Can you possibly post comparisons to other MMO games? I mean, an MMO may have to have more characters on the screen than a single player game will typically have, so I would expect fewer polys. I am wondering how different ESO is from something like Guild Wars, New World, WoW, etc.

As much as I agree that the graphics can use an improvement, there are more imminent issues in game that needs to be addressed first

Elsonso wrote: »

Can you possibly post comparisons to other MMO games? I mean, an MMO may have to have more characters on the screen than a single player game will typically have, so I would expect fewer polys. I am wondering how different ESO is from something like Guild Wars, New World, WoW, etc.

Good request and especially for the comparison of MMORPG to MMORPG vs other types of games. That comparison is what matters when making such judgments on ESO. I look at the top titles that ESO contends such as WoW and FF14 and their graphics do not come close to what we have here. After these top games, the financial resources put into the games plummet and this is one area that experiences cost-cutting.

Now that this one know Khajiit tails are 6 segmented she will be scared of wrenches.
Imagining an clockwork robot comes and unscrew her tail.

ESO's models are not the best but their texture work is top notch. Get good enough textures and sometimes you might not even notice the issues. However, since we players are looking at our characters all the time it's... hard to ignore. Don't get me started on my Breton's hands and feet with how the textures just struggle to work with the geometry.

The character models don't bother me nearly as much as the wooden animations do.

NotaDaedraWorshipper wrote: »

Also, comparing an mmo to singleplayer just doesn't work. It should be compared to other mmos of similar age.

So FFXIV and Black Desert?

I'm not sure how that helps.

CyberOnEso wrote: »

Comparing polygons isn't exactly a fair example when ZOS purposefully clearly limits character polygons by design and instead prioritizes graphical techniques with much less of a performance hit.

They obviously don't anymore when you compare the Blackwood Chapel to the Anvil/base game chapel. It looks to me like the poly count has increased tenfold or even more.


That notwithstanding, models aren't what cause performance issues, it's texture resolution. And the texture resolution on DLC objects has progressively increased since launch as well. So why is it that the most important part of the game for many of us, our characters, haven't gotten a graphical update when every other aspect of the game has continuously gotten higher resolution?

I mean... this game was made to perform well on consoles with 100s of players on the screen, thats why the character animations are limited and reused, it's why the skill bars are only 6 and 6 with weapon swapping, it's why the polygon count of our characters are limited.

By consoles, we're also not talking current gen, were talking about PS4/Xbox One which couldn't even render games at 1080p, 60 frames a second. Most of the games that gen were 30fps to hit 1080p.

Any graphical improvements they make now, are entirely optional and polygon count of our characters doesn't sound like something they'd be able to enable/disable for one console vs other platforms.

But it doesn't really matter that much, as someone else stated, normal maps are much more cost effective way of handling smooth edges and detail, it works well for games like this where your view is usually farther away.

Could the character models use an upgrade? 100%, but we need to remember when this game was developed, the fact that it's an mmo that needs to read every characters unique animations and inputs, and finally what platforms it's trying to target.

ESO is the most casual friendly Western MMO available, if not in the entire world and they want their game playable on every machine from low to high range. They've accomplished that, it is a visually stunning game, but the game lacks that real feel you get from New World or BDO.

Objects in the world appear very flat, because they are flat. Take a look at any object with a rope or chain, anything cylindrical really. There are ropes in even the newer DLC area's that have only 3 sides (triangular). It's jarring when you zoom in, but from a 3rd person perspective, you don't even notice it. A rope is a rope.

Basically, PS4/Xbox One is holding this game back and this engine was never that great to begin with, BDO released in 2014 too and pulls off much better visual quality. There is proof in a few interviews where the combat designer was saying how they had to stop creating new animations for the game because it was going over the consoles budget.. which is why the animation for your character using Crushing Weapon is the same as the animation for Crystal Weapon is the same as the animation for summoning your pet (I think). 3 different skills, ranging from launch to 6 years later, exact same animation.

Until support for PS4/Xbox is dropped, I don't see us getting any rehauls like this or even a spellcrafting system unfortunately.