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Alpha Two Phase III testing has begun! During this phase, our realms will be open every day, and we'll only have downtime for updates and maintenance. We'll keep everyone up-to-date about downtimes in Discord.
If you have Alpha Two, you can download the game launcher here, and we encourage you to join us on our Official Discord Server for the most up to date testing news.
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Re: Ashes Terrain Topography and Cohesion
For me, the most important part of level/setting design is environmental storytelling. As I'm exploring, I want the things around me - whether great or small - to inform the 'backstory' of a given area relative to our perspective as players.
Let's use Metroid as an example:
https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/metroid/images/1/1e/Torvus_Bog.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20230521011448
The first two are some art for an area in Metroid Prime 2 - the third is an actual ingame screenshot of the same space, which the image share function didn't want to directly post. Figured I'd add all three since the perspective in each is a bit different.
The idea here is that this was once an industrial facility in a forested area, but the region was rapidly flooded after some drastic environmental shifts (a meteor impact about 50 years prior). By the time you explore it, the civilization who lived here has largely abandoned the area, leaving nature to slowly reclaim it.
Metroid Prime 2 is full of environmental storytelling like this - an area that was once verdant plains got scorched into a desert from the same meteor, there's ruined structures all around, and all in all you can feel the story-beats of the area without anyone needing to tell you anything.
The Metroid Prime series (particularly the first two games) rely on this type of environmental storytelling a lot. There's a lot of written lore you can find throughout its biomes, mind you, but all of it aligns with what you're already seeing all around you. Whether it's ancient lore from when a given area was inhabited, or more recent stuff detailing what led to things being abandoned, it all adds to the total picture.
For an engaging environment, I think it's important to think of the story of a given area first and then build your features AROUND that. Give players a sense of what happened, show them enough that they can extrapolate and theorize and make conjectures - and then have the deeper lore available for those who want to look.
The ruined structures in that artwork are a good example of "big dramatic features" I suppose, but the entire AREA they're in informs that "this was once a forest but now it's a flash-flooded bog"; there's evidence that the environment is still adapting to the new water levels everywhere. The cohesiveness is what matters the most.
As for biome-specific gameplay stuff - it's fine to let that just be emergent, in my opinion. For example, in the flooded forest, it's hard to move around and navigate a lot of the time simply because a lot of the places you can go are knee or waist-deep, lol. Finding equipment and other means to navigate the area more smoothly is as much of a challenge as hostile wildlife, since the whole area's going through some very rapid changes (on the environmental timescale, anyway). I would say, let biome-specific gameplay be emergent from all the other parts of an area rather than trying very hard to build an area around a specific gameplay mechanic. Worlds and environments are emergent things, and the difficulties we, as living things, have with them are emergent too.
but here is the problem if the areas ,biomes,POI or wahtnot lack anything interesting no one will care , i've went through the entirety of ashes map so far there is litearlly NOTHING that got me interested or made stop ,look and think "wow that looks really cool , i want to explore it" nothing , the only thing that had a hint of that was carphin but knowing there is nothing to do there other than just grinding mobs removed any of it so no one will care about the story of any place or would want to know more about it
Re: Ashes Terrain Topography and Cohesion
Ok but please remember that Chrono Odyssey is basically an Action Combat game and therefore uses that style of Camera for a lot of the screenshots you would see.
There's a meaningful difference in how good a world can look when it's designed to be seen from that view, compared to Ashes which will often be played from max zoom overhead. Ashes is 'better off' being designed visually like an isometric game.
Short version, if you're almost never looking at the horizon or seeing the sky in-game, it will always look and feel very different even with similar models.
(not the forests thing, though, that mostly comes from the tree design being used right now, but they've said they will update the Jundark ones)
There's a meaningful difference in how good a world can look when it's designed to be seen from that view, compared to Ashes which will often be played from max zoom overhead. Ashes is 'better off' being designed visually like an isometric game.
Short version, if you're almost never looking at the horizon or seeing the sky in-game, it will always look and feel very different even with similar models.
(not the forests thing, though, that mostly comes from the tree design being used right now, but they've said they will update the Jundark ones)
Azherae
1
Re: Ashes Terrain Topography and Cohesion
For me, the most important part of level/setting design is environmental storytelling. As I'm exploring, I want the things around me - whether great or small - to inform the 'backstory' of a given area relative to our perspective as players.
Let's use Metroid as an example:
https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/metroid/images/1/1e/Torvus_Bog.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20230521011448
The first two are some art for an area in Metroid Prime 2 - the third is an actual ingame screenshot of the same space, which the image share function didn't want to directly post. Figured I'd add all three since the perspective in each is a bit different.
The idea here is that this was once an industrial facility in a forested area, but the region was rapidly flooded after some drastic environmental shifts (a meteor impact about 50 years prior). By the time you explore it, the civilization who lived here has largely abandoned the area, leaving nature to slowly reclaim it.
Metroid Prime 2 is full of environmental storytelling like this - an area that was once verdant plains got scorched into a desert from the same meteor, there's ruined structures all around, and all in all you can feel the story-beats of the area without anyone needing to tell you anything.
The Metroid Prime series (particularly the first two games) rely on this type of environmental storytelling a lot. There's a lot of written lore you can find throughout its biomes, mind you, but all of it aligns with what you're already seeing all around you. Whether it's ancient lore from when a given area was inhabited, or more recent stuff detailing what led to things being abandoned, it all adds to the total picture.
For an engaging environment, I think it's important to think of the story of a given area first and then build your features AROUND that. Give players a sense of what happened, show them enough that they can extrapolate and theorize and make conjectures - and then have the deeper lore available for those who want to look.
The ruined structures in that artwork are a good example of "big dramatic features" I suppose, but the entire AREA they're in informs that "this was once a forest but now it's a flash-flooded bog"; there's evidence that the environment is still adapting to the new water levels everywhere. The cohesiveness is what matters the most.
As for biome-specific gameplay stuff - it's fine to let that just be emergent, in my opinion. For example, in the flooded forest, it's hard to move around and navigate a lot of the time simply because a lot of the places you can go are knee or waist-deep, lol. Finding equipment and other means to navigate the area more smoothly is as much of a challenge as hostile wildlife, since the whole area's going through some very rapid changes (on the environmental timescale, anyway). I would say, let biome-specific gameplay be emergent from all the other parts of an area rather than trying very hard to build an area around a specific gameplay mechanic. Worlds and environments are emergent things, and the difficulties we, as living things, have with them are emergent too.
Let's use Metroid as an example:
https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/metroid/images/1/1e/Torvus_Bog.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20230521011448
The first two are some art for an area in Metroid Prime 2 - the third is an actual ingame screenshot of the same space, which the image share function didn't want to directly post. Figured I'd add all three since the perspective in each is a bit different.
The idea here is that this was once an industrial facility in a forested area, but the region was rapidly flooded after some drastic environmental shifts (a meteor impact about 50 years prior). By the time you explore it, the civilization who lived here has largely abandoned the area, leaving nature to slowly reclaim it.
Metroid Prime 2 is full of environmental storytelling like this - an area that was once verdant plains got scorched into a desert from the same meteor, there's ruined structures all around, and all in all you can feel the story-beats of the area without anyone needing to tell you anything.
The Metroid Prime series (particularly the first two games) rely on this type of environmental storytelling a lot. There's a lot of written lore you can find throughout its biomes, mind you, but all of it aligns with what you're already seeing all around you. Whether it's ancient lore from when a given area was inhabited, or more recent stuff detailing what led to things being abandoned, it all adds to the total picture.
For an engaging environment, I think it's important to think of the story of a given area first and then build your features AROUND that. Give players a sense of what happened, show them enough that they can extrapolate and theorize and make conjectures - and then have the deeper lore available for those who want to look.
The ruined structures in that artwork are a good example of "big dramatic features" I suppose, but the entire AREA they're in informs that "this was once a forest but now it's a flash-flooded bog"; there's evidence that the environment is still adapting to the new water levels everywhere. The cohesiveness is what matters the most.
As for biome-specific gameplay stuff - it's fine to let that just be emergent, in my opinion. For example, in the flooded forest, it's hard to move around and navigate a lot of the time simply because a lot of the places you can go are knee or waist-deep, lol. Finding equipment and other means to navigate the area more smoothly is as much of a challenge as hostile wildlife, since the whole area's going through some very rapid changes (on the environmental timescale, anyway). I would say, let biome-specific gameplay be emergent from all the other parts of an area rather than trying very hard to build an area around a specific gameplay mechanic. Worlds and environments are emergent things, and the difficulties we, as living things, have with them are emergent too.
Re: Ashes Terrain Topography and Cohesion
GreatPhilisopher wrote: »like its not just the scale , its also the lack of any fantasy and even beautiful or interesting environments
godlike response, i agree with you 100%
Snekkers
5
Re: Ashes Terrain Topography and Cohesion
like its not just the scale , its also the lack of any fantasy and even beautiful or interesting environments
Re: Ashes Terrain Topography and Cohesion
@Vaknar just look at it mate, this is Chrono. This is actual forest, that's how forests should look in ashes, that's how Jundark should look.
the more i look the more i just dislike ashes biomes , why is the scale of everything in it so weird and messed up , everything is small , look at chrono horse is an actual horse , right scale and feels like one , same with the character and their looks i can actually see them without needing to zoom almost inside of their heads then again why would i do that with how ugly they are...for real everything looks so damn tiny.
like every other game make the scale of things bigger cuz that how they look right they did the opposite in ashes and everything looks wrong, how did they manage to do that when A1 had it right ,hell A1 had a lot more stuff right from scale to environment to atmosphere to actual fun crafting not a grind ...etc its just sad honestly
Re: Ashes Terrain Topography and Cohesion
[*] What kinds of landmarks or terrain features make a zone feel memorable to you?
I enjoy this kind of thing a lot, grassy/flowery fields with vegetation that isn't overly flat or bland looking. The pictures below are from the Nesting Grounds in Throne and Liberty, it's filled with rivers and flowers and the excessive flatness of the area is contrasted by a few giant rocky bird nests and by the observatory ruins overlooking the area from high above. It's these contrasts and the beauty of the vegetation that make it notable to me.
I also enjoy stuff like FFXI's Uleguerand Range. It is a mountainous snowy biome and the reason it's memorable is because of the difficulty in traversing it combined with the beauty. Scattered through the entire range there are crevasses that you might fall into, leading through complex frozen cave systems with difficult enemies. The climb to the top of the Range is long and difficult, but also marked by beautiful views due to the height. Reaching the top lets you then slide down a snowy slope in order to reach a particular cave you can't get to any other way. If you fail to glide the right way, you need to restart the climb.
The Yuhtunga Jungle in FFXI was also memorable. When maps used to be unlocked via quests only, that area was really difficult to navigate by just walking through, because it's an actual labyrinth. I ended up writing a journal with the attempted routes until I mapped out a successful route through. I'll always remember it because no other area in any MMO made me feel as a cartographer/explorer in quite the same way.
[*] Do you like big, dramatic features or more subtle stuff that you discover as you explore?
A mix of both, please. I enjoy large dramatic features like magic obelisks, tower ruins and so on, as long as they overlook terrain which is beautiful in its own right and as long as I can walk around and discover small details. I'm generally afraid devs will either overdo it with the dramatic or put so much thought into the subtle exploration that they forget to make screenshot worthy vistas.
[*] What kind of biome-specific gameplay would help tie things together for you?
I like the concept of terrain that changes with the weather/tides. Tidal flooding changing your pathways through an area for example. Day/night cycles changing the way you approach areas (ffxi has undead spawn at night, TL turns some areas into pvp at night etc). Mob tribes fighting each other in certain conditions and you adapting to them being distracted. Volcanic erruptions being both an obstacle and a source of minerals. Sudden weather changes meaning some resource/mob spawns that is suddenly more profitable than what you were doing, meaning you have to think on your feet and act fast to make a good profit.
Re: Why The Game Needs Fast Travel
Ashes design in regards to PvP and the economy does mean that fast travel will screw other those aspects.
However, Ashes large world size means that no fast travel will screw over players wanting to run content. Its almost as if major decisions about this game are being made by someone that has never created a game before or something.
Ashes needs fast travel of some form to be playable as an MMORPG, as opposed to a PvP murderbox or economy simulator. Not the family summons - but something.
Finally you and I agree on something
I think New World here did a great job. There's wayshrines, but they're quite far apart from one another.
Re: What keeps me from playing
GreatPhilisopher wrote: »....Another theoretical solution is to give casual players best in slot gear, but in a way where it is only best in slot for casual content....
Another, possibly easier solution to enact and manage, would be to remove crafting restrictions and allow players to craft their own decent but not BIS gear. Also, stop the insanely long processing times, 1 minute per item??!!! Hell, I processed 25 timber and for 25 minutes I went out back and cleaned the rear deck. That is just insane, make people stare at the screen for no good reason, a process per item shouldn't be longer than 5 seconds each (I think I hi-jacked this thread a little bit to vent on how stupid the timetables are for processing).
true , i dont think they understand that good game play isnt stupid grind but accessibility and then making higher tier stuff have a mix of easily gathered mats, mid difficulty stuff and a piece or two that are hard to get which is what leads to adventure ,group play,pvp and conflict not having everything in the game require a billion mat,hours and money even a beginner tool ..its so stupid
I played Chrono Odyssey last weekend and was thrilled to craft items that were meaningful within the level I needed them. Also getting exp that leveled my char so I didnt fall behind while crafting. I am not saying Chrono is a standard of an awesome game, I would just like to see Ashes tuned crafting this way as well.
Re: Ashes Terrain Topography and Cohesion
Appreciate all the details here!
Interesting points about terrain shape, variety, and zone identity. The screenshots and comparisons help paint a clear picture of how things feel on the ground right now.
Here are some follow-up questions for those who haven't specified on them in this thread:
- What kinds of landmarks or terrain features make a zone feel memorable to you?
- Do you like big, dramatic features or more subtle stuff that you discover as you explore?
- What kind of biome-specific gameplay would help tie things together for you?
I reply to this even though my post contains those answers.
1. I provided 2 landmarks from league of legends cinematic. Those instantly feel unique, specific, memorable. So probably this style of terrain shaping would be ideal.
2. I think both are necessary, big/grand landmarks make the world feel memorable, fantasy, unique. Small features, details that you discover when exploring, they add depth and immersion to the world. Good fantasy open world game would ideally have plenty of both.
3. I am not sure what you mean by "biome specific gameplay". I think my post would not impact overall gameplay that much, but technically you can have AoC gameplay on grayboxed UE5 flat plain. Having good memorable, natural world with grand monuments, fantasy landscapes, but also filled with discoverable details would compliment gameplay without necessarily altering it.
Snekkers
1