KSP Loading... Preview: Breaking Ground - Moho Wrinkle Ridge

[klgraham1013]

11 hours ago, steve_v said:

This looks like you didn't even try, just plonked it down and said "that'll do".

I mean.  Have you looked at the tech tree, part pricing, or placeholder gizmo buttons?  For a while it seems like Squad's company motto was "That'll do."  Recent developments made me think they were past that mentality.  Maybe there's still a bit of it creeping back in.

11 hours ago, Frank_G said:

the current way of implementation makes such features easy to spot, which is good for gameplay.

The stock scanners already pick up anomalies.  No need to see them with the naked eye from such a distance.

[Challyss]

So.... After the Mohole, the Moho Zit ? ....

[Columbo]

I'm all in for things like that. But please, for the love of your players, make it blend in at least at little bit. This might have been enough for the anomalies in the Base game but i think for a 15$ DLC we can expect a little bit more than this. 

[GearsNSuch]

The lava flow itself looks all right, if low resolution, but I do agree that it needs more integration.

Any natural structure must have "placement." Otherwise it's like walking in a field and seeing a styrofoam cup or a shopping cart lying around.

Here's an example:

The crystal kinds... sticks out. I don't think they typically grow out of the grass. Just a simple half-boulder at the base, or even changing it to a cracked-open geode would make it look much more natural.

In the case of the lava flow, while they are often distinct from the landscape, scattering small rocks and chunks of dried lava of the same color around the perimeter would do wonders for the realism.

Thank you, and keep up the good work!

 

In a semi-related note, perhaps normal maps, only visible on the higher terrain settings, would be a good idea to increase detail?

 

-----Addendum-----

 

Ooh! I just noticed! It looks like you guys are re-vamping the parachute / backpack! Yay!

Edited May 15, 2019 by GearsNSuch

[lajoswinkler]

19 hours ago, Tyko said:

Oh nice  we apparently haven’t. please send some real life pics that look like what you’re talking about

I can’t imagine a spot where a stand-alone feature like this exists which doesn’t have any of the same colors or textures as the surrounding terrain and exists all by itself on a giant plain without any similar features nearby. 

Im excited to see examples, thanks!

 

Here's one recent example.

And yes, I'd make these things on Moho a lot bigger in area and in numbers.

[Challyss]

Well, make the rest of the planet look as good as the forest on this picture, and we'll be good

[Loskene]

4 minutes ago, lajoswinkler said:

Here's one recent example.

Draw a line around the fissure edge with black marker then pixellate the surrounding forest like pre-watershed TV censoring and it'd be a more accurate example. The need for transitional blending gets a lot clearer when you're not looking at it from a helicopter.

[steve_v]

2 hours ago, GearsNSuch said:

The crystal kinds... sticks out. I don't think they typically grow out of the grass.

Speaking of the (decidedly 2D) grass... That texture *shudder*.

High detail crystal model and pretty texture clashes with low poly terrain and smeary low resolution grass texture: Check.
Nice crystal abruptly meets nasty grass, with no attempt made to deal with those sharp and unnatural borders: Check.

I had hoped that the lava flow was an isolated incident, as I hadn't seen this one. Now I suspect that "just chuck it somewhere, it'll be fine" is the soup of the day for all of these features.

Did it grow up out of the ground? If so, where is the mounding of the surrounding earth that would have created? Why is there no sign of other mineral formations nearby?
Was the hillside formed around it? If so, why is there "grass" right up to a nanometer from the crystal surface? Grass doesn't grow like that, and it certainly doesn't grow the sharply truncated blades I see at the borders.
Why is there nothing at all with comparable quality anywhere on the local terrain? This thing sticks out like a baboons butt at fur convention.

The crystal is very nice and all, but not placed the way it is. That just looks bad.
Seriously guys, this looks like someone screwed up the Z position of the model so it clipped into the terrain and didn't bother to go back and fix it.

Edited May 15, 2019 by steve_v

[steve_v]

2 hours ago, lajoswinkler said:

Here's one recent example.

Now show me a closer picture, with a person (or kerbal) for scale, and point out the razor-sharp debris-free transitions like this one:

Being sharply defined from a distance is fine. Utterly abrupt transitions at near-LOD look like the model isn't part of the surroundings. Or even the same game.
If it looks like that in a low-res highly compressed video, I can assure you it will look even more abrupt up close and personal.

 

Huh, no auto-merge. I still haven't figured out the right incantations for that I see.

Edited May 15, 2019 by steve_v

[Guest]

will it randomly spawn

[CdRKerbal]

Looks cool, but I agree with what other people say, maybe adding some other black rocks / debris around it would make it blend in a bit more, while still standing out.

[Altaille]

I agree too with the general feeling : the idea is nice, but the implementation into the landscape could definitely be smoother. Right know it looks very similar to the anomalies we already have in game, but more out of place beacause it is intended as natural stuff. I just hope the terrain features shown untill now are not the "best" ones, that should push people to buy the game because of amazing screenshots

Just an idea : i guess it is not coded the same way as the scatter objects. However SVT made scatter objects solid, so wouldn't it be possible to get some solid scatter objects around the anomaly ? They could even look almost the same, forcing the player to search in a crystel forest for the "anomaly" one (maybe with special tools / anomaly detector). It could even profit from a local special ground texture to help blending with the surroundings. However I don't know how hard to make it would be. I guess it is too late for this DLC, but I like the idea of aeras that you would want to explore in a rover.

[MechBFP]

I am hoping that these new assets were made to blend into the new planet textures and Squad’s just trolling us until they announce those. 

[Loskene]

[snip]

We're aware of that, and voicing our concerns anyway because the game is still in development and they'll be taken into account for the patch that fixes all of this. If nobody buys the DLC because of the ugly implementation of its features you best believe they'll try and turn it around. Things like DLC volume and release schedules are usually decided by the publisher as part of the agreement, I doubt they get much wiggle room for delays if it's not up to scratch, so we have to hope for patches to justify it later. Not ideal, but few things are in this world.

Edited May 18, 2019 by Vanamonde

[Pthigrivi]

[snip]

In all seriousness Im sure its true its much too late for them to make any major revisions, but they have taken last-minute community feedback on little details in the past. Im pretty jazzed about all this either way.

Edited May 18, 2019 by Vanamonde

[Foxster]

3 hours ago, Loskene said:

We're aware of that, and voicing our concerns anyway because the game is still in development and they'll be taken into account for the patch that fixes all of this. If nobody buys the DLC because of the ugly implementation of its features you best believe they'll try and turn it around. Things like DLC volume and release schedules are usually decided by the publisher as part of the agreement, I doubt they get much wiggle room for delays if it's not up to scratch, so we have to hope for patches to justify it later. Not ideal, but few things are in this world.

Well, yes, but let's critique and suggest changes once we know what we are actually getting. All we have is a short video and a couple of screenshots. It might all seem quite different when we get it or it might be the appearance makes more sense. 

Oh and let's be serious: No one is not going to buy the DLC because of an arguably ugly bit of scenery. KSP is full of it already and we are all still here. 

 

[shdwlrd]

4 minutes ago, Foxster said:

No one is not going to buy the DLC because of an arguably ugly bit of scenery. KSP is full of it already and we are all still here.

Here, here... so true.

[VelocityPolaris]

LAVAAAA YESSS I have been waiting for centuries for something like this

EDIT: Oh yeah it does look pretty whack placed on Moho, contrast-wise. I reckon it's just a placeholder or something until they can figure out where it should go, though.

Edited May 16, 2019 by VelocityPolaris

[steve_v]

[snip]

No. This is a discussion forum not a fanclub, and discussion involves differences of opinion just like any other human interaction. No form of "If you don't agree with my opinion, go away" has a place here - start your own thread if you want to try that.

 

On 5/15/2019 at 1:36 PM, Pthigrivi said:

Im sure its true its much too late for them to make any major revisions, but they have taken last-minute community feedback on little details in the past.

You're probably right in that it's too late to change now, but there's no reason what we get in the upcoming release can't be polished in later ones.

Perhaps SQUAD can even rescue some good stuff from 2005 in that polish... Like ambient occlusion and textures that don't look like they were lifted straight from Quake. Both would make those scenes look a whole lot better without touching the models at all.

 

On 5/15/2019 at 2:19 PM, Foxster said:

KSP is full of it already and we are all still here.

Sure, but that doesn't mean we can't critique it, new and old.
You might be happy with the lowest-common-denominator as a yardstick, and that's fine, it's your opinion after all.
I however still hope to see the game achieve more of it's enormous potential. Adding stuff that looks lousy and calling it acceptable because there are other ugly elements in the game already is a sure road to mediocrity.

Edited May 18, 2019 by Vanamonde

[KerikBalm]

On 5/15/2019 at 2:25 AM, klgraham1013 said:

The stock scanners already pick up anomalies.  No need to see them with the naked eye from such a distance.

There's no guarantee that these features will be picked up by the stock scanners.... just as stock scanners don't tell you about terrain scatters. I expect these features to be very numeroud, so that you can land just about anywhere, then go driving around a bit and stumble across one. *IF* that is the case, then there would be far too many of them to justify having the scanners pick them up, the display would be waaaayyy too cluttered.

 

22 hours ago, GearsNSuch said:

The crystal kinds... sticks out. I don't think they typically grow out of the grass. Just a simple half-boulder at the base, or even changing it to a cracked-open geode would make it look much more natural

...

In a semi-related note, perhaps normal maps, only visible on the higher terrain settings, would be a good idea to increase detail?

Yes, and Yes. I'm fine with there being large crystal features, those do occur in reality, but they don't just stick out in the open like that... If this had a "cave" around it (a simple "hood" geometry), I'd appreciate it much more.

RL examples that I think of when I see this... they are all underground, formed in places where you had water.

Spoiler

 

14 hours ago, Foxster said:

Come on, guys, be realistic. It's way too late to get any changes made now. You are getting what was shown. Appreciate it or move on. 

Well, I wouldn't think it would be too hard to add a simple terrain colored base - like the way they have the KSC buildings/runway/launchpad "blend" ito the flat grass around KSC. We're talking very few polygons here, reusing a pre-existing texture, and 1 transition. Then you can plop it anywhere on moho and have it look better.

Also I think it would look better if they made it wider and flatter, that is just a real simple act of scaling up along the X and Y dimensions, and scaling down the Z dimension

19 hours ago, steve_v said:

Speaking of the (decidedly 2D) grass... That texture *shudder*.

 

Yea... it kind of reminds me of this old game operation flashpoint, and KSP could use what was added in its sequels... "3d" grass

Spoiler

OFP:

The sequels were called Arma, due to the developer and publisher having a falling out, where the publisher kept the OFP trademark

Arma:

Arma 2: Grass in the foreground, but not the background, saves performance...

Arma 3 example:

 

Even Arma 1 level of grass, showing at short distance, would be great for kerbin... but it would be a lot of work for 1 stock planet... I'm not sure how well a grass system could be adapted to look good on other planets that you'd expect to just have dust and rocks, maybe some lavarocks, but....  yea, a ground clutter system would be nice, I don't expect it though.

Just better textures and normal maps would be good.

Spoiler

I think this ground is done with just a texture and normal map, none of that grass effect:

I think it would also work well for a sort of sand/gravel/pebbles like what you'd expect on planets of KSP

 

Edited May 16, 2019 by KerikBalm

[steve_v]

40 minutes ago, KerikBalm said:

Even Arma 1 level of grass, showing at short distance, would be great for kerbin... but it would be a lot of work for 1 stock planet... I'm not sure how well a grass system could be adapted to look good on other planets that you'd expect to just have dust and rocks, maybe some lavarocks, but....  yea, a ground clutter system would be nice, I don't expect it though.

I don't see why we can't have high detail scatter / 3D grass / high-res texture etc. fade in as the camera approaches it. That's how pretty much every other game does grass and small stones.
LoD isn't rocket science and there is already LoD fade-in for the (insubstantial for some bizarre reason) tree-scatter on Kerbin. Maybe it's just such a poorly implemented perfomance-hog that SQUAD decided not to work on it further, I don't know, but it seems to work for everyone else.

The procedural nature of the planets would make this a bit more complicated, but we must already know what's in a given area to apply the texture - where there is grass texture, draw detailed grass in a radius around the camera.  Some pop-in would probably be unavoidable, but that's a pretty minimal price to pay IMO.
 

40 minutes ago, KerikBalm said:

Just better textures and normal maps would be good.

Yes, yes they would. You can do amazing things with good normal-mapping. Hell, we had bump-maps in frikin' 1998, and it was awesome.

Edited May 16, 2019 by steve_v

[klgraham1013]

2 hours ago, KerikBalm said:

There's no guarantee that these features will be picked up by the stock scanners....

Then that would be a huge miss in the gameplay department.  It would actually close the gameplay loop on those scanners.  Right now they basically pick up anomalies for no real purpose other than easter eggs.

[KerikBalm]

Easter eggs which can provide technology, or funds rep and science... its not so bad as already implemented... we'll just have to wait and see. I'd be fine if these new features didn't show up on the kerbned scanners

[Pthigrivi]

6 hours ago, KerikBalm said:

There's no guarantee that these features will be picked up by the stock scanners.... just as stock scanners don't tell you about terrain scatters. I expect these features to be very numeroud, so that you can land just about anywhere, then go driving around a bit and stumble across one. *IF* that is the case, then there would be far too many of them to justify having the scanners pick them up, the display would be waaaayyy too cluttered.

This is probably true but I hope they're mappable in some way. The devs have hinted that they'll use a different scatter system for these and Im hoping that means they're geographically varied, for instance with crystals appearing every kilometer or so spread over this or that biome. If the features had varied values (crystals less common but worth more, that stratified rock more common but worth less, etc) there would be incentives for players to land more carefully than if everything was distributed evenly everywhere and you might as well plonk down and hope for the best. That would make at a mapping system that at least highlighted areas with more or less features of a given type really helpful. 

4 hours ago, KerikBalm said:

Easter eggs which can provide technology, or funds rep and science... its not so bad as already implemented... we'll just have to wait and see. I'd be fine if these new features didn't show up on the kerbned scanners

And yeah this system is okay but I rarely have the patience to spin around the planet watching for questions marks in kerbnet. I agree that tagging ground-scatter would get really cluttered looking, but they're also talking about things like cryovolcanoes which sort of sounds like a much larger, perhaps less random class of anomalies. If these got lumped in with the existing fixed-location anomalies I'd be pretty happy to have the option to automatically mark their locations if we had a probe or scanner within range. 

Edited May 16, 2019 by Pthigrivi

[KerikBalm]

2 hours ago, Pthigrivi said:

yeah this system is okay but I rarely have the patience to spin around the planet watching for questions marks in kerbnet.

I agree, that is why I mod all the probes to have a 100% detection rate.

Its also why I proposed a different system in the suggestions forum for 100% detection rates, but with location error, so more advanced probe cores give more accurate locations.

The current system is a clickfest