Thogh the reaction is exagerated, what's so hard about making water sprites? For an open world game set in environnement surrounded by water..that's kind of....
I don't know what the development of the game was like but the people behind the game are some of the most talented in the industry. Chances are other things were prioritized over it.
More importantly though, is the fact that 99% of the people bitching about this game are complaining about graphics. Let's say the graphics did look as good as the original E3 demo, what then? Would these people nitpicking at tiny details magically start making love to their game discs? They'd be bitching about something else that is insignificant.
The funny part is that statistically speaking, most PC gamers can't even run the game at high settings and have a playable framerate (according to Steam hardware surveys) so where is the complaining coming from? Do people really want a game that looks amazing, that they can't even play, or is it just the 1% of people with sufficient hardware being loud?
I have a dentist appointment early in the morning, which sucks, but I can't wait to get home and play some Watch Dogs on my PC. According to people who have nearly identical hardware as me, I'll be looking at around 60 FPS at low/medium settings.
not defending the game or the looksof your shot, but that comparison is plain stupid - go wire up your plastation 2 and play some of the latest games again
I still cannot understand how's its legal to post fake videos and market them
It's one of the reasons I'm so eager to get a job in games just to find out.
Seriously, who thought it was a good idea to invent the bullshot? Just create your game on whatever hardware you expect to play it on and take in-game screenshots.
If you really want your game to appear pretty at first, create a short CG movie. At least that's more understandable since no one questions if it's fake or not.
Seriously, who thought it was a good idea to invent the bullshot? Just create your game on whatever hardware you expect to play it on and take in-game screenshots.
If you really want your game to appear pretty at first, create a short CG movie. At least that's more understandable since no one questions if it's fake or not.
You guys should seriously stop. You think they did it on purpose? "Muahaha lets kill all the graphics, just because we CAN hahaha!"
Stuff happens on production. The exact same is happening on the one I am working on atm.
It's one of the reasons I'm so eager to get a job in games just to find out.
"So why do you want this job?"
"So I can find out why publishers lie to me!!"
Good luck!
Reviews are out, 8s and 9s mostly. In the 80s on Metacritic right now. Congratulations to everyone who worked on it!
As for people being terrified about the review embargo, it is kind of lame, but publishers mainly do that because they want all the reviews to hit on the day of release so you can see all the noise/marketing/reviews and then immediately go buy it. The amount of ads and talk I've seen about this game today is insane. And I can buy it today. Which is cool.
Didn't even know this game was a thing until I bought my graphics card and got it free. Its pretty awesome so far, but
<rant> I REALLY HATE that I cannot pull people out of freaking cars. Oh I managed to stop the target I needed without performing a vehicle takedown..time to wait for him to start moving before I can try again. Like, Let me pull him out! This drives me nuts! Every mission involves a freaking vehicle takedown, and I CANT PULL THEM OUT OF THEIR CARS!
</rant>
Other than that I find it pretty fun, Great graphics.. Cinematics are nice.. I don't know anything about the game other than what i've been given. Went in with no expectations.. Guess I need to do the campaign to unlock online play?
Anyhow ill play more tomorrow. Night.
"So why do you want this job?"
"So I can find out why publishers lie to me!!"
Good luck!
Reviews are out, 8s and 9s mostly. In the 80s on Metacritic right now. Congratulations to everyone who worked on it!
As for people being terrified about the review embargo, it is kind of lame, but publishers mainly do that because they want all the reviews to hit on the day of release so you can see all the noise/marketing/reviews and then immediately go buy it. The amount of ads and talk I've seen about this game today is insane. And I can buy it today. Which is cool.
Or you know, simply drop the embargo a week before release date, Spam the reviews and paid for reviews. Get the hype up and no-one thinks you're hawking snakeskin oil. All these massive criticisms would not come about as people would be actively reviewing it and defending the mechanics. Of course you have the negative reviews to deal with but that's the industry, trying to hide away from those reviews does more damage to the company's reputation than a few bad scores.
Too much hype with this game. At the end resulted worse than Alien: Colonial Marines. There are too many gamers that paid for it and are really upset... err, wait, too many other gamers said them: "cancel your pre-order man".
It may be a good game with ps3/xbox360 graphics, and reading reviews it seems it's quite repetitive. Glad i didn't buy it, phew.
Anyways, if the game is on sale for 5$ i'll grab it. It's a huge shame that GTA4 with ENB looks better than this. What a SHAME, and more man.. 2015 is around the corner.
If the division is another game that will end heavily downgraded, it will be another no buy for me. As a PC gamer i don't pay what i pay in hardware for games so obsolete in graphical terms like this one. Ubisoft should learn from Crytek, at least a 5%.
And what Frell said, what just an expression or a way to say how horrible are the graphics. Don't take things literally.
Here's totalbiscuits thoughts. Love him/hate him, I think he gives good level headed reviews generally. I don't always agree with him but at least he gives things a fair shout. Also, looking about at other reviews I'm generally seeing only good things being said about it. I dont know where you guys get all the negative stuff from, except maybe in youtube comments. And we all know how accurate that place is...
strongly agree with fonfa!
On the one hand all we want, that publishers go another direction, do maybe
some different styles and games - with taking risks
on the other, we as developers know how it works (read fonfa`s answer)
yep - read many bad things about watchdogs and that made me curious. The game isnt the old trailer - but its looking quite good!
Did you ever complain to Mcdonalds - cause you didnt get
the excatly burger - shown in the advertisment?
Or you know, simply drop the embargo a week before release date, Spam the reviews and paid for reviews. Get the hype up and no-one thinks you're hawking snakeskin oil. All these massive criticisms would not come about as people would be actively reviewing it and defending the mechanics. Of course you have the negative reviews to deal with but that's the industry, trying to hide away from those reviews does more damage to the company's reputation than a few bad scores.
? I never said I thought this was completely the best route to take or anything. I'm just explaining it isn't the publisher trying to sell snakeskin oil, but trying to maximize the release day impact. So many publishers are doing this, or having reviews drop the day before, so it's not surprising or suspicious. Or you know, get all angry?
so i just played for an hour on my lunch break, and there are a couple of issues i have:
1. driving feels very, very clunky. maybe i'm spoiled by GTA, but i almost feel like that should be the minimum standard for driving controls in a sandbox game.
2. visually the game feels disjointed. individual assets look pretty good, some look incredible. but there is a lot of variance not only in quality but also in the overall look. for example, you have Aiden who looks like he's supposed to be this hyper realistic character, his clothes certainly look that way... and then you see his face, and it's straight into the uncanny valley. and then when you put him into the environment, there's a huge difference not just in quality, but in the way his clothing seems to be lit in comparison to the environment around him. grassy areas look weird (at night, haven't seen daytime yet) with really dark ground but very bright grass. overall it just feels... i dunno, it doesn't feel consistent.
3. lack of atmosphere - currently there seem to be no noticeable atmospherics, no real fog or gloom, the lighting just feels kinda flat.
Ubi has this thing going for them. They launch flawed first entries of their high-budget properties (see Far Cry 2 - the first done internally, Assassin's Creed 1) and then drastically improve on them in subsequent entries. Watch_Dogs will be fine as a franchise.
Threads like this are always great, because its an easy way of seeing which members have established a, hmm, mature (?) understanding of how the industry works, and those who are still looking at things from the outside in. I think this is a category of topics we don't discuss to often around here. Granted, it warrants its own thread.
Watch Dogs looks like a game made for two completely difference systems - previous and current gen, and we're commenting on the current gen. Which, IMO, is viable. Though we need ot have an understanding that what we're seeing on the current generation of consoles is likely the last generations tech with some simple "up-ressing" of materials, geometry, and particle counts.
IMO, once we start to see titles built for current-gen only, we'll be pleasantly surprised by their visuals. Until then, play Watch Dogs for the fun, not the graphics.
we need ot have an understanding that what we're seeing on the current generation of consoles is likely the last generations tech with some simple "up-ressing" of materials, geometry, and particle counts.
IMO, once we start to see titles built for current-gen only, we'll be pleasantly surprised by their visuals.
So much this. Every cross-gen title is going to have this problem for the simple reason that you can't base core rendering technology on stronger hardware specs when you need to ship on 360/PS3 because that tech simply won't work in the budgets available on those platforms.
Imo when we start seeing the second gen of first-party titles which are exclusive to current (XB1/PS4) gen hardware, that's when things are going to start looking noticeably better.
Devs are still working out the hardware and what's possible with it - you only need to look at what was achieved on last-gen with the shift from forward to deferred rendering to see the kind of drastic technological improvements that can (and inevitably will) be made.
The whole WD dramabomb of "oh my gods gais why doesn't the game look like the original reveal graffffixxxx" really couldn't have had any other outcome than this. What was shown was quite obviously a very early prototype, likely built to hardware specs of target-boxes for current-gen consoles (you know, off-the-shelf PCs provided with promises of "well yeah the final console hardware will maybe be somewhere in the ballpark of this. Kinda.").
Yeah it's good to drum up excitement for the franchise, but I can imagine it was never intended to be held up as representative of the final visual fidelity of the end product.
I really don't understand the complaints here. It's not like you just found out the visuals had to be down graded. The latest videos all showed that. Ubisoft didn't lie.
As production went along the visual bar they set became unfeasible so they down graded some things to get the game running properly. It's going to happen especially with games early in the new generation. You don't know what the limitations off the systems are early on, nor how to optimize for them properly. Which is made worse by the fact that your game systems have to run on both last gen and the new generation of consoles.
Also did any one really want to buy Watchdogs because of the visuals? Not trying saying the game looked bad. The game strengths seemed to be from it's gameplay mechanics rather than it's visuals.
Either way congrats to anyone involved in the project. It looks great. I will definitely pick it up soon.
Unfortunately GMG was down last night so I couldn't have my download ready for this morning but it seems to be back up. If anybody purchased the game from GMG, be sure to check your games collection on the site because they gave out a bunch of free games to anybody who pre-ordered Watch Dogs (to make up for being down for the midnight release.)
Threads like this are always great, because its an easy way of seeing which members have established a, hmm, mature (?) understanding of how the industry works, and those who are still looking at things from the outside in. I think this is a category of topics we don't discuss to often around here. Granted, it warrants its own thread.
I agree this isn't a black and white issue and that there's a ton of reasons why games may have to be downgraded.
However, I'm still not excusing the behavior of bullshotery that has over stayed its welcome in the game industry.
As for the Mcdonalds example last page, I hate that stuff too. Companies paying billions to touch up products people will probably buy anyone is always a horrible proposition.
I don't understand why people would defend "Well, most people don't have that powerful computers" when talking about the graphics not able to be any better. That's the whole point of PC, that we can adjust the graphic settings and the likes, to balance quality and fps to fit with the hardware you have now.
So when all the options are set to maximum, it shouldn't be so it can run on the average computer, but for the gamer computer. The standard settings should be what the max console setting would be.
Yeah but tbh a lot of the reason Crysis spanked peoples computers is because it wasn't optimised very well, not because it was balls-to-the-walls OTT graphical fidelity if I remember.
I don't understand why people would defend "Well, most people don't have that powerful computers" when talking about the graphics not able to be any better. That's the whole point of PC, that we can adjust the graphic settings and the likes, to balance quality and fps to fit with the hardware you have now.
So when all the options are set to maximum, it shouldn't be so it can run on the average computer, but for the gamer computer. The standard settings should be what the max console setting would be.
One word: Crysis
But almost everyone stopped making games for top of the line PC specs a decade ago. Now that consoles are king whatever hardware they release with is what most games are designed for.
Getting a top of the line PC specifically for a game, isn't going to allow someone to unlock greater "graphics" that aren't there. I honestly think the amount of effort put into PC ports is, "if it runs on consoles it will probably run on most PC's, ok".
When you develop for wide range of hardware, often the lowest common denominator sets the specs for your top end.
Yeah it's good to drum up excitement for the franchise, but I can imagine it was never intended to be held up as representative of the final visual fidelity of the end product.
now i don't think the game looks bad or anything, but thats just balony.
it was very specifically intendet to wow the crowds at E3, just like the prerendered killzone 2 trailer 2005 or whenever that was. both times it was stated multiple times that this would represent the final quality of the product.
just like that staged deep down trailer.
its just a benchmark running on a buffed up PC and the teams goal is to get as close as possible to that for the final game.
still you can't deny that its a deliberate lie to build hype and get some preorders in while you're at it.
When you develop for wide range of hardware, often the lowest common denominator sets the specs for your top end.
Then why do they show the e3 demo looking so good if they're just going to cut most of it? Ubisoft has made tons of games, they're pretty familiar with what they can handle. I can only guess that they keep over-shooting in quality demos for hype.
I also hate that they hold a playstation controller when showing demos so people assume it's console footage when it's really PC
They're a company and companies are out to make money. They won't stop doing this if its securing pre-orders, why is that so hard to believe?
Mind you I'm not talking about asset quality here, I'm talking about overall rendering. It seems like they purposely boost it for hype
Im honestly ok with the graphical decrease. It happens. And when you`re working on a brand new system, ya, you dont know what the limits are really going to be. You dont hav ethe experience with it yet. Why does "Next-Gen" HAVE to be only about graphics? Look at everything else they do in the game. All the random encounters they have. I think I heard like 70% of the animation budget was spent on the living world. All the hacking stuff you can do.
The driving isnt as good as GTA? Sooo, a game that focuses on hacking doesnt have driving as good as a game that is focused on driving... *Mind BLOWN*
Do I wish the graphics were as good as originally shown? Absolutely. What gamer wouldnt? But not for a second do I think that will make the game unplayable, or even worse just because things needed to be optimized.
I don't plan on buying it just yet (In crunch ATM), but I definitely will want to sink my teeth into this when I get the chance.
I don't understand why people would defend "Well, most people don't have that powerful computers" when talking about the graphics not able to be any better. That's the whole point of PC, that we can adjust the graphic settings and the likes, to balance quality and fps to fit with the hardware you have now.
So when all the options are set to maximum, it shouldn't be so it can run on the average computer, but for the gamer computer. The standard settings should be what the max console setting would be.
One word: Crysis
It's a pretty logical argument in my opinion. If game assets were separated to have "low quality" console assets and "high quality" PC assets, then development of the game would be more expensive and require a larger team, not to mention organization of the entire project would become more difficult.
At the end of the day, you have to remember that games are provided by businesses, they need to get a return on their investment and for a franchise to be considered successful it must also bring in a certain amount of profits. Providing high quality assets just for PC gamers may be the "kind" thing to do, but from a business perspective it isn't worth the effort.
I don't think Crysis is a good example either of the success given by making such a move because it got criticism for being nothing other than a "tech demo", it was on the top of the list of pirated games for a long time, and Crytek changed their entire mentality with the game with both Crysis 2 and 3 (hence why there are people complaining that Crysis 1 with mods still looks better than the other two games.)
As a PC gamer, I'd love for developers to spend more time on the version I'm going to be playing, it would probably even encourage me to upgrade my hardware more often, but the fact is, it isn't worth it for developers. I would gladly accept a "worse" looking game if it means the people who spent so much time and energy bringing the game to me get to keep their jobs.
Then why do they show the e3 demo looking so good if they're just going to cut most of it? Ubisoft has made tons of games, they're pretty familiar with what they can handle.
How many of those were made with final hardware PS4/XBox Ones?
How many of those were made with final hardware PS4/XBox Ones?
the problem with this argument is that for the first time since, well... i guess since before the ps1, consoles are so similar to PC's that you can actually build in-house pc's and expect similar results. there is only one difference between the new consoles and a pc - unified ram.
and when you see games like Second Son, or Ryse (for all of its bad points, it was gorgeous), i honestly don't understand the graphical cutback on the new systems.
i guess that's my biggest problem with it though, i just don't understand the cutback.
It's a pretty logical argument in my opinion. If game assets were separated to have "low quality" console assets and "high quality" PC assets, then development of the game would be more expensive and require a larger team, not to mention organization of the entire project would become more difficult.
That's a bad excuse in my opinion. The assets are already made high quality, and then trimmed down as needed to optimize it for the console.
So it's not as much extra work since the PC already got more then consoles in terms of quality, meaning they already using some high quality assets. I just don't feel like they should (being rough here) half-arse it, and just go all the way to get as good looking game as possible. Especially since they did advertise the game using two SLi graphic cards. That does smell of deceiving advertising to me.
I get what you mean about the business perspective, but it can bite them in the end, because of the reputation. If people feels cheated too many time, it will end up as bad business.
and when you see games like Second Son, or Ryse (for all of its bad points, it was gorgeous), i honestly don't understand the graphical cutback on the new systems.
It's because Ryse & Second Son devs were able to focus on one platform.
Second Son: PS4
Ryse: Xbox One
Watch Dogs: PC, PS3, PS4, Xbox 360, Xbox One and I think the WiiU?
I don't even work in AAA and I'm aware of how much of a shitty hassle it is to stop mid production and attempt to push out a demo of your unfinished game to try and wow people at E3.
while Ryse was an xbone exclusive, remember that it was also built on a (largely) public game engine. sure the iteration they used is currently closed but they've already announced their plans to launch it with their subscription model, and most of the features used are already in the current public version (seriously, look at the Ryse tech papers).
I would argue that if it weren't for a signed piece of paper, Ryse could very very easily, and quickly become cross platform and look great on all of them.
while Ryse was an xbone exclusive, remember that it was also built on a (largely) public game engine. sure the iteration they used is currently closed but they've already announced their plans to launch it with their subscription model, and most of the features used are already in the current public version (seriously, look at the Ryse tech papers).
I would argue that if it weren't for a signed piece of paper, Ryse could very very easily, and quickly become cross platform and look great on all of them.
i can tell you with absolute certainty that this is not the case.
I would argue that if it weren't for a signed piece of paper, Ryse could very very easily, and quickly become cross platform and look great on all of them.
How so? Less funding plus the added costs and difficulty of multiple platforms? Yes, the next gen systems are more like PCs but the PS3 and 360 are different beasts entirely. I've seen a pretty modest spec PC game totally melt the face off of a 360 and it wasn't just a button push to get to that point either.
@ wesley - I'm confused why do you say average metacritic rating of 80-90 ? The average user score is 4-6. You cannot trust reviewers as they are usually paid
These complaints make me lol. If you have worked in AAA companies I think this is the normal way of operation. Things happen... things get cut.
According to reviews from WatchDogs this game did good overall 9 and 8 ratings. I would like to present a case in point does the first "The Last of Us" trailer look as good as the final game?
With user reviews, you're lucky if they even played the game at all. I like that one of the user reviews listed "not funny" as a con - I wasn't aware it was a comedy.
Seems like a loose loose, cant really trust any reviews. The gamers will just post if mad and actual reviewers are usually paid/bribed
There's more than enough outlets for reviews on the internet that someone taking bribes would be obvious. I really just follow Rock Paper Shotgun, Giant Bomb and occasionally Edge. If it's your thing you can watch "let's play" videos although I find them annoying myself :P
Lol, first review I see in users. With a score of zero.
Uplay is down, I can't download the game. Judging by the slew of similar problems reported here I can see that I'm not the only one.
Maybe it is a blessing in disguise, the game seems to be a lame duck of a console port judging be the sites that I trust like Rock Paper Shotgun
Ok, so he scores the game zero even though he hasn't played it.
Yes, Uplay being down is a problem, but how does that make the game a zero.
See the same problem on google play, etc. Comments like "can't install on my phone score 0/5". Pretty shitty really that people drag the game score down even though they cant play it due to other reason.
Uplay being down is a problem, but how does that make the game a zero.
SimCity was unplayable completely for 1.5 weeks. And had tons of down time for a month. At that point I disputed the charge with my credit card company, if I can't play the product I paid for, and it's not my fault, I expect a full refund, but couldn't get one through EA or the online retailer. At that point the game is a 0 to me.
But a service being down on launch day is kinda expected, it happened with Diablo 3, that shouldn't affect your review, but they do deserve some angry messages on their twitter and forums.
Replies
Looks like playstation 2 maxed out
More importantly though, is the fact that 99% of the people bitching about this game are complaining about graphics. Let's say the graphics did look as good as the original E3 demo, what then? Would these people nitpicking at tiny details magically start making love to their game discs? They'd be bitching about something else that is insignificant.
The funny part is that statistically speaking, most PC gamers can't even run the game at high settings and have a playable framerate (according to Steam hardware surveys) so where is the complaining coming from? Do people really want a game that looks amazing, that they can't even play, or is it just the 1% of people with sufficient hardware being loud?
I have a dentist appointment early in the morning, which sucks, but I can't wait to get home and play some Watch Dogs on my PC. According to people who have nearly identical hardware as me, I'll be looking at around 60 FPS at low/medium settings.
not defending the game or the looksof your shot, but that comparison is plain stupid - go wire up your plastation 2 and play some of the latest games again
I don't care if graphics didn't live up to everyone's expectations. I wanted to play Watch Dogs for it's gameplay mechanics.
Seriously, who thought it was a good idea to invent the bullshot? Just create your game on whatever hardware you expect to play it on and take in-game screenshots.
If you really want your game to appear pretty at first, create a short CG movie. At least that's more understandable since no one questions if it's fake or not.
You guys should seriously stop. You think they did it on purpose? "Muahaha lets kill all the graphics, just because we CAN hahaha!"
Stuff happens on production. The exact same is happening on the one I am working on atm.
"So why do you want this job?"
"So I can find out why publishers lie to me!!"
Good luck!
Reviews are out, 8s and 9s mostly. In the 80s on Metacritic right now. Congratulations to everyone who worked on it!
As for people being terrified about the review embargo, it is kind of lame, but publishers mainly do that because they want all the reviews to hit on the day of release so you can see all the noise/marketing/reviews and then immediately go buy it. The amount of ads and talk I've seen about this game today is insane. And I can buy it today. Which is cool.
<rant> I REALLY HATE that I cannot pull people out of freaking cars. Oh I managed to stop the target I needed without performing a vehicle takedown..time to wait for him to start moving before I can try again. Like, Let me pull him out! This drives me nuts! Every mission involves a freaking vehicle takedown, and I CANT PULL THEM OUT OF THEIR CARS!
</rant>
Other than that I find it pretty fun, Great graphics.. Cinematics are nice.. I don't know anything about the game other than what i've been given. Went in with no expectations.. Guess I need to do the campaign to unlock online play?
Anyhow ill play more tomorrow. Night.
Or you know, simply drop the embargo a week before release date, Spam the reviews and paid for reviews. Get the hype up and no-one thinks you're hawking snakeskin oil. All these massive criticisms would not come about as people would be actively reviewing it and defending the mechanics. Of course you have the negative reviews to deal with but that's the industry, trying to hide away from those reviews does more damage to the company's reputation than a few bad scores.
It may be a good game with ps3/xbox360 graphics, and reading reviews it seems it's quite repetitive. Glad i didn't buy it, phew.
Anyways, if the game is on sale for 5$ i'll grab it. It's a huge shame that GTA4 with ENB looks better than this. What a SHAME, and more man.. 2015 is around the corner.
If the division is another game that will end heavily downgraded, it will be another no buy for me. As a PC gamer i don't pay what i pay in hardware for games so obsolete in graphical terms like this one. Ubisoft should learn from Crytek, at least a 5%.
And what Frell said, what just an expression or a way to say how horrible are the graphics. Don't take things literally.
the graphics aren't horrible, they just don't look as good on weaker hardware. The maxed out screens look pretty solid to me.
Im stoked! Got my copy and can't wait to play it.
Here's totalbiscuits thoughts. Love him/hate him, I think he gives good level headed reviews generally. I don't always agree with him but at least he gives things a fair shout. Also, looking about at other reviews I'm generally seeing only good things being said about it. I dont know where you guys get all the negative stuff from, except maybe in youtube comments. And we all know how accurate that place is...
[ame]www.youtube.com/watch?v=IBb2BIVrV7M[/ame]
On the one hand all we want, that publishers go another direction, do maybe
some different styles and games - with taking risks
on the other, we as developers know how it works (read fonfa`s answer)
yep - read many bad things about watchdogs and that made me curious. The game isnt the old trailer - but its looking quite good!
Did you ever complain to Mcdonalds - cause you didnt get
the excatly burger - shown in the advertisment?
? I never said I thought this was completely the best route to take or anything. I'm just explaining it isn't the publisher trying to sell snakeskin oil, but trying to maximize the release day impact. So many publishers are doing this, or having reviews drop the day before, so it's not surprising or suspicious. Or you know, get all angry?
1. driving feels very, very clunky. maybe i'm spoiled by GTA, but i almost feel like that should be the minimum standard for driving controls in a sandbox game.
2. visually the game feels disjointed. individual assets look pretty good, some look incredible. but there is a lot of variance not only in quality but also in the overall look. for example, you have Aiden who looks like he's supposed to be this hyper realistic character, his clothes certainly look that way... and then you see his face, and it's straight into the uncanny valley. and then when you put him into the environment, there's a huge difference not just in quality, but in the way his clothing seems to be lit in comparison to the environment around him. grassy areas look weird (at night, haven't seen daytime yet) with really dark ground but very bright grass. overall it just feels... i dunno, it doesn't feel consistent.
3. lack of atmosphere - currently there seem to be no noticeable atmospherics, no real fog or gloom, the lighting just feels kinda flat.
playing the PS4 version btw.
Watch Dogs looks like a game made for two completely difference systems - previous and current gen, and we're commenting on the current gen. Which, IMO, is viable. Though we need ot have an understanding that what we're seeing on the current generation of consoles is likely the last generations tech with some simple "up-ressing" of materials, geometry, and particle counts.
IMO, once we start to see titles built for current-gen only, we'll be pleasantly surprised by their visuals. Until then, play Watch Dogs for the fun, not the graphics.
So much this. Every cross-gen title is going to have this problem for the simple reason that you can't base core rendering technology on stronger hardware specs when you need to ship on 360/PS3 because that tech simply won't work in the budgets available on those platforms.
Imo when we start seeing the second gen of first-party titles which are exclusive to current (XB1/PS4) gen hardware, that's when things are going to start looking noticeably better.
Devs are still working out the hardware and what's possible with it - you only need to look at what was achieved on last-gen with the shift from forward to deferred rendering to see the kind of drastic technological improvements that can (and inevitably will) be made.
The whole WD dramabomb of "oh my gods gais why doesn't the game look like the original reveal graffffixxxx" really couldn't have had any other outcome than this. What was shown was quite obviously a very early prototype, likely built to hardware specs of target-boxes for current-gen consoles (you know, off-the-shelf PCs provided with promises of "well yeah the final console hardware will maybe be somewhere in the ballpark of this. Kinda.").
Yeah it's good to drum up excitement for the franchise, but I can imagine it was never intended to be held up as representative of the final visual fidelity of the end product.
As production went along the visual bar they set became unfeasible so they down graded some things to get the game running properly. It's going to happen especially with games early in the new generation. You don't know what the limitations off the systems are early on, nor how to optimize for them properly. Which is made worse by the fact that your game systems have to run on both last gen and the new generation of consoles.
Also did any one really want to buy Watchdogs because of the visuals? Not trying saying the game looked bad. The game strengths seemed to be from it's gameplay mechanics rather than it's visuals.
Either way congrats to anyone involved in the project. It looks great. I will definitely pick it up soon.
I agree this isn't a black and white issue and that there's a ton of reasons why games may have to be downgraded.
However, I'm still not excusing the behavior of bullshotery that has over stayed its welcome in the game industry.
As for the Mcdonalds example last page, I hate that stuff too. Companies paying billions to touch up products people will probably buy anyone is always a horrible proposition.
So when all the options are set to maximum, it shouldn't be so it can run on the average computer, but for the gamer computer. The standard settings should be what the max console setting would be.
One word: Crysis
Most expensive Photoshop job ever.
Getting a top of the line PC specifically for a game, isn't going to allow someone to unlock greater "graphics" that aren't there. I honestly think the amount of effort put into PC ports is, "if it runs on consoles it will probably run on most PC's, ok".
When you develop for wide range of hardware, often the lowest common denominator sets the specs for your top end.
now i don't think the game looks bad or anything, but thats just balony.
it was very specifically intendet to wow the crowds at E3, just like the prerendered killzone 2 trailer 2005 or whenever that was. both times it was stated multiple times that this would represent the final quality of the product.
just like that staged deep down trailer.
its just a benchmark running on a buffed up PC and the teams goal is to get as close as possible to that for the final game.
still you can't deny that its a deliberate lie to build hype and get some preorders in while you're at it.
[ame="
Then why do they show the e3 demo looking so good if they're just going to cut most of it? Ubisoft has made tons of games, they're pretty familiar with what they can handle. I can only guess that they keep over-shooting in quality demos for hype.
I also hate that they hold a playstation controller when showing demos so people assume it's console footage when it's really PC
They're a company and companies are out to make money. They won't stop doing this if its securing pre-orders, why is that so hard to believe?
Mind you I'm not talking about asset quality here, I'm talking about overall rendering. It seems like they purposely boost it for hype
The driving isnt as good as GTA? Sooo, a game that focuses on hacking doesnt have driving as good as a game that is focused on driving... *Mind BLOWN*
Do I wish the graphics were as good as originally shown? Absolutely. What gamer wouldnt? But not for a second do I think that will make the game unplayable, or even worse just because things needed to be optimized.
I don't plan on buying it just yet (In crunch ATM), but I definitely will want to sink my teeth into this when I get the chance.
Congrats on the release, Ubi guys and gals.
At the end of the day, you have to remember that games are provided by businesses, they need to get a return on their investment and for a franchise to be considered successful it must also bring in a certain amount of profits. Providing high quality assets just for PC gamers may be the "kind" thing to do, but from a business perspective it isn't worth the effort.
I don't think Crysis is a good example either of the success given by making such a move because it got criticism for being nothing other than a "tech demo", it was on the top of the list of pirated games for a long time, and Crytek changed their entire mentality with the game with both Crysis 2 and 3 (hence why there are people complaining that Crysis 1 with mods still looks better than the other two games.)
As a PC gamer, I'd love for developers to spend more time on the version I'm going to be playing, it would probably even encourage me to upgrade my hardware more often, but the fact is, it isn't worth it for developers. I would gladly accept a "worse" looking game if it means the people who spent so much time and energy bringing the game to me get to keep their jobs.
How many of those were made with final hardware PS4/XBox Ones?
the problem with this argument is that for the first time since, well... i guess since before the ps1, consoles are so similar to PC's that you can actually build in-house pc's and expect similar results. there is only one difference between the new consoles and a pc - unified ram.
and when you see games like Second Son, or Ryse (for all of its bad points, it was gorgeous), i honestly don't understand the graphical cutback on the new systems.
i guess that's my biggest problem with it though, i just don't understand the cutback.
That's a bad excuse in my opinion. The assets are already made high quality, and then trimmed down as needed to optimize it for the console.
So it's not as much extra work since the PC already got more then consoles in terms of quality, meaning they already using some high quality assets. I just don't feel like they should (being rough here) half-arse it, and just go all the way to get as good looking game as possible. Especially since they did advertise the game using two SLi graphic cards. That does smell of deceiving advertising to me.
I get what you mean about the business perspective, but it can bite them in the end, because of the reputation. If people feels cheated too many time, it will end up as bad business.
It's because Ryse & Second Son devs were able to focus on one platform.
Second Son: PS4
Ryse: Xbox One
Watch Dogs: PC, PS3, PS4, Xbox 360, Xbox One and I think the WiiU?
I don't even work in AAA and I'm aware of how much of a shitty hassle it is to stop mid production and attempt to push out a demo of your unfinished game to try and wow people at E3.
I would argue that if it weren't for a signed piece of paper, Ryse could very very easily, and quickly become cross platform and look great on all of them.
i can tell you with absolute certainty that this is not the case.
How so? Less funding plus the added costs and difficulty of multiple platforms? Yes, the next gen systems are more like PCs but the PS3 and 360 are different beasts entirely. I've seen a pretty modest spec PC game totally melt the face off of a 360 and it wasn't just a button push to get to that point either.
According to reviews from WatchDogs this game did good overall 9 and 8 ratings. I would like to present a case in point does the first "The Last of Us" trailer look as good as the final game?
omg we cheated you!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rWzcYbtZQrk
don't make light of the grave human rights violation committed here.
http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/watch-dogs
I think a lot of people pirated it and wrote the reviews on release date.
Definitely the people we should trust! :poly142:
There's more than enough outlets for reviews on the internet that someone taking bribes would be obvious. I really just follow Rock Paper Shotgun, Giant Bomb and occasionally Edge. If it's your thing you can watch "let's play" videos although I find them annoying myself :P
Lol, first review I see in users. With a score of zero.
Ok, so he scores the game zero even though he hasn't played it.
Yes, Uplay being down is a problem, but how does that make the game a zero.
See the same problem on google play, etc. Comments like "can't install on my phone score 0/5". Pretty shitty really that people drag the game score down even though they cant play it due to other reason.
hey ho.
SimCity was unplayable completely for 1.5 weeks. And had tons of down time for a month. At that point I disputed the charge with my credit card company, if I can't play the product I paid for, and it's not my fault, I expect a full refund, but couldn't get one through EA or the online retailer. At that point the game is a 0 to me.
But a service being down on launch day is kinda expected, it happened with Diablo 3, that shouldn't affect your review, but they do deserve some angry messages on their twitter and forums.