Do you think the games animations and textures need a graphical update?

LalMirchi · March 3

Neither need a visual update

FelisCatus wrote: »

It has become increasingly apparent over the years that the old classes and zones do not hold up to the new zones textures and class animations. This game is a decade old now and it really shows visually.

What is dead can never die... "Fixing" often means breaking working stuff with other unexpected outcomes. The old adage of not fixing that what is not broken comes to mind. Surely there are other aspects of the game that need the developers gaze more?

Elsonso · March 3

Both animations and textures need a visual update

They still have resource gathering animations that don't exist. Clams, for example.

FelisCatus · March 3

Both animations and textures need a visual update

I guess one of my points is if they can make new animations and update them for custom actions like recalling or harvesting resources then they can easily overhaul animations for classes.

For textures if they can add new high res textures for new dlc zones they could go back and overhaul the low res textures for older zones and motifs.

It can be done they just don't want to do it.

Dax_Draconis · March 3

Neither need a visual update

Honestly, I never notice a difference between the old and new zones.

ADarklore · March 3

Neither need a visual update

Be careful what you wish for... just ask Templars how they liked their new Jabs animation! Or how DW like the update to the Flurry animation.

Arizona_Steve · March 3

Only textures need a visual update and not animations

I'm mostly fine with the way the game looks (and I like being maxed out at 4K), but I'm not against the base zone textures being upgraded. This seems like a simple upgrade that can be applied gradually.

I'd also like to see the nuclear explosions that accompany some players getting on their mounts toned down. These don't have any place in Elder Scrolls, in my opinion.

disky · March 21

Both animations and textures need a visual update

I'll take an update to animations if I can get one but a higher-quality texture resolution would be fantastic. And while there are people in this thread complaining about the potential for change to their characters, some of the armor shaders in this game are incredibly outdated and look terrible. The plasticky metallic reflection shader on the older armor is particularly bad. We could use an update, and I think the potential is high for even those who are comfortable to be happy with the improvements.

To those who want things to remain the same due to the potential for increased system requirements, I wouldn't be surprised if you'd still be able to keep your texture quality as-is. A higher quality level wouldn't be forced on everyone.

DreamyLu · March 21

Other (Explain)

A lot of things need an update in this game. However, since we know that changes take time and that only a few get done at once, personally, I wouldn't give priority to graphical textures and animation. I find them good enough. I would focus on other things first.

Kite42 · March 21

Other (Explain)

Can't say without information on the opportunity cost. If it would delay other stuff or increase my sub cost, then no.

I'd like horse-looking horses though.

FelisCatus · March 21

Both animations and textures need a visual update

Kite42 wrote: »

Can't say without information on the opportunity cost. If it would delay other stuff or increase my sub cost, then no.

I'd like horse-looking horses though.

I doubt it would increase your sub cost because the newer zones and dlcs have better textures than older zones. You could argue it's delaying other stuff but they've already stated they have scrapped the year long story format. They now actually dedicate a quarter to patching, bug fixes and general maintenance.

JonesFPS · March 21

Other (Explain)

I wouldnt mind both. But judging on how updates in general went ..... eeeeh better leave it as it is.

Haenk · March 21

Only textures need a visual update and not animations

Some (old) textures were already awful 10 years ago. There are so many washed out textures that should not have been in the game by then. Those really need an update.
Also valid for a lot of the old landscape modeling.

Things have improved a lot, though. I don't think textures/areas of the last couple of years need an overhaul - they are fine as-is.

Aurielle · March 21

Only textures need a visual update and not animations

I don’t really care about the character animations, but textures could use an update across the board (characters and environments included) for those of us whose systems can handle it. Call it Ultra Max or whatever. People who don’t want their textures to change for whatever reason can just keep their existing settings.

AnduinTryggva · March 21

Both animations and textures need a visual update

I voted yes although I think these updates are only for some content, not on a general basis.

Some older textures could well merit an improvement in texture (resolution) and polycount

Some animations should be changed if there is a need to alter. I for instance route for a change of how axes and maces are placed in the stow away position which would require to modify the animation for it.

I also would love to carry my two daggers on the back when I am a dual wield and then of course the animation of drawing and stow away should be adapted.

Shagreth · March 21

Both animations and textures need a visual update

Definitely, the game looks & plays like crap. Still love it despite that, but an update would help, it will also attract new players. Stop being selfish and let the devs update the game so that it can survive in the future. Yeah, I am aware of some changes that didn't go well (i.e. jabs) but look at Arcanist, it's phenomenally good. I trust them.

Jestir · March 21

Both animations and textures need a visual update

The visuals+animation (and well the crown store/loot boxes/dlcs if I can get them past the visual jank) have been what keeps people I've talked too from being interested in playing the game

KekwLord3000 · March 21

Both animations and textures need a visual update

Animations I'd rather not we got used to them changing them will just hurt the game like DW/Jabs.

Textures? for sure, best example is the MoL skin it's so pixelated and was never reworked and just looks so bad, zos should rework all the vanilla one's at least as those were probably made around 2010.
I guess also updating cities and modernizing them, Wayrest is fine, but like mentioned in the post Riften looks like someone had few legos leftover and they threw together some random buildings and called it a city.

jtm1018 · March 21

Both animations and textures need a visual update

Yes, we all need to play on a pc with i11 10001000, gtx 4090 with 256 gb ddrx of ram, so there would be no loading and will just play continously, and cut off the console peasants from eso!!!

All hail the pc master race, wink wink.

BetweenMidgets · March 21

Neither need a visual update

When WoW redid their character animations and textures, it completely changed how I felt about the game. Growing up playing a Tauren, when I saw the reworked animations everything just looked so comical, instead of stoic.

The point is I had grown accustomed to how things looked and while they were vaguely familiar, in the end I hated it.

I would hate to have that happen to ESO character models. I think there is a certain charm about them as they are. Yes, maybe there are massive graphical upgrades and updates that they have the capabilities for, but for me personally, I enjoy the heart that I can see in what was made a decade (or more really) ago.

As for environments, they don't hold the same feeling for me as characters do, so that wouldn't bother me as much.

But just my opinion!

Tallon_IV · March 21

Both animations and textures need a visual update

They'll never do it, per Matt Firor.

ZOS_MattFiror wrote: »

On the development side, we have a strict policy to never change art assets once they have been in the live game, except – and this is important – if they are obviously “wrong”. Think bad animations, shoulder pads clipping through armor, weapons hanging too far off a character model’s hip – that kind of thing. This “no change” policy has been in effect since the Redguard Female Armor Debacle of 2015. This was where we updated the visuals of one type of Redguard Female armor and pushed it live without thinking of the consequences of players who liked the way it looked and had been using it for over a year. This caused a lot of – very much merited – criticism from players that liked the older style much better. That’s when we started our “no change” policy. Even if we think an asset needs to updated because it doesn’t fit ESO’s established art style or the artist responsible thinks they could have done better, we no longer change live assets because players are used to the way the game and their characters look, and that is more important than what WE think.

Funny story about this – and I’m sure you are all seeing where this is going – we have a backlog of art bugs and issues that we address over time. If these are flagged as low priority, it can take a long time to get to them. Just after our HDR versions of ESO launched, we flagged an HDR issue where some assets were not responding correctly to our HDR renderer – their color values were not configured properly and were “blown out”, meaning they were far too bright for the established ESO art style. This was entered as a bug, and sat there (not high priority) on the bug list for a few years. Eventually it was addressed and made its way into the build that launched with Update 19 (Wolfhunter).

A side effect of this change is that it changes how our HDR “slider” bar displays HDR changes – on some TVs, you won’t notice any change after moving the slider 10-15%. This is exacerbated by the fact that there is no commonly accepted HDR standard for TVs – cheaper HDR TVs tend to be dimmer with not as much control, and higher-end TVs have a large range of brightness. You’ll definitely notice a difference after our change, especially if you have one of the lower-end TVs.

Short story: It was flagged as a bug, not an “art asset change”, so it never came to the attention of the Art Director (or me) until it went live. Obviously this should have been seen as an “art change”, not a bug fix. We should not have changed it, even if we think that the change is merited, due to our “no change once live” policy.

So now this leaves us in a sticky situation: if we change it back, there will be players that like the new way better than the old. And they will be correct, just as are the ones who like the old way – this is subjective. We are now in a no-win situation, which is why we haven’t given you guys much information up until this point. What we need to do is step back, look at our options, and figure out what is the best thing to do that makes the highest number of players happy. I’m not 100% sure what this is yet, but hang tight and we’ll let you know.

And my sincere apologies for rolling this out with no information, no background, and no heads-up. We take this very seriously, and we’ll make some process changes to ensure something like this doesn’t happen again in the future, just like we did during the Redguard Female Armor Debacle.

disky · March 21

Both animations and textures need a visual update

Tallon_IV wrote: »

They'll never do it, per Matt Firor.

ZOS_MattFiror wrote: »

On the development side, we have a strict policy to never change art assets once they have been in the live game, except – and this is important – if they are obviously “wrong”. Think bad animations, shoulder pads clipping through armor, weapons hanging too far off a character model’s hip – that kind of thing. This “no change” policy has been in effect since the Redguard Female Armor Debacle of 2015. This was where we updated the visuals of one type of Redguard Female armor and pushed it live without thinking of the consequences of players who liked the way it looked and had been using it for over a year. This caused a lot of – very much merited – criticism from players that liked the older style much better. That’s when we started our “no change” policy. Even if we think an asset needs to updated because it doesn’t fit ESO’s established art style or the artist responsible thinks they could have done better, we no longer change live assets because players are used to the way the game and their characters look, and that is more important than what WE think.

Funny story about this – and I’m sure you are all seeing where this is going – we have a backlog of art bugs and issues that we address over time. If these are flagged as low priority, it can take a long time to get to them. Just after our HDR versions of ESO launched, we flagged an HDR issue where some assets were not responding correctly to our HDR renderer – their color values were not configured properly and were “blown out”, meaning they were far too bright for the established ESO art style. This was entered as a bug, and sat there (not high priority) on the bug list for a few years. Eventually it was addressed and made its way into the build that launched with Update 19 (Wolfhunter).

A side effect of this change is that it changes how our HDR “slider” bar displays HDR changes – on some TVs, you won’t notice any change after moving the slider 10-15%. This is exacerbated by the fact that there is no commonly accepted HDR standard for TVs – cheaper HDR TVs tend to be dimmer with not as much control, and higher-end TVs have a large range of brightness. You’ll definitely notice a difference after our change, especially if you have one of the lower-end TVs.

Short story: It was flagged as a bug, not an “art asset change”, so it never came to the attention of the Art Director (or me) until it went live. Obviously this should have been seen as an “art change”, not a bug fix. We should not have changed it, even if we think that the change is merited, due to our “no change once live” policy.

So now this leaves us in a sticky situation: if we change it back, there will be players that like the new way better than the old. And they will be correct, just as are the ones who like the old way – this is subjective. We are now in a no-win situation, which is why we haven’t given you guys much information up until this point. What we need to do is step back, look at our options, and figure out what is the best thing to do that makes the highest number of players happy. I’m not 100% sure what this is yet, but hang tight and we’ll let you know.

And my sincere apologies for rolling this out with no information, no background, and no heads-up. We take this very seriously, and we’ll make some process changes to ensure something like this doesn’t happen again in the future, just like we did during the Redguard Female Armor Debacle.

So they can release an updated texture pack, while keeping the old ones for low-spec machines. They're doing their game a disservice by not updating it, and frankly I think they're allowing this fear of conservative players with older hardware to affect far too many of their design decisions. I get that those players stay and pay, but you can still do things for people who want to see the game evolve without rattling any cages. If ESO continues to stagnate then it will end before its time, and it will be due to reinforced complacency from older players and devs alike.

ThelerisTelvanni · March 21

Both animations and textures need a visual update

Well the bace game textures were muddy the day the game released.

I personally thing that the models and the textures of many older zones are in need of a big upgrade! As well as some animations and the landscape designe of the old zones. Especially Windhelm needs a rework to be in line with the lore! As well as the Direnni ruins around Highrock!

The newer zones feel far more natural and and while the models and textures are not perfect they are far better these days! Getting everything on the current level might be a big setp up for the game! The newer citys also feel far more like real citys and I love that! The team has come a long way since the bace game! And I'd love to see that in all zones!

I think the 10th anniversary is one of the best oppurtunetys for an implementation on an upgrade like that. The question is if they made room for that developement work.

Of cause I'd also love to see all zines connected so you can transition from one to the other by foot or mount without a loading screen.

FelisCatus · June 18

Both animations and textures need a visual update

It's definitely needed.