Disappointing enhancement
ljwljw21
Member Posts: 22
I am playing BG2EE these days. The game itself is still awesome. But I am afraid the graphics and gameplay enhancement is not as great as it could be. It seems to me nothing really improved besides the resolution. Actually there are so much could be done with minor efforts. What if they just improved the character models and shadow effects like those in NOX, which was published in 2000? What a shame.
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To give an in-depth version of what @CrevsDaak said. All character 'models' are sprite based, since all the actual model assets were lost. Which is unfortunate.
To give some kind of indication of what would be required, what you are stating would require only "minor efforts," I present one walking scene:
If the image above looks tiny, that's because it is. The first thing to do is increase the size. Each frame, ten frames in total for just this one. Because each frame is a different size, you cannot just say "increase to A x B resolution." At this point, you're probably thinking, "whoa, wait a second, can't they just make new models?" They could. But, unfortunately, there are two points regarding that; first is that it costs money, probably more money than up-scaling the images they have, and second is that new models would look out of place quality and appearance-wise.
So, the images. The next thing to do after increasing the size. Obviously, they would need to add in some smoothing to the now-pixelated image. Smoothing isn't going to be good enough, either, they would also need to add detail. That's the least I would expect if they increase the resolution.
Now, the scale of the request. Some of the numbers. This is the forward (south) walking animation that I have above. You also have north, north west, west, south west, south east, east, and north east. Each, approximately with 8-10 frames. A conservative approximate, using an average of 9, would be 72 frames. Each requiring a personal touch.
If you've ever done pixel by pixel image editing, you can probably already see how tedious this is going to be. That's only the start, though. That's only the walking sequence.
What about melee attacking? Well, that's an interesting one. That's divided up into overhand, slashing, and stabbing/thrusting. That's near enough the same number of frames for each one. Multi-directional, 72 for overhand, 72 slashing, and 72 stabbing. I am also certain that things like two-handed weapons are dealt with separately, staves, spears, two-handed swords, and dual-wielding; but we'll ignore them for now, just to get a conservative estimate.
Add on projectiles. Again, this is a tricky one since it is also divided up. There's throwing (daggers, darts, etc.), bow, and crossbow. Each with the same approximate number of frames; 72, 72, 72.
There's also the flinch/damage animation, also somewhere in the same region of 72. Okay, that's a fairly round figure of approximately 600 (576, so far). We'll leave it there, and ignore the other attack-based animations.
I left it there, just for some perspective on quantifying what is being asked. This is the big one, multiply the above by each armour set (4 in total). That's a very conservative approximate of 2000 frames just for one race, rounded down to the nearest thousand. This number should also by multiplied to take into account of the two genders, male and female spprites. Certain classes also have their own set of frames, such as fighters, clerics, wizard classes, and thieves, and most races also have unique framesets. No joke, it wouldn't stop at 20,000 frames.
It couldn't just be done for the player related content, either. It would need to also be done for creatures, as well, so that nothing would look out of place.
Shadows are, likewise, frame based as you can see above. No additional shadows would be possible. This is not a 3D model where you can add a specular map, bump map, or shader related map.
To cut a long-winded and very boring story short: they decided that it wasn't feasible.
@Troodon80 thanks for the full explanation
Replacing those models would have taken too much work/time/money.
Given the explanation above about the level of complexity associated, I've personally got no qualms about Beamdog/Overhaul taking a pass on that much effort as being "not worth the lift". It is quite simply a cost/benefit analysis. As you say, the majority of players might "Like" better graphics, but aren't going to fault them for not having them provided that other things were improved. They were, so the majority are happy.
If you aren't that's a valid point of view. However, you may not find a huge amount of sympathy towards that line of thinking, particularly if you are souring the entire game based on that factor alone (which would seem to be the case based on the wording of the thread title).
All simply my opinion.
I realize that would probably have been beyond their budget though.
To also draw upon my utterly terrible computer knowledge the other issue I'm thinking would be about how the change would have impacted their ability to put the game on tablets. Higher resolution sprites means it takes up more hardware space and both of the games are already a pretty big games. At least by tablet standards. Plus the games already had issues when it comes to lag. How would higher resolution sprites impact the availability of RAM for instance? It might not be an issue out in the wilderness areas but in places where there are a lot of commoners (or commoners and the possibility of area of effect spellcasting) it might have been an issue.
The original Baldur's Gate games were some of the most beautiful I've ever seen: they weren't photo-realistic but they looked like very tasteful drawings. the sprites were very small but detailed enough that you could clearly distinguish a dwarf in heavy armour from an elf in leather armour and these little figures moved through vibrant, living backgrounds.
Sadly time has taken its toll and BG1, which was written for tiny monitors doesn't play well on today's equipment. Vanilla it's just over-enlarged, even with Tutu and widescreen mods it looks too small. BG1EE is like having the original scaled properly to a large, modern monitor - which is all I want. With the addition, even, of the ability to do a certain amount of zoom. Having the original look of BG1 scaled correctly to a modern monitor is worth the price of the game alone to me. BG2 the visuals aren't so much of an issue: I could probably play my original disc version relatively happily so I'd rather they didn't change too much as it was so good to start with.
I've been looking at the 'Baldur's Gate Reloaded' mod fitting BG1 into the NWN2 engine and I'm in awe of the skill and the sheer volume of work that's gone into it, but I also couldn't help wondering how at the time everyone was so enthusiastic about those early 3D games. To my eyes today Baldur's Gate (so long as it's at an appropriate scale and not over-zoomed into) looks far, far better than the blocky 3D of NWN.
No doubt, delivering the promise (since December 2013) on giving us a new patch soon, I have not yet picked up any announcement that the "latest" patches for the BG:EE and BG2:EE will be arriving or not?
Not just that, but even the Mods (for BG2:EE) are not yet updated to meet with the enhanced game since December 2013
I'm disappointed and tired of awaiting for the staff speeding up with the fixes, plus there are issues that the last patches introduced other bugs, which then need to be rectified, and still pending.
Any reasons for the delays or excuses, as such??
The only *big bad bug* is in the iPad version of game (Might have been patched by now, don't have the game on iPad)
Mods are made and sustained by modders. Can't blame BG:EE for that.