Goblin Squad Member
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The latest video I've been able to find is:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6JUdZlu9cvc
This is pre-alpha footage. I am hopeful we can expect significant improvement in the graphics quality, texture quality, visual content depth and character motion quality when the game is complete.
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Goblin Squad Member
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For me graphics is overrated. Game mechanics is way more important. But I understand that in this modern day, graphics is often put above all others because that seems to be what most people look at to determine if they want to play or not.
But I've seen games developed that basically sucked because they focused too much on graphics.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Relatively tiny budget. Absolutely smaller than normal staff.... Plus the fact that it is not in any way billed as a finished product at the Early Enrollment stage, which was Nihimon's hint there... :)
Much of the stonework, wood, buildings, etc... are already pretty good.
Graphics are of low importance to me, compared to the frustration of mechanics that fail or time out.
I can wait and work with what I have for the chance to help shape it all to readiness for the "wide open" market.
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Goblin Squad Member
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It is sad, but I have had friends tell me that they won't pay to play Early Enrollment with me because they don't like the graphics.
But that is ok, I won't play Elder Scrolls Online with them because I think it is same old, same old boring MMO. So I guess that makes us even.
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Goblin Squad Member
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But that is ok, I won't play Elder Scrolls Online with them because I think it is same old, same old boring MMO. So I guess that makes us even.
I spent the $60 to play ESO and for the first week it was fine, but after that every time I logged in to play I found I was falling asleep at the "keybored". While I do love Elder Scrolls lore, and they did a great job with the graphics and really even the quest lines, chains and stories...it was not compelling. A played reached "end game" in less than 36 hours, the character models were very "wooden" and manikin-like, there was no auction house unless you were in a guild, most of the guilds were not appealing, and it was full of bugs that caused you to fall through the ground, get trapped in stairs and fall through bridges, etc. Pretty, but not compelling.
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Goblin Squad Member
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It is sad, but I have had friends tell me that they won't pay to play Early Enrollment with me because they don't like the graphics.
People said the same about WoW with its cartoony graphics. Once their friends started playing it, they came around. Relationships with actual real-life people are what keep people playing MMOs. Even if you've never met those people face-to-face in your life, the relationships you build in-game are what keep you coming back.
PFO is founded upon the idea of developing relationships by maximizing meaningful human interaction. That puts it in a very strong position to succeed in this market.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Graphics don't bother me, so long as I like the art style.
The animation, however, is important. A nice vid on animation: GDC Vault: Animation Bootcamp, an indie approach
Possibly the current animation the knees are a bit stiff and I've not seen much of combat animation but it looks decent to my unprofessional eyes at any rate and satisfyingly attempting to choreograph actual strokes as opposed to superhero strokes.
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To me the graphics are okay at this point and i really like the artstyle.
What needs some work is the animations themselves. What needs a lot of work is how characters relate to each other and the npcs. This might be the hardest part to get right, but i think its very vital to how real and solid the gameworld feels. The devs have adressed the animations and that it will improved later in the development, but it cannot be stressed enough imo.
Someone mentioned how WoW wasnt graphically advanced when it launched, which i guess is correct. WoW tho had some pretty smooth animations, which i hope PFO will get right aswell.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I'll second the animations being much more important than the graphics. Uncanny Valley is a hypothesis that humans experience revulsion when animations or movement of something human-like is not quite human-like enough. There are ongoing studies currently exploring this.
WoW had very smooth animations and I think that caused people to connect with their character very easily right from the beginning.
I'm not sure how difficult it is to get animations correct in Unity, but I hope the devs put much more effort into that than into the graphics.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Rather sad that many seem to think a choice has to be made between visuals and gameplay as if only one can be at superior levels but not both. Also rather sad that many seem to think the people that work on the gameplay mechanics are the same people that develop the visual content. No one is violating any MMO hipster code if they want graphics and character motion standards from this decade to be satisfied when the game is released.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Rather sad that many seem to think a choice has to be made between visuals and gameplay as if only one can be at superior levels but not both. Also rather sad that many seem to think the people that work on the gameplay mechanics are the same people that develop the visual content. No one is violating any MMO hipster code if they want graphics and character motion standards from this decade to be satisfied when the game is released.
I don't think anyone is saying they that good graphics and solid game mechanics are mutually exclusive. I believe that everyone here just agrees that the priority is and should be on mechanics and when Goblinworks has that taken care of then graphics can get some love.
The reality is that given the budget GW is working with, PFO is going to be a work in progress for a while. One that we as members of the goblin squad are lucky enough to assist with.
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Goblin Squad Member
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@doug did you watch the link I provided? I mean you can have 2d highly responsive mario and it FEELS GREAT for decades and decades (even pacman feels good to this day!) compared to some highly complex model such as a giant boss in an mmo that is static: It FEELS TERRIBLE even if it looks fantastic. I guess that is the point I was making.
I wonder if a good solution wouldn't be to open the possibility of graphic modding. Everyone I know agree that TES5 is a terrible game, without graphic mods, but with them, the game become awesome.
I could see GW opening for modding of stuff like settlement buildings and dungeons (which they have mentioned before) some time in the future. Great way to add value to the game cheaply and also involving the community. Win/win. Still a lot that has to be done before that.
I just hope they prioritize animations before a lot of other stuff. But i think they understand they cant sell their product to a larger market without getting this right. So maybe some time next year? Should be before OE at least.
Have they said anything about NDA during EE? Another problem could be potenial customers already dismissing the game before they see the OE product (before animation fixes are in place).
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Goblin Squad Member
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Have they said anything about NDA during EE?
There won't be an NDA during Early Enrollment. Part of the process is getting lots of community feedback and we couldn't get that if people couldn't talk about the game.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Just for clarity - there is no NDA for Alpha either.
Thus, we should start being able to talk about actual game content very soon now.
Goblinworks Executive Founder
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I could see GW opening for modding of stuff like settlement buildings and dungeons (which they have mentioned before) some time in the future. Great way to add value to the game cheaply and also involving the community. Win/win. Still a lot that has to be done before that.
I was thinking about client-side mod, like Minecraft. At least for the characters. I mean, modding buildings texture could offer the possibility to cheat, for example by making transparent walls. But I don't see any -SIGNIFICANT- way to cheat, with character modding.
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Goblin Squad Member
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I could see GW opening for modding of stuff like settlement buildings and dungeons (which they have mentioned before) some time in the future. Great way to add value to the game cheaply and also involving the community. Win/win. Still a lot that has to be done before that.I was thinking about client-side mod, like Minecraft. At least for the characters. I mean, modding buildings texture could offer the possibility to cheat, for example by making transparent walls. But I don't see any -SIGNIFICANT- way to cheat, with character modding.
Having anything mod client-side will open up 'cheating' especially with characters. I'm for players creating dungeons and such, but it should be controlled server-side.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Modding, and getting away with, client files appears to have gotten much harder over the years.
I remember reading about hex edits for EQ that let you get away with a lot, and ShowEQ (which would basically be a god program in PFO). With WoW I really do not recall a lot of that hackery gaining traction. Was not something I really spent time looking for, but neither was it something I came across during the years I actively followed WoW news. Account/password hacking was the far more prevalent form of illicit behavior.
That said, I would not be sad at all if GW avoided the level of snooping that Blizz went to.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Just for clarity - there is no NDA for Alpha either.
Thus, we should start being able to talk about actual game content very soon now.
We already talk about one another, right here. We will be the content for all intents and purposes, won't we?.
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Goblinworks Executive Founder
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Audocet, would your vision of modding characters just apply to our personal character? If we could mod our enemies, to make them appear in bright neon colors for easy spotting - that seems less than optimum.
I am talking about modding texture. And texture aren't classified by "player factions", but more by races. It would be impossible to make your enemies appear neon colored. You could make Elves or Dwarves neon red, but not "TEO Elves" or "PAX Dwarves" or "UNC Halflings".
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Goblin Squad Member
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I am talking about modding texture. And texture aren't classified by "player factions", but more by races. It would be impossible to make your enemies appear neon colored. You could make Elves or Dwarves neon red...
Which would potentially make them easier to spot when in stealth... thereby giving an advantage to those using the mod.
It is very difficult to allow players to mod or access game data without this leading to tangible advantages to doing so.
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Goblin Squad Member
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Graphics are the thing I care about least. I'll turn them down even if they are incredibly detailed and fancy. I'd rather have great game mechanics and an interesting story.
There are a couple of reasons I'd rather play the old SSI Goldbox games and the Baldur's Gate/Icewind Dale games over 90% of the dreck that is passed off as next great thing in gaming, and graphics aren't one of them.