Rocket Part Revamp Discussion Thread

[Wjolcz]

35 minutes ago, Andem said:

See even in that list of artists, you had someone who made excellent imitations, I'm not sure you could get that as often when working with photorealism. Also, photorealistic kerbals are truly terrifying. Which creates the issue, if you make some things realistic, then the things that aren't will jut out like a sore thumb. I prefer the "endearing" side of the uncanny valley much more than the horrifying, off-putting pit of despair that follows it, even if the end result is true photorealism.

Sorry to quote you again, but I missed the edit it seems.

How I see it is there's a clear separation: biological and non-biological elements of the game. Kerbals are obviously biological creatures. They evolved, or were created. They had no way to influence their look, body functions and stuff like that. The non-biological elements are buildings and rocket parts. If something works here, on Earth and is built by giant pink apes then why shouldn't it work in a parallel universe where little, green and very intelligent creatures are up to task to also build them? The chamber pressure matters. Isp and material strength is also a thing. Physics works the same here and there, except there's something wrong with density of planets and stars.

A part of my crappy lore, I guess, but in my head it makes sense.

[Temeter]

Long story short:

The new parts look awesome

[Andem]

4 minutes ago, Temeter said:

Long story short:

The new parts look awesome

TL;DR Everyone likes it but Andem

Edited September 10, 2016 by Andem
EVEN IF THAT ISN'T ACTUALLY ACCURATE!

[Temeter]

8 minutes ago, Andem said:

TL;DR Everyone likes it but Andem

>:D

Joke, Im sure in the end there will be a consistent and beautiful style when PorkJet is done with the main rocket parts. It's of course a pity if you don't like the direction, but I'm at least sure of that.

[Andem]

16 minutes ago, Temeter said:

>:D

Joke, Im sure in the end there will be a consistent and beautiful style when PorkJet is done with the main rocket parts. It's of course a pity if you don't like the direction, but I'm at least sure of that.

Yeah, I think that the parts themselves are beautiful, and those are only test versions (if my info is correct), I just hope that either the rest of the game is up to snuff or they match better in game. 

[njmksr]

Enough arguing over them, I'm just wondering about using the mounting brackets for my ATLAS mod that I am working on!

[WWEdeadman]

My only reaction to this is: Holy *** that looks good. Looking forward to having that in the game.

[NeoFatalis]

Matt Lowne just uploaded a video with 1.2 gameplay and in the end of the video he showed couple of revamped parts (monoprop engine , the single nozzle RCS port and probodobodyne QBE) 

EDIT : skip to 4:50

Edited September 10, 2016 by NeoFatalis

[Temeter]

2 hours ago, NeoFatalis said:

Matt Lowne just uploaded a video with 1.2 gameplay and in the end of the video he showed couple of revamped parts (monoprop engine , the single nozzle RCS port and probodobodyne QBE) 

EDIT : skip to 4:50

Maybe I'm missing something, but the white cube with the black ends is the new science storage units for probes.

[NeoFatalis]

44 minutes ago, Temeter said:

Maybe I'm missing something, but the white cube with the black ends is the new science storage units for probes.

Yeah... I just read this in the hype train thread , it makes much more sense...

[benjee10]

For those who seem to think that the engines are 'too blue', they are not blue, that is a consequence of the reflective shader: Unity has a default skybox with blue sky above which is being reflected in the metal parts of the rocket, making them look blue. So toning down of the blue is not possible unless you want to change the colour of the sky (yes, this means that metallic parts will look purple on Eve and red on Duna - that's how light works).

As a CG modeller who creates photoreal assets (at least attempts to), I find the idea that you could call these parts realistic pretty preposterous. The designs are obviously based on actual rocket engines but have been stylised and simplified, and the texturing is extremely stylised and obviously largely hand-painted. The only thing making them look in any way real is the PBR shading. The models and textures are just as stylised as the existing rocket parts, except that now they've been brought up to a much higher standard and some care has actually been taken to have them make sense from an engineering standpoint. Take a look at photos of real rocket engines and you'll see the ridiculous level of detail and the tiny imperfections that would have to be created to make something even marginally photorealistic. Rivets, bolts, dust, dirt, weathering, tiny imperfections in the metal etc. etc., and not just in a cartoony way as we have, but with full specular, roughness, metallicity and normal mapping as well. As it stands these parts have a nice aesthetic to them that's somewhere between realism and cartoon; it almost reminds me of the style of the Sims 4, which is IMO beautiful and the entire game would look lovely if it were done like that. Perhaps Porkjet could give the kerbal spacesuits a bit of a revamp as well? They always looked a little flat and the textures a little muddy to me, especially when compared with some of the amazing custom suits people have made.

[Temeter]

45 minutes ago, benjee10 said:

but with full specular, roughness, metallicity and normal mapping as well

I like my metal to be shiny and metally.

Really hoping Squad doesn't drop the PBR shader idea. I want that ingame! Imagine what mods could do with this, what they could do to parts, and maybe even planets!

Edited September 10, 2016 by Temeter

[Andem]

4 hours ago, NeoFatalis said:

Matt Lowne just uploaded a video with 1.2 gameplay and in the end of the video he showed couple of revamped parts (monoprop engine , the single nozzle RCS port and probodobodyne QBE) 

EDIT : skip to 4:50

Oh thank god... those look really good. 

50 minutes ago, benjee10 said:

For those who seem to think that the engines are 'too blue', they are not blue, that is a consequence of the reflective shader: Unity has a default skybox with blue sky above which is being reflected in the metal parts of the rocket, making them look blue. So toning down of the blue is not possible unless you want to change the colour of the sky (yes, this means that metallic parts will look purple on Eve and red on Duna - that's how light works).

As a CG modeller who creates photoreal assets (at least attempts to), I find the idea that you could call these parts realistic pretty preposterous. The designs are obviously based on actual rocket engines but have been stylised and simplified, and the texturing is extremely stylised and obviously largely hand-painted. The only thing making them look in any way real is the PBR shading. The models and textures are just as stylised as the existing rocket parts, except that now they've been brought up to a much higher standard and some care has actually been taken to have them make sense from an engineering standpoint. Take a look at photos of real rocket engines and you'll see the ridiculous level of detail and the tiny imperfections that would have to be created to make something even marginally photorealistic. Rivets, bolts, dust, dirt, weathering, tiny imperfections in the metal etc. etc., and not just in a cartoony way as we have, but with full specular, roughness, metallicity and normal mapping as well. As it stands these parts have a nice aesthetic to them that's somewhere between realism and cartoon; it almost reminds me of the style of the Sims 4, which is IMO beautiful and the entire game would look lovely if it were done like that. Perhaps Porkjet could give the kerbal spacesuits a bit of a revamp as well? They always looked a little flat and the textures a little muddy to me, especially when compared with some of the amazing custom suits people have made.

I feel pretty stupid now. But I still feel like the pumps on the engines could be brought down by maybe one notch. It just seems like a touch too much greebling. 

[Pthigrivi]

So, not being all up on the gossip, are we under the impression that Porkjet might finish this overhaul of the rocket parts at some point?

[benjee10]

7 minutes ago, Pthigrivi said:

So, not being all up on the gossip, are we under the impression that Porkjet might finish this overhaul of the rocket parts at some point?

It's unclear at the moment, but it's been pointed out that PBR shaders rely on light probes which are very tricky to set up in games like KSP where scales are constantly changing and objects are split across multiple layers and some think SQUAD may have bitten off more than they can chew and be quietly dropping it. There's even been suggestions that Porkjet may have left but there's virtually nothing to base that on at the moment so speculation like that isn't really helpful.

If SQUAD do end up dropping the idea of a complete rocket part overhaul then I'm kinda tempted to put together a complete stock overhaul mod. The stock rocket parts are almost unbearably ugly at the moment and while Ven's artwork is fantastic it doesn't really fit with stuff like BDB and Tantares. 

[Andem]

7 minutes ago, benjee10 said:

If SQUAD do end up dropping the idea of a complete rocket part overhaul then I'm kinda tempted to put together a complete stock overhaul mod. The stock rocket parts are almost unbearably ugly at the moment and while Ven's artwork is fantastic it doesn't really fit with stuff like BDB and Tantares. 

Yeah, I've been using @hoojiwana's revamped stock assets for a while, it makes the Mk1-2 bearable to look at as well as improving decouplers and some other stuff.

[panzer1b]

I have to say i like the new engines, although most of the ones already in game are adequate for my tastes (all 1.2m and 3.5m ones look fine as is, its just the very tiny engines and the 2.5m ones that can really use an overhaul).  That said, the number of times i use the rather bad looking engines is extremely rare since im almost always using 3.5m parts for excessively large craft, and most other things are either 1.2m or the 48-7s engine so those look perfectly ok for me (the 909 while not stellar is actually one of the best looking engines from the days before Porkjet even existed...err started making stock parts for KSP...). 

Perhaps the main reason i dont mind the change is because i never actually became attached to any of the older parts, and i have nothing against them being completely redone in a new art style.  The only craft that are going to suffer visually are my pirate faction craft (lets face it, the reason they even look like pirate vessels is because they have hulls made of structural panels and old style engines), and while that isnt great, i dont mind that alone.  The only visual change that i refuse to accept (and will mod it out if it ever happens) is structural panels becoming white.  The stark contrast between structural panels and wings makes most of my spacecraft look cool and not monotone, aside from that, whatever changes to the visuals are ok with me...

All in all (with the exception of making structural panels similar to wings in appearance), im all for whatever new updates to the visual style of parts...

[Armisael]

I'm happy that the swivel and reliant will finally be visually distinct. Other than that blech - not a fan of the shader.

Edited September 10, 2016 by Armisael

[OrbitalBuzzsaw]

Those things are ugly²

On 9/9/2016 at 3:49 AM, Alshain said:

The plane and rocket part aesthetic doesn't match now

And it should STAY that way, rockets are DIFFERENT than planes!

[Alshain]

4 minutes ago, OrbitalBuzzsaw said:

Those things are ugly²

And it should STAY that way, rockets are DIFFERENT than planes!

You misunderstand, I'm not saying they should be the same, I'm saying they don't match.

[OrbitalBuzzsaw]

Just now, Alshain said:

I'm saying they don't match.

And they SHOULDN'T! the plane parts look good already, those ... things are ugly as krap

Edited September 10, 2016 by OrbitalBuzzsaw

[Alshain]

1 minute ago, OrbitalBuzzsaw said:

And they SHOULDN'T!

They should actually.  They should have an aesthetic theme.

[OrbitalBuzzsaw]

Just now, Alshain said:

They should actually.  They should have an aesthetic theme.

Then match the rocketparts to the planeparts. They look waaaaay better!

[Alshain]

2 minutes ago, OrbitalBuzzsaw said:

Then match the rocketparts to the planeparts. They look waaaaay better!

I agree.  These engines do that quite nicely IMO.  We just need them in the game, and the other parts to be re-done.

Edited September 10, 2016 by Alshain

[OrbitalBuzzsaw]

Just now, Alshain said:

I agree.

Ahh. I misunderstood