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Bard's Tale The Bard's Tale IV: Barrows Deep - Director's Cut

Lady_Error

█▓▒░ ░▒▓█
Patron
Joined
Oct 14, 2012
Messages
1,879,250
Well, the graphics definitely look better now, especially the NPC's and even on low resolution.

Though I still don't care enough to actually play the damn thing. I don't know, the story starts out as a boring "raycism" cliche, for fuck's sake.
 

anvi

Prophet
Village Idiot
Joined
Oct 12, 2016
Messages
7,530
Location
Kelethin
Some of the graphics are way better, some of them are way worse. Now someone talk about gameplay changes.

Gameplay is essentially the same tedious card-battle bullshit. Within a few hours you have the tactics and attacks you'll likely use through the full game. The only draw about the game before was the environments, puzzles and to some people the story, but the gameplay is largely "meh". Not terrible, but not particularly exciting either.

If I ever actually decide to replay this I'll probably just stick to the original version.
I trust you and I am gonna skip this game.
 

grimace

Arcane
Joined
Jan 17, 2015
Messages
1,959
Was Bard's Tale IV Director's Cut "optimized" for X Box One? Is this the reason why the PC version, upon early impressions, seems to be less graphically intensive?

(((Microsoft Money)))
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,228
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
Dev post: https://forums.inxile-entertainment...&sid=2c40cee6c0777602086353475fd097f1#p207610
https://steamcommunity.com/app/1091980/discussions/0/1639794651181919536/?ctp=5#c1638669204730007358

Hey all, apologies for the delay in responding.

First and foremost our intentions with the Director’s Cut is only to make improvements. That includes fixes to stability, performance, tweaks to combat and balance, and new features and quality of life improvements—as well as the new content. We’re happy to see that we’ve already received more than a few comments and reviews that it’s a positive change for the game.

However, there are some legitimate questions and concerns here, as well as some changes we should explain. The first of which is that we made some stylistic changes in the Director’s Cut to certain areas of the game to change the coloration, lighting, atmospheric effects, etc. to address some complaints from the original release and create a more consistent stylized look. Skara Brae above/below are prime examples of that, and we’ve made stylistic choices to the time of day, number of lights, coloring, etc. to create a new feel. Additional light sources and changes to global illumination can have pretty drastic impacts to the appearance of a scene, which don’t necessarily mean we’ve removed graphical options or fidelity, but may reduce their visual impact. For example adding more lights to brighten a scene may reduce how sharp the shadows and specular highlights appear.

Second, we moved from full dynamic shadows to a mix of baked level shadows and dynamic character shadows. This was primarily for performance reasons, because (as most who played the original release can attest to) framerate issues were a pretty widespread complaint we wanted to address. This is definitely a visual trade-off, although one we think leads to an overall improved experience, and in some cases more accurate shadows.

Outside of those changes (some like global illumination and colored lighting which can greatly impact the overall look of an area) the graphical options are overall unchanged, or even improved.

Before / After

ibx4sSm.jpg
hwy2FOq.jpg


0jwYr7x.jpg
pxhNCt9.jpg


23q3OSq.jpg
HcQHVau.jpg


eI1KXae.jpg
S6RArAr.jpg


awqlQm8.jpg
OFWJiPl.jpg


But there are some issues. For example we’re attempting to track down the loss of dynamic shadows for characters and why they appear on our internal release builds but not the actual live product. We believe it should be fairly simple fix, but it is a legitimate bug. We’ll keep you updated as our work progresses to correct it.
 
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Gord

Arcane
Joined
Feb 16, 2011
Messages
7,049
What they did was like those shitty ENB mods, where they just tweak the contrast and saturation. Yes, Skara Brae looks a bit better, before always looked terrible. But every other area I've seen so far lost a lot in quality, especially that fire tunnel that was used back in fucking 2015 to sell the Kickstarter. Yeah, they downgraded something from 2015. And the game STILL suffers from slowdowns in Skara Brae.

I don't know who why somebody would think Skara Brae looks better now, honestly. It's lacking allmost all shadows and suffers from generally flat lighting. Maybe it's better compared to the original's release version, but in every direct comparison I made, the patched original is using relatively contrasted lighting and color tones, which got removed in DC, together with any dynamic shadows.
I hope that at least the latter is a bug, although I very much doubt it, since they keep removing posts in the official bug thread in the Steam discussion making mention of it.
As for the models which a certain guy here claims are improved - well, if you are generous, maybe? But exchanging helmet hair with an actual helmet is a pretty minor improvement.

Just saw Infinitron's post: So they did indeed remove global illumination to fix the performance. Explains a lot. I do wonder about the shadows. If the characters would be casting shadows again, at least they would stop looking as if they are floating...
 
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passerby

Arcane
Joined
Nov 16, 2016
Messages
2,788
In some ways it's prettier, with more saturated colors, but technically it's a downgrade with glossiness and wet surfaces gone, many dynamic light sources replaced with baked in lighting and with many decorative objects gone.

I don't own the game, I can judge just by looking at comparison screenshots, but not dev provided ones. Classic redux edition for console release.
 

Curratum

Guest
In some ways it's prettier, with more saturated colors, but technically it's a downgrade with glossiness and wet surfaces gone, many dynamic light sources replaced with baked in lighting and with many decorative objects gone.

Not "many" dynamic light sources, try "ALL" dynamic light sources. Don't take my word for it, a dev said it.

"we moved from full dynamic shadows to a mix of baked level shadows and dynamic character shadows"

Sadly, the dynamic character shadows are currently bugged and not rendering at all. What a great shitshow Inxile served up again!
 

Themadcow

Augur
Joined
Feb 17, 2012
Messages
308
*reads last few pages*

*notes that most people are commenting on graphics rather than gameplay 'improvements'*

*reprioritises a Grimoire run-through instead*

It says a lot about BT4 that the official forums have barely registered any activity in the last six months despite the Directors Cut being in the pipeline. I started a post yesterday but then realised the absolute futility of my efforts.

Once again though, the Remastered Trilogy is a cracking job, as long as you accept the limitations of the original game designs.

Edit - ha, even the absolute bum-boy of BT4 white knighting Eisberg is having a moan. That's rock bottom.
 
Self-Ejected

theSavant

Self-Ejected
Joined
Oct 3, 2012
Messages
2,009
I definitely like the graphics of the Directors Cut more (looking at the screenshots). Especially the warmer color tones and fuller lighting make it much more appealing to me. The difference is big enough to consider a replay.
 

Bohr

Arcane
Joined
Nov 20, 2012
Messages
1,878
Wow.

'Being independent allows us to make the sort of games we want to make'

'Being part of the Microsoft family allows us to take our games to the next level, with the sort of shiny graphics you've come to expect'

'The inXile name has a long and prestigious history and will always be remembered fondly, but here at Microsoft we've decided it's time to rationalise and simplify our studio structure, allowing us to more easily redeploy talent to where it's most needed and focus on what we're here for - making top quality games for you'
 

Barbalos

Savant
Joined
Jun 14, 2018
Messages
200
I'm currently downloading this and looking forward to seeing the balance, performance, and stability changes. I don't care very much about the graphics changes, it's kind of funny that they downgraded them but I myself spent a long time fiddling with the graphics settings trying to get increased performance, so if that is improved that is more important to me than how the game looks. I'm also looking forward to being able to skip some of the puzzles if I want to. I liked the combat style a lot, hopefully it is more balanced now and maybe I can try some different characters and builds.
 

cvv

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Mar 30, 2013
Messages
18,071
Location
Kingdom of Bohemia
Codex+ Now Streaming!
The game looks like my arse now, everything is infested with this obnoxious haze, everything is flat and washed out. And for what, so that I can run the game at 70 FPS instead of 40 like before? Jesus fuck, give me back my colours, my shadows and my dynamic lighting, I'm more than happy with 40 FPS. Goddamit Fargo.
 

Nyast

Cipher
Joined
Jan 12, 2014
Messages
609
It looks like they improved textures ( especially on characters ) but decided to change the tone of the game from dark moody to light cartoony. The dynamic shadows were lost too but that seems to be a bug. Overall, I would prefer the moody ambiances of the old version with the updated characters of the new version.
 

Efe

Erudite
Joined
Dec 27, 2015
Messages
2,597
making something worse so people whining about previous experience actually start wanting it back...
brilliant!
 

felipepepe

Codex's Heretic
Patron
Joined
Feb 2, 2007
Messages
17,274
Location
Terra da Garoa
It looks like they improved textures ( especially on characters ) but decided to change the tone of the game from dark moody to light cartoony.
Yeah, it's exactly that, I went until the first good-looking area of the game to compare:

Original:

4Cm0HIw.jpg


DC:

G0mjOji.png
It really feels like playing a lame ENB /Reshade mod.
 

Grauken

Gourd vibes only
Patron
Joined
Mar 22, 2013
Messages
12,784
well, you can only polish a turd so much, can't magically un-turd it
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,228
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
RPS have actually reported on the downgrade: https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2019/08/28/the-bards-tale-iv-directors-cut-released/

Eagled-eyed players noticed the new version is looking a little different, and some have griped about a “downgrade.” Enter InXile communications director Micah “whippleshuffle” Whipple to explain why that is.

One immediate issue is that the dynamic lighting isn’t working on characters, when it should be – and is in their own internal builds. “We believe it should be a fairly simple fix, but it is a legitimate bug,” he says.

Beyond that, inXile have intentionally altered the look. Following numerous complaints about the original version’s poor performance, Whipple says they made “a visual trade-off” by switching some shadows from dynamic to baked. That might not look as fancy, but Micah says InXile think the change “leads to an overall improved experience.” They’ve also, he says, “made some stylistic changes in the Director’s Cut to certain areas of the game to change the coloration, lighting, atmospheric effects, etc. to address some complaints from the original release and create a more consistent stylised look.”

So yes, it looks different: partially owing to a bug; partially to improve performance; and partially to straight-up look different.
 

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