Thanks for that clear explanation, Tincup.  I know what 2D & 3D look like in games but would have had a difficult time describing them.

Since my subjects are, or rather were, Physics & mathematics I am aware that you can define matters in whatever manner you think fit so long as you are completely consistent with the definition. And so, using a 3D model and in programming with X, y, AD Z coordinates, Developers can call their products "3D". Bit IMHO there is already an accepted definition of 3D and it is NOT that one which is IMO unfair and confusing - call it anything else instead "Composite" "universal, whatever but NOT 3D when the products are NOT what we *all* understand as 3D.

I agree 100% that my remark is not or should not be specifically aimed at Dear Esther. and I have said so already, but applies to pretty well ALL games to date that publicize themselves as 3D. If something is not right, or good, or applicable, it does not make it right because others do exactly the same thing. But I agree that it would not be fair to "pick upon" Dear Esther particularly or imply that that game is alone  in the matter.

Actually I happen not have played any games which categorize themselves as 3D for a LONT time (Maybe MY bad !) and my criticism has only been awakened due to the fact that I played Dear Esther very recently.

So let’s take Dear Esther JUST as an example:-

You can move your mouse left & right on your mouse-pad (if you have one) and obtain a scrolling panorama in the x-axis alone.

AD - You can move your mouse up & down on your mouse-pad (if you have one) and obtain a scrolling panorama in the y-axis alone (I think !!).

Combined (as in Dear Esther) you obtain a *2D*  in a 2-dimensional panorama.

But 3D model, or XYZ coordinates or whatever I co0mpletely fail to see haw the game cam possibly be categorized as *3*D !!

The ONLY other action in the whole game that you can take AFAIK is to click on the mouse and obtain a close up BUT YOU CANNOT PRCEED ONE IOTA EITHERB FORWARDS OR BACKWARDS (in the z-axis)

That's my opinion – please correct me if I'm wrong and sorry for refuting your contention – I have NO experience whatsoever as a Developer (although I HAVE helped MANY to some degree!!) 

Would you call it 3D if you can walk around an object, e.g. a table? Because you can in Dear Esther.

Edit: Could you please change the extra large text to a normal font size before posting?

From a mathematical point of view, one can call videogame 3D "3D projected on a 2D surface". But that does seem like a needlessly complex way of describing it, because as long as we are talking about videogames, it is understood that we are dealing with a 2D surface (the screen). 

And I agree with Fien, please don't use that huge font.

Originally Posted By Lady Kestrel (28 FEB 2012 2:56pm)

Thanks for that clear explanation, Tincup.  I know what 2D & 3D look like in games but would have had a difficult time describing them.

This goes for me, too. Thanks, Tincup, for your concise, to-the-point post. 

I think the best way to perceive the differences between 2D & 3D in gaming (not scientific) terms is to play Myst and RealMyst.  In Myst, the player moves ahead or turns at fixed points in the environment.  In RealMyst, the player can move anywhere s/he can move the cursor.  I remember thinking how great it was to walk from the ship to the library without having to go all the way down to the end of the dock first.  I just went up over the grass.  Also, holding the mouse down allowed me to stroll along and stop wherever I wanted to.  I remember looking down at Ti'ana's gravestone in a place I was never able to visit before.  It's a difference in the way the game is played that gives it perceived depth.  We know the screen is flat, just like a movie screen is flat, but we perceive it as a more real environment.

A splendid example, Lady K.

You deserve some extra chocolates.

Len-

I edited your post to reduce that enormous font size.

Originally Posted By Fnord (28 FEB 2012 3:42pm)

From a mathematical point of view, one can call videogame 3D "3D projected on a 2D surface". But that does seem like a needlessly complex way of describing it, because as long as we are talking about videogames, it is understood that we are dealing with a 2D surface (the screen). 

 

And I agree with Fien, please don't use that huge font.

Yes, we are always dealing with a 2D projection so that goes without saying. When games become tangible 3D holograms we will have reached a true form of 3D represention. For now the closeset we have are 3D headsets which project images onto the eye that can fool the brain into thinking one is actually standing in a space, and not simply looking through a convincing virtual window.

@Lady Kestrel: A fine example for making the comparison! To make RealMyst the programers needed to make a fully developed 3D wireframe. With the model in place code was developed to allow mouse and keyboard to move the viewer's "eye point" in any of the 3 axes.

The original Myst is probably made from a model too, but full rendering was applied only to the selected points of view corresponding to the game's "slides". No code was developed for situating and manipulating a floating "eye point" - just a simple "point and click" to take you to the next slide. But in this case you are not actually moving, just calling up another slide corresponding to whichever hotspot you clicked. The path you travel is a sort of flow chart.

Full realtime flythroughs with complete control over view point are pretty CPU intensive - lot's of number crunching! Nowadays it's not's so bad, but in the early 90's you probably needed a university computer to generate convincing 3D. Anyone remember the original Flight Simulator? Practically no surface rendering, just the bare wireframe itself...

Actually it's more complicated. It's not simply a question of the 3D model per se, but how perspecive is handled in order to give a convincing illusion of space in projection: 1 point, 2 point or 3 point perspecive basically, but I'm out of gas for that one!  

Hi tincup2 " 3D movement consists of forwards/backwards, up/down, left/right, the same axes we use to move around in our sad little world.".

I agree with that sentence of yours without the slightest difference of opinion.

As an illustration :-

***** You are up in the sky in some sort of navigable balloon, and facing North.

You can move freely right and left i.e.  towards the East or west.

You can move freely up and down.

But you can also move freely backwards and forwards  i.e. towards the South and North and from every different point in your 3D space you will get an entirely different view.

In the So-called 3D games (including Dear Esther) you can do the first two but ou CANNOT do the third 0 hence you are moving in a *TWO* dimensional space and not a *THREE* dimensional space.

SOLTION – fid another name for this non-3 Dimensional game – "Complex movement", compound movement" whatever (I'm no expert on inventing names & proper definitions).

But I don't want to flog a dead horse – and I suppose not a very important one, and I have explained fully my academic point of view.]

So I don't think I'll continue this aspect of general 2D/3D  

Originally Posted By Len Green (28 FEB 2012 6:23pm)

In the So-called 3D games (including Dear Esther) you can do the first two but ou CANNOT do the third 0 hence you are moving in a *TWO* dimensional space and not a *THREE* dimensional space.

 

Yes you can.

Fien --- I said I would not continue with this difference of opinion.

But I really would like you to explain how in Dear Esther for examle you can move "into" and "out of the [lane of your monitor screen.

"JA-Staff3 ---

 Len-

I edited your post to reduce that enormous font size.

Don't feed the spammers!"

Sorry – it was a one-time accident  - as can be seen from my later posts.

As I believe most know, I am totally 100% blind in one eye and have only something like 15% vision in the other. This causes permanent fairly painful eye-strain.

What probably happened was that it was hutting more than usual & I GREATLY enlarged my post on screen to read it with ease. Then I guess I must have posted the magnified text instead of the original normal post !

At any rate – thanks for correcting it for me.

P.S.

I sincerely hope that your reach AT LEAST 87 years of age but with good eyesight 

Originally Posted By Len Green (28 FEB 2012 7:04pm)

Fien --- I said I would not continue with this difference of opinion.

 

But I really would like you to explain how in Dear Esther for examle you can move "into" and "out of the [lane of your monitor screen.

You said Tex Murphy was 3D. I don't see any difference between Dear Esther and Tex, as far as 3D is concerned. It is true that there are no drawers etc. to open and inspect in DE, but that's because of the lack of interactivity. Like I said, you can walk around a table. You can go east and west, up and down, in and out (or forward and backward?) and the perspective will change.

Hi Fien,

About Tex Murphy I believe that you are right and I should NOT have  inferred that it was REALLY 3D. But maybe those 3 games were the closest I can remember to SIMULATING 3D.

But 2 wrongs don't make a right !and Dear Esther has simply opened my eyes to a general misnomer (NOT an individual discrepancy !)

But as a final comment (I hope) to continue my specific example

It would have been better, firer, more ;honest' not to use the term 3D on ANY of  this type of game but some label such as "Panoramic" or whatever.

EXAMPLE from chapter 1 of Dear Esther  ;-

****** I am looking at a hill on top of which seems to be some sort of fence or railing.

I move my mouse to the right and see a building and a tall tower.

I move my mouse to the left and see the waves lapping at the sea sore.

EXCELLENT _ ONE DIMENSION

I move my mouse down and I see a boat,

I move my mouse up and I see the sky.

EXCELLENT _ A SECOND. DIMENSION

TOGETHER THEY MAKE A 2D GAME **AND THAT IS ALL**

I would love to go forward and see things beyond the fence/railing i.e. the third dimension - *IMPOSSIBLE ---

Or behind me  - equally impossible.

Conclusion no third dimension and the (and many others ) is 2D and not 3D,

I'm sorry, but I really don't understand what you're saying. Is this an academic or theoretical question? From the point of view of the player, you can go forward, enter the building while everything around you changes just like it does when walking in the real world. You can turn around and enter the water. You wouldn't be able to do that in a 2D game. No, you can't go forward in Dear Esther and see beyond the fence, just like you can't in the real world. You will have to find your way up there. If there are games where you may walk on water or fly through the sky and go simply everywhere without any restriction, a sort of 3D God mode, then I haven't come across them and I doubt if I would want to play them. Too much freedom. For me, as a player, the difference between 2D and 3D is obvious. As described by others in this thread.

PS: Perhaps this is what you want? It's called no clipping, a cheat mode. Start watching at 0:35.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jyrQXIIaEGc&feature=related

I also have a slight problem understanding Len's reasoning. 

If you look at the image itself, what you see on screen, it is a 3d projection on a 2d plane. So not true 3d.

But if you look at the movement in game, you are able to change your position relative to the X, Y & Z axis. You don't have free movement in all directions (much like you don't have it in real life), but we are not dealing with a flat plane. 

Originally Posted By Fien (29 FEB 2012 4:35am)

I'm sorry, but I really don't understand what you're saying. Is this an academic or theoretical question? From the point of view of the player, you can go forward, enter the building while everything around you changes just like it does when walking in the real world. You can turn around and enter the water. You wouldn't be able to do that in a 2D game. No, you can't go forward in Dear Esther and see beyond the fence, just like you can't in the real world. You will have to find your way up there. If there are games where you may walk on water or fly through the sky and go simply everywhere without any restriction, a sort of 3D God mode, then I haven't come across them and I doubt if I would want to play them. Too much freedom. For me, as a player, the difference between 2D and 3D is obvious. As described by others in this thread.

 

PS: Perhaps this is what you want? It's called no clipping, a cheat mode. Start watching at 0:35.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jyrQXIIaEGc&feature=related

It seems that Dear Esther easter egg videos are popping up all over YouTube. After watching the video you linked to, I looked at some related ones.

I don't know enough about the technical aspect of capturing this kind of thing to be sure if what's displayed actually appears in Dear Esther, or has possibly been added by a third party.

This one is pretty strange. It seems that the person who made the video is able to fly around and pass through solid walls:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=psezT5D7Kag&NR=1

At one point in the video, a console of some sort is pulled up but it's too small to see properly. Could you (or someone) please shed some light on this?

Are these easter eggs actually in the game? If so, is a separate program needed to access them? I'm really quite curious, and I hope my asking about this stuff doesn't make me sound as dumb as a box of rocks. Thanks! 

The content of the video is not the reason I posted it. Sorry! I realize now that was totally unclear. The guy who made the video is showing an easter egg (the ghost in the left top corner) by using no-clipping software, which enables him to hover in midair, fly, do all kinds of things that you're not supposed to do in games. There's a ghost in Dear Esther, you can see several in fact, so nothing was added to the video. But there's no way to get up that rock and look at them from close by. Except by going into this "God mode", by "cheating" and removing the (very useful) restrictions the developers put in the game, like walls, objects, etcetera.

I only posted the link because I thought it was relevant to Len's opinion that DE is not real 3D. I wanted to show that it is. I'm no techie. If you want to know more about noclip, I'm sure there are people here who can help you.

Folks – you may think me pedantic & nitpicking – and very likely I AM !!!

But I taught Physics for 40 years to 17 & 18 year old pupils * incoming University students (of both sexes) and for 4 years for UNESCO in West Africa ditto. True most people are not affected by Physics or the exact sciences. But for PROPER understanding, ACCURATE definitions are absolutely essential!

For example ----- Most people understandably use the everyday terms Force, Work, Energy, Power, Moment, Momentum, in pretty vague everyday terms – but not in science – every one has a precise and exact definition.  I would guess that well over 9o% of people say things like "Mu weight is 70 kilograms" or that truck weighs 5 tons" and wouldn't dream of saying "I weigh nearly 80 0Newtons' or "That truck has a mass of 5 tons"

Sounds trivial doesn't it;  but the exact differences between mass & weight are often very difficult & ESSENTIAL it is to  explain how important the differentiation IS !!  Especially since the old fundamental 'Law of conservation of matter (i.e. mass" is no longer completely true and in the age of astronauts and space travel.

So once again I apologise for my seeming triviality – I agree of little to no importance in Adventure games.

But about the matter of the so-called 3D games (including Dear Esther) ((I conclude my "case"** by saying that I have not changed my Mind but there is no further point in trying to convince others – and I can only leave the matter by saying "LET  US   AGREE   TO  DISAGREE"  

Peace be with you !

I have more than a passing familiarity with natural science as well (I don't own a lab coat with my name written on it just for show), and I just can't agree with your description.

1D game: Takes into account movement in a single dimension. A straight line. It does not require free movement, there might be restrictions like say you can't move backwards, or there might be different tasks that you need to accomplish along the way, but the game is restricted to a 1dimensional plane.

2D game: Takes into account movement in two dimensions. It does not require free movement, Mario after all could not fly, he was limited to jumping (in the early games). And he could also not move back in Super Mario Bros, but the game was clearly a 2D game.

3D game: Allows you to move in all 3 dimensions, up, down, left, right, forwards and backwards. Again, it does not require free movement, but you are not limited to purely move on a 2D plane. Dear Esther does allow you to move in all 3 dimensions, though it restricts you in some ways (you are not allowed to fly, for an example). 

First, let me say that I have yet to play Dear Esther; my comments below are based on what I have read about and seen of it, as well as my experience in the field of computer games, both as a player and a developer.

I'm inclined to say that there are two things to be defined here: 3D graphics (what I suspect is usually being referred to when a game is described as being "3D") and 3D gameplay (or perhaps interaction in the case of Dear Esther, given the lack of "game-like" elements).

3D graphics

These are those graphics that are produced based on a model defined in 3 dimensions: that is, a model that is defined in all of x, y and z (commonly by specifying vertices, although I've read that new methods may be in development). I'm somewhat uncertain of whether to call pre-rendered graphics such as those in Riven "3D" in this sense, given that they are rendered to the viewer from 2D images, albeit images that were themselves produced from 3D models.

So, let me then define two branches of 3D graphics:

 - Real-time 3D, in which the graphics are rendered from models to the player.

 - Pre-rendered 3D, in which the graphics are first rendered to a 2D form, and then rendered from that to the player.

Note that this does not in any way speak to how the player interacts (if at all) with the results; an entirely non-interactive cutscene (without even the capacity for player movement as found in Dear Esther) would still be "3D" in this sense if it falls into either of the above two categories.

From what I've seen, Dear Esther does indeed have 3D graphics, and I suspect that this is what the description of the game was referring to; I believe that this is what is generally meant by such descriptions in the field of computer gaming.

3D gameplay

This is gameplay (or other interaction) that allows interaction in all three of the spatial dimensions; an example might be allowing the player to run along the 2D plane and jump over obstacles.

Note that a game might have 3D graphics, and thus be a 3D game, while yet having 2D (or even 1D) gameplay; an example orf this might be a game that uses 3D models to present its game-world while constraining the player to only moving on a 2D plane.

This is slightly complicated, however, by games that only allow interaction in 2 dimensions, but in which the surface of play is not a plane, such as a game that only allows movement forwards, backwards and to the left or right, but which takes place on uneven terrain.  I'm inclined to say that such games might be 3D in gameplay if the changes in height affect gameplay - such as causing shots to miss by virtue of being too high, or allowing hits against targets on the other side of hills - but 2D in cases in which they do not - such as in a game in which shots hug the landscape, making height irrelevant.

As to whether Dear Esther offers 3D gameplay, I'm afraid that I do not know, not having experienced it.

As to whether Dear Esther is interactive or not, I'd say that my impression is that it fulfils the most basic criteria for interaction in that it allows the player to move with some degree of freedom; one may not have much choice of paths, nor anything to alter or pick up, but one can still chose to walk or not walk, which seems to me to be a form of interaction, albeit a very basic one.

On-topic, I haven't yet played Dear Esther, either the mod or the new version, but would very much like to do so.  Given the graphical enhancements (at the least) of the new version, I might actually get that version, despite the price.

I haven't played Dear Esther either, but only because (believe it or not) I can't spare $10.00.

I can tell from the videos I watched on YouTube that the plot would likely give me a lot to think and speculate about. I love games that do that. 

I try to support indie developers whenever and however I can, but it's just not fiscally feasible right now.

 Likewise, I fear - my own financial situation is a little tight at the moment, I believe. :/

(I could probably spare $10 once, I suppose, but I'd want to be careful to not make a habit of it.  In any case, I also currently lack a working computer of my own... ^^; )

You can play Dear Esther and 15 other games for 30 minutes on Onlive. For free, till 12 March. Registering at Onlive is free too.

http://www.onlive.com/corporate/press_releases/1250