Games on the smartphone look better from year to year, that’s no question. However, summoners war toa team build creator Epic Games shows the Samsung Galaxy S7 how impressive the graphics can actually be.
The graphics of our smartphones and tablets can already be better than what we saw on our TVs in the past console generation. In the coming year even the current consoles of smartphones could be overtaken.
An assertion that, of course, needs to be proven first. The Samsung Galaxy Unpacked 2016 event, for example, which took place on Sunday, was particularly well suited for this purpose. There, the Korean company presented the new smartphones of the S7 series, among others, but also had time for the Gears of War creators of Epic Games, who are currently not only working on the MOBA Paragon, but also want to turn the market for smartphone games upside down.
What you see up there in the video is not a polished tech demo for the latest high-end PCs, but a tech demo for smartphones. Using the Unreal Engine 4, it will show us what future games might look like on the small (or now quite large) devices.
We see ProtoStar, a real-time 3D experience shown as part of the new Vulcan API, which is one of the first devices to be used in the Samsung Galaxy S7. The API, i.e. the programming interface, will replace OpenGL as a cross-platform graphics interface in the medium term. The Vulkan API is described by Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney as the new industry standard that brings high-end console technology (i.e. PlayStation 4 and Xbox One) to mobile devices as a graphics revolution. The first supported engine is of course the Unreal Engine 4 developed by Epic Games itself.
These technologies were used in the Epic Games ProtoStar video:
- Dynamic Layer Reflections (high-quality reflections for dynamic objects)
- Full GPU particle support on mobile devices, including vector fields
- Temporary Anti-Aliasing (TAA)
- High-quality ASTC texture compression
- Dynamic, cascaded shadows for the entire scene
- Chromatic Aberration
- Mobile dynamic light refraction
- Filmic tone mapping curve
- Improved mobile static reflections
- High quality mobile viewing depth
Vulkan API support with thousands of dynamic objects on screen.
The accompanying Samsung Galaxy S7, like the S7 Edge, will feature water cooling, a “No Alarms” setting and the ability to record and broadcast gameplay live. If you pre-order one of the smartphones, you’ll also get Samsung Gear VR glasses for free. The Galaxy S7 can now be pre-ordered for an RRP of 699 Euros.
By the way: Rumor has it that the volcano API will not only be used in the Samsung Galaxy S7 and will be fired by the Unreal Engine 4. Also the upcoming Nintendo NX is supposed to support the interface.
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The future lies in mobile plays – managing director over new adjustment
For Konami, the future lies in the mobile market with a focus on smartphones and tablets, not in classic large-scale productions for PCs and consoles. At least if you believe an interview with CEO Hideki Hayakawa translated from Japanese. According to this, mobile gaming platforms are now the new number one for Konami. The information originally came from the Japanese entertainment website Nikkei Trendy Net. A Neogaf user in turn translated it from another Japanese-language games website. Due to possible translation errors, the message should be treated with caution.
In view of the takeover of Kojima Productions, the continuing rumours of a separation between the publisher and game developer Hideo Kojima, and the discontinuation of Silent Hills, the news of the reorientation comes as little surprise. In recent weeks it has already been speculated that Konami will concentrate more on the mobile market and turn away from traditional AAA titles. “Gaming has spread across a variety of platforms, but at the end of the day, the platform that is always closest to us is mobile. Mobile gaming is where the future of gaming lies,” the translation says.
