watching G4TV made me feel like an idiot for being a gamer. Who is the idiot now? Me for reading/posting under a G4TV thread or the /. editor that decided this story was worth the front page. Who cares about G4TV? And who cares about HL2 hype? I lived through too many years of HL2 hype--I'm cool with waiting for the product to hit the shelves and learning about the new stuff then...

    • Personally, I don't care about G4 but I do care about HL2 hype as it's one of my favorite games of all time. :-) Next Wednesday will be the first time in months I've watched anything on G4, let alone The Screen Savers... err.. Attack Of The Show.

      Attack Of The Show? Excuse me while I go in the corner and laugh out loud for several minutes. That has to be the WORST name for a show EVER. So it should fit in real well on G4.

    • I still watch X-Play (formerly known as Extended Play); they've been tarting up Morgan Webb something fierce, but her and Adam Sessler still seem to be their sassy, sarcastic selves, and then reviews generally tend to jive with how I feel about the games.

      Just waiting for them to replace Adam with some "cute" but clueless chick, then I'll cancel the channel.
  • I thought Farcry version 1.31 had HDR. if is the same technology it isn't exactly new.
  • Already their Source engine is "messed up". It contains hundreds of bugs and performance issues. To top it all off, their Steam distribution platform also has sinister bugs that do affect some people (Steam always worked for me)

    I'm sure that they want to create this expansion pack for the money... But, their current technologies require really a lot of work.

    And, where is TF2? Guess that it will be never finished... And what about the bugs in Source, I guess that CS:S will never get into CAL.

    That's just m
    • I'm sure that they want to create this expansion pack for the money... But, their current technologies require really a lot of work.

      They aren't selling this "expansion pack" its just a patch and new map that will be available to all owners of HL2.

      And, where is TF2? Guess that it will be never finished...

      Try Fortress-Forever [fortress-forever.com] I'd personally rather play a 3rd person mod that is currently being worked on than some vaporware that will probably never see the light of day.
  • HDR isn't all that new... Everyone is doing it now. Age of Empires 3, Unreal Engine 3...

    Besides, wasn't HDR supposed to have been implemented in HL2 a long-time ago?

    And I thought The Lost Coast was just a new level, not an expansion...?
    • New set of levels = expansion. Doesn't mean it'll be packaged as a separate product. Think of it as a free expansion pack!

      HDR was implemented, and you can see it, in the source engine. It was not used in HL2 (the game). And of course, the new levels themselves take time to finish.
      • I agree with a new "set" of levels being an expansion. Epic Games has been doing this since Unreal 1's Fusion Pack. AFAIK, "The Lost Coast" is a standalone level. Unless Valve's updated their story, it's a single map.

  • Valve Should Do Other Things With Their time (Score:3, Insightful)

    by jmole ( 696805 ) on Friday March 25, 2005 @12:18PM (#12047175)
    I know Valve probably has different divisions that work on different aspects of their games, but if they have enough resources to come out with new improvements to the source engine and a new expansion can't they shift some of those resources to the areas that need more attention?

    They are working on expansions when HLDM and CS: Source are practically incomplete. Its been 5+ months (counting beta) that CS: Source still has only two available player models. I just think there are more important things that need to be added(especially VAC2)/fixed with the games already out rather then start on something new. There is a good portion of the servers out there now, which are being exploited with the falling skulls and purple boxes. I could care less about lighting when I can't even play in a server without it crashing due to exploits.
  • My lowly Sapphire Radeon 9600 256mb with 5ns ram runs this game just fine maxed out at 2xaa and 4xAF. None of that slow down or skippage people spoke of. Even when I had 512mb of ram on this barton 2500+.
  • Not only is high-dynamic-range-lighting old news for everyone else, but isn't it even old news for Valve? It looks like Source has always had HDR lighting, supported in DX8 and DX9. It was featured in all of those Blink videos Valve was putting out before the game's release,

    On a related note, it should really be called LOW dynamic range lighting - anyone with a DSLR knows that viewing HDR in the same color space decreases contrast and brightness in order make every color viewable, whereas low dynamic ran

  • http://www.g4tv.com/mediaplayer/index.aspx?video_k ey=9032 [g4tv.com]
    The guy who plays Dr. Kleiner is pretty weird.

    Very weird.
  • Voodoo Extreme has word that new technology for the Steam engine, as well as a HL2 expansion entitled 'The Lost Coast', ....
    From the article: "On Wednesday's show, Valve's Doug Lombardi ... utilizes a brand-new technology that Valve is implementing into the Source engine. Called 'high-dynamic range lighting,' ...."

    See the difference? It's the SOURCE engine that is being shown off, not the STEAM "engine".

  • Priorities! (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Dubpal ( 860472 )
    Lighting effects and a new level's all well and good, but surely the folks at Valve could be putting their energies to better use?

    I for one certainly could have waited another month or two for this release if it had meant they could put more manpower into delivering Day of Defeat: Source or Team Fortress 2 (Valve's very own Duke Nukem Forever) to the people earlier.

    With the constant delays their fanbase endured during the development of HL2, releasing something more gamers actually want would have been

    • Has it occurred to you that they may have different teams working on their different projects?

      Personally, I'd much rather have new single-player content than, well, anything else - so I'm really looking forward to whatever their single-player mapping team produces!

  • Screw G4 (Score:1, Troll)

    by samdu ( 114873 )
    They screwed TechTV, so screw them.
  • the fact the Half-Life 2 has an expansion or that G4TV might show something I care about!
  • Personally, rather than expansion packs, etc, I'd like to see Valve port HL2 to Windows x64 - like was done with Far Cry.
  • They renamed Screen Savers to "Attack of the Show." Now seriously, what kind of stupid name is that? How could you watch that and take it seriously?

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