The New Icons, Sci-fi or Fantasy?

[Cogline]

So long as Technomancer's nukes look different enough for me to remember which ones I can safely use on me to hit attacking mobs and which ones turn me into smoking boots as well while I'm trying to find a place to run to then I'm happy. And it's nice to get comprehensive answers from the dev team, too.

[Marketplace]

I have 2 ways to look at it. Shiny, colorful things can be either:
- Magic. Fantasy has magic, AO has magic. The magic in AO is scientifically explained, making it sci-fi.
- Futuristic. Medieval settings means dirty, rusty. Back then they didn't clean so often, they didn't have the technology to make nice shiny (neon) lights or nicely polished metal or glass surfaces. A futuristic setting means a clean metal /glass shiny look where different colored lights are possible. The icons belong very well into a futuristic setting, it's the games with a medieval setting that are doing it wrong . (To be honest though, the sandy rustic cyberpunk nature of AO makes it not very futuristic in the way I explained it . And taking magic into the equation some medieval towns do have the technology to become very shiny and colorful... I guess my first explanation is the most solid one )

Ethylenediaminetetraacetic, I am still processing your answer.

[Kintaii]

But most importantly, I think you have better things to do, then to debate with me over the board, and that is why I will shut up, and let you work. Thank you for being so dedicated and taking interest in the game to reply on the forums from time to time.

I'm at home now so it's cool, I can debate all I want. XD

As for the resolution, everyone has to deal with it not just Funcom.

The resolution thing is actually a *lot* more important than you'd think, and something that's becoming less of a concern with changes in technology (scalable vector graphics becoming more prominent and viable, as an example). Even a difference of a few pixels can make the largest of impacts - You can say that it's a universal problem, and that may well be, but the odds are that the majority of those games I listed (and most games out there, I'd wager) have a higher default size than we do. It just makes stuff easier; no two ways around it.

This also effects *what* you can display and how you can display it - Take the Hellgate one as a good example. There's one of the abilities they're displaying that has a red cross in the middle of a seven-pointed star. The resolution they're running at means that the lines of the star are actually visible, despite being very thin; I was doing some icon work with Docaholic earlier today wherein we wanted something very similar for one of the items headed into Pandemonium and, at the end of it, had to realize that we simply *couldn't* - The resolution of the icon is just too small to be able to show off that finer kind of detail.

Ultimately, though, I think that this is where we're going to just end up not quite seeing eye-to-eye:

There are a myriad of ways that you can create color schemes to denote the strength of a nano program or differentiate it and keep a sci-fi feel, even if it is just as simple as around the border, or with certain opacity, zoom, positioning or other attribute of the object e.g. a pistol.

Which is what we've done with the new set - Colour schemes that remain consistent and help denote purpose/function (all debuff nanos retaining the same colouration, as an example), added in borders to the NCU icons to denote friendly/hostile, - Again, the definition of what is "sci-fi" and what is "fantasy" is kinda nebulous at best on a *good* day, and this is just sorta coming down to personal opinion of how the icons came out. At that point the new icons already do what you've talked about, just maybe not in a way that you, personally, prefer. Which is the point of the thread - To garner opinions and such, which will always be cool. I'm just the guy who gets to explain the *why*. XD

I should also note, as an aside and since you mentioned it, that we are extremely limited in terms of our transparency options - Essentially, Anarchy Online has no alpha blending for its icons (or character textures, which is a whole other ballgame). This means that everything HAS to have a 'solid', hard-edge to it - If a pixel in the icon has any kind of transparency in it at all, it displays as bright green in-game [hence the little green spots you can see on some icons sometimes]. Remember, AO is an old game; technical limitations are as big of a consideration in things like this as anything else. =)

[Marketplace]

Again, the definition of what is "sci-fi" and what is "fantasy" is kinda nebulous at best on a *good* day, and this is just sorta coming down to personal opinion of how the icons came out. At that point the new icons already do what you've talked about, just maybe not in a way that you, personally, prefer. Which is the point of the thread - To garner opinions and such, which will always be cool. I'm just the guy who gets to explain the *why*. XD

I agree with you that my definition of what is sci-fi and what is fantasy is not very lucid, and that is where I come unstuck. It is really the reason I asked the question in the first place, to see what people thought about it in general.

I should also note, as an aside and since you mentioned it, that we are extremely limited in terms of our transparency options - Essentially, Anarchy Online has no alpha blending for its icons (or character textures, which is a whole other ballgame). This means that everything HAS to have a 'solid', hard-edge to it - If a pixel in the icon has any kind of transparency in it at all, it displays as bright green in-game [hence the little green spots you can see on some icons sometimes]. Remember, AO is an old game; technical limitations are as big of a consideration in things like this as anything else. =)

I wasn't aware of the transparency, nor the alpha blending limitation. Thank you for explaining. The last thing you want is green pixels everywhere. Would have been nice to have though, maybe down the road.

As for the resolution, and the Hellgate example, I see what you mean with the seven pointed stars thin lines. There is only one solution: Full HD AO. Just kidding of course. I did re-size the Hellgate image, not that it would necessarily equate to the in game issue of resolution, but it does give a hint towards the thin lines in the star fading into the background.

Hats of to you for taking the time to reply. I never thought this would be such an informative thread, I was expecting evil replies, mostly.

[Keex]

Ethylenediaminetetraacetic, I am still processing your answer.

stop making this matter Complex!

[Marketplace]

stop making this matter Complex!

Ok ok. It's an icon. I press icon, something happens. Duuuurr.

Better?

[Keex]

it was a pun, but kind of an insider pun i admit

[Duken]

when r icons coming ingame? are they on test now?

[Anarrina]

when r icons coming ingame? are they on test now?

The icon updates come when batches of them are ready. A good number of them already exist in-game, and have been for some time now.

[Alternity]

Anyone said too asian yet?

[Biancha]

The new icons will help identify stuff more easily which is functionally very cool. The old AO icons have a minimalist abstract charm to them though that I really like.

I don't really like the designs personally though because they are so literal, and have an awful lot of glowy stuff going on. Because of that, in ten years I think they will look more out of date then our current icons do.

/shrug!

[Xenotric]

I actually prefer the old ones for the style and look, specially stuff like the heal ones which look really nicely made in the current icons but the ones in the new batch look a bit... rushed.

I also don't think "newbies being confused" is really a valid argument, when your completely fresh and new you don't have a clue what anything does regardless of how obvious an icon is, the only thing that holds true in that statement is when you start going up nanolines where their Icons seem to reset to earlier version or don't have any graphical progression at all. Newbies will always have to have a look at the icons with the names next to em to learn what they do because you cannot put that much detail into icons that you know without reading :P.

Thats not to say I deplore the new icons, some of them are very nice and as you say it will help with the main issue with the current icons which is lack of variety, is that drain psychic or voice of god? Is that my main heal or is it my short hot? etc etc but if the current icons get completely replaced and lost that would make me a sad panda as they really are very nice for those area's they fit (newer nanos tend to be getting icons randomly attached).

[Marketplace]

it was a pun, but kind of an insider pun i admit

I got the joke Keex, but the point was also valid in itself.

[Destru]

The new icons are better icons. Style can be argued indefinitely.

[Biancha]

The new icons are better icons.

Maybe, but the only problem I personally ever had with the current set is just that there are not enough of them and they are reused too often. Anyhow icons will probably be the least of our concerns for the future, with how many changes are coming o.O

[Marketplace]

Maybe, but the only problem I personally ever had with the current set is just that there are not enough of them and they are reused too often. Anyhow icons will probably be the least of our concerns for the future, with how many changes are coming o.O

Yes, lots of changes it seems:

• New rendering.
• New resources.
• Remake of old resources.
• New content.
• New starting area.
• And then I think they will turn things upside down as far as storyline and blow things up as Kiantii put it indirectly in one of his posts in 4th Wall.
• And much much more.

[Lusos101]

And all that is coming so0on.

[Boltgun]

What surprises me if that alpha exists for model textures, ie helmets.

Plus it's not even a good transparency, it looks like jpegs and a green = transparent filter. Because of compression some green pixels end up on your texture, ugly. I hope there is alpha in the new engine, or at minimum something that act like png8 where transparent is a color.


I'm not a fan of poser models at all, plus some icons like pearls have a deep black shadow making it quite ugly. Adding a tint of blue and a minimum light to the ambience would make them a lot more professional looking.

But that's criticism, I like all the work on it. It makes the game all easier to read.

[Marketplace]

And all that is coming so0on.

I'm sure (read; I hope) the engine and rebalance will be here prior to the release of The Secret World which is set to April 2012.

[Rktim]

I'm sure (read; I hope) the engine and rebalance will be here prior to the release of The Secret World which is set to April 2012.

If someone 3 years ago would have told me that the new engine will come out after TSW and that TSW will come 9 months AFTER Duke Nukem Forever.... I would have slapped him silly...

Just saying..