Alpha 21 Dev Diary

[crazywildfire]

So we back for the 1000th time about graphics again. So someone please tell me, what 100% voxel game has great graphics? I mean I don't know every game out but I don't know any. So for what the game is the graphic are really not that horrible. I'm not convinced that even if the game started development today it would look much better. Maybe a little sure but it be at the same level as comparing the first alpha to now. So yeah would look better but by how much? ..... Also yes 2013 in development so what? AAA companies with millions dollar budgets and a lot more employees take more then 5 years to develop. Example right now starfield was announced in 2018. I 100% can tell you it just didn't start the development process that year. We still don't have it yet. Point is why are we still comparing this and that to a game not fully developed yet? If you seen starfield development or gta development during the process would you quickly jump the gun on why they look like this or that and why it taking so long? 

 

Maybe I misreading things and ranted for nothing but these things have been discussed over and over already even during this alpha so still valid points. 🙃

[meilodasreh]

didn't know you ranted until you said so.

But yes, you did it for nothing.

 

Do I think the graphics of this game is meh compared to many other games today? Yes.

Did I recently pass over a 1000h in 7D2D? Yes.

Do I have over 1000h in any other non-voxel super blinky blinky fancy AAA hyper realistic graphics game? No. Not. Even. Close.

 

See how much I care about graphics.

[forgetful genius]

1 hour ago, IzPrebuilt said:

 

I'm dying to know if my eyes are seeing correctly.  Is your avatar a capture of Kane from the Nod faction in Command & Conquer?

[IzPrebuilt]

4 minutes ago, forgetful genius said:

I'm dying to know if my eyes are seeing correctly.  Is your avatar a capture of Kane from the Nod faction in Command & Conquer?

Yes lol

[forgetful genius]

One of my favorites from way back when.  Nice.

[Roland]

Developers create games for the players but they also create games with their industry peers and critics in mind. 
 

Players typically disregard technical limitations and simply compare all games on the surface without even thinking or caring about why. All they do is judge good/bad graphics on a very superficial basis…as we’ve seen many times here. 
 

Industry peers are extremely cognizant of all contributing and limiting factors surrounding the final product and so are quite impressed and give high critical praise when they see a high level of accomplishment. 
 

So a player can be dumbfounded at the time and effort the developers take to increase the technical and graphical level of this game since it will never reach the level of current games that have static worlds and mostly non interactive background art—while peers of the developers are amazed that a fully voxel world with every building, tree, mountain, and ground for dozens of meters below can look so good. 
 

So it may not be super impressive to some of you when the developers improve technical aspects of the game when compared to just adding additional content but try to remember that you are not the only type of audience they are trying to impress.

[Roland]

BTW, when the developers first began, their goal was to create a full voxel world with the graphical equivalency of Quake because that was what they felt was possible. That they were able to improve that goal to a full voxel world with the graphical equivalency of Skyrim is amazing. One might make that second comparison out of derision but I think the devs would take it as high praise and those in the industry would be similarly impressed. 

[Fanatical_Meat]

3 hours ago, IzPrebuilt said:

Agree, I legitimately don't care that it looks bad. Although I think Valheim is an art style choice to keep the file size really small which is nice.

 

 

First of all, what credibility? who put you in charge of the credibility? can i exchange my limited retained credibility for something useful like staples or dried bugs? Why are you talking to me like an Oblivion NPC i just stole from? Are you from a PS3 game like the graphics in this game? Is this the reason for your offense? Have i offended an entire era of gaming?

 

Second of all you have just shown my point.
It's made about 3-4 years of graphical improvement in a decade. It's never going to look good.

 

So YES, it has NOT gotten MUCH BETTER. Precisely what I said.

 

It's not even the fault of the devs at this point, it'd be impossible to make it look good without restarting.

 

 

 

Those ugly screenshots are official marketing for the game. Probably the worst looking one out of them all but still lol

 

Haha reminds me that I wanted to suggest the pimps update their steam page with current visuals.

[Callum123456789]

me personally i would prefer more game features over graphical overhauls for assets but at the end of the day this is their game and they chose what gets worked on and what doesnt, besides that if they work on graphics it will modernise it lets say we eventually egt something like combo moves not saying we will but wouldnt it feel out of place if we could do all these unique things but then it would look like play dough? imagine 7 days now with the graphics it had back in 2013 i dont mind graphics but i appreciate the work they do on them.

[Blake_]

33 minutes ago, Callum123456789 said:

me personally i would prefer more game features over graphical overhauls for assets but at the end of the day this is their game and they chose what gets worked on and what doesnt, besides that if they work on graphics it will modernise it lets say we eventually egt something like combo moves not saying we will but wouldnt it feel out of place if we could do all these unique things but then it would look like play dough? imagine 7 days now with the graphics it had back in 2013 i dont mind graphics but i appreciate the work they do on them.

Well, I can tell you this: TFP wouldn't be at the level of Bethesda Game Studios in terms of depth of Lore, mainly because BGS is based on a wide knowledge of history from their writers (Dark elves:  a bit of Mesopotamian and Japanese culture, Empire: Roman empire, Nords: Vikings, LOTR: Dwarves, magic, several sci fi and fantasy influences... and a wide etc). I know, I know, It's a zombie game, but it compares directly to Fallout, which has a huge lore and coherent world within its madness, like The Elder Scrolls have.

 

While Madmole has stated before, he didn't really thought about history growing up, and it's in his core believes that technical sciences are the way forward, both personally and in general, which is objectively half truth, as we need a written database of mistakes to keep going forward too.

 

What does that have to do with the game? Well, the core believes of the creators themselves will result in great gameplay, a great deal of emergent gameplay/quests, unbelievably amazing level design and a story that, while lacking vs BGS titles, can always improve as they study and achieve that long due knowledge for their own purposes. They are both young and strong still, lol.

 

Even if not at Gold, there is always the DLCs after.

[meilodasreh]

funny fact is that no one ever said that the graphics are "too bad" or "should be better" or else alike.

The only thing that came up is that the game doesn't have the same graphics quality as other "today's/modern" games,

but no one demanded it should have.

And btw naming the technical limitations of a voxel engine running on today's hardware doesn't make it magically look better,

no matter how much one can appreciate the effort in improving there because he knows about the technical background.

 

 

But TFP should really follow the suggestion of @Fanatical_Meat and update these marketing "screenshots".

Especially this one that was picked by @Jost Amman doesn't reflect actual ingame graphics quality very well.

I really thought it was a screenshot he made himself, with just really low settings.

Now that I know and see that it is a photoshopped marketing shot (truck and Zeds "glued" flat ontop the background), I can only say that's a fail.

 

In general these shots are postprocessed to the excess and I assume everybody is more or less used to

"hey the actual game does not look anywhere near as good as in these advertises".

 

So just in case anyone new to the forum checks by, I can tell you this:

Hey buy and try it, you will be surprised how much better it looks compared to the official screenshots.

 

...sorry this all came out as a much bigger wall of text as I indended.

[Jost Amman]

1 hour ago, Callum123456789 said:

me personally i would prefer more game features over graphical overhauls for assets

You can have both. Most features are worked on by different devs than the ones who work on graphics assets.

 

5 minutes ago, meilodasreh said:

funny fact is that no one ever said that the graphics are "too bad" or "should be better" or else alike.

No, and neither did I make it my point in my post.

I was just saying that it's unfair to state that the graphics improvements from 2013 to now are "meh".

 

Anyone saying that is either nearsighted or biased IMO.

[Roland]

14 minutes ago, meilodasreh said:

The only thing that came up is that the game doesn't have the same graphics quality as other "today's/modern" games,

Exactly. This is the superficial comparison by typical gamers I was talking about. It’s what leads them to then wonder why TFP bothers to spend so much time working on graphics. 
 

19 minutes ago, meilodasreh said:

And btw naming the technical limitations of a voxel engine running on today's hardware doesn't make it magically look better,

no matter how much one can appreciate the effort in improving there because he knows about the technical background.

True. But understanding all of that brings appreciation instead of dismissiveness. From those who understand, you hear comments like, “It is amazing what TFP has accomplished. For a full world voxel game this game is technically and graphically brilliant”. 
 

From those who don’t understand you get comments like, “This game is just a turd graphically and trying to improve it is simply polishing a turd”

 

[meilodasreh]

Ah...turds...the good old times.

 

Can we all now agree that we don't love this game for its bling but for its bang, and go on with another topic.

 

Maybe a new riddle about some new stuff.

Now know the last one was last year, which is a looong time ago.😀

Edited January 2, 2023 by meilodasreh (see edit history)

[Doomofman]

I'll take the current level of graphic fidelity in 7 Days over the pixelated art of Minecraft or Valheim every time

Edited January 2, 2023 by Doomofman (see edit history)

[meilodasreh]

5 minutes ago, Doomofman said:

pixelated art of Minecraft

its a matter of perspective, like sitting way too close in front of your TV.

Just zoom out until everything is smooth😁

[Roland]

They’d have to project Minecraft onto the face of the moon for it to look smooth. 😜

Edited January 2, 2023 by Roland (see edit history)

[Code6]

I typically introduce 7 Days to Die to new people as "like Minecraft with better graphics".  And better zombies...

I must admit that I have never played Minecraft, but I do have several thousand hours in 7 Days.

[Jost Amman]

3 hours ago, Roland said:

They’d have to project Minecraft onto the face of the moon for it to look smooth. 😜

I hear in Iran they did something like that... but not with Minecraft, apparently. 

[Guppycur]

I personally feel the graphics have gotten in the way of the great potential of the game.  Sacrifices have been made in the name of graphics, and I'd personally rather a better game than better graphics.  

[Fanatical_Meat]

4 hours ago, Code6 said:

I typically introduce 7 Days to Die to new people as "like Minecraft with better graphics".  And better zombies...

I must admit that I have never played Minecraft, but I do have several thousand hours in 7 Days.

Come on it looks totally the same

[Adam the Waster]

1 hour ago, Guppycur said:

I personally feel the graphics have gotten in the way of the great potential of the game.  Sacrifices have been made in the name of graphics, and I'd personally rather a better game than better graphics.  

agreed, personally the graphics from A16 and A17 were pretty good. 

as long as the game is fun i don't care, plus it gave a Unique art style. if they wanted to improve the older models/zombies/Animations thats fine.

but many games now focus too much on graphics    

[Blake_]

On 1/3/2023 at 3:45 AM, Guppycur said:

I personally feel the graphics have gotten in the way of the great potential of the game.  Sacrifices have been made in the name of graphics, and I'd personally rather a better game than better graphics.  

That's a tricky opinion if you think about it. Where would the "terror" part of the game be without graphics? Not quite up there I presume. Bear with me here and genres aside, would complexity of content like Rimworld and Dwarf Fortress make the game better? No, I don't think so. Would you call Rimworld a better game than Dwarf Fortress?

 

Yes, because of the better Graphics. Would a compromise leaning towards the crappy graphics result in better content/gameplay for 7dtd? probably? but I do believe I wouldn't be playing a beefed up alpha 1-10 today vs the game we have now. And not only because of the graphics, but because of core engine limitations directly resulting from that first choice. I am thankful for the compromise, because even if we can whine about what could've been, graphics always delay the aging of a game that has a good enough gameplay, and that is a truth that extends to all genres. 7dtd's core gameplay mechanic is addicting already.

[Riamus]

2 hours ago, Blake_ said:

I am thankful for the compromise, because even if we can whine about what could've been, graphics always delay the aging of a game that has a good enough gameplay, and that is a truth that extends to all genres.

This is very true.  Look at any old game that is still enjoyed by many people today and you will find that the graphics have stood the test of time.  That doesn't mean they are equal to today's standards, but that they are done in a way that still looks good today.  Often, they are done in a specific style that fits the game really well even if they aren't hyper realistic.

 

That said, graphics are certainly not everything.  A game with amazing graphics and horrible gameplay will not be enjoyed anywhere near as much as a game with horrible graphics and amazing gameplay.  The goal of any game is a balance of the two.  Occasionally, you will find a game that has both amazing graphics and amazing gameplay, but those are few and far between.  If you focus too much on only one aspect, your game will likely not do very well, or at least not as well as it could have.  I think that this game has a good balance.  The graphics are very good for a voxel game and fit the game well, imo.  They don't have to be equal to the best graphics seen today.

 

That said, I am very interested in the updated art assets.  I think it will make the game more interesting for more players (people do like graphics), which benefits everyone as TFP is more likely to continue improving the game after gold if it continues to do well.

 

Speaking of the new art assets, @Roland, do you have any favorite new art assets that you could tell us about (or show us)?  What would you say is the most noticeable thing improved and why do you think it is better?  I know we have seen some new things like cars, but if you could let us know what stands out the most to you, that would be great.

[Gcf2099]

Is the character overhaul still coming to a21 or has it been pushed back? Apologies if this information is known, I just can't find it! (It also may just be hush-hush which is understandable!)