Rykan
Member
I don't agree that it's not a visual upgrade. To go back to the Zelda example again: If you enter a castle or a building in Zelda: ALTTP, you had to look from it top down, by nature of it being a 2D game. The only alternative was to show the scene sideways. This has all sorts of "issues" with it. You can always only show part of the scene and the size of objects are all wrong. Trees are too small, characters too large, buildings have strange sizes etc.That's more of a leap in terms of the scope of games. I don't think that's necessarily a "visual" advance which is what the question asked.
So you're right if it's about the development of gaming. But not necessarily if it's about the biggest leap in how impressive graphics are.
In 3D Zelda, you can walk into a room or a building and see the entire scene. A hall in a castle actually looks the part. You can look at every aspect of it. The roof, floor, walls,door, Objects That is a huge visual jump.