The Elder Scrolls Online

[Laeris]

Oh, and Elder Scrolls Online uses the Hero engine. I think SWTOR is the ugliest MMO ever made and the Hero engine one of the worst engines ever to bankrupt 2 design studios and flop out one of the most underwhelming 200 million dollar budget games I have ever seen. So yeeeeah, I'm not in the least bit thrilled about this game.

When I first heard about it, I was like, "oooh!" Now... If half of the things in this post are accurate then I can guarantee that you won't see me there. Hell, if it uses the Hero engine for real... I won't be there. I hated SWTOR's textures and hyper instancing that much. I can only hope this is some massive late-sprung April fools prank by Game Informer.

[Rayner]

Oh, and Elder Scrolls Online uses the Hero engine. I think SWTOR is the ugliest MMO ever made and the Hero engine one of the worst engines ever to bankrupt 2 design studios and flop out one of the most underwhelming 200 million dollar budget games I have ever seen. So yeeeeah, I'm not in the least bit thrilled about this game.

When I first heard about it, I was like, "oooh!" Now... If half of the things in this post are accurate then I can guarantee that you won't see me there. Hell, if it uses the Hero engine for real... I won't be there. I hated SWTOR's textures and hyper instancing that much. I can only hope this is some massive late-sprung April fools prank by Game Informer.

I think SWTOR looks great. It's a stylized MMO to avoid the uncanny valley that Rift will eventually succumb to, so I can see why some people don't enjoy the visuals.

I'm not sure what hyper instancing you're referring to. It can't be the instancing between planets, of which many are the size of multiple Rift zones.

Also, do you have an official source for that 200 million dollar figure? I would love to see it.

[Annalea]

It's a stylized MMO to avoid the uncanny valley that Rift will eventually succumb to, so I can see why some people don't enjoy the visuals.

It's a bit strange you think that Rift is going for the realistic approach that leads to the so-called valley! It's not so much a comparison of Style vs Non-Style... it's... more about Style-Done-Wrong vs Style-Done-Well. But, like in all things, some people prefer the cheaper things in life; some people like the lower quality wine and, similarly, some people prefer the lower quality visuals.

So, I can see why some people might not enjoy Rift's visuals.

[Ace]

I am interested and would be a fool not to try it. However, based on my experience with SWTOR alone, I feel like a fool to preorder but probably will anyway if it’s not another $70 EA like release with day one downloadable content on disk. Who knows? Might find I like it here and stay anyway.

You want the real bottom line from me? It’s simple, everything I read makes me feel like the TESO development team is ripping out everything that made the elder scrolls games fun to play in favor of making a familiar WOW clone. I been there and done that and would dearly love something new to come along.

Sure, they seem to have some new features to tout, but maybe the wrong ones. It takes more than fun sword swinging to keep a game fun over time. I am not sure how much of a sandbox the game will really be. There are still a lot of unanswered questions.

It’s interesting to see the 100V100 battles noted in a game using Hero Engine after listening to Bioware claim the engine would not support it.

[Rayner]

It's a bit strange you think that Rift is going for the realistic approach that leads to the so-called valley! It's not so much a comparison of Style vs Non-Style... it's... more about Style-Done-Wrong vs Style-Done-Well. But, like in all things, some people prefer the cheaper things in life; some people like the lower quality wine and, similarly, some people prefer the lower quality visuals.

So, I can see why some people might not enjoy Rift's visuals.

I'm not sure what game you're talking about that has lower quality visuals, as I don't recall any being brought into the discussion. We were talking about alternate styles, sure, but not low quality.

Also, I hope you're not insinuating that I don't enjoy Rift's visuals. The only reason why I kept my Rift subscription so long was because of the visuals. Without the appearance tab and without the set of armor that I enjoyed thoroughly, I would have quit months sooner. I might have played even longer if only I could have used the appearance tab to replace my dagger with a sword. Dagger-and-board just doesn't have a good ring to it.

I understand why you were confused, though. You keep company with people who only see in black and white. You see, I am capable of critiquing something without vehemently hating it, or even feeling overly negative towards it at all. I am able to constrain my rhetoric as well. Perhaps you should look into that and avoid using words such as "wrong" when referring to artistic taste in the future.

It’s interesting to see the 100V100 battles noted in a game using Hero Engine after listening to Bioware claim the engine would not support it.

BioWare said their version of the engine could not support it at this time. It really depends on what version each game started with and what each development team steered towards when developing. Honestly, both studios have been working with the shell for so long and making their own changes and additions that it's like comparing two complicated java web services because they both use Joda Time. That was an incredibly specific reference.

[Laeris]

I'm not sure what game you're talking about that has lower quality visuals, as I don't recall any being brought into the discussion. We were talking about alternate styles, sure, but not low quality.

Also, I hope you're not insinuating that I don't enjoy Rift's visuals. The only reason why I kept my Rift subscription so long was because of the visuals. Without the appearance tab and without the set of armor that I enjoyed thoroughly, I would have quit months sooner. I might have played even longer if only I could have used the appearance tab to replace my dagger with a sword. Dagger-and-board just doesn't have a good ring to it.

I understand why you were confused, though. You keep company with people who only see in black and white. You see, I am capable of critiquing something without vehemently hating it, or even feeling overly negative towards it at all. I am able to constrain my rhetoric as well. Perhaps you should look into that and avoid using words such as "wrong" when referring to artistic taste in the future.

BioWare said their version of the engine could not support it at this time. It really depends on what version each game started with and what each development team steered towards when developing. Honestly, both studios have been working with the shell for so long and making their own changes and additions that it's like comparing two complicated java web services because they both use Joda Time. That was an incredibly specific reference.

No, I said it was an ugly game. What is ugly to me is not ugly to someone else. It's called an opinion. What I can say is that the game is forcibly rendered at half detail because the Hero engine is apparently a prepubescent toddler that quite can't figure out how to act like a big boy engine and display high rez textures.

Now let's talk about right and wrong design techniques. Right way: Add detail sliders. Let people ratchet up the detail and character models to a level they're comfortable with. Wrong Way: BioWare's way. "We weren't pleased with client performance with the higher detail models so we disabled them for everyone."

That is an actual quote.

[Rayner]

What I can say is that the game is forcibly rendered at half detail because the Hero engine is apparently a prepubescent toddler that quite can't figure out how to act like a big boy engine and display high rez textures.

Not anymore. Please keep your TOR hating up to date!

[Laeris]

I don't hate TOR. I just think it's ugly. The detail thing is just one major part. The other is... well, stylistically it looks more like a Starship Troopers MMO than a Star Wars MMO... what with all the hangar bays, corridors, super huge goofy guns and little to no space combat. Oh and don't forget the Roadwarrior style end-game armors.

I still can't believe they put a pvp blaster in game called the Masta Blasta.

[Rayner]

I don't hate TOR. I just think it's ugly. The detail thing is just one major part. The other is... well, stylistically it looks more like a Starship Troopers MMO than a Star Wars MMO... what with all the hangar bays, corridors, super huge goofy guns and little to no space combat.

I seem to recall hangar bays and corridors in the movies, and I'm not sure what goofy guns you are referring to. Also, only about 8% of the movies consists of actual space combat. Maybe you're just not big enough of a Star Wars fan?

Oh and don't forget the Roadwarrior style end-game armors.

Some endgame armors are pretty bad and deviate from the armors you see leveling up. This happens in Rift too, though. Leveling up I loved all of the realistic plate armor, but then the end-game armor has aircraft carriers for shoulders.

I still can't believe they put a pvp blaster in game called the Masta Blasta.

What game are you referring to? I have never seen this item, nor does torhead nor Google seem to know what you're talking about.

[Credo]

My point was that if you take away the things I listed, it doesn't set itself apart from any other game. Elder Scrolls is a mainly 1st person game with living breathing AI. It's a game where a person puts a mark on the world. If you remove those things, it just isn't an Elder Scrolls game. Period.

I recognize that doing away with radiant AI in a game like Rift would be trivial. But this is a themepark MMO... not an Elder Scrolls game. Again, doing away with such things puts it further towards the pile of "same old, same old" and less Elder Scrolls styled gameplay. Who says you have to do quests? Just like in Skyrim, if you don't go see the guy at the right time you miss him. Why have a linear progession pathway? It's an Elder Scrolls game. I should be able to go from A to B or A to R then back to B whenever I want. But no, it's a linear progression game which has to use static NPCs for continuity and quest progression.

It's not an Elder Scrolls game to me it sounds like.

As for housing, EQ2 uses the system you say can't be done. You purchase said singular house and there's just 419 instances of that house given to other people. When you use the door, you teleport to your version of the interior. That's all the mechanic is in Skyrim anyway. It isn't like you can do anything to the exterior. They're just shirking the feature.

It's ok to meddle with the trivial things in a game like Elder Scrolls... but you can't bastardize the fundamental elements of something that's been going for more than a decade and expect people not to scream about it.

How would SWTOR have turned out if they allowed Republic players the ability to quest on Dromund Kaas? Or, how about if Jedi couldn't wield lightsabers? You can't mess with the IP the way they're doing and expect it to not turn quite a few people off.

It's like how a post on that article reads at the end, "We waited so long for an Elder Scrolls MMO... then all of a sudden they yank the carpet out from under our feet and we're left wondering... dear gods what is this filth?"

Edit: And what is this? No real time combat? This is fancy speak for saying, "button mashing, auto attack style." Plenty of MMOs like DCUO, GW2, Mortal, Age of Conan... they all use real time combat. Elder Scrolls uses real time combat. But... apparently not Elder Scrolls Online.

Sigh.

Your not taking the rumors with a shot of penicillin...

[Laeris]

What game are you referring to? I have never seen this item, nor does torhead nor Google seem to know what you're talking about.

Well, sometimes I flip a coin Rayner. If it's heads, I troll. If its tails... I go eat a sandwich.

[bah]

Well, sometimes I flip a coin Rayner. If it's heads, I troll. If its tails... I go eat a sandwich.

Translation: You like to speak with your *** most of the time.

Seriously, between *****ing about things that have already been fixed or don't apply to the game in the first place it's hilarious that you keep complaining about ToR like you actually know wtf you are talking about.

Which one of the Bioware developers slept with your boyfriend?

[Galibier]

Have you ever worked with a game engine? Its actually very likely that certain engines are easier to work with than others. Optimization isn't just for end users. It also applies to programmers. The Unreal Engine is apparently a bit unfriendly to programmers (this has been said before by other companies). The reason why Gamebryo is so popular is that its extremely adapatable and easy to use, I'd venture to guess that is also the case with the Hero engine or all these MMO's wouldn't use it.

I did find it interesting that a relatively small eastern MMO in Archeage is using the Cryoengine. But its no news that the Cryoengine is notorious for being horribly optimized. One hopes they will be doing some fair modding of the engine to make it more MMO friendly.

The problem is the Hero engine was actually never used in any game until SWTOR. It was designed and used in the developement of the never released Hero's Journey. That said the version of Hero Engine that Bioware is using has been so heavily modified on their end to suit their purposes that it is not really the engine causing a lot of the issues but the modifications that Bioware made. Tbh from the digging I have done you could argue that Bioware would have broken even if they just designed their own engine. When you add up the man hours generated to modify the engine and the licensing fees they paid to use the Hero Engine... it just made me shake my head.

[Laeris]

Translation: You like to speak with your *** most of the time.

Seriously, between *****ing about things that have already been fixed or don't apply to the game in the first place it's hilarious that you keep complaining about ToR like you actually know wtf you are talking about.

Which one of the Bioware developers slept with your boyfriend?

I think it was the same one who F'd up the Ilum PvP system.

[Laeris]

The problem is the Hero engine was actually never used in any game until SWTOR. It was designed and used in the developement of the never released Hero's Journey. That said the version of Hero Engine that Bioware is using has been so heavily modified on their end to suit their purposes that it is not really the engine causing a lot of the issues but the modifications that Bioware made. Tbh from the digging I have done you could argue that Bioware would have broken even if they just designed their own engine. When you add up the man hours generated to modify the engine and the licensing fees they paid to use the Hero Engine... it just made me shake my head.

True. SWTOR uses an alpha build of the Hero Engine that was not ready for release. They then heavily modified it. It has been sold twice to different companies for further development... and still hasn't made it into an actual MMO release as a finished product.