Ubisoft envisions a future of 3-D movies, games

by Richard Mitchell on Dec 1st 2009 2:00AM

Older readers out there might think that the 3D gaming revolution began with the advent of consoles like the PlayStation, N64 and the Sega Saturn, but the real 3D gaming revolution is just beginning, according to Ubisoft. 3D gaming doesn't refer to three dimensional graphics anymore; nowadays it means that the game jumps out of the screen and into your eye holes. Beginning with the game adaptation of James Cameron's Avatar, Ubisoft Montreal's Yannis Mallat tells the Financial Post that he sees the company becoming a "360-degree entertainment content provider."

As the wording suggests, Ubisoft's future won't necessarily be restricted to games. Mallat hopes that future game consoles will be able to render photorealistic graphics, enabling Ubisoft to create games and films using the same assets -- similar to what the company did with the Assassin's Creed: Lineage short films.

Of course, enjoying this "360-degree entertainment" will require a special television set. Still, Mallat is firmly behind the technology, saying that it does for images what Dolby did for sound. "No one wants to go back to mono," says Mallat. That's all well and good, but a huge number of gamers have yet to even upgrade to an HDTV at all, let alone one that can take advantage of 3D technology.

[Via VideoGamer]

Source

Tags: 3-d, 3-d-games, 3d, 3d-games, avatar, Microsoft, ubisoft, Xbox-360

Reader Comments (66)

I prefer watching movies in 2d rather than 3d, so I doubt I will ever play games in 3d unless they force me to.

I agree, I went to see a 3d movie at the theatres with Disney's 3d tech. And omg is it irritating. Glasses on glasses action is not HOT. It's irritating, plus the 3d glasses dim the screen a great deal. And the whole 3d thing is just a gimmick, it doesn't enhance the experience, it just goes along with it.

All I can say is that you guys must have seen some shit examples (or if you have issues w/ the glasses due to an eye problem). Try watching a 3D movie on a Sony 4k digital 3D projector, and play a game with REAL depth w/ the nVidia 3D Vision glasses.

Yeah , 3d is the only way to play. I use to play everything in 3d back in the day (Geforce 2 Ultra) days. Then I went ATI and no more 3d. Then I got back to NVidia but too late now I have an LCD screen that doesn't support it.

I can't wait until I get a screen that supports 3d again, It really is great gaming in 3d.

I can't believe that the 240hz screens that are out today don't actually run at 240hz (usuable) instead all they do is duplicate on frame 3 times in an attempt to eliminate motion blur. Is it possible they could update the firmware on these 240hz screens to make them usuable as actual 240hz devices?

I just find 3d to be distracting from movies, and I can't even imagine how annoyed I would get with it in games. I don't think 3d will ever catch on as mainstream, it may be technically possible on most tv's in the future, but it will still remain an optional gimmic.

Yeah, seeing in 3D is such a gimmick. I mean, it's not like we're born with the ability to see in 3D in real life!

Idiot.

The 120Hz and 240Hz screens out today, some of them at least, interpolate white or black screens to reduce ghosting. Others interpolate the picture to give a smooth, hand-cam experience.

We need screens that accepts 120Hz or 240Hz inputs. It may be possible to patch some TVs with a firmware update, but I think most won't have fast enough hardware for such 120 fps inputs.

Anybody have that NVIDIA 3D Vision device? How is it?

I don't own it, but I had a fair amount of playtime with it at CES when it launched. It's pretty good, not as headachey as a lot of other 3D stuff. Overall though, it's just a gimmick. If you bought it I doubt you'd want to use it very much. It's a little fuzzy and it's not like it gives you any real advantage. $200 plus the cost of a new monitor/tv for silly stereoscopic vision just isn't worth it.

I've got it.

I have to say that I am happy with the effect I am not happy with adoption of the tech.

The best effects come from games that have been written with 3D in mind, like Unreal and few others.

The generic effect is disappointing overall. The drivers give you the ability to tweak the differences between left and right images to enhance the 3D effect. I had to turn it up to above 75% of the max value before I really saw any noticeable difference at all.

Plus, it effectively cuts the refresh rate of your monitor in half so if you don't have a nice monitor (above 90hz) then get ready for some headaches and horizontal tearing.

I have it and find it very impressive on games that nVidia worked to get 3D profiles for (Far Cry 2 is a great example). Almost all games can use it, but some you have to turn off some of the cool effects, especially in Crysis. Honestly though, the 3D effect is probably more rewarding than _some_ of the post-processing or shader effects.

The stereoscopic image quality is top-notch and doesn't feel gimmicky because it actually is a rendered scene for each eye. I do get impatient with nVidia's driver updates though as to really take full advantage of a 3D game, nVidia needs to make a profile for it.

Avatar the demo didn't have a profile when it came out and it will still damn awesome. The new driver now has a profile and the 3D effects are AMAZING, but I have run into other bugs that have required me to roll back drivers for now until it's ironed out. At least I can still play in 3D tho and it looks amazing.

3D Vision users often say "Once you go 3D, there's no going back" because quite simply, nothing looks as impressive as real depth.

And here I am putting my 3-d glasses on to see the ubisoft logo in 3d...

Now I'm disappointed :(

My brain is spinninghjkl;'
456+

My eyes! The goggles do nothing!

Do we get smell-o-vision games next?

That would work great for the Virtual Console with games like Boogerman: A Pick and Flick Adventure!

You want Conker's Bad Fur Day don't you?

Pick it, lick it, roll it, flick it. The method of a true master.

It sucks for me when it comes to movies and 3D. My left eye is damaged so pretty much me putting the glasses on means I only see the screen being red. As if some one doused my eye with red kool aid.

Oh well. I just hope games wouldn't venture to far into it. I mean I remember when I was younger and pressing select on rad racer during a race to put it in 3d mode and thought it was cool for a while then it got tiresome.

Yea. Like 3D World Runner.
Anyone here remember world runner?
...
Anyone?

You do know that the 3D being talked about here isn't the ancient anaglyph method (red/blue glasses) right? This is talking about either polarized glasses or active LCD shutter glasses.

Where is Beyond Good and Evil 2 Ubisoft?

I'm thinking the same thing. I don't want 3d, I don't want Rabbids or whatever the fuck they are, I want this, Splinter Cell Conviction and that will probably do me for Ubisoft games till AC3 rolls around.

For some reason I want some grape drink.

I disagree Ubisoft, all of my mono Beach Boys LPs sound better than the stero versions

At least I'll have an excuse to buy another TV

I have a 50ince plasma and i will just continue to ignore this fad.

I think Ubisoft is thinking of another type of 3D than some of the commenters here. I think they speak of 3D utilizing 3D-screen and polarized glasses, not those cheap red/cyan paper glasses. The tech has already been shown to people at tech conventions and such, and it's supposed to be quite good. I tested it once on a computer with FarCry 2, it wasn't bad, just different, takes some time to get adjusted to.

from what i've read, it's not "3D-screen and polarized glasses" but LCD shutter glasses and a TV capable of 120Hz.

most new 1080p HDTV's should be able to do this. I got my TV in 2007 and it has the 3d-output jack in the back. this would connect to a 3D settop box that would send the signal to the glasses to flip the shutters in the glasses.

LCD shutter glasses don't dim the image as much as polarized glasses and they insure you won't see ghosted images in the wrong eye.

the coolest demo i've seen with LCD shutter glasses is where player 1 get both eyes ON-OFF-ON at the same time and player two gets both eyes OFF-ON-OFF. you can play split-screen multiplayer games but both players see their image full screen and can't see each other's screens.

THAT i'll pay for :)

^ Actually, if Avatar the game is any indication, it's talking about a number of methods including polarized and LCD shutter.

And also, they're hoping for a feature with consoles that can produce photo realism? Aren't companies/consumers already complaining about the production cost on these AAA titles? Games will just take longer and longer to develop, hope there is some software revolution soon, making it 300% faster to make such high-res graphics.

The hardware is in the pipe (Larrabee and other GPGPU's) but I don't think any major software revolutions are on the scope.

The fact that a huge amount of people have yet to upgrade to HDTV means nothing. You do not need to upgrade your technology in little steps. All it means is that there is still a large number of people who haven't spent a lot of money upgrading their sets yet, and so 'may' actually be more likely to fork out the cash then those who have recently upgraded. Remember the 3D sets ARE HD too, so this may be the thing that helps those who have yet to upgrade, decide that their is a reason to upgrade.

Personally I feel the 2D - 3D transition is a bigger step then SD - HD and is much easier to demonstrate to the public the differences and the point of having it.

since when did 3d become so popular, what is this, the 50's? 3d movies/games aren't cool anymore

They became popular when Beowulf decided to have a 3-D showing. I'm not saying that is the first of this new form of 3-D (it's not the red/blue 3-D, it's a different technique, something to do with polarization, but I don't really know), but it's the first
big movie I remember trying it, or maybe that was Spy Kids...

Whatever. Ever since then, every Disney/Pixar film has to have 3-D; hell, every damn CGI flick has to have 3-D. I like it actually, but I don't think I'd pay for a ton of hardware to utilize it, if I would have to. Maybe if I was rich and felt the need to waste money on something.

nah, i seen spy kids back in like 3rd grade, it was the traditional red+blue glasses

ABSOLUTE bullshit!

C'mon, enough with the 3d fad, you two-eyed bastiches...

Video games need not a depth perception, I aint paying for the dimension I can't see!

I doubt this, I think they are forgetting that not everybody has perfect eyesight. my right eye is so dominant that 3d doesn't work for me. I know at least 3 other people with the same problem. and I'm only 28. I imagine my eyes are only going to get worse as I get older

I'm in same position - well I can switch eyes but don't really see through both at once, except for 'edge' vision. 3D generally doesn't do anything for me.

3D is a stupid gimmick it shouldn't be part of film making or games and im surprised a serious director like james cameron has got involved with this bulls-*it

Lol, shows you don't know shit. Nearly every major filmmaker (aka all the good ones like Ridley Scott, Speilberg, Jackson, Cameron....) are all advocates of 3D movies. Don't act like an old boob and talk shit about anything new just because it's different.

Unfortunate, if I wear 3D glasses over my glasses, I get motion sick. If I take my prescription glasses off and leave the 3D glasses on I literally can not see anything. So, unless Ubisoft is footing the bill on Lasik, I'll pass.

Also, is it the 1950's all over again? WTF is with this 3D crap?

get contacts , its what i did, they dont bother me one bit and i had glasses for 14 years.

I'm with Roger Ebert on this one. No more 3D. Two-dimensions is fine. Let's skip 3D and go to realistic virtual reality systems!

Dur, virtual reality would require 3D as reality is in 3D. How are you going to emulate depth perception without depth.

Wow.

Why are you guys all so adverse to 3D technology? If you hate 3D so much perhaps you want to cut out one of your eyes because newsflash you perceive the real world in 3D as well. This new 3D technology can not be compared to the one from the 50s and it will only get better and better. Nobody is forcing you to upgrade just like when HDTV or blu ray came out. In 10 years you will get your free 3D glasses in a cereal box and a 3Dtv for 100$.

Another example think about natal + a 3D tv
an image of a bad guy is standing in front of you in your room. Natal can calculate its position relative to you and they said it can also calculate the dimensions of your room. So you can just swing your sword which is projected into your hands and you can cut of the baddies head with a swift flick of your wrist and his head will roll over your floor. This technology will ofcourse not be available from the get go but this is not that far away anymore. Give it some time to evolove.

Considering HDTV's aren't at that 100 dollar price point, I sincerely doubt it. They're going to be as pricey as OLED.

We're skeptical. Deal with it.

because unless they can prove otherwise THIS TIME AROUND .... 3D has been little more than a blight that pops up every so often to a resounding worldwide, meh .....

and dies a bout 14 months after they initially start pushing surprisingly unimpressive tech out the door.

Then again looks like this round they have invested more than ever into it so it might stick around but they are going to have to push past the "thats a neat conversation starter" and put their tech and investment dollars where their pie hole is.

@Darth: Skeptical =/= Ignorant. Look into the tech before spamming the comments with nonsense. 3D-Ready TVs are already here and some are very cheap (DLPs). I remember a year or two ago when "1080p is like $3000 more than 720p! No one will buy them when people haven't even upgraded to 720p yet!" GIANT fucking fail of a prediction, LOL. What makes 3D-Ready TVs 3D-Ready is a higher refresh rate (in a nutshell)... which is already happening anyways.

yet another pattern that crops up around every five years, a company or group of companies get a bur in their nickers that convinces them they need... NEEED to go 3D.

All I can say is hopefully they do it right this time and hopefully it sticks, or I guess it could just go the passing flavor of the year way it normally does ~.~ either way I guess.

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Ubisoft envisions a future of 3-D movies, games

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