Less is more. Keep it low fantasy to avoid lag and stressing players, especially newer ones out.

Anyone who has seen modern MMOs has seen this problem.

Abilities are so flashy and everyone looks like a huge tornado on fire which just hit a fireworks deposit.

This is very bad because:

1. You want 250 vs 250 fights or more? Good, then make sure people can see what the hell is going on in battles and make sure the lag will be down. How? A good first step is to stop making everyone look like the child of a christmas tree and a pile of dynamite.
2. When everything is epic nothing is. Keep flashy abilities to ultimates and such so its value can be real value.
3. It just stresses players out. Especially if you're new to a game (it can look very overwhelming and honestly, cheap... because thats what cheap, bad mmos do, they just throw a lot of flashy stuff). Even players who like it get tired of it.
4. It just hurts people's eyes. I'm sure some like it still, especially people very new to mmo-rpgs (trying to avoid using the word kids but ye.. there it is).

Its a very bad path I hope AoC will avoid, but the alpha didn't really give me much hope in terms of this.

Honestly, I think its one of the very good things Vanilla WoW did and I think this trait had a good contribution to it becoming the top dog for so long. It kept things simple. It kept things minimalistic.

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Comments

Dygz

LMAO
Ashes is high fantasy. That's not synonymous with flashy.
Though these devs love flashy.

JustVine

If it doesn't fit your aesthetic it doesn't fit your aesthetic. That doesn't make it 'objectively very bad'.

I have none of the problems with it that you listed and quite like the aesthetic. I personally am quite tired of minimalist design.

Here's to hoping they find a middle ground people like yourself can tolerate while keeping things intense and high fantasy.

TheDarkSorcerer

So i started playing GW2 again after 7 years of not playing it. The first week i was very turned off with the effects everyone was running around with. Now i honestly don't care and i'm part of the flashy train as well.

ESO have done a pretty good job in keeping it flashy, but still lowkey.

I honestly don't mind flashy, as long as it fits in. Example, i do hate that GW2 introduced real world items like sunglasses and such. Just feels off. Just like this post from Ashes;

https://instagram.com/p/CLPF006rlpu/embed/

Their illustration stuff have def improved since. But i hate when fantasy games introduce real world items and look.

Cypher

Is no one gonna tell him the devs have already confirmed there will be options to adjust the effects? Also it’s easier to make them flashy first and tone them down later, rather than start them bland and add flair later.

I do agree with your number 2 point though, @Ironhope

Ironhope

Cypher wrote: »

Is no one gonna tell him the devs have already confirmed there will be options to adjust the effects?

I did not know that sir, but am glad to hear that. Thanks.

Cypher wrote: »

Also it’s easier to make them flashy first and tone them down later, rather than start them bland and add flair later.

Yeah I agree and hope this will be the case.

Ironhope

JustVine wrote: »

If it doesn't fit your aesthetic it doesn't fit your aesthetic. That doesn't make it 'objectively very bad'.

If it makes the game unplayable because of lag and being unable to understand whats happening in a fight, well thats quite objectively bad (among other examples, many given in my original post).

JustVine wrote: »

Here's to hoping they find a middle ground people like yourself can tolerate while keeping things intense and high fantasy.

Hope so as well.

George_Black

I dont like flashy, like bdo and ff14. But I dont like Esos animations either.

I wabt to see impressive moves. Moves that great heroes would pull off. But I dont like color and flash polution

George_Black

For me AoE out of control are a big offender.
AoEs should have high mp cost and/or high CD

Aerlana

You speak about flashy effect... to speak about high fantasy...

High fantasy is not about "flashy"... you can have flashy spells in low fantasy also.

Low fantasy is a world close to a "normal" world in which magic-related things are rare, harder to get.
"pirates of the caribbean" is low fantasy. mostly all is about real world in caraib but with some little part of magic.

High fantasy is when using spells and seeing "strange" creature is nothing but normal. Forgotten realms in D&D is high fantasy. WoW, GW2, FF (any), Elder Scrolls, and many other are high fantasy.

About what you really wanted to say. I tend to your side... But mostly it is about a lot personnal taste. Some people dislike it, Others will find it unreadable, while some could love it and have no problem.
Lag ? Not exactly "lag" the problem (which is netcode and internet connexion, while flashy effect rely on your graphic cards) But yes, sometime it can be too much for some low end computer. It is part of choice of the devs about system requirement also. Again, i prefer game with low requirement to be open to more. But it is personnal taste.

Also, you can do really flashy but readable fight, and not flashy and unreadable fight... Small visual effects well thought, even if flashy, can easily stack on your screen (with X people doing there own).

Ironhope

Aerlana wrote: »

You speak about flashy effect... to speak about high fantasy...

High fantasy is not about "flashy"... you can have flashy spells in low fantasy also.

I partially used the wrong term and partially didn't so I partially apologise.

Its just that I just can't see how a game could be low(er) fantasy while very flashy (everyone being super magical and a demi-god and stuff like that).

Aerlana wrote: »

But yes, sometime it can be too much for some low end computer.

Yeah this is what I ment.
The more people playing the game the better for everyone basically and if a lot of people cant play because of requirements being too high... yeah thats bad for everyone.

This isn't my personal concern because I have a decent recently-made gaming PC but yeah, I hope this game's requirements wont be a wall too high to climb for many and I hope they won't make battles look like large scale battles in classic wow where half of the players are fighting, half are frozen and where you keep playing only to realize you actually died 4 minutes ago.

Aerlana

I think a true gamer (like Steven shows himself) knows that the game can be able to run well on 4-6 years old computer (even if in those case it could ask to go "medium" in settings, and so be sure medium is already good enough to play on) . Many things (including wow) showed well that wonderfull graphic (asking big system requirement) can sometime be the main game problem (not all can play it due to requirements, optimisation bad so many freeze while playing, or simply too much money spend on it, and not enough left for the game itself )

With the 250v250 siege being major thing in the game, and the known risk it can get higher. i think the requirement part won't be a too big problem because they will be sure the game is smooth to enjoy for most "potential customers" on those siege.

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