25 replies to this topic

[FrOdO]

I have to say I was seriously impressed by the in game footage (game engine footage) shown in the 2009 announcement video.




The level of detail for a game that up until then had only been hinted at was outstanding (i.e the urban environment, the damage modeling, the way the Warhammers PPCs left the barrels of the cannons visibly red hot, etc etc). I have always been impressed by the Unreal 3 engine and its continuing ability to adapt to different types of games.

Quick Disclaimer : When it comes to the programming, tweaking, modding, and "deep" knowledge of using game engines I am a complete Noob. ....... I made a CS map once using Source SDK.... lol....


Having said all that, while the CryEngine has always demonstrated its power in the visuals department. I always come away feeling like the world is a little "plastic" for lack of a better word. The objects within the environment always felt clumsy and the interactions with the environment never drew me in. Another thing to mention are the animations of enemy soldiers. I always thought they looked a little stiff, as if the fluid animation was not the priority. The damage modeling on the soldiers was absent as well. You would think for a game that looked so good to have proper damage modeling ( i.e soldier has bullet entries or blood splats where the player shot them)..... I think the original Far Cry (Cryteks First Game) even did this.

I enjoyed Crysis, but always felt that it was more of the tech demo and not the game.

CryEngine 3 to me has always been about broadening Cryteks market space onto the consoles and doesn't appear to have changed much other than to make it more console friendly. Some say it may even be a step backwards in terms of graphical power.

While MWLL still gives me hope at times, even it still feels like a "rough draft".... pretty to look at.




O well, what do you guys think? Maybe some of you can put my fears to rest.

Edited by FrOdO, 06 December 2011 - 01:47 PM.

[S3dition]

Are you talking about crysis or cryengine 3?

Edited by S3dition, 06 December 2011 - 10:24 AM.

[FrOdO]

Yeah the Engine..... I hadn't seen that "girl in the forest" rendering video but, had seen the Engine as an outlet for DOD training. I just don't feel like that engine handles damage models too well. In terms of vehicles something is either in perfect condition or completely blown up.... no in between phase and in a game like Mechwarrior, there is a lot of in between.

[Alex Wolfe]

FrOdO, on 06 December 2011 - 10:18 AM, said:

Having said all that, while the CryEngine has always demonstrated its power in the visuals department. I always come away feeling like the world is a little "plastic" for lack of a better word.

(...)

While MWLL still gives me hope at times, even it still feels like a "rough draft".... pretty to look at.

(...)

O well, what do you guys think? Maybe some of you can put my fears to rest.

So is it plastic-looking, or good-looking? Isn't it a contradiction?

You sure you haven't already gone over your fear of "looks", if you find LL, which is merely a mod after all, pretty to look at?

[Grotonomus]

I'm just hoping I have the funding to get a Graphics Card that can play this game on maximum settings!

[FrOdO]

Alex Wolfe, on 06 December 2011 - 10:34 AM, said:

So is it plastic-looking, or good-looking? Isn't it a contradiction?

You sure you haven't already gone over your fear of "looks", if you find LL, which is merely a mod after all, pretty to look at?

I wrote the world is plastic.... not the visuals. The world feels a little fake at times do to poor interaction with the environment. Think of postcard, pretty to look at.... you can't really interact with it though.

[S3dition]

FrOdO, on 06 December 2011 - 10:29 AM, said:

Yeah the Engine..... I hadn't seen that "girl in the forest" rendering video but, had seen the Engine as an outlet for DOD training. I just don't feel like that engine handles damage models too well. In terms of vehicles something is either in perfect condition or completely blown up.... no in between phase and in a game like Mechwarrior, there is a lot of in between.

This "in between" that you refer to is states and alpha channels. You can change object states to represent damage in any modern engine, and alpha channels to add blood splatter, scorch marks, etc. It's more a question of whether or not the developers decide to do so.

Realistically, everything has 2 modes - working or blown up. You don't often see an M1 running around with its turret on fire. That amount of damage will kill/incapacitate the crew and potentially detonate fuel or ammo.

Damaged aircraft may smoke, but again for there to be enough damage to be physically obvious, the aircraft would fall out of the sky. About the only exceptions to this are A-10's, which have been known to fly with van-sized holes in their wings and shredded engines.

Edited by S3dition, 06 December 2011 - 10:42 AM.

[FrOdO]

S3dition, on 06 December 2011 - 10:42 AM, said:

This "in between" that you refer to is states and alpha channels. You can change object states to represent damage in any modern engine, and alpha channels to add blood splatter, scorch marks, etc. It's more a question of whether or not the developers decide to do so.

Realistically, everything has 2 modes - working or blown up. You don't often see an M1 running around with its turret on fire. That amount of damage will kill/incapacitate the crew and potentially detonate fuel or ammo.

Damaged aircraft may smoke, but again for there to be enough damage to be physically obvious, the aircraft would fall out of the sky. About the only exceptions to this are A-10's, which have been known to fly with van-sized holes in their wings and shredded engines.

Thanks S3, I'll be the first to admit I am lacking in the knowledge department when it comes to these sort of things. Anything that expands that knowledge base is extremely appreciated.

[Type ZERO]

If I remember correctly, the main focus on the CryEngine3 was to better optimize the engine and to make it console friendly.

There was a lot of talk about it being less powerful then it's predecessor, but I think in the real world user experience it is on par, but just doesn't require nearly as much horsepower to get a good quality image out of it.

Let's be honest... Crysis 1 didn't look bad. =P Crysis 2 also didn't look bad, and that was using the new engine.


Personally, I'm just happy they didn't go with the Unreal engine. Though a great engine, I really didn't want MWO looking like Gears of War, Unreal Tournament 3 or Batman.


My 2 cents. =)

[Ghost]

One of the biggest new features of CryEngine 3 is its inclusion of deformable materials. It was a big part of my decision to go with CryEngine 3 for my pet project too.

[Evgeny Bear]

I'll second that... I don't like the unreal engine so much.
But to be honest, I hope that the dev team implements a full Damage modell + internal damage simulation with critical engineparts & so on

[Alex Wolfe]

FrOdO, on 06 December 2011 - 10:39 AM, said:

I wrote the world is plastic.... not the visuals. The world feels a little fake at times do to poor interaction with the environment. Think of postcard, pretty to look at.... you can't really interact with it though.

Well you didn't specify that it's the visuals that are nice to look at. The saving grace of MWO may be that it deals with mechs and likely vehicles (machines, rather than humans, so looking "plastic" may not be a problem if they make some nice textures to "mask" it). The environment will be seen from quite a long distance (impossible to get closer to the ground than about 6 meters), so it should be mitigated as well.

With some good rework, the engine should do its job just fine, especially with nary a non-armored human being in sight.

Edited by Alex Wolfe, 06 December 2011 - 11:09 AM.

[FrOdO]

Whenever I post in an open form, I always find myself humbled by the breadth of knowledge of others.


I realize now that maybe I was a little to naive to have jumped to such conclusions about CryEngine 3.... I digress



As always Thanks for the feedback!

Edited by FrOdO, 06 December 2011 - 11:18 AM.

[Kodiak Jorgensson]

iam happy they switched, i personaly got bored of seeing most games using UE3 back in 2009-10 i think it was a good move to go with Crytek 3, the games going to look fresh and stunning and vibrant. as for Cryteks "broaden market" yes they wanted to move into the console market, but they wanted to compete with UE3 with Epic releasing the UDK for mod and indie developers, Crytek took similar action and released a free version of the Cryengine 3 improveing on there tools and allowing for easier acess for the mod community. crytek has improved on sevral features in previous cryengines also included a few more. anyway it was a good decision to move to CryEngine 3 imo.

[Adridos]

About the world being "plastic". I remember blowing out whole houses with barrels, thrown corpses, or even bare hands in Crysis. Destrying rainforests with machine guns was a lot of fun too. I don't think any developer would be stupid enough to scrap so good physics model. There's none in Crysis 2, however, as those crappy pieces of .... (pardon me) can't run anything well, they had to put it out of the game. I still have hope it is coded in the engine, though.

[Galen Shannow]

Why do people keep thinking that 2009 video was actual gameplay footage?

[Arnie1808]

Galen Shannow, on 06 December 2011 - 12:23 PM, said:

Why do people keep thinking that 2009 video was actual gameplay footage?

Seriously?
If you watch the trailer it tells you it's "IN GAME FOOTAGE" in the lower right of the screen.

[xMarshallx]

Arnie1808, on 06 December 2011 - 02:43 PM, said:

Seriously?
If you watch the trailer it tells you it's "IN GAME FOOTAGE" in the lower right of the screen.

Can't really dispute that

[CobraFive]

Arnie1808, on 06 December 2011 - 02:43 PM, said:

Seriously?
If you watch the trailer it tells you it's "IN GAME FOOTAGE" in the lower right of the screen.

"In-Game footage" and "Actual Gameplay Footage" are very, very, very different.

"In-Game" just means its rendered with the game's engine. It doesn't actually mean it was any type of gameplay or even filmed within any sort of game. Its highly doubtful there was any game behavior at all. Mechs almost certainly weren't actually modeled beyond a graphics representation.

So it was "In-Game" the same way that the TF2 'Meet the Team' videos are "In-Game".

[Ghost]

Arnie1808, on 06 December 2011 - 02:43 PM, said:

Seriously?
If you watch the trailer it tells you it's "IN GAME FOOTAGE" in the lower right of the screen.

If you read the Developer Q&A #1 --

Is the trailer for the game really in game footage? Because if it is, then the game will be amazing!


[PAUL] The 2009 video teaser is not the trailer for MechWarrior Online. It was a technology and inspiration piece that we created and yes it was all in-game footage. DevBlog0 and the FAQ on this site explain in detail the creation of the video and what it was used for.