[Official High Resolution Textures Post] Can we get a clarification on this?

[gabrielhead]

Here is the true look of your game http://img833.imageshack.us/img833/1963/pvparmor.jpg

 

That is not what is being sold or marketed. This is not the level of texture quality seen in the materials you send to sites. That is patently false advertizing.

 

So the UI bug caused us to have high expectations... It seems you havent informed the marketing people of the new fix. Until you do i cant take you at your word. I really do expect the screenshots on this site and others to show me the game as it can be played on a computer with recommended specs. So you need to re-label the Screenshots section to rendered. as those were in no way taken using the gameclient anyone but you have access to.

[digitalfreak]

Don't expect another reply from BW. Me thinks this is all you're going to get.

[Caonimah]

anyone with realistic expectations wouldve seen this coming.

 

Although I could easily see where this issue was going to end, I just couldn't see HOW it got to the point other than overestimating Bioware's capabilities at optimizing their games. Blizzard, Turbine, NCSoft, Trion, even SE of all people have all shown us what their engines can do, despite their age (or in SEs case, the engine not being designed for MMOs at all). High resolution textures, client stability even with very large numbers of people on screen were all possible. But for some reason, Bioware just cant do it.

 

I'm not holding up any hope on them fixing this any time soon, just gonna play the game till get one or two characters to cap, run a few raids and then move on to the next MMO in the pipeline

[Bloodscorn]

It should be our choice if we want to suffer performance issues for higher resolution textures, don't punish those with higher end systems just because others can't run it properly

 

The game just looks like a muddy ugly mess as it is now.

Edited January 11, 2012 by Bloodscorn

[Elarion]

It's a cop out and there is no other way to look at it. If BW had shown the in game screenshots with all the characters looking blurry then everyone would have laughed. With all the money invested into the game, it's sad to see that the graphics don't even hold up against low budget MMOs.

 

To SR and the rest of the BW team I suggest you actually log into the game and have a look at your character. That is why everyone in this thread is disappointed and for me I'll just chalk it up as another reason not to subscribe.

[ModernZombie]

I have to say I too am disappointed in this response. Some of us have the processing power to handle hi-res textures at all times. Why cant we have that option? I see it in videos and screenshots but not in my game experience. I feel like this is almost avoiding the issue just like the official Bioware response to performance problems. They state that it is only happening on low end machines. My computer is a beast and I have VERY inconsistent performance, as to many other players.

 

Can we please stop with the "working as intended" and actually give the people paying money to play this game real answers.

[GamewizX]

Maybe it's just me, but ever since I forced Mipmap on my graphics card to high quality, my textures look just as crisp as any of those textures that are shown as the "hi-res" versions in the OP. /shrug Edited January 11, 2012 by GamewizX

[PureLuckNoSkills]

This explanation would be reasonable if the graphics of SWTOR is the best most amazing graphics ever existed on a MMORPG and we needed this "lo-rez" crap to play the game... Right now however it looks like he's just saying "well guys we can't provide what you ask for because we ****ed up in technical department and we know you'll pay for this game anyway so yeah suck it... we'll change it some day, maybe"

[deathomight]

This is disappointing news, especially since the vast majority of the time I am playing I am sitting at well above 60 fps.

 

The only time it really drops below is in fleet station and pvp, so maybe special trigger to disable ultra textures in those areas, while using ultra everywhere else?

 

I mean really even playing on my laptop with an Nvidia Geforce 310m can the game with this games 'high' textures in the open world inbetween 24-30 fps in combat and what not... and thats a ultra low end several year old mobile chip...

 

At the very least can you add an option to force high rez on your own character? Really sucks looking at smudge all day.

 

I really don't get why there isn't an ultra option that gives a big warning saying if your comp using anything but the latest fastest hardware, please don't use this setting. Its not like the textures don't exist...

Edited January 11, 2012 by deathomight

[Nerghal]

Why not let the game switch on the fly between both modes?

 

Load the single textures when the environment allows you to, and once too many characters enter the frustrum switch out to atlases?

 

Also, flashpoints seem a rather controlled environment to me as well, so why not allow high res textures in there as well?

[mcfabulous]

And that seems like a great idea on paper.

 

However, look at the threads with people talking about how the game isn't running smooth on their water cooled, over clocked super machines, could you imagine what would happen if they released a setting that they knew, ahead of time, would cause poor performance on even high end computers? it would be chaos, because everyone is always going to try to play on ultra settings, even if it causes performance issues, and then, they will most likely complain about poor programming choices that are causing the slowdown.

 

Basically, the amount of people complaining about the lack of those textures, are probably not as large as the amount of people who would be complaining if the feature was in, and their performance was slow, so not including them was the better decision. Maybe not one I like, because i do love me some hi res textures, but still the better decision.

 

the problem is, it isn't left up to choice, and even with gimp'd graphics those people are still suffering. However their issue is probably more software related.

 

They cannot look me in the eye and tell me my Dell XPS 400 (from freaking 04) can run this game at 25 fps during beta yet theres a rendering problem so they have to cut out options.

 

Although I could easily see where this issue was going to end, I just couldn't see HOW it got to the point other than overestimating Bioware's capabilities at optimizing their games. Blizzard, Turbine, NCSoft, Trion, even SE of all people have all shown us what their engines can do, despite their age (or in SEs case, the engine not being designed for MMOs at all). High resolution textures, client stability even with very large numbers of people on screen were all possible. But for some reason, Bioware just cant do it.

 

I'm not holding up any hope on them fixing this any time soon, just gonna play the game till get one or two characters to cap, run a few raids and then move on to the next MMO in the pipeline

 

exactly, in other games you can render HUNDREDS of people at one time no problem on max settings. In most cases those max are far better than these medium.

Edited January 11, 2012 by mcfabulous

[AyrikaStar]

Thank you for the response.

 

a, Why not enable the "High Resolution option", but have it come with a warning, like ALL normal games do. ie: "Warning: settings this option could reduce your game performance are you sure you want to enable it?"

 

b, I've played games in the past with HD rendering, at maximum resolution and never experience any lag. Lineage 2 for example, on seige weekend can have anything near 2-300 people displayed at the same time, lag free.

[Caonimah]

Maybe it's just me, but ever since I forced Mipmap on my graphics card to high quality, my textures look just as crisp as any of those textures that are shown as the "hi-res" versions in the OP. /shrug

 

Its just you, theres a .dll that caps in game textures to half their fidelity. Zoom in and notice the crisp, clear, puddle of mud all over your chest.

[Jeronas]

That's extremely disappointing. Honestly, probably one of the biggest gut punches I've read from a developer. I appreciate the time you took to type of the response, I just don't appreciate the content of it.

 

It's perfectly acceptable for there to be bugs, features not fully implemented or simply missing, etc. Those are things common with any game of this scale. When something like higher graphics quality is there, but it's disabled due to not functioning well on lower end PCs, that's just something I can't continue to support.

 

Not just canceling my subs, but also claiming a FULL refund of my two CE editions!

 

I feel cheated, lied to, deceived! I feel ripped off for 300 bucks and I want it back!

 

They can permanently close our two accounts! We do not care anymore!

 

These shady underhand practices shows YET AGAIN why EA has such a bad reputation!

[Valorak]

I assume you will be removing the High res screenshots from the site that market the game as something that its not. And asking the reviewers to do the same.

 

QFT.

 

We get that you're aware of how poorly optimized the engine is, and it's good that you know that, but how about giving players the choice as to what quality textures they use? Instead of writing a long and condescending post explaining why it's in our best interest that you've kept this quiet for so long, when it clearly isn't.

[youwillburn]

Not just canceling my subs, but also claiming a FULL refund of my two CE editions!

 

I feel cheated, lied to, deceived! I feel ripped off for 300 bucks and I want it back!

 

They can permanently close our two accounts! We do not care anymore!

 

These shady underhand practices shows YET AGAIN why EA has such a bad reputation!

 

woah. overreacting much?

[RaiausderDose]

but there are still 3 options of textures you can write TextureQuality=2 in the .ini files, why isn't this used or mentioned for people with laptops and low end systems?

[Aurian]

I'm not sure if this has been mentioned already, (the thread is moving too quickly to keep up with at the moment), but I think it might help a lot if they gave us a client-side option to always show the highest quality textures for our own character. We want to be able to appreciate the look of our characters, and it's hard to do that when the textures appear blurry and washed out.

 

Sure, it'd be nice to see other players with those textures, but I understand where they are coming from and am willing to sacrifice that for performance.

Edited January 11, 2012 by Aurian

[Merwanor]

So the marketing and screenshots shown of the game was lies and trickery, I don't know if I want to play this game for long. The choice of graphics and performance should be up to the player, if we want to take the performance hit then let us, not just force bad textures on everyone because of the majority of players might not run it. That is why you have different graphics options. Or put a check box like in Dragon Age 2 for high textures with a warning that this might reduce the performance.

 

I was expecting a bad answer to this, and I got a horrible answer along the lines of working as intended. I like the game, but so far many things are not as advertised. First I realize that almost no armor for the Jedi Knight class has a hood down like in the trailers and lots of the screenshots shows lower level characters with purple lightsabers etc etc. Then you come out and tell me that the textures and quality of the graphics shown on your advertisment is false and is not how the game looks and we should just deal with it.

 

How am I supposed to trust a company that does this?

[SillyTurtle]

That's what I figured was the case.

 

That said, I'd like to see a higher rez preview window when trying on gear.

 

This... can they at least do this for us? I would be really happy.

[Skylerr]

I am disappointed but not really surprised by this answer... it's not a deal breaker for me personally but I can certainly empathize with those folks that at least partially informed their purchasing decision with the clearly misleading gameplay footage where the high fidelity textures were used.

 

In retrospect it seems like a bit of bait and switch (when in reality it's probably more of a simple blunder).

[mcfabulous]

but there are still 3 options of textures you can write TextureQuality=2 in the .ini files, why isn't this used or mentioned for people with laptops and low end systems?

 

Didn't you read, it was a glitch that the game created the word medium..........

 

I am disappointed but not really surprised by this answer... it's not a deal breaker for me personally but I can certainly empathize with those folks that at least partially informed their purchasing decision with the clearly misleading gameplay footage where the high fidelity textures were used.

 

In retrospect it seems like a bit of bait and switch (when in reality it's probably more of a simple blunder).

 

a stupidly large number of people who got this game built pc's just for it.

Edited January 11, 2012 by mcfabulous

[Parrothead]

Bioware, I am disappointed in you. You made a terrible mistake going with the Hero engine. There are many other games that run well with high resolution textures, MMOs included.

[ToonPhil]

Are you kidding me? So basically no ones computer can run high resolution textures because their engine is garbage Lol. This game already looks poor and in a couple of years when pc games continue to look better and the next generation of consoles are released this game will simply be a bad memory. This has some of the worst textures of an recent pc releases as well as some of the worst shadows I have seen in a modern game.

 

At first I wasn't sure if all this negativity toward the Hero Engine was valid but this proves it was a poor design flaw.

Edited January 11, 2012 by ToonPhil

[Calimwulf]

Thanks much for the clarification!

 

I'm with the other folks saying that I should have the option to make my machine crawl if that is the choice I make. That is usually why graphical option settings are ... optional. I can understand why the team wouldn't have wanted to deal with the 'bugs' that would be reported because folks were over taxing their machines, but options would definitely be nice.

 

Be Well.