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Phase I of Alpha Two testing will occur on weekends. Each weekend is scheduled to start on Fridays at 10 AM PT and end on Sundays at 10 PM PT. Find out more here.
Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest Alpha Two news and update notes.
Our quickest Alpha Two updates are in Discord. Testers with Alpha Two access can chat in Alpha Two channels by connecting your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Talking lighting
Vissox
Member, Alpha Two
I feel as though 99% of people's reservations about this game could be solved by fixing the lighting. The game just looks overall too dark at times, especially indoors but also in the open world. It makes the spell effects look really weird, especially the bright ones, because they look fine when the lighting looks fine. But like in the cyclops fight where it was kind of dark it just all looked really off. Same thing with showcasing the mage abilities in that one hallway where they started. I think the lighting in this game needs to overhaul.
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99% of peoples reservations seem to be in relation to PvP. Whether there will be too much, not enough, corruption being too harsh, not harsh enough etc.
Lighting may well fix some comments people have in relation to the games visuals, but then at this stage of game development, the lighting shouldn't be in a finished state anyway.
Lighting is an easy right now fix, PVP isn't. (Not saying I have issues with it) I think it makes more sense to fix objective problems than controversial subjective ones first, don't you?
What makes the most sense is following proper development practice.
You don't just "do" all of anything. You get the basics of things in to the game, and then you iterate on everything several times.
Can the lighting for the game be improved? Yes, obviously.
Does that mean it should be worked on now until completed? No, it should be iterated in turn with everything else.
Or do you disagree with that?
Yeah I do. Do things right the first time, don't half ass things, fix problems as they arise. The lighting is a problem, it needs to be fixed. There's no need to intentionally stage the development process so things look shitty in alpha because it's alpha. That's the stupidest, most bureaucratic thing I have ever heard.
That is not how game development works, your comment effectively shows that you don't know how developers make games lol.
Do you even know what PBR is?
Here is an example, this is in the same video same zone just by changing the weather
and here is an image comparing 2 different showcases, on different weather within the same biome (riverlands)
??
I have seen it, That's not an excuse for it to look like s*** the other 50% of the time you see it.
Clearly you are just being a toxic troll at this point. You don't care about how development is done you just want to say crap on the forum and attack the game not backed by actual criticism.
There is a reason why they are developers are you are here trying to start some crap for no reason with your inability to have a discussion or come to an understanding of the process.
Pointing out a flaw in the visuals=trolling. Ok buddy.
I might not be a game developer, but I do know a thing or two about "how development is done." I spend 6 hours a day mixing audio. That's also a simultaneous process. If my mix sounds shitty, I don't go "oh well it's not done yet so I shouldn't bother fixing this obvious problem" I fix it. Then another thing pops up, and I fix that too. Not to mention that that's just me. By myself. Not a crew of developers. I think the person who doesn't know what the development process is. Is the person sitting here telling me that the lighting in the game doesn't need to be fixed because it looks good for a few frames in a showcase that dynamically changes from that moment. But hey! If you think the lighting is totally done and it doesn't need anything changed about it, that's fine. I can just sum you up as another rose tinted goggle. Andy, who can't handle when other people bring up actual issues that need to be addressed.
Tell me this looks good. I'll wait.
And btw, even this screenshot is still artifacted and would look better when you're playing the game.
I'm saying as a professional you don't seem to want to understand how things are done, and you are not speaking from a place of knowledge either on the process. Mixing audio has ntohing to do with lighting or understanding the process and pipeline.
You are suddenly changing your narrative now, based on my post earlier you saying this shows you know absolutely nothing about development so I wouldn't make comments like this. As what was said earlier their process is not done, lighting isn't just lighting there is more to it than throwing a light on your scene and adjusted it. Textures made and edited, shaders make for the different assets in the game are all things that need to be worked on and change how lighting effects and reacts to it. All these things have a big impact on the world in how lighting will be "lighting" the world effectively.
Seriously leave it to the professionals or if you want to have a discussion atleast do some research and understand the bare basics of unreal engine and work flows in general.
I could get more detailed but anything is going to fly over your head, you don't care how it is done, meaning you are going to be ignorant to anything someone explains to you. Please don't compare audio work to development when it comes to art in games please.
What do you know about game development and the lighting process....I'll wait.
Nothing. How about you, what's your experience? Or are you just talking out of your ass?
You can go look at the video yourself bro, it's free. There's only so much you can blame on compression, this lighting looks bad man. Can we just stop kidding ourselves please...
You were suppose to reply to my previous post or have some comment on that.
No need to talk out of my ass, I've worked on movies you watch, and have worked on plenty of content in unreal engine as well in multiple departments
So you have no experience and don't know how the process works. Which again as i said before it isn't just you throw lighting and things are perfect. That means if they aren't polishing their textures, if they have shader work to do still and tweak / polish. You aren't going to see the final look of the lighting either.
So again if you don't know how things work, why are you assuming they can just do it, why are you assuming their prios, why are you assuming this will be the final look of the game when they again are in development?
I would like a answer to this question.
Nah, what movies. Name one. You talk mad trash let's see what backs it up. And while you're at it, quote me where I said the lighting was in a finished state. Why am I assuming they can do it? Because it's their fucking job.
I also prefer that they have a much more dull lighting rather than fucking "burn your eyes out at each spell" kind of lighting. This to me looks way better than an alternative of "the whole room is now blue"
As for the Cyclops showcase, I think Mag is right, they currently have a problem with how snow interacts with spell effects. Instead of being super reflective to light, it just doesn't really change that much, which comes off as unrealistic because we're used to snow being hella bright.
But, Intrepid, take this as a piece of feedback from me - I prefer it this way. I don't want to decrease my screen's brightness every time I enter a snow biome (AND I PLAN TO FUCKING LIVE IN ONE), so I'd rather lose some realism than burn my eyes out for 10h every day.
Also, I would assume that lumen would be responsible for that kind of thing and I'd imagine that Intrepid haven't fully optimized its work yet, so they decided to not fully utilize it for this particular showcase (it having 16 people and all). And this comes back to what Mag was saying. "Fix the lighting" is not as easy as just pressing a button or checking a setting in UE. It impacts way more stuff in the overall developmental process. And when the question is "do we show 10fps pretty gameplay or a 50fps a bit less pretty gameplay", I'd imagine, for a proper studio the answer is always the latter, because to gamers it comes off as a much better representation of what the game can do.
Though I guess I'm completely wrong on that, considering how fucking many people fall in love with a completely fake cgi teaser instead of waiting for proper gameplay.
The mage showcase has the same issue. Blocked lighting and direct contrast between light and dark aspects. Cloth doesn't glow and metal reflects. We see neither reflection in good detail or cloth in proper cohesion.
It runs deep and should be highlighted because the game engine has inbuilt functions and ai which does a better job than the current iteration. I feel if the game hadn't come from ue4 we would have less issues overall. We still have ue4 elements in a ue5 engine which causes the disparities.
Saying what exact movie isn't going to change anything at this point, it is just leading for you asking more question eventually. If I can assume you have seen it just take it as a big movie is all.
I'm well aware it is their job, the issue is you are trying to state this
Effectively you have admitted to not knowing how anything works, Not even the basics I have mentioned. Yet you are trying to say stages aren't needed they just need a final result. When if you knew the basics you would understand that is a contradiction.
Effectively you are saying all their art needs to be in a near finished state across all departments related to it in the pipeline (Pretty much making it as basic as possible so you understand and not including the nuances since i feel that be pointless to discuss at the moment.)
Do you start to see where I'm getting at? Personally i don't care if you think things need to be better, I'm sure any artist will always want their work to be better and they are working towards it. My only issue is not what you feel about the look but you without knowing on anything trying to dictate they need to have things in a near final look.