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> Greatly improved graphics and draw distance BOO! BOO! Speaking of “introductory guides for modern gamers”, there definitely should be one that lists most co

> Greatly improved graphics and draw distance BOO! BOO! Speaking of “introductory guides for modern gamers”, there definitely should be one that lists most common ways they unwittingly mutilate the old games. Mistake #1 is, without doubt, using high resolution uncommon at the production period for rendering. So they start the game, then feel it looks a bit shitty (it really is, now when you set it that way), then turn to mods, HD skins, NN-upscaled textures, and other craptastic “enchancements”. If step 0 was wrong, don't try to fix it with further wrong steps. Screen resolution, texture resolution, model complexity, artistic style, etc. should all be in balance. If you want a game that looks good in FullHD, you need to gather a new team that remakes the whole thing from scratch (and that production is going to cost more than the original one). Mistake #2 is increasing view distance for the sole reason that hardware allows you to do it. Virtual horizon is really important to set scale for the game world. If it's too far, the exciting travel to the unknown place turns into moving to a next stand in theme park, or the wide plane turns into the small crossroad with NPCs standing here and there who don't even need to shout to hear each other. These changes are as drastic as giving rocket launcher to the player, but everyone is so used to them that they don't realize what is wrong. Some people even make “retro” games assuming this is how games looked like originally.

m1gu3l 4y ago
Ok. we will be sure to consult with you before actualizing any nostalgia or imagined nostalgia to make sure we are getting it just right. Lol.
- lucideer 4y ago
  The gp is calling out augmentations / enhancements. The point is you don't need to add anything or do anything extra. They're not suggesting doing something complex, they're suggesting leaving things be.
Alekhine 4y ago
I'm the author. I'll add this in a minute, but all those enhancements can be turned off. According to a developer on the Discord I just spoke to, there's a set of options that makes the game very closely resemble vanilla morrowind.
NanoCoaster 4y ago
Alternatively, just let people mod their games as they please. I see your point and you're not wrong, but people have different priorities and playing video games is a hugely subjective experience anyway. Yes, adding a sentence or two about how the game may not look and feel as intended could be a nice idea. But it's not _wrong_ to change it, if that's what you prefer. I've played Morrowind vanilla and with loads of mods (including graphical improvements) and I honestly liked the modded one better. Just personal preference.
- ogurechny 4y ago
  My point was not about mods at all. Using a mod is a conscious decision, both when adding pink ponies, and when fixing a bug that causes you to fix saves or edit scripts manually. My point was about the trap people fall into because software and tools auto-select highest or native resolution, or because they are used to doing that manually in every game's settings screen, or because “bigger equals better”. Here they don't even understand the conscious decision to choose a suitable setting has to be made. Look at some examples: https://vintage3d.org/gallery/vt4.php https://vintage3d.org/gallery/vt4.php Rough pixels, rough edges, rough effects, everything is more or less balanced. On the contrary, when you streeeeeeeeetch the same 64×64 texture onto a single polygon covering half of your giant screen, then blend it with pixel-perfect light gradient, it won't ever look good. But a lot of people today call the monstrosity they see on screen in high res a “vanilla look”, and even reason about its visual quality. Morrowind was made in later era, and was less resolution-dependent, as there was a range of accelerators of varying performance to run on. Still, its user interface makes it clear that playing in resolutions higher than commonly available at the time was not really considered. Many other games simply crash or develop bugs at high resolutions because they weren't even tested with those (or it was simply impossible with contemporary consumer hardware). When people release “fixes” for that, they don't question themselves whether everything that is possible to do should really be done. Game makers had some top hardware configuration in mind as a performance and quality reference. In simple terms, the beefiest machine in the studio set the gold standard for the look of the game. I would advise against setting game resolution higher than that for '90s and significant part of 2000s games to see the game the way it was meant to be seen (visuals produced in modern shader graphics era are much less dependent on rendering resolution if they aren't constructed in a hacky way).

m1gu3l 4y ago

Ok. we will be sure to consult with you before actualizing any nostalgia or imagined nostalgia to make sure we are getting it just right. Lol.

lucideer 4y ago
The gp is calling out augmentations / enhancements. The point is you don't need to add anything or do anything extra. They're not suggesting doing something complex, they're suggesting leaving things be.

Alekhine 4y ago

I'm the author. I'll add this in a minute, but all those enhancements can be turned off. According to a developer on the Discord I just spoke to, there's a set of options that makes the game very closely resemble vanilla morrowind.

NanoCoaster 4y ago

Alternatively, just let people mod their games as they please. I see your point and you're not wrong, but people have different priorities and playing video games is a hugely subjective experience anyway. Yes, adding a sentence or two about how the game may not look and feel as intended could be a nice idea. But it's not _wrong_ to change it, if that's what you prefer. I've played Morrowind vanilla and with loads of mods (including graphical improvements) and I honestly liked the modded one better. Just personal preference.

ogurechny 4y ago
My point was not about mods at all. Using a mod is a conscious decision, both when adding pink ponies, and when fixing a bug that causes you to fix saves or edit scripts manually. My point was about the trap people fall into because software and tools auto-select highest or native resolution, or because they are used to doing that manually in every game's settings screen, or because “bigger equals better”. Here they don't even understand the conscious decision to choose a suitable setting has to be made. Look at some examples: https://vintage3d.org/gallery/vt4.php https://vintage3d.org/gallery/vt4.php Rough pixels, rough edges, rough effects, everything is more or less balanced. On the contrary, when you streeeeeeeeetch the same 64×64 texture onto a single polygon covering half of your giant screen, then blend it with pixel-perfect light gradient, it won't ever look good. But a lot of people today call the monstrosity they see on screen in high res a “vanilla look”, and even reason about its visual quality. Morrowind was made in later era, and was less resolution-dependent, as there was a range of accelerators of varying performance to run on. Still, its user interface makes it clear that playing in resolutions higher than commonly available at the time was not really considered. Many other games simply crash or develop bugs at high resolutions because they weren't even tested with those (or it was simply impossible with contemporary consumer hardware). When people release “fixes” for that, they don't question themselves whether everything that is possible to do should really be done. Game makers had some top hardware configuration in mind as a performance and quality reference. In simple terms, the beefiest machine in the studio set the gold standard for the look of the game. I would advise against setting game resolution higher than that for '90s and significant part of 2000s games to see the game the way it was meant to be seen (visuals produced in modern shader graphics era are much less dependent on rendering resolution if they aren't constructed in a hacky way).