Matte Fairings Prease

[Bomoo]

I find it very unpleasantly striking how much glossier the fairings are than most of the other, if not all, stock parts, and the stockalike aesthetic in general. Were they always so glossy? I don't think they were. And looking at older screenshots seems to confirm that.

[cubinator]

There are two solutions to this problem:

1. Make the fairings less shiny (easier, makes them fit in)
2. Make all the other parts more shiny (more work, changes general aesthetic)

I would personally prefer the second option, but the first is fine with me too.

Edited June 4, 2016 by cubinator

[Spaceception]

15 minutes ago, cubinator said:

There are two solutions to this problem:

1. Make the fairings less shiny (easier, makes them fit in)
2. Make all the other parts more shiny (more work, changes general aesthetic)

I would personally prefer the second option, but the first is fine with me too.

Shiiiiney.

Actually, not now, my laptop couldn't handle it

Edited June 4, 2016 by Spaceception

[Matuchkin]

I believe that the aesthetic of KSP parts should be completely changed. Since I'm not going to derail this thread, I'll post another thread on the subject. Please do not answer to this comment.

[Andem]

Please make them matte again... The current shader(?) is perfect, they reflect enough light.

[Bomoo]

Oh god, make everything glossy? I think that'd be hideous, and I'd probably stop playing. It'd look like you're playing with cheap plastic toys.

But thanks for all your replies, folks.

[Kerbinchaser]

13 minutes ago, Bomoo said:

Oh god, make everything glossy? I think that'd be hideous, and I'd probably stop playing. It'd look like you're playing with cheap plastic toys.

But thanks for all your replies, folks.

That would be horrible. 

Edited June 5, 2016 by Lo Var Lachland

[pandaman]

IIRC from previous devnotes a visual overhaul is planned for fairly soon (1.2 or 1.3 possibly ?), so at a guess this kind of thing will be looked at then. 

[Bomoo]

1 hour ago, pandaman said:

IIRC from previous devnotes a visual overhaul is planned for fairly soon (1.2 or 1.3 possibly ?), so at a guess this kind of thing will be looked at then. 

Now I'm nervous. Considering they've long since bled out all the best stockalike texture artists to contribute to KSP in an official capacity, except for Porkjet, I don't think that bodes well for the quality of texture they're, as I think you're suggesting, going to be repainting everything with. To describe some of the newer rocket parts as fugly would be extremely charitable. The NASA parts, for instance. And as much as Roverdude is a superbly gifted and prolific scripter and all-around modder, texture art is not one of his strong points by any stretch of the imagination.

Not that I'm saying the fairings in question need any kind of overhaul - they just need to be reverted back to the state they were initially introduced in. Namely matte, non-glossy texture.

Edited June 5, 2016 by Bomoo

[pandaman]

55 minutes ago, Bomoo said:

Now I'm nervous. Considering they've long since bled out all the best stockalike texture artists to contribute to KSP in an official capacity, except for Porkjet, I don't think that bodes well for the quality of texture they're, as I think you're suggesting, going to be repainting everything with. To describe some of the newer rocket parts as fugly would be extremely charitable. The NASA parts, for instance. And as much as Roverdude is a superbly gifted and prolific scripter and all-around modder, texture art is not one of his strong points by any stretch of the imagination.

Not that I'm saying the fairings in question need any kind of overhaul - they just need to be reverted back to the state they were initially introduced in. Namely matte, non-glossy texture.

The trouble with aesthetics is that they are very subjective.  I think the current 'stock' rocket parts in particular would benefit from having a more uniform style.  Fully dull matte or super high gloss, apart from on specific components, wouldn't look right IMO, but I'm not one to get too bothered about whether the surface reflectivity is a bit too much or too little.

[Bomoo]

25 minutes ago, pandaman said:

The trouble with aesthetics is that they are very subjective.  I think the current 'stock' rocket parts in particular would benefit from having a more uniform style.  Fully dull matte or super high gloss, apart from on specific components, wouldn't look right IMO, but I'm not one to get too bothered about whether the surface reflectivity is a bit too much or too little.

The issue for me is that one makes my rockets look fine and the other makes them look like cheap plastic toys. Though I do agree that extremes on either end would tend not to look right.

[blorgon]

I don't particularly mind or even notice this as much as the straight edges. Not having smooth fairing curves drives me absolutely batty.

And before you all remind me of Procedural Fairings or whatever, "there's a mod for that" is not the way I want to game. I am completely supportive of mods and modding communities, but I also think that there are some things that are so mind-numbingly obvious that should be stock, and it's incredibly frustrating having to rely on modders for those things. I honestly don't understand why all structural, tank, engine, aero, fairing, battery, solar panel, and comm parts aren't procedural. It might be more difficult up front in terms of development, but the quality of the game would improve by orders of magnitude, and I think probably much less maintenance intensive.

[Andem]

As far as making the parts shiny: Oh god please don't!!! Making them look shiny would make KSP look like every other space game you can find, the more matte look is one of my favorite hings in the art style. KSP would lose a whole lot of credibility and charm if it went for generic space game shiny.

[Bomoo]

1 hour ago, blorgon said:

I don't particularly mind or even notice this as much as the straight edges. Not having smooth fairing curves drives me absolutely batty.

And before you all remind me of Procedural Fairings or whatever, "there's a mod for that" is not the way I want to game. I am completely supportive of mods and modding communities, but I also think that there are some things that are so mind-numbingly obvious that should be stock, and it's incredibly frustrating having to rely on modders for those things. I honestly don't understand why all structural, tank, engine, aero, fairing, battery, solar panel, and comm parts aren't procedural. It might be more difficult up front in terms of development, but the quality of the game would improve by orders of magnitude, and I think probably much less maintenance intensive.

Don't real life fairings have similarly angular edges?

[Kerbart]

4 minutes ago, Bomoo said:

Don't real life fairings have similarly angular edges?

 

I was going to say... it must infuriate Roskosmos. But you've beaten me to it!

 

[blorgon]

6 minutes ago, Bomoo said:

Don't real life fairings have similarly angular edges?

Just now, Kerbart said:

I was going to say... it must infuriate Roskosmos. But you've beaten me to it!

Right, because all rockets have angular fairings... 

[RocketSquid]

14 minutes ago, blorgon said:

Right, because all rockets have angular fairings... 

By the looks of it, most Russian rockets and many American rockets.

Also, it is possible to make curved fairings by just putting a sufficient number of angles. I'm not sure how "curved" you need the fairings to be, but I've managed some that look fairly rounded.

[blorgon]

11 hours ago, RocketSquid said:

By the looks of it, most Russian rockets and many American rockets.

Also, it is possible to make curved fairings by just putting a sufficient number of angles. I'm not sure how "curved" you need the fairings to be, but I've managed some that look fairly rounded.

[emphasis mine]

I know it's possible to approximate curves, but only to a certain degree. Jeez, am I the only one here that wants actual curved fairings?

This is a thread about aesthetics, is it not?

Look, I think we've all gotten a little too used to relying on the modding community for everything. I see so many responses on this forum that boil down to "well you can approximate this," or "you can sort of get close by doing this". People are so quick to just throw up their hands and say "oh well, I guess this is it." I get that there's a necessary amount of compromise that players have to make with any game, but with the KSP community sometimes, it seems like we give SQUAD way too much slack.

Not everybody is comfortable modding their games, and vanilla is objectively boring after a while. Like I've said, I love mods, and I love what happens when a community gets together to make them (look what it did for Skyrim), but I think there's a point that you can cross where it becomes unhealthy how much we depend on them to make the game enjoyable playable.

Sorry to veer off-topic a little there, but I'm just getting tired of seeing this kind of response in the community.

Again, I don't particularly mind the glossy fairings. I think it'd be cool if you could do texture switching for parts, like the way PP does it, so that you can actually have aesthetic consistency. I really hate having to slap two orange tanks to the bottom of some grey fairing bases, which are then attached to red and yellow and black engines, which is attached to a white-ish, striped fuel tank, et cetera*. I'd love to be able to choose a texture, choose whether or not it's glossy, choose a color...

 

*I'm actually not using PP right now because, last I recall, the mod was having some issues. I forgot how crappy stock tanks are.

Edited June 6, 2016 by blorgon

[Andem]

32 minutes ago, blorgon said:

[emphasis mine]

I know it's possible to approximate curves, but only to a certain degree. Jeez, am I the only one here that wants actual, curved fairings?

This is a thread about aesthetics, is it not?

Look, I think we've all gotten a little too used to relying on the modding community for everything. I see so many responses on this forum that boil down to "well you can approximate this," or "you can sort of get close by doing this". People are so quick to just throw up their hands and say "oh well, I guess this is it." I get that there's a necessary amount of compromise that players have to make with any game, but with the KSP community sometimes, it seems like we give SQUAD way too much slack.

Not everybody is comfortable modding their games, and vanilla is objectively boring after a while. Like I've said, I love mods, and I love what happens when a community gets together to make them (look what it did for Skyrim), but I think there's a point that you can cross where it becomes unhealthy how much we depend on them to make the game enjoyable playable.

Sorry to veer off-topic a little there, but I'm just getting tired of seeing this kind of response in the community.

Again, I don't particularly mind the glossy fairings. I think it'd be cool if you could do texture switching for parts, like the way PP does it, so that you can actually have aesthetic consistency. I really hate having to slap two orange tanks to the bottom of some grey fairing bases, which are then attached to red and yellow and black engines, which is attached to a white-ish, striped fuel tank, et cetera*. I'd love to be able to choose a texture, choose whether or not it's glossy, choose a color...

 

*I'm actually not using PP right now because, last I recall, the mod was having some issues. I forgot how crappy stock tanks are.

Well, maybe, just maybe, they are discussing aproximation because they are happy with the angular fairings, or non PP. I would stop playing KSP right now if PP became the only available parts. Building rockets would no longer be fun, it would be a chore.

[Spaceception]

16 minutes ago, Andem said:

Well, maybe, just maybe, they are discussing aproximation because they are happy with the angular fairings, or non PP. I would stop playing KSP right now if PP became the only available parts. Building rockets would no longer be fun, it would be a chore.

Agreed, if they ever, for some reason, implement procedural parts, they should only be additional, not the only ones.

Also, IOUrep.

[blorgon]

7 minutes ago, Andem said:

because they are happy with the angular fairings  

That's perfectly fine if it works for them. But it doesn't work for me, which is the point. I'm not talking about other people's aesthetic preferences. I'm talking about mine. And approximating a curved fairing is not what I want to have to do.

13 minutes ago, Andem said:

Building rockets would no longer be fun, it would be a chore.

That's perfectly fine too. I don't understand the sentiment—I personally enjoy putting a fuel tank on my craft that will exactly fit my needs—but hey, whatever. It's not like SQUAD will ever actually do most of the things we talk about here, so I don't think you have to worry about only ever using procedural parts.

3 minutes ago, Spaceception said:

Agreed, if they ever, for some reason, implement procedural parts, they should only be additional, not the only ones.

Now I'm genuinely curious. What is it about procedural parts that you don't like? I mean, is it the textures of the stock parts you would miss? You could still have them with procedural parts. I don't really see any other reason why you would prefer a big orange tank over a procedural one with the same texture, but in the perfect size that you need for what you're building.

In case it's not clear enough, I'm not talking about making "Procedural Parts" the mod stock. I'm talking about SQUAD doing procedural part generation with stock textures.

[Panel]

@blorgon

I think that what people are saying, and I agree, is that is much more fun to try to build a rocket with only a set of parts rather than every possible part. It would be a bit like a lego set that let you 3D print a lego brick into the precise shape of a castle, rather than trying to put it together on your own.

[Spaceception]

2 minutes ago, Panel said:

@blorgon

I think that what people are saying, and I agree, is that is much more fun to try to build a rocket with only a set of parts rather than every possible part. It would be a bit like a lego set that let you 3D print a lego brick into the precise shape of a castle, rather than trying to put it together on your own.

Yep.

Also: You are only allowed to give 25 likes per day. You cannot give any more likes today.

[Andem]

2 hours ago, Panel said:

@blorgon

I think that what people are saying, and I agree, is that is much more fun to try to build a rocket with only a set of parts rather than every possible part. It would be a bit like a lego set that let you 3D print a lego brick into the precise shape of a castle, rather than trying to put it together on your own.

/\/\

This.

If you want to make a certain type of craft, you have to work around it. If you want to have the right Delta-V without clipping, you have to deal with potential spaggheti. It, for me anyway, would feel like a chore because instead of tinkering in the editor, you check your calculator or some website, pull out KER, and plug in the numbers.

[Claw]

 

Perhaps the thing to realize is that many different points of view can be valid. It's quite physically impossible to make a singular game, that is this open ended, that makes everyone happy. It's equally as possible that some folks really enjoy the lego-esque features, as it is that other folks enjoy having procedural (or size tweakable) parts.

The game is deeply made in a way that allows extensive modding, so that players can have exactly the experience they want. I also know that not everyone wants to modify their game. But I would submit that not everyone wants the same things available in stock either, and that can be a very difficult edge to walk. It's pretty easy to go back through the forums and look for introduction of feature X, and see plenty of folks who are disappointed that feature Y wasn't added instead (or even upset about adding feature X).

 

But back to the subject at hand, I agree, the fairings are quite a bit more shiny that nearly everything else. It would be good to have some consistency. Rocket parts will be getting an upgrade, so perhaps during the overhaul we can have a look.

We do, actually, read this subforum even if we don't always respond.

Cheers!
~Claw