Arx Demo... Not bad... Not great either - by TazMan
TazMan on 2/3/2002 at 20:56
Well.... Being an avid Underworld fan and since I'm making an Underworld Mod for Morrowind... after running the Arx Demo... I think it's so-so... needs a little "polish" to make it great... Which I hope the devs do before final release.
Issues I see:
~ Installation program blows chunks. Period.
~ Loads way too slow.... My machine will sit there for a minute or so before the loading bar even starts... then sits for another minute after loading bar is full. (Maybe a DX 8.1 Problem)
~ Texture seams are visible. A big "no no" in this day and age, especially on square / flat surfaces like the textures on the brick floor.
~ Head bob WAY overdone... highly annoying.
~ Interface is a little rough... not bad but needs a little work (Not talking about drawing runes, but the interface to do stuff in general)
~ The water BLOWS. Gotta be the worst animated water I've seen in years. Need to really work on that. Hell... even Half-Life animated water is better! Sheesh!
~ You get spun around (or knocked out of kilter) too much when you get "hit"... that's really annoying. (Might be a low level thing though, so I reserve judgement on that)
~ Some collision problems... you can stick a chair through a wall... LOL
Otherwise the game is pretty good.... just needs some polish, that's all. ;)
Taz
xman on 3/3/2002 at 16:07
You should keep in mind that it's only a beta version and not the final game.
Arkane released it in order to feed our impatience/curiosity and to get feedback about bugs and suggestions.
Therefore it's normal to find bugs, crashes and all... But past these glitches, which will certainly be fixed, the game looks just GRRREAT and I'll buy it for sure!
TazMan on 3/3/2002 at 19:01
Quote:
Originally posted by xman You should keep in mind that it's only a beta version and not the final game.
Arkane released it in order to feed our impatience/curiosity and to get feedback about bugs and suggestions.
Therefore it's normal to find bugs, crashes and all... But past these glitches, which will certainly be fixed, the game looks just GRRREAT and I'll buy it for sure! I know it's beta.... that's why I said "Which I hope the devs do before final release."
Some of it is MAJOR work though.... like getting all the texture seams out. If the game is due in April... they don't have much time.
Regards,
Taz
xman on 3/3/2002 at 19:15
I haven't noticed many seams problems with textures...
I noticed indeed a few problems with the wooden floor in the tavern (square textures are drawn by 2 triangles, as usual but sometimes, the 2 triangles of a square do not match. But all in all, textures look great.
TazMan on 3/3/2002 at 19:40
Quote:
Originally posted by xman I haven't noticed many seams problems with textures...
I noticed indeed a few problems with the wooden floor in the tavern (square textures are drawn by 2 triangles, as usual but sometimes, the 2 triangles of a square do not match. But all in all, textures look great. Heh... after you escape the jail... andkill the guard.... look at the floor around the table and chair.... you can clearly see texture seams in the brick floor. ;)
Taz
Nethawk on 3/3/2002 at 19:48
Raf answered my more flaming posts quite professionally and he said he was made aware of some of the issues and planned to go to work on them. He has a large task ahead of him, but I'd say he's planning to do a good job. The game has loads of potential though. If the team does a great job for the final release, I'll definitely be playing. One thing I would do as a developer is look at all the recent games that are the highest sellers in its genre and lump together all the things that made them both easy to use and replayable. Interface, storyline, sound & voice acting, are some of these elements. Really, there is no excuse for not having a quicksave feature in any game nowadays. I didn't buy Hitman: Codename 47 when it first came out simply because it was third person. They listened to the feedback and decided to make it a toggleable option. They also decided to add a quicksave feature. Winning moves. Now I'll be buying the sequel for sure. The Max Payne team also didn't include a first person option, and look at how many customers they lost. It's not how a developer wants us to play the game that counts - it's how WE decide to play the game.
TazMan on 3/3/2002 at 23:34
Quote:
Originally posted by Nethawk Raf answered my more flaming posts quite professionally and he said he was made aware of some of the issues and planned to go to work on them. He has a large task ahead of him, but I'd say he's planning to do a good job. The game has loads of potential though. If the team does a great job for the final release, I'll definitely be playing. One thing I would do as a developer is look at all the recent games that are the highest sellers in its genre and lump together all the things that made them both easy to use and replayable. Interface, storyline, sound & voice acting, are some of these elements. Really, there is no excuse for not having a quicksave feature in any game nowadays. I didn't buy Hitman: Codename 47 when it first came out simply because it was third person. They listened to the feedback and decided to make it a toggleable option. They also decided to add a quicksave feature. Winning moves. Now I'll be buying the sequel for sure. The Max Payne team also didn't include a first person option, and look at how many customers they lost. It's not how a developer wants us to play the game that counts - it's how WE decide to play the game. Well... my main concern is their time limit, if this game is supposed to be out by April.
The game has
A LOT of potential, I just doubt that with their small team, they can get the "kinks" out of it before final release. I hope they do, though. :)
Lemee put it this way... for a beta release demo... you can surely tell it's beta. :D LOL
I'll repeat though...
The top 5 non-technical things I find annoying is:
1) Overdone head bob
2) Getting knocked so hard off camera when you get hit, that you can't swing back
3) The texture seams that are visble
4) The very bad animated water
5) The interface being a bit encumbersome
Most of that is easy to fix, granted... but some would take quite a bit of time to fix.
I'd like to see:
1) "Head bob" and "knocked around when you are hit" adjustments in the options menu.
2) Texture seams eliminated
3) Water totally redone (That's actually a pretty simple Animated texture change, if their engine allows it)
4) And as for the interface... I suggest
generally (not specifically) mimicking Deus Ex or System Shock 2 to get a smooth useable interface (with medieval like graphics).
Taz
Nethawk on 4/3/2002 at 00:36
Agreed Tazman, agreed:thumb:
Le Magot d'Oz on 4/3/2002 at 02:00
I'm not agree !
all your complains are -almost- graphical detail : no new graphic after beta !
the water looks terrific ! have you set up at the top of the waterfall and watch between your feet ?
animation ? what need to be animated ? when you throw a fish away ? who cares ?
texture seams are seldom visible and if you really want to see them in place of the wonderfull environment in front of your eyes ! but be sure you will see no more once the anisotropic filtering activated ! (or at least the trilinear filtering)
knocked to much around when you are hit ? I had hardly notice it ! and even so, I'd prefer not stay in front of my opponnent, letting me arm my future hit ; anyway in life you aren't often able to response immediately after been hit...
Nethawk on 4/3/2002 at 03:13
Monsieur Le Magot d'Oz...
[SPOILER]Monsieur le Magot, Taz et moi n'avions pas dit que le jeu est terrible, tout simplement que d'autres ameliorations seraient fortement recommandees. Dans l'etat qu'il est, il ne merites pas d'etre mis sur le marche, c'est tout. Je suis sur que Paz y mettra les ajustements necessaires avant Avril. De toute facon, c'est bien que Raf ait venu ici pour savoir quoi on y pensait, non? [/SPOILER]
