Vanguard mini-videos -- you got 'em!

[Aradune Mithara]

I posted recently that it took time to make videos, that we needed to go to our publisher and shoot them, have them edited, etc.

Some people took issue with that and said that's great for major videos for big releases, releases to major sites or game pubs, etc., but seriously, how hard is it to release a few little movies... heck, you post a few screenshots here and there that are works in progress, have flaws, etc. to get people excited, even though they are picked apart, etc. Why not little videos?

I really thought about that. And so did an avid in-house Vanguard player and programmer, Jerrith (he also played a LOT on Veeshan, although wasn't an FoH member).

He has his system set up at home that he plays, like I said, avidly on. He also has it set up to take movies.

So as a test, he put a quick movie together. It's very basic. It's one of his Beta 3 characters that he's earned in the same Temple area I showed recently in a batch of screenshots. It's a quick video -- he simply pulls a mob with a bow and then kills it with melee. There's nothing special or too exciting. It wasn't set up with forethought. It is live on beta 3, but just him soloing a mob.

Here's what he wrote to me:

"Saw the most recent post on FoH about Temple of Dailuk, along with the comments about movies. So I recorded one this morning that, to my eye at least, is good enough to release. It’s 30 fps, 1280x800, 38 seconds long, 14.9 mb in size, and uses medium settings. I’m standing in the outpost (with tents, and guards beating on practice dummies) just outside the Temple of Dailuk, looking up at the main entrance. I have a Dustwalker (giant centipede) targeted and I draw my bow, activate my damage bard song, and then shoot, pulling it. I then activate abilities, fighting it (including a complete combat chain) and kill it. My clothing is mostly generic / Thestran, both my swords are from Qalia and different. The video ends shortly after it falls to the ground. My UI is on for the entire fight, names are off (except on my offensive target, of course) and there are no other players in the video. There are no major graphical glitches that I’m aware of. The arrow arced correctly to my target, and I switched my wield preference from ranged back to melee before my first melee attack so that the correct animation would play. Also, Shadows are on and working during the movie as well. Any chance you might put this up for the public to see? I think one nice decent simple fight like this would go quite a distance in answering the people asking for combat videos. It also fits with the screenshots you’ve been releasing, as it’s in the Temple of Dailuk area. My machine is an AMD dual core Processor which was top of the line over a year ago, but aging a bit now. My video card is an Nvidia 7800 GTX and I have 2 gigs of RAM."

So I thought about it and decided to give it a shot and see what you guys think. I know there will still be skepticism and criticism. And I know there are cooler things we could show. But what the heck, let's try this out and see what the comments are. If people like at all what they see, maybe we'll do another one, but, of course, no promises.

JerrithCombat1.avi

edit: Jerrith sent me the exact specs of his machine, although, really, as long as you are on medium settings, any machine would display the game like this or almost exactly like this -- the spec of the machine determines framerate, how quickly things load, etc. The graphics settings determine what you see visually, and like I said, this is what is currently medium mode in beta 3 taken last night. Everything during beta is subject to change, and we continue to tweak, make things look better, optimize, etc.

In any case, here are his specs:

AMD Athlon 64 X2 4800+ (2.4GHz)

2 GB RAM

EVGA NVIDIA 7800GTX 256 MB

Let me emphasize again, however, that you do NOT need a machine like this to enjoy Vanguard, nor see a scene like the one this quick micro-movie depicts. We have not announced min or reccomended specs officially yet, but to be super clear, these are NOT them, and most certainly min-specs will be much lower, and likely recomended specs as well. Like I've posted -- I'll always be up front with you guys, even if I pay a price for it, but, that said, I also know that means I'd better put up disclaimers and make sure I'm darn clear as well

Oh, and as a bonus, while the video isn't super exciting, this is probably the most we've released of the beta 3 UI as it exists right now and has sound too!

[findar]

not bad :O still beyond the realm of my current pc tho sadly.

[Hardcore Cracka]

Pretty smooth, on medium that looks like EQ2 on pretty high settings iirc. I especially like the smoke slowly billowing in the background and the pattens on the tents. The other Dustwalker suddenly popping in and out of view is kind of startling, but I'm guessing that has to do with the settings.

All in all, looking pretty good.

[Badass]

Definitely looks promising. I dont want to heap too much praise for fear you guys will get too comfortable and not go the extra mile. That said, I like what I see.

p.s I assume that is smoke in the background that will "billow" upon release?

edit: Upon further review...the smoke is gently "billowing"....very nice.

[Simoran]

I don't see anything wrong with the animations for combat, especially the crossing swords combo looked insane, i assume there is alot more that has to be seen to make a decent comment on, but im pretty excited, wauw for medium settings imho

The creature he pulled, looks red to me so how does a player know what level the creatures are. (Would love to hear more about this, see im a little colorblind so i could be mistaken on what the real color is on that mob, but anyways) ;p

The enviroment shadows are not in/on as i can see it, but i don't think it looks bad, i think it looks promising, it just makes you want to see him move around and running/jumping, thanks to Brad and Jerrith.

Looking forward for more of the same Quality

[Jerrith]

*grins* I wasn't a FoH member, but played on Veeshan, from Kunark through PoP.

I play at that resolution (1280 x 800) about half the time, the other half I play at 2560 x 1600. I usually move some of the settings higher while playing, but just used straight "Medium" settings for this. That's also not the default layout for the UI, but what I've found to be best for my playstyle.

[Kolle]

That's not as bad as some posters make things out to be. For medium that looks good. The animation wasn't terrible.

[Froofy-D]

Looks pretty good IMHO. Nice UI and I like the sound effects. Defiinitely bumping the interest meter up there a lot more than screenshots. The engine looks a lot nicer in motion.

[Mkopec1]

That looks pretty sweet, like the environment too. Keep it up Bradley!

[Jait]

Well those voices who said 'put up or shut up' have been silenced now. It really even surprises me how good that video looks for the stage the game is in now.

Still, Co-op is where is it's at. I'm really wanting to see a typical group and/or raid environment. IE How do players work together?


Great video though Jerrith.

[Xen]

The female in the background doing that little stretch animation before attacking the dummy was pretty cool.

It's small details like that which draw my attention.

The main combat animations looked average, really.

But after attacking your one thousandth "a spider" it doesn't really matter how pretty it looks, a player will tire of their avatar's movements.

Still, for the purpose of the post, the animations look decent.

[Simoran]

Those bones in the background, are they from a giant elephant/mammoth ?

I hope they will be in the game, would be cool to see so huge creatures roam that place

[FoghornDeadhorn]

Feels somewhere between Diablo II and Fallout I. Nice to see a movie at all....now let's see some more.

[Duppin]

I thought it looked pretty good.

It'd be good to see a video of some casting animations next.

[Screamfeeder]

Negatives:
Biggest issue I can see is when the mob gets hit he does a "Mike Tyson Punch out" pause and jumps back.

Smaller issue would be those massive info boxes popping up when you use the skills (I assume you can turn those off though and were just using them for this example).

Even smaller issue is the High-Res font you guys are using. Just looks a tad out of place.

Positives:
Whoever designed those UI icons deserves a raise.

Nice far-clip on terrain (I also assume there are different clips due to mob clipping in and out).

Textures look BETTER than most of the screenshots shown (just let Jerrith keep making these videos instead of SS's from now on).

Player animations look better than I was expecting.