Unsung heroes of ESO art direction - the Stone Shaper

Nemesis7884

Maybe I am a bit weird - I know we all have seen how much better and more detailed ESO's art, design, graphics, are design have become over the years - these guys are doing a fantastic job...

What I just always notice and find is fantastic is how amazing the design of the rocks in a specific area is; I don't know if you ever noticed this but every area has very distinct rock-style to that area (color, surface etc.) that not only looks fantastic but also supports the atmosphere of a specific area extremely well (For example the grey gothic and blue-snowy look in western skyrim).

They also manage the stones to look fantastic without looking too "busy" - for example if you compare ESO western Skyrim to TES V Skyrim... the rocks in TES V look way worse, even with mods imo...often too busy and not dedicated to an atmosphere...

Below a few examples of what i mean:

Cloudtrader

I agree, the rocks in the game are very nice.

What_In_Tarnation

YandereGirlfriend

As much as I have bottomless doubts about the combat team, the art and art direction team are routinely truly "killing it" and deserve every possible accolade that I can give them.

Their work doesn't usually inspire threads, so I also applaud OP for taking the time to bring this up. Well done!

Kr3do

I think they're rather annoying.

Faulgor

You forgot my favourite one. I still think Hew's Bane has the best rocks in the game ...

drkfrontiers

You've heard of Zbrush right? I can do that in a click on a button - welcome to 2020.

Turelus

Yeah the world building and 3D asset design for the zones is amazing.

I do kind of wish some of the older release zones could get a touch up, I love the layout of Stonefalls but the assets and textures look dated compared to the newer zones now.

Runefang

Now if only the cactus planter knew to keep things out of the walkway...

Raudgrani

Nature around Clockwork City is ridiculously well looking, a lot more well made than rest of the game. This was for the Xbox one X I guess, then we had the game improved to take advantage of it's additional resources etc.

Much of the new content is really well looking, but Clockwork is in a class of its own.

Amunari

while i am not overly impressed with art in this game, the placement on assets is really, really topic notch. I kind of feel like the game could be using higher quality models, especially textures. Some more playing with PPE would also be nice.

I give them a hard score of 4/5 stars, but i will say its probably the best area of the zos score wise. the other aspects of the game i'd score lower.

CMDR_Un1k0rn

This thread rocks.

RedReign

drkfrontiers wrote: »

You've heard of Zbrush right? I can do that in a click on a button - welcome to 2020.

Zbrush isn't the same as hand placing assets.


[snip]

[edited for baiting]

drkfrontiers

RedReign wrote: »

drkfrontiers wrote: »

You've heard of Zbrush right? I can do that in a click on a button - welcome to 2020.

Zbrush isn't the same as hand placing assets.


[snip]

[edited for baiting]

90% of maps are not designed by individually placing assets. - most are or should be done through functions and master materials.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FzoY062kY1s