I am fine with these graphics. My priority is good gameplay. I also think this team should be thinking about appealing to a wider audience, we have seen enough games with only 100 or less people playing them. The dev team has to decide if they want to release a game and actually make money or appeal to a few hundred hard core players and end up with a few players playing. Focusing more on realism is going to tank the game.
Dev team has to realize the people on this forum are just ultra hardcore and dont represent a large portion of the playerbase. Ignore them and keep moving forward.
Above all else, make a game that will actually release sometime relatively soon, my goodness.
Razorbrains said:
Dev team has to realize the people on this forum are just ultra hardcore and dont represent a large portion of the playerbase. Ignore them and keep moving forward.
And yet this dream was started on the buck$ of these 'ultra hardcore' people. Now toss them away like they never mattered in the first place.
I can see why a lot of people are upset with the changes. It was not what was promised years ago when most people (including myself) backed this game. Things change over time and decisions had to be made so I can respect VR for doing that. However, if this can get the game shipped and playable in a good state then I'm for it. Art and graphics can always change later, I care more about the mechanics. I remember when Everquest Next (which was huge vaporware btw) was revealed and they went with a super cartoony look, I don't remember people being upset about that. Of course that's the style they went with initially so can't fault them. I am getting those kind of graphic vibes from this new art style and while I don't hate it like some of you, I do still prefer the "realistic" look. Like I looked back at videos from 2017 with CohhCarnage and it looked great (especially the monk focused one!). For now I'm putting Pantheon on the back burner and will just wait and see what happens. Its beyond our control so no point in worrying about it. Either VR will release the game, either finished or early access, or they will be forced to cancel
Marilee said:Razorbrains said:
Dev team has to realize the people on this forum are just ultra hardcore and dont represent a large portion of the playerbase. Ignore them and keep moving forward.
And yet this dream was started on the buck$ of these 'ultra hardcore' people. Now toss them away like they never mattered in the first place.
I backed this game many many years ago, so do people like me not count? I dont remember them saying that this game was based on a gritty dark ultra hardcore game for only 100 players to play when they put out the pledges. There are so many more people like me out there, thats where the real playerbase is. I rarely even come to these forums because people like me dont bother to bloviate about things that wont exist. When this game gets to a point where it has made serious progress, then more people will start to get involved.
I do agree that they have been leading a certain small audience along, knowing that the game would be super niche if they appealed to those people. They have tried a little bit and have said a few times in the past that this game is not designed to be a niche game. But they certainly did lead these people on.
I think what has happened is a very small vocal minority has taken over the forums and is inside the "pre-alpha" and was giving bad advice to these devs. I see it all the time with these indie games where ultra hardcore types take over and steer all the forums with ultra niche mechanics, then the game has to backtrack either just before release or after release.
Maybe this dev team has become more astute and is finally realizing the game will be dead if they appeal to this niche crowd.
These people complaining this new art is too much like WoW, LOL what a joke, there is not much difference from WoW classic and EQ. The big difference comes in retail WoW and especially the new EZ mode mobile games, this is where the biggest problem is. Merging to an EQ/WoW classic design would be very popular.
If I was the dev team I would completely ignore this hardcore ultra niche group of forum dwellers and make the game that will be popular, but still has roots in old school.
Razorbrains said:
I backed this game many many years ago, so do people like me not count?
I backed this game in 2015. I have alpha access and two copies of this game coming to me no matter what form it takes. And yet you are literally saying a voice like mine should not count. Not once have I called for anyone else's opinion to be ignored. I've only suggested changes that would help me to accept graphics that I do not love.
As someone who is currently playing on a TLE sever in EQ2, I'm going to affirm that my taste in graphics isn't that overly demanding. If we're going to go to fairytale graphics in Panetheon then I want the Brothers Grimm, not Disney.
Razorbrains said:If I was the dev team I would completely ignore this hardcore ultra niche group of forum dwellers and make the game that will be popular, but still has roots in old school.
Words like 'niche' were used by VR in the past. For example in 2014 Brad Mcquaid said in an interview: " But having $800k will make this much easier, because we’ve shown that there is definitely a demand for a more ‘niche’ game." (full interview https://tagn.wordpress.com/2014/01/16/brad-mcquaid-on-pantheon-rise-of-the-fallen-and-project-focus/).
Things change, yes. But if a company continually walks back previous statements over and over as VR has done, then you absolutely should expect discontent.
Marilee said:Words like 'niche' were used by VR in the past. For example in 2014 Brad Mcquaid said in an interview: " But having $800k will make this much easier, because we’ve shown that there is definitely a demand for a more ‘niche’ game." (full interview https://tagn.wordpress.com/2014/01/16/brad-mcquaid-on-pantheon-rise-of-the-fallen-and-project-focus/).
Things change, yes. But if a company continually walks back previous statements over and over as VR has done, then you absolutely should expect discontent.
I've followed this since the Kickstarter. There were a lot of people that perhaps naively, bought $1,000 packages to support their vision for a hardcore MMO. What seems obvious to me however is that the team and fundraising does not appear to have ever grown to a sufficient level to develop the game that we were all promised. I honestly do not know what the best path forward is now. The game looks like a mobile game and totally unappealing to me. People that bougth VIP packages early may feel burned but perhaps we all just have to admit that the goals were too ambitious and are now unreachable? I almost feel like they should just launch this as a mobile game (maybe under a different name?), and monetize it using those funds to support development of the real MMO. The systems need to be scaled back though, too many years of talking about complex systems that would be too difficult for a small team to implement as has been shown now.
I dont mind the new graphics as long as its not retro pixel style or overly childish cartoony its all ok to me.
I pledged 120$ so far like 8 Years ago. I dont have ill feelings against the Pantheon Team at all. And i doubt theres any ill will against pledgers. As suggested in some posts.
If the game is successful on a broader scale good for them and for me since it should stay around longer.
As long as the Tenets wont be ignored it should be a pretty damn fantastic game like EQ was. And i strongly believe that such games can be very successful since theres just a few outdated games that are alike.
Since im gaming since 38 years i dislike most modern Mmos that play like on rails and you will just win anyway not much effort needed to reach the top. I like the deep complex meaningfull stuff.
I kinda feel sorry for all the posters that cant accept the new graphics and i understand there are different opinions.
Im just posting to show support since as learned 1 unhappy customer voices his opinion much faster then 100 happy/neutral ones. I just hope Pantheons Team morale doesnt drop because of it.
Ondark said:
Im just posting to show support since as learned 1 unhappy customer voices his opinion much faster then 100 happy/neutral ones. I just hope Pantheons Team morale doesnt drop because of it.
lol, this has been Exactly the problem from the beginning.
Everyone rushing to pat the devs on the head and not "hurt their feelings".
They are grown adults. Who happen to be ruining a game that was soo close to being great.
Look at Embers Adrift. They have what, a 10 person team behind it? And they have no problem rendering 3d graphics and in fact releaseing a game.
Things that Pantheon, with a larger team and larger budget, just can't seem to do.
The community has consistently refused to light a fire under these people and after 10 years this is what we get.
Really we have only ourselves to blame for that.
I like the art style. I think the negative feelings are more likely to be shared, so that's driving a bunch of chatter. But I feel like the style works well and is more likely to be widely accepted by the general population. It's also less taxing on the systems and production.
The joy of a good game comes from the content, challenge and gameplay overall, far more than the graphics and most everyone agrees. So if you don't like the style you can rest assured that you will not care as much once you experience the full suite of components that the VR team is working towards.
The painted style looks pretty cool. Just need to tone down the "cheeriness" of it. Less Disney, more HBO.
I was never attracted to the graphics in Pantheon though I hoped they would improve with time. I'm surprised to read that so many people were so drawn to them and viewed them as a fundamental part of Pantheon. To me, the painted style is just as good if not better. I generally notice animations much more than graphics and I thought the animations shown in the art update actually looked pretty good. Perhaps the painted style will be more forgiving for animations? That would be a big plus for me.
But honestly, whatever keeps the gears turning at VR is good with me.
lotuss79 said:Look at Embers Adrift. They have what, a 10 person team behind it? And they have no problem rendering 3d graphics and in fact releaseing a game.
Well since you bring up Embers Adrift, look at that game. Less than 25 people logging in less than 1 year after release. Some people convinced the devs that hardcore death mechanics, slow health/mana recovery, darkness, and gritty textures would be popular enough to support the game. What they found out was that a couple of hundred people liked it, and everyone else quit. There is an endless list of people complaining about these features. The game is in shambles, nobody will even play it even though they are now free. There were a few people explaining that these things wouldnt fly while in testing phase, but they were shouted down by the diehard fans that dont even care of the game succeeds or not. Devs of that game made the game for a niche crowd and thats exactly what they got, 25 people logging in most of the time.
Now the devs have been trying to backtrack on everything because they have seen that the vast majority of people dont want that stuff. Its too late, the game released, no way to turn back time, they lost the momentum no matter what they do now. Whats even funny is the people that begged the devs to stick with the hardcore style, are still playing the game even after the devs walked back much of the features. So apparently it was all hot air, and it really didnt matter to them anyway. Unfortunately it did matter to everyone else that quit.
Maybe Pantheon devs will learn the lesson from Embers and build a game that has a wider audience. Lesson to learn, dont listen to the bloviating hardcore crowd, they dont represent the mainstream and they will likely play the game either way. What other choice do they have, no other MMO exists that is even sort of hardcore other than Embers which has 25 people. Any decent MMO that leans to oldschool is really going to be the only option out there other than a 20+ year old game.
I think you've generalized a bit too much about the reasons why Embers hasn't been as successful as people wanted. But, that's for a different thread. Let's keep this one about the art update. If the art of Ember's relates go ahead and use it for examples, but most of what you said is about gameplay, not art.
They want this game to last well into the future, but I doubt they can keep up with the realism other games will provide in the coming years. This choice to stop competing with other "realistic" games and choosing "handpainted" for a better performance seems to me a good choice, but I don't think it was an easy choice to make.
Savanja said:lotuss79 said:This just can't be the case.
You could have always simplified the graphics while retaining a "realism" style.
This shift to a cartoony style is a fundamental imaging change thats designed to appeal to a "wider demographic".
The producers letter announcing this change stated so very clearly.
For your reading enjoyment, a quote from the Producer's Letter stating the why:
We have opted to shift our in-game art direction to address several needs:
Performance – We have run into difficulty with the former art performing well on even the beefiest of machines. We have made progress on this front but ultimately determined we could get better gains by a shift in style.
Speed of Development – The shift speeds up the art pipeline substantially. What would sometimes take weeks now can take days, or in some cases, hours.
Sustainability – With the new art direction, we feel confident we can achieve our long-term goals with an indie-sized development team. It is not only faster, but more affordable.
Marketability – One of the top comments we routinely receive from the public is how the game looks old or unappealing. This is an opportunity to reach a broader, more contemporary audience.
It was not just a matter of turning down the realism. 3D art rendering is very intensive, time-consuming, and resource-hoarding. If we had tons of funding and a huge staff of 3D artists, then realism would have been the way to go. We don't.
I'm sorry, but being a game developer myself and working for an actual successful company. I can tell that the drivel you just quoted is a lie.
It is PR speak for "we dug ourselves into a hole and now we don't know how to get out of it". I also know why you dug yourself into a hole that you can no longer find a way out of - because you spend so much damn time fiddling with your thumbs.
There has been zero planning when it concerns this project. Zero. You didn't even have your pipeline tools in place until a good year or two ago and now, your funds are definitely also on the low side and you are panicking and boy am I glad young software engineer student me did not pledge a lot of money, but had the foresight to say: No, I want actual results.
I mean for the love of all.. Most of those models and their animations are something a first year Animator/3D Model student produces.. Effing wings clipping through a Gryphon.. Embarrasing.
Ashreon: I mean for the love of all.. Most of those models and their animations are something a first year Animator/3D Model student produces.. Effing wings clipping through a Gryphon.. Embarrasing.
I am hoping that this video was a rushed job aimed to quell the immediate back-lash and just goes to show that this bombshell was dropped from a great height with little or no thought to existing customers. I mean, even EQ2 "griffin" shipped without wing clipping through its own back (and looked meaner!).
I can think of one thing VR can do that will make all but the most die-hard "I truly hate this look" people accept the advantages.
Come out with an explicit statement that they are now focusing almost exclusively on getting to release within X years based on polishing and expanding what they have now (including the new art) with a timeframe of alpha starting within Y months. For years they have been gun-shy about any timelines - because they or their predecessors have missed so many of them. But we may be at a point where the risk of missing another timeline is less than the certainty of many of the most dedicated long-term supporters seeing the negatives of the art change all too clearly and just seeing very vague positive language about it being cheaper and able to be developed faster of the type we have seen with every do-over and no longer place a lot of faith in.
The odds of this happening remind me of a feature in Analog magazine many years ago (maybe still there for all I know) called "Probability Zero".
dorotea said:I can think of one thing VR can do that will make all but the most die-hard "I truly hate this look" people accept the advantages.
Come out with an explicit statement that they are now focusing almost exclusively on getting to release within X years based on polishing and expanding what they have now (including the new art) with a timeframe of alpha starting within Y months. For years they have been gun-shy about any timelines - because they or their predecessors have missed so many of them. But we may be at a point where the risk of missing another timeline is less than the certainty of many of the most dedicated long-term supporters seeing the negatives of the art change all too clearly and just seeing very vague positive language about it being cheaper and able to be developed faster of the type we have seen with every do-over and no longer place a lot of faith in.
The odds of this happening remind me of a feature in Analog magazine many years ago (maybe still there for all I know) called "Probability Zero".
As much as I, and many others, would like VR to start committing to timelines we know it will just not happen. They have missed to many of them. Heck they can't even announce something without first announcing that soon they will have an announcement. Who here remembers Brad's statement that 'Alpha will start in 2018"? I do not believe that 1)VR actually has a list of things and the order in which they need to be done; and 2) a project manager that is actually keeping track of who is doing what to ensure that individual projects are being completed on-time and on-budget. I really think they are just winging-it..or at least that is the appearnce we get.
Razorbrains said:lotuss79 said:Look at Embers Adrift. They have what, a 10 person team behind it? And they have no problem rendering 3d graphics and in fact releaseing a game.
Well since you bring up Embers Adrift, look at that game. Less than 25 people logging in less than 1 year after release. Some people convinced the devs that hardcore death mechanics, slow health/mana recovery, darkness, and gritty textures would be popular enough to support the game. What they found out was that a couple of hundred people liked it, and everyone else quit. There is an endless list of people complaining about these features. The game is in shambles, nobody will even play it even though they are now free. There were a few people explaining that these things wouldnt fly while in testing phase, but they were shouted down by the diehard fans that dont even care of the game succeeds or not. Devs of that game made the game for a niche crowd and thats exactly what they got, 25 people logging in most of the time.
Now the devs have been trying to backtrack on everything because they have seen that the vast majority of people dont want that stuff. Its too late, the game released, no way to turn back time, they lost the momentum no matter what they do now. Whats even funny is the people that begged the devs to stick with the hardcore style, are still playing the game even after the devs walked back much of the features. So apparently it was all hot air, and it really didnt matter to them anyway. Unfortunately it did matter to everyone else that quit.
Maybe Pantheon devs will learn the lesson from Embers and build a game that has a wider audience. Lesson to learn, dont listen to the bloviating hardcore crowd, they dont represent the mainstream and they will likely play the game either way. What other choice do they have, no other MMO exists that is even sort of hardcore other than Embers which has 25 people. Any decent MMO that leans to oldschool is really going to be the only option out there other than a 20+ year old game.
Vandraad said:
As much as I, and many others, would like VR to start committing to timelines we know it will just not happen. They have missed to many of them. Heck they can't even announce something without first announcing that soon they will have an announcement. Who here remembers Brad's statement that 'Alpha will start in 2018"? I do not believe that 1)VR actually has a list of things and the order in which they need to be done; and 2) a project manager that is actually keeping track of who is doing what to ensure that individual projects are being completed on-time and on-budget. I really think they are just winging-it..or at least that is the appearnce we get.
So right. I don't think it can seriously be said that VR employees are working full time 8 hour days, 40 hour work weeks, with any oversight. (although they are certainly paying themselves full time hours).
And thats why they are where they are today. Out of money and switching to VeggieTales style graphics.
Im sure the response will be "how dare you! you have no idea how hard we are working behind the scenes!"
Well, im sorry, but at some point results have to speak for themselves. Its either laziness or incompetence. It can't be nither after after all this time.
lotuss79 said:Ondark said:
Im just posting to show support since as learned 1 unhappy customer voices his opinion much faster then 100 happy/neutral ones. I just hope Pantheons Team morale doesnt drop because of it.
lol, this has been Exactly the problem from the beginning.
Everyone rushing to pat the devs on the head and not "hurt their feelings".
They are grown adults. Who happen to be ruining a game that was soo close to being great.
100% agree. Most people and companies, VR included, live in an echo chamber. To many people telling them how great everything is. Until now. It's like American politics, everyone just listens to the side they are comfortable with and nothing gets done. You either watch Fox News or CNN. There is no voice of honesty. Please don't start a political debate, it was just an example.
VR needs to know we appreciate the effort to make a game we all want. We bought into the vision, so clearly we are supporters. However it seems the majority of us hate the new art direction. This needs to be said loudly and often so they can still mitigate the damage.