Detha

After all, nobody minds paying $50 for a finished console game (the platform it applies to doesn't support patching, by the way) with 100% class A crash bugs in it. Yup. No biggie.

Couple of screenshots? Well Damn! Where do I get my refund for those?!

Some people have more money than sense, I guess.

Alright, what's this mystery game with the 100% reproducable bug you're referring to? Must be a Wii title, because the other two systems support patching.

If I was advertised the game shown in the right screenshot and delivered the one in the left, that game would be returned faster than you can say "console war".

Captain Impulse

Gibb

Anyways, you guys need to realize that the trailer screenshot is from 5 months ago and you have no real idea where the game is now and what it looks like. For what we know, it could be only a tiny touchup from what they have completed.

Chunkylover21

Gigith

Literally, just about every game has doctored screencaps. Usually the most common offense is supersampling a screencap to make it seem like it has an ungodly amount of anti aliasing. BioShock, Halo 3, Resistance: Fall of Man, Ninja Gaiden Sigma, Ninja Gaiden Black, Assassin's Creed, Ratchet & Clank Future, R6 Vegas, etc. etc. etc. Just about every game that hits the shelves has doctored screencaps.

Even more interesting, I managed to get the exact same coloring (sans the shadow on the right) on my HDTV. So the coloring can be explained solely through output device settings.

Also the "doctored" screenshot is apparently from a different playthrough than we've seen before, evidenced by the glowing bulletholes that are absent in the E3 trailer.

SnakeCL

So... which other companies have done these touch ups? Because so far every game I've bought will produce screenshots just like the ones previewed on game sites... that's kinda the exact point of having them up in the first place.

fuchikoma

dead_red_eyes

siamgx

Well, that is unless you ask Kotaku, in which case you bet your ass it is!

Big World

ShirtGuyDom

Samos42

Myself, along with most likely a lot of folks that visit Kotaku, do not go to the Killzone forums and therefore hadn't a fucking clue that this had occurred. I'm sure all would have been better for the developers if it stayed that way.

muu

seasponge

floppylobster

You can find all of the posts here...

[boardsus.playstation.com]

I think the way this Kotaku piece is written gives the false impression that...

1.) The flawed PSU created screenshot comparison is representative of or approved by the developers statement and...

2.) This development is breaking news when in fact 4 days of discussion and clarification have already occurred.

Together, all of this further cements my impression that this is a lot of fuss about nothing.

O-Z

0starter0

Why is a screenshot being compared to a video traier (read: compressed) in the first place?

O-Z

Simply put, this is all a part of advertising and marketing, and has been going on in every commercial industry since forever. Just look at McDonalds ads, that burger looks bloody effing PERFECT. And then you see it in real life. Please, get over yourselves.

Type-R

Dipshit.

O-Z

The difference between those two pics is less than the difference between any PS3 game being displayed on an average WS TV versus a quality 1080p capable LCD that supports full range color.

Until Call of Duty games stop being advertised with 100% pre-rendered cut scenes and a Final Fantasy commercial shows actual gameplay this kind of retouching doesn't warrant attention.

O-Z

SquirrelPhister

cubabit

Seven Is Darker

sycodude

mangoboy

Exia

The difference is that Maxim is selling you THOSE pictures of those women. They aren't selling mail-order brides. They really aren't trying too hard to sell the models' TV shows or movies, even if that is the motive for the model.

In this case, you're being sold on a product you hope to purchase. Bullshots are just wrong. It's nothing major, but it's an awful industry practice.

And yeah, everyone does it. I love me some Ninja Gaiden, but as much as 1up/EGM says that the NG2 shots aren't touched-up, I don't buy it and I'm not expecting it to look like that.

A little more honesty would be nice, seeing as how the Internet community seems to catch bullshots anyhow.....

GorbyGipper

The one on the right looks much much better, it's a simple overlay, as they said, it was a 'picture edited' not inside the actual game, obviously if they could do that in the game, they would, and there would be no need to 'touch up anything'. sad they have to do this..... it looks quite bland... dull... now that they have these pics side by side.... I thought it had a little more vibrance and color in it, apparently I'm wrong?....?

MySoul7

if we're going to be crusaders against bullshots, why not put every screenshot released under such scrutiny?

snorggy

Shame on them for lying. Lying is bad.

And Had I known about the halo three thing I would be tell bungie SHAME on you too.

Gamers don't like being lied to.

mordennight

congratulations, luke. by no small measure, you've effortlessly managed to validate any concern of gutter trash journalism by latching to the lowest common denominator your readership (and, by extension, kotaku) rely on. for the sake of parity, i merit your consistency.

AAA+++

ref: supersampling, framebuffer and gamma/brightness correction ad infinitum etc.

cambridge

Jet Set

Thanks for stopping by!

Brian Ashcraft

Murrytmds

i think this game is going to be great.

simonmagus

simonmagus

Billkwando

It sounds like in reality he only did what he said. I'm also wondering why you are dwelling on this and not on other games which have actual bullshots, like the GeOW and UT3 fiascos did.

Do you guys just love to hate on Sony? I really get that impression from Kotaku news specifically, it's like a hate orgy on Sony here.

osirisomeomi

Tribal11

rezak

And for the record, if this really is 'normal' behavior in the industry, rather than allowing this as the excuse, I think we could demand a bit more from the companies that charge us $60 for a plastic disc with an incomplete manual, and $20 for the guide....if it is the norm, it's time for it to become the exception.

phloog

They will also have de-interlaced it probably and perhaps sharpened it up a bit too. Everything that is there in the photo on the left is there in the shot on the right, it's just looking a bit de-saturated.

If the company sending the images doesn't do it then the designer on the other end at the magazine or whatever will do it anyway without you ever knowing.

Things are constantly re-touched. It's not as major as you seem to think though. They don't add in extra textures etc.

krisb

Samicham85

That's ok, guy. I don't feel like letting you drag me into ban land on "Arbitrary Ban Day." So I'll just let you sling your slang and you can travel down that road alone.

PapaBear434

Normally I wouldn't go out of my way for this but Family Guy has fallen so far on the wayside of "insert random (and I mean random ) tasteless content", I can't even watch it anymore.

KeithCourage

Samicham85

DONNYchiban

See, the difference is that Family Guy is witty. And funny. Calling a game "Gaylo" instead of "Halo" is not quite high humor. Or humor, for that matter.

@Hiroken:

The bandwagon is easier to get page views, though. No walking, and a lot more people on it. :P

PapaBear434

Seamonkey92

1. The darker version is very possible on my display, at least, by adjusting display settings.

2. Motion blur shows motion where there isn't any---in a screen shot. Eliminating it makes sense.

All this hubbub is overblown. Hop off the bandwagon, guys.

~

Hiroken

Samicham85

Of course, overreacting on the internet was that last thing I'd expect to happen! Never would have thought it!

Buttah

WizarDru

I've played a lot of games with doctored screen shots. I remember this same "OMG THEY PHOTOSHOPPED!" cries of distress when Quake 3 was coming to market.

"How can we trust them now!? The bullet holes are just decals, and they edited them to make them look better! Unreal owns it anyway..."

The game ended up a classic, and the engine was the basis for almost half the games on all the platforms of that generation.

I'm not worried about this, as I've seen the game in action, in HD, and it looks incredible. Obsessing over a photoshopped screenshot that I could have done simply by clicking on an option under the "Filter" menu when you've already seen the gameplay videos that prove otherwise is just looking for something to complain about.

PapaBear434

weasl

ara

TearsandScreams

No scandal.

sandwiches

Salacious_Sloth

Aflack: Likes slushies

kenkankendo

Ever read a game magazine? ALL of the screen shots in every issue are "touched up". No burning torches and pitchforks are being thrown at Game Informer every month. This is a common practice for all games and game publishers, not a conspiracy by Sony.

crashlanding

JayrodT

Now I hate this game. :P

Bokusatsu_Tenshi

chitownmexican

Why not report on everyone across the board; why single out Sony?

darthpoontang

JorgieX

chitownmexican

I remember quite a few fanboys said the same thing about Gears of War before it came out. Guess how that went.

SnakeCL

They all doctor screenshots ... just like all those 1080p screenshots Bungie released for Halo 3, then come to find out it was running less than 720p.

And MSFT still advertises on the back of the boxes now the games are 1080p, when THEY ARE NOT! They are upscaled of 720p or less!

EnigmaNemesis

NotSoCool

why do you guys go out of your way to make anything Sony look bad? when almost every other game does a bit of SHOPPED here and there.

food for trolls => traffic => love from advertisers => $$$

nice! i kinda feel why gamespot did what they did now...

cooldood

Stormrider

Doctoring screenshots? That's direct fraud. They're trying to sell you a game that doesn't exist. That's it - any more hype I hear about this game will go in one ear and out the other beacuse it's all BS until I'm holding a controller playing it... which now would only happen at a demo kiosk.

DAMMIT SONY I WANT TO BE ON YOUR SIDE... It's hard when every thing they do in public is a lie or screwup though!

fuchikoma

cybereality

thegunshow

CyOps

sinny

sirpilf

Calm down, they haven't represented anything which isn't already there.

Argyle

there shouldnt be a big fuss, but people here are retarded and just like to hate on sony. the actual gameplay trailer really did a great job, and pretty much lived up to the CGI trailer, and pretty much all the media/journalists sites agreed.

who the hell cares if they darkened it? there isnt any difference in graphics really at a technical level, all they did was darken the shadows and put more color into it. people act like the final game wont be able to have more saturated colors or something if they wanted the game too before it releases.

sirpilf

belo

NutManIV

No, and by that same token, people who purchase KZ2 aren't buying an actual war. They're purchasing a simulation. Just as when you purchase Maxim, you are purchasing simulated, airbrushed visual representations of women.

TitillatedOcelot

Guerrila's screenshot
HD video cap original
HD video cap post photoshop™

Obviously you can't compare the video cap to the in game screenshot, even though the video was in HD.

However, my only problem is this, if it was so easy to photoshop it, why isn't the game capable of doing this on its own, why waste time adding colour to screenshot if the game is able to output in better colours than the video shows?

Sasuntsi|Davit

XbhaskarX

Metalmurphy

Anyone remember all the screens of Halo3? The game doesnt even come close to looking as sharp as it does in some of the screens they release, the real game is really jaggy. Or how about Mass Effect, the screenshots are again, not as clear as the real game.

Its a common practice when releasing images. Its funny people play it down when they admit it for a PS3 game but if you ask any developer out there, they do it too.

Viet0ne

Seriously, who is in charge of marketing on Sony's side?
Only a gnat could make such mistakes >_<

Coquiton

Strangelove

If we didn't retouch images it would look less like what you see when you play the game anyway.

Mongoosekun

Well, that was my pitiful attempt at cracking a joke.

*bows down*

I would like to apologise humbly and deeply all those that felt offended by its terrible quality.

*takes wakizashi*
*slices his bowels*
*falls down in the pool of blood*

Barts

Take the console war BS somewhere else.

You're right, of course.

After all, nobody minds paying $50 for a finished console game (the platform it applies to doesn't support patching, by the way) with 100% class A crash bugs in it. Yup. No biggie.

Couple of screenshots? Well Damn! Where do I get my refund for those?!

Some people have more money than sense, I guess.

Bumpmap

Well, aside from the combative tone you take with The Great & Powerful Editor on Ban Monday, I have to agree with your point about what people were complaining about.

Nobody was talking about color correction and such on the other thread. They were all talking about blurring, and smoothing, and otherwise messing with textures. Now, they are yelling "Ah HA! I knew it! They changed the color! PHOTOSHOP!!!"

PapaBear434

monkeybars

morpherspride

Gaylo? Wow, dude, I'm not a Halo fan, and prefer the PS3 to my 360 for the most part, but come on...

What the hell is that? Gaylo? That's offensive on a couple different levels, not to mention one of the most immature things I've ever seen on the internet.

And I have to say, that is a hard list to get on these days.

PapaBear434

The game will look great, we've all seen that. Let's worry about the gameplay and multiplayer instead, shall we?

PapaBear434

I take it that if a Killzone 2 demo is released and it does actually look spiffing and fantastic, all the detractors will publicly state that they were wrong to jump to conclusions of pre-emptive cons from Sony and Guerilla? I thought not. Let's wait until the product is out there before kicking it to death.

Mind you, Killzone 1 was arse but it was the shoddy gameplay that killed it, not the graphics. Note to developers: if you are going to boast of how you made the guns sound the way they did by sampling office equipment, don't expect players not to visualise shooting staples rather than bullets. Too much info ruined the effect for me, not helped also by the fact that firing staples- sorry, bullets- doesn't exactly take down the bad guys in a hurry.

Or perhaps we have all fallen for a new tactic from Sony... by deliberately lowering expectations we will all be pleasantly surprised. Sure beats falling for hype and being disappointed.

Bentles

blacksamurai87

I love how people are claiming that they can tell that shadows/anti-aliasing/whatever were touched up based on 100x200 pixel images.

I'm holding judgment until I can see a full sized image.

fulgore66

Samicham85

2SBs

Are you telling me that they finally realized that color>grayscale? And to anyone that said it only takes a few minutes to touch-up the photo, how long would it take to refine every texture in KZ2 to make it up to the quality of that image? Keep in mind that they have more textures than a standard DVD can hold.

This is sad news to Sony fanboys everywhere. Quick, let's change the subject to Little Big Planet.

Hiero Glyph

DimensionWarped

rabbitsoup_87

Perdew

Photospping steps :
1. duplicate the layer
2. set the display type of the copy to overlay
3. increase red a bit on color balance
4. brush black at the top and bottom of the pic
5. brighten up the rifle scope
Done.

Now, for a fully detailed HD resolution pic that method might be way too harsh to produce print quality shots, but I have nothing else than those tiny little thumbnails to judge.

ara

SnakeCL

Vidril

It simply looks like someone taking a screenshot from a quicktime movie (which nearly always have reduced colours on Windows).

It doesn't look like the HD trailer I downloaded, which is much darker.

tonynibbles

jynxycat

[forum.beyond3d.com]

All promo images were rendered at 720p natively for sites like Ca$hwhore errrrm Gamestop.

Compare the promo images to an actual screenshot from the game.

[dot50cal.the-horror.com] and you start to see what I mean.

SnakeCL

I see a black gradient on the right side, which is the difference in the wall as well. That takes 5 minutes.

badasscat

This is relatively minor retouching. If you think this is major, then you haven't seen what some publishers do with their screenshots and how much time they spend on them. I can tell you that some publishers will spend upwards of 40 man-hours retouching a single screenshot. What I'm seeing in the shots above could have been done by me in the span of half an hour. It appears to be nothing but exposure and color correction with a little bit of a gradient mask on the right side, though the image is too small to really tell if there's been any smoothing done. I definitely don't see any compositing or complex layer masks or anything like that.

You can debate whether even this is too much - I'm not saying it's not a debate you should have - but in the grand scheme of things, this really is minor.

badasscat

Look at the wall behind the soldier, and the gun model. I don't doubt that the final game will look just as good as the touched up pic, but the touch ups are more than minor.

SG79

The Halo 3 screenshots are two-fold. Anti-aliasing that isn't there, and a resolution that isn't capable in the game. (Remember that old 640p debacle? How were the promo shots at 720p unscaled?)

There is a LOT more going on with that than in these images. As I stated before, a lot of the detail and sharpness is going to be missing from a video cap, as opposed to a frame buffer grap. The color, for all intents and purposes, could simply be a modification to the filter. Uncharted allows the user to pick different filters for the game. I'm not seeing why it would be so unbelievable for something to have changed in the game over the course of several months of development.

SnakeCL

eponym

@PriorMarcus: They've changed the contrast which results in sharper images. Don't be fooled into thinking they decided to "sharpen" every edge in the picture.

chef4hire

satanyoka

I've only seen Halo 3 screenshots remove jaggies, which does little to change the overall screenshot compared to this, even if there are only a few changes to the screen, it has a dramatic effect on the final shot. This shot smooths out the image, drastically improves the lighting (something your TV won't do for you), improves the colour (your tv won't add colour where there is none), and apparently adds detail to some textures according to others. Now to be honest I only looked at screenshots from IGN's collection, starting in May 2006. Besides those that were drawn from the commercial, which even then, are more true to the game's graphics than this.

robbo_the_hood

cduran

Scaramanga

edhe (xbl)

It's totally Sony to promise on standards they'll never achieve but this is pretty much guaranteeing that their developers are the same. The PS3 is meant to be some kind of powerhouse.. yet this happens? And it still doesn't look as good as Gears.

edhe (xbl)

Those can all be attributed to the fact that the first image is a cap from a movie, which is going to have slight blurring and compression artifacts due to the medium, and the other is a screenshot, which is an actual single frame from the framebuffer. Not the amalgamation of several frames together to fit into a video format.

Course, there's also the chance that the engine has... ya know... improved since E3 and we're seeing an even better clarity thanks to that.

SnakeCL

Ballaboy311

I think we have reached a point where doctoring things has become an accepted practice in this country. News photos get doctored, magazine ads, etc. Heck, if you watch politics at all, they know we know they are lying, but lie anyway. The fact that it is now happening in gaming comes as no surprise to me.

spongedaddy

@CDURAN02 & AFMVDP
I hope I stayed true to your technique, especially since Sony's been getting a lot of love lately for the great titles it's been putting out. It's old, Sony does something stupid they're still gonna get flack for it, even if it was still a love fest for Sony on the web.

robbo_the_hood

Also, I fail to see why people think these are minor touch ups... the image looks sharper and more defined, the textures look higher and smoother - even the targeting on the gun looks better on the photoshopped image.

Other developers doing it doesn't matter, because whenever it's brought to light people should make a stand. Other developers make shitty ports too, does that mean we should roll over if games like Call of Duty 4 had been awful?

Marcus117

MarcusZin

REDFIELD8

BioShock and Halo 3 are far more guilty of doctoring their screenshots than this. The 720p 4x AA Halo 3 press shots are more in the realm of "bullshottery" than color correcting an image, something I can do pretty well with the settings on my HDTV.

So I ask, where's the outrage over Halo 3?

SnakeCL

Wait, what; no Kotaku After Dark tag? *blushes* Hooo boy, I got a little confused there.

aelfin

*Whew* close one! Cause it was touch and go for a minute there from where I was sitting.

-EDGE-

okenny :)

What do you do after your über-hyped game gets busted for using pre-rendered video for gameplay footage? Well, you start doctoring screenshots, of course!

It's the best kind of damage control and PR, you know.

...

Okay, can we now officially start calling it LOLZONE 2, please? Because there's nothing left to take seriously anymore.

Melting_snowman

@gnugeek: You're using maxim as an example? We aren't running to retail to buy women. If we could, I'd prefer something a bit...I dunno...darker.

@cduran02: Isn't that being ported to PS2?

@Bumpmap: awesome point. Reminds me of how 360 RRoD has been deemed acceptable because of a bullshit extended warranty. How about making the console that doesn't suffer from the RRoD.
Same guys from the EB games I love to hate try selling me on that nonsense. "it's all good because of the extended warranty. See MS is looking out for you..just send your console back and...." When are we going to stop drinking the koolaid and call it what it is...bullshit. Same as this touched up photo flim flam action. Guerilla should just show the game as it is, show what we're buying (or not buying since many people will pass on this) instead of what you wish the game looked like.

Striderhayasa - Phillyyakk on PSN and Live.

Brian Ashcraft

On the other hand, about every single Wii "screenshot" I've seen has antialias, sometimes even HD resolution :)

kryo

satanyoka

You can say that about most "big" games. Halo 3 had the most hype of any game I have ever seen and it turned out well. It seems like some people just like seeing things fail.

spongedaddy

GlompWorthyGamer

tehFluffz

If KZ II had meh graphics, but a great story, gameplay, etc. I would still enjoy it very much. When did the VG hobby get so serious?*

*Rhetorical

spongedaddy

I told you guys those were bullshots.

DankPanties

Well it is Monday, for his sake I hope you had Coffee ;)

-EDGE-

Ill just go back to finishing my Silent Hill O

cduran02

I did go to an Ivy League school.

Brian Ashcraft

It's really not the PS3's fault you couldn't get into an ivy league school or that they were all out of cherry flavor when you got to the 7-11.

That dog of yours that died back in summer of 2002 though... yeah, that was Sony.

Sorry dude. They just hate you that much.

afmvdp

ara

I don't know why they feel compeled to "touch up" the images. They look great in both shots. They keep doing this after the "E3" fiasco and it's gonna turn a LOT of people off, if it hasn't already.

Heres a tip from me to them, we are NOT stupid don't treat us like we are kthnxbye.

-EDGE-