Why is Scatterer (or similar) not part of the base game by now?

[mystik]

On 3/15/2019 at 9:00 PM, SQUAD said:

 

Scatterer is a graphical mod that adds realistic atmospheric scattering, ocean shaders (with transparency, sky reflections, foam, refractions and underwater effects), better sunflare rendering, godrays, terrain shadows and visible eclipse shadows! 

 

Compatible with the latest version of KSP and recently updated to include anti-aliasing and ocean shadows. Definitely a must have!

Get it here!

I know this is going to be super obvious, but, how about you just implement this in the game so that we don't get periods of time after a new version is released where the game is untouchable due to meh graphics after being spoiled by the most basic of graphical enhancements?

 

If you have issues with the Unity engine, then just switch to Unreal and be done with it, if that is what it takes.

 

I bought the game when development was a thing you did, but now I see the developers are wasting time on parts redesign instead of fixing serious bugs and adding graphical complexity. For the people with potato computers you can just add settings to lower the settings. The game is starting to look dated guys.

Edited March 28, 2019 by mystik

[Capt. Hunt]

4 hours ago, mystik said:

I know this is going to be super obvious, but, how about you just implement this in the game so that we don't get periods of time after a new version is released where the game is untouchable due to meh graphics after being spoiled by the most basic of graphical enhancements?

 

If you have issues with the Unity engine, then just switch to Unreal and be done with it, if that is what it takes.

 

I bought the game when development was a thing you did, but now I see the developers are wasting time on parts redesign instead of fixing serious bugs and adding graphical complexity. For the people with potato computers you can just add settings to lower the settings. The game is starting to look dated guys.

One does not simply "switch to Unreal engine."  that would probably require years of work re-coding the entire game from scratch.

 

But hey, don't take my word for it, if you think you're such a bad ass coder that an engine switch is easy, Squad is hiring, you can find out for yourself.

Edited March 28, 2019 by Capt. Hunt

[mystik]

16 hours ago, Capt. Hunt said:

One does not simply "switch to Unreal engine."  that would probably require years of work re-coding the entire game from scratch.

 

But hey, don't take my word for it, if you think you're such a bad ass coder that an engine switch is easy, Squad is hiring, you can find out for yourself.

Easy there, fanboi. You're misreading the things I'm saying. They should commit to the switch to the Unreal Engine if they can't fix issues with Unity and if Unity is the reason why there are so many unresolved bugs in the bugtracker. What's the point of going on this path if it constantly shows up as limited in results? And yes, if they are hiring, they should definitely consider the switch to Unreal. It's the current year and we still don't have a proper atmosphere model. I mean, even World of Tanks ran on their stupid old engine since 2010 up to 2018 when they switched to encore, I can hardly see why KSP cannot commit to such a task. I don't have a problem with the engine itself, but I do have a problem with the way they manage it. And here's something interesting. When mods appeared for that game, the developers saw how popular they were and implemented them in the game gradually. So far, we're only gotten some dv readings after all this time. Now that's lazy.

Also, I don't have to be a coder to say that I think the current state of the game is bad and that it is missing basic graphical enhancements that are found on cheap mobile games. Now, they could be either lazy or incompetent about this, but that's not an excuse to waste time revamping parts that are working fine. Because the way I see it, you got nice HD parts in absolutely turd-level-detail atmosphere. Now that makes no sense.

 

Also, not to mention the amount of bugs that keep piling up with every new version. So, bottom line, make the visual enhancements that scatterer adds part of the game and stop sending people on wild hunts to pile up hundreds of MB just to make the game look better than vomit. I like the game, but I don't like the developers, they seem to be low effort in actually bringing it to industry standards. You want money? Fine, do a kickstarter, I'll donate and you must ensure you keep your promise or refund me. That's something I can definitely do if for nothing else than see the developers running around and wasting time on things that are not important.

Edited March 29, 2019 by mystik

[Enceos]

@mystik If Take Two ever decides to do an engine switch they are going to make KSP 2 from scratch. And, your post doesn't make impression of an informed person about KSP development (how many mods became stock) and game development in general (how many resources certain tasks require). It is just scratching the surface by oversimplifying the look on a very complex task. 

Edited March 29, 2019 by Enceos

[Capt. Hunt]

15 hours ago, mystik said:

Easy there, fanboi. You're misreading the things I'm saying. They should commit to the switch to the Unreal Engine if they can't fix issues with Unity and if Unity is the reason why there are so many unresolved bugs in the bugtracker. What's the point of going on this path if it constantly shows up as limited in results? And yes, if they are hiring, they should definitely consider the switch to Unreal. It's the current year and we still don't have a proper atmosphere model. I mean, even World of Tanks ran on their stupid old engine since 2010 up to 2018 when they switched to encore, I can hardly see why KSP cannot commit to such a task. I don't have a problem with the engine itself, but I do have a problem with the way they manage it. And here's something interesting. When mods appeared for that game, the developers saw how popular they were and implemented them in the game gradually. So far, we're only gotten some dv readings after all this time. Now that's lazy.

Also, I don't have to be a coder to say that I think the current state of the game is bad and that it is missing basic graphical enhancements that are found on cheap mobile games. Now, they could be either lazy or incompetent about this, but that's not an excuse to waste time revamping parts that are working fine. Because the way I see it, you got nice HD parts in absolutely turd-level-detail atmosphere. Now that makes no sense.

 

Also, not to mention the amount of bugs that keep piling up with every new version. So, bottom line, make the visual enhancements that scatterer adds part of the game and stop sending people on wild hunts to pile up hundreds of MB just to make the game look better than vomit. I like the game, but I don't like the developers, they seem to be low effort in actually bringing it to industry standards. You want money? Fine, do a kickstarter, I'll donate and you must ensure you keep your promise or refund me. That's something I can definitely do if for nothing else than see the developers running around and wasting time on things that are not important.

they've said before that the cartoony look was a visual design choice, that's hardly lazy.  There's no "industry standard" for how a game should look.

[mystik]

On 3/29/2019 at 7:26 PM, Enceos said:

@mystik If Take Two ever decides to do an engine switch they are going to make KSP 2 from scratch. And, your post doesn't make impression of an informed person about KSP development (how many mods became stock) and game development in general (how many resources certain tasks require). It is just scratching the surface by oversimplifying the look on a very complex task. 

Yeah, I'm not buying it.

Like I said, WOT switched engines and didn't do WOT 2. Your first argument is debunked. Next argument *clap clap*

Please list how many mods became stock, since you think there are more than the ones I mentioned. I'll wait for your exhaustive list. I genuinely want to be informed. Ok, so... Go!

"How many resources certain tasks require". Well, it may take some resources, but it seems to me like the modders are doing it successfully for the past 4 years? And get this: FOR FREE!!! And this is my discontent with KSP. They have the resources, they make the money, they ask for the money people pay for the game. I think I'm pretty entitled to request such things since I bought the game and the expansion and I am allowed to express my dissatisfaction with some of the product features. If KSP wants me to continue purchasing their products, as the customer, they need to also to consider my wants and feedback. Look, I'm not asking for dumb multiplayer or other stupid kinder stuff, I just want the game to be improved visually. If that seems like it is too much, then maybe I guess I'm talking to the wrong crowd. Again, amateurs did it for FREE! Let that sink in.

If this seems to you like it is me asking the impossible, then we're done here, but the thing is that I can play other games and then not bother with this company at all in the future, or their publisher. This is something that developers seem to ignore a lot and then end up on the chopping block and go bankrupt. There is a crisis in the gaming industry recently, where a lot of companies lost plenty of stock because they liquided enough players and told them "if you don't like our game, don't buy it" and then the players didn't buy it. And then they accuse the players of being bad people for not buying the game. You know which games I'm talking about. And by the looks of it, Take-Two has lost a lot during the last 6 moths, in stocks. https://www.marketwatch.com/investing/stock/ttwo (check out the 6M values).

So, what I'm trying to say is: you may be a fanboi and consider anybody criticizing the game to be the enemy, but I have the wallet. And my wallet isn't infinite. My money will go to the developers that give a crap about their product and their customers. And if KSP does not care about their game or the customer, I won't really bother caring about them. You can understand from this long post whatever you want. I have spoken EXACTLY what I think. And my suggestion is: PUT THE DAMN ATMOSPHERE IN THE GAME ALREADY and get with the times. Over and out.

[Capt. Hunt]

3 hours ago, mystik said:

Yeah, I'm not buying it.

Like I said, WOT switched engines and didn't do WOT 2. Your first argument is debunked. Next argument *clap clap*

Please list how many mods became stock, since you think there are more than the ones I mentioned. I'll wait for your exhaustive list. I genuinely want to be informed. Ok, so... Go!

"How many resources certain tasks require". Well, it may take some resources, but it seems to me like the modders are doing it successfully for the past 4 years? And get this: FOR FREE!!! And this is my discontent with KSP. They have the resources, they make the money, they ask for the money people pay for the game. I think I'm pretty entitled to request such things since I bought the game and the expansion and I am allowed to express my dissatisfaction with some of the product features. If KSP wants me to continue purchasing their products, as the customer, they need to also to consider my wants and feedback. Look, I'm not asking for dumb multiplayer or other stupid kinder stuff, I just want the game to be improved visually. If that seems like it is too much, then maybe I guess I'm talking to the wrong crowd. Again, amateurs did it for FREE! Let that sink in.

If this seems to you like it is me asking the impossible, then we're done here, but the thing is that I can play other games and then not bother with this company at all in the future, or their publisher. This is something that developers seem to ignore a lot and then end up on the chopping block and go bankrupt. There is a crisis in the gaming industry recently, where a lot of companies lost plenty of stock because they liquided enough players and told them "if you don't like our game, don't buy it" and then the players didn't buy it. And then they accuse the players of being bad people for not buying the game. You know which games I'm talking about. And by the looks of it, Take-Two has lost a lot during the last 6 moths, in stocks. https://www.marketwatch.com/investing/stock/ttwo (check out the 6M values).

So, what I'm trying to say is: you may be a fanboi and consider anybody criticizing the game to be the enemy, but I have the wallet. And my wallet isn't infinite. My money will go to the developers that give a crap about their product and their customers. And if KSP does not care about their game or the customer, I won't really bother caring about them. You can understand from this long post whatever you want. I have spoken EXACTLY what I think. And my suggestion is: PUT THE DAMN ATMOSPHERE IN THE GAME ALREADY and get with the times. Over and out.

So, just because the devs aren't working on the feature you want, they don't give a crap?

Get over it.  They've been working on tons of stuff, just read the "KSP loading..." threads.  As I said before, the Cartoony look isn't because it's "visually outdated," games have been doing "realistic visuals" for decades, it was a design choice.

[Vanamonde]

This discussion has diverged quite a bit from its parent thread and so has been moved to Suggestions & Development. 

[klgraham1013]

On 3/28/2019 at 9:31 AM, mystik said:

If you have issues with the Unity engine, then just switch to Unreal and be done with it...

Sounds easy enough.  See, Squad.  Problem solved.  I expect progress by the end of the week.

On 3/28/2019 at 9:31 AM, mystik said:

I see the developers are wasting time on parts redesign instead of...adding graphical complexity.

Umm...

On 3/28/2019 at 9:31 AM, mystik said:

The game is starting to look dated guys.

Goodness.  The game looked dated from the get go.

On 3/29/2019 at 10:10 PM, Capt. Hunt said:

they've said before that the cartoony look was a visual design choice, that's hardly lazy.

Let's not use "cartoony" as excuse for poor art.  There's plenty of not so great art in KSP.  The part revamp is a step in the right direction.

Edited April 2, 2019 by klgraham1013

[mystik]

On 3/29/2019 at 9:10 PM, Capt. Hunt said:

they've said before that the cartoony look was a visual design choice, that's hardly lazy.  There's no "industry standard" for how a game should look.

I never mentioned anything about the cartoony look. I don't know where you get your points to argue against.

On 4/1/2019 at 12:01 PM, Capt. Hunt said:

Get over it.  They've been working on tons of stuff, just read the "KSP loading..." threads.  As I said before, the Cartoony look isn't because it's "visually outdated," games have been doing "realistic visuals" for decades, it was a design choice.

Again the cartoony mention. Do you argue with your own points often? Or is the first time for you?

For the sake of testing your honesty, I actually went through all the "KSP loading..." threads. This is what I found.

Part revamps (aka lazy tactics and avoiding touching the big pile of bugs sittin' o'there in the ksp bugtracker)

A "KSP Loading..." Preview: TVR Stack Couplers revamp!
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: 24-77 "Twitch" Liquid Fuel Engine Revamp
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: Kerbodyne ADTP-2-3 Adapter revamp
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: O-10 "Puff" MonoPropellant Fuel Engine Revamp
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: Protective Nose Cone Mk12A & Mk16A
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: RV-105 RCS Thruster Block Revamp
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: The 48-7S “Spark” Liquid Fuel Engine revamp
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: The FL-A5 and FL- A10 Adapters
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: the Mk2 Lander Can
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: The Rockomax RE-L10 “Poodle” Engine Revamp
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: Vernor Engine Revamp

Actual work on enhancing the game in a useful way:
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: New Idle Animations
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: Activate Navigation to Launchsite

[snip]
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: The Mun Launch Site (KSP Enhanced Edition)
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: Parachutes in KSP Enhanced Edition

 

Maybe you want to review your previous post mate?
 

[snip] the community has many great ideas and I hardly see anything implemented. The devs have a big brainstorming pool available at their disposal and they waste time redesigning perfectly working parts. I guess I'm repeating myself and yelling into the void at this point.

Whatever, like I said, I have plenty of other games I can play, where the developers actually give a crap. Indie studios are booming while big ones just deflate like a balloon. Revamp all the parts you want, and when you're done you can re-revamp revamp parts, the end result will not add much to the game when there are core issues that need to be fixed.

If you can't take criticism (and especially I'm talking here to the fanbois) then you're not really looking at it objectively, but rather from a cult / ego trip POV. From the statistics you're not doing so great since the start of 2019. https://steamcharts.com/app/220200#6m

Have fun revamping. I got tired of waiting for actual fixes. Buying future DLC is excluded until I see actual improvements.

Edited April 3, 2019 by Starhawk
Redacted by moderator

[Starhawk]

 

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[Capt. Hunt]

10 hours ago, mystik said:

I never mentioned anything about the cartoony look. I don't know where you get your points to argue against.

Again the cartoony mention. Do you argue with your own points often? Or is the first time for you?

For the sake of testing your honesty, I actually went through all the "KSP loading..." threads. This is what I found.

Part revamps (aka lazy tactics and avoiding touching the big pile of bugs sittin' o'there in the ksp bugtracker)

A "KSP Loading..." Preview: TVR Stack Couplers revamp!
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: 24-77 "Twitch" Liquid Fuel Engine Revamp
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: Kerbodyne ADTP-2-3 Adapter revamp
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: O-10 "Puff" MonoPropellant Fuel Engine Revamp
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: Protective Nose Cone Mk12A & Mk16A
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: RV-105 RCS Thruster Block Revamp
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: The 48-7S “Spark” Liquid Fuel Engine revamp
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: The FL-A5 and FL- A10 Adapters
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: the Mk2 Lander Can
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: The Rockomax RE-L10 “Poodle” Engine Revamp
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: Vernor Engine Revamp

Actual work on enhancing the game in a useful way:
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: New Idle Animations
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: Activate Navigation to Launchsite

[snip]
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: The Mun Launch Site (KSP Enhanced Edition)
A "KSP Loading..." Preview: Parachutes in KSP Enhanced Edition

 

Maybe you want to review your previous post mate?
 

[snip] the community has many great ideas and I hardly see anything implemented. The devs have a big brainstorming pool available at their disposal and they waste time redesigning perfectly working parts. I guess I'm repeating myself and yelling into the void at this point.

Whatever, like I said, I have plenty of other games I can play, where the developers actually give a crap. Indie studios are booming while big ones just deflate like a balloon. Revamp all the parts you want, and when you're done you can re-revamp revamp parts, the end result will not add much to the game when there are core issues that need to be fixed.

If you can't take criticism (and especially I'm talking here to the fanbois) then you're not really looking at it objectively, but rather from a cult / ego trip POV. From the statistics you're not doing so great since the start of 2019. https://steamcharts.com/app/220200#6m

Have fun revamping. I got tired of waiting for actual fixes. Buying future DLC is excluded until I see actual improvements.

You want something like Scatterer done to the stock visuals, yes I understand that.  However, my point still stands.  As cool as scatterer is, it doesn't really fit the cartoony visual style of the stock game, that's why the devs haven't done something like it, not because they're lazy, but because their vision of the game doesn't need it.  I'll admit I use scatterer too, but it's not because I think the stock game looks outdated.  And you're proving my other point by discounting most of the stuff they post in the news because its not what you want.

Besides, there's been plenty of bugsmashing going on behind the scenes that doesn't make the news, just look at the patch notes.  Just because your pet "bug" isn't fixed right now doesn't entitle you to anything.  There are plenty of other people on this forum with "pet bugs," some are getting fixed, some don't need fixing, but none of them are as "game breaking" as they think.  Get used to it.

And guess what, those other games "where the developers actually give a crap," will be exactly the same.  No dev team can please every single customer.  Honestly, Squad has a history of being one of the more receptive and open dev teams in the industry.

You want to take your wallet elsewhere because you're not getting what you want right now?  Go right ahead.

If supporting this company for doing good work labels me as a fanboi, so be it.

Edited April 3, 2019 by Capt. Hunt

[StrandedonEarth]

KSP requires plenty of physics processing power, but isn't too demanding on the graphics processor. Which is good for me, because my six year old laptop has a decent CPU but relatively wimpy GPU. I understand that graphical enhancements can also be de-tuned via settings. But there are plenty of KSPers out there hooked on this unique game who run the game on a computer comparable or worse than mine. It would be interesting to know what percentage of players have high-end GPUs, and if I'm not mistaken Squad has that info.

The bottom line is that Squad wants to devote its resources to enhancements that will benefit the most players. Adding eye-candy that may  have to be turned off by a significant portion of players seems like a non-optimal use of resources. Those that want the eye-candy can seek out the mods for that, while Squad can concentrate on features that benefit all players.

[mystik]

16 hours ago, Capt. Hunt said:

You want something like Scatterer done to the stock visuals, yes I understand that.  However, my point still stands.  As cool as scatterer is, it doesn't really fit the cartoony visual style of the stock game, that's why the devs haven't done something like it, not because they're lazy, but because their vision of the game doesn't need it.

That's all nice and stuff, but if they're going for the "cartoony look", which of the following look more cartoony to you, the ones on the left or the ones on the right?

Please, tell me more how the parts on the right side look more cartoony than the ones on the left, please show me that you got argumentative integrity.

[snip]

12 hours ago, StrandedonEarth said:

KSP requires plenty of physics processing power, but isn't too demanding on the graphics processor. Which is good for me, because my six year old laptop has a decent CPU but relatively wimpy GPU. I understand that graphical enhancements can also be de-tuned via settings. But there are plenty of KSPers out there hooked on this unique game who run the game on a computer comparable or worse than mine. It would be interesting to know what percentage of players have high-end GPUs, and if I'm not mistaken Squad has that info.

The bottom line is that Squad wants to devote its resources to enhancements that will benefit the most players. Adding eye-candy that may  have to be turned off by a significant portion of players seems like a non-optimal use of resources. Those that want the eye-candy can seek out the mods for that, while Squad can concentrate on features that benefit all players.

If the gaming industry would have to base their games on the most potatoes of the pc's out there we would still be playing minecraft and consider it to be the top of graphics development.

But you know what the industry actually does? Crysis, Metro, SOTTR... Yeah, so we can actually make progress to better graphics instead of sticking to old potato hardware.

"Buh my potato laptop" is not an argument for using dated graphics. Buy a better one. We shouldn't be held hostages to your outdated choice of hardware. 

Console [users] buy next gen consoles every time when they want to have better graphics. The console gaming industry moves on. I don't get why laptops deserve a different treatment, but feel free to explain, tell me how I'm wrong exactly.

See, you may be happy that you can play the game on your 6 year old hardware. But what if someone buys a nice graphics card and plays the titles I mentioned before. Do you think they're going to find KSP more appealing or less appealing to play once they see just how dated the graphics are?

KSP needs to decide which way they want to go. The path of old and dated hardware or the new and modern realistic look. And if you're going to even hint that they want to stick with the "cartoony" I will send you to read the beginning of this post again.

Edited April 3, 2019 by mystik
Redacted by moderator

[DMagic]

I'm not sure why people think KSP has a "cartoon" look. Cartoon, or "toon" is a fairly specific visual style, there is a wide range here (think Borderlands on the more realistic side, or flat-shaded, low poly games on the other side), but KSP doesn't fit anywhere in that range. The Kerbals themselves look a bit cartoonish, and I could see the argument for them, though not so much when you only see them from behind with their helmets on.

But the actual game just has a very bad realistic visual style. The terrain of basically all planets has realistic, but very bland textures. The parts range from smudgy, oil-drum style visuals, to fairly decent realistic styles. 

I think the game looks the way it does because its visual aspects have remained basically unchanged since the early versions, which were made for an ancient version of Unity, by people who either weren't very experienced with art assets or were more focused on the programming side. A huge amount of visual improvement could be had by just taking advantage of some of the more modern lighting and shader aspects of Unity. There is no reason to change game engines simply to get better visuals.

And for people that have old computers, that is why the graphics options menu exists. If something like clouds, atmospheric light scattering, better lighting, or improved water effects is too much for your computer to handle then you could just turn off such features. 

 

13 hours ago, StrandedonEarth said:

It would be interesting to know what percentage of players have high-end GPUs, and if I'm not mistaken Squad has that info.

Maybe KSP's player-base differs a little from the overall Steam population, but I doubt if there is a more representative source of hardware information available. 

https://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey/videocard/

According to Steam about 50% of users have at least a GTX 1050 or higher level of graphics card (maybe more like 60% if you add up all of the individual GPUs above that level). Which is more than enough to handle anything KSP can throw at it, even with a lot of visual mods. A range of visual improvement options doesn't seem like something that would be ignored by the majority of players.

 

Edited April 3, 2019 by DMagic

[klgraham1013]

@DMagic Well said on all accounts.

[Pthigrivi]

Man the tone of this discussion is really off-putting so Im reluctant to dive in. I use scatterer and SVE on a 7 year old macbook and it runs fine, but Im sympathetic to folks dealing with latency. It really does improve the look of things, and I don't think it detracts from the style of the game at all. As others have said there's no reason they couldn't be toggleable in the graphics settings. That said, I know there's a whole world of legal/financial considerations around mods that make it more complicated than just plugging things in, and building from scratch has its considerations in terms of dev time and support. I, personally, also think there are more pressing matters tied to the core mechanics of the game that I'd love to see Squad look at before gussying up the graphics--things like transfer window aids, an alarm clock, some deeper science mechanics and more robust planetary surfaces. Life support and habitation would be amazing too. All that said I fully recognize Im not the one setting priorities here so thats just like my opinion, man. 

Edited April 3, 2019 by Pthigrivi

[klgraham1013]

9 minutes ago, Pthigrivi said:

I, personally, also think there are more pressing matters tied to the core mechanics of the game that I'd love to see Squad look at before gussying up the graphics--things like transfer window aids, an alarm clock, some deeper science mechanics and more robust planetary surfaces. Life support and habitation would be amazing too.

As would I, but we've also been waiting for all of these things since 2011.  If you've been around since the beginning of early access.  We only just recently got DV calculations.  It's hard to give Squad to much leeway.  As all the things mentioned have been posted in this very "Suggestions and Development" subforum since, what seems like, this forum began.  Graphics, at the very least, would provide a selling point for any of the remaining folk still on the fence after all these years.  Which must be a number that's becoming smaller and smaller with every passing update.

Edited April 3, 2019 by klgraham1013

[Lisias]

On 4/2/2019 at 8:37 AM, klgraham1013 said:

Let's not use "cartoony" as excuse for poor art.  There's plenty of not so great art in KSP.  The part revamp is a step in the right direction.

Perhaps it's just me, but I like the cartoony look. It matches perfectly the characters and, frankly, the last thing I want on this game is realistic crashes with realistic beings being smashed in gruesome photorealistic ways .

[mystik]

16 hours ago, Lisias said:

Perhaps it's just me, but I like the cartoony look. It matches perfectly the characters and, frankly, the last thing I want on this game is realistic crashes with realistic beings being smashed in gruesome photorealistic ways .

Having decent graphics does not imply gruesome endings for the characters. Notice that I was not complaining about the characters since I think they fit in the goofy aspect of the game. But not having BASIC lighting effects, atmosphere effects, reflections and so on, is just a poor show from SQUAD, in the current year. We're pushing 8GB texture limits on games and this game is so badly optimized for what it is offering. Remember how they discontinued the 32 bit version because it was constantly running out of memory? For what? The graphics to not justify this. If I had to look at the game in vanilla mode and have to guess the VRAM used I'd say 512MB plus no more than 1GB or RAM. It isn't worth more than that. The fact that it eats up up to 8GB or ram during a session just shows that you're not getting much for your RAM's worth.

To me, all this effort of revamping parts is wasted time and money at this stage. The parts are too small to notice in details to such an extent that it would be bothering someone with graphics requirements. But the lack of proper lighting effects, atmosphere and reflections, is something that make the game look unfinished and amateur-ish.

Did I mention Planet Shine? Yeah, you need that mod because SQUAD fails to implement proper lightning into the game. Now we know this isn't an engine restriction, because mods can certainly do it, and for free, mind you.

So, why hasn't SQUAD prioritized the more critical aspects of the game, such as bug fixes and updating graphics? Who demanded part revamping? How many requests were there? I know people asked for the parts to be FIXED, but not remodeled. A lot of people demanded the things I mentioned, but SQUAD keeps ignoring these suggestions "not because they are easy, but because they are hard". And it is easy to earn your salary when you do minimal effort, but putting in the hard work to revamp the graphics of the game, well, who wants that?

The customer would want that, and has been quite vocal about it. As a person that bought the game, I do have a stake in the game, so to speak. And I would like to see some relevant improvements. And I don't think I'm being absurd in asking these basic things. And all the salty folks trying to tell me to become a coder, or the fact that I don't know how hard it is, let me remind you: neither do you. But these people made the game from scratch and are payed to work on it. And AGAIN, I have to bring up modders, who do this stuff for FREE. How can someone that does this for FREE do it better than a payed programmer? Please explain.

Like, I said, personally, I will not be throwing any more money at the game until I see some visual updates. The 2012 graphics isn't working for me anymore. I have been spoiled by modern graphics and I feel no attraction towards a game that sticks to turd outdated graphics. And I am not a graphics snob or elitist. I can enjoy a game that has been discontinued and got stuck in the past with the graphics. I can put up with vomit inducing outdated graphics if the game development stopped years ago, 10-20 years in the past. Some games even look fine with the old graphics, especially retro ones, but KSP wants to be a modern title, using a modern engine, still being developed. Time to stop being lazy. If you still want more of my money. Oh, and FIX THE DAMN BUGS ALREADY!

Edited April 4, 2019 by mystik

[Pthigrivi]

@mystik Look, I hear you and I'd love all that, but its not laziness. Its just a difference in priorities. I think a lot of folks, me included, are way more interested in things like dV and the new maneuver and flight data overhaul and things that bear directly on the core mechanics of the game than we are in graphics. The parts were also dying for an art pass, and it doesn't do much good to have a fancy lighting model if its shining on 6 year old models and textures. Most of us who have been around here a long time have come to know progress is never as lickity-split as everyone wishes. KSP is a unique kind of game and Squad has a relatively small staff. Some folks grumble, others of us are more patient. Im sure they'll get to things like clouds and atmospheric scattering. Until then we might just have to wait a few weeks for mod updates.

[Lisias]

7 hours ago, mystik said:

Having decent graphics does not imply gruesome endings for the characters. Notice that I was not complaining about the characters since I think they fit in the goofy aspect of the game.

KSP has already decent graphics for me. And the current graphics fits the characters in my opinion. So we will need to agree on disagree on this.

 

7 hours ago, mystik said:

But not having BASIC lighting effects, atmosphere effects, reflections and so on, is just a poor show from SQUAD, in the current year.

I don't see the way you do.

There's no real game playing improvement by adding bells and whistles. My rockets do not fly better when I use Scatterer - it's the other way around, they fly worse as my machine shares memory between GPU and CPU and such stunts tax the overall performance.

"Ok'" you can argue, "so turn off on your machine". And you would be right, But so, why spend resources on a feature that a good portion of your audience will turn it off, where you have so many features to improve and add that would be usefull for ALL of them?

 

7 hours ago, mystik said:

Remember how they discontinued the 32 bit version because it was constantly running out of memory? For what? The graphics to not justify this. If I had to look at the game in vanilla mode and have to guess the VRAM used I'd say 512MB plus no more than 1GB or RAM. It isn't worth more than that. The fact that it eats up up to 8GB or ram during a session just shows that you're not getting much for your RAM's worth.

You see… Graphics is not the only thing that needs memory. The Mono's runtime eats a lot of it for himself, and if you use 2GB of RAM for textures, you can't use it for code. And without more space for code, you can't add features neither fix the current ones by adding more code.

Do you see where we are going now?

 

7 hours ago, mystik said:

The customer would want that, and has been quite vocal about it. As a person that bought the game, I do have a stake in the game, so to speak. And I would like to see some relevant improvements. And I don't think I'm being absurd in asking these basic things. And all the salty folks trying to tell me to become a coder, or the fact that I don't know how hard it is, let me remind you: neither do you. But these people made the game from scratch and are payed to work on it. And AGAIN, I have to bring up modders, who do this stuff for FREE. How can someone that does this for FREE do it better than a payed programmer? Please explain.

I'm a customer also, and I'm not demanding any of that. So your argument is void  

How many of "me" and how many of "you" are the real concerning for Squad.

And, by the way, NO, we are not a big stakeholder as you think. We already had paid for the game. We are legacy now.

They need to revamp the game to enlarge the audience, as it's this way they pay their bills.

Did you bought the DLC? If no, so we have a reason they are looking for new gamers instead of investing on the current ones. It's about the money it's always about the money. Hungry developers don't code games.

Edited April 4, 2019 by Lisias
tyops as usulla...

[Dman Revolution]

On 4/1/2019 at 10:00 AM, mystik said:

Yeah, I'm not buying it.

Like I said, WOT switched engines and didn't do WOT 2. Your first argument is debunked. Next argument *clap clap*

Please list how many mods became stock, since you think there are more than the ones I mentioned. I'll wait for your exhaustive list. I genuinely want to be informed. Ok, so... Go!

"How many resources certain tasks require". Well, it may take some resources, but it seems to me like the modders are doing it successfully for the past 4 years? And get this: FOR FREE!!! And this is my discontent with KSP. They have the resources, they make the money, they ask for the money people pay for the game. I think I'm pretty entitled to request such things since I bought the game and the expansion and I am allowed to express my dissatisfaction with some of the product features. If KSP wants me to continue purchasing their products, as the customer, they need to also to consider my wants and feedback. Look, I'm not asking for dumb multiplayer or other stupid kinder stuff, I just want the game to be improved visually. If that seems like it is too much, then maybe I guess I'm talking to the wrong crowd. Again, amateurs did it for FREE! Let that sink in.

If this seems to you like it is me asking the impossible, then we're done here, but the thing is that I can play other games and then not bother with this company at all in the future, or their publisher. This is something that developers seem to ignore a lot and then end up on the chopping block and go bankrupt. There is a crisis in the gaming industry recently, where a lot of companies lost plenty of stock because they liquided enough players and told them "if you don't like our game, don't buy it" and then the players didn't buy it. And then they accuse the players of being bad people for not buying the game. You know which games I'm talking about. And by the looks of it, Take-Two has lost a lot during the last 6 moths, in stocks. https://www.marketwatch.com/investing/stock/ttwo (check out the 6M values).

So, what I'm trying to say is: you may be a fanboi and consider anybody criticizing the game to be the enemy, but I have the wallet. And my wallet isn't infinite. My money will go to the developers that give a crap about their product and their customers. And if KSP does not care about their game or the customer, I won't really bother caring about them. You can understand from this long post whatever you want. I have spoken EXACTLY what I think. And my suggestion is: PUT THE DAMN ATMOSPHERE IN THE GAME ALREADY and get with the times. Over and out.

 

This is a game about science and engineering. I personally find the fact that the base game with fairly simple vehicles is extremely easy to run a huge selling point. More people can play the game and more people can learn math, science and engineering from it in ways that you can't even learn in school.

Even beyond that, I have a fairly beefy system. Im not gonna say an i7 from a few generations ago and a 1060 3gb is insane, but even with that I push maybe 6-15 fps with some of my ships. Thats why I dont play with mods like scatterer and EVE. I doubt unreal has a more efficient physics engine, and if it doesnt have a more efficient engine then large crafts and multi vehicle bases and systems would be near impossible. I don't know what kind of nasa hardware youre working with, but I sure as heck dont have that kind of cash.

At the end of the day I honestly think youre being quite selfish by essentially asking squad to take the game away from its many fans on low powered pcs. If you find a game that works exactly like kerbal that looks and runs better, lemme know cause I would be interested in playing...

 

Edit: 

I see after reading again you mentioned how if the whole industry were basing off ... (clipped)... wed still be playing minecraft.

 

...You realize ksp is essentially just minecraft in space, and, although i dont know if its a stated goal by squad but, it should have the same availability as minecraft for the educational value it provides.

Edited April 4, 2019 by Dman Revolution

[mystik]

11 hours ago, Dman Revolution said:

 

This is a game about science and engineering. I personally find the fact that the base game with fairly simple vehicles is extremely easy to run a huge selling point. More people can play the game and more people can learn math, science and engineering from it in ways that you can't even learn in school.

Even beyond that, I have a fairly beefy system. Im not gonna say an i7 from a few generations ago and a 1060 3gb is insane, but even with that I push maybe 6-15 fps with some of my ships. Thats why I dont play with mods like scatterer and EVE. I doubt unreal has a more efficient physics engine, and if it doesnt have a more efficient engine then large crafts and multi vehicle bases and systems would be near impossible. I don't know what kind of nasa hardware youre working with, but I sure as heck dont have that kind of cash.

At the end of the day I honestly think youre being quite selfish by essentially asking squad to take the game away from its many fans on low powered pcs. If you find a game that works exactly like kerbal that looks and runs better, lemme know cause I would be interested in playing...

 

Edit: 

I see after reading again you mentioned how if the whole industry were basing off ... (clipped)... wed still be playing minecraft.

 

...You realize ksp is essentially just minecraft in space, and, although i dont know if its a stated goal by squad but, it should have the same availability as minecraft for the educational value it provides.

Everything you said is wrong.

The game does not teach you math. It can make you use math, but to use it, you have to know it. The only thing it does is teach you some basics about orbital mechanics, but nothing more. Everything else is broken in the sense that it does not make scientific sense.

I have a G4560, a budget dual core CPU, not even close to your i7, and the same video card. I max out on all settings and run comfortably (60 fps) any ship I designed (including the ones in my signature). I can record and post it here to prove it, I'll use MSI Afterburner to show the numbers. I mean I don't know what you're doing wrong on your pc, but that should run better than what you're describing. You gotta invest in some ram, in case you're still running 4GB, because this game is so poorly designed it just gobbles up all your ram.

So there must be something wrong with your ships. Mine never have issues with performance. I usually limit my stuff to around 300 parts with minimal clipping. Again, that because I learned that the code is garbage and causes huge amounts of ram to disappear when you start building ships too large or too complex. If an i7 cannot keep up with your ship design, maybe it is time to rethink how you build.

And also, KSP is anything but minecraft in space, that sentence makes no sense. Minecraft is a resource gathering and item crafting game. What resource do you gather here exactly that allows you to craft? If you're going to say credits, then that means any RTS, city builder, or whatever game that involves credits is minecraft. Surely, they aren't.

If you are looking for a minecraft in space experience, I would say Astroneer is what you're looking for, a game that, by the way, is running on the more demanding Unreal engine, is also kinda poorly optimized but I can still run at 60fps.

[mystik]

16 hours ago, Lisias said:

KSP has already decent graphics for me. And the current graphics fits the characters in my opinion. So we will need to agree on disagree on this.

 

I don't see the way you do.

There's no real game playing improvement by adding bells and whistles. My rockets do not fly better when I use Scatterer - it's the other way around, they fly worse as my machine shares memory between GPU and CPU and such stunts tax the overall performance.

"Ok'" you can argue, "so turn off on your machine". And you would be right, But so, why spend resources on a feature that a good portion of your audience will turn it off, where you have so many features to improve and add that would be usefull for ALL of them?

 

You see… Graphics is not the only thing that needs memory. The Mono's runtime eats a lot of it for himself, and if you use 2GB of RAM for textures, you can't use it for code. And without more space for code, you can't add features neither fix the current ones by adding more code.

Do you see where we are going now?

 

I'm a customer also, and I'm not demanding any of that. So your argument is void  

How many of "me" and how many of "you" are the real concerning for Squad.

And, by the way, NO, we are not a big stakeholder as you think. We already had paid for the game. We are legacy now.

They need to revamp the game to enlarge the audience, as it's this way they pay their bills.

Did you bought the DLC? If no, so we have a reason they are looking for new gamers instead of investing on the current ones. It's about the money it's always about the money. Hungry developers don't code games.

Two things I want to approach. The "turning off on your machine argument". According to the Steam Hardware Survey attached somewhere earlier, more people than not, are not running potato hardware. So in essence, the majority have something that can benefit the visual improvements. I don't think the capable hardware folks should be held hostage to the potato hardware. Upgrade or turn off settings. Don't limit users, let users limit themselves.

Also, I bought the DLC and I am still a stakeholder, and not legacy. If they put out new DLC guess what? I will buy it if the game will be worth it. So until the game development stops I will not be legacy. I am still a potential customer, as shown by my previous two purchases. Not to mention that the fact that just because you don't demand the same thing I demand, has no authority over my arguments, so I'd say your argument is the void one.

Why are so many people shy to criticize SQUAD? I don't get it. Why are people so happy with the bare minimum on a product that they payed for? Do you think that bought early access bought it to be minimally happy about the way the game was or were they supporting the game so that it gets better later? If you actually believe that then I'd say you have a real issue with making your reasonable demands. I expect KSP to improve. I am not happy to see it stall.

Edited April 5, 2019 by mystik