Hey! I'm sure you've played games at least once in your life, and I'm sure it may be even more because games are something that are unavoidable! We saw the growth of graphics from pixelated games in the 1990s to today's realistic worlds that one want to live in. The game's size has increased, as has its quality, and the game's story, which was previously pre-rendered, has now evolved into stories that depend on each of your moves and decisions. As an example, consider the games Mario and CSGO. Mario is a pre-rendered game with all of the stages programmed by the developer. A pre-rendered game is one that has everything fixed, such as the levels and the obstacles that will appear in the level, even if the same level is played multiple times. Games like CSGO, on the other hand, rely on your decisions and strategies, such as whether you want to eliminate a player for points or defuse or set a bomb to win a game.

                                                                       

Let us look back at the history and origins of the gaming industry. Games were created in labs by scientists rather than programmers or game developers. During World War II in the 1940s, scientists created the first computer primarily for military purposes. Even the first US patent to make a "missile simulator based on radar display from World War II" was in 1948. Because of the game's high costs and need of huge computers it was tough for the scientists to publish their invention. However, another revolutionary invention came, this time by an engineer and inventor Ralph Bear, who merged video game technology with television-based technology and created his first console, the "Magnavox Odyssey," which ran a multiprogram video game system. Following this, another electrical engineer, Nolan Bushnell, created the Pong game and the first money-operated arcade machine in 1972, which was a big success. 

People took inspiration from these stories and technologies and created innovative games such as Pac-Man, asteroids, Super Mario, the Legend of Zelda, and many more. Some of you may have played these games using rom emulators or a Nintendo console, but have you noticed how we could clearly see the pixels of the sprites compared to today's games like GTA 5, Matrix, which have 1080p or even 8k resolution, making our experience much better.  Graphics cards have been upgraded over time, increasing the quality and power of computers, which may become so powerful in the future that we cannot imagine. Recently game engine called as "Unreal engine 5" launched by Epic Games has made a good name in the market because of its demo games like Matrix which was a project to showcase Unreal engine 5's capabilities which has surprised people with its new technologies.

Out of some technologies added in this engine the key features are "Lumen" and "Nanite". Let's understand what do these help to do:
1. Lumen (A global illumination system): This is feature which provides advanced and high quality animation and graphics, mostly used by the developers to use dynamic lighting in just one click! Say the main character holding a light source if goes near an object the object shows real life feature of reflecting light in the correct direction which helps the game get good FPS (frame rate per second) by rendering only the near by objects.

2. Nanite (Virtualized Micropolygon Geometry): This software is extremely useful for rendering hundreds of thousands of polygons, which are needed to make an item in a game appear more detailed. Previously, games could only be made in 300-1500 polygons, but with this programme, developers can utilise thousands and millions of polygons to construct a single item, making the game appear highly realistic. Furthermore, if an engine employs numerous polygons for objects, the rendering time increases, which may cause a game to lag. However, the Unreal Engine contains all of the features in one package, which reduces game rendering time and provides good frame rates(Fps).

Now we know these amazing piece of technologies but let's know about another cool feature .

  • Meta Humans: When playing a game like GTA 5 or any other open-world game, you may have had the feeling that if you were there, you would be the happiest person in the world! This is now possible but with a clone which is very similar to you. A program called ZRT Face Trainer which is a 4D and machine learning software which scans your whole body and in 1 hour creates a clone which looks just like you to use the your character in Metaverse games or anything else.

Finally coming to the end of this blog you may have got a clear picture of the future of gaming and how it has changed over years. For checking projects made with these technologies, type "Matrix" gameplay or "Lumen in the Land of Nanite" gameplay on youtube. Have a good day!

Question: What game do you like?? (Write down in the description)