Pictures of your games Part 5

[sorophx]

is it more like RAGE or Borderlands? not exactly the same, but what type of game it gravitates towards?

[nipsen]

 

 

It does look like Mass Effect 3, only uglier.

Dude no, this is one of the best looking games I played on XBone so far. The fidelity of the textures and lighting is epic. And you can really admire the detail of the creatures you shoot at. It does look a lot muddier on last gen consoles though

 

Those screenies don't do it justice, then.

 

..actually they do. Bungie have been very clever with the technical restrictions they're working with. Not in the sense of drawing more out of the hardware, but when it comes to spending resources on the layers in the picture that matter. To that type of game, with this design.

 

For example:

So here's probably a ps4 shot. The very close edges and objects, including the weapon model, and so on, has a sharpening pass of some sort. Texture detail is very high in that area around the player. Very likely the animation frequency for targets is much higher in this layer, etc. At the ground between that sphere and the far layer, there's basically nothing. The craters and the snow is more or less a complete blur, and there's nothing that moves here in the scenery. You can see this in the normal gameplay and any screenshot, that there's a fairly close distance where everything looks like you should be wearing glasses. On close range, however, things look perfectly fine. And the long range mobs as well have a switched out model I think, so that looks good and isn't scaled too badly. Beyond that it's a flat layer with background.

 

So when the game moves during any action - not in the least because the AI will scramble to get out of the mid-range blur - you obviously notice the close layer and the very detailed flat layer behind that. And this does give off a very solid impression if you don't.. look too closely, or don't use semi-auto weapons all that much, etc..

 

The dropship in the pic here is another good example. The closest part of the ship and the cannon effects, etc., are very detailed. Everything further back, any particle effects that don't eventually approach you, and so on, are a blurry mess. The entire ship does exist, but it's been created to sit in a particular part of the sky with a particular type of lighting on beforehand. And because Bungie have been so good at putting it all together, and because they're so used to how this works -- they've kind of used the limitations to their advantage. With animation, with effects, and with the textures on flat surfaces - and not to mention by avoiding indirect effects that might affect framerate in an unpredictable way - that look very good most of the time.

 

So, you know, objectively speaking, this is an improvement over, for example, Call of Duty's "super density top layer and scaled down blur for everything else outside the cutscenes" approach.

 

But it's funny that Team ICO managed to draw a more impressive variant of this type of "visual science" out of the ps2 in 2006. But there you go. It's a pretty game with lots of well made visuals.

[nipsen]

"Super-awesome-double-heroic-kneeldrop at the beginning of every mission-Stance!"

[nipsen]

"Ink black bolt".

[Keyrock]

Meet Keyrock's Ranger Crew:

 

The Leader - Tallulah

 

The Sniper and Tech - Rayyan

 

The Medic - Makiko

 

The Meathead - Grimey

[Bos_hybrid]

 

Meet Keyrock's Ranger Crew:

The Medic - Makiko

 

God damn it, you stole my Asian medic. They even wear the same clothes. I demand justice.

[Keyrock]

God damn it, you stole my Asian medic. They even wear the same clothes. I demand justice.

 

Pistols at dawn, unless you prefer a different dueling weapon.  Your choice. 

[Bos_hybrid]

 

God damn it, you stole my Asian medic. They even wear the same clothes. I demand justice.

 

Pistols at dawn, unless you prefer a different dueling weapon.  Your choice. 

 

 

Nah it's alright, I'll just steal your giant American Indian women concept.

[Majek]

If Destiny was PS4/Xbone only it probably would have looked even better.

[Lexx]

Not exactly my smartest idea:

 

[sesobebo]

[CoM_Solaufein]

Think I found Mad Max's Interceptor.

[nipsen]

Looks a lot like a Ford Falcon, at least.

[Majek]

pic

Magnus art, awesome. o.ob

[CoM_Solaufein]

I was out of my league.

[sorophx]

I remember that place. there was an easter egg there in the beta, I wonder if it's still there

[nipsen]

The Stone Beetles have had their defense lowered in the new beta version. So the non-linear approach to defense converts normal hits to critical hits more often. Just as the Monk converts normal hits to grazes because of the class' high defense.

[melkathi]

Cleaning the science lab

[SadExchange]

The Stone Beetles have had their defense lowered in the new beta version. So the non-linear approach to defense converts normal hits to critical hits more often. Just as the Monk converts normal hits to grazes because of the class' high defense.

I have to say after playing Wasteland 2 a bunch, seeing the gameplay of Torment and watching some beta footage of Pillars of Eternity, I really am enjoying what these developers are able to offer with Unity and hope that we see more games in the same vein as these titles.

[nipsen]

I have to say after playing Wasteland 2 a bunch, seeing the gameplay of Torment and watching some beta footage of Pillars of Eternity, I really am enjoying what these developers are able to offer with Unity and hope that we see more games in the same vein as these titles.

Mm. It must be a real boost for Josh and Feargus to be able to prove that a two-year development of a project like this (with a small team) is actually possible as well.

 

Another impressive thing is that they've demonstrated the process openly. We hear regularly - even from Bioware and so on - that modern development cycles dislike complex story-driven games. That writing story-driven games with branching content is out of date, that it can't be done. And you might say something like "but look at Alpha Protocol?". And they'll say "but that sucked and was full of bugs because it was rushed and they ran out of time", etc.

 

And then PoE turns up. With the framework done and the levels sketched out early, the story written on top of it. The ruleset developed on paper independently (as far as I can tell). The real-time with pause system implementing the ruleset. All developed concurrently. And then the visuals and polish on top of that.

 

So that must be fantastic. A planning success like that. To be able to simply say "PoE" and have that count as an argument every time someone claims it's impossible and/or untenable and certainly not profitable regardless, etc.. Great for us as well, of course. Just hope it actually sells a bit as well - that'd be the final nail in the coffin for the entire "everyone wants shallow ****" wave lately.

 

"Sword flairs in solitude".

[HoonDing]

 

 

 

[melkathi]

I think you are th first peron I know wo has outed himself as playing Jack Keane.

[HoonDing]

huh?

[melkathi]

When GOG was giving away free copies of games, Jack Keane was the one that was taking the longest to be given away. So people were joking about nobody wanting to play it even for free.

[Volourn]

"To be able to simply say "PoE" and have that count as an argument every time someone claims it's impossible and/or untenable and certainly not profitable regardless"
 

Eh. Don't overrate PE. So far, it doesn't look as good as it was supposed to be. Now, WL2, outside of the annoying little bugs, is fantastic.

 

btw, AP did suck in every way manageable. If you are going to suck up to Obsidian, actually mention their awesome games like FO:NV or  MOTB. Not AP or the PE ebta.

 

Also, people keep claiming that PE's writing is the 'best ever'. But, how? Because of the deep story of ogre hunting? LMAO

 

 

WL2 > PE