Outdoor/Enviornment textures a little blah?

[ShinRa]

Is it me or in the E32k4 vid on the hover bike, the mountains and the dirt looks really...blah...i just noticed this. Please tell me source is capable of better outdoor enviornments than this? I mean i could go as low as saying the moutiain sides look like hl graphics.... :x

 

[seinfeldrules]

I didnt notice it...

 

[clarky003]

its all done HL2 style, so I suppose yes the enviroments could be made far more detailed, at the cost of performance of course.. but then again the vid isnt the best quality, but HL2 isnt a game for brilliantly detailed realistic outdoor enviroments (also has to run on a lowish spec machine too ), try Stalker for the nice outdoor environments.

 

[Mr.Reak]

Is it me or in the E32k4 vid on the hover bike, the mountains and the dirt looks really...blah...i just noticed this. Please tell me source is capable of better outdoor enviornments than this? I mean i could go as low as saying the moutiain sides look like hl graphics.... :x

Omg Thats It I Wont Buy Hl2. The Vaporizationizorz Iz Not G00d Enuff 4 Me. **** Hl2!!!! Noone Shuld Buy This Piece Of $hit Game The Vapoirizationzorz Sux0rz!!

..................

 

[slicktick]

Well, i think it will look that bad on my machine whether it is made to look good or not, so... but they arent so detailed but its not the best video to tell either.

 

[ShinRa]

Reak, that 2nd quote u have of me is called sarcasm. nice try in attempting to make me look stupid...yet you've done it onto yourself yet again...

 

[MultiVaC]

Dude... you jump all over people for making the slightest complaints, yet here you go with complaints of your own. The textures look ok to me, not 'omg amazing' but no worse than Far Cry.

 

[Mr-Fusion]

It's pretty hard to tell the quality of texturing from those shots.

Though it certainly looks better than HL1.

 

[ZombieBudgie]

I think that this look is almost certainly done on purpose - from what I've read, the feeling in many of these City 17 outdoor stages is grim and bleak. The feeling of apprehension the player would get in these environments would be lessened if everything was too vibrantly presented.

 

[Neutrino]

Reak, that 2nd quote u have of me is called sarcasm. nice try in attempting to make me look stupid...yet you've done it onto yourself yet again...

Me thinks you missed the point.

 

[Mr. Redundant]

the quality of the video was crappy to begin with (even the 700mb fp one) Im holding judgement until I see a high quality bink...

remember theres nothing cooler than 16xaf 6xaa

 

[ShinRa]

Ok I'm talking (not COMPLAINING) about the OUTDOOR ENVIORNMENTS, you know, which MATTER. Not some stupid vaporizing animation that noone will even pay attention to.

 

[hiln]

Ok I'm talking (not COMPLAINING) about the OUTDOOR ENVIORNMENTS, you know, which MATTER. Not some stupid vaporizing animation that noone will even pay attention to.

Sounds like complaining, since your judging it from a crappy cam video of it. We'll see when/if binks of the videos come out.

 

[Mr-Fusion]

Well as ZombieBudgie said it's probably deliberate. That sparseness and barren feel of the moutains adds to the semi-apocolyptic atmosphere of the Half-Life 2 world.

 

[Styloid]

Can you be more specific? Or say what you expected out of the vid or what would not be blah?

 

[dream431ca]

outdoor enviroments, indoor enviroments...As long as there is something to shoot.... I LIKE IT!! :sniper: :sniper:

 

[ShinRa]

Specifically...some of the mountain sides, hills whatever, the grass looks like one flat green texture to me. Idk. I'm probably expecting too much. I just thought there'd be more detail than that.

 

[Impulse147]

your basing your opinion on a video that has crappy quality and also the player is constantly moving in that part.

 

[clarky003]

you obviously havnt been following the game to closely, I understand

 

[Lobster]

considering u probbally cant leave the river area, and ur mainly gonna be traveling fast in an airboat being chased, u wont be stareing at the backdrop relief hills, and even so, i think it looks fine, most games that try and do natural landscapes look like that, even stalker (underneath all the prop grass).

 

[dream431ca]

Calm down humans!! it's not like a piece of grass will change a game.

 

[Mr. Redundant]

textures of basically anything in a crappy shaky cam vid look to be one color, with maybe slight detail...

go look at some of E3 2003's binks (last years) if you arent confident in Valves artwork.
and if anyone has seen/played the leak, you know outdoor is just as gobsmackingly beautiful as everything else... IM A GFX WHORE you can trust me when I say it looks good

 

[Lobster]

And if you think that looks like a HL1 outdoor enviroment, you obviously havnt played HL1 in a long time, COMPLETE WITH PINK ROCKS OF DOOM!

 

[ShinRa]

Mr redundant did playing the leak kill the hype for you? Like isnt the physics and the graphics just boring now that uve seen and played them to death?

 

[Mr. Redundant]

however if you said outdoor environments look to be a tad squarish in geometry, no one would dissagree... since HL2 still uses .BSP based maps, you construct your map from primitives and then populate it with textures and models...

so yeah you wont get the free flowing rolling hills like in FC, or BF:1942.. but how do they handle indoor environs? sadly.

Im trying to get into CS.. (never liked it, well I did back in the first releases waaaay back in the day) but man the accuracy thing is so random.... sit still aim shoot for head (tap) hit, he turns around and sprays = he wins.. from half a level away...
a lot of the time I feel cheated then some games I get on and I just own...
the accuracy and ballistics is waaaaay to heavily reliant on luck and random bullet patterns regardless of how still you are.

and yeah Im trying to get into CS, because CS:Source is around the corner... I figure what the hell eh?

Mr redundant did playing the leak kill the hype for you? Like isnt the physics and the graphics just boring now that uve seen and played them to death?

heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeel no... if anything I cant wait more than anyone else to get my hands on my two copies....
I was absolutely blown away, and the E3 2004 vids just make me even more err moist
the physics arent used as... techdemo.. or gimmick status, its part of a living breathing world, sure picking up barrels and throwing them at things gets boring... any repetitive action does... its having the option to manipulate EVERYTHING in your environment, use anything as a weapon, it really really adds to the immersion.

 

[Wesisapie]

go and play hl1. then look at the video again. its bucket loads better.
and i agree with the comment about you contradicting yourself, you made fun of someone for commenting about something looking poor, then did the same yourself
wait a second, let me try the same thing to you.

OMGzzZZz Wy DUZznT the H1LLS LOOK BETTAR!!!%#232five i WOENT BYE IT NOW@!!

it's really quite clever, isnt it?

 

[Intamin]

Well, when I played the leak, it didn't ruin much for me. But I never played it.

Don't play it, it's probably a static shadow compared to today's build and from the looks of the E3 vids, even with their horrible resolutions.

 

[Mr. Redundant]

stay away from the leak, I in no way condone even looking at it.
and no I dont have it, however I did try it when it first was erm, leaked (to my shame... damn no willpower, and I rationalized that I had just bought a new video car, and cpu/mobo just for HL2)

its so close to release now, and its going to be so damn good, nothing can touch it.

 

[Smawg]

I did notice that and thats what i was complaining about earlier... but im gonna say i didnt notice it.

 

[Styloid]

So I guess your idea of non-blah mountains would be having lots of grass and plants that 'stick out' of the grass texture. I think that would be pretty good and we've seen it in Stalker. I'm not sure if it could be done in Source.

 

[Lobster]

So I guess your idea of non-blah mountains would be having lots of grass and plants that 'stick out' of the grass texture. I think that would be pretty good and we've seen it in Stalker. I'm not sure if it could be done in Source.

Yes it can, Battlegrounds mod recently completed this in the Half-Life 1 engine, Ive already seen examples of it in HL2, I think its called blended prop ... somthing..

 

[Styloid]

Yes it can, Battlegrounds mod recently completed this in the Half-Life 1 engine, Ive already seen examples of it in HL2, I think its called blended prop ... somthing..

yeah, the little bit of grass in the hovercraft vid looked like the same kind of thing. I wonder why they didn't put a bit of grass on the mountains (instead of the relatively flat looking texture).

 

[MultiVaC]

If there is that kind of grass on the mountains you'd have to get closer to see it. Look how it works in the rest of the game.

 

[Apos]

The grass is detail textures which are set to fade in when you are a certain distance from an object. A lot of games use it now. I think you can set the distance to your liking, with, obviously performance considerations.

 

[Viperidae]

Originally Posted by Mr. Redundant
however if you said outdoor environments look to be a tad squarish in geometry, no one would dissagree... since HL2 still uses .BSP based maps, you construct your map from primitives and then populate it with textures and models...

Nope, they use deformable terrain, i.e. you have vertex handles in a brush, and you raise/lower the terrain in these specific spots (think rolling hills), so you can achieve much more realistic terrain.

 

[Colonel Sanders]

Isn't the grass a form of sprite? I always thought it was.

 

[DarkStar]

Guinny...I really don't listen to anything you say anymore. Sorry, but all of your posts are either nonsensical or contradictory. Bye.

 

[PvtRyan]

Nope, they use deformable terrain, i.e. you have vertex handles in a brush, and you raise/lower the terrain in these specific spots (think rolling hills), so you can achieve much more realistic terrain.

You can also import 8-bit grayscale heightmaps I think, just like in BF1942.

 

[Gunner]

considering u probbally cant leave the river area, and ur mainly gonna be traveling fast in an airboat being chased, u wont be stareing at the backdrop relief hills, and even so, i think it looks fine, most games that try and do natural landscapes look like that, even stalker (underneath all the prop grass).

QFE! when you're traveling at 50mph you shouldn't be looking at the scenery but what's in front of you. It's like saying the ground textures on flight sims look bad, well of course they're not top notch but it's like that for a reason.

 

[Mr. Redundant]

Nope, they use deformable terrain, i.e. you have vertex handles in a brush, and you raise/lower the terrain in these specific spots (think rolling hills), so you can achieve much more realistic terrain.

really? well color me moron, sorry about that.
if thats the case though... why does it visually (at least from what has been shown) look so squarish, just like HL1 geometry with static models added?