Demo 1st impressions from accross the pond

Thu Feb 27, 2003 1:36 pm by kalniel

First of all, I'm going to try and make this demo last, because I won't be seeing the game for a very long time...

So I haven't played all that much, but I thought I'd share some opinions that I'm not sure others have touched on.

One of the first things that hit me was the camera movement when you're planet side - it's sheer hollywood quality and something I really didn't expect. I guess that's the bonus of having 3d planetside areas. Likewise the characters are amazing - not great on the poly side, but there's detail where it matters. I'm a Morrowind fan, which has extremely high poly characters, but the faces and hands in freelancer are far superior and bring the characters to life a lot more. And talk about animation! The way a girl walks in this game, swinging her arms, moving hips realistically, even the way the hands open and flex as they walk is all done really well.

Which kind of led me to ask the question: Why did someone spend so much time on the characters? They're obviously highly polished but the quality seems suited to a first person shooter - they are as good as, if not better than, Jedi Outcast.

Onto the spaceport areas. I did notice that the textures don't match up to the quality of the characters. At a distance, like the overhead shots, they look great, but then at that distance you don't need so detailed characters either. But if you zoom in to see the detail of the character (during a transaction) then you also spot the problems with the background textures/design. It doesn't feel up to the quality of 2d backdrops, but then it needed to be 3d to get the cool camera movements etc in.

I also have to say the lighting is very well done, again something that requires the 3d environment.

I realise I'm spending a lot of time talking just about starbase etc interactions, but I think that's because it feels like the devs have spent a lot of time on them too. Maybe too much time, because game-wise they don't seem to serve any more purpose than the privateer games, and a lot less than strike-commander.

Once in space the thing I really picked up on was the elegance. Disregarding combat for a moment, just selecting systems, setting waypoints and going places in general is a truely fluid experience. I'm sure I will spend a lot of time exploring and I'm glad the devs have made this a joy, rather than a chore. Likewise there's something very satisfying watching the relative motions of ships pass each other, or when other ships enter cruise mode and you join them moments later. It just oozes coolness.

Combat. Something I need to spend more time on, but I have to say I can feel the difference between the rhino and the starting ship - but only at extreme turn rate when my mouse is right off the screen as I try to turn the thing around and whop that rogue behind me. I can't decide if having nano-bots and shield batteries is a bit like the health and mana potions in Dungeon Siege - as long as you're well stocked up the experience can be a bit like you're on rails rather than you can mess things up. It's a bit weird. Certainly it's very frantic and pretty, but it also feels a bit like something like rogue squadron. However I can't really comment yet.

Graphically I've been pretty impressed all the way through. Bar the textures planetside, everything else has looked amazing and in my eyes better than any previous space sims. I have 2x Anti-aliasing and 4x Ansotropic Filtering as my default, and it does look movie like to me. Likewise the effects like star-lense-flares are a nice touch, and a lot less intruding than in other games.

The sound just adds to the experience, making combat more intense and space more serene. Some of the volumes for voices could do with some tweaking though as I struggled to make out some things, while others were very clear.

Well I look forward to spending more time with the demo, and certainly it's had a positive effect so far with regards persuading me to get the game.

Kalniel

Thu Feb 27, 2003 2:40 pm by WhiteTiger

Cool! Good review! And just imagine...the demo is only a very, very small part of the game!

Thu Feb 27, 2003 3:11 pm by bagemk

I'm also from "across the pond" and I have to disagree with you, lest everyone believes that we accept lower quality here.

How can you praise the lighting in the demo? Space is lit up like a badly draw cartoon. There are no night sides to the planets. The space stations are of low-poly count and have no shadows. (In Wing Commander Prophecy all those years ago, stations had dark and light sides)

The on-planet graphics are attrocious. Given that there is insignificant otehr activity for the CPU to do at these times, we should be looking at correctly lit scenes with real light sources, shadows and more than a few 100 polygons. In 2003, the hair should move, the jacket should be 3D - not just a texture.

Given that the development team started with the Starlancer code, I cannot see what they've been doing for three of the four years it has taken to develop this.

Thu Feb 27, 2003 3:39 pm by RubberEagle

a) this game does NOT use StarLancer code
b) show me the first person shooter with "moving Hair" and jackets that are modeled different from the one's in FreeLancer. THIS IS A SPACE SIM, IT'S ABOUT SHIPS, NOT HUMAN MODELS!!!!
c) low poly stations: you don't really have any experience in modelling, do you? otherwise i can't explain how you come to think of the space stations only having "a few 100 polygons". I think i can call myself a veteran modeller, and i assure you, the models in freelancer have way beyond 2000 polygons.

The texture quality on planet could have been better, but still is acceptable.

If you want a more realistic space sim, go and play I-war2, and have fun with it (i didn't)

Thu Feb 27, 2003 3:46 pm by kalniel

I was refering to the lighting planet side. Ok shadows aren't really in, but the way characters are lit seems pretty cool to me - like right at the start when you step into the ship yard and the lights get turned on side by side.

I've not spent all that much time in space, but the lighting seems OK there as well - there are dark sides to things - look at the main menu for eg. It's just not a whole half of the structure in blackness, just a few surfaces.

Kalniel

Thu Feb 27, 2003 3:57 pm by Fear Factor

Hi bagemk, if you feel that all the reviewers are wrong, how can you explain that ALL of them disagree with you? there's just one explanation: YOU are wrong. FL has had all kinds of critics: on the mouse issue, AI, gameplay, static pricing etc, but NONE of them had touched the graphics. Even the trolls praise FL's graphics.

Thu Feb 27, 2003 4:10 pm by Bargib

The lightning bagemk wants is the same Tach wanted for a long time... the real lightning, where the sun is the source of the light... problem is, that for instance in a nebula wou would often play in pitch darkness, and you where shooting at "HUD-boxes" that attacked you... not much fun...

Best Regards
Christian "Bargib" Koerner
Editor in Chief, The Lancers Reactor

Thu Feb 27, 2003 4:42 pm by WhiteTiger

bagemk....The planets do have darker sides. Maybe you need to adjust your gamma settings on your video card or your monitor is going bad? And as far as the polygons of the stations and objects,...man, are you wrong.

Thu Feb 27, 2003 6:55 pm by RubberEagle

just wanted to clarify that my comments weren't amied at kalniel, but at bagemk...

Thu Feb 27, 2003 7:21 pm by Rogueone

I just wanted to clarify a little background about Freelancer and Starlancer for the fellow who seems to be missing some info here.

Starlancer was brought into development after MS acquired DA, who was already working on Freelancer. As I recall a press release way back when (and my memory could be off here a little), MS already had Warthog developing a game for them, and decided to have them adjust that game to become a prequel for Freelancer, rather than just a stand alone space sim. (again, this is what I recall, it might be off, maybe they contacted Warthog afterward, but in the back of my mind I recall it this way)

With the investment they were going to be putting into Freelancer, it made sense to have a teaser as it were, something to keep fans interested, plus it gets players caught up on the history of this new universe.

You have to remember that Privateer was based on the Wing Commander universe, as Freelancer is based on a universe/time frame setup by Starlancer, which is why Starlancer was very useful in this scenario. I'm sure Chris Roberts would have preferred to use the original universe from WC, but like there was a chance in hell of Origin letting him. So he needed a WC-esque game to setup Freelancer.

So please don't think there is any real relation between SL and FL other than story.

regards,

RogueOne

Thu Feb 27, 2003 7:37 pm by bagemk

Well, my comments have certainly stirred up some reaction.

Given the hype and history of the development team behind this, I expected more.

On a few specific points:

Some seem to think that I was asking too much when I suggested the planet scenes should be better. I do not understand why. A major part of this game is the trading and planetside aspect - so why doesn't it look as good as the in-flight.

RubberEagle: This is not a 3rd person shooter. During the planetary scenes the CPU has 100% of it's time to make the graphics look drop-dead-gorgeous. I was playing Dead Or Alive 3 on the XBox yesterday. That has considerably less CPU and graphics capability than an entry level PC today, yet look at the environments there. Yet DOA3 is 18months old. Look at the models - Freelancer should look like that. (Not necessarily with the girls, but you get the point)

RubberEagle: You state "The texture quality on planet could have been better, but still is acceptable". I would argue that it is not. This is 2003, the game has been in development for four years - it looks significantly worse than other games being released today.

FearFactor: Reviewers are susceptible to all sorts of "interference". Look at the previews of Combat Flight Simulator 3. All said fantastic graphics and plays really well. In practice, the game stutters and runs like a dog on even the latest state of the art systems.

Bargib: I'm not after exact "real" lighting. But there is an in between. The lighting in Freelancer looks to me like a cheap cartoon. I'd like to see something more akin to movie/tv space lighting. In my view, in games where that has been used, it is much more atmospheric.

RogueOne: I take your word for it that SL and FL are different code bases. But as a developer, I would say that is plain stupid. No wonder they need MS to bail them out. You do not waste money doing the same thing twice. FL is not different enough from SL to justify it. (There is more variation in all the FPS that share the Quake engine than SL to FL)

Thu Feb 27, 2003 10:20 pm by GnatB

I'm pretty much a lurker, but I feel obliged to bring up a few points.

1. There is directional lighting, the side of the planet/space station/whatever away from the sun *is* darker than the side facing it, at least in the demo.

2. There is no "shadowed side" to anything. If you are on the darkside of a spacestation/planet, you are getting hit fully by the suns light as if you weren't.

3. There is no excuse for this. I've heard people here saying then you would be shooting at pure black, just using targetting boxes. There *is* ambient light in space. Quite a bit of it, actually. Go outside on a dark night and look around. Not only do you get reflected light from planets/moon, but there is also quite a bit of light from the stars. Is it as bright as pure day? No.... but you would just use the "ambient" light to light the objects. Just like the dark side of planets/spacestations aren't pure black, but are lit by spaces "ambient" light.

4. I'm sorry, but the graphics in freelancer *are* poor. Low resolution textures all around. You'd have thought they'd at least stick higher res textures on the docking bay areas that you frequently get close to, instead of letting you count the pixels. NO dynamic lighting either. Laser bolts don't light the sky, as it were. Explosions don't even seem to other than the semi-transparent "glow" particles/polies they like to throw up... (probably the same glow engine that thrust uses)... incidently, fairly ugly when you see said "glow" particles/polys actually clipping through a ship.... Don't fly too close to a ship on fire, or you'll see what I'm talking about.

5. So yes, the graphics are adequate, but they are *NOT* good.

Thu Feb 27, 2003 10:32 pm by Yapab

I havent really looked into the graphics side of the game, I like eye candy but prefer good AI / gameplay instead of good graphics, but wouldnt mind both

Though the dynamic light issue and shadows is BADDDDDDDDDDDD like if your behind a planet on its dark side, shouldnt you be harder to see? it should be darker, that way attacks and ambushes could more easily be implemented. In how many space movies have we seen ships and attack coming from 'DARK' areas of planets etc??? many!!!! too bad FL doesnt have this... shame

Yapa

Fri Feb 28, 2003 1:54 pm by kalniel

Many discussions on this already. Ambient lighting was only added late in the dev process - lack of ambient lighting was in the marketing for a long time. But I hear it just wasn't fun when you hit a nebula or dark area. And there are areas that are pretty near pitch black. I have enough trouble seeing in the badlands as it is! Maybe an expansion or future game might be able to get around this problem.

--
continuation of demo impressions:

After playing the demo a bit more, I think combat isn't so dumb. Finding the afterburner and thrust reverse keys certainly helps. I am getting keyboard overload problems though! While it's neat that everything is to hand, I'm beginning to struggle to hit the right key and quite often I'm missing.. But I don't want to remap because I need them close to hand. I might experiment with more mappings to the mouse or something.

I've begun noticing the dialogue repetitions now as well. I don't really mind but it's a bit annoying listening to the small talk before getting your rumour.

Note for demo users - don't do what I did and pay to have a planet location revealed - it wasn't in my system so I couldn't get to it in the demo!

I've found the boundaries of the demo system pretty much now, I'm glad it's only a small part of the game. Having said that, there's quite a lot in it. I love the huge number of things that you can dock to. I also love the way you can just go anywhere, either via trade lanes or not. Just avoid the badlands!

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