Streamlining.

[Blutters]

Within RuneScape there are four levels of technology. I would define these as:

1. Pre-RS2/Classic - Example: Digsite Quest

2. RS2 - Example: Priest in Peril

3. RS2.5 - Example: Fairy Tale Part I

4. RS3/RS HD - Example: While Guthix Sleeps

Now, just because I only used quests in my examples does not mean that this is limited to only quests. If it were, there wouldn't be as much of an issue.

The issue is that even though we are in what is basically RS3, these other levels of technology and mechanics still exist, and there seems to be a policy of "when we visit this area again, we might update it or we might not" by JaGEx.

Being that this is the upgrade year, so-said by them, the creators, they should actually be focusing on these areas more than anything. It's really fairly difficult to list out everything they need to do, as it is a huge amount.

 

There are also areas that are caught in 2.5 and are therefore hard to differentiate - these too need upgrading, albeit likely not as much as anything from earlier eras.

 

On top of bringing those parts of the game up to date, they need to fix the minor everyday issues such as wrong or missing textures (take for example the Soul Wars lake dark spots and especially the jerky animations when characters wield staves or halberds). RuneScape is a huge game, so they can be cut some slack. But only so much, and only for so long. Such small issues should take no longer than a week to fix. There are still graphical issues in my Player Owned House that have been there since the skill's creation.

RuneScape is a game. It is a saved creation and even work of art, and it CAN be made perfect, and smooth, and sleek, and finished. And at this rate we won't get there for years to come...

 

The newest quest is actually what sparked me to write this. If you have done it you will know that they completely reuse the Vengeance animations not once but twice, as well as the Chaos Elemental's attack animation, and the Balance Elemental's arrows (and there may be others that I missed...). They also failed to update Thorgel, the assisting dwarf, or his crew, who are excavating a tunnel (as well as him having missing animations), and used what seemed to be completely pre-HD plague clothing for Arianwyn (which is NOT even the same kind as you actually handed him! INCONSISTENCY!!).

What they DID do is craft a beautiful all new puzzle room with stunning HD graphics, and a HD-grade NPC (the scribe).

This is one of the saddest possible things they could do: release a new quest within a prestigious storyline with decent play value and stick it in a limbo between RS2 and RS3 graphics, animations, and mechanics.

What's more is that I read on a different thread on these forums that they are waiting to release Mournings End Part III until they have an even higher level of graphics. If they were truly worried about the prestige of this questline, and not just pulling a lame excuse out from somewhere I don't even want to think about, they would have made all-new animations and upgraded all involved NPCs for this just-released quest.

 

I do not like their seeming mentality that RuneScape is a finished product when it is far from being so. I believe they do still officially acknowledge it as 'HD Beta'; however, they then do things like sell all sorts of apparel and game cards, and flashy advertising. JaGEx is deserving of the fruit of their labor but it's misleading that they should always (look at the trailers they presented) show only the HD side of RuneScape. It nearly physically hurts me to see the glistening, moving water in the Legends Quest dungeon and then have the giant blob of a rock right next to it.

 

HD is like gleaming delicious icing on a stale, rotten cake...

 

 

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There are other things I wanted to add that escape me right now, so I'll likely post those here once I remember them.

 

For one, they've updated the near entirety of the Free-to-Play side, which is what people will see and then reflect upon the rest of the game, believing the whole game to be of such quality and signing up for members in hopes of more of the same. This is very nearly false advertisement.

 

-------

 

I said what I wanted to say. Have fun.

[3hitm4g3u]

The thing about an upgrade year is you can't complain about a lack of certain upgrades until the end of said year.

[Blutters]

The thing about an upgrade year is you can't complain about a lack of certain upgrades until the end of said year.

I can if their upgrades thus-far have barely scratched the surface of what I'm describing, and when they don't seem to have any plans of getting anywhere near it.

[J35u5_M4]

There is a rants forum for this kind of thread.

 

Also, I would like to add that the gnomes are still the same pointy guys, but I don't blame them on not updating, maybe they're going to update them later on a future grandmaster quest? Like the Fairies which are expected to be updated massively after the new Fairy Storyline Quest.

[Blutters]

There is a rants forum for this kind of thread.

 

Also, I would like to add that the gnomes are still the same pointy guys, but I don't blame them on not updating, maybe they're going to update them later on a future grandmaster quest? Like the Fairies which are expected to be updated massively after the new Fairy Storyline Quest.

This isn't angry enough to be a rant. :wink: ;)

And as to that, that's exactly like what I was saying - they seem to need an excuse to go back and update something, and even then, as with the dwarves, they sometimes don't. They should be updating and upgrading everything that isn't HD yet.

[Makoto_the_Phoenix]

The issue is that even though we are in what is basically RS3, these other levels of technology and mechanics still exist, and there seems to be a policy of "when we visit this area again, we might update it or we might not" by JaGEx.

Being that this is the upgrade year, so-said by them, the creators, they should actually be focusing on these areas more than anything. It's really fairly difficult to list out everything they need to do, as it is a huge amount.

 

There are also areas that are caught in 2.5 and are therefore hard to differentiate - these too need upgrading, albeit likely not as much as anything from earlier eras.

 

In theory, you're correct. But the idea is that not many people will ever go back to the Legends' Cave. Think about it - what do players see more often, the Kharazi Jungle or Ardougne? I say you're correct in theory, but it isn't like Jagex doesn't have their priorities right when they're updating.

 

On top of bringing those parts of the game up to date, they need to fix the minor everyday issues such as wrong or missing textures (take for example the Soul Wars lake dark spots and especially the jerky animations when characters wield staves or halberds). RuneScape is a huge game, so they can be cut some slack. But only so much, and only for so long. Such small issues should take no longer than a week to fix. There are still graphical issues in my Player Owned House that have been there since the skill's creation.

RuneScape is a game. It is a saved creation and even work of art, and it CAN be made perfect, and smooth, and sleek, and finished. And at this rate we won't get there for years to come...

 

Two fallacies in one.

 

1) It would not take a week to fix those kinds of graphical anomalies. Dealing with graphics software, especially Java, can (and will) get extensively complicated - even when you're doing something like RuneScape. You find a 3D game which does not suffer from this kind of grahpical anomaly, and I might consider this stance more.

 

2) No work of software is ever perfect. There is and always will be bugs. Not to mention, the very notion of updates means that Jagex doesn't feel that this software is perfect.

 

The newest quest is actually what sparked me to write this. If you have done it you will know that they completely reuse the Vengeance animations not once but twice, as well as the Chaos Elemental's attack animation, and the Balance Elemental's arrows (and there may be others that I missed...). They also failed to update Thorgel, the assisting dwarf, or his crew, who are excavating a tunnel (as well as him having missing animations), and used what seemed to be completely pre-HD plague clothing for Arianwyn (which is NOT even the same kind as you actually handed him! INCONSISTENCY!!).

What they DID do is craft a beautiful all new puzzle room with stunning HD graphics, and a HD-grade NPC (the scribe).

This is one of the saddest possible things they could do: release a new quest within a prestigious storyline with decent play value and stick it in a limbo between RS2 and RS3 graphics, animations, and mechanics.

What's more is that I read on a different thread on these forums that they are waiting to release Mournings End Part III until they have an even higher level of graphics. If they were truly worried about the prestige of this questline, and not just pulling a lame excuse out from somewhere I don't even want to think about, they would have made all-new animations and upgraded all involved NPCs for this just-released quest.

 

The whole point of Object-Oriented programs is for you to be able to reuse your code. There's really nothing wrong with reusing the animations from other attacks. If they were to make something new, they would have had to test it against the new code, which means a longer wait. Why not just use some code that we actually know works?

 

Also, they waited until RS2.1 was out and released before they did Player Owned Houses. They had the idea to do them in the standard detail (RSC), but they scrapped them not only because of what they wanted to do with the skill, and not only because the engine couldn't support it at the time, but they also wanted to give it the graphics that it deserved. In my book, that wait paid off.

 

I do not like their seeming mentality that RuneScape is a finished product when it is far from being so. I believe they do still officially acknowledge it as 'HD Beta'; however, they then do things like sell all sorts of apparel and game cards, and flashy advertising. JaGEx is deserving of the fruit of their labor but it's misleading that they should always (look at the trailers they presented) show only the HD side of RuneScape. It nearly physically hurts me to see the glistening, moving water in the Legends Quest dungeon and then have the giant blob of a rock right next to it.

 

HD is like gleaming delicious icing on a stale, rotten cake...

 

There's just no justification to this statement. I don't know where you get the feeling that RuneScape is a finished product, and you're probably the only person here that catches that vibe. There are things that should be improved, as I said earlier, but priorities are first - more people will be concerned with the looks of major cities than they would some obscure tunnel they'll only ever go to once.

[Suiku]

Sorry all this text confuses me when I don't see nice pics to compare

[Mike_Ike111]

Personally I don't mind the older graphics still being present. There are a few older quests that I decided to do recently, after years avoiding quests, and I did notice a lot of primitive models and animation. It reminded me of how this game is a work in progress.

 

Not everything should be put to the top priority of updates. Some cave that was created 5 years ago that you only visit once for a few minutes should not be given a complete graphical makeover when there are still areas that need attention. Sure it would be nice if some of the more visited places could be updated; such as the desert, slayer castle, relleka, and brimhaven, however there should be no rush to get those areas set.

 

I'm fine with the way things are going with graphics and animations. As long as there is a useful update each week, I will keep playing this game.

[Toad]

Jagex reuse animations because it's browser based and all of runescape when compressed can fit on a pen-drive.

 

You have to understand reusing is a good thing because it prevents heavy loads, to complain about that then you have to complain about the fact all the sand is the same in the desert and the grains of sand aren't different.

 

#1 to remodel older areas weekly takes many months, especially with bigger areas like this, have you seen the length the new zanaris has taken etc?

 

#2 if their intention is to upgrade it'll come with MEP3 and honestly it doesnt look that bad, to criticise every animation every texture is one thing but to want them on a weekly monthly basis is a little insane.

 

Say team A, B, C, D all working on different projects, when A finishes, B has to be ready following week and so on.

 

So when A finishes they go back to the preliminary stages and start all over again, it's not as simple as now create 3000 new objects place them into a quest because that'd take around 10 months just to release that quest ;)

 

I realise you're saying that they use older animations but its fine with me, hunter uses firemaking animations with boxtraps etc

 

If you want to boil it down and say well it isn't working every skill is infact the same with different animations, so if you have preference saying X skill sucks, you're actually doing your favourite skills with different xp rates and animations, but it's still programmed the same.

[Mercifull]

Arent all the dwarfs being upgraded as part of a seperate project?

[Kimberly]

The thing about an upgrade year is you can't complain about a lack of certain upgrades until the end of said year.

I can if their upgrades thus-far have barely scratched the surface of what I'm describing, and when they don't seem to have any plans of getting anywhere near it.

 

There's still an entire half of the year left. With the successful implementation of the RuneTek 5 engine, which they have promised could help them take things further than they could before, who knows what we can expect?

 

Though I'm not saying your points have no foundation. I do agree with some of them.

[Barihawk]

Merciful hit it on the head. It has been stated numerous times that Runescape's graphical abilities are immense and the resources required to update everything within versions is a massive undertaking. There are hundreds of thousands of models that have to be redone, tens of not hundreds of times more items than the game had at RS2 launch. As such, they are updating everything they can in phases, and only currently are creating new NPC's with the new graphics. Older npcs and areas will have to be done later.

 

Eventually in a year or so, this quest will all be RT5 quality, but Jagex only has limited staff and they themselves have said that focusing only on graphics would divert attention from gameplay areas for minimal satisfaction gain.

[Lunar_Drifter]

Basically, OP is saying that you can polish a turd... but it's still a turd.

 

Which I don't agree with in this case. RS is and always will be a work in progress.

 

Now they don't update certain NPCs and certain areas because of traffic. For example, if your business had an advertisement in Times Square that was falling apart, and one in Kenilworth, NY, which would you update? The one in Times Square, because it will net you more profit.

 

The same concept applies here- Jagex updates the areas that are seen the most, because that is what brings in new customers. Potential-members will see Varrock in all its shiny grandeur long before they see that oh-so-saddening rock in the Legend's Guild.

[Randox]

RuneScape will never be finished because it is in a constant state of change. Thats a Given.

 

As to reusing things, its a time thing. If every single thing were created fresh, the graphics team would need to be larger, things would be slower to develop, and the game would probably be more expensive. The fact that all new animations for an entire quest could add a month to production, as well as increase the size of the game is a reason to reuse some things.

 

Now, reusing really uniqe things can get kinda cheep. But, we probably don't notice it in other areas. By all rights, we are short a number of teleport animations. One for each spell book, one for jewlery, but what about the other category? The ectophial has a redone standard tele, but then you have something like the crystal seed which is the same as an standard tele. Mounted glorys use that animation too.

 

The problem is that RuneScape is huge on epic proportions. To actualy redo the game and bring it all into the same era, they would pretty much need to halt all development for a minimum of 1 or 2 years.

 

They are in a bad position because there are so many large projects in the pipeline that all the small stuff is having a hard time getting through. It also means they aren't going to allow anything large to take longer than they feel is needed. If that means reusing a few animations to get something out of the way, they'll do it.