Will this be the new norm for ESO?

Xinihp

Since people are accusing me of "cherry picking" I will collect another round of screenshots.

ZOS: If you want to moderate some of the trolling accusations that aren't objectively evaluating the detail of the content and instead choose to belittle and accuse me personally, that's fine. But please note that -I- am not saying anything mean or nasty or against the TOS, so kindly refrain from killing the entire thread. I think it is important we talk about this.

If there was some difficulty meeting timetables this release, or if there is still work being done on the environment, that would be great to know. But while understandable and even forgivable, I do think a marked drop in quality and level of detail should coincide with a proportional adjustment in the cost of said product.

"Less for more" is not really a sustainable philosophy.

Jaraal

To be fair, Summerset had some really bad textures and graphics anomalies when it first hit the PTS. There were several threads about it. But they did clean things up before the zone went live. Hopefully High Isle is also still a work in progress, as far as landscaping goes.

Xinihp

Here is an example of the castle walls outside Wrothgar. This was a FREE DLC (not a full expansion):



Now, take a look outside the main castle in High Isles. Keep in mind this is a full price expansion.



People can talk about differences in art appreciation and style all they want, but most can tell the difference when actual detail is simply not there. It is like saying "some people might have different tastes" to justify using gym socks instead of meat patties and charging the same price for a cheeseburger.

I'm sure someone will eat that sock burger, but it isn't me!

EDIT FOR CLARIFICATION: Wrothgar was a DLC that was offered free with ESO plus, just to clarify. The new High Isles however requires a separate purchase, even for ESO plus subscribers, because it is sold as an EXPANSION (or "Chapter") rather than a DLC like Wrothgar.

Xinihp

Shall we look INSIDE each of the above castles?

Here is inside Wrothgar (the DLC):



Here's inside the new paid expansion castle:



I won't even bother captioning these, the difference in quality and detail speaks for itself. You can't "cherry pick" this. That is literally what is actually there. Before and after. Night and day.

It almost feels like someone took all the previous ESO content, put it in an algorithm, and said "auto generate ESO." I see none of the love and human touch attention to detail of previous offerings in this content.

Cireous

I absolutely love the High Isle buildings, but that's my opinion. He is right about the beaches, though, and a number of other areas. There are so few assets that it seems like the landscape is just a skeleton of what it's supposed to be. As if they haven't built it out yet. This contrasts sharply with many other areas in High Isle that are probably the most gorgeous environments I've seen in this game to date.

ADarklore

I have to say I disagree... the 'details' you seem to complain about aren't enough to notice IMO. It isn't like I sit around staring at the scenery (most people don't, they're doing their quests and moving on)... we see it blur by as we're off between quests.

I've been happy with all the DLC zones ZOS has put out, even the recent ones. Clearly from the increase in population and the health of the game, many players agree.

Syldras

Wrothgar wasn't free when it was released, by the way.

Xinihp

I get that PVP players in particular don't really pay much attention to the details. Most of them I talk to say they don't even read the quest text, and just PVE because "they have to" in order to get levels/CP/gear for PVP. I get that.

However you also have to understand that ESO is an Elder Scrolls game FIRST, a game with a deep history and heavily invested community of RPG players. A huge percent of this community actually DOES read the quest text, and they absolutely DO care about the "living world" and attention to detail.

Just look at that Wrothgar interior. Trophies hanging on the wall, tons of detail, lots of NPC's going about their lives, stuff happening, a rich LIVING WORLD. Somewhere you could ROLE PLAY your character actually existing.

Now, compare that to the empty featureless box in the new content.

I can't imagine my character doing anything there except running from one checkpoint to the next, not reading quest text, not paying attention, so I could get back to PVP. There is just no life present.

The featureless landscapes and context-lacking features of the overall world design feel the same. Like a rushed featureless top covering not meant to live in, to roll play, to immerse yourself in, but rather something to rush through with blinders on not looking too deep because there is not much really there.

That is not what I have come to expect from an Elder Scrolls game.

SeaGtGruff

Faulgor wrote: »

Summerset was already boring and disappointing, so maybe not the best point of reference. I made similar posts back then comparing it to the far superior Hew's Bane. I call it green Craglorn.

Vvardenfell and Elsweyr were the high points as far as chapter landscapes go, imo.

What this says to me is that you enjoy a different type of environment than Summerset has. And that's one of the things I love about this game-- the huge diversity of environments in all the zones. I wouldn't want High Rock to look like Summerset, just as I wouldn't want it to look like Glenumbra, Northern Elsweyr, Wrothgar, or Murkmire. Different people love or hate different zones because of their environments, and I might spend more time in some zones than in others, but I love them all.

Syldras wrote: »

Wrothgar wasn't free when it was released, by the way.

I wasn't around back then, but my understanding is that you're absolutely correct-- the only free expansion was Craglorn, and everything after that had to be purchased inside the game with Crowns, or purchased outside the game with a credit card, or "rented" by having an active (paid) subscription to ESO Plus.

wenchmore420b14_ESO

First off, yes I think High Isles has some beautiful spots. And I understand the working at home thing.
Yes OP might have cherry picked a few shots, but his question is sound.
Textures aside, I have noticed ZoS is skimping on assets a little more with each Chapter.
Example: Go explore the ships in Davons Watch or any base game port. Then go to Dragon Guard area and look at that ship.
It's empty. No quarters, no hold, etc. In Balmora, over a dozen houses and only 2 are you able to enter, and that's for quest. Anyone who played TES3, that was a big disappointment.
Each year, it seems we are seeing more invisible walls, more doors locked out, less "details" and explorable little things.
I love ESO, but I too am wondering where they are taking us in future and the lessening of that "Elder Scrolls" feel.
Anyway, here are a couple of not so flattering shots from HI.

Kesstryl

wenchmore420b14_ESO wrote: »

First off, yes I think High Isles has some beautiful spots. And I understand the working at home thing.
Yes OP might have cherry picked a few shots, but his question is sound.
Textures aside, I have noticed ZoS is skimping on assets a little more with each Chapter.
Example: Go explore the ships in Davons Watch or any base game port. Then go to Dragon Guard area and look at that ship.
It's empty. No quarters, no hold, etc. In Balmora, over a dozen houses and only 2 are you able to enter, and that's for quest. Anyone who played TES3, that was a big disappointment.
Each year, it seems we are seeing more invisible walls, more doors locked out, less "details" and explorable little things.
I love ESO, but I too am wondering where they are taking us in future and the lessening of that "Elder Scrolls" feel.
Anyway, here are a couple of not so flattering shots from HI.

The ground looks like you are playing with vegetation turned off. When vegetation is turned on, it looks a lot better.

Xinihp

Kesstryl wrote: »

The ground looks like you are playing with vegetation turned off. When vegetation is turned on, it looks a lot better.

I am using the exact same video settings in my live vs. PTS comparisons.

Sylvermynx

She wasn't quoting you OP - she quoted wenchmore420b14_ESO.

FeedbackOnly

Have you seen the sunflowers that look like some dying gloomy flowers instead?

It's like the forgotten how to use bright colors

FeedbackOnly

wenchmore420b14_ESO wrote: »

First off, yes I think High Isles has some beautiful spots. And I understand the working at home thing.
Yes OP might have cherry picked a few shots, but his question is sound.
Textures aside, I have noticed ZoS is skimping on assets a little more with each Chapter.
Example: Go explore the ships in Davons Watch or any base game port. Then go to Dragon Guard area and look at that ship.
It's empty. No quarters, no hold, etc. In Balmora, over a dozen houses and only 2 are you able to enter, and that's for quest. Anyone who played TES3, that was a big disappointment.
Each year, it seems we are seeing more invisible walls, more doors locked out, less "details" and explorable little things.
I love ESO, but I too am wondering where they are taking us in future and the lessening of that "Elder Scrolls" feel.
Anyway, here are a couple of not so flattering shots from HI.

Everything went downwards after Summerset.

What's the point of houses we can't break into or backpacks we can't loot?

Amottica

Grizzbeorn wrote: »

Nice cherry-picked display.

@Grizzbeorn

While I would agree that there seem to be some lighting differences between some of the comparisons it does seem to overall show lower quality graphics.

I would suggest that instead of suggesting OP cherry-picked the selection of images a better refutal would be to present some comparisons that show things in a different light. Pun intended.

Syldras

As I haven't seen much of the new area on PTS yet, I can't agree nor disagree about this topic yet. The places I found while wandering around from the main city to the eastern coast didn't look that bad so far, actually (and this is only on about medium settings):



Generally speaking, I find it hard to judge a work that has not even reached its final status yet - let alone draw conclusions about a franchise or studio getting downhill because of that. It's a test, some textures are still missing, and I can imagine very well some places are to be revised before release as well.

Xinihp wrote: »

I get that PVP players in particular don't really pay much attention to the details. Most of them I talk to say they don't even read the quest text, and just PVE because "they have to" in order to get levels/CP/gear for PVP. I get that. However you also have to understand that ESO is an Elder Scrolls game FIRST, a game with a deep history and heavily invested community of RPG players. A huge percent of this community actually DOES read the quest text, and they absolutely DO care about the "living world" and attention to detail.

I basically grew up with the TES single player games, watched my father playing Arena and Daggerfall when I was a child, and played Morrowind, Oblivion and Skyrim on my own when I became old enough. I play ESO for the stories and lore and never cared for PvP. Of course I enjoy detailed environments that feel alive, but I don't think immersion necessarily is about perfect texture blending and the number of grass stalks and rocks that you pass by while exploring. Otherwise every game without high-end graphics would be unimmersive and no one would ever have enjoyed Morrowind.

Ilumia

WhiteCoatSyndrome wrote: »

Re: size I have to disagree with OP; Summerset is tiny, and has big chunks of mountain that are impassable or nearly so. Anyone else remember this?



While High Isle also has a lot in the way of mountains, so far all the ones I’ve come across have had paths running through them so you can explore them. (I do acknowledge I haven’t been over the entire map yet.)

Yes, the size of summerset with those huge dead mountains and too little land to roam is a real shame. Summerset is beautiful though, which does make up in some way I suuppose. But to be honest it feels more and more like corners are cut and we are paying the same for less and less content. I feel a bit dirty for still falling for it and putting money into the hands of a company that I don't feel cares enough.

Cireous

Wandering around the beaches right now. I actually found a spot that was built out a lot more and it looks really great. Here, you can see what the style would look like if they put more care into other areas. I'll see if I can find more nice spots (it's a struggle, heh).


This is what most of the rest of the shorelines looks like (at least on the first island), tried to add a few that still look somewhat nice even if a little plain:



So, I guess if mostly barren is what they are going for then it's a successful recreation of... something. It's
just a little hard on the eyes when you come in expecting Summerset-level treatment in a new beachy Chapter. I think if they just rounded out the landscape with a lot more coral and vegetation it would look a lot better. Also, the color scheme is fairly boring. It's two colors: tan (the rocks and the sand) and some green (the ground and trees) with the very occasional yellow shrub here and there.

Hopefully some reshade on live will add a little shimmer of pretty to things, but there is not much to work with, unfortunately. Granted, it is a muggy day out there on High Isle right now.

wenchmore420b14_ESO

Kesstryl wrote: »

wenchmore420b14_ESO wrote: »

First off, yes I think High Isles has some beautiful spots. And I understand the working at home thing.
Yes OP might have cherry picked a few shots, but his question is sound.
Textures aside, I have noticed ZoS is skimping on assets a little more with each Chapter.
Example: Go explore the ships in Davons Watch or any base game port. Then go to Dragon Guard area and look at that ship.
It's empty. No quarters, no hold, etc. In Balmora, over a dozen houses and only 2 are you able to enter, and that's for quest. Anyone who played TES3, that was a big disappointment.
Each year, it seems we are seeing more invisible walls, more doors locked out, less "details" and explorable little things.
I love ESO, but I too am wondering where they are taking us in future and the lessening of that "Elder Scrolls" feel.
Anyway, here are a couple of not so flattering shots from HI.

The ground looks like you are playing with vegetation turned off. When vegetation is turned on, it looks a lot better.

Lol... It does I know. But, they are on and settings ulta.

Jaraal

The first thing I noticed in the comparison of Wrothgar to High Isle is the clouds. Look how well defined and varied the textures are, compared to the fuzzy blobs that are the new ones.

FeedbackOnly wrote: »

Have you seen the sunflowers that look like some dying gloomy flowers instead?

It's like the forgotten how to use bright colors

I was shocked when I first saw the sunflowers. Drab orange lumps of blah... and lots of it. And re: the old world ships vs new, I went on a High Isle ship and it was tiny, and every single door had the dreaded "we don't have time to develop this properly" chains blocking them off. You couldn't even go below decks. And the static pixel lava at the volcanic dolmen things was awful. Nothing molten and moving like Stonefalls or even Vvardenfell.

The general landscape is similar to gold cost, but with less colors and plants. As a whole, it does look like they made a conscious effort to reduce detail for performance.

RisenEclipse

I think some of the struggle is trying to make a beachy like island zone NOT feel like Summerset. I know people on this thread are crying out "look at Summerset" and asking for more coral, or things from that zone. But if they did that, then you'd have an entire thread about basically having a Summerset 2.0 zone and not something that stands on its own two feet. I do not have the PTS so I cannot tell you what they already put in the game. But I also don't know what they'll add later on before release.

Although I do agree that the passion for the game has become less and less. So many locked houses. Reused objects. They could do so much with the island. I have no idea what the finished product will look like, but I really hope it feels like a game made by passionate creators, then one that feels like a half made content made for the sheer purpose of milking money.

SeaGtGruff

The zone as seen on the PTS literally isn't finished yet. Has anyone here been attacked by invisible enemies (fauns, I guess they are) yet? Or seen the use of placeholder icons when playing Tales of Tribute? [Edit: My point being, it's a bit premature to start nitpicking about whether the zone looks finished or unfinished. Wait until it's released instead of griping about a literally unfinished zone looking unfinushed.]

As for sunflowers, they do come in a variety of colors, so the ones in the game are quite reasonable.

Aardappelboom

Hmm even if they are cherry picked, I always liked the detail and world building, even in the base zones. I'll have to check for myself when it comes out but I do like my PVE experience to be detailed and immersive, the details matter and are one of the reasons I love this game.

We'll see when it's released but "lowering details for performance reasons" is honestly a bogus statement, graphics are client based, they can be adjusted to an ewtend by the user to fit low end devices so there's no reason to lower details.

Lugaldu

Sure, the beaches of High Isle don't look particularly exciting right now, but I hope that as the story progresses, a clear contrast to other locations will develop as in previous chapters. At least that's how I feel about Blackwood - Blackwood is rather dull and empty from the landscape, most importantly it's not a forest (which was really a disappointment for me last year), but Leyawiin is very atmospheric, it´s a simple, but nice and relaxed atmosphere. On the other hand, if you come to Fargrave later in the story, then you get a certain "wow effect" because everything here is much more detailed and exotic. It's a definite contrast and intensification that wouldn't be apparent in this form if Leyawiin and Blackwood were already stunning. I see it in a way like the development of the story itself, classically you start by fighting a bunch of bandits and skeletons and in the great finale you find yourself surrounded by hordes of sinister creatures that you have to defeat.

Grizzbeorn

I mean, Goddess forbid a volcanic archipelago look kinda barren around the fringes. That's kinda what happens.

FeedbackOnly

Ilumia wrote: »

WhiteCoatSyndrome wrote: »

Re: size I have to disagree with OP; Summerset is tiny, and has big chunks of mountain that are impassable or nearly so. Anyone else remember this?



While High Isle also has a lot in the way of mountains, so far all the ones I’ve come across have had paths running through them so you can explore them. (I do acknowledge I haven’t been over the entire map yet.)

Yes, the size of summerset with those huge dead mountains and too little land to roam is a real shame. Summerset is beautiful though, which does make up in some way I suuppose. But to be honest it feels more and more like corners are cut and we are paying the same for less and less content. I feel a bit dirty for still falling for it and putting money into the hands of a company that I don't feel cares enough.

Summerset was 10 dollars cheaper too ..

FeedbackOnly

Jaraal wrote: »

The first thing I noticed in the comparison of Wrothgar to High Isle is the clouds. Look how well defined and varied the textures are, compared to the fuzzy blobs that are the new ones.

FeedbackOnly wrote: »

Have you seen the sunflowers that look like some dying gloomy flowers instead?

It's like the forgotten how to use bright colors

I was shocked when I first saw the sunflowers. Drab orange lumps of blah... and lots of it. And re: the old world ships vs new, I went on a High Isle ship and it was tiny, and every single door had the dreaded "we don't have time to develop this properly" chains blocking them off. You couldn't even go below decks. And the static pixel lava at the volcanic dolmen things was awful. Nothing molten and moving like Stonefalls or even Vvardenfell.

The general landscape is similar to gold cost, but with less colors and plants. As a whole, it does look like they made a conscious effort to reduce detail for performance.

I more sad because we were promised pretty. We were promised color. It looks like the same shades as blackwood

EnerG

I dont really see anything wrong, summerset is described by its grand marble buildings and idyllic shores, thats what it was supposed to be, high isle is a town, only the rich homes and their private beaches will be anything close to summerset. Thats how real life works, the peasants certantly aren't living in anything more than 4 walls and sometimes an attic.

EnerG

pklemming wrote: »

Maybe lower poly count for performance, rather than addressing the hardware issues.

The hardware issues are getting adressed, theyve stated this, gods how many times? It's not an easy process, and not a quick one when large corporations run on 10 okeys, 20 signed papers research by interns and all other manner of corporate hoops for 1 decision.