Anyone else underwhelmed by the unit graphics?

[tniem]

Obviously your not the only one who is put back by the graphics. It seems to be the main reason that Civ III didn't do that well in terms of awards at E3. And as far as I can tell the graphics aren't as good as the ones in Sim Golf. Makes you wonder...

[AroSch]

I like the unit graphics, to me they are "just the best ever seen in a civgame".

But some other things will be disappointing to me: the water don´t look like water (rivers, irrigation and finally the ocean too). It is to many cyan and should be more blue, I think.

And then the city-screen - instead of the Civ2 grain symbol there are now Slices of bread (do you say this in english?) and instead of some neutral "gold" they are using now "$". I don´t like that! Grain is used thousands of years during the whole time but Slices of bread didn´t. And Dollars didn´t it too. May be this reflects the development during the game - then it is okay. But I don´t like have dollars at... say 50 B.C. or so!

However, if the game plays well, and if it is possible to change it easy, its a minor thing.

[Krypter]

The units look great on the website, but on the screenshots they seem to be shrunk too much. Maybe this is simply a matter of the (adjustable?) zoom factor.

Animation does add a lot to the look a graphic. Now the question is are the graphics made of sprites or downsampled 3D models?

The game looks good so far. Not great, but good. The ocean and forests definitely need a major revision. My guess is that they're just the first version.

I'm moderately optimistic that the graphics will improve.

[SerapisIV]

I prefer cold coins over dollar signs as well. About grain for food, I can't think of any better symbol, I don't mind it.

[Grumbold]

Re: Re: A response

Originally posted by Dan Magaha FIRAXIS


One of the problem with critiquing the unit graphics based on screenshots is you don't get any sense of the animation or sound, both of which have a big impact on how you perceive a given unit. The knight, for example, is quite hard to miss when he's galloping around the map. I personally never have any problems seeing my units on the map when I'm playing, but then there is a world of difference between a screenshot and a game with motion and sound.


Dan

I'm a little concerned that the screenshot he referred to is zoomed in so far that the screen is only showing sixteen tiles width from top left to bottom right. Firing up Civ II in the default view on my monitor displays 26 crisply. Yet the Civ III fine detail is still quite awkward to pick out on a larger zoom. I would cite:

- the blue and grey city names
- parts of the blue border against sea and irrigated squares
- the fact that the grey units have no obvious colour marks (grey on grey)
- the units on any "busy" terrain are much harder to make out compared to the ones on plain green grassland.
- that it is difficult to tell at a glance exactly which tiles are connected by those meandering roads

All of these problems are presumably going to get worse when the map is zoomed out enough to actually see the bigger picture. Having to zoom in and out to complete routine turn by turn empire maintenance would be a serious turnoff. Having maps so small that zooming out was unnecessary (like the one in the screenshot, judging by the map window) would be an equal turnoff for different reasons.

[Grumbold]

I thought I'd bump this thread since we have now had a chance to see and hear blurry units moving and fighting on the avi. I certainly found the moving unit easy to pick out and the fights were impressively animated. I didn't find the player colour that easy to detect which could cause problems if it turns out a stationary enemy unit can go unnoticed and wreak chaos when it would have been easy to stop if seen. We still badly need a sign of what the modern era game is like but perhaps that is still subject to heavy tweaking as beta testing goes on.

[Urban Ranger]

While the screenshot does look too dark as if it's shrouded in heavy shadows, and I have some objections over the colour scheme (water should be blue and what's that godawful neon green doing in there?), it's a large improvement over the earlier games.

As for the inability to recognise units on the first sight, the reason is you aren't used to spotting units in this game. It's part of the learning curve for the game.

[lord of the mark]

Originally posted by Steve Clark
Animation and Sound? How could the Knight unit be galloping around the map when it's sitting on a tile waiting for the next turn? What about those (most?) that will be turning animation off? And finally, what about those that will not or in my case, cannot rely on game sounds? Each unit should be clearly distinguishable regardless of animation or sound.

agreed - i almost always play with animations off in TOT, especially past the middle game, and sometimes with sound off. Not that i dont like the animations or sound in TOT ( I think they're just fine) - my not so powerful computer has a tendency to slow down in late game with them on.

IIUC firaxis wants civ3 to run on widest variety of systems possible. If so units must be distinguishable without animation and sound.

LOTM

[KrazyHorse]

I really don't understand what the problem is. The graphics really do take a backseat to the gameplay, but even so, reviewers have been very happy with the graphics. I personally really like the parchment map-like feel which has been added, and if anyone else complains, they might just stick us with the colour scheme from SMAC. So afraid...

[tniem]

Originally posted by AroSch
I like the unit graphics, to me they are "just the best ever seen in a civgame".

I agree that the graphics are the best in the Civ Series, but I am not satisfied with that. I really hoped for more to make the graphics up to speed with th 21st Century pc game graphics. I will play the game either way but if Sid wants to attract new gamers and I hope he does (more people for me to destroy...) than he needs better graphics in my opinion.

[Adm.Naismith]

Originally posted by Ralf
Expected new graphics-engine? Fill me in here - have I missed something? Anyway; Both the unit-graphics and the advisor/diplomacy-screen shown so far is absolutely stunning.

Ralf, it's a guess some of us have done, reading into a preview that graphic artist at Firaxis painted some thousands of tiles, and speaking of contoured map (while that showed aren't).
Adding this to Firaxis words about a completely new graphic engine and we supposed that early screenshots are from a temporary graphics engine (the SMAC + Civ II tiles they mentioned).

Today I'm afraid that was a silly hope: they showed the game at E3 without any comment about this, and while I like the unit movement, I really don't like the map, as you say:

Finally, the maps looks too flat. It should have at least two height-levels (elevating landmass somewhat above ocean), or perhaps even four height-levels (ranging from deep ocean to highlands).

My very same opinion
The map is sooooooooooo flaaaaaaaaat you can fold it and put it into your pocket, when quitting game!

[Guest]

Re: Anyone else underwhelmed by the unit graphics?

Originally posted by Bubba
Is anyone else anyone else underwhelmed by the unit graphics?

To me they seem small, fuzzy (ie.unclear was to what each unit is and its civ affliation, esp. in comparison with CTP II and even Civ II), undetailed and dark. I really hope that the units will improve before the release.

Just a thought

Are you kidding?

All of the pics I saw at the official site have me thinking these will be pretty awesome graphics, especially considering we haven't seen them animated yet.

Maybe Firaxis could provide a few animations to quell your worries?

[ContradictioN]

If you want them to change it so badly, prepare to wait around 4 more months for them to finish it

It's a fairly big job creating all those terrain images and I think they've had to do a lot more than Civ2's images, hopefully they are customisable, and i'm sure they will be, then we can make them look better ourselves, except I did like the SMAC 3D look style, and wished Civ3 at least had that. oh well

[BigRich]

Originally posted by Ralf


Expected new graphics-engine? Fill me in here - have I missed something? Anyway; Both the unit-graphics and the advisor/diplomacy-screen shown so far is absolutely stunning.

The only minor thing I dont like is the irrigation-graphics that gives my quagmire-associations. I say, make the irrigation-canals more thin, and let them appear in regurlary straight patterns (in princip, like they did in civ-2) so it looks obviously man-made. Also, some hint of crop actually growing there would be nice.

Personally, I would prefer ocean-squares in light- to medium-blue nuances only. Not turquoise blue-green nuances.

Finally, the maps looks too flat. It should have at least two height-levels (elevating landmass somewhat above ocean), or perhaps even four height-levels (ranging from deep ocean to highlands).

I agree absolutely about the irrigation graphics. Heck the Civ 1 irrigation was better. At least alter the colours a bit to distinguish irrigation water from seawater (OK OK so its the same stuff in reality - I want pretty graphics here not realism ), and get rid of the 'swamp' effect.

The units look OK to me - there are enough places on their graphics which can be coloured to reflect identity, to make them distinguishable.

Rich.