Usage
Pre-rendered graphics are used primarily as cut scenes in modern video games, where they are also known as full motion video. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, when most 3D game engines had pre-calculated/fixed Lightmaps and texture mapping, developers often turned to pre-rendered graphics which had a much higher level of realism. However this has lost favor since the mid-2000s, as advances in consumer PC and video game graphics have enabled the use of the game's own engine to render these cinematics. For instance, the id Tech 4 engine used in Doom 3 allowed bump mapping and dynamic per-pixel lighting, previously only found in pre-rendered videos.
One of the first games to use pre-rendering was the Sharp X68000 enhanced remake of Ys I: Ancient Ys Vanished released in 1991. It used 3D pre-rendered graphics for the boss sprites, though this ended up creating what is considered "a bizarre contrast" with the game's mostly 2D graphics. One of the first games to extensively use pre-rendered graphics along with full motion video was The 7th Guest. Released in 1992 as one of the first PC games exclusively on CD-ROM, the game was hugely popular, although reviews from critics were mixed. The game featured pre-rendered video sequences that were at a resolution of 640x320 at 15 frames per second, a feat previously thought impossible on personal computers. Shortly after, the release of Myst in 1993 made the use of pre-rendered graphics and CD-ROMs even more popular; interestingly most of the rendered work of Myst would later be the basis for the re-make realMyst: Interactive 3D Edition with its free-roaming real-time 3D graphics. The most graphically advanced use of entirely pre-rendered graphics in games is often claimed to be Myst IV: Revelation, released in 2004.
The use of pre-rendered backgrounds and movies also was made popular by the Resident Evil and Final Fantasy franchises on the original PlayStation, both of which use pre-rendered backgrounds and movies extensively to provide a visual presentation that is far greater than the console can provide with real-time 3D. These games include real-time elements (characters, items, etc.) in addition to pre-rendered backgrounds to provide interactivity. Often a game using pre-rendered backgrounds can devote additional processing power to the remaining interactive elements resulting in a level of detail greater than the norm for the host platform. In some cases the visual quality of the interactive elements is still far behind the pre-rendered backgrounds.
Games such as Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos have used both types of cutscenes; pre-rendered for the beginning and end of a campaign, and the in-game engine for level briefings and character dialogue during a mission.
Some games also use 16-bit pre-rendered skybox, like Half-Life (only GoldSrc version), Re-Volt, Quake II, and others.
CG movies such as Toy Story, Shrek and Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within are entirely pre-rendered.
Read more about this topic: Pre-rendering
Famous quotes containing the word usage:
“Pythagoras, Locke, Socrates—but pages
Might be filled up, as vainly as before,
With the sad usage of all sorts of sages,
Who in his life-time, each was deemed a bore!
The loftiest minds outrun their tardy ages.”
—George Gordon Noel Byron (1788–1824)
“Girls who put out are tramps. Girls who don’t are ladies. This is, however, a rather archaic usage of the word. Should one of you boys happen upon a girl who doesn’t put out, do not jump to the conclusion that you have found a lady. What you have probably found is a lesbian.”
—Fran Lebowitz (b. 1951)
“I am using it [the word ‘perceive’] here in such a way that to say of an object that it is perceived does not entail saying that it exists in any sense at all. And this is a perfectly correct and familiar usage of the word.”
—A.J. (Alfred Jules)