The New Screenshots - overall quality of the cryptic engine

[Kletschmeister]

i didn't realize it at all cause i just take a fast look at the screenshots and watching the movies for "new" information i do not compare the grafik quality to other games cause the release date i not even mentioned in terms of the YEAR... maybe 2010 maybe 2011 or 2012
But watching a friend playing Age of Conan with DX10 on a 21 inch 1680x1050 it looks really great... looking at the new games and the growing power of our workstations.... dualcores->quadcore -> DX10 grafic -> speed up to 3,5 GHz - screens are growing fast to 24 inch with full-hd resolution....
i think STO looks in comparism to other "state of the art" games in this development stage a bit old fashioned. The character costumizing movie remember me very strong to StarWarsGalaxies from 2003 the look is really familiar....
And the ground screenshots are looking something between DarkAgeOfCamelot and Battlefield 2 something like that...
If i take a look at Call of Duty - Modern Warfare and World at War or Crysis it shows me that STO is now a bit olf fashioned if the game will be released somewhere 2010....
ok the space screenshots looks not so bad.... but there is not such an enhancement according to SWG

The gameplay trailer looks in someway trekkie but.....somehow it really feels like ... i dunno .... old yeah i only can say - STO looks old the grafics, the animation..... the part where there is the fight at the bridge.... it looks like old Dark Age of Camelot - CounterStrike
it doesn't look like some "crysis light"

what do you think ?

[jbarker82]

Well, it's an unfinished game at the moment so i'm sure there is still plenty more for them to do to smooth out some of the graphics and whatnot.

Some of the screenshots have really blown me away actually. Shots of the Akira ship and some of the Asteroids and things have been really fantastic. I'm really liking the look of the game so far :)

[USS_Parallax]

The great MMOs never look amazing. Look at WoW.

However I can say that WoW has a great style (mostly) despite the poor graphics and nobody who gets into the game actually thinks "OMGosh the graphix suck!" while they're playing.

STO is following suit. If it wants to not alienate half the Trek fans who don't have good gaming rigs it's got to follow suit and make a "Graphic Casual" game. I'm mostly impressed with the way this game looks. It's got a great style mostly. Heck, they've improved the characters a lot already.

[-Brett-]

I heard that Age of Conan has abysmal subscription numbers because not many people can afford a rig powerful enough to run it. Hardly an example STO should follow. The fanbase is small enough as it is.

As for World at War, Modern Warfare, Crysis, etc. They're not MMO's. It's not the same standard. Those games have maps the size of a couple football fields tops, and have to support upwards of 32 players at a time. MMO's need gigantic maps that have to support hundreds, or even thousands of players at a time. The graphics tend to suffer for the sake of keeping that running smoothly.

[eNDIE]

In the case of age of conan they were to focused on graphics so the contents and features of the game was lacking

[k.mpok]

I heard that Age of Conan has abysmal subscription numbers because not many people can afford a rig powerful enough to run it. Hardly an example STO should follow. The fanbase is small enough as it is.

As for World at War, Modern Warfare, Crysis, etc. They're not MMO's. It's not the same standard. Those games have maps the size of a couple football fields tops, and have to support upwards of 32 players at a time. MMO's need gigantic maps that have to support hundreds, or even thousands of players at a time. The graphics tend to suffer for the sake of keeping that running smoothly.

Its not so much the computer requirements as it is the lack of content and plethara of bugs/glitches/balancing/apparent lack of desire by the Devs to do anything to save their product that is killing AoC.

They were just rushed by marketing to finishes a good product.

[Kletschmeister]

sure they cannot push up the minimum requirements to some stat of the art equipment... but WoW is the example i have waited for...

1) WoW is popular - so anybody will do WoW-like-Stuff
2) WoW is for casual players
3) WoW earns a lot of money so they do it right..

this is why a lot of MMO's fail and their development is canceled - take a look into the past... take a look at movies.... Star Trek - TOS was not the show that were in the 60s successful - no there where Bonanza, Comedy, SitCom.... and then Roddenberry take a risk - he invested a lot and if you do a real summary he has won...
In the 70s George Lucas take a risk... against the odds and the mainstream he did Star Wars and wins...

Every moviemaker who has taken a lot of risks and delivers at good piece of work has earned the respect and the money....
Nowadays they call this kind of movies "cult movie" or get the oscars....

and for games i think it is the same.... the new inventions - gameplay - grafics

[USS_Parallax]

sure they cannot push up the minimum requirements to some stat of the art equipment... but WoW is the example i have waited for...

1) WoW is popular - so anybody will do WoW-like-Stuff
2) WoW is for casual players
3) WoW earns a lot of money so they do it right..

this is why a lot of MMO's fail and their development is canceled - take a look into the past... take a look at movies.... Star Trek - TOS was not the show that were in the 60s successful - no there where Bonanza, Comedy, SitCom.... and then Roddenberry take a risk - he invested a lot and if you do a real summary he has won...
In the 70s George Lucas take a risk... against the odds and the mainstream he did Star Wars and wins...

Every moviemaker who has taken a lot of risks and delivers at good piece of work has earned the respect and the money....
Nowadays they call this kind of movies "cult movie" or get the oscars....

and for games i think it is the same.... the new inventions - gameplay - grafics

I couldn't disagree more.

If you REALLY want to not have a good playerbase going with awesome graphics is not the way to go. You're making analogies that just don't apply here. It's not about taking risk and making a game with amazing graphics at all.

[CaptainHoliday]

Age of Conan has the best graphics of any major MMO, but the game sucks and will slowly die out soon.

Star Trek Online's graphics are consistent with leading MMOS of the day. You should check out the new Star Wars MMO, the graphics are the same or a little more cartoony. Same with Stargate Worlds and other leading ones.

Granted, the graphics are not as good as Modern Warfare, World at War, or Crysis. But that's to be expected, since those are FPS.

I think the graphics are OK, not great, just OK. I am mainly concerned about ship interiors right now.

[Kletschmeister]

set aside that we are all fanboys/girls and take a unprejudiced look at the actual MMOs - google for pictures of 5 to 10 MMOs like: DAOC, SWG, EVE, WOW, LINEAGE, TABULARASA, AOC and all the others... i feel that the cryptic engine has to improve to be combative to existing MMOs... and do not forget... it is still a long time to release...

[Rivaris]

a yeah ago of conan the grafics were super top of the line needed a $3000 rig to play it.

BUT

the game was a total piece of junk when it came out they were so focused on the look they for got to make a playeble game many people have left and more will go.

ago of conan was suposed to be a pvp based game but funny enough pvp was patched in like 6 months afther launch. the game play was horrible and the ui wasnt much better.

face it make STO a high rig game only it will crash and burn 6 months afther launch.

they should make it for as many systems as possible and just add a super ulltra high grap option for the players with the newest systems

[Kletschmeister]

your so called "high rig" isn't that ~high~ if i take a look at the Dell XPS 430 which is a normal workstation for someone who will play a new internet based game this is not a "high rig"
for a game which really isn't released anytime sooner as christmas 2009 it would not be unusual to have somd 512 MB grafic and a dualcore processor and that is really no "high rig"

and that MMOs are designed for thousands of players on really huge maps - cryptic has to prove that first.... we didn't even have more than just ONE little trailer

we do not have any idea how big the planets will be
we do not have any idea how the "space" map will look like except that the map will likely be 2D

[k.mpok]

a yeah ago of conan the grafics were super top of the line needed a $3000 rig to play it.

I laugh at your $3000 computer rig then. Mine didn't cost a 1/3 of that and I built mine before the drop in the 8800 series (before the 9k series)


the game was a total piece of junk when it came out they were so focused on the look they for got to make a playeble game many people have left and more will go.


No they focused most of their effort on the unique combat rose wheel system.


ago of conan was suposed to be a pvp based game but funny enough pvp was patched in like 6 months afther launch. the game play was horrible and the ui wasnt much better.

Maybe so. the pvp in the beginning was nothing more then ganking and rez-spawn camping but then again it hadn't changed much before I left.


face it make STO a high rig game only it will crash and burn 6 months afther launch.

they should make it for as many systems as possible and just add a super ulltra high grap option for the players with the newest systems

You don't have to make a game require a high/top of the line rig just to have good graphics.

LoTR: O has pretty good graphics. I want to be able to utilizy my computer to play a new release game not my cell phone.

Instanced zones takes stress off a system that might have 1000s of players in one location. ST also lends itself well to instancing IMO. Each sector can be an instance/zone. Using the turbo left to go from the bridge to medical (if/when interiers are added) can be instanced/zoned. If anything I think ST is much easier on instancing then a standard fantasy MMO (how tdo you explain walking past this or that tree and then load into a new zone).

* When I say instance I don't mean only you style or a set amount of players but rather EQ style zones.

[Sumdian]

a yeah ago of conan the grafics were super top of the line needed a $3000 rig to play it.

my rig just cost me $300 to build its got 4gig ddr2 800mhz ram duelcore 2.6 with a 320 gig sata HD and a 9800gt 3D i just went to the canyourunit.com site and it told me my PC passes but my OS failed lol i have win XP pro SP3 and its telling me i need vista to play it lol so you don't need something that stings you 3k to play it

[Kletschmeister]

LoTR: O has pretty good graphics. I want to be able to utilizy my computer to play a new release game not my cell phone.

that's the right quote.... apart from the fanboys who bought their last workstation in the early 90s - a new game have to please my eyes... and how long is DX10 available?
Crysis as a shooter was released 2007..... MMO's capable of good DX10 graphics with anti aliasing, water effects and realistic shadows are not so rare or damned to fail.....

[k.mpok]

my rig just cost me $300 to build its got 4gig ddr2 800mhz ram duelcore 2.6 with a 320 gig sata HD and a 9800gt 3D i just went to the canyourunit.com site and it told me my PC passes but my OS failed lol i have win XP pro SP3 and its telling me i need vista to play it lol so you don't need something that stings you 3k to play it

U can still play it on Win XP tho so you probably wouldn't even need to update ur OS if you had a desire to play it.

[dyvimtorm]

The graphics look immeasurably better through your neural net directlink wet matter line. Just make sure you update your drivers before viewing!

Pavel Bester

[OddjobXL]

They look alright to me. Frankly, smart money says focus on requirements that people can easily meet rather than going for supah special technical eye-candy.

Really, most people will be as enchanted by a good visual design executed with less flash than something that's not as well thought out but with loads of bells and whistles. Z-buffer isn't a kitchen table word. Anti-aliasing is when Lex Luthor tries to discover who Superman is, right?

As along as it looks good and runs on most machines out there they'll be fine. More than fine. So far it looks a little too tricked out to me, like a Star Trek funny car with neon running lights and a big blower on the hood, but I'm old. As long as there's some space out there that's black enough you can see the stars and I can customize my ship to reflect my old fogey tastes I'll be fine.

[Manta2015]

I think the graphics are OK, not great, just OK. I am mainly concerned about ship interiors right now.

QFT ~

In any case, WoW is successful because you can run it from a crappy laptop ~ and still play it smoothly. STO won't be quite as forgiving, but considering what they're shooting for ~ as long as I don't see something 'ugly' while playing (shoddy, horrid textures etc) I think it'll more than suffice for me ~ with my ship's interiors of course.. *cough* =)


-Manta-

[LordDave]

Geeze, another "the graphics look subpar" thread. There is a REALLY big one that died a few months ago. You also sound like Nic, though not as aggressive.

So, graphics. I can tell you, right now, what your problem is: Color/lighting. Seriously, that's what you're seeing as being "subpar". The engine isn't outdated. I quoted one of the developers talking about Champions and they said it has bloom, depth of field, motion blur, ect....
The textures themselves are highly detailed, but most of it is drowned out because of two reasons:
1. The screenshots aren't as upclose and personal (with the exception of the klingon, which we can see the threads in his uniform.)
2. The bright lights and colors drowns out the really deep details.

Now, you also mentioned the character creator as looking outdated. You are incorrect. Let me give you an example:

That is Alyx Vance from Half-Life 2, using the Source Engine (and some mods to buff up the looks)
http://img384.imageshack.us/img384/1043/alyxs6ao.jpg


This is the Heavy from Team Fortress 2.
http://galerie.half-life2.cz/albums/userpics/TF2_-_Heavy_Guy_interview.jpg

Notice how both are VERY different in art, yet both are made with the same engine and the same company. So from these we can show that an engine does not dictate "realism". Next we have to look at WHY HL2 looks so detailed. And the answer is? Skins. HL2 and all high detail games have pre-created faces and textures, which allow the artists to have a very high quality of detail. An MMO, however, is restricted. SWG, for example, does have pre-defined faces. But that means you can only have a certain number of actual faces. If I wanted to recreate my face, for example, I couldn't.
Cryptic, however, doesn't play that way. What they've done is use layer textures overtop of colored skins. This provides maximum customization without having clipping issues on textures. Think Spore.

So that's why it looks the way it does. Questions?

[ArdraVentax]

I'll wait and render (pun intended) an opinion on STO when the game is actually optimized and released.

However, I think it's a fallacy that intentionally NOT pushing the limits graphically is a key to success.

I seem to remember a couple games called FarCry and Crysis that have mostly made a name because of their intense graphics (and intense graphic requirements).

Were it not for that feature, they would be otherwise "just another FPS shooter".

I say push the limit and if the game is good, people will upgrade just to play it. The OP's point is true, we are living in a multi-core world now, and even moreso a year or two from now. Why not make a game that will still look good in 3 years?

Everquest II used this model and it was pretty darn successful.\

Enough of the WoW comparisons. that game is an aberration and its success may never be repeated. History has proven that copying it does no good, and going entirely in the opposite direction from it does not guarantee success either.

[Sythian]

I with game play and content over Graphics any day. I would prefer that the Devs pull their resources and time into the game itself rather than squandering it over making it look pretty.

[UA_Fleet_Admiral]

i didn't realize it at all cause i just take a fast look at the screenshots and watching the movies for "new" information i do not compare the grafik quality to other games cause the release date i not even mentioned in terms of the YEAR... maybe 2010 maybe 2011 or 2012
But watching a friend playing Age of Conan with DX10 on a 21 inch 1680x1050 it looks really great... looking at the new games and the growing power of our workstations.... dualcores->quadcore -> DX10 grafic -> speed up to 3,5 GHz - screens are growing fast to 24 inch with full-hd resolution....
i think STO looks in comparism to other "state of the art" games in this development stage a bit old fashioned. The character costumizing movie remember me very strong to StarWarsGalaxies from 2003 the look is really familiar....
And the ground screenshots are looking something between DarkAgeOfCamelot and Battlefield 2 something like that...
If i take a look at Call of Duty - Modern Warfare and World at War or Crysis it shows me that STO is now a bit olf fashioned if the game will be released somewhere 2010....
ok the space screenshots looks not so bad.... but there is not such an enhancement according to SWG

The gameplay trailer looks in someway trekkie but.....somehow it really feels like ... i dunno .... old yeah i only can say - STO looks old the grafics, the animation..... the part where there is the fight at the bridge.... it looks like old Dark Age of Camelot - CounterStrike
it doesn't look like some "crysis light"

what do you think ?

All games look alittle clunky at this stage. Look at Left 4 Dead, the early screens sucked...but just before it was ready to release you saw more of the finished product and it was night and day difference. So just hang on to your guarder belt and wait for the good stuff to be posted later on like the rest of us......patience young jedi. :cool:

[DCutshall71]

I've been a fan of ST,and SW for a very long time. I play MMO games and im currently playing WOW(altho, its getting pretty boring doing the same crap over and over again,day in and day out).
SWG was a very fun game to play when it first released, but when they did a major overhaul on the game to accomidate the easier gameplay, it lost its "luster"... in my opinion. I felt like the SW universe that was created, that kept me playing, was lost in the process.

WOW is a good game, dont get me wrong, but the game more or less ends when u lvlup and get ur gear u want. When ur finished doing that, ur more or less lvling a new toon(starting over ...in other words), or doing the same things over and over again (nothing left to accomplish, other than staying in contact with friends and messin around online to pass the time).
I, personally look for an MMO to have endless posibilities, vitually endless options to persue for personal gain and rep. Having new things to explore, achieve, discover, and create every time i log on is something i hope i will find in STO.

Graphix-wise, Yes, i like a game to be as good-looking as possible. There's nothing wrong with playin a game for the "eye-candy", but i personally would rather sacrifice some of the graphic capabilities of this day and age and not worry about lag and state-of-the-art requirements just to play a good game.

STO has alot of potential and i think they are taking this game and heading in the right direction. I have high hopes that this game will meet my expectations in gameplay, and be a leader in the MMO game industry.

im hoping for an early release ;)

[Kirky]

I have to say I really don't see a problem with the graphics. If you take a look at some of the more recent screenshots (think Akira and the like) they look beautiful, and highly detailed.

I'll grant that the graphics are not Crysis quality, but that game was known as a mass murderer of P.C's, not to mention the fact that Crysis was a singleplayer FPS.

I'm not the most informed about matters of grapical performance but, really what is the issue with STO's graphics? For an MMO they're certainly average, and definately beat today's most popular MMO; WoW.

As for AoC, I'd much rather have a game with excellent gameplay and average graphics than the other way round.

[Thibor]

my rig just cost me $300 to build its got 4gig ddr2 800mhz ram duelcore 2.6 with a 320 gig sata HD and a 9800gt 3D i just went to the canyourunit.com site and it told me my PC passes but my OS failed lol i have win XP pro SP3 and its telling me i need vista to play it lol so you don't need something that stings you 3k to play it

You may have built your latest rig and paid $300 for those four components but toss in your case, PSU, media drive(s), mobo, and OS and I highly doubt you got all of that for $300 unless you bought the parts off a back of a truck at 3am in a downtown alley.

[Silverspar]

Graphics has nothing to do with game play. I could care less if if you can count each individual poor on a man's face, if the game play sucks there isn't much to the game at all. The train of thought that graphics make a game is easily proved inaccurate, because once the wow factor has worn off of the graphics, then what you are left with determines the game. And some people will play a game through, call it great, and never touch it again, because realistically it was a shoddy piece of work but the graphics were enough to boost it up. A great game, truly great game, is one you keep going back to play over and over again.

[Captian_Pike]

I'm all one for broad compatibility in an MMO; it makes a lot of sense, though for those of us with the GPU power to crank up settings, it should be an option to do so.
Although I don't mind my 260 running cool, I also don't like it being under-utilized, though I think every developer should take Devil May Cry 4 as an example of optimizing graphics performance. That game barely made my card hiccup (if at all) at max settings, running 1680x1050 resolution, but look really great. The cutscenes and the end missions were particularly impressive.
Also WOW, I agree, is a good example of the artists making the best of what they had to work with. My main qualm with that game (as with a lot of MMO's) is the over-expansive landscapes that seemed to have been made gigantic just to consume time, which takes away from the feeling of 'getting somewhere,' which is important for any game.

Anyway, the further ahead the release gets, the more detailed and feature rich the graphics should become, as GPU's that are close, if not better, to the 9800GTX+ are going to be more in the mainstream segment of the graphics industry.
Dedicated raytracing cards might be fairly common by then as well. I can see myself (surely by 2012) having a quad PCI-e x16 mobo with 2 GPU's, raytracing card and AI card, or maybe an extra card for dedicated PhysX processing. Maybe by then dedicated AI and raytracing chips with be integrated into graphics cards.

@silverspar - you're completely right on that one.There's quite a few old DOS and windows 98 games that I still come back to every now and then (Star Control 2 is a prime example). Still, I'd prefer to have both great graphics and gameplay.

[Strandberg]

i didn't realize it at all cause i just take a fast look at the screenshots and watching the movies for "new" information i do not compare the grafik quality to other games cause the release date i not even mentioned in terms of the YEAR... maybe 2010 maybe 2011 or 2012
But watching a friend playing Age of Conan with DX10 on a 21 inch 1680x1050 it looks really great... looking at the new games and the growing power of our workstations.... dualcores->quadcore -> DX10 grafic -> speed up to 3,5 GHz - screens are growing fast to 24 inch with full-hd resolution....
i think STO looks in comparism to other "state of the art" games in this development stage a bit old fashioned. The character costumizing movie remember me very strong to StarWarsGalaxies from 2003 the look is really familiar....
And the ground screenshots are looking something between DarkAgeOfCamelot and Battlefield 2 something like that...
If i take a look at Call of Duty - Modern Warfare and World at War or Crysis it shows me that STO is now a bit olf fashioned if the game will be released somewhere 2010....
ok the space screenshots looks not so bad.... but there is not such an enhancement according to SWG

The gameplay trailer looks in someway trekkie but.....somehow it really feels like ... i dunno .... old yeah i only can say - STO looks old the grafics, the animation..... the part where there is the fight at the bridge.... it looks like old Dark Age of Camelot - CounterStrike
it doesn't look like some "crysis light"

what do you think ?

I'd take gameplay over graphics any day of the week - you also have to look at it from a business perspective, the more high end a game is the fewer people are able to run it; you will want people with outdated comps to come p(l)ay.

That aside I'd also take stability over graphics any day of the week, both SWAT 4 and L4D had outdated
graphics but they run smooth as a shapeshifter

[KO_Gilligan]

We're probably wearing rose colored glasses. I'm pretty certain it looks great, but the real test will be when the masses, and reviewers, get their hands on it.

I got to give it to Cryptic and the latest screenshots, they are going for some far-out looks. Judging from the past sci-fi games, this might be a very wise move, like Mass Effect, or it might just be unappreciated eye candy.

I remember when I bought Genesis Rising, I was thinking "this game is good sci-fi looking" it never really held my attention, so many other great games around at the time.

[Corehaven22]

Im excited about a lot of the things being done with this game, and Im disappointed by other things. The graphics are not something I see anything wrong with. The space backdrops I've seen as well as the planetary scenery looks amazing and original.

I have no doubt there are better looking games as far as realistic graphics go. But we could do A LOT worse as well. I sort of feel like complaining about STO's graphics is nit picking, almost in an extreme sense.

A lot of new games dont look as good. I love Sins of a Solar Empire, but the graphics there cant begin to compare with what Im seeing in STO. If STO can manufacture graphics of this quality, while allowing people with even low end computers to play it, it will be an amazing feat.