Large world, tiny people - Map Design flaw

[Tazzuki.2648]

Comment moved below

Edited August 19, 2021 by Tazzuki.2648

[Tazzuki.2648]

49 minutes ago, Chaba.5410 said:

That's fair.  I think you could have approached the topic a little differently.

 

At the uni I went to, the teaching style was more theoretical than vocational so a lot of time was spent thinking and writing critically about art.  The approach used was to ask first why we think the artist made those decisions and what our own biases were that could be coloring our feelings towards the art to start a discussion from there.  You could imagine this was actually a difficult activity for those who thought they could just cruise through college on an "easy" art degree.

Apologies if I come across strong, however did you not see that I was questioning the art direction at the start of the post?  The point of the post was to -start- critical thinking which for some reason flew over your head. My degree was no way near as easy as you paint it to be and I’m not posting a whole essay on a Guildwars forum for upset chaba. Now instead of questioning my format of the post how about you try add to it? because I honestly don’t have the time if you’re just going to complain and not add anything remotely relevant.
 

CCing is back and forth about the subject, not the person behind posting the subject 

but you would know that if you actually finished your collage/uni 😊

Edited August 19, 2021 by Tazzuki.2648

[Xeph.4718]

Somebody has obviously never played Lord of the Rings online and been to Moria...

[Chaba.5410]

27 minutes ago, Tazzuki.2648 said:

Did you not see that I was questioning the art direction at the start of the post?  The point of the post was to START critical thinking which for some reason flew over your head.

Starting off a conversation by saying something is flawed and how you don't like it and how it should be another way is NOT how one starts critically thinking about a subject.

 

Nor did I specify that YOUR degree was easy, only detailed the general educational philosophy at the Uni I attended to provide background on why I thought you could have approached the topic differently.  There were fellow students in my classes that often looked like deer caught in headlights and complaints that the program didn't teach enough vocational skills.

 

Questioning the format of your post is exactly what is needed here because the tone you set dictated the types of responses you got.  If you haven't noticed, the majority of responses here aren't talking about a theory of scaling in game artwork, but people trying to explain to you why you're wrong and you arguing back why you're right, like that whole tangent about arches, to which I did "add to it" and never got a response from you about.

Edited August 19, 2021 by Chaba.5410

[Forum Moderator.3419]

Hello Everyone,

Just a reminder to keep it civil and avoid attacking each other.

Regards.

[Astralporing.1957]

19 hours ago, LSD.4673 said:

Never a good sign of a community when any form of even remote criticism has to be prefaced with "i love the game and have played it for years!"...

Sometimes it is a bad sign about community, but sometimes it's just a bad sign about the criticism in question.

[Tazzuki.2648]

1 hour ago, Chaba.5410 said:

Starting off a conversation by saying something is flawed and how you don't like it and how it should be another way is NOT how one starts critically thinking about a subject.

 

Nor did I specify that YOUR degree was easy, only detailed the general educational philosophy at the Uni I attended to provide background on why I thought you could have approached the topic differently.  There were fellow students in my classes that often looked like deer caught in headlights and complaints that the program didn't teach enough vocational skills.

 

Questioning the format of your post is exactly what is needed here because the tone you set dictated the types of responses you got.  If you haven't noticed, the majority of responses here aren't talking about a theory of scaling in game artwork, but people trying to explain to you why you're wrong and you arguing back why you're right, like that whole tangent about arches, to which I did "add to it" and never got a response from you about.

Taking into account the moderated warning, don’t worry we will keep it civil! 

I looked back to search what you posted (bare in mind you’re not the only person replying so I might have missed it) and all you did was link a picture of arches and typed ‘ LOL ok ’. leading into a city.

Multiple arches but I would still consider it a single peice directing into something massive from what I could see. Although I’m not familiar with the piece you specific posted but feel free to elaborate on it. 
 

Ps

I did state in the post I’m not a great writer due to Dylexia so really I’m limited on what I can format with what I was handed as writing is already a struggle without autocorrect. Never stated I was right or wrong just that I wanted to start a topic about scale and people’s counter arguments that don’t agree with me are great and some people agree with me and that’s also great. 
 

it’s best not to go through the forums expecting everyone to be the best writer instead indulge in what they’re trying to say 😊 I’ll work on myself but alas that for the future. 

Edited August 19, 2021 by Tazzuki.2648

[LucosTheDutch.4819]

If you think DR is bad, wait until you enter LA. Lion's Arch used to look great, but now it looks like an oversized water themepark. Especially the plaza in the middle where the festivals are held is just out-of-this-world big and destroys any sense of scale.

 

With DR I never felt the architecture is unreasonably big. Yeah, some of it is grandiose, but we have our fair share of grandiose buildings in real life, with archways much bigger than necessary, simply to impress the visitors.

 

Houses are usually too big as well, but that's actually for a reason: it's because they need to be big enough so charr and norn players aren't locked out. They wanted all areas to be accessible to all players, and so that means we have a lot of oversized doors and houses in order to accommodate the max-height norn and max-height charr.

[Tazzuki.2648]

1 hour ago, LucosTheDutch.4819 said:

If you think DR is bad, wait until you enter LA. Lion's Arch used to look great, but now it looks like an oversized water themepark. Especially the plaza in the middle where the festivals are held is just out-of-this-world big and destroys any sense of scale.

 

With DR I never felt the architecture is unreasonably big. Yeah, some of it is grandiose, but we have our fair share of grandiose buildings in real life, with archways much bigger than necessary, simply to impress the visitors.

 

Houses are usually too big as well, but that's actually for a reason: it's because they need to be big enough so charr and norn players aren't locked out. They wanted all areas to be accessible to all players, and so that means we have a lot of oversized doors and houses in order to accommodate the max-height norn and max-height charr.

I remember the old LA I agree it quite a jump in differences. It has its good sides like the bridge over to fractals and the jumping puzzles. But also it’s goofy sides like the octopus then a massive empty area right in front of it. It’s great to have fun things but that’s down to questions such as ‘does it match the lore of LA?’ Since I know there used to be a massive lion statue and I don’t see many lions represented in LA anymore.
 

and after a huge attack I can’t imagine LA would want to make a giant octopus xD but I’m just theorising that. Normally after wars citys/towns would want to make themselves look more intimidating for future conflicts I would assume.

Edited August 19, 2021 by Tazzuki.2648

[nopoet.2960]

20 minutes ago, Tazzuki.2648 said:

I remember the old LA I agree it quite a jump in differences. It has its good sides like the bridge over to fractals and the jumping puzzles. But also it’s goofy sides like the octopus then a massive empty area right in front of it. It’s great to have fun things but that’s down to questions such as ‘does it match the lore of LA?’ Since I know there used to be a massive lion statue and I don’t see many lions represented in LA anymore.
 

and after a huge attack I can’t imagine LA would want to make a giant octopus xD but I’m just theorising that. Normally after wars citys/towns would want to make themselves look more intimidating for future conflicts I would assume.

I think you have the tools to answer your own question.  Consider what the artist was trying to communicate and also what problems were they trying to solve.  Though you may disagree the style it does what it needs to do functionally and I think most of the environmental artistic decisions communicate what was intended.   

[nosleepdemon.1368]

Imagine being a professional artist and not knowing that environmental upscale is a requirement in 3rd person games? Go read about what happened when Blizzard tried making WoW to scale originally - everything was far too cramped for the camera.

[Tazzuki.2648]

23 hours ago, lokh.2695 said:

Something that bothers me more, but is a more recent thing since mounts came to the game, is the forced perspective in DR. On launch, designers put tiny houses at the edge of the map that, when seen from the ground trickes your brain into thinking they're farther away. Now with mounts, you can go to these houses and see that not even an asura could fit through some of the doors. A better example you can find is the aerodrome where, to make the room look taller than it actual is, the airships get smaller and smaller the higher up they are.

this is exactly what bothers me tooo! And I'm glad you mentioned it. Maybe it just an issue of an out of date map which is where I think the flawed statement comes into play. not to say 'entirely flawed' which is mostly far from being since everything works functionally. Just for me not visually. 

[Tyncale.1629]

On 8/18/2021 at 7:11 PM, Tazzuki.2648 said:

 

 

lets talk about the issues of clipping/cameras! we do have a first person perspective option so if we did have smaller spaces people could switch to first person if they wished to. Plenty of replies have made fair arguments that a lot of players would dislike the awkwardness of it all and I completely agree. So the solution is not to make things smaller but indeed something else. 

 

So we agree that players like the 3rd person viewpoint and camera-handling would become a chore and feel cramped in smaller quarters. What would your solution be?  Seems to me that MMO-developers are simply between a rock and a hard place here.

 

I understand where you are coming from though. In Everquest we initially grew up with playing in 1st person and proportions in cities felt much better. Dungeons felt nicely cramped too.  3rd person was rather bad in Everquest, though I think most people are playing it in 3rd now anyway.  I think it was also the novelty of MMO's back then, that players not only accepted 1st person so easily, but even preferred it. I remember I did, to the point of being dismissive of newer MMO's who did not even have 1st person.  

That has changed now, I sometimes go in 1st person in GW2  but that's just for looking around a bit or examining something closer. 🙂

 

I have no solution other then designing a new MMO that *only* has a first person view. I wonder if there is a niche market for that?

 

 

 

 

[Roda.7468]

Honestly, I think the focus on macro structures and infrastructure is misplaced.  Like I think having enough room for the biggest possible player character AND their camera has kinda been talked to death at this point.

 

Props (including doors and windows) are honestly where the most inconsistency lies in this game.

Take a tour of the durmond priory.  Look at that mess.

Edited August 19, 2021 by Roda.7468

[Gehenna.3625]

On 8/18/2021 at 7:11 PM, Tazzuki.2648 said:

 

Divinity’s Reach. Why is there so many giant archways? And why would an archway be ten times bigger then a mount to reach a bank? Or a trade post?  Why does a bank look more of like a horse stable then a bank… basically what I’m trying to say is.. the map design dose not sell or convince me that I’m in a world that cares about the reasoning for the architecture and why (as example) the divinity’s reach civilians would need giant archways (as example) 

I would say it's the exact same reason why people in real life built things like the huge cathedrals with huge doors and way too high ceilings as well: to show off. 

 

But there's also another reason why some things are oversized and that's to facilitate camera angles. Just try to get a decent camera angle when you stand very close to a wall or go into a small building.

[Chaba.5410]

On 8/19/2021 at 9:54 AM, Tazzuki.2648 said:

I looked back to search what you posted (bare in mind you’re not the only person replying so I might have missed it) and all you did was link a picture of arches and typed ‘ LOL ok ’. leading into a city.

Multiple arches but I would still consider it a single peice directing into something massive from what I could see. Although I’m not familiar with the piece you specific posted but feel free to elaborate on it.

 

It's part of an old Roman aqueduct among several others that cuts through the middle of Istanbul.  The point was that it was an example of the opposite of all the points you tried to make about arches based on aesthetics.  The arches 1) don't come limited, 2) isn't meant to compliment a space, and 3) aren't intended to lead one into a culturally important space.  They're purely functional.  They bring water to a city and dump it into a collection of hundreds of large underground cisterns (which incidentally are also built of numerous columns and arches/vaults).

 

Let's go back to your first post because it reveals more about this aesthetics vs. function idea:

Quote

Divinity’s Reach. Why is there so many giant archways? And why would an archway be ten times bigger then a mount to reach a bank? Or a trade post?  Why does a bank look more of like a horse stable then a bank… basically what I’m trying to say is.. the map design dose not sell or convince me that I’m in a world that cares about the reasoning for the architecture and why (as example) the divinity’s reach civilians would need giant archways (as example) 

 

If you want to be in a world that cares about the reasoning for the architecture, it doesn't make much sense to me why a city built mostly of stone and brick would not have giant archways.  Nor does it make sense to me why there would not be giant flying buttresses to help support the weight of the walls of the entire towering palatial structure.  Not having those things would break immersion to me, like what happened when I saw some parts of an aqueduct ruin defy gravity in the New World MMO or like the backwards strung Watchkeeper Trophy Bow in GW2.  I think it is easier to overlook scaling than some virtual object that tries to mimic a real world object poorly.

The reasoning for the architecture essentially comes down to the materials, not unlike the perceptional constraints of moving through a 3D landscape on a 2D screen dictating some of the scaling.  Stone and brick are strong compressive materials but not very high in tensile strength (pulling apart).  Arches are compressive structures where gravity keeps the weight of the blocks in compression, not only for decoration.  By the time Gothic architecture came around, architects were able to create lighter buildings that could be built even higher without collapsing under their own weight by the addition of the type of arch known as a flying buttress.

 

The bank I think you're talking about in DR looks a lot more to me like an old Byzantine building than a horse stable.  In fact, most of DR's stone/brick structures look like some mix of Byzantine Revival and Gothic styles while the giant dome in the center looks like cast-iron architecture from the 18th century.  These more modern architectural styles are probably meant to help communicate the idea that Kryta is 250 years in the future from the original game.

 

Edit: BTW, we can throw a wrench into this discussion by mentioning the Great Northern Wall of Ascalon

Edited August 23, 2021 by Chaba.5410

[Solvar.7953]

The most jarring to me is perhaps the Great Lodge in Hoelbrak.  Aside from it not seeming particular efficient use of space (random beds spread about - wouldn't it be better to make some private rooms), the fact that my character has wandered the world and never come across any trees that would seem to even close in size to build that structure.

However, I also get that this is a design/visual aesthetic - they want the place to feel massive, even if  it may not make a lot of sense within the game itself.