EC Art Update... a quick look (now with (large) pics)...

[Dermott of LS]

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Got home, got patched up, and taking a quick run around, and yes, there IS quite a bit of difference.

The terrain is now silky smooth regardless of zoom level and while item plant, and mobile artwork still pixelates as you zoom in, the level of distortion, at least on my system is NOTICEABLY lessened.

Great work Grimm and team!

Did you guys "cut" the grass again? It seems a bit more flat than it used to though. I'll freely admit to missing KR's more wild/varied look to the grassland terrain, so I might just be remembering it a little differently... but again looking at EC screenshots from earlier and the client, looks like there WAS a bit of a tweak to it.

 

[Kayne]

Re: EC Art Update... a quick look...

Dermott since I dont really use EC do you have any screenshots of the same area you can post to compare the changes? I didnt notice the difference when i tried it but I dont log into EC often enough

 

[Dermott of LS]

Re: EC Art Update... a quick look...

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I'll work something up in a bit... been doing about 3 things at once since I got home, so I'm gonna unwind a bit first, then I'll mock up a comparison shot of KR vs pre-73 EC vs post-73 EC in the same area.

 

[Kayne]

Re: EC Art Update... a quick look...

Ah awesome nice one.

 

[Woodsman]

Re: EC Art Update... a quick look...

The terrain is now silky smooth regardless of zoom level and while item plant, and mobile artwork still pixelates as you zoom in, the level of distortion, at least on my system is NOTICEABLY lessened.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think when they release the updates for the plants and mobiles (please have some in Pub 74 Grimm ), that some of it will be KR.

Liking the terrain as well.

Is it just me or does Castle Britannia look sharper on the outside? I think it was just terrain in this update, but it seemed like that looked sharper at least.

 

[Pinco]

Re: EC Art Update... a quick look...

Also the new bug in the virtues gump is not bad, I'd like to see more broken things, why just one for this version?

 

[Dermott of LS]

Re: EC Art Update... a quick look...

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Virtue gumps were working fine for me :/

 

[Shiznit Bo'Bourbon]

Re: EC Art Update... a quick look...

Wish they'd make it not chug on systems that should run it easily.

 

[pgib]

Re: EC Art Update... a quick look...

Well, honestly I don't see the difference. I'm trying to get it but really it looks the same to me.

 

[Crysta]

Re: EC Art Update... a quick look...

It looks much smoother now to me.. but I also seem to be getting insane lag spikes any time I try to open my house's packing crate... in the "20 seconds or so before the game starts responding again" range. :x

 

[Pinco]

Re: EC Art Update... a quick look...

It looks much smoother now to me.. but I also seem to be getting insane lag spikes any time I try to open my house's packing crate... in the "20 seconds or so before the game starts responding again" range. :x

That's an old problem...
The game have to generate 9999 slots so it takes some time

 

[Crysta]

Re: EC Art Update... a quick look...

Ah. I have no complaints then.

 

[Martyna Zmuir]

Re: EC Art Update... a quick look...

First blush: Forest terrain...Uhm... I guess I sorta see an update.. but it's very subtle... almost to the point of not being noticeable.

Grass tiles used for housing look sharper.. at least I think. Okay, general grass terrain definitely wraps over z-axis changes better - i.e. embankments.

Cobblestone in Britain appears to scale better scale when zooming...

Dungeon terrain definitely looks better.

I think the most noticeable differences will appear when the housing tiles and plant art is upgraded.

Edit: Just noticed this... graves.. they look really odd.. muddled.. almost melted in comparison to the ground. I'm guessing they're considered 'items' though.

 

[Slayvite]

Re: EC Art Update... a quick look...

 

[Uvtha]

Re: EC Art Update... a quick look...

Yeah... fer realz

 

[Dermott of LS]

Re: EC Art Update... a quick look...

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Ok here's the first one regarding the grass. Granted it's very subtle in difference between the EC pics, but if you look near the edge of the foundation you can see the main difference. I have a couple more that I need to put side by side... one at Brit bank showing the cobblestone difference (this is more noticeable) and at the ant lion pit showing quite a BIG difference in the terrains there (first one (grass at house) will be KR vs EC vs today EC, the rest will simply be EC before vs EC after).

Note that pics will be rather large.

 

[Dermott of LS]

Re: EC Art Update... a quick look...

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Comparison shots #2: Britain Bank (LS Fel as that was where I took the initial shot)

 

[Heartseeker]

Re: EC Art Update... a quick look...

Terrain, so far looks sharper to me.

Grass is an improvement, so are dungeon tiles.

So far so good.

The thing is, that now the items look real bad in comparison.

We need the rest of the game sharper too.....

 

[Dermott of LS]

Re: EC Art Update... a quick look...

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Comparison #3, Ant lion pit

 

[Storm]

Re: EC Art Update... a quick look...

the ground seems much clearer especialy when you place items on it like plate legs then zoom in

 

[Woodsman]

Re: EC Art Update... a quick look...

The thing is, that now the items look real bad in comparison.

Yeah, hopefully the plants will go in next.

 

[Storm]

Re: EC Art Update... a quick look...

like they said they are doing it in stages this is just the first pass so I would expect more at a later date most likely a few months but thats my guess at least they are doing what they can when they can

 

[Larisa]

For someone who really doesn't like the EC, I am VERY impressed.

The terrain looks awesome!

Nice job art guys, this is very nice

Thank you for the comparison screenshots, very well done!

I still won't ever play it but I'm highly impressed

 

[G.v.P]

For someone who really doesn't like the EC, I am VERY impressed.

I agree. The characters and creatures are still a little too muddy for me...it's hard to leave the sharp contrast of the 2D/CC. But the terrain density/sharpness changes are very nice looking.

I still won't ever play it but I'm highly impressed

/facepalm lol well...I could never feel comfortable PvPing in the EC the way the graphics of characters feel muddy to me but we'll see how it goes from here. I've PvM'd with it, and crafted stuff and all, and it isn't all that bad just...not the same sharpness.

 

[TheGrimmOmen]

For someone who really doesn't like the EC, I am VERY impressed.

The terrain looks awesome!

Nice job art guys, this is very nice

Thank you for the comparison screenshots, very well done!

I still won't ever play it but I'm highly impressed

Actually you can thank the art gal. I can't remember what her moniker is on the forums, but she did a terrific job on it!

- Grimm

 

[Petra Fyde]

I still won't ever play it but I'm highly impressed

I didn't think I would. It made my head ache and gave me nausea.

But then my new graphics card didn't like running at anything other than default resolution, which made CC too tiny to see.
I found the thing that made my head ache was not having the fps matched to my monitor refresh rate. I fixed that.
I found the thing that gave me nausea was the mis-match between footsteps sound and movement. I turned footsteps off.
Now I play it all the time and it feels strange going back. Only I wish it wouldn't crash so often when running around.

Funny thing is, it rarely crashes when I'm playing Siege, but does it often on other shards.

 

[Ahuaeyjnkxs]

Petra you might have well put your finger on the wound here...

this discovery will highly reduce the possibilities that must be explored to find the culprit !

 

[Pinco]

it's nice the trick for hide the tile difference of the water whirlpools, now finally looks like the same thing with the sorrounding water
I hope we will see also the tokuno "water" looks like water in the next future

 

[Kayne]

Thanks Dermott. Nice to see some KR screens again.

There are definitely some sharper edges now etc but the change isnt as great as I thought it would be. Still I'm looking forward to seeing the next stage of this update

 

[Herman]

I like it if they get everything else as sharp as the ground i probably will change to EC

 

[lucitus]

Iam the only one who sees only a slight non talkable difference?

I see the difference between KR and EC, but the difference between pre and now i cant really see. Yes the water now looks light blue instead of realistic dark blue but... this should be the art update for terrain?

Iam disappointed and confused, but i would never negate any work on this!

 

[HD2300]

Re: EC Art Update... a quick look...

Well, honestly I don't see the difference. I'm trying to get it but really it looks the same to me.

Screenshots Dont Lie. My Astigmatism is gone. Its so Silky Smooth now or whatever. See you all again in 9 months time. LMAO x 5

 

[A Thought Elemental]

I could never feel comfortable PvPing in the EC the way the graphics of characters feel muddy to me but we'll see how it goes from here. I've PvM'd with it, and crafted stuff and all, and it isn't all that bad just...not the same sharpness.

EC client uses both of my CPU cores and my graphics card. Classic client is singlethreaded and doesn't appear to know that my GPU exists, and uses a single core of my other wise dual-core CPU for everything.

EC client effectively allows me to run faster through the world. I think I've been accused of speedhacking due to running faster through the world than ppl using the classic client.

I can get the spell functions for PVP to work acceptably well between the two (UOAssisted-classic vs EC).

What destroys EC client for PVP however is what happens when someone puts down paralyze fields (or any fields, really). Won't discuss just what the difference is with the 2d client due to forum rules. But for EC client to be the clear choice for "PVP", it must be given an option to display all fields to be nothing more than flat, unanimated, boring, zero-GPU-using, easy-to-see, and easy-to-target tiles on the ground. It just has to be.

 

[hawkeye_pike]

If that's what they made such a big fuss about then I'm really disappointed. The difference is hardly noticable (at least from those screenshots). All but the floor tiles still looks horrible, so they made about 2% of the whole way. YAY!

 

[A Thought Elemental]

If that's what they made such a big fuss about then I'm really disappointed. The difference is hardly noticable (at least from those screenshots). All but the floor tiles still looks horrible, so they made about 2% of the whole way. YAY!

Well, if you look closely, you can see where the original texture on the ground below more resembles a series of smudges, whereas the new one more looks like a texture that's supposed to be ... a ground texture.

They had to start somewhere, this seems like a nice place, to me.

My own art-related pet peeve remains untouched but I'm trying not to complain in context. Some of the monster art in EC makes me want to die. I don't take my Hiryus out of the stable any more, they look too horrible. And I can't tell my rough-skinned brown dragons from my smooth-skinned red ones, they are all a nasty looking pink color in EC. Definitely prefer the 2d colors and textures on dragons, and am real close to preferring the 2d models as well, despite the unnatural carriage of the wings.

 

[lucitus]

Cool i found the new terrain today!

 

[Mapper]

If that's what they made such a big fuss about then I'm really disappointed. The difference is hardly noticable (at least from those screenshots). All but the floor tiles still looks horrible, so they made about 2% of the whole way. YAY!

Artists: So shall we do the dozen or so terrain tiles first? Or the 50,000+ art tiles?

Hmmm.. I'm not surprised at their decision to START at terrain.

 

[A Thought Elemental]

Artists: So shall we do the dozen or so terrain tiles first? Or the 50,000+ art tiles?

Hmmm.. I'm not surprised at their decision to START at terrain.

I think that speaks positively to the decision to start there. Terrain contains the textures to which players are exposed to the most (hell, surrounded by it). You'd get the most mileage out of your work that way, and then perhaps proceed on down the line. (like, the line to making my pets look right again ).

 

[pgib]

Definitely prefer the 2d colors and textures on dragons, and am real close to preferring the 2d models as well, despite the unnatural carriage of the wings.

A matter of taste I think. Imho the CC dragon is hideous and the EC one looks awsome, it's just a bit small.

 

[Kayne]

Cool i found the new terrain today!

**Image**

I can see thats Malas somewhere but where?

 

[Kayne]

Definitely prefer the 2d colors and textures on dragons, and am real close to preferring the 2d models as well, despite the unnatural carriage of the wings.

A matter of taste I think. Imho the CC dragon is hideous and the EC one looks awsome, it's just a bit small.

My personal preference is the CC dragon. The CC blue and orange beetles too.

 

[pgib]

Oh c'mon, you're kidding me. Look at that:

It's a living, breathing, biting thing. The CC one looks like a stop-motion franken-lizard monstruosity.

 

[Kayne]

If I hadnt already been screenshot happy I'd bother to go get a CC one and continue this but my preference and yours are different so i'll leave it at that

 

[Larisa]

Actually you can thank the art gal. I can't remember what her moniker is on the forums, but she did a terrific job on it!

- Grimm

I stand corrected, thank you art GAL whoever you are, great job!

Terrain is MUCH smoother, blends better, looks more realistic...no choppy bits.

And the reason I don't like the EC isn't because it gives me a headache.

My initial reason was the fact that everything was transformed into little boxes. Slotted packs and hot-key bars made it feel like every other game out there, which UO is clearly not.

Then they made the ability to change that into *classic* view...great!

Then the models come in. There are a few creature models I really like..most of them look horrible, to me anyway.

The characters look like big blobs, I don't like the paperdoll stance AT ALL...there are many reasons lol but this new change is awesome

 

[Elric_Soban]

Hmm

I was really looking forward to this update. After looking at Dermott's screenshots...

Uhhh..

..

Im not really, ehh.. uhh.... umm..

..What?

 

[Viquire]

Oh good grief. It's just terrain art. They just started for crying out loud.

 

[Kayne]

Oh good grief. It's just terrain art. They just started for crying out loud.

I have a special design in mind for a pointy stick for you Viquire...

 

[Viquire]

I have a special design in mind for a pointy stick for you Viquire...

Which is okay, I have a high parry skill and an enduring metal shield of animated invulnerability and I'm not afraid to use it, unless the durability gets too low.

 

[olduofan]

Oh c'mon, you're kidding me. Look at that:

It's a living, breathing, biting thing. The CC one looks like a stop-motion franken-lizard monstruosity.

looks awesome other than that pinkish-glowing white dragon thats the number 1 reason I refuse to play the ec and Im not alone on this

 

[Ender]

looks awesome other than that pinkish-glowing white dragon thats the number 1 reason I refuse to play the ec and Im not alone on this

A more realistic looking dragon is the top reason you refuse to use the Enhanced Client?

LOL. Ok then.