I was thinking about Skyrim at work the other day, as I often do, and it occurred to me that it's pretty remarkable that they've fit that game on one disc. Mass Effect 2 came on multiple discs as have other games like Blue Dragon (yawn) etc, so I'm wondering, did they use magic? 
I'm pretty clueless when it comes to the technical aspects of game development, but does anybody smarter then me actually know the reason why a massive game like Skyrim is one disc while others don't seem to fit? If nobody else knows I'm gonna assume it's magic.

at first I was impressed at the size of the game.

but now take a look at the internet and how bethesda has grandly fucked over a lot of PC players

Yep, I'm pretty sure it's magic too

Texture compression, perfect use of generic assets, perfect allocation of memory budget (who gets what, where, when) great texture and geometry streaming engine (even though the dynamic streaming screws up sometimes).

Theres barely any video files, everything is rendered and presented in-game. There's not that many heavy post processes (screen-size transparent texture overlay) , DX9 API, low polycounts.

Yeah they did a great job.

I work on farcry3, we have a lot of similar restrictions and budgets (low amounts of memory on console, but you need First Person level of quality, and assets are rendered kilometers away, unlike corridor shooters), a lot of devs have respect for bethesda and their ability to fit everything in.

A lot of developers tend to focus on the micro (details here and there, texture is too low res, fix it, and so on). Bethesda has perfect control, and focuses on the macro. The game is gorgeous when played and viewed normally, its only when you focus at low poly rock formations or grainy ground textures that you see an issue. But it works, and everyone is happy. That's what other developers have a hard time grasping. Stop focusing on the smallest of details and look at the bigger picture.

Also goes without saying that Beth manages to make the world feel alive and beautiful with the DX9 API in 2011, whereas other devs would have rushed towards more efficient but heavier DX10 or DX11 solutions (for PC), thus requiring heavier types of textures, displacements maps and so on, making your install folder exponentially larger.

@Father_Vice: I'm not really sure what you're going on about. I haven't seen this complaint from any PC gamers.

people have lost 30+ hour saved games....

MAGIC!!!

@warxsnake: Good luck with Far Cry 3, it's been on my radar ever since that sweet E3 demo.

The only complaints about corrupted saves that I've heard about were people who had system crashes while saving. But they've all had secondary (and tertiary) saves, so ... what? A friend of mine playing on the PC had that happen to him, but between the autosaves and his own manual saves, he lost about a half hour. His power went out while saving. Bad luck.

Texture compression, perfect use of generic assets, perfect allocation of memory budget (who gets what, where, when) great texture and geometry streaming engine (even though the dynamic streaming screws up sometimes).

Theres barely any video files, everything is rendered and presented in-game. There's not that many heavy post processes (screen-size transparent texture overlay) , DX9 API, low polycounts.

Yeah they did a great job.

I work on farcry3, we have a lot of similar restrictions and budgets (low amounts of memory on console, but you need First Person level of quality, and assets are rendered kilometers away, unlike corridor shooters), a lot of devs have respect for bethesda and their ability to fit everything in.

A lot of developers tend to focus on the micro (details here and there, texture is too low res, fix it, and so on). Bethesda has perfect control, and focuses on the macro. The game is gorgeous when played and viewed normally, its only when you focus at low poly rock formations or grainy ground textures that you see an issue. But it works, and everyone is happy. That's what other developers have a hard time grasping. Stop focusing on the smallest of details and look at the bigger picture.

Also goes without saying that Beth manages to make the world feel alive and beautiful with the DX9 API in 2011, whereas other devs would have rushed towards more efficient but heavier DX10 or DX11 solutions (for PC), thus requiring heavier types of textures, displacements maps and so on, making your install folder exponentially larger.

They built a tile-based game in 2011, a year where no other game of the year contender is tile based. It's not mysterious how they fit it all into one DVD, but why it's still so good. The result is more than the sum of its parts, and can be said to be truly magical.

So they have high alteration skill level? 

@warxsnake said:

Texture compression, perfect use of generic assets, perfect allocation of memory budget (who gets what, where, when) great texture and geometry streaming engine (even though the dynamic streaming screws up sometimes).

Theres barely any video files, everything is rendered and presented in-game. There's not that many heavy post processes (screen-size transparent texture overlay) , DX9 API, low polycounts.

Yeah they did a great job.

I work on farcry3, we have a lot of similar restrictions and budgets (low amounts of memory on console, but you need First Person level of quality, and assets are rendered kilometers away, unlike corridor shooters), a lot of devs have respect for bethesda and their ability to fit everything in.

A lot of developers tend to focus on the micro (details here and there, texture is too low res, fix it, and so on). Bethesda has perfect control, and focuses on the macro. The game is gorgeous when played and viewed normally, its only when you focus at low poly rock formations or grainy ground textures that you see an issue. But it works, and everyone is happy. That's what other developers have a hard time grasping. Stop focusing on the smallest of details and look at the bigger picture.

Also goes without saying that Beth manages to make the world feel alive and beautiful with the DX9 API in 2011, whereas other devs would have rushed towards more efficient but heavier DX10 or DX11 solutions (for PC), thus requiring heavier types of textures, displacements maps and so on, making your install folder exponentially larger.

Awesome. It's always nice to see a post from a professional game developer.. As others in this thread have said, Far Cry 3 is looking cool and I am looking forward to seeing more of it.

@The_Laughing_Man said:

So they have high alteration skill level?

No it's illusion. Everybody thinks the game is great, but all we're playing is Superman 64.

@The_Laughing_Man said:

So they have high alteration skill level?

No it's illusion. Everybody thinks the game is great, but all we're playing is Superman 64.

Actually they are lizard wizards but whatever.

@Mr_Skeleton said:

Actually they are lizard wizards but whatever.

those illuminati fucks!!!!....they are showing us how things can be compressed so that when they take over they can all compress us and have us live 6 families in a 3 bedroom bungalow while they take the rest of the free space to grow drugs to feed to our children and control their minds.

I think it's remarkable as well. But not for the fact that the game is 4.4GB. For the fact that they are the only developer who has released unacceptable, borderline broken product for the 4th fucking time and they still get their dicks sucked more by the gaming community than a Chippendale dancer.

That right there is some magic.

@warxsnake: Cool! Thanks for your professional opinion. Love hearing game developers talk shop. Good luck with Far Cry!

Contant wise there's no argument that Bethesda are masters of their craft. They really make you feel like you are playing in a complete and realized world with endless possibilities. However, their ps3 coding technics are lacking even though it's the second time they worked on the machine with this engine having the experience of Fallout 3.

@The_Laughing_Man: I did too, and I still have it out in my garage. I wonder how much it's worth.

@Father_Vice said:

people have lost 30+ hour saved games....

MAGIC!!!

Cool story troll.

Yep, it's pretty amazing how much they can do with so little. Too bad a quest-giver broke and now I can't advance the thieves guild storyline. I absolutely love the game, but come on. That is not acceptable.

@thehexeditor said:

@warxsnake said:

Texture compression, perfect use of generic assets, perfect allocation of memory budget (who gets what, where, when) great texture and geometry streaming engine (even though the dynamic streaming screws up sometimes).

Theres barely any video files, everything is rendered and presented in-game. There's not that many heavy post processes (screen-size transparent texture overlay) , DX9 API, low polycounts.

Yeah they did a great job.

I work on farcry3, we have a lot of similar restrictions and budgets (low amounts of memory on console, but you need First Person level of quality, and assets are rendered kilometers away, unlike corridor shooters), a lot of devs have respect for bethesda and their ability to fit everything in.

A lot of developers tend to focus on the micro (details here and there, texture is too low res, fix it, and so on). Bethesda has perfect control, and focuses on the macro. The game is gorgeous when played and viewed normally, its only when you focus at low poly rock formations or grainy ground textures that you see an issue. But it works, and everyone is happy. That's what other developers have a hard time grasping. Stop focusing on the smallest of details and look at the bigger picture.

Also goes without saying that Beth manages to make the world feel alive and beautiful with the DX9 API in 2011, whereas other devs would have rushed towards more efficient but heavier DX10 or DX11 solutions (for PC), thus requiring heavier types of textures, displacements maps and so on, making your install folder exponentially larger.

Awesome. It's always nice to see a post from a professional game developer.. As others in this thread have said, Far Cry 3 is looking cool and I am looking forward to seeing more of it.

Yeah, I'm really looking forward that game. Very interesting post.

The first time I saw that Skyrim was only 5.5 gigs I was like "aww hell naw steam u got h4cked againz"

@Enigma777 said:

I think it's remarkable as well. But not for the fact that the game is 4.4GB. For the fact that they are the only developer who has released unacceptable, borderline broken product for the 4th fucking time and they still get their dicks sucked more by the gaming community than a Chippendale dancer.

That right there is some magic.

Which game that you liked this year had its hype get swept under the rug for Skyrim?

I'm curious.

@Doctorchimp said:

@Enigma777 said:

I think it's remarkable as well. But not for the fact that the game is 4.4GB. For the fact that they are the only developer who has released unacceptable, borderline broken product for the 4th fucking time and they still get their dicks sucked more by the gaming community than a Chippendale dancer.

That right there is some magic.

Which game that you liked this year had its hype get swept under the rug for Skyrim?

I'm curious.

All of them. Now excuse me while I go punch a dragon in the face.

@warxsnake: Just because you are using the DX11 API doesn't mean you *have* to make use of the tessellation stage. In fact you can get it to emulate the functionality of DX9 and it will run on DX9 level hardware (But only Vista and Win7 of course but seriously who is still using XP for modern stuff?). I'm not sure what you mean by DX10/11 requiring "heavier" types of textures, it can use whatever texture format you choose really.

@ChaosDent: What do you mean by tile based? Obviously the gameplay itself isn't restricted to tiles so I'm going to assume you're referring to the modular design of interiors, dungeons and citys. This is something a lot of games do, even today, to allow re-use of assets and to construct large areas without filling the memory full of complex and unique geometry.

@Kung_Fu_Viking said:

@warxsnake: Just because you are using the DX11 API doesn't mean you *have* to make use of the tessellation stage. In fact you can get it to emulate the functionality of DX9 and it will run on DX9 level hardware (But only Vista and Win7 of course but seriously who is still using XP for modern stuff?). I'm not sure what you mean by DX10/11 requiring "heavier" types of textures, it can use whatever texture format you choose really.

@ChaosDent: What do you mean by tile based? Obviously the gameplay itself isn't restricted to tiles so I'm going to assume you're referring to the modular design of interiors, dungeons and citys. This is something a lot of games do, even today, to allow re-use of assets and to construct large areas without filling the memory full of complex and unique geometry.

Yes no shit, it was part of an argument depicting developers that try to go all out as soon as they have the tech to do it instead of relying on DX9 like Skyrim has, and if you want to go all out with DX11, you introduce a whole slew of new texture types to support tessellation (displacement maps) and on the post process side, heavier textures as well. Skyrim doesn't use too many particle systems at all, mostly material-based scrolling transparent textures. Skyrim has a complexity equivalent to Half Life 2, or early UE3, or a game of that type, supporting only the most basic textures, except they do it on a larger scale. (diffuse, spec, normal, glow, distortion). If they wanted to make it look more like Metro 2033, the game would easily double in size.

Of course you can release a game that just supports DX11 and adds nothing new, or just adds a few of its features like local image-based reflections, but that doesn't apply to my argument. I'm depicting developers that try to go all out.

@warxsnake said:

Skyrim has a complexity equivalent to Half Life 2

I recently replayed HL2 and it holds up surprisingly well, graphics-wise. That said, I'm eagerly looking forward to the next generation of consoles so we can move on from circa 2006 graphics technology.

Hey all. Just wanted to step in here before things got too out of hand. Disagreeing with one another is perfectly fine, but do try to avoid derailing this topic and allowing it to get super heated, alright?

Thank youuu. <3

@Father_Vice said:

people have lost 30+ hour saved games....

MAGIC!!!

First I'm hearing of this. Not that hard to back up your saves on PC.