Arx Demo... Not bad... Not great either - by TazMan
TazMan on 4/3/2002 at 06:39
I'll try to answer this... the translation is a bit rough so I'm having a bit of trouble understanding...
Quote:
Originally posted by Le Magot d'Oz I'm not agree !
all your complains are -almost- graphical detail : no new graphic after beta !
Yes... graphical detail and interface issues on the "non-technical" criticisms. Sorry... texture seams are not commercial quality, and haven't been for ages in most games. But there are technincal problems too... which will hopefully be worked out by final release.
Quote:
Originally posted by Le Magot d'Oz 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 ?
I have a Geforce 3 Ti500... and the water is almost INVISIBLE in the pondlike area. The water from the waterfall... looks like a semi-clear plain white animated texture. Heh... sorry... that's aweful. Hell... games as old as the original UNREAL (1997... 5 years old) have way better water.... and that's low tech stuff by today's standards. Who cares? People that buy modern games do. Slapping something in that looks worse than 5 year old technology, doesn't mix well with the rest of ARX's splendor... and it kills game sales.
Quote:
Originally posted by Le Magot d'Oz 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)
That's a bunch of Bull. I run Triliniear. A seam is a seam... if it's in the texture... it's there. No amount of Video Card filtering will "eliminate" a texture seam. As I said... I'm making an Underworld mod for Morrowind.... I have ZERO texture seams. Now granted, some of my textures aren't as pretty as ARX's... but there are many programs out there that let you edit seams out.... and it's inexcusable in a commercial title.
Quote:
Originally posted by Le Magot d'Oz 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... This is not life... it's a game, and getting wacked to a point where you can't swing back from the first hit, because you are totally turned away from your opponent... then the opponent gets a few more "free hits" on you... sucks for a game. It makes the combat kludgy. Kludgy interface + kludgy combat + kludgy detail = commercial bomb (Won't sell well).
Does that mean I won't get Arx? No.... I'm too much of an Underworld fan to pass it up, so I'll probably still buy it. It means if Arkane-Studios and Fishtank want to really
sell this game
well.... they better bring it up to commecial quality or it will only sell to a "few old school fans" in the US.
Taz
Zerker on 4/3/2002 at 14:20
Hey Tazman, one minor point you might not be aware of... WATER IS CLEAR!! It's NOT BLUE! Or it doesn't reflect an incredible amount of light, ala Unreal (very green water/yellow).
Geeze, one game actually has semi-realistic water, and you complain!
And another thing, water doesn't ripple on its own. In an underground cavern, where there's no wind, the water should be perfectly still, unless something disturbs its surface. Granted, the water in the demo is flowing, and should appear more as such, the Ark team has a limited budget and limited time, and that would hardly be first priority :).
They're not exactly going to be programming a procedural texture engine like Unreal's just to have water that animates like that. Need I remind you that Uneral was in development for four years for a reason. Although it is 5 years old, there still hasn't been any better water than the procedural textures of Unreal.
TazMan on 4/3/2002 at 17:40
Quote:
Originally posted by Zerker Geeze, one game actually has semi-realistic water, and you complain!
ROFLMAO... ok... whatever... if you say so.
:tsktsk:
Taz
PS:
Oh... by the way... if anyone at Arkane is watching... here is a handy dandy little program I use to eliminate my texture seams:
(
http://www.mediachance.com/pseam/) PhotoSEAM
It's a pretty powerful little editor, specifically meant for taking out seams... though it does a few other things too.... I mainly create my textures in Photoshop, and if there are still seams in it, even though I created it as a seamless texture (which does happen if you get too fancy)... I use this little program and take out the seams! ;)
Hope that helps,
Taz
Le Magot d'Oz on 9/3/2002 at 02:10
sorry for this rough english (Nethawk's french is also rough ;) or it might be Babelfish french ;) ) : I was tired (2 AM GMT means 3 o'clock here and I have to wake up at 6 and half...), I usually try to be understood...
your request seemed to me of minor concern... (and I do not understand what's wrong with the water : one of the most beautifull I've ever seen so far, althought it was not animated -except for the texture- or hadn't any kind of particles system ; note that I'm using a GeForce 256 DDR : the water is ABSOLUTELY NOT invisible, it's only clear)
anyway the seams issue seems to be fixed already
Entropy on 9/3/2002 at 02:50
Might I suggest that people complaining about visual anomalies post a cropped screenshot or two to a) illustrate the point and b) make it possible to compare the images on the systems of people complaining and the system where people think it's fine - it could be a bug making the image look different.
Zerker on 9/3/2002 at 16:33
Tazman, I suggest you pour water into a bathtub and study it, you seem to have trouble understanding the basic appearance of water :)
