All Things Art: Building Edition

Speaking of museums, I always wanted to see the following instance tilesets:

*Museum
*Apartment building (seriously!)
*Airport
*Mansion
*School (ala that one University instance)
*Elevated highway (ala the Matrix - no buildings, just road)
*Nemesis base

Quote:

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.

Looking at that new video doc about GR, one thing that might improve the current zones would be to make the trees look more like those more detailed Praetorian trees.

David, might I direct you to this thread and its posted link?

I think a lot can be gained from applying that algorithm properly.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow City of Heroes is a game about freedom of expression and variety of experiences far more so than it is about representing any one theme, topic or genre.

FPARN

On to business: One interior office map that really bugs the heck out of me is the one where the corridors run in a complete square with the map entrance on the interior of the loop. The elevator is usually on the "back" side of the loop. Needless to say, this map never corresponds to a building where the entrance is enclosed in a courtyard, since no such building exists that I know of.

I think there's also a warehouse map that behaves in this fashion.

Sorry, don't have the map names handy.

When Dark Astoria gets a makeover, it should totally have the winding narrow streets and gothic buildings that are in Bloody Bay - and part of the war walls should be broken down like in Siren's Call, so that the sea comes into the zone a bit to form a saltwater swamp in one corner, so the Banished Pantheon can have the right atmosphere for their voodoo

The in-game advertising idea never seemed to take off - probably because it wasn't quite implemented properly, but nevermind that. What strikes me is that very few of the billboards in the game are well situated for exposure to passing heroes - they're not in high-traffic areas.

Worse, those that we can/do see often are... boring, they're just scenery, easy to ignore. So, here are some ideas for 'outdoor advertising' signage:

• Have a few more of them, of various sizes.
• Place them where the traffic can see them - Okay, Not in the truly central areas, like Atlas Plaza, or Freedom Court, but out on the roads and near the tram stations and inter-zone gateways. Orient them so that Character traffic will actually see them!
• Update existing signage imagery to Ultra Mode clarity - if we can't see it and read it, it won't be seen, or read.
• Until or unless actual advertisers buy into the concept, put up 'dummy ads' and have them change, occasionally. Perhaps at regular Issues and other updates. Real billboards are not static for years, but are regularly updated.
• Generate these 'dummy ads' in the same way as the recent 'Declare Your Allegiance' contest - let the Players create the content. Repeat the contest regularly - don't let the content get stale.

i think they had already tried selling billboard ad space and nobody took them up on it. It'd be kind of funny if they just had ads for NCSoft's other games on billboards. Not like NCSoft would have to pay itself to put up ads in their own game.

Museums would be interesting. Galaxy City could finally live up to its name and have an aeronautics and space museum located in it. Or some kind of science museum. The Arena being the big attraction of Galaxy...yeah, never took off the ground.

ugh... can't believe in all these pages I totally forgot about this HUGE request that would make a HUGE HUGE difference to indoor maps:

So the basic lab tileset is used time and again, right? To represent secret labs, research facilities, underwater bases and orbital bases.

How can you differentiate between them though? Most of us, even those with good imaginations often feel it is the same darn blue lab map over and over. Why not create a couple rooms with windows looking out to a world geometry? It might just be a glass tube connecting two rooms of the lab/sub base/orbital platform. But depending upon context, we may see ourselves as moving through a glass tube bridging two skyscrapers in steel canyon or aeon city, or a tube connecting pods at the bottom of the sea as a shark or two swims by in the distance and kelp waves to and fro, or the moon and earth below as sections of a large space station spin at either end of the tube.

These are just windows... to non-reachable geometry, much like pocket D was for ages till the ski resort was opened. But it could make a WORLD of difference to refresh those maps and remind people where they are at any give point.

On a related note, the listing lab maps inside the new positron TF and the now aging faultline arc are wonderful. Have you ever considered putting us inside a listing ship or any other sort of map? It's a really effective gimmick.

I'd love to see different styles of architecture, please. Especially Art Deco!

Maybe we could have "historical" districts to add flavor and immersion -- distinctive decorations both outside *and* inside the buildings?

And, of course, how about some of that St. Martial neon goodness in parts of Paragon, please?

Thanks!

RAWR!

Bumping this thread because it's cool and important.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow City of Heroes is a game about freedom of expression and variety of experiences far more so than it is about representing any one theme, topic or genre.

Would it be possible to name all the streets (where feasible) and then put up street signs with those names on there... give players a 'real-world' point of reference when finding places, contacts, objects, events and each other?

That's something I've wanted since the first day I played. Of course, it might be easier if the streets actually acted like real streets. I wouldn't know what part to name what when it's just a long road with no outlets ending in a circle cul de sac.

LEGION OF VALOR - Be a part of the Legend!

Also going to put my thumbs up in approval of the idea of signs with street names! Sure, maybe not feasible, but it would still be fantastic!
It would improve immersion AND allow players another means of locating things.

"Need help at -3431.1 0.0 78.2!"
"What?"
"Need help on the corner of Bold and Hughson!"
"AH!"

Can we get some nice restaurants/pubs. Every time I'm wonder around Nerva, I see some really nice outdoor seating. Yet the only 'social' indoor atmosphere (leaving certain aspects aside,) are the bars Pocket D which have all the atmosphere of a college town dance club the morning after a weekend party. The Tiki Club is nice, but it is not accessible to everyone.

Seating is lacking or unusable, the place is never clean and most of the bar stools have been stolen.

It'd be nice if there were several locations throughout the zones that are restaurants on the outside, and if you click on the door, you enter someplace like this...


or


or


or

The only thing I would like to see added is MUSEUMS.

Both as an instance mission map ("prevent theft", "defeat awakening mummy", etc, etc), and as a place for heroes to wander / gather.

We already have lots of stuff to put in it, from the Base Editor. Although adding dinosaur skeletons would also be awesome.

Before playing City of Heroes, if you'd asked me the one map a superhero game would HAVE to have, I would have put museum over bank, office building, and cave.

If anything is deserving of a custom building, it's the Hero 1 Monument. It doesn't have to be huge, but it should be distinct.

Heroes should be sent to that building for the cape mission.

Additionally, players should be able to enter the building and see the same things (sans villains of course) without having the mission - it is a public building and monument after all!

(If it's a problem to have a shared mission door and publicly-accessible door, then I'd recommend having two sets of doors; one for the mission entrance and one for the "public" entrance.)