Disappointed

A while ago I bought Half-Life: Source for real money. The game looked good back in 1998. Today it looks embarrassingly bad, even with its cool style and design. It's butt ugly, frankly, but I still paid money for it. I am now considering grabbing the original Half-Life, Opposing Force and Blue Shift because Half-Life: Source doesn't have the high definition weapons pack and because I love Opposing Force. Damn that tutorial was cool! I wish they'd do something with Adrian Shepard in the Half-Life 2 storyline.

That is to say, it's quite possible for a game to be good enough to pay money for it even if it has bad graphics. Even so, those are exceptions. By and large, for a game to be at all playable, the player has to be able to stand looking at it, and for many people that just requires a certain level of graphics. Beyond that, if the visuals of a game are good enough, they can rival the actual gameplay in terms of appeal. For instance, Legacy of Kain: Defiance is probably the worst of the Soul Reaver games, both in terms of gameplay and in terms of puzzles, but its Devil May Cry inspired swordplay more than makes up for that, making it one of the coolest games in the series despite its many staggering shortcomings.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

Seriously. I've said my piece, but to sum up, it's simply this: graphics engines are meant to serve gameplay. Whether or not realistic graphics is required or not depends greatly on the gameplay and otherwise on the tone of the narrative being told.

CoX's base engine serves gameplay very well, and that needs to be maintained. Thus, any additional features cannot give any significant advantage to higher graphics settings compared to lower.

However, when it comes to setting narrative tone, more and more advanced graphics--when used appropriately and with some restraint--definitely enhance one of the most vital parts of gaming: immersion.

I seriously just don't see how anybody's losing out. These graphics engine programmers aren't the same people writing new mission arcs or making new graphics assets (well, probably not) or adding new sets. They'll probably have other engine work to do after GR hits, but adding too many deep-down engine changes at once is dangerous. We already have a big game mechanics change in side switching, which has been long requested and is pretty popular with the majority of players. Asking for more changes in GR gameplay-wise is a risk that doesn't need to be taken. More free content with some major gameplay changes can happen any time. A major graphical update like this? You don't see those in regular Issues.

After all, the devs would never officially announce something as done that didn't make it in game (*cough*Vault*cough* *cough*CoP*cough*), or announce something that turns out to be underwhelming in implementation (*cough*PvP*cough* *cough*bases*cough*).

Sorry for all the coughing - the air is a bit dry in here.

What any MMO devs says they are implementing versus what actually appears can be two very different stories.

I think you've inadvertently filed the Cathedral of Pain in column A when it should be in column B. It's not as if it never appeared.

(Also, I don't recall the Vault ever being announced as done; it was announced as being worked on a couple of times, before it ultimately didn't work out, but that's not quite the same thing, is it? If they'd announced "Okay, it's ready!" and then never rolled it out, that'd make it the Moller Skycar of MMO features. )

Well, good, because that's what I'm gonna tell you. No need to draw this into an argument. The details are nice, but not necessary.

It's actually quite hard to create good random content. I've been playing around with the idea of creating a massive-world game, and even something as simple as generating a small town is hard: you'll often wind up with something that looks like someone vomited a bunch of buildings on the landscape. I suspect our current set of maps are the result of randomly generating thousands of maps, then selecting the best of them and hand-tuning them to work well.

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Originally Posted by Tyger42 Well, good, because that's what I'm gonna tell you. No need to draw this into an argument. The details are nice, but not necessary.

That's subjective. You'd be surprised to know how many people find the details very necessary, me being one of them. However, I just think mitten hands look better for the game's art style. It's a very important detail to me.

I thought about changing the wording, but the CoP certainly didn't "make it" as content given the speed it was pulled out.

The Vault was announced as "coming very soon" and there is at least one player who felt the devs mocked him a bit at a convention when he asked about it and it was then shown on screen as almost ready.

My point was that until you see it, you can't just take the devs' word for it. Actual implementation might be very different from intention.

Personally, I HATE the mittens, but having seen Arachnos Soldier hands, I'm not all that impressed with them, either. Having fingers is one thing, and I've argued for it, but without animating them in a meaningful way, they don't look good. In fact, one of THE key problems I had with the Champions Online visual style was the fingers. Not that they HAD them, but that their hands didn't make good fists with them. They'd leave room between the fingers in a grab and not close the hand properly. With our mittens, you just fold them and you get a balled-up fist.

Fingers are one of the hardest parts of the human body to get right visually, and a lot of both game designers and artists have utterly failed at it. Fingers and toes just never seem to come out right, for some reason, toes especially since most artists just avoid having to show them. A game with good finger animation can look incredible, but a game with BAD finger animation can actually look terrible even if the graphics are otherwise good.

I'm not sure if I'd insist on separate, separately animated fingers, but there is ONE thing I'd really like to see - fingers with indented gaps between them. Right now, fingers are represented by black lines drawn on the texture of the mittens, which are otherwise smooth top and bottom. What I want to see is for the gaps between the fingers to be represented not by a black line, but by a gap in the mesh where the gaps between the fingers should be, with possibly separate finger tips. A lot like how the Monster gloves are, in fact.

That, and I'd like to see bare feet that look like human feet, not like something on borrow from Tomb Raider 2.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

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Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow Personally, I HATE the mittens, but having seen Arachnos Soldier hands, I'm not all that impressed with them, either. Having fingers is one thing, and I've argued for it, but without animating them in a meaningful way, they don't look good. In fact, one of THE key problems I had with the Champions Online visual style was the fingers. Not that they HAD them, but that their hands didn't make good fists with them. They'd leave room between the fingers in a grab and not close the hand properly. With our mittens, you just fold them and you get a balled-up fist. Fingers are one of the hardest parts of the human body to get right visually, and a lot of both game designers and artists have utterly failed at it. Fingers and toes just never seem to come out right, for some reason, toes especially since most artists just avoid having to show them. A game with good finger animation can look incredible, but a game with BAD finger animation can actually look terrible even if the graphics are otherwise good. I'm not sure if I'd insist on separate, separately animated fingers, but there is ONE thing I'd really like to see - fingers with indented gaps between them. Right now, fingers are represented by black lines drawn on the texture of the mittens, which are otherwise smooth top and bottom. What I want to see is for the gaps between the fingers to be represented not by a black line, but by a gap in the mesh where the gaps between the fingers should be, with possibly separate finger tips. A lot like how the Monster gloves are, in fact. That, and I'd like to see bare feet that look like human feet, not like something on borrow from Tomb Raider 2.

But the mitten hands are so adorable! Like cute little plushies! xD

Regarding the feet though, yes. The human feet look terrible in this game.

Pretty much my stance right here. Heck, see my avatar for an example of the kind of graphics in games I've been playing obsessively lately. Give me good gameplay with controls that flow well and graphics can take a dive off a bridge. Any time I see a game preview bragging about how good their graphics are first and foremost, that basically translates into 'we haven't done anything innovative with the gameplay' to me.

(As an aside, at least 3d graphics have gotten to the point where they can truly compete with 2d ones for levels of detail. I used to end up raging every time a game series would 'upgrade' to 3d, since it would look half as good and also play half as well since they spent so much time on the graphics.)

I'm not really against a graphics update, but it does fall into the 'I hope there are other big changes to the game as a whole that haven't been hinted at yet' area for me. Fortunately, all signs point to yes there.

Well, when you put it that way... HELL YES! That would be awesome. It looks like we might get some of that anyhow, thanks to the Mission Architect.

One of my favorite parts of the game is the market, and that's nothing but numbers.

I have a friend who, after reading a comic book, couldn't tell you what anyone said. He knows mostly what they did, but not why. He doesn't think at all about plot or character. But he can talk for an hour about the use of shadow and something about the coloring, and the composition and on and on and on. After I read a comic book, I can tell you exactly who said what and why and what they were doing and why they did it and what it shows about their evolving characters and the hints of backstory and foreshadowing and so on and so forth. But I don't remember much of anything about how stuff looked.

Which game would that be?

Here's an example of the graphics from a game I still play off and on these days after being introduced to it 15 years ago:

Dungeon Crawl: Stone Soup. It's an unofficial branch of Dungeon Crawl (Yet Another Roguelike) that's still being developed and has a tileset option.

I used to play a game that looked liked that on the old 8088...

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Originally Posted by Tyger42 Which game would that be? Here's an example of the graphics from a game I still play off and on these days after being introduced to it 15 years ago:

And if they asked for a fraction of the game's original cost to give you an upgraded version of that very game with a bunch of new features, and most importantly, a 2D graphics upgrade (using pictures instead of ASCII characters), you would believe they're ripping you off and "half assing" an upgrade as someone mentioned?

Damn straight! They could have used that dev time to code in Madman Omar's House of Mimics!

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Originally Posted by Captain_Photon Damn straight! They could have used that dev time to code in Madman Omar's House of Mimics!

...yah, at this point it's a discussion of opinions.

Everyone enjoys a nice portion of graphics. But in games other than FPS their're not the thing that sells the game. And when graphics come with a cost ... there's always better and cheaper options that will stand out due to gameplay. See PS3 vs competition. Same thing on PC's. How many fps lovers upgraded for Crysis ? Some did but not all. Is ''some'' a considerable amount ? Maybe , maybe not. High end graphics always found their place as I said in fps games to due to their type of gameplay where the surrounding and scenery play an important role when it comes to gameplay and they bring a certain type of complexity and detail(S.T.A.L.K.E.R)
Right now to me the super hero mmo market looks like a poker game with CoX, Co and DCUO. same Theme but different games that target the same sort of mmo player. NCSoft probably waits to see what the others too have to bring to the table, therefor I suspect we'll also get some sort of enviroment interaction around the date dcuo will launch as we did get the power customization. I also dont think the ultra settings are the super hot thing about GR and will definately not buy it for that but the engine will probably remove some existing limitations allowing for more things to be added to this mmo so they can keep up with the market.

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Originally Posted by Perfect_Pain So then I am in the minority here thinking that CoX gameplay is above average on the fun scale... and fixing the graphics like they are doing is only going to be the - a la mode - to my gaming experience here? I believe we are all aware of how desperatly we need new game content in the game. So thats like a - given -...

You're not in the minority.

As a student in the field of Game Development, I've said it over and over again in this thread. But, as expected, everyone's opinions seems to make any research, actual statistics, and professional advice obsolete. Here it is again:

Graphics goes hand-in-hand with gameplay and content.

Simply debating which one is more important for the well-being of a game is a pointless, meaningless discussion.

Since it seems that the "Pfft! Graphics are not important!" people are completely ignoring facts and observations from people who work in the field, here is the quote from one of my earlier posts on this subject:

The following is taken from the book Game Design and Development, written by Ernest Adams and Andrew Rollings. It is a university text book being taught in the field of Software Engineering and Game Design:

"Video games are an art form, so aesthetics are a part of their design..."

"...a game with clumsy animation, a muddy soundtrack, trite dialog, or sloppy artwork will disappoint players even if its gameplay is good."

"An ugly or awkward video game is a bad one, no matter how innovative its design or impressive its technology. Part of your job [as a game developer] is to give your players aesthetic pleasure."

A little further on:

"We [game developers] believe the graphics versus gameplay debate is no longer a meaningful one. The truth is that graphics and gameplay must work together to produce the total play experience. The graphics create the setting, which both sells the game and involves the player in the game's fantasy. The gameplay provides the challenge and things for the player to do. Both are essential to the player's enjoyment of the game."

Are we REALLY gonna continue this pointless debate?

If you think the graphics of a particular game are lacking, or if it's content and gameplay is lacking, then that's your opinion and it is as worthless as mine. But do not claim that the same should be true for everyone else. And because of that, do not criticize a COMPLETELY OPTIONAL FEATURE in an upcoming expansion SOLELY BASED ON YOUR OPINION.

Ok, I get it, but at some point, will the needle bore a hole in the broken record?


Thank you for bringing this to the forefront again. It should be stickied.


The mittens are why my characters mostly wear gloves. And why do the bare feet look even smaller and more cramped than boots? They're HORRIBLE.

--NT