Glorious Alpha Two Testers!
Alpha Two Realms are now unlocked for Phase II testing!
For our initial launch, testing will begin on Friday, December 20, 2024, at 10 AM Pacific and continue uninterrupted until Monday, January 6, 2025, at 10 AM Pacific. After January 6th, we’ll transition to a schedule of five-day-per-week access for the remainder of Phase II.
You can download the game launcher here and we encourage you to join us on our for the most up to date testing news.
Alpha Two Realms are now unlocked for Phase II testing!
For our initial launch, testing will begin on Friday, December 20, 2024, at 10 AM Pacific and continue uninterrupted until Monday, January 6, 2025, at 10 AM Pacific. After January 6th, we’ll transition to a schedule of five-day-per-week access for the remainder of Phase II.
You can download the game launcher here and we encourage you to join us on our for the most up to date testing news.
Comments
Asmongold was referring to a location that was mostly generic UE5 assets with very little embellishments to make the location unique to Verra. His suggestions were to add some banners or Zombie skulls or Minotaur skulls.
So… that critique was quite specific, rather than general.
And, yes, most likely Asmongold would not say the same thing about the Desert Biome video.
He was watching the cleric video but he has said It multiple times. So I know he thinks that way in general.
People should look at the December 2021 Stream though when they showed off UE5 for the first time. Character model and environment were great.
The fact that make the game generic or not is the gameplay before the graphics. We all know that a game with great graphics and bad gameplay is a bad game. The true signature of a game is therefore its gameplay rather than its graphic.
The fact that make the game generic or not is the gameplay before the graphics. We all know that a game with great graphics and bad gameplay is a bad game. The true signature of a game is therefore its gameplay rather than its graphic.
So in term of priority I'll tell :
1. Gameplay
2. Content
3. Graphics
I recall Asmongold being blown away by the Character model demo. Pretty sure he did not say that seemed generic.
I'm watching Asmon's reaction to the Freehold demo - he says that graphics are kind of binary for him - either good enough or they're not and what he sees so far at the beginning of the Freehold demo is good enough and he likes it a lot.
He says the draw distance for what we can see far away was nice and he's a very big fan of that.
He says the Lightfoot Leverit looked good and the animations for it are amazing.
He says the color scheme of the Freehold in the demo reminds him of New World and he always liked the aesthetics of New World.
He says persistent mounts adds to immersion.
When the devs go inside the house on the Freehold, Asmon says it's the best update they've had in a while and he's loving it.
When the devs move outside to look at he cows and sheep, Asmon says it has a really great atmosphere and he really likes it.
Someone in his chat says it looks like ArcheAge 2. Asmon says, "Good! I'll play that, too!"
Asmon says the animations for Harvesting tomatoes looks surprisingly good.
Overall, Asmon says the Freehold update was the best in a long while. Ramps up the hopium. And is great.
Yes and no. Yes he says it multiple times no not for Desert Biome video.
I think Asmongold's super stoked but he has said multiple times that the art is lacking using the example of " if you saw a screenshot then you wouldn't be able to tell the difference"
Just watched the Unreal 5 demo and stream again and the Dragon Raid boss showing the Poison/Fire/Ice dragons. Just look amazing in every way. I think he's just used to Stylized and the character it brings to a game.
He seems to be very specific about what he likes and dislikes… and then people take him out of context.
He wasnt referring to a specific location only. He literally brought up multiple stylized graphics games and made mention of how even New World lacked it and T&L. Ive heard him say it 3 times. I'm beginning to wonder if you even saw the video.
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Yes. He says the basic UE5 assets are generic - those will look the same in any Fantasy MMORPG using UE5 unless the artists do things to make them look less generic.
The artists have to do something so that players can easily recognize which game a location is associated with.
If by stylized you mean easily recognizable as an Ashes of Creation location compared to a New World location, yes, Asmongold believes Ashes of Creation locations should be easily recognized as Ashes of Creation locations.
That is a valid expectation.
He doesn’t say Ashes of Creation is generic when he gushes over how great the Freehold demo looks or how the Character Creator demo looks.
Feel free to share some quotes that support your claim.
What purpose does that standard make in the age of staged pictures where posts get polished and the objects in the picture carefully selected because the one taking the picture want to deliver a particular kind of message?
Why would it matter to someone in the gaming community to immediately identify a game by a randomly taken screenshot when real hype comes from game mechanics and story telling anyways?
Ask Anthem what the ancient-hypertech artstyle did for them while story telling, UI and game mechanics were lacking.
Minecraft on the other hand didn't particularly care about graphics or even creating an artstyle, they took what was "good enough" graphics and art to package their mechanics in it, which got the game the hype it deserved.
Cyberpunk while struggling with game mechnics in the beginning, has continuously improved those mechanics and has stayed much more relevant (comparing google trends numbers and player numbers from peak hype to today) since the story was great and the environment, to the point that CD project Red deemed it worthwhile AND fans are looking forward to the September content update. The "unique" artstyle about the game is the futuristic city, the nihilistic, flashy and vulgar society as well as the tech with which people modify their bodies, but that was only the case because so much of it was previously established by the general cyberpunk artists and 2077 in particular from its Table Top RPG roots.
Also games like Animal Crossing, Pokemon or Super Mario which don't really boost a "unique" artstyle but much rather a very general "cute" and colorful design continue to be popular because the mechanics continue to be to their customers liking and adding some unique elements to that general artstyle.
Which leads me to the conclusion:
- Fun & engaging mechanics make and keep a game relevant
- Good story telling make and keep a game relevant
- Time, meaning contiuously delivering the two things above until certain elements of the game world become distinctly known to your brand (like a front pointy hood makes us go "assassin", a bonfire with a sword or someone raising both sides in a Y-pose makes us go "praise the sun", like 3 triangles stacked on another we call now Triforce, a green pipe coming from the ground makes us go "it's-a meeeee, Maaaario", etc), is what then becomes "a unique artstyle"
Ashes of Creation is not even out yet and as far as I am aware Intrepid is very particular about not showing too much of the games world because a core element of the game is discovery by playing. So the whole debate seems very much meaningless to demand full release results from an alpha stage project, especially when the "authority" to which people refer is someone whose job it is to "overdose on games" because they play them more than most people can. Of course graphics and art style will easily look boring to Asmongold compared to someone with neither the same amount of game time and capital to purchase and play all these games. But even he doesn't have access to enough content that he could seriously concude whether or not Ashes of Creation will look "generic" or "unique enough" (and that would still not answer "unique enough for what?"). At best his commentary is a as-of-now opinion, far from anything that could be a sound judgement - because too much information is missing.
But patience isn't a particularly common trait these days so the "drama" will likely continue.
What year will Ashes release?
I think we already discussed our opinions on Asmongold in a different thread, you're good^^
I'm asking @Fiddlez and the ones who think that a game in Alpha Stage has to already focus creating [Edit] and broadcasting [/Edit] a "distinct artstyle" in all areas, even though discovery is going to be a key aspect of the finished game.
The expectation seems off the mark for a project that has to focus much more (and hopefully does) on building functioning and fun game mechanics rather than polish the looks of things.
And I really don't get why "unique art" would be necessary in the first place, especially then remembering my past 90 hours of playing Baldurs Gate, nothing in particular in the visuals makes me go "oh this is a Baldurs Gate game", if anyone remembers this game then it will be because of the brilliant story writing and the DnD game mechanics not because it look unlike anything we have ever seen before.
The art is clearly D&D - same for NWO.
And it was an instant hit for me specifically because it's more D&D, just from the art, than any othe online RPG I've seen before. I've actually been waiting for online RPG art to get there for over 20 years.
BG literarily just looks like a realistic fantasy game the art styles isn't particular to dnd.... What is particular would be the lore used in the game. Side by side if you compare 2 character one high quality from Ashes of creation and one from this game you could easily make a argument they both come from the same world art style wise.
Also this isn't a bad thing.
Neverwinter online is more stylized and cartoony.
This whole identity argument honestly is kind of silly if you are talking about creating a realistic setting. The goal is to make things look as good as possible while of course making sure things can preform as well optimization wise based on intended gameplay.
That being said when the game is released and popular and get traction, people will know ashes of creations look and its iconic spots and I'm sure getting deep into the lore of the game. Creating a stronger bond and feeding the "identity" of the game. Which will happen when there is actually a game...
D&D was the first RPG to allow for Dwarves and Elves and Tiefling that can have African or Polynesian or Indian ethnic features with 3rd Edition. And BG3 is the first to allow the same with its character creator.
NWO is more stylized and cartoony than what? UE5?
Of course it is. NWO is 10 years old.
I still know I'm playing a D&D game when I'm playing NWO just by the art.
But, sure, if you just show me around one ruin in NWO, one ruin in BG3, one ruin in Ashes...
I probably would not be able to tell which game that ruin belongs to - especially if it's a Human ruin. Especially if it's still an Alpha version of the ruin.
Which is why the counter to what Asmon said is:
Ashes is still in Alpha and they were not trying to show how unique Ashes locations can appear.
A lot of the distinguishing features of a location will probably depend on race.
Also a lot of the unique paraphanalia will probably not appear until Nodes progress enough to influence which occupants reside in the ruins/dungeons.
I am not expressing my opinion I am expressing what I understood Asmongolds opinion is. I disagree with asmongold.
I think you misunderstand what Asmongold's opinion is.
Asmon says many times he thinks this looks great and insanely fucking good.
He says again that Ashes needs a very strong visual ID that makes it uniquely recognizeable as Ashes.
Like I don't get why you are having a argument based on asmongold, this guy can have good takes sure, but he also has really bad takes...Like who cares what he says his audience are sheep and will just agree with anything in chat for the most part it is kind of the whole meme, reddit, group mentality culture thing, echo chamber.