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Justinian

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Everything posted by Justinian

  1. Justinian
    I'm impressed. The Vithrack look amazing and the Xaurips are animated with flair. Much better than the first batch of character animations. Can't wait for the beta!
  2. Justinian
    Nice. Earlier than expected which should allow extra time to tweak and squash bugs. Hopefully it will be more representative of the final game than the Wasteland 2 beta.
  3. Justinian
    A couple of things that stand out as particularly jarring to me still is the lack of nuance when characters turn. Aloth snaps into another direction while he's running as if he's a sprite. Another issue is that the shadow map doesn't adhere to parallax. This can be seen when Aloth runs into the shadowed area, and his character darkens immediately when his head reaches the shadow, rather than remaining lit until his entire body is behind the building which casts the shadow. That said, the game is looking great, and really gives off the feeling of an infinite engine game as opposed to a 3D one.
  4. Justinian
    The animation could really do with some work. The walk/run cycles look OK, except for the zombie - needs more shambling and movement in hips. Attack animations are just not very good though. As someone above mentioned, they all look like they are pitching a ball. Also, why do 3 completely different creatures in size, agility and disposition have the same swing and follow through? Why does the zombie return to a fearsome strike pose after an attack, when it's seen earlier shaking and barely able to balance? Maybe look toward Diablo 3 for some guidance on how a wide variety of creatures of hugely differing sizes are animated. It's simply a masterclass on how to bring character to creatures through animation and modelling.
  5. Justinian
    This happened to me too on the Steam version I was really hoping Obsidian would release a polished game and shake off their reputation somewhat, but alas it's not to be...
  6. Justinian
    I agree. The latest iteration of atributes is an improvement over the previous one but quite a few of the attributes don't make much sense. I understand Josh's rationale for streamlining them in this way, but in the end, "mighty" wizards and "intelligent" barbarians just doesn't sit well with me. Why would a wizard who is able to move heavy objects have more potent spells? How does a Barbarian's ability to navigate dialogue intelligently have any bearing on how effective his physical AoE attacks are? It breaks basic coherence and credibility.
  7. Justinian
    I'm currently playing Neverwinter Nights 2 and the atrocious party control is driving me nuts. I turned all the AI off since it was unreliable and because I like controlling each character fully, but I'm finding that has it's own set of problems. Characters will inexplicably stop attacking an assigned enemy, not follow attack commands, and give the general impression that I am not in control. This has raised some concerns regarding the party control in PoE. Have AI "behaviours" been confirmed? If so, and if AI is turned off, will characters actually follow commands with some semblance of obedience like they did in BG? Maybe the issue is with some settings I've missed in NWN2? I find it hard to believe that in an RPG centered on party control, that the control can be so unreliable.
  8. Justinian
    I love how this style of graphics pulls off a coherence and consistency in detail that you don't see in 3D titles. The fact that there is only one angle to worry about, everything is pre-rendered in exquisite detail and that every pixel of the screen has been polished with a fine eye for detail, makes all the difference. Contrast it with something like Wasteland 2 where every location is filled with repeated textures and blocky geometry, all exacerbated with the terrible camera that you're fighting with every moment of the game. Ugh.
  9. Justinian
    One of the best things about using a U shaped UI on a 16:9 screen is that it can give you the same 16:9 perspective of the game. The screenshots where the BG2 Widescreen mod UI was pasted over it actually looked really good, despite taking up more physical space than the bottom par in pixels. Alas once again I fear I have to state that I do not actually think this will ever be used to avoid some misquote. While it would be nice to retain the 16:9 ratio with a U shape UI, I think the focusing of icons and character portraits in one general location is easier on the player during gameplay. That said, I definitely think the first mock-up can be improved.
  10. Justinian
    Serial soul stealer/killer with multiple personality disorder leading us on a merry detective chase.
  11. Justinian
    Everything I've heard about this dungeon sounds fantastic. I love the idea of the main quest leading you to a relatively inconspicuous dungeon which ties in with the story, and then the player finding out that both the mystery and extent of the dungeon go far far further than they first expected. It's just a shame that we all know how many levels the dungeon has already so we're always aware of how much further we have to go. I can imagine how much more enjoyment someone with no knowledge of a megadungeon would have exploring it - espescially as they have to pace themselves throughout the game to overcome it's challenges.
  12. Justinian
    I'm really happy to hear this. A solid timeframe with just enough vagueness to allow for some extra time and polish. Makes the waiting harder though.
  13. Justinian
    The whole alpha thing doesn't really hold weight for me, since this seems far more fundamental than simply "missing animation polish". This is what leads me to think it's intentional in order to increase PoE's faithfulness to infinity engine games. As such, I'm sort of on the fence about it all. On one hand I think it's kind of cool they've "retro-fied" the game for the sake of nostalgia, but on the other hand I'll miss the smooth animation I'd come to expect from 3D models. I'd like to hear Obsidian clarify this point.
  14. Justinian
    The reasoning is so simple I can't believe how anyone can be confused: 1) A game designed for a precision pointer like a mouse is impossible to play on a gamepad. This rules out consoles. 2) Redesigning the game to work well with 2 completely different control schemes requires significant extra resources and most certainly results in compromises to gameplay. The Steambox is a solution to a problem no one has. The only reason it exists is to play PC ports of console games on a TV and so that Valve have something to compete with in the battle of the living room against the next gen consoles.
  15. Justinian
    After watching the trailer a few times I realised why the animation and character models reminded me so much of Infinity engine games - the 3D models behave like 8 directional 2D sprites! I have always assumed that having 3D models in the game would mean character turning would be smooth rotation (like in Diablo 3), but either through a limitation in the engine or deliberate choice, Obsidian have decided to limit the viewing angles of characters and mobs to just 8. Has anyone else noticed? Has this been mentioned before? What do you all think of this implementation?
  16. Justinian
    Mine's missing
  17. Justinian
    Fantastic site and teaser video Obsidian! Totally worth the wait. I can pretty much echo the sentiments from others in this thread in that the gameplay footage looks great, but there is room for additional work in character animations and perhaps spell effects. Overall, the footage screams "infinity engine game" and evoked a thrilling sense of nostalgia and excitement in me. I can't wait for the final game!
  18. Justinian
    What are the chances we get the first gameplay footage this week? I'm giddy at the prospect...it just seems...right.
  19. Justinian
    I play Shadowrun Returns on my Surface Pro just fine, albeit at a lower resolution because of the smaller screen. It hitches slightly during combat at times, but is quite playable. I imagine Eternity will be slightly more resource intensive than SR but with the 20% improved CPU performance and 50% improved graphics performance in Surface Pro 2, it shouldn't be an issue.
  20. Justinian
    I suspect it's a case of different LOD at various distances - a scaling down of the higher detail geometry in the game view. Even then I don't see why any scaling of geometry should be necessary. I would expect there to be ample geometry budget for characters since almost all of the environment is prerendered 2D.
  21. Justinian
    I don't think anything was cut on the relaunch, but starting out again with the existing backers and a lower goal has certainly helped them out greatly.
  22. Justinian
    Relaunched and already funded
  23. Justinian
    Brilliant work! Love the battle-wearied warrior priest shining through. Her face is exquisite.
  24. Justinian
    It's good to hear there is good potential for tundra and snowy environments - I always love those in games There also appears to be some mountainous formations to the south on the map, so it should give good justification to more drastic changes of environment in a relatively small region.
  25. Justinian
    I think a nice brisk default walking pace like in BG would be great. In addition though, what do you guys think about the characters breaking into a jog if you click a destination offscreen? The rationale being if you're clicking a distant destination, you kinda want them to hightail it.
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