More Exclusives for FoH

[Lost Ranger]

Hmm.. Inquistor sounds interesting I was figuring it was going to be something similar to EQ2's version. Nice to see some different takes on what an Inquistor can be.. I personally always found EQ2's priest version a little lacking.

[Djaypally]

Originally Posted by Aradune Mithara

Lol.

No, just being up front and honest about things. If I'm not positive something will be there at launch, I say so.

No offense...but it seems like whenever a dev says that, it doesn't make it to release.

I (we?) do appreciate you coming here and talking to us, though. I'm still very much looking forward to this game. I've been following it since back when you just had the sigil forums and hadn't announced the name yet, so I hope that it will end up being worth the wait.

[Furism]

Somebody shoots Utnayan in the face please. Stay the fuck away from these threads, we already know what you'll say in the next 15 VG threads.

Anyway, screens look good, feel immersive. I also think stances suck if they limit which skill you can or cannot use (ala WoW). I also want to state here, again, that the way the beta testers are chosen suck. Send a application form at the very least, that'll filter out all the people who are not interrested in beta testing but are still in your forum database. Less numbers = more chances to be picked.

[Deris]

I think Vanguard will do very well, The world looks nice and put together, and from what I hear, the dungeons are alot of fun and bring back alot of that "EQ" flavor. It might not be everyone's cup of tea (I personally don't think I could ever be swayed from WoW's raiding atm - even with the repair costs, etc.). From things i've heard, i'll bet it will grab a large segment of the market that doesn't "fit in" with World of Warcraft (RP'ers, heavy crafters, etc. people who log in to log in, hang out, have guild meetings in game.. you know the type!).

That being said, Ut shut the fuck up already jfc. I'm sure the game runs fine on any mid-range to high end box, which by the time the game actually comes out, will be towards the low end of the spectrum.

How about you just fucking stop armchair designing altogether, shut the fuck up, put your money where your mouth is and make your OWN fucking game, and we'll gladly rip that apart for you having no balls, no sense, and no brain to back your inane and baseless comments on.

[Zarcath]

I hope all that wide open space is put to good use. AC1 and SWG both had huge tracts of land with nothing of interest to speak of, sometimes not even populated with mobs. I hope all of this "unexplored" land have points of interest, including some not listed on the map. One of my exploration disappointments is going to some secluded island on the world map only to discover absolutely nothing.

[Aradune Mithara]

Originally Posted by Zarcath

I hope all that wide open space is put to good use. AC1 and SWG both had huge tracts of land with nothing of interest to speak of, sometimes not even populated with mobs. I hope all of this "unexplored" land have points of interest, including some not listed on the map. One of my exploration disappointments is going to some secluded island on the world map only to discover absolutely nothing.

that is a danger one risks from making a huge seamless world, but content is king and we are filling it up, no worries!

[ShamusChad]

I have a lot of questions about the game because I don't know much about it. I noticed you were level 10, is that a significant feat or are you taking your time leveling? I like to face high level battles so I will probably just race through the earlier levels like I always do. Will there be significant high end battles to engage early after release?

How customizable is the UI?

Are the roles of classes rigidly defined [A does B on raids and Y does Z on raids]?

How many people can be in a guild at one time? Is it easy to be a guild leader and manage a guild?

If everything is outside (non-instanced), how will they keep raid content fresh? Shit, I get bored waiting a week in WoW for bosses to respawn... isn't it worse when other guilds can steal a kill from you under your nose?

How long does it take to run across the entire world as it stands right now?

How long would you say it will take for people to achieve the max level in the game? Could you rate the difficulty of leveling in terms of other existing games?

[Lost Ranger]

Well I tried.. Ut will now be back tomorrow with some long winded comments (again) about Vanguard and its "vanbois" (real fucking original btw) and the thread will just spiral from there into absolute shit like all the other threads. Least we did get a few comments out of Brad and hopefully the next "FoH exclusive" will have a little bit more before Ut finds it.

Btw Brad, we have all seen the videos you linked I was referring to video that shows us a bit more gameplay substance then just some PR fluff (which isnt bad) that the current videos have. Most important being things like combat and its animation, general character animations.. and framerates. Youll get the armchair developers of FoH (ut) who will tell you its all shit though so be warned heh. You know the guy whos most artistic piece of work was probably done with a fucking crayon.

Thanks again Brad.

[Drave]

Cheers Brad,

The UI looks familiar, but decent... It would be nice to see a few more screen shots with the UI up from different testers, in different environments.

OK, maybe this is a little jaded, but ".... might not make it by launch"... that's a like new urban cliché, with a touch of marketing... advertising possibilities that (may) never materialize...

[Lost Ranger]

Originally Posted by ShamusChad

How customizable is the UI?

Oh good point Im real curious about this as well. I hope its easy to work with but not so open ended like WoW. Some unique looks are always fun but less "mods" to make the game easy mode please.

[ShamusChad]

I also have a question about the guild beta test. My guild really enjoys MMOs. We've been together a while and about 40 of us registered on the Vanguard forums and sent in an application for the guild beta test. We linked our guild website and i've been checking my e-mail in order to see if we made it in. We haven't received any word about getting in or being rejected. Is it closed now to guild beta? Are there notifications for not being selected?

[Zefah]

I know size is important especially when you are taking shots at that resolution, but those pictures would look a lot better if you didn't use the JPG format I think. Can you take non-JPG screenshots in game? If not use fraps or something to get some high quality shots, because I can tell that the JPG format is blurring and smearing a lot of the details and colors.

Edit: Also, are there going to be any forests in the game? All of the screenshots I have seen in the game look the trees are too few and far between for anything to look like a "forest". I know comparing a single player game to a MMORPG is not good, but I would be happy to see at least some Oblivion like forests in Vanguard. You are using the same Speed Tree tech. right?

[WillzZz]

I feel like I'm becoming a broken record on these vanguard pic threads, but the shadows and lighting are just abysmal. It just feels flat to me. Not necessarily everything in a shot, but in almost every shot I can look at something and go "That doesn't look right at all" because of the shading.


The ground textures are beautiful, all of the foliage seems to be coming together very nicely.

The water isn't marvelous, and doesn't seem to have any kind of fast fresnel shading going on, which would do absolute wonders for the realism of it. Even just faking it would really be a tremendous change from saying "oh that's water" to "ooooooh that's pretty water!".

The griffon looks badass.


That's about all I can see, other than the fact that the swords look a little goofy unanimated, but I'm sure they look great in-game, so it's a moot point.

Really though. Give it some depth! Please! I have no sense of scale or depth from that cave, the temple room looks flat, the bush to the left in the first duel shot (with both characters in it), these are just examples but it seems like every shot has something that makes me sad.

Still, it seems that every time we look at a set of shots, they get better, so keep up the good work. I also must say that this is one of the first set of shots I've seen where I've been impressed by the texturing more than anything else. I realize ground splotting is a lot different from normal UV texturing, but the ground just looks superb.

[The Hiram Key]

Unibody is soooo next gen Brad, it gets me wet.

[Laerazi]

Nitpicks :

- Clothing bending is pretty blocky looking right now; very apparent in the cloaks and "skirts" seen in all of the pictures. The cloak hood, in particular, looks abysmal on that dark elf. Not sure what's going on there, but it's conforming very badly to his head.

- Lighting doesn't look very uniform throughout the pictures. In the last shot, the super dark green plant looks out of place with the rest of the shot.

- Water shader sucks, please make a more realistic one. The water color is more akin to a swimming pool than something with lifeforms living in it. Shorelines have no buffer leading up to the land whatsoever.

- The LOD doesn't look uniform in detail in some shots.

- The LOD doesn't look evenly lit; some LOD textures look much darker than others at the same distance.

- Grass could use a bit of variety in the texture; looks almost monotone.

- JPEG compression sucks!

- The sky needs some birds flying around.

- A bit of armor clipping going on with the shawls/cloaks.

- Semi-close mountains looks spraypainted. Going from the brown dirt to the green grass, the LOD texture is the exact same, which gives it a strange look.

Overall, the visuals are continuing to improve; most of the issues I have would be global fixes. The landscape and actual geometry is all great; just needs some work in some textures, lighting, shadowing, and LOD.