The fate of photorealism in computer games

Here's an article worth checking out about the inexorable push in video games towards more and more realism, more polygons, more complicated lighting models, richer textures.

http://modetwo.net/users/nachimir/vga/

The text is on the pompous and wordy side. The writer dances oafishly around the question of gameplay -- like, gameplay, as in, what is there FUN to do? Is Doom XII any better a game than Doom IV, despite the fact that, thanks to a new pixel shader model and a wider polygon pipeline, I can now see my bullet flashes reflected in the sweat beads on the cheekbones of the demon lizard, even though he's partly obscured by a tapestry of photorealistic unicorn hair? Hmm, I shot him, and he died. Huh. Now what?

But I do like the gallery of alternate-universe games: most of them I had never seen before. Don't know if I'd want to play in a world that looked like a pencil sketch all the time -- but who knows. It would be a nice to take a break from the lizard.