Realistic Graphics Feedback

[-Moose-]

I'm using the Dev build for my ships now, and I'm really liking the new 'realistic' graphics. That said I do have some feedback on them. While I am aware that Schema didn't make the graphics, I am not aware of who did, so this seems like the best place to put it. If someone could refer to me the person who creates the graphics, I would be happy to contact them about my feedback.



Power Tanks and Power Generators need distinct and easily identifiable graphics. From a distance the blocks look the same, and even up close the only differance is the animation and the faint green glow, which isn't distinctive enough to identify them on their own. In previous versions power tanks were red, and generaters were blue, making them easily distinguishable perhaps something similiar can be done.

The Missile Computers in the Hotbar all look the same, it is essential that these are easily identifiable while in the hot bar. I don't know if this is a placeholder or not, but it should be changed.

As nice as it is to have glass without tint, it's also fairly annoying in its own way, it's difficult to tell which way wedges are facing or if there's any glass there at all. Perhaps a more identifiable rim or a very slight color tinge to signify the presence of glass.

As much as I like the HAL reference in the new BOBBY AI module, I feel it is more important for Star-Made to have it's own Iconic graphic than to swipe an idea from someone else. The old angry face was easily iconic in and of itself and could easily linked to Star-Made while the new graphic is linked to an unrelated movie. To put it another way, it would be like if Minecraft turned the Creeper face into the face of Captain Picard.

 

[Captain Fortius]

I\'ll add my two cents if you don\'t mind;

Using the realistic texture pack, ships look like realistic bathrooms with all those square tiles. The gaps are too large and dark between them.

Communicating these concerns to anyone who could do anything about them is nigh impossible though. At least the textures we can fix ourselves with some patience.

 

[DJ-Col7]

They plan to combine them into one system soon.

 

[WaffulMann]

Kupu made those textures as an texture pack before schema (or some dev) decided to make kupu the head artist. And a long time ago beetlebear (I think) made those \"old style\" textures. But beetlebear quit because of money apparantly. Correct me if I\'m wrong.

http://star-made.org/content/starmade-texture-pack

That\'s the original thread.



I do agree with that person who said that everything looks like realistic bathrooms. we need spaceship-y looks, large, futuristic, sciency, and the current grey hull just makes your ships look like they are made of concrete. That is not good.

I agree that a lot of people like to make their ships complicated and with a lot of pipe-sort things (like all minmatar ships), but they should make, say, normal hull look like that, not hulls that cover wide areas.

And while we\'re on the topic of hulls, damn, we need more colors. And armor. aaaand color.

 

[blurb357]

kupu made the texture + the hardened hull isn\'t a nice texture.

 

[kupu]

It was recently anounced in the news article that i was handling new textures, as i always have been, I am contactable via PM or in my texture threads in the Project Logs or General Discussion.



Give me a few minutes and i\'ll repsond in full to the feedback in this thread.

 

[kupu]

Hey Guys,

Thanks for the feedback, believe it or not the Dev\'s do listen!

@-Moose-

Powertanks and Gen\'s ; Yea, they are quite similar, although the animations are very different. I think a simple colour change might be in order to differentiate the two better from a distance.

Missile Computers ; I think the Missle computer blocks is subject to change in upcoming patches, as such it is a waste of resources to alter these now to have them be changed / removed.

Glass ; Glass is a hard block to balance. Lot\'s of players are wanting to use it in a realistic sense, to be able to clearly see out of glass cockpits / bridges, although i do realise this gives certain troubles in build mode.
It\'s something i will have to look into, although i am not wanting to go back to the misty glass of the old textures.

Bobby ; Please note the textures we\'re adopted from a personal project of mine. They are undergoing a slow evolution to bring them closer in line with the original theme of Starmade. Although perhaps you\'ve noticed the huge amount of 2001 easter eggs in the game already?



@Captain Fortius ;

The hard hull is actually the same sqaure \'tile\' layout of the older textures. It was kept similar in appearance to avoid the plethora of players complaining about the game changing too much.

It\'s depth was added to combat those opposing \"flat\" textures.

With coming updates, it might well be possible to avoid having to use this one block for an entire ship as i feel that is largely the problem. Essentially being forced to use limited amounts of blocks for ship preformance is impacting on the asthetics. Something i\'m against.

I\'d like to keep the current hard hull and just see more variants added.



@WaffulMann ;

Although i for the most part agree with you, i am (or was) limited while making this texture pack.

Creating a \"one size fits all\" sheet of textures that have to be generic enough to cater to all players, yet carry enough \"starmade flavour\" is no walk in the park. I can\'t cater to especially to JJ Abrams star trek fans... or specific H R Giger requests, nor can i make it look like that favorite show or allow you make replicas of that EVE ship you always liked in perfectly fitting textures.

However, we DO need more variation, we do need more colours and we can push the boundries of our designs further. All things i intend to do, it just takes time.



@NeonStrum ; Yea. This is something the Dev\'s have been discussing. We would all like to see more colours added with easier handling in the inventory / build mode.



As always thanks for the feedback.

Please remember everything you see is in alpha! Expect changes.

 

[generalBLT13]

if you use the dev you may never be able to use your ships on another version or on any servers, so stick to the latest version of the stable game and wait for the dev to be stable.

 

[-Moose-]

Thank you for your feedback Kupu!

And keep up the great work. I can\'t wait to see how the graphics will evolve in the future.







if you use the dev you may never be able to use your ships on another version or on any servers, so stick to the latest version of the stable game and wait for the dev to be stable.





If a change in the versions causes all my ships to be unloadable, chances are it will affect all the ships in older versions as well.

 

[ltmauve]

The inventory icons for normal and hardened hull are very difficult to tell apart. Also, the white pentas and white full block icons are also close to indistiguishable.

 

[NeonSturm]

Glass ; Glass is a hard block to balance. Lot\'s of players are wanting to use it in a realistic sense, to be able to clearly see out of glass cockpits / bridges, although i do realise this gives certain troubles in build mode.
It\'s something i will have to look into, although i am not wanting to go back to the misty glass of the old textures.


Same with water.

I would prefer to have different textures (with outlines) for build mode. Is it possible to make a build-mode-overlay?


@NeonStrum ; Yea. This is something the Dev\'s have been discussing. We would all like to see more colours added with easier handling in the inventory / build mode.


Good to know that devs are aware of it



For hulls, I prefer to have low-health, low-weight and low-cost deko hulls, one station-hull with the biggest downside in weight (or eff. hp per block) and one hull for actual protection.

Maybe a forth type: Military grade hull - not affordable/usefull for players, but maybe to buff military sector patrols...



I think all (except some deko) hull types should have either a \"chaotic\" or one-color plating where it doesn\'t hurt the visuals too much instead of \"having not fitting textures\" on parts of wedges, corners, tetras (and maybe incomplete sides of pentas)

• this makes a lot more sense with weight of vitals >hulls > deko in mind (weight either through code or how many you use).

With all the stuff planets have, would it not be fun to have some walk-through full blocks? like redwood/ice leaves or some plants which cover walls and the whole sprite width/height

I would like a waterfall with some hidden chamber behind



Also be fun to have NPC sprite-blocks for a bird, wolf or a few butterfly in the default pack (for your space-station garden). It would make it easier to use ships/stations on different servers.

 

[kupu]

In the current Dev builds the block icons in the inventory and hotbar are placeholders.

 

[kupu]

Re: Glass, Currently i don\'t think we can have seperate textures for buildmode.

You could alter the pysical state of blocks already in the block editor if you like though.

(Check out Crusades USE mod. He created a forcefield block that is immune to 5 damage and below ((pistol fire)), yet can be walked through by all players. + a few other cool blocks)

 

[ante185]

You could have a teaxture that goes along the edges when in build mode, like a wireframe and for all block that is aswell so it doesn\'t matter what the block looks like.

The diffrent missile computers could have some colour diffrence, like generator and enegry tank

 

[FlyingDebris]

This could actually kill three birds with one stone.

Remove hull colors, freeing up the shops and inventories.
Add a color picker, kind of like Paint.NET has.
Allow hulls to be grouped, and entire sections can be changed at once, allowing for easy hull customization.

(Make hull grouping an option, for simpification. It would simply be a selector allowing to customize whole groups at once.)

 

[Magrim]

And an expansion of the idea:

I believe it has been said before but, what about ripping off a popular mod for another not so small block based game and implement connected textures, through the hull grouping option FlyingDebris spoke of. Make it independent of color choice, meaning you can connect 2 hulls of different color.

+ Could go a long way in fixing the \"realistic bathrooms\" look.

+ Who doesnt want large plating on their million block ship instead of 10 trillion little plates.

- Dont think it will work with current textures. Maybe when kupu designs the new hulls he could keep this in mind.

 

[kupu]

We\'ve discussed slicing textures and their merits amongst the devs. Regardless of our thoughts on the matter, the game currently doesn\'t have them. As such (and unfortunately) suggesting changes for the current textures relying on unsupported mechanics is moot.

 

[Ithirahad]

...Compared to the flat old textures, the deep grooves are a bit much.

 

[Magrim]

I know it\'s moot, thats why i wasn\'t suggestinig changes to the current textures

 

[General_Revil]

Well I haven\'t seen all of the blocks yet, but what I think is the realistic texture should be a realistic version of the original texture. That means the design should stay the same, but the style should be realistic.