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

[Adelbert]

This is the 7th post about this issue:

 

1st post (117 pages long): http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=140954

2nd post (112 pages long): http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=151787

3rd post (125 pages long): http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=162569

4th post (148 pages long): http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=164481

5th post (117 pages long): http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=167957

6th post (105 pages long): http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=175553

 

Off topic: If you are looking for some information in order to increase the graphics quality of the game, and since nothing can be done with model textures until Bioware gives us real hi-res textures, I recommend you to visit this post in order to increase the scenario texture quality: http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=178454

 

*New Update 11/01/2012*

 

So here we go. The answer we wanted, and also probably the answer nobody wanted:

 

Hey everyone, thanks for bearing with us as we investigated the concerns raised here.

 

After investigation, it seems that the confusion here is a combination of a UI issue that's been resolved and a feature that's working as intended, but the reason why it's 'working as intended' needs explanation.

 

First, the UI issue. The preferences menu as it is seen on the Public Test Server for version 1.1 of the game is correct - there are only supposed to be two texture choices, 'Low' and 'High'. This replaces the original three-choice preference of Low/Medium/High because in reality, there was never supposed to be a 'Medium' choice - that was a bug.

 

Here's where we need to explain. As many of you have noted, your character in the game world is rendered using lower resolution textures than inside of cinematic conversation scenes. This was a deliberate decision by the development team. To understand why this was done, I have to briefly talk about MMOs and their engines.

 

In comparison to single player games and other genres of multiplayer online games, MMOs have much higher variability in the number of characters that can be potentially rendered on-screen at the same time. In MMOs, even though most of the time you'll see a relatively small number of characters on screen, there are certain situations in which many more characters will be seen. Some examples of these situations include popular gathering places in-game (in our case, the two fleets), Operations with large teams, and Warzones. In those scenarios the client (and your PC) has to work hard to show off a lot of characters on-screen.

 

During development and testing of The Old Republic, our priorities were to ensure the game looked great and performed well. In testing, we discovered that using our 'maximum resolution' textures on in-game characters during normal gameplay could cause severe performance issues, even on powerful PCs. There were a variety of possible options to help improve performance, but one that was explored and ultimately implemented used what is known as a 'texture atlas'.

 

To understand that I've got to get technical for a minute. When a character in the game is 'seen' by another character - ie, gets close to your field of view - the client has to 'draw' that character for you to see. As the character is 'drawn' for you there are a number of what are known as 'draw calls' where the client pulls information from the repository it has on your hard disk, including textures, and then renders the character. Every draw call that is made is a demand on your PC, so keeping that number of draw calls low per character is important. With our 'maximum resolution' textures a large number of draw calls are made per character, but that wasn't practical for normal gameplay, especially when a large number of characters were in one place; the number of draw calls made on your client would multiply very quickly. The solution was to 'texture atlas' - essentially to put a number of smaller textures together into one larger texture. This reduces the number of draw calls dramatically and allows the client to render characters quicker, which improves performance dramatically.

 

When it comes to cinematic scenes, however, characters are rendered using the higher number of draw calls and maximum resolution textures. This is because in those scenes, we have control over exactly how many characters are rendered and can ensure that the game performs well. The transition between 'atlas textured' characters (out of cinematics) and 'maximum resolution' textures (in cinematics) is mostly hidden by the transition between those two states (when the screen goes black), but obviously it's clear if you pay close attention.

 

In summary; yes, we had a small UI bug that unfortunately caused confusion over how the game is intended to work. The textures you're seeing in the course of normal gameplay are optimized for that mode of play. The textures you're seeing during cinematics are also optimized for that mode of play. They are higher resolution, but that's because we're able to control cinematic scenes to ensure good performance in a way we can't during normal gameplay.

 

We understand the passion and desire for people to see the same textures you see in our cinematic scenes in the main game. Because of the performance issues that would cause for the client, that's not an immediate and easy fix; we need to ensure we're making choices that the majority of our players will be able to benefit from. Having 'atlassed textures' helps performance overall, and that's a very important goal for us.

 

With that said, we've heard your feedback here loud and clear. The development team is exploring options to improve the fidelity of the game, particularly for those of you with high-spec PCs. It will be a significant piece of development work and it won't be an overnight change, but we're listening and we're committed to reacting to your feedback.

 

So no, we won't have high resolution textures in a 2012 AAA game anytime soon.

 

Thanks all for the support on this subject guys.

 

New Update 09/01/2012

 

We finally got a first response by Stephen Reid. I'll just quote it:

 

Hey all, wanted to let you know we're aware of this issue.

 

We're tracking down the details with the development team and will give you an update soon - hopefully later today.

 

I'll update this post as soon as we get that info.

 

 

Original 1st post with 117 pages: http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=140954

 

I want to thank EVERYBODY for the support we are all giving to this post. Many good opinions here. More than 50 pages in 1 day clearly shows one thing: as customers paying for a 50$ product and worth 15$ a month, we deserve an answer.

 

//Update

 

Ok, since this has become the "official" post for the High Resolution Textures issue, I'm going to update this post for newcomers with the information we have at the moment. So, here are the facts we know:

 

1- The game had high resolution textures during beta. But they disappeared before releasing the live client.

 

2- You are NOT playing in high settings, no matter what your preferences window says. At this moment, medium=high, and there is no high, so you are all playing viewing your char's textures in medium quality.

 

3- This was expected to be fixed in the PTS. However, at this moment the issue hasn't been fixed for 1.1. What is more, they deleted the "Medium" quality option, and now there are only two options. Low and High. And yes, you are right: High is just the new Medium, as you can see in this screenshot:

 

http://img651.imageshack.us/img651/9238/swtor3.png

 

More info on this, by MaxWham:

 

Ok, I've made myself to download the whole Test Client, and that's what I've found:

Now there are only 2 options for "Texture Quality", "Shader Complexity" and "Character

Level of Detail":

 

http://floomby.com/content/Unhn91yMJ0

 

http://floomby.com/content/mx3gBmTTkS

 

http://floomby.com/content/axEz2UPYUE

 

This is how the game looks on Low:

 

http://floomby.com/content/5hsuNryE1E

 

And High:

 

http://floomby.com/content/SpcGe55FUk

 

So you see enviroment textures do change, but the character ones are always the same...

The options of "Low" and "High" only affect cutscenes, but unfortunately I can't make screenies during them:(...

 

4- Somehow, the high resolution textures are already in the game. But they are not being used while playing with your character. You can see em during dialog cutscenes. You can see them on your companions wardrobe preview window. And you can see them for 0,5 secs after clicking on your holo terminal in your ship. Here are some examples:

 

Medium: http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/59/screenshot2012010419385.jpg/

High: http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/851/screenshot2012010419390.jpg/

 

Medium: http://img32.imageshack.us/img32/8974/screenshot2012010710454.jpg

High: http://img38.imageshack.us/img38/553/hirez.png

 

Medium: http://imgur.com/NqI7j

High: http://imgur.com/M7Geg

 

ToonPhil shared with us this one: http://img12.imageshack.us/img12/3646/swtorhightextures1.png

 

Another one from Adamant:

 

Medium: http://i.imgur.com/PsqBo.jpg

High: http://i.imgur.com/U1RMk.jpg

 

And yet another one: http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r277/UnruheEndlos/The%20Old%20Republic/TORTextureComparison.jpg

 

One of the best high/med comparison photosets I've seen in this forum, by Rhykker: http://img51.imageshack.us/img51/5493/hirez.jpg

 

Gif showing the difference between both: http://m.uploadedit.com/bac/1325903803236.gif

 

and another gif: http://i40.tinypic.com/ip8wmb.gif

 

And a video:

 

And a WoW vs SWTOR comparison: http://i146.photobucket.com/albums/r277/UnruheEndlos/TORWOWComparison.jpg

 

Also, I'm getting this technical information from the user Lemon_King. It's really impressive what some users like him are finding inside the code:

 

FYI: Did some mining, in the Renderer where it handles Dynamic Models - There is code for once it has all the textures for a Player / NPC Dynamic model is resizes the texture by 50%. So forcing MipMap Bias to -1 won't work around this issue.

However, a crafty dll Mod for RemoteRenderer could get around this issue by setting the resize to 1:1 instead of 1:2."

 

XML Data for Controlling Texture MipMaps in RemoteRenderer.dll @ 0x00096B60

Code:

<?xml version="1.0"?>

<TextureObject>

<MagFilter>Linear</MagFilter>

<MinFilter>Linear</MinFilter>

<MipMapFilter>Linear</MipMapFilter>

<UAddress>Clamp</UAddress>

<VAddress>Clamp</VAddress>

<WAddress>Clamp</WAddress>

<LODBias>0</LODBias>

<MaxMipMap>1</MaxMipMap>

<Compression>Color</Compression>

<Type>Image</Type>

</TextureObject>

 

Direct Dump from RemoteRenderer.dll @ 0x000944B9

 

Shader Function for Downscaling Textures

Code:

#ifdef PS_1_x.#define TEX2D( value ) tex2D( tex##value, In.T##value ).#define EXTRA_TEXCOORD( value ) float2 T##value : TEXCOORD##value;.#define CONSTANT_SCALE( value ) ( ( (value) > 2.0 ) ? 1.0 : ( (value) / 2.0 ) ).#define RESCALE( value ) value += value.#else.#define TEX2D( value ) tex2D( tex##value, In.T0 ).#define EXTRA_TEXCOORD( value ).#define CONSTANT_SCALE( value ) value.#define RESCALE( value ).#endif.sampler tex0 : register( s0 );sampler tex1 : register( s1 );sampler tex2 : register( s2 );float4 consta : register( c0 );struct VS_OUT{ float2 T0: TEXCOORD0; EXTRA_TEXCOORD( 1 ) EXTRA_TEXCOORD( 2 )};float4 main( VS_OUT In ) : COLOR{ const float4 crc = { CONSTANT_SCALE( 1.595794678f ), -CONSTANT_SCALE( 0.813476563f ), 0, 0.0 }; const float4 crb = { 0, -CONSTANT_SCALE( 0.391448975f ), CONSTANT_SCALE( 2.017822266f ), 0.0 }; const float4 adj = { -CONSTANT_SCALE( 0.87065506f ), CONSTANT_SCALE( 0.529705048f ), -CONSTANT_SCALE( 1.081668854f ), 0 }; float4 p; float y = TEX2D( 0 ).a; float cr = TEX2D( 1 ).a; float cb = TEX2D( 2 ).a; p = y * CONSTANT_SCALE( 1.164123535f ); p += (crc * cr) + (crb * cb) + adj; RESCALE( p ); p.w = 1.0; p *= consta; return p;}........#ifdef PS_1_x.#define TEX2D( value ) tex2D( tex##value, In.T##value ).#define EXTRA_TEXCOORD( value ) float2 T##value : TEXCOORD##value;.#define CONSTANT_SCALE( value ) ( ( (value) > 2.0 ) ? 1.0 : ( (value) / 2.0 ) ).#define RESCALE( value ) value += value.#else.#define TEX2D( value ) tex2D( tex##value, In.T0 ).#define EXTRA_TEXCOORD( value ).#define CONSTANT_SCALE( value ) value.#define RESCALE( value ).#endif.sampler tex0 : register( s0 );sampler tex1 : register( s1 );sampler tex2 : register( s2 );sampler tex3 : register( s3 );float4 consta : register( c0 );struct VS_OUT{ float2 T0: TEXCOORD0; EXTRA_TEXCOORD( 1 ) EXTRA_TEXCOORD( 2 ) EXTRA_TEXCOORD( 3 )};float4 main( VS_OUT In ) : COLOR{ const float4 crc = { CONSTANT_SCALE( 1.595794678f ), -CONSTANT_SCALE( 0.813476563f ), 0, 0.0 }; const float4 crb = { 0, -CONSTANT_SCALE( 0.391448975f ), CONSTANT_SCALE( 2.017822266f ), 0.0 }; const float4 adj = { -CONSTANT_SCALE( 0.87065506f ), CONSTANT_SCALE( 0.529705048f ), -CONSTANT_SCALE( 1.081668854f ), 0 }; float4 p; float y = TEX2D( 0 ).a; float cr = TEX2D( 1 ).a; float cb = TEX2D( 2 ).a; float a = TEX2D( 3 ).a; p = y * CONSTANT_SCALE( 1.164123535f ); p += (crc * cr) + (crb * cb) + adj; RESCALE( p ); p.w = a; p *= consta; return p;}.ps_2_0

 

 

It is important to note that after 200+ pages, Bioware still hasn't said anything about this.

 

I'm also quoting this very well written post:

 

Well, that thread on the PTS forum shows that they at least know about this one and are reading it. I have faith in Bioware to fix this issue, I'm sure they understand the damage to their credit by removing the medium texture setting and changing it to be called "high" and obviously the cat's out of the bag now. I think in general if they answer the following questions here, most of us will be satisfied -

 

1. Please clarify the "work around" requested in the first post of this thread, including a clarification of the sentence: If you installed prior to 5:00AM CST on January 4th, 2012, your graphics will display as "Low" even if actual in-game settings are higher due to automatic preference detection. and if reinstalling the game from origin, or any other source will remedy this issue.

 

2. Please explain the removal of the "medium" texture setting on the PTS and its apparent promotion to being called "high" despite the fact that it still retains all of the characteristics and low quality textures of the current "medium" setting.

 

3. Please indicate if a fix is being worked on/implemented, and if so, when we may roughly be able to expect it.

 

Muddy textures are not a game breaker. You can still, as I have, have an enormous amount of fun with this game. I think we jump the gun if we say that bioware is sweeping the problem under the carpet, without an explanation, we wont know for sure if that is the case until 1.1 goes live.

 

That being said, this is a Triple A title, from a Triple A studio, and a Triple A publisher. We are indeed paying customers who really want noting more than an explanation. I think we all generally understand that this isn't a "snap your fingers" fix, because if it was they would have no reason to hold it back. The frustration from most reasonable people in this thread is one of lack of explanation/communication.

 

We can split hairs about if the issue is lighting, or if its textures (though the visual proof shows textures http://m.uploadedit.com/bac/1325903803236.gif). And we can say "Why not just settle? Its a good game," But the core of this problem is a simple one - missing high res textures, and the apparent lack of information on a fix.

 

Say you buy a blender at Wal-Mart, you have really been wanting this blender. You have read previews about it online, you have been watching videos about it, and have been ooggling at pictures of it. One of its prime features, often advertized is the new "Mega Frappe" button. This button helps to differentiate this blender from its competition.

 

Alas! When you buy the blender and fervently remove it from the box, you find that the Mega Frappe button has been pried out, and the words "Mega Frappe" have been crossed out with a magic marker. Surely you would feel like you have been just been, for lack of a better word, screwed.

 

Now, replace the words Blender, with SWTOR and Mega Frappe with Hi-Res Textures and I think that you will find that the frustration is indeed well placed.

 

I have faith in Bioware to fix this issue, but we really do need to be told what is going on.

 

//Update.

 

So, this is what the official known bugs forums says:

 

If you installed prior to 5:00AM CST on January 4th, 2012, your graphics will display as "Low" even if actual in-game settings are higher due to automatic preference detection.

Workaround: Your graphics setting will display properly once modified and saved.

 

Workaround: Individual preferences will display properly once modified and saved.

 

Also, it was stated on 1.0.2 patch that:

 

Upon a new installation and first launch of the game, settings files and in-game graphics preferences are now consistent with each other.

 

So, please Bioware, can we get a clarification on this? Does this mean that if we reinstall the game using the online installer, we will get high resolution textures everytime and not only during dialog cutscenes?

 

If not, any ETA on when the high resolution textures bug will be fixed?

 

Thanks in advance for answering this confusive situation.

Edited February 10, 2012 by Adelbert

[Ellvaan]

Greetings everyone!

 

Since the previous thread has reached past our 1k post threshold, we have closed it. We have recreated it here for you to continue your discussion of this topic.

 

As a reminder, please keep our Rules of Conduct and the following in mind when posting:

 

• Insults - Please do not resort to or use them in any way in your posts. Posts should be productive, not destructive.
   
  
• Trolling - Please do not post messages that are purposefully designed to provoke, antagonize, or otherwise elicit a negative emotional response.
   
  
• Agree to Disagree - Be respectful of others' viewpoints even if they are opposite of your own. Discuss disagreements constructively.
   
  
• Flag, Don't Fight - Utilize the Flag Post feature to report possible rules violations, rather than responding to or fighting them.
   
  
• Ignoring - If you feel you simply cannot get along with another community member, please place them on your ignore list.
  

 

We would like to draw your attention to responses made by Senior Online Community Manager, Stephen Reid:

 

Hey everyone, thanks for bearing with us as we investigated the concerns raised here.

 

After investigation, it seems that the confusion here is a combination of a UI issue that's been resolved and a feature that's working as intended, but the reason why it's 'working as intended' needs explanation.

 

First, the UI issue. The preferences menu as it is seen on the Public Test Server for version 1.1 of the game is correct - there are only supposed to be two texture choices, 'Low' and 'High'. This replaces the original three-choice preference of Low/Medium/High because in reality, there was never supposed to be a 'Medium' choice - that was a bug.

 

Here's where we need to explain. As many of you have noted, your character in the game world is rendered using lower resolution textures than inside of cinematic conversation scenes. This was a deliberate decision by the development team. To understand why this was done, I have to briefly talk about MMOs and their engines.

 

In comparison to single player games and other genres of multiplayer online games, MMOs have much higher variability in the number of characters that can be potentially rendered on-screen at the same time. In MMOs, even though most of the time you'll see a relatively small number of characters on screen, there are certain situations in which many more characters will be seen. Some examples of these situations include popular gathering places in-game (in our case, the two fleets), Operations with large teams, and Warzones. In those scenarios the client (and your PC) has to work hard to show off a lot of characters on-screen.

 

During development and testing of The Old Republic, our priorities were to ensure the game looked great and performed well. In testing, we discovered that using our 'maximum resolution' textures on in-game characters during normal gameplay could cause severe performance issues, even on powerful PCs. There were a variety of possible options to help improve performance, but one that was explored and ultimately implemented used what is known as a 'texture atlas'.

 

To understand that I've got to get technical for a minute. When a character in the game is 'seen' by another character - ie, gets close to your field of view - the client has to 'draw' that character for you to see. As the character is 'drawn' for you there are a number of what are known as 'draw calls' where the client pulls information from the repository it has on your hard disk, including textures, and then renders the character. Every draw call that is made is a demand on your PC, so keeping that number of draw calls low per character is important. With our 'maximum resolution' textures a large number of draw calls are made per character, but that wasn't practical for normal gameplay, especially when a large number of characters were in one place; the number of draw calls made on your client would multiply very quickly. The solution was to 'texture atlas' - essentially to put a number of smaller textures together into one larger texture. This reduces the number of draw calls dramatically and allows the client to render characters quicker, which improves performance dramatically.

 

When it comes to cinematic scenes, however, characters are rendered using the higher number of draw calls and maximum resolution textures. This is because in those scenes, we have control over exactly how many characters are rendered and can ensure that the game performs well. The transition between 'atlas textured' characters (out of cinematics) and 'maximum resolution' textures (in cinematics) is mostly hidden by the transition between those two states (when the screen goes black), but obviously it's clear if you pay close attention.

 

In summary; yes, we had a small UI bug that unfortunately caused confusion over how the game is intended to work. The textures you're seeing in the course of normal gameplay are optimized for that mode of play. The textures you're seeing during cinematics are also optimized for that mode of play. They are higher resolution, but that's because we're able to control cinematic scenes to ensure good performance in a way we can't during normal gameplay.

 

We understand the passion and desire for people to see the same textures you see in our cinematic scenes in the main game. Because of the performance issues that would cause for the client, that's not an immediate and easy fix; we need to ensure we're making choices that the majority of our players will be able to benefit from. Having 'atlassed textures' helps performance overall, and that's a very important goal for us.

 

With that said, we've heard your feedback here loud and clear. The development team is exploring options to improve the fidelity of the game, particularly for those of you with high-spec PCs. It will be a significant piece of development work and it won't be an overnight change, but we're listening and we're committed to reacting to your feedback.

 

That screenshot is from a cinematic in-game. As stated, cinematic scenes use high resolution textures because we have control over how many characters are rendered on-screen at once. This is how the game was always intended to look in cinematics. We did not 'remove' high resolution textures - they were always in the game for use in cinematics.

 

With that said, thank you for all of your responses. We understand everyone's desires around this issue, and although it's not going to be an overnight fix, as mentioned we're working on addressing this. Many of the suggestions you have made are similar to potential changes the development team is investigating...

 

You can find all this information and more in our Developer Tracker, which lists the latest posts from developers, as well as our Community Managers and Coordinators.

 

Thank you!

[cipher_nemo]

Has there been an official word lately? I haven't seen any announcement regarding high-res. Or is EAoware just stalling?

 

Forget Bioware. This is EA.

 

That's why I called them EAoware.

[Chessrook]

Wait, we still need this thread?

[Atarufighter]

Wait, we still need this thread?

 

There hasn't been a satisfying, official answer yet, they just said they were working on it, and didn't mention it among the other features being implemented in 1.2, so yes.

[Chessrook]

There hasn't been a satisfying, official answer yet, they just said they were working on it, and didn't mention it among the other features being implemented in 1.2, so yes.

 

I'd consider the big yellow block of text to be an answer. Satisfying to me, I'm glad to at least have an answer. Somehow I doubt there's really anything constructive anyone can really add anymore until Bioware posts that it's showing up in the next patch. So..... why remake the thread?

Edited February 9, 2012 by Chessrook

[Atarufighter]

I'd consider the big yellow block of text to be an answer. Satisfying to me, I'm glad to at least have an answer. Somehow I doubt there's really anything constructive anyone can really add anymore until Bioware posts that it's showing up in the next patch. So..... why remake the thread?

 

So people can discuss it. And returning to my point, I'm not satisfied, because the post is vaguely confirms it might be in by 1.2, and there's a good enough possibility it won't, considering they didn't mention it anywhere else.

[Mikkeos]

Other char comes into range.

Client loads the High-Res texture.

Client downsizes it to 50%.

Client displays it.

 

Sounds like a great idea.

 

Just like:

Ads are done in high-res.

Beta is done in high-res.

As soon as the people handed over the cash: the new high-res textures are shown.

[Luewen]

I call it bull#### on the huge performance issues if the high details get in game, unless the game engine has deteriorated since beta. I had no issues on performance with beta high res textures while there were 30+ toons in screen. As of matter i go as far as saying the current live version is performing worse than high res beta client. Edited February 9, 2012 by Luewen

[mdobrowney]

I call it bull#### on the huge performance issues if the high details get in game, unless the game engine has deteriorated since beta. I had no issues on performance with beta high res textures while there were 30+ toons in screen. As of matter i go as far as saying the current live version is performing worse than high res beta client.

 

 

i agree. Beta ran better then this release.

[AlValentyn]

I'd consider the big yellow block of text to be an answer. Satisfying to me, I'm glad to at least have an answer. Somehow I doubt there's really anything constructive anyone can really add anymore until Bioware posts that it's showing up in the next patch. So..... why remake the thread?

 

Bioware remade the thread.

 

Also unless you keep a topic alive there might never be changes.

 

The answer is also no good, as they never stated they're reintroducing the High res textures.

 

Just some PR spin on improving "graphical fidelity". Which could be anything from a 1% to 100% improvement.

[Atarufighter]

They added a lot from beta to release, so keep that in mind too. But I'm also quite unhappy with their response, especially because this is a really big deal for a lot of people.

[EranMichaelLevi]

I honestly don't understand what kind of answer is: "this may cause severe performance issues". Isn't it up to each individual client and their rig's capablities? We know there are higher resolution textures available and that they were playable during beta testing, than why leave us without the option to choose?

 

The current blurry textures are unimpressive and combined with the already debatable cartoonish looks Bioware chose for this title its really testing my resolve.

Edited February 9, 2012 by EranMichaelLevi

[AlValentyn]

I honestly don't understand what kind of answer is: "this may cause severe performance issues". Isn't it up to each individual client and their rig's capablities? We know there are higher resolution texture available and that they were playable during beta testing, than why leave us without the option to choose?

 

The current blurry textures are unimpressive and combined with the already debatable cartoonish looks Bioware chose for this title its really testing my resolve.

 

Thats one of the main reasons this thread is still going.

 

Graphical options and settings have always been there, and it's been up to the player to pick the best settings for their machine.

 

Many people have midhigh-highend machines which should easily handle the best graphics and textures.

 

Yet everyone is stuck with Medium settings, and removing medium and calling it High is a cheap underhanded move alright.

[EranMichaelLevi]

Thats one of the main reasons this thread is still going.

 

I just noticed this is like the sixth reincarnation of this thread, you would think Bioware will get the message by now.

Edited February 9, 2012 by EranMichaelLevi

[Atarufighter]

I honestly don't understand what kind of answer is: "this may cause severe performance issues". Isn't it up to each individual client and their rig's capablities? We know there are higher resolution texture available and that they were playable during beta testing, than why leave us without the option to choose?

 

The current blurry textures are unimpressive and combined with the already debatable cartoonish looks Bioware chose for this title its really testing my resolve.

 

 

In my opinion a few graphical elements are great (landscapes environments from afar, terrains, buildings, alien and human faces, very few armor pieces), but I just can't accept the crap they are forcing onto our characters: I even love the style and design of the armor pieces and graphics, but with such low textures they are as you stated - testing my resolve too. I just hope they come to their senses and restore the real high option they had in beta and during development, soon.

[Illyean]

I think calling half of the in world character textures medium is lowering the term too much, they are low in most cases. Story scenes have medium textures (at best) that scale badly, they look acceptable in wide scenes, poor in close up. I've given up on any kind of sensible or logical answer from BW on this (or pretty much any other issue it seems) but I do think its important every one keeps these threads alive to make it clear what we want.

 

They have hobbled their game, which mostly works quite well, but has some really huge issues, this texture issue being one of them for me.

 

So, give us back the 'high' resolution textures that we had, improve the graphical fidelity of the game as much as possible, give us options, give us the choice to play with the best visual settings out hardware can handle.

 

(side note, I honestly think a lot of the in game lag and hitching is the engines horrendous texture coding, you can see how long it takes to render textures all the time, many issues are, imo, related to this core deficiency, something BW had admitted to as the reason why they changed the texture handling and lowered the character textures)

[Atarufighter]

Apparently the conversation texture quality should be high, but I can't seem to spot the difference, and I noticed a few other people are having this problem. I can, however, see a huge difference when using the hologram trick on my ship, which leaves me deeply disappointed.

[EranMichaelLevi]

Do you think they might address this in patch 1.2? are there any indications for this? I heard half chewed rumors but never with a confirmation. Edited February 9, 2012 by EranMichaelLevi

[Atarufighter]

Do you think they might address this in patch 1.2? are there any indications for this? I heard half chewed rumors but never with a confirmation.

 

Quote by Stephen Reid:

 

"That screenshot is from a cinematic in-game. As stated, cinematic scenes use high resolution textures because we have control over how many characters are rendered on-screen at once. This is how the game was always intended to look in cinematics. We did not 'remove' high resolution textures - they were always in the game for use in cinematics.

 

With that said, thank you for all of your responses. We understand everyone's desires around this issue, and although it's not going to be an overnight fix, as mentioned we're working on addressing this. Many of the suggestions you have made are similar to potential changes the development team is investigating.

 

I rounded up the development team once more and had another discussion, and wanted to update you with a better timeline and some more precise details on what we're doing right now.

 

The first major changes will be in our next major Game Update, which will have the version number of 1.2. Those changes will bring greater visual fidelity to your character and those around you, but will still allow for good performance in situations where a lot of characters are on-screen at once. In other words, for those screenshots of your character in their best gear, you should see a marked improvement.

 

Other potential changes are being discussed right now – as I said, many of which are similar to changes suggested by many of you. As usual, you’ll see these sorts of changes on our Public Test Server before they make it into the live game. Right now we cannot commit to a live date for the 1.2 Game Update, but it will be within Q1 2012."

 

I didn't see any mention of this in the "Coming up" video or any other source I know of. If they didn't say anything else on the subject then I'll just have to wait to know.

[Schizman]

Esteemed EAware,

 

Please activate the high-res textures for those who have rigs that CAN run them.

It can't be that hard if they were up and running during Beta, unless you've made it hard, in which case you just f'ed yourself over, because you could have foreseen these ''protests''.

 

If you're afraid YOUR end of the system may not be able to manage half of your players enabling high res, simply admit it and tell us you're going to fix it.

 

Give us a solid explanation as to WHY it is so hard to simply switch them on? Maybe because, like I implied, you've done something to make it hard to do so, in which case I would suggest admitting your mistake like a grown up, and getting to work.

 

We are your paying customers, and we demand what we have seen in advertisements.

 

 

PS @ fellow players:

 

[DAILY] Mission: Thread Bumping

 

The BioWare corporation, once our friends and allies, have turned their back on us. Their newly formed alliance with EA has provided them with a long forgotten technology and they are severely impeding our graphical capabilities. They have already taken out one of our options, the "Medium" option. Even our strongest PCs are no match to their devious tactics. The community is suffering heavy losses, including women and children, and we need your help. Our only hope is to perform the dark ritual of "Bumping". Widely frowned upon in the community, the ritual is often performed by those know as "Trolls" and is associated with the conditions of "flame" and "rage". Do not let these consume you. I sense the posting is strong with you. You must help us keep this thread bumped. The survival of The Old Republic depends on you.

 

{ACCEPT} {DECLINE}

 

 

Provided Rewards:

 

[Advanced Graphics] [stim: Critical Gameplay] [Adrenal: Enhanced Fun]

2x Community Commendation

 

PPS @ fellow players: don't simply say ''bump'' or something similar, because they can actually ban you for doing this repeatedly.

Simply do as I do, and take 10 minutes to write a decent post.

Its not bumping, technically, its letting your voice be heard.

Edited February 9, 2012 by Schizman

[Clemsonalum]

2012 MMO should have high res textures need to be fixed.

[Schizman]

2012 MMO should have high res textures need to be fixed.

 

^^^Hah! for all my eloquence, I never considered saying just that! +1 ^^^

[Clemsonalum]

^^^Hah! for all my eloquence, I never considered saying just that! +1 ^^^

 

Short and sweet my friend short and sweet.

[Schizman]

Oh, for easy quoting here is the post originally made by daMarek in the last incarnation of this thread.

All I did was copy the text, paste it in a reply box, and re-add colours using Editor Mode (top right of light-blue box in the reply window)

 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

[DAILY] Mission: Thread Bumping

 

The BioWare corporation, once our friends and allies, have turned their back on us. Their newly formed alliance with EA has provided them with a long forgotten technology and they are severely impeding our graphical capabilities. They have already taken out one of our options, the "Medium" option. Even our strongest PCs are no match to their devious tactics. The community is suffering heavy losses, including women and children, and we need your help. Our only hope is to perform the dark ritual of "Bumping". Widely frowned upon in the community, the ritual is often performed by those know as "Trolls" and is associated with the conditions of "flame" and "rage". Do not let these consume you. I sense the posting is strong with you. You must help us keep this thread bumped. The survival of The Old Republic depends on you.

 

{ACCEPT} {DECLINE}

 

 

Provided Rewards:

 

[Advanced Graphics] [stim: Critical Gameplay] [Adrenal: Enhanced Fun]

2x Community Commendation

 

*Originally by daMarek*

Edited February 9, 2012 by Schizman