Warren Spector's Master Class videos

Post by **Jonas** » Sat Apr 12, 2008 8:32 pm

It'll look hot as hell.

The question is: How will it play?

Dead-eye · Post by **Dead-eye** » Sat Apr 12, 2008 8:58 pm

Jonas wrote:It'll look hot as hell.

The question is: How will it play?

I played it with VLC media player because quick-time sucks...

That is what your talking about right?

Edit: Oh I see it is not.

Jetsetlemming · Post by **Jetsetlemming** » Sat Apr 12, 2008 9:22 pm

Jonas wrote:It'll look hot as hell.

The question is: How will it play?

I'm hoping they severely alter movement and physics behavior, while including the ability to climb up and on shit and mantle ledges. The main thing the base engine means to the end consumer is graphical features and optimizations, and minor stuff like loading times and file structure. Look at all the multitude of ways the Unreal engine has been used besides just FPS.

Post by **Jonas** » Sat Apr 12, 2008 10:14 pm

One thing Invisible War had over DX: The best mantling in any first-person game ever.

justanotherfan · Post by **justanotherfan** » Sat Apr 12, 2008 11:02 pm

Heh, for me, it's loading. Can't stand it. It makes the game not real to me. In consoles, I stuck with cartridge games, and happened to leave the consoles when they moved completely to optical media. Graphical features are great, but I can always bump up FSAA/filtering etc.

Not sure about the climbing stuff. I always felt very limited in DX2. Where Deus Ex would present a level like Paris Champs de Elysees, DX2 would give Cairo, where I was always on a path or track. I remember the Youtube video of someone jumping on the roofs in Trier, but I don't remember doing that type of thing in DX2.

I think I played the first level of Tomb Raider 2 on my G4, but that's it. What do we know about this engine or their plans for it? If they're listening to Smith, it's no wonder they're going for all this in-house tech so they can integrate it better.

Jetsetlemming · Post by **Jetsetlemming** » Sat Apr 12, 2008 11:33 pm

Jonas wrote:One thing Invisible War had over DX: The best mantling in any first-person game ever.

Really? I can't remember a single situation in which I used it in IW. It at least HAD it, unlike Deus Ex, so it's something. Claiming that it's better than SS1's or 2's though...

Post by **Jonas** » Sun Apr 13, 2008 12:02 am

Problem is DX1 had far better use for climbing. I was always stacking crates and jumping to high ledges. IW had those tiny levels so there wasn't as much need to climb anywhere. But the option was there, and it was extremely well implemented.

Jetsetlemming · Post by **Jetsetlemming** » Sun Apr 13, 2008 1:04 am

I just played the Tomb Raider: Legend demo to remind myself of what the engine was like and was extremely unimpressed.

I remember reading reviews and hearing people talk about this game as if it was an RE4 style rebirth of the series, making it actually good and fun to play. What's in the demo is the same old Tomb Raider shit- awkward platforming hurt by one of the worst cameras ever made, boring shooting, and staring at Lara's ass. The only additions to the formula are listening to two character comment on your progress via an earpiece and a few rare shader effects. The water looked good, at least.

I hope they do some major overhauling at Eidos Montreal. >_>

Post by **Jonas** » Sun Apr 13, 2008 1:20 am

Everything you mentioned is gameplay stuff, none of it has anything to do with the core ending. DX is first-person so the camera won't be a problem, it has no platforming, its shooting is significantly different from Tomb Raider (if nothing else then simply by virtue of being first person), and Lara's ass will probably not be included in DX either (probably).

So stop whining already, it's just a goddamn engine. DX was built on Unreal Tournament and you can plainly see how little those two games have in common. Everything will be fine.

justanotherfan · Post by **justanotherfan** » Sun Apr 13, 2008 1:26 am

True, though I did ask about Tomb Raider. I didn't like the one I played, mostly because I could just shoot constantly and Laura would aim for me as soon as she saw something. Since the developers certainly will have DX2 in mind, I'm interested in how this new engine will change the things Smith was talking about. I have no idea what to expect.

I thought DX had a lot in common with UT. Mostly in map size and the possibilities for outdoor environments. I was contrasting it against Quake3 though, so there's a lot of leeway in comparison there.

Jetsetlemming · Post by **Jetsetlemming** » Sun Apr 13, 2008 3:49 am

Jonas wrote:Everything you mentioned is gameplay stuff, none of it has anything to do with the core ending. DX is first-person so the camera won't be a problem, it has no platforming, its shooting is significantly different from Tomb Raider (if nothing else then simply by virtue of being first person), and Lara's ass will probably not be included in DX either (probably).

So stop whining already, it's just a goddamn engine. DX was built on Unreal Tournament and you can plainly see how little those two games have in common. Everything will be fine.

Wasn't whining about the engine, I was whining about Legend.

The engine itself did look outdated besides the water, even for 2006. Kinda low def texturing, and no bump maps as far as I could see. Maybe the PC port was the PS2/Xbox version of the game and everything was super high def super shiny in the 360 or something.

Michael_TSM · Post by **Michael_TSM** » Sun Apr 13, 2008 5:22 am

This may be thing of the past, but I always felt that the UT and Quake engines had a distinct feeling to them...
You could always tell when a game was made on either the Quake engine or the Unreal Engine.

I remember lending Deus Ex to a friend and having him comment that it felt like a Unreal Tournament Mod...even though the games have about as much in common as Vatican City does with an Ikea store.

justanotherfan · Post by **justanotherfan** » Sun Apr 13, 2008 5:41 am

I always felt like I was indoors in Quake 3. In UT could do very large outdoor spaces beautifully, though the indoors were kinda blocky, built from very large bricks it seemed. Deus Ex did an entire island without loading screens (Liberty Island), while UNATCO could be best described as a cinderblock bunker with carpeting.

Even in Doom 3 the "Martian outdoors" felt like a room with blowing sand in it. ISTR thinking that in Quake 4 they had fixed that issue or otherwise made large outdoor environments, but I only remember one outdoor team environment. I'm trying to think of some indoor environments to UT3, and failing, since I haven't had time for the deathmatch levels.

Deus Ex 2 felt entirely indoors though. Small maps strike again I guess, but it was a different feel. Here's the concept art for what I believe Seattle was to be, and the map turned out entirely different in perspective and dimension-
http://www.planetdeusex.com/dx2/files/a ... eattle.jpg

Post by **Jonas** » Sun Apr 13, 2008 11:04 am

Jetsetlemming wrote:The engine itself did look outdated besides the water, even for 2006. Kinda low def texturing, and no bump maps as far as I could see. Maybe the PC port was the PS2/Xbox version of the game and everything was super high def super shiny in the 360 or something.

Was this with "next-gen" graphics enabled? There's this peculiar toggle in the game's display menu where you can switch between a low-detail mode and a high-detail mode. The difference is pretty massive.

justanotherfan wrote:I always felt like I was indoors in Quake 3. In UT could do very large outdoor spaces beautifully, though the indoors were kinda blocky, built from very large bricks it seemed. Deus Ex did an entire island without loading screens (Liberty Island), while UNATCO could be best described as a cinderblock bunker with carpeting.

You may be on to something, but I think you should remember that UNATCO HQ was an underground bunker. Contrast and compare with the 'Ton hotel in NYC, Maggie Chow's apartment in Hong Kong, or the DuClare Chateau in Paris. Do you think those feel like they were made out of big blocks too?

Even in Doom 3 the "Martian outdoors" felt like a room with blowing sand in it. ISTR thinking that in Quake 4 they had fixed that issue or otherwise made large outdoor environments, but I only remember one outdoor team environment.

Maybe you should take a look at Enemy Territory: Quake Wars which is built on id Tech 4, the Doom 3 engine. Quake Wars uses huge outdoors maps with the occasional enterable building.

Deus Ex 2 felt entirely indoors though. Small maps strike again I guess, but it was a different feel.

That is unfortunately very true. It's the tight quarters above anything, I reckon. Trier managed to feel outdoors though, in my opinion, because you can believe a town built in the middle ages would have very narrow streets and low buildings.

DaveW · Post by **DaveW** » Sun Apr 13, 2008 4:35 pm

Michael_TSM wrote:This may be thing of the past, but I always felt that the UT and Quake engines had a distinct feeling to them...
You could always tell when a game was made on either the Quake engine or the Unreal Engine.

I remember lending Deus Ex to a friend and having him comment that it felt like a Unreal Tournament Mod...even though the games have about as much in common as Vatican City does with an Ikea store.

Some engines have very distinct renderers, especially Unreal Engine 2. With some games like America's Army it's so obvious when they're using it. But Unreal always had very distinctive lighting, I thought.

Jonas, one thing Enemy Territory did was use 'MegaTexture' technology, which is what made the outdoor scenes not look so shit. There were other modifications too, so a strict comparison with Doom3 isn't quite fair.