Infinity Engine: Still gas left in the tank?

[NiM82]

3D games also have massive load times, entering a house in BG2, TOEE or Fallout = Instant. Enter a house in Witcher, NWN2, Obliv etc and your twiddling your thumbs for ages, then you find there's nothing in there you want and wait another age. They may have (arguably) caught up with teh pretty, but their still miles behind in terms of efficiency. If they were to make TW have instant interiors it wouldn't look half as pretty.

while pre-rendered backgrounds are not destructible.

2D backgrounds are as destructible as you code them to be, there's no reason you can't have overlays to change the state of locations. Unless you mean red faction style tunnelling, but you wouldn't want that unless it's a FPS/3rd person game.

 

[Volourn]

"because true 3d doesn't look near as gorgeous{"

Bullshit.

 

[DarkUnderlord]

3D games also have massive load times

Only because of a combination of bad coding (or a lack of focus on optimisation, EG: See The Witcher and their ability to apparently massively increase loading times) and a focus on pushing machines to their limits, rather than making something "work". That is, maybe it doesn't have as many polygons as the machine can push but it still looks nice.

, entering a house in BG2, TOEE or Fallout = Instant.

Keeping in mind ToEE had some horrible slow downs at times (that was also bad coding). There's also no reason why computers today wouldn't be able to instantly load a 3d environment (unless it was chugged up to bloom heaven). We're talking about some pretty powerful machines sitting on your average desktop these days.

2D backgrounds are as destructible as you code them to be, there's no reason you can't have overlays to change the state of locations. Unless you mean red faction style tunnelling, but you wouldn't want that unless it's a FPS/3rd person game.

I dislike "painted backgrounds" mainly because ToEEs never looked right and I could never tell how wide they were. In a tile engine, I know how many guys I can fit in a corridor. I know how wide that passage is. Where-as in ToEE there were multiple times were a corridor would look like it could fit 2 people but would only fit 1.

It also removes the opportunity for modding (I'm aware there are modders around for BG but it's a lot harder when you have to draw your own backgrounds). I think ToEE could really have taken off if they'd had a tile engine and made some modding tools for it. Arcanum never took off simply because the combat sucked and the graphics, well, you had to like them. ToEE had great combat and graphics, two things modders don't often change easily which means adding in some decent story to their own environments would've been very possible. Also, it was D&D so massive available fan-base.

 

[crufty]

Right on the money about TOEE.

I think Ultima VII is a better 2d engine anyway. I like world interactivity, and the IE stuff really didn't have much in the way of that. Actually, that goes for most of Bioware's games. A shame really, I always disliked how my fireball wouldn't set papers on the desk on fire, or my pc's couldn't kick over a chair.

 

[Ratty]

The Witcher's pre-rendered backgrounds are at least as good as Baldur's Gate's.

The Witcher doesn't have pre-rendered backgrounds.

Bullshit.

Don't be a moron. Anyone who has even a hint of clue about computer graphics knows that pre-rendered scenes can never look anywhere near as good as those rendered in real-time (which is, y'know, the whole reason why they are pre-rendered). The reason why real-time 3D is necessary is because that's the only way to have a free-moving perspective camera, not because it has the capacity to look "gorgeous".

 

[nik2008ofs]

entering a house in BG2, TOEE or Fallout = Instant.

Can't recall about ToEE of Fallout, but interior/exterior transitions in Infinity Engine games load the locations each and every time. Sure, the load times are practically zero in today's insanely powerful machines (in relation to the requirements of the engine), but so will NWN2 and the Witcher's load times be in the rigs we'll have 6 or 7 years from now...

 

[Brother None]

I'm no expert, but from memory, Baldur's Gate is all pre-rendered backgrounds, and the "hand-painted" thing came from BIS forum tards who couldn't understand what "pre-rendered" meant - not unlike the Bethesduh forum tards who can't grasp what "permutations" means in relation to OVER 9000! endings.

They tended to be rendered and then touched up. I mean, it's not really "hand painted" and certainly not "hand drawn", but IE did have the capability to feature such backgrounds. Which is a plus, it was just never really fully used. It was used to some level, and I think the results look pretty good in some IE games.

 

[Andhaira]

Actually IE's loading times in trasition were always fast.Especially if you already visited that area, and you had a large cache.

Speaking about U7,it was completely seamless. There was absolutely NO loading screens at all, save for when you saved/loaded the game :D

They really need to get that old team together, have gariott head it and make a totally new rpg.

 

[Brother None]

Oh yeah, 'coz Garriott has proven he still has any competence.

I love classic developers...when they're still good. Garriott. Molyneux. Roper...they should just quit. Hell, they should've quit ages ago. They have neither moved on with the industry nor retained the qualities that made them good to begin with. So why stay?

 

[Andhaira]

Perhaps. However, it shoudl be noted that no one has yet caught up with ultima 7. I doubt any game ever will. Full screen, seamless world without loading times, no interface, weather effects (which could be manipulated with spells mind you) day/night cycles, ability to hold a torch in one hand and a weapon in the other, reagent based spellcasting, increadibly openended world where you could truly go anywhere, travel by ship, horse, carriage, flying carpet, party members, full dialogue, tons of rpg interaction, great plot, low magic weapons, lots and lots of items and equipment (you could weild gardening tools as weapon!), blood and gore, fully manipulated envirnment, living breathing wolrd which moved without your interference, etc.

Gariott wcould live for a 1000+ years and still have nothing more to prove.

Heck U7's engine was so awesome it was used to power the FIRST fully graphical MMORPG Ultima Online.

Anyhow, molyneux I knowhas lost it by making crappy games (b&w, fable etc, )

 

[Brother None]

Perhaps. However, it shoudl be noted that no one has yet caught up with ultima 7.

Sure

And here's the kicker:

Including anything Garriott has done.

Why is that? Lack of funding? Lack of opportunity?

Or maybe he's just a washed out old git.

Gariott wcould live for a 1000+ years and still have nothing more to prove.

He doesn't have to prove anything, he should retire

But he didn't. Instead he got paid the equivalent of a full game's budget by NCSoft to work on a shitty MMO and use his name to hype it up.

 

[Andhaira]

Well his new project isn't out yet solets see. But do keep in mind it wasn't jsut gariott, it was the entire team at origin that made U7.

And yeah, i doubt even gariott will ever top u7.

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

They tended to be rendered and then touched up. I mean, it's not really "hand painted" and certainly not "hand drawn", but IE did have the capability to feature such backgrounds. Which is a plus, it was just never really fully used. It was used to some level, and I think the results look pretty good in some IE games.

Using photoshop to touch up pre-rendered backgrounds doesn't come close to fitting the definition of "hand painting", no matter how it's sliced. There's a big difference between using a brush and canvas versus a mouse and CRT monitor.

True. Though again, I'm not so sure if IWD 2 made a loss.

Good question. I think it did, but part of that was the over extended development the game got and the woefully botched released of it in Europe. Given it was released around the same time as NWN was released, IWD2 probably should have never been attempted. NWN was 3E, IWD2 was a hacked 2.5E. Everything about IWD2 was obsolete before they even started developing it. Even if it hadn't had problems with the European release, I doubt it would have made much money.

BGDA wasn't a mistake. It was a hit. It also spawned one sequel, and the engine was used in at least 3 other games as well. BGDA was one of Interplay's *good* decisions during its death throes.

BGDA didn't do as well as most people thought. Being released on three platforms and not even shipping 1M units isn't exactly striking gold there. The sequel and Fallout Enforcer both flopped pretty hard.

 

[Andhaira]

I'm pretty sure IWD2 made money. Definately not a loss. AFAIR it was released slightly PRIOR to NWN.

 

[nik2008ofs]

Actually IE's loading times in trasition were always fast.

Not exactly. On the Celeron 400MHz, 128ram, Riva TNT 16mb ram I played IWD when it first came out (a fairly decent rig for its time, far exceeding the game's recommended specs) loading times were fast, but noticeable enough to be grating when you had to frequently pop in and out of places in Kuldahar... and save/load times increased a lot if you already had lots of saved games (50+) as I like to do.

Especially if you already visited that area, and you had a large cache.

NWN2 and the Witcher load fast too... especially if you have a quad-core, 4gb ram, couple of 8800 GTS in SLI machine.

Increasing cache was not that easy with the 6-8gb hard disks common circa 2000, that in absence of external hard drives and truly affordable cd recorders had to fit lots of other stuff too.

 

[MetalCraze]

"Yeah, one was mismanaged into near bankruptcy and the other one sold itself."

In other words, INT was mismanaged, and BIo wans't. I doubt EA would have bothered with BIO if they were as poorly mismanaged as INT was/is. Heck, Interplay can't even make a game now. L0L

BIO, 'sold (out) or not', are still making games, money, success, and on, and on.

Volly, Bio just jumped from Interplay to some other guys and then to EA's CEO's pet-company in 2005. They just know how to whore themselves out best.

 

[Jeff Graw]

We definitely lost something in the transition to 3D, something that we're just starting to get back. The Witcher is a step in the right direction. MotB, if you have the monster rig required to run it close to max settings, has surpassed the IE games in aesthetics for it's outdoor sections, but still lags behind them for indoor sections.

 

[Volourn]

"Don't be a moron."

Take your advice.


"BGDA didn't do as well as most people thought."

What do people think it did? BGDA did well. I don't the goal was to make millions; but it was definitely successful. As for the sequel, I doubt it did as bad as you claim. Of course, Fallout Alliance did bomb (though, i find it underrated and harshly judged since people had a bad habity of comapring it to Fallout PC).


"I'm pretty sure IWD2 made money. Definately not a loss. AFAIR it was released slightly PRIOR to NWN."

Close enough for itss ales to be effected most likely. Not to mention it's fubar release.


"Volly, Bio just jumped from Interplay to some other guys and then to EA's CEO's pet-company in 2005. They just know how to whore themselves out best."

You are dumb. Until their partnership, they were their own company. Period. Atari, btw, was just the NWN publisher. They didn't own BIO.

 

[roshan]

I dislike "painted backgrounds" mainly because ToEEs never looked right and I could never tell how wide they were. In a tile engine, I know how many guys I can fit in a corridor. I know how wide that passage is. Where-as in ToEE there were multiple times were a corridor would look like it could fit 2 people but would only fit 1.

It also removes the opportunity for modding (I'm aware there are modders around for BG but it's a lot harder when you have to draw your own backgrounds). I think ToEE could really have taken off if they'd had a tile engine and made some modding tools for it. Arcanum never took off simply because the combat sucked and the graphics, well, you had to like them. ToEE had great combat and graphics, two things modders don't often change easily which means adding in some decent story to their own environments would've been very possible. Also, it was D&D so massive available fan-base.

Most mods for BG simply rip off area graphics from other games such as Diablo 2 or the other IE games. Some mods have created their own graphics though, I assume using the same process that BIS/BIO did to create area graphics.

I think the reason that TOEE doesnt have a strong modding scene is that the game simply sucked. It didnt have any spirit to it. The only thing good about it was that it had turn based combat.

 

[Brother None]

Using photoshop to touch up pre-rendered backgrounds doesn't come close to fitting the definition of "hand painting", no matter how it's sliced. There's a big difference between using a brush and canvas versus a mouse and CRT monitor.

Yeah I know. You could've used brush and canvas backgrounds for the IE engine, but I don't think anyone ever did.

But that said, the backgrounds are more "manual" than backgrounds in most RPG engine. In that sense, "hand painted" is wrong, but not that incredibly far off

 

[Disconnected]

Meanwhile, I'm still hoping for the day the silly industry will go for a set of standard game engines instead of this constant wheel reinventing shite that shifts the focus from gameplay & content to fucking polycount.

Gimme a DX team of game engines. Then we can start talking about ridiculous shit like destructible environments, because it won't be the 30 million dollar feature that ended up getting all the other content cut.

 

[DemonKing]

I think the IE engine has stood the test of time very well artistically to this day - I was playing BG2 the other day and my wife walked by and said "that looks nice" and all she cares about in games is eye candy! So to say that Interplay was trying to milk a dead cow in 2002 seems a bit far fetched to me.

I'm of the opinion that the IE games BIS released were more responsible for keeping the company afloat than bringing it down and Feargus has stated in the past that they were all profitable. It was more the decision to release crap like FO: BoS and other excrement that was bringing them down than the decsion to release fairly decent games using an older toolset.

The original NWN looked pretty awful in comparison to the IE engine when it was released in 2002 and personally I didn't feel that being able to spin around 360 degrees, zoom in on characters or make ugly modules with the tile set was that big of an attraction...it felt like NWN was 3D because the consensus among the gaming public at the time was "2D was outdated" not the fact that "3D is better than 2D". However, Bio have an uncanny knack for following the zeitgeist when it comes to these things hence they survived and prospered despite NWN being pretty awful as a game.

 

[Volourn]

"The original NWN looked pretty awful in comparison to the IE engine when it was released in 2002"

Nope. NWN looks much better than IE. No contest. People who think otherwise are simply blind. And, that's an insult to blind people. Sorry, blind people who are reading this.

R00fles!

 

[The Watchman]

Nope. NWN looks much better than IE. No contest.

Usually i just laugh at you, but reading that quote im actually starting to feel sorry for you. Hope you get better some day and until then cheer up.

 

[Jeff Graw]

Nope. NWN looks much better than IE. No contest. People who think otherwise are simply blind.

I doubt that there is a single person alive who shares that opinion. Prove me wrong.