By Kieron Gillen on January 8th, 2010 at 12:58 pm.
This broke over Christmas, but a morning prod by Schizoslayer reminds me I wanted to post it. It’s Depth, a forthcoming old-school shooter. But with a twist. A 3D twist. So, you can put on a pair of the glasses and i) look like a member of devo ii) have that fancy 3D malarkies. The game should be out before March – and you can follow its development over at the workblog – but I thought the footage is interesting enough to post by itself. Is this the sort of thing we’d like to see more of?
In other notes, I wanted to go see Avatar in IMAX 3D. I tried to book tickets for myself and delightful girlfriend in late December, and we couldn’t get a seat until early February. Pah!
08/01/2010 at 13:07 Ian says:
I’m going to see Avatar in 3D IMAX next week. Decided if I’m gonna see it at the cinema I might as well see it how Jimmy intended it.
08/01/2010 at 13:26 Kieron Gillen says:
Ian: Exactly.
KG
08/01/2010 at 13:51 Seniath says:
With the Bradford IMAX a mere 20 minutes drive away, and costing about £2 more than a crummy Vue screening, it’d be rude not to!
I will, of course, be dosing up on painkillers before hand. Stupid headaches/neckaches.
08/01/2010 at 19:38 Bhazor says:
Don’t worry it’s essentially Pocahontas with violent Smurfs replacing native Americans.
08/01/2010 at 21:50 jonfitt says:
I’d say more Fern Gully with Space Marines.
08/01/2010 at 13:10 CMaster says:
Ugh, red/green 3d. Stereoscopic 3d is nice, but I don’t think it’s worth paying the price of colour for.
Also KG, where do you live? I was able to go see Avatar at the Bradford IMAX the week it came out, with booking 2 days before hand. (Admittedly, the academic lifestyle makes it easier as we could go in the daytime).
08/01/2010 at 13:28 Kieron Gillen says:
CMaster: London. Hence the problem.
KG
08/01/2010 at 14:29 Alexander Norris says:
In all fairness, the London IMAX is a horrible place to see any film. The seats are way too cramped, and neither the image quality nor the sound was particularly good when I last went.
Mind you, I’ve not seen a 3D film ever, so it could be better – I’m comparing two showings of Watchmen (one a week before the official UK release, at an Xbox LIVE promo thing on one of the private screens they use for the BAFTAs, and the second at a bog-standard IMAX showing).
08/01/2010 at 14:33 AndrewC says:
I don’t think you’re comparing like for like, there.
08/01/2010 at 14:34 CMaster says:
@Alexander Norris
Seeing as Watchmen was just filmed as a normal film and not on IMAX film and to the levels of quality required, you wouldn’t get most of the benefit. Also the Bradford one at least does also suffer from far too cramped seats, but has better sound than any of the Leeds cinemas, independent or multiplex.
The only hollywood feature films with enough IMAX footage to be worth seeing at one that I am aware of are Batman Begins (absolutley AMAZING at IMAX, with about 40-50 minutes at IMAX quality) and Avatar (whole thing in IMAX level 3D). Transformers 2 had some short IMAX sections, but weren’t really worth it, as have a couple of other films I think.
08/01/2010 at 17:08 RagingLion says:
Hmm. I saw it just before Christmas in 3D at the cinema in the O2. Didn’t actually book beforehand in the end although we then had to see a later viewing than intended. It didn’t seem too bad for viewings being sold out well in advance or anything.
I thoroughly enjoyed the whole experience of the film by the way.
08/01/2010 at 13:16 James G says:
I need to get hold of a pair of 3D glasses. I tried improvising some out of Roses wrappers, but although I got a fairly decent colour match to nVidia’s 3D system, the wrapper itself tended to be a bit flimsy, lost shape, and warped the image.
08/01/2010 at 13:27 AndrewC says:
Are those sprites being embiggened to give the illusion of getting closer? Oh god I am so nostalgic right now. I miss them so!
08/01/2010 at 13:36 Morph says:
Red/Green… that’s not the new shiny 3D way! I thought there were already 3D monitors that added depth to certain games.
PS:
Avatar = terrible script, shiny-shiny-awesome 3D awesomeness.
08/01/2010 at 13:47 Daniel Rivas says:
3D invariably gives me a headache, so I really hope this isn’t where everything goes in the future.
Being left out is no fun.
08/01/2010 at 13:50 golden_worm says:
Reminds me of the 3D mode of Magic Carpet.
Man, I feel old now.
08/01/2010 at 15:47 Ratinox says:
“Is this the sort of thing we’d like to see more of?”
No. 3D on a 2D screen is just a gimmick that has been tried many times over the last 30 years or so and has always failed to engage the public because, put simply, it looks crap and, for many people, doesn’t work. The true 3D revolution will come when full-colour free-floating holographic displays hit the mass market. Until then, don’t bother, ’cause you’ll just be disappointed and wind up with a headache.
08/01/2010 at 15:51 Sam says:
Meh. Actually, the “headache problem” is a lot less bad with modern 3d-on-2d displays than it used to be – although red-green 3d is always going to be an issue for people, polarising displays are actually pretty okay for the majority of users.
The true 3d revolution, on the other hand, probably does need to wait for good wearable displays, because then you can actually (in principle) completely eliminate any vergence/focal plane disparities in the generated image.
08/01/2010 at 17:21 BaconIsGood4You says:
Deep Deep Down!
http://www.artofthetitle2.com/media/film/60s/danger_diabolik_480p.mov
08/01/2010 at 17:22 El Stevo says:
What we need is a high-resolution, head-tracking, affordable 3D headset. With technology that tracks which direction your eyes are looking so things you’re looking at will be in focus, and the 3D effect can be more correct. And it explodes if you’ve got a lazy eye.
Seems very far off, sadly.
08/01/2010 at 19:58 Sucram says:
You mean
08/01/2010 at 19:59 Sucram says:
*cough*
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jd3-eiid-Uw
*ahem*
10/01/2010 at 00:44 Kavika says:
Double oops :)
That Wii head tracking only finds the head position. I think El Stevo is referring more to eye tracking. And just because a research prototype exists (VR ones have for more than a decade) doesn’t mean there is any reasonable quality consumer product coming out any time soon. To quote XKCD:
http://www.xkcd.org/678/
08/01/2010 at 22:35 Calabi says:
or Dances with USB ports
10/01/2010 at 00:43 Kavika says:
That Wii head tracking only finds the head position. I think El Stevo is referring more to eye tracking. And just because a research prototype exists (VR ones have for more than a decade) doesn’t mean there is any reasonable quality consumer product coming out any time soon. To quote XKCD:
http://www.xkcd.org/678/