Making History preview - critique and discussion

[Waxing_Kibbous]

9 hours ago, RoverDude said:

@DuoDex - Except these are rocket parts, not space plane parts.  And also part of a historical pack.  The Saturn parts, for example, match up very nicely with the NASA parts.

I agree with this sentiment- I may be misunderstanding but it seems some people want all the parts to look like the space plane line? What specifically does it mean to have all parts be cohesive? There are a lot of us who only use rockets and want new rocket parts, especially after all the space plane love in previous versions.  Let the rocket people get some new parts this round yeah?

Anyhow, I like how the part preview is looking so far (implying that is is still WIP) but I have one concern, and that is how the external pipes will affect radial attachment of other parts.

Quote

Yet, this is a game with Lego style building.  

 

Edited April 2, 2017 by Waxing_Kibbous

[TheKosmonaut]

1 minute ago, Waxing_Kibbous said:

Anyhow, I like how the part preview is looking so far (implying that is is still WIP) but I have one concern, and that is how the external pipes will affect radial attachment of other parts.

There are parts now with external plumbing and radial surface attachments work alright so far. But, to be fair, the Atlas V rocket has external plumbing that does have an effect on radial symmetry, most notably are any of the variants that have SRBs attached, see the variants such as the 431/531 and others.

[CobaltWolf]

7 minutes ago, Waxing_Kibbous said:

I agree with this sentiment- I may be misunderstanding but it seems some people want all the parts to look like the space plane line? What specifically does it mean to have all parts be cohesive? There are a lot of us who only use rockets and want new rocket parts, especially after all the space plane love in previous versions.  Let the rocket people get some new parts this round yeah?

Anyhow, I like how the part preview is looking so far (implying that is is still WIP) but I have one concern, and that is how the external pipes will affect radial attachment of other parts.

I'd refer you to this post by @passinglurker:

8 hours ago, passinglurker said:

You mean paint and panel like a big ole' round mk3?, or do you mean apply the same standards and details but keep the manufacturer unique style? (like synchronized color pallets, panel edging, baked AO, grunge and scratches you only notice when you get close, no visible panel bolts etc..)

It's important to make the distinction to avoid confusion.

The mothballed overhaul by porkjet showed us how parts can have different manufacturer specific styles but still go together by simply applying the same artistic wear and physics to everything so they look like they came out of the same universe.

We already have remade 1.25m parts, as well as style guides for the design language and intent to be used moving forward. As a rocket part user, how about this: Why keep making rocket parts that look worse than the spaceplane parts?

Also, they likely won't affect attachment.

@DuoDex speaking from experience, the implication that this is as close as another artist can come to emulating another's style is insulting. It is completely doable. How else would any game development team with more than one artist function?

Edited April 2, 2017 by CobaltWolf

[klgraham1013]

23 minutes ago, Waxing_Kibbous said:

 

 

Two can play at this game.

[Randazzo]

I think the parts follow a consistent style, look like they belong in KSP, and I know the modeling is well done because of the author. Having some experience in the matter, I believe these look quite good.

The trifling niggles in the critique are silly. Slightly different shades of black? Corrugated conduit? I chuckled. Also, don't compare Roverdude to Porkjet. Porkjet bailed and left his work unfinished.

[tater]

The problem with having the parts lacking a certain consistency is that ideally in the "lego" world, they should all play nice together.

The "orange tank," for example is fine as a shuttle tank, or a Delta IV style tank, but there is no nose cone for it for that purpose. The other 2.5m tanks are AWFUL, again, a simple retexture would make many people very happy.

With the DLC addition of R7 parts, the texture problem is exacerbated. The saturn parts pictured above nicely seem to match the colors of the saturn stuff---historicity is not an issue, the issue is that in KSP people should be able to make variant designs that use parts that don;t go together and get something that looks decent (impossible right now since the 2.5m parts couldn't possibly look worse).

In short, new parts should all be able to work together, and part of the base game update to support the DLC should at the very least include a retexture pass on the extant rocket parts so that the stock parts play nice with the DLC. I no longer use any stock tanks, but I seem to recall that the stripes don't even align on the 3.75m parts, right?

[klgraham1013]

I'd like to say, I don't think consistency means everything is grey and black.  I definitely think there could be parts of different colors that could be designed to work well with the grey and black of other parts.

[CobaltWolf]

42 minutes ago, klgraham1013 said:

I'd like to say, I don't think consistency means everything is grey and black.  I definitely think there could be parts of different colors that could be designed to work well with the grey and black of other parts.

Definitely not. The revamp in fact planned on emphasizing the appearance of the different brands - Jeb's use of yellow on the engines, Rockomax's orange, etc. The point is that the palette is consistent.

1 hour ago, Randazzo said:

I think the parts follow a consistent style, look like they belong in KSP, and I know the modeling is well done because of the author. Having some experience in the matter, I believe these look quite good.

The trifling niggles in the critique are silly. Slightly different shades of black? Corrugated conduit? I chuckled. Also, don't compare Roverdude to Porkjet. Porkjet bailed and left his work unfinished.

I actually enjoy the models personally. I have no issue there. I actually am completely in love with Roverdude's model for the LEM - I love how obviously its a LEM while being kerbal-proportioned.

Can you name a reason why the black should be so inconsistent? There's a difference between having variation in the 'top coat' of the paint, and having different base colors. These little things add up. Someone asked for specific critiques of the parts (similar to Bac9's critique of the barn when it was shown) and we did. I posted a written critique/summary of the differences between the style several posts down from the OP.

I also feel that is unfair to Porkjet, since we don't know the full details of why he left. If you have something you'd like to share, feel free. Don't forget that he created style guidelines (part of which we saw in the engine design sheet) for the language and thought process to use moving forward, for other artists to consult.

 

I'd also like to repeat that for me, the question on the table is - are we or are we not getting some sort of revamp in the future? We were never given any information on its future apart from Porkjet leaving. I feel that if expectations had been set for that, these would not have been such a blindside. These parts imply that we're sticking with the, in my opinion, lower detail and now dated-looking graphical style of the current stock parts - which, might I remind, were mostly meant to be placeholders when they were added. Is this DLC also full of placeholders?

My other feeling on the matter is this, and I know it's anecdotal - almost exclusively, the people I know that don't play KSP say its because of the graphics. Squad obviously needs money if this game is going to continue to be viable. We can see this with their decisions to port the game to consoles, improve the localization features, and release an expansion pack. If they want to make money off the game again, from my (again, anecdotal) point of view, a valid way would be to increase the graphical fidelity of the game. Something that these parts are a very clear step back from.

[passinglurker]

5 hours ago, Veeltch said:

Firstly, I don't think the new parts should be compared with something which didn't make its way into the game (PJ's rocket parts).

you may want to sit down for this 

The fuel tanks in the NASA parts use the same pallet and follow the color transition rule as the overhaul all they need is to apply the panel edge wear and an AO bake and bam you have some budget pork. (though things could be improved further with either higher res textures (big tanks need big textures) or a more efficient UV map (or both)) really we aren't asking for much with this critique.

3 hours ago, Waxing_Kibbous said:

What specifically does it mean to have all parts be cohesive?

well for starters using an AO bake instead of airbrushing on the shadows like @RoverDude does on his twitch streams because light behaves the same way regardless of if you are a spaceplane or rocket.

Then follow that up with having paint, insulation, and metal scratch, wear, and grime the same way because regardless of being for a space plane or a rocket they are being subjected to the same general environment.

And finally (this may get a bit silly) no bolts on the exterior panels because the oil drums and elements borrowed from them are universally hated regardless of if they are for rockets or space planes

1 hour ago, Randazzo said:

The trifling niggles in the critique are silly. Slightly different shades of black? Corrugated conduit? I chuckled.

I thought it pertinent to be thorough the fact that some small details are small doesn't mean some big details (like how Ambient Occlusion is handled) aren't big

1 hour ago, Randazzo said:

Also, don't compare Roverdude to Porkjet.

I am not comparing roverdude and porkjet that would be a critique on a personal level which is not allowed. I am comparing parts made by roverdude to parts made by porkjet because the parts porkjet made laid the foundation for how KSP can move forward artistically.

1 hour ago, Randazzo said:

Porkjet bailed and left his work unfinished.

and he left us the tools we needed to finish his work.
 

1 hour ago, tater said:

I no longer use any stock tanks, but I seem to recall that the stripes don't even align on the 3.75m parts, right?

no they fixed it

 

If we wanted to be cheap about this the nasa tanks would probably be some of the easiest and most straight forward old rocket parts to salvage and make consistent and the same could be said of Roverdude's making history rocket parts since he based them off the nasa parts. we aren't asking for much we are just asking that this is done right the first time so that there isn't a build up potential of insurmountable technical debt when/if the rocket revamp comes.
 

3 hours ago, CobaltWolf said:

So, I suppose part of the issue here is this - Squad never properly explained whether or not the rocket parts overhaul was well and truly dead. Are we, or are we not, getting an upgrade to the quality of the stock parts? The style of these Saturn parts (in that they match the existing NASA parts) implies that we are not getting that - ever. If so, fine, ok. But I think the community should know that moving forward, since it definitely changes some things.

This is a good point as long as squad wants to buy our consumer loyalty by dangling this carrot in front of us I'd want to see them walk the walk so to speak. If the revamp is well and truly dead till the end of time please make it official and public so we can all shut up and go home compiling these critiques are time consuming.

Edited April 2, 2017 by passinglurker

[Wjolcz]

22 minutes ago, passinglurker said:

you may want to sit down for this 

The fuel tanks in the NASA parts use the same pallet and follow the color transition rule as the overhaul all they need is to apply the panel edge wear and an AO bake and bam you have some budget pork. (though things could be improved further with either higher res textures (big tanks need big textures) or a more efficient UV map (or both)) really we aren't asking for much with this critique.

Oh-kaaay...? I'm not sure what you are trying to convey here. The ARM 3.75m tanks were made before PJ started to overhaul the smaller ones. I guess you are either talking about the historical parts being less historical and more ARM-y or the never ending SQUAD's part overhaul plan should be more historical pack-esque. To be clear: I'm 100% cool with both options. I just don't think they should be compared to something that never was (and probably never will be) official and stock.

But then, it's just my opinion. I'm in the consistency camp. Doesn't matter what colour scheme there is on these tanks as long as they all look good together.

Edited April 2, 2017 by Veeltch

[passinglurker]

5 minutes ago, Veeltch said:

Oh-kaaay...? I'm not sure what you are trying to convey here.

You said I shouldn't use the overhaul as an example but the overhaul is just what the nasa parts could be if they were higher quality. It's in reality a small jump from NASA/Making History to the Overhaul parts it's entirely possible for us to have consistency without sacrificing quality.

Edited April 2, 2017 by passinglurker

[Stone Blue]

Just want to say, people seem to be getting stuck on who made what textures, and just because someone left Squad, or someone is STILL with Squad, that artistic "flavor" of either is null & void on that alone...

As Cobalt stated above, just because one artist starts a "look", does NOT mean only that ONE person can continue it, and no one else can emulate it...

Neither Porkjet's or RD's style/textures are "bad"... I think the consensus is, the difference in the details and methods is substantial, and one direction should be chosen...
It comes down to whether Squad should keep the "cartoony" look, or go for something a bit more realistic, or at least more fitting with today's modern 3d games...

I think passinglurker's point, and others, is, is RD's current "look", the look we would like Squad to stick with, possibly forever, OR is now the time for them to seriously consider an "updated" aesthetic & feel...

Once they commit to either, that should be stated, as others have said, and quit holding this carrot out, and just get it done, either way...

Edited April 2, 2017 by Stone Blue

[klesh]

2 minutes ago, Stone Blue said:

Just want to say, people seem to be getting stuck on who made what textures, and just because someone left Squad, or someone is STILL with Squad, that artistic "flavor" of either is null & void on that alone...

 

I prefer to look at it as what is actually in the game and what isn't.  

[klgraham1013]

47 minutes ago, passinglurker said:

8 minutes ago, Stone Blue said:

As @CobaltWolf stated above, just because one artist starts a "look", does NOT mean only that ONE person can continue it, and no one else can emulate it...

...and as we know, the works already been started.  A guide has been left by @Porkjet for future artists.  It's unfortunate @SQUAD didn't simply carry on with the work already started.

Edited April 2, 2017 by klgraham1013

[passinglurker]

2 minutes ago, klesh said:

 

I prefer to look at it as what is actually in the game and what isn't.  

panel wear is actually in the game (space plane parts) baked AO is actually in the game (spaceplane parts and recent IVA's), imperfect paint edges as used by the overhaul are also actually in the game (nasa parts) everything asked for has examples in the game and is universally applicable regardless of the parts intended role.

[Stone Blue]

11 minutes ago, klesh said:

 

I prefer to look at it as what is actually in the game and what isn't.  

Sooo... Ok... you want to keep the traditional KSP look, with no changes or updates, just because they werent in the game originally?

6 minutes ago, passinglurker said:

panel wear is actually in the game (space plane parts) baked AO is actually in the game (spaceplane parts and recent IVA's), imperfect paint edges as used by the overhaul are also actually in the game (nasa parts) everything asked for has examples in the game and is universally applicable regardless of the parts intended role.

Werent PBR, or at least "new" shaders rumored or discussed at one time?... how would RD's and Porkjet's  (or even something else), look, if those shaders were to be implemented?

If its a substantial effect, or "look", maybe THAT needs to be considered NOW as well...

Edited April 2, 2017 by Stone Blue

[tater]

I'd be really interested in seeing what any new engines look like... The trouble is that they will likely be far better than what we have in stock, so if the awful stock engines (I'm looking at you built-in tank butts) remain unchanged, they will become obsolete unless you want an ugly looking craft.

Seems like switching would be a simple solution. Ie: set the mount diameter for any given engine.

[Stone Blue]

1 minute ago, tater said:

Seems like switching would be a simple solution. Ie: set the mount diameter for any given engine.

I thought that was incorporated as part of Porkjet's overhaul??

[passinglurker]

16 minutes ago, Stone Blue said:

Werent PBR, or at least "new" shaders rumored or discussed at one time?... how would RD's and Porkjet's  (or even something else), look, if those shaders were to be implemented?

If its a substantial effect, or "look", maybe THAT needs to be considered NOW as well...

I'd opt to choose my battles its unlikely they'd implement PBR this update and when/if it happened every part will be effected it would be a large undertaking no matter how you shake it. To me it would be better just to focus on encouraging consistency for now because it's a change that can be approached in a more gradual bite sized fashion that may be easier for @RoverDude 's schedule and budget realities to handle.

Hopefully me and @RoverDude can bury the hatchet despite my rude outbursts earlier and work something out or at least come to an understanding.

 

 

8 minutes ago, Stone Blue said:

I thought that was incorporated as part of Porkjet's overhaul??

it was proposed in the design reference document but was not implemented that's why all the engines have separate boat tail and bare bones versions as separate parts

personally I wouldn't be mind if squad just went with the vector style "nozzle pointing out of a rotatable base" for the rocket engines like I said before I'm not picky about meshes.

Edited April 2, 2017 by passinglurker

[klesh]

59 minutes ago, passinglurker said:

panel wear is actually in the game (space plane parts) baked AO is actually in the game (spaceplane parts and recent IVA's), imperfect paint edges as used by the overhaul are also actually in the game (nasa parts) everything asked for has examples in the game and is universally applicable regardless of the parts intended role.

There you go.  I'd prefer to see these comparisons, they make more sense.

 

54 minutes ago, Stone Blue said:

Sooo... Ok... you want to keep the traditional KSP look, with no changes or updates, just because they werent in the game originally?

Lol, yes thats exactly what I said.  C'mon man.   

Picking Porkjet's overhaul work as a foundation for everything seems about as applicable as choosing any random modder's style and declaring you think that should be the new baseline.  They're not actually in the game, and it created a 4th or 5th conflicting aesthetic.  With the OP demonstrating the things he's looking for are in fact found in the game already, I see his requests as asking for continuity with already established in-game artwork.

 

As far as my opinion, I don't look this closely at how the tiny little shadows are technically created in the nooks and crannies of my rocket, so its not that important to me.  I think the new Making History items look fine (I didnt even notice the nuts on the tanks!)

[Angelo Kerman]

39 minutes ago, Stone Blue said:

I thought that was incorporated as part of Porkjet's overhaul??

Diameter switching wasn't added to the rocket parts overhaul, but I did create a version that had mesh switching and fuel tank resource switching when 1.2.2 was nearing completion. I modified the models provided in the part overhauls release to perform tank but mesh switching, and was in the process of making the KR-1. You can find it here, and the project source here.

And the readme

Spoiler

Porkjet's design sheet proposed three different configurations for the rocket engine overhaul: Standard, Boat-Tail, and Compact. The design sheet suggested using mesh switching to accomplish this. Mesh switching is the combining of several 3D models into one .mu file, and showing or hiding the 3D model depending upon the configuation. After examining the art assets generously provided by SQUAD, I realized that I could bring Porkjet's vision into reality by writing a mesh switch plugin and rearranging the art assets a bit. With this modified PartOverhauls, you no longer have two separate engines for the LV-series (T15, T30, etc.). Instead, you have one combined engine that lets you switch between the Standard and Boat-Tail configurations. The rest of the engine parameters remain the same.

Folder Descriptions
GameData: Contains the modified PartOverhauls by SQUAD along with the plugin by me. Simply replace your existing PartOverhauls in your GameData folder.

Switchers: Contains the source code for the mesh switch. The current version doesn't support changing the attachment rules for the part, but hopefully the next version will. I also plan to add a check to see if certain part upgrades have been purchased; you could have alternate engine nozzle configurations that way, for instance.

ArtSource: Contains the .unity files for each modified rocket engine. You MUST download SQUAD's PartOverhauls art assets to make use of this; space limitations required me to leave the full source out.

Thanks again to SQUAD for making the art assets available.

 

[PocketBrotector]

1 hour ago, CobaltWolf said:

Someone asked for specific critiques of the parts (similar to Bac9's critique of the barn when it was shown) and we did. I posted a written critique/summary of the differences between the style several posts down from the OP.

Pretty sure that was me (via Reddit); and I have to say that the detailed discussion, and relatively respectful disagreement, in this thread is way more useful in helping me understand what the objections/critiques of the new parts are.

If it's really as simple as showing wear-and-tear on the textures at high zoom, and a few other fairly fine details... well, I'm not assuming that the previewed versions of the parts are completely final. They were presented with minimal commentary and so it's an open question whether or not Squad still intends to do finishing touches on the textures, or the models for that matter. I personally am more interested in the other information conveyed by the post (i.e. we are getting official 5m and 1.875m parts) than I am concerned about the question of whether those parts as they exist at this point in time are perfect, especially given that we have no idea when all this is going to be released. That's not to say that it's wrong to critique the work as it stands right now, but rather that we should at least be mindful of the possibility that the critiques may become moot as they may have been planning on changing or refining the textures anyway. 

It also occurs to me that the DLC, which is explicitly a historical-replica pack, may not be following the exact same style intentions as the base game, which is much more focused on mix-and-match Lego-style modularity. (Certain stock parts are fairly explicit in their influence, such as the Mk3 shuttle or 3.75m SLS parts, but many others are pretty generic). We've seen a hint of that already, with indications that the LEM is going to have built-in RCS and some internal LFO storage; to some, that's heresy, but personally I'm okay with the notion that some content is going to be slightly more purpose-driven in the DLC. It's entirely possible that the textures of the Saturn tanks are going to be influenced in the same way: if they're explicitly intended for use in an expendable launcher, perhaps it makes sense that they have a clean paint job with no wear-and-tear. (That's not to say that this hypothetical approach won't have it's drawbacks - perhaps the new parts won't fit in seamlessly with base-game parts, which would be a bummer.)

Lastly I understand that it's painful that Squad has been in a state of radio silence about whether the rocket part overhaul will ever be resumed. But that was the case for months before these DLC parts were previewed, and there's no reason to believe it's going to change anytime soon. We can rake Squad over the coals for having an inconsistent art style if we want (and the criticism would be warranted in my opinion) but the scope and stakes of the hypothetical overhaul would be a lot larger than just fuel tank textures - among other things, it would replace the existing engine balance entirely by adding new engines and adjusting the roles of several existing engines, not to mention move from a tankbutt-based system to a clusterable surface-attached paradigm. That would be welcomed if it happened, but we've been given zero indication that Squad still intends to move forward with these enormous, fundamental changes to the way rockets would be constructed in KSP. We don't even know if we going to have to live with the godawful 2.5m oil drums forever. So given that I'm resigned to the wildly inconsistent existing stock art for the foreseeable future, I'm okay with evaluating these parts on their own rather than comparing them to an unimplemented style standard.

[passinglurker]

27 minutes ago, klesh said:

There you go.  I'd prefer to see these comparisons, they make more sense.

I have limited space on the preview image and the overhaul cleanly incorporates all the elements that are otherwise scattered across the game's art assets, also if I leaned on the spaceplane parts too much a lot of casually observing users knee jerk reaction would have been "These are rocket parts not spaceplane parts" as if light and wear behave differently for different roles made out of the same materials, and despite my efforts it is still a common pitfall a lot of commenters are falling into.

In the end weighing the pro and cons and anticipating kneejerk reaction comments I decided using the overhaul would be the best way to grab people's ear and explain the rest later. 
 

27 minutes ago, klesh said:

Picking Porkjet's overhaul work as a foundation for everything seems about as applicable as choosing any random modder's style and declaring you think that should be the new baseline.  They're not actually in the game, and it created a 4th or 5th conflicting aesthetic.

Porkjet's work while technically one of many layers of artistic geology is the largest layer in size thanks to his space plane overhaul if we are to bring this down to only one layer porkjet's work is the best place to start and in the effort to emulate his work there is nothing wrong with using his mods as reference especially when people are so quick to misunderstand and say "These are rocket parts not spaceplane parts". And to be clear... This was in no way like picking a random modders style as the new baseline this was a conscious and thoroughly contemplated decision.
 

27 minutes ago, klesh said:

As far as my opinion, I don't look this closely at how the tiny little shadows are technically created in the nooks and crannies of my rocket, so its not that important to me.  I think the new Making History items look fine (I didnt even notice the nuts on the tanks!)

If you really don't notice or mind making history's divergences then you wouldn't mind us encouraging changes that make it more consistent right?

Edited April 2, 2017 by passinglurker

[PocketBrotector]

9 minutes ago, passinglurker said:

I have limited space on the preview image and the overhaul cleanly incorporates all the elements that are otherwise scattered across the game's art assets, also if I leaned on the spaceplane parts too much a lot of casually observing users knee jerk reaction would have been "These are rocket parts not spaceplane parts" as if light and wear behave differently for different roles made out of the same materials, and despite my efforts it is still a common pitfall a lot of commenters are falling into.

In the end weighing the pro and cons and anticipating kneejerk reaction comments I decided using the overhaul would be the best way to grab people's ear and explain the rest later. 

In the interest of keeping the conversation respectful and productive, I suggest that you avoid dismissing others' comments as "kneejerk reactions" and instead respond to them on their merits. Particularly as you admit that your own arguments were incomplete - it's on each of us to explain and defend our positions clearly to each other.

[passinglurker]

 

48 minutes ago, PocketBrotector said:

If it's really as simple as showing wear-and-tear on the textures at high zoom, and a few other fairly fine details...

While the fine details were a distinct trait of the spaceplane parts and overhaul parts I used as reference there are also larger elements at play like how AO is handled (it's lacking in some places and is done very loosely and smudgy in others which is inconsistent with other relativly recent parts in stock. Light doesn't cast its shadows differently just because its a rocket part or a spaceplane part) or the Bolts (with the spaceplane parts it was a trend to remove small technical details like screws, bolts, and wires to make things look simplified, exaggerated, and toylike. traits these tanks lose by haveing bolts on the panels and since not even the real saturn V had bolts in that place it isn't even realistic so instead it comes across as goofy and cartoony. They do a very good job at being cartoony yes in that sense this is high quality work but it's different from the pre-existing toylike parts which is a big problem for the game as a whole with its fractured aesthetic)

48 minutes ago, PocketBrotector said:

well, I'm not assuming that the previewed versions of the parts are completely final. They were presented with minimal commentary and so it's an open question whether or not Squad still intends to do finishing touches on the textures, or the models for that matter. I personally am more interested in the other information conveyed by the post (i.e. we are getting official 5m and 1.875m parts) than I am concerned about the question of whether those parts as they exist at this point in time are perfect, especially given that we have no idea when all this is going to be released. That's not to say that it's wrong to critique the work as it stands right now, but rather that we should at least be mindful of the possibility that the critiques may become moot as they may have been planning on changing or refining the textures anyway. 

Well if this were the case I would welcome it because it means @SQUAD or @RoverDude could put these issues to bed in short order
 

48 minutes ago, PocketBrotector said:

It also occurs to me that the DLC, which is explicitly a historical-replica pack, may not be following the exact same style intentions as the base game, which is much more focused on mix-and-match Lego-style modularity. (Certain stock parts are fairly explicit in their influence, such as the Mk3 shuttle or 3.75m SLS parts, but many others are pretty generic). We've seen a hint of that already, with indications that the LEM is going to have built-in RCS and some internal LFO storage; to some, that's heresy, but personally I'm okay with the notion that some content is going to be slightly more purpose-driven in the DLC. It's entirely possible that the textures of the Saturn tanks are going to be influenced in the same way: if they're explicitly intended for use in an expendable launcher, perhaps it makes sense that they have a clean paint job with no wear-and-tear. (That's not to say that this hypothetical approach won't have it's drawbacks - perhaps the new parts won't fit in seamlessly with base-game parts, which would be a bummer.)

I've got no issue with thier design decisions outside of the textures they can size and shape the meshes how they see fit because it won't have the same ripple effect on the rest of the game that the textures do
 

48 minutes ago, PocketBrotector said:

I'm okay with evaluating these parts on their own rather than comparing them to an unimplemented style standard.

As stated before the style standard isn't unimplemented. The unimplemented parts are examples of how the style standard introduced by the spaceplane parts could be extended to apply to rocket parts while still preserving uniqueness for ease of identification in the part catalog.

Edited April 2, 2017 by passinglurker