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With that being said, I'm pretty certain Unrecord may take a HUGE leap in determining a much higher plateau for the future and evolution of PC VR FPS gaming. That very minimal sample of the game above, is so unbelievably hyper-realistic. It looks like something out of a sci-fi movie where an advanced law/security/military organization would use this program to train their officers/soldiers/fighters from a futuristic civilization. Yet here it is now. Well...almost. The release date given is sometime between 2024-2026. That's a pretty broad window. And if it that much work has already been put into it, I'm leaning toward the side that they'll probably release it in LATE 2026, if they wanna get it right. Why put all that work into it and then rush it? Then again, no one knows how much of it is complete and if their standards, guidelines and goals created the example above so far, they'll probably even miss their mark and underestimated how much they really have left. They have set the bar pretty high. So, they might have much more work ahead of them. If I had to guess, I'm guessing they've gotta be around 80% done. And it might come down to whether or not they wanna dot all their I's and cross all their T's with the details. I guess that is my BIGGEST concern with this game. Will they get the details right?
My other concern is, will they put all that time, money and energy into this game and then knock it back a few pegs to appease the gods of censorship? As a gamer since the days of owning an Atari console as a child, I have watched gaming from its infancy grow to its current astronomical magnitude creating a firm foothold in human civilization. In some ways its similar to things like AI, global warming or Covid. It started very small, snowballed into a mountain and there looks like there is no light at the end of the tunnel, in terms of it ever stopping once it gets going. Now we are at a crossroad where a new standard may be set in terms of maximizing the graphic abilities of our screens or headsets. I've been saying to some of my boys for years, instead of starting with lines of code and starting from scratch and building images around actors in green suits, why not start with actual high resolution photos and build the game around real images. I don't know enough about video game development to know if its possible, but this game Unrecord, looks pretty damn close.
Yet I still continue to wonder, will they get the details correct? What I mean is, Alyx DEFINITELY, correctly and accurately solidified a players ability to become highly immersive and interactive within the environment. They knocked it out of the park. You can pick up a can of spray paint from the ground and if you shake it, you can hear the ball inside. They did miss being able to spray the paint. That's neither here nor there. You can also pick up a marker and begin to write on a dry eraser board. You can open almost anything with a handle. Drawers, refrigerators, trash cans, dumpsters, ect. You can pick up anything. Throw anything. Break almost anything. My only complaint was, if you can pick up a brick or a crowbar, there should be NO reason why you cant use it as a weapon if you are out of ammo. So I am wondering, will Unrecord get that interactive and immersive aspect correct? What is the point of making it this hyper-realistic, if you don't follow thru with the details?
Now here is where my biggest question ensues. Will Unrecord get the details of the interaction, the violence and the physics correct? If I or an opponent or a bot is shot in the left arm, will they be dead in the game, like most games? Or will they get it right? If a right-handed player is shot in the left arm, will they still be in the fight? They should still be able to return fire, but they would have to do it one handed and their aim should be compromised or more difficult, especially if you expect to aim a gun well, you need two hands. If a player is shot in the leg, knee or foot, they should still be in the fight, but their mobility should be compromised, but they should still be able to defend themselves and return fire, either from the ground, limping or moving slower.
I mean come on, if the goal here is to create such a hyper-realistic game, then bullets from a SAW, M240 machine gun, portable mini-gun or sentry gun, to any body part is going remove or viscerate the corresponding anatomy completely. Many MANY games fall extremely short to these kinds of details. Its 2023 and gaming still has not gotten these aspects of physics correct. At least not all in one game. Shouldn't legs and arms be separated from the body/torso depending on the angle, the caliber and the number of hits taken. If a player takes a hit to the head, depending on the position, trajectory and caliber, shouldn't ears, teeth, hair, skull & brain matter be on the ground, the wall or even on a teammate standing too closely. I know this sounds very VERY gory. I am not advocating for a bloodbath. I'm just talking about simple and accurate physics, that's it.
I'm sure I'm probably getting waaay ahead of myself, because for all I know, it probably requires ALOT more work to compute all of this information, then have it processed in real time and have it play out correctly. For all i know, if it is at all possible, the billable hours it would require and the amount of staff and employees it would take to create such a game, would probably make the games final price too unaffordable. And the size of the game might require a terabyte of space or more. It might even require some sort of super computer that doesn't even exist to handle the mathematical computation of environmental factors into the equation of accurate physics in an all out war, especially if its a multi-player game. I don't know, I have no idea how game-devs work. I'm just another user/player at the end of the rainbow waiting to buy and play the finished product.
I could be completely wrong and it isn't about the cost or the time or graphics, but it is more about the societal impact and domino effect it would create outside the game. Would it make people more violent, like politicians have been saying for years about FPS video games? I don't think so. We all have seen things much worse on the news, in movies and in our own personal lives.
Let me just stop, first to applaud this level of extensive, methodical, meticulous hard work that these Unrecord game-dev's committed to this game so far. I was blind-sided by this game when I first saw it. At first, I sincerely thought "oh, this is just click-bait and this is some bullshit video to get views and I fell for it" As I continued to watch more, I thought, "No wait, this is just a movie scene playing out and someone is calling it a game or some CGI expert or self-taught CGI kid made this." Finally when i saw the reloading and the hands of the player, I opened up another window and fact-checked it, outside of the video trailer and to my astonishment, Steam verified that it would eventually be coming to released on their platform and more importantly for PCVR.
I never EVER considered anything this real would be hitting the masses for at least another 20 or 30 years or more. It is an absolutely astonishing, amazing, phenomenal level of dedication and development. Definitely the 1st of its kind. However, this is an exceptional moment that is creating and defining a cornerstone in the EVOLUTION of FPS gaming and more importantly PC VR FPS gaming which is in its infancy, in terms of becoming a household name and product. If the goal here, is essentially to create a hyper-realistic game which will fundamentally become a stepping stone on a path toward even more realistic gaming in the future, why blast it with censorship, bludgeon it with rules, & restrictions & practically dumb it down to the point where all that hard work to make it look that real only moves it backwards. We have all the parental advisories, anti-violence groups, mental health programs and appropriate protective platforms in place.
I mean, I get it. No company is going to want to weather the storm and deal with the PR nightmare or the blowbacks from any violent societal occurrences that shift the blame on this game. Not to mention all of the negative responses, comments, boycotting, anti-violence groups or politicians using it as campaign leverage. But we are a species that is forever moving forward. Someone will eventually have to take that leap. And whoever has the cojones to face all of the noise that comes with it, negative reactions or not, that individual will eventually be considered a visionary pioneer and will be forever known as the first one to solidify that VERY big first step. And as a result, it will set off a chain reaction where FPS gaming will have an evolution revolution, rapidly progressing it into the stratosphere from various platforms for years to come. They will set the bar, as the standard for FPS gaming. Which will be, as violent as FPS is, a creative and artistic movement for video games forever.
What I mean is, isn't removing all of the gory realistic aspects of a FPS game like this just back-tracking ALL the hard work that went into obtaining such a difficult point to get to in the first place? Are we just saying, as a society, or as humans, we aren't ready, strong enough or smart enough to handle a game of that magnitude and that we cant differentiate between a game and reality? I mean come on, that's an old argument, that's been around for too long. I tend to think and lean toward that this type of game is already doable. The above video trailer for Unrecord is so real looking, I learned some viewers initially thought this video was an actual officers bodycam when it was first released. I would say, if this level of hyper-realism is achievable, then the resulting and corresponding reactive details, perspectives and most importantly physics are attainable as well.
Is it, we cant do it? Or, we don't wanna do it? If you are gonna make a game "REAL." Make it ALL real. You can't remove the reality of physics and then call it hyper-realism. Then its just another game. But physics be damned. When this game drops, I'll be first in line to buy it, download it and play it til' the cows come home. And there are NO cows where I live. Injury and kill accuracy be damned. This game looks like it has the potential, just from the video above to be a game-changer, no pun intended. I've been waiting for a game like this my whole life, since the birth of Atari. I'm probably too old to even be playing games, but how can you say no when it looks like history may be made in front of your face. How can you not want to try a piece of that history and even be a part of it. At the very least, it seems like it will be a stepping stone for FPS, very similar to the way Doom, N64 Golden Eye, Counter-Strike for PC and Call of Duty all were in relation to FPS's evolution. I cannot contain my excitement for this game, so it looks like I'm going to have to settle for Alyx mods for the next two years in the mean time, until that link in the evolutionary chain of FPS gaming can be completed. Thoughts? Anyone? Insight? Anyone have any more info on this game? Have I taken it too far? Am I expecting too much? Too little? Chime in.....I've got 2 years of time to kill....