Friday with Means - March 13th, 2009

[DecemberSky]

I think the new graphics are going to be fantastic...the only thing I hope is that it doesn't become "too" pretty.

The small things about the original art really need to stay in, like for instance... the opifex eye's are partially red, and her ears are pointed in the original. Don't lose the small detail please =)

Of course, I know its just a sample rendering, and I know the art team isn't anywhere close to done yet. =)

[sultryvoltron]

Good to see that OS will be adjusted a bit.
Too bad that the current heads are covered by helmets 99% of the time.
So only the lower levels will enjoy the new heads that look much better.
Maybe it's an idea to make the heads visible when not in combat?

Thanks for the engine update, always fun to hear about that!

I'd much rather have it possible to hold your helmet in your hand in the social window. That'd let people see your helmet, and see your head while not in combat.





Also, any updates on when "Neutral balance" will be discussed?

[Kaylinne]

You guys get get it all... OMG my toon is hawt!!! Blahh blahh... Makes me think I run round with a bunch of transvestites or something... How about letting us girls get something better to look at for a change? Say Sam Elliots smile with Patrick Swayze head... Oh and the chest of Mel Gibson.... And his backside... Oh yeah and be able to dress him in a proper firemans stuff... Red suspenders with no shirt... Yeah yeah now we are talken... Hey FunCom hire me to do the artwork!!!

I agree like totally!

[Windguaerd]

i'm still confused how people insist on thinking of AO having only 1 developer that does everything.

cause Means never mentioned, therefor its implied that they have the graphics people are doing these new tress and faces, cause really, what else would they be working on now that Xan is out?

the optimizing of the new graphics engine is still up to the people who have been working on it all this time.

funcom is a multi-threaded company people!

I never said there is one guy working on it. In the recent AOU interview with Means he stated there are 11 people working on AO.

Let's see if I can narrow down some positions.

Game Director
Assistant Game Director
Concept Artist
Character Artist
Gameplay Designer
Programmer
Lead Programmer
Lead World Designer
Lead Designer
Content Designer/Writer
Community Manager

Now we can assume some are multitasking, in other words having more than one role in the team, Means is not just GD but probably also a Dev himself (as he has been for 5 years) not just supervising but doing some creations of his own.

LoX will keep the high levels occupied a while, but it's not finished, and also the mid-low levels will want some love, so that is some chance that after LoX is wrapped up the following free content may be directed at that part of the player base along with further fixes and improvements to the game.

How many out of 11 are working on the engine itself 100%? my guess would be about 3-4, mostly programmers due to the Directx9 work involved.

[Trebie]

Outside of the fact that she looks cracked out in the pic (really, the original looked calm and serious, this one looks like someone just walked in on her in the shower), the graphics themselves are coming along really well!

It's disheartening to hear that things are still so far from being done ofcourse, but the update itself on the matter is also very reassuring that it will infact be done, and is activly being worked on.

Optimization is very important, and I hope that the system will beable to take advantadge of SLI and quad cores, seeing as the new "clunker" the the 2010's will more then likly contain q6600 processors, with that machine averaging around $800-1000 self built.

A question I would like answered, is on what machine were they seeing those low frames? Was it on one like mine (an i7 ddr3 gtx295 machine)? or was this on like.. a P32.4ghz radeon9800 DDR2 machine, and in what resolution?


The fact that it could be an entire year before we see the game finished is ****ty and all, but the game itself atm is still fun for those of us who have allowed our eyes the time to "adjust" and get back into it (much like myself! ). We all just have to be sure not to burn ourselves out on it before it gets finished.

Im begging you to PLEASE try and keep us up to date on the matter a bit more frequently, with teaser screen shots of these "new" effects, or maybe a quick clip of character movements here and there. That would really boost the moral around here, AND on top of that it would draw alot of attention to the game, as if it were a new game in beta. Hell, it might even get some people to sign up and score you guys some new accounts after they see whats coming and then go "hmm, wonder what the games like right now. think I'll go try it out". lol

If you have to, since you don't enjoy the code talk, ask one of the devs working on it to start a journal or something, or do a weekly post here about whats going on. Even if it's just a quick 2 sentence update like "huzzah! High frame rates now acheived with "insert possibilitys here"! We can now begin work on "insert work here" and are looking to finish "insert stuff to finish here"! More coming next week!" *screen shot attatched*.
That's it, that's all it would take. Would be like 5 minutes outta their day once a week or every 2 weeks to keep us up to date on whats goin on.
So yeah.. Please ask them?

*edit*
How about this, I'll PAY them to do updates weekly. lol

[vadagget]

Since we're on this kick about graphics and funcom being multi threaded and what not, how about we get some attention on the fact that many higher end graphics cards aren't being recognized by AO such at this thread: http://forums.anarchy-online.com/sho...53#post5452653



is there any comment about new cards working in the new engine?

That's been covered long ago. Assume 99% of all current video issues will go away and the more powerful your graphics card, the better will be your performance.

That said, Means has indicated they are making sure that $20 PCI video cards from 5 years ago will run the game smoothly (maybe not with all 'eye candy' turned on).

[Trebie]

It'll look pretty much like old AO on those cards still im willing to bet, lol.

I'd like to know what they're running it on atm that's seeing low frame rates though.

[vadagget]

If you have to, since you don't enjoy the code talk, ask one of the devs working on it to start a journal or something, or do a weekly post here about whats going on. Even if it's just a quick 2 sentence update like "huzzah! High frame rates now acheived with "insert possibilitys here"! We can now begin work on "insert work here" and are looking to finish "insert stuff to finish here"! More coming next week!" *screen shot attatched*.
That's it, that's all it would take. Would be like 5 minutes outta their day once a week or every 2 weeks to keep us up to date on whats goin on.

Maybe tell Enno to post blurbs on his blog? Something more interesting than the fact that his PC can't enter sleep mode with 6 Gb RAM or Firefox has too many plug-ins...

[delsabre]

Erm... wow... well... the new face model has alot more detail and might allow very advanced emotes/animations but... apart from the eyebrows it has no resemblance to the old low poly-count version and to be honest I'd feel quite cheated if my toon was changed so drastically.

Reminds me of the famous(?) NGE upgrade Star Wars Galaxies went through a while back.

I used to be quite proud of FC's gfx team (well except the helmet designers... whoever designed the Nomad helmet should be spanked silly and deported to some remote star where he/she couldn't bring more disgrace to humankind) but I suppose they all went to work with Conan... >_<

[vadagget]

As for head models, have the artists post up the latest iterations as part of the billboard rotation in-game (not like there's anything on the billboards now...) and a sticky forum for voting on them. Might actually get some people to discover there -are- AO forums, even...

[Disodoctor]

Let's see if I can narrow down some positions.

Game Director
Assistant Game Director
Concept Artist
Character Artist
Gameplay Designer
Programmer
Lead Programmer
Lead World Designer
Lead Designer
Content Designer/Writer
Community Manager

erm, like, Tea Lady, Cleaner.

[Trebie]

erm, like, Tea Lady, Cleaner.

Janitors can help too. Someone has to clean the sloppy programmers desks!

[Chrys]

Chinese code monkeys are cheap these days. Weren't they using them?

I hope the graphics coders go back to AO's old concept art which I think is timeless and very good. The update is looking very interesting, nice work.

Edit: This looks absolutely awesome. But as we all know, biomech ended up looking sorta like egghead armor and is remembered as such More people would roll clans if they looked like this. Concept art gallery here

[Ebondevil]

I imagine it is unlikely we will simply replace all the heads in game as all of us have some attatchment to these...but more likely offer a choice to move to a "new" head if we want...and remove the old ones from character creation so all new characters will get new heads.

My 2 cents on this would be that there are already methods in game for changing a characters appearance, so I would suggest not adding any more. Perhaps add a free use of the Plastic surgery clinic in the org HQ's for people so they can change their characters once when the engine comes out though. And yes, I know that would only apply to paying customers ^^

As far as more profession specific things are concerned, it's only a small thing, but Agents do get access to Face Graft and Advanced Face Graft, if new faces are going to become available please don't forget to add those faces to the list of options for the nano. Or even better change the Advanced Face Graft so the Agent gets free use of the Plastic surgery clinic so they can change not only their face but more of their appearance, thus allowing Advanced Face graft to do something different from the basic one.

[PhoenixOfAges]

My 2 cents on this would be that there are already methods in game for changing a characters appearance, so I would suggest not adding any more. Perhaps add a free use of the Plastic surgery clinic in the org HQ's for people so they can change their characters once when the engine comes out though. And yes, I know that would only apply to paying customers ^^

Actually it only applies to paying customers in an org, with a city and a large HQ.

[Technogen]

Actually it only applies to paying customers in an org, with a city and a large HQ.

But since the instance cities will be out before them it should be no problem for anyone.

[PhoenixOfAges]

But since the instance cities will be out before them it should be no problem for anyone.

Which will, last I heard, be small city plots. At least some with small city plots don't have large HQs not because they didn't want one, but because they couldn't fit one. Some just don't have a build area big enough to fit a large HQ at all so they have to make do with a smaller one. Also they have given no indication as to when those will be available, for all we know the engine could end up coming first.

[Ebondevil]

Actually it only applies to paying customers in an org, with a city and a large HQ.

Never really used it, so I wasn't aware it was in Large HQ only, still, I don't think extra ways to change peoples appearance should be added to the game when they already exist, though I wouldn't see any problems with putting the clinic's in HQ's of all sizes.

[IHaveHugeNick]

No one asked most important question yet.

Will you be taking nipple technology from AoC???

[Technogen]

Will you be taking nipple technology from AoC???

I have a trench with Nipplecom does that count?