Friday Facts #23 - Year after

[slpwnd]

The regular news for this week: http://www.factorio.com/blog/post/fff-23

[BurnHard]

The fine pattern on the front of the machines might look a little bit spreckled and disturbed in some zooms. And the outlines (basement of the machine) maybe would look more nice if it would not be so 100% perfect straight.

But as to say, very nice graphic, animation and theme, graphics have improved extremly. Can't wait to see the other graphical updates, love to see how it gets "one thing". And hope you guys pull the thing through to a awesome 1.0 release

(are the shadows on mashine nr 3 correct? looks like the light source is not placed correctly)

[Gammro]

Too bad the 0.9.2 release won't be until at least next week. But I'll live, I guess.

The new assembler graphics look great though, it'll probably take some getting used to, but they look awesome. I'm really curious what the new belt graphics will look like. I never really considered them "out of place", but that's probably because I've seen them in the game since I bought it.

[Calico]

I like the new assemblys.... overall fits a lot better to the new "better" style.

2 things i might wanna add:
1) The tier 3 Maschine could use a bit more of a electric look, thinking of how highly advanced it is compared to the tier 1.

2) Lights: Yes, i know we kan place lights by ourselves. But i do think that atleast some of the maschines could use some small light sources of their own. Control Lights, terminals, flickering welding torches and so on. We got a small refinery not to far away here in north germany and during the nighttime it literally is a city of light. I know, living on a alien world we wouldn't build that way, but some lights would be nice, adding to the feeling of a working factory. I sometimes just dont upgrade to electric furnaces cause the normal ones look so much better during nights.

Best of luck for your second factorio year!

[BurnHard]

2) Lights: Yes, i know we kan place lights by ourselves. But i do think that atlesat some of the maschines could some small light sources of their own. Control Lights, terminals, welding torches and so on. We got a small refinery not to far away here in north germany and during the nighttime it literally is a city of light.

Some blinking red/green light an assembler and other variations on other machines would be awesome. Or eg on splitters. Red light when its not working, green light when actually splitting. Only very small, just as a gimmic.

[dusho]

hm.. didn't know you're going for some old steampunky looks (or you named it 'old style'). As you mentioned, some stuff will look out of place now.
I'm wondering here.. if you'll have unique animated graphics (15 or so frames) for every machine and 4 possible rotations.. will GPUs with 1GB still handle it?
Any thoughts about using some small moving (translation, rotation, scale) images representing valves (gears, arms, ...) and stuff instead of doing animations frame by frame for whole objects?

[ray4ever]

The new assembling machine needs some getting used to. I guess you are than overall going for a very steampunk heavy graphic style? I guess steampunk is fitting for quite some machines, especially early on in the game but I would think about "electrifying" the machines with the technology progress. I mean your character crashed with a space ship and is making shields for his personal armor, so it seems reasonable to move away from 18th century steam machines. This could mean advancing to some more "clean" style with more lightning.

On another note I would think about adding more and stronger colors to the game/machines. As all the art on its own is looking really nice, the overall game is getting kinda dark (which isn't bad per se) and without much contrast making it hard to spot the differences between everything when zoomed out. Stronger, more diverse colors would help to differentiate all the different things on a short glance.

[Garm]

Shadows on mk3 looks like they originated from nearby light source, not from sun

Mk1 has Mk2 shadow animation

[AlexPhoenix]

i like this graphics, but i really think about more elecricity, like sparks and so on.

[sparr]

On the topic of new artwork for assemblers... when the chemical plant gets re-skinned, could you please make the activity indicator (currently just the green goo in the tank) visible when the alt info is overlaid?

[immibis]

The new assembling machine needs some getting used to. I guess you are than overall going for a very steampunk heavy graphic style? I guess steampunk is fitting for quite some machines, especially early on in the game but I would think about "electrifying" the machines with the technology progress. I mean your character crashed with a space ship and is making shields for his personal armor, so it seems reasonable to move away from 18th century steam machines. This could mean advancing to some more "clean" style with more lightning.

This.

On another note I would think about adding more and stronger colors to the game/machines. As all the art on its own is looking really nice, the overall game is getting kinda dark (which isn't bad per se) and without much contrast making it hard to spot the differences between everything when zoomed out. Stronger, more diverse colors would help to differentiate all the different things on a short glance.

Also this.

Edit to make this post not completely useless: I thought the original assembling machines (and pipes) were OK, but they definitely don't fit the new graphical style that you seem to be going for in 0.9. I would rather have the pipes and oil equipment match the old style, than change everything else to match the pipes and oil equipment, but that could just be because I'm used to that style. Also, if you're supposedly short on art assets, redoing everything in a new style isn't helping.

[MaxStrategy]

Oh between this and the pipes you definitely seem to be going for a steampunk/dieselpunk look, that's pretty cool. I like the new animations and can't wait to see the rest

[ssilk]

This new graphics make the style much lighter - fixes an very old issue from last year.

[production]

I have a bit of contrarian opinion on this direction, I'm afraid. Here's what I think:

- The existing assembling machine graphics were perfectly fine
- Changing existing graphics is a distraction when there are lots of ideas for gameplay improvements or entirely new machines
- Recoloring is a time-honored technique to stretch limited art resources; there's nothing wrong with it.
- The old graphics should remain in the game asset files and be accessible to modders

[Rhodan]

I like the new look!

Is there a plan to replace some old item-graphics? For example the iron gear wheel? I think some are really outdated.

[kovarex]

I like the new look!

Is there a plan to replace some old item-graphics? For example the iron gear wheel? I think some are really outdated.

We found a girl who is going to be responsible for ingame icons (items/technologies/fluids etc). She will be supposed to make all the icons in unite style.

[drs9999]

I have a bit of contrarian opinion on this direction, I'm afraid. Here's what I think:

- The existing assembling machine graphics were perfectly fine
- Changing existing graphics is a distraction when there are lots of ideas for gameplay improvements or entirely new machines
- Recoloring is a time-honored technique to stretch limited art resources; there's nothing wrong with it.
- The old graphics should remain in the game asset files and be accessible to modders

Basically I agree with all points, on the other hand the release(s) after a stable 0.9 will not contain much new content, so there is no need to create new graphics and the time can spend on refurbish old ones.

[slpwnd]

I have a bit of contrarian opinion on this direction, I'm afraid. Here's what I think:

- The existing assembling machine graphics were perfectly fine
- Changing existing graphics is a distraction when there are lots of ideas for gameplay improvements or entirely new machines
- Recoloring is a time-honored technique to stretch limited art resources; there's nothing wrong with it.
- The old graphics should remain in the game asset files and be accessible to modders

Basically I agree with all points, on the other hand the release(s) after a stable 0.9 will not contain much new content, so there is no need to create new graphics and the time can spend on refurbish old ones.

There will be new content even after 0.9 But the thing is that we need to fix some graphical problems from the past first - that means re-skinning assembling machines (now done), inserters, transport belts. Redoing the radar (that one looks like from a completely different game), maybe small electric pole and couple of other small things. And then of course unify the icons and objects on the belts.

There are still quite a few new things we want to add into the game (though keeping an eye on the growing complexity) , but we want to fix this "graphical debt" first.

[drs9999]

Yes of course. I did not choose my words wisely

What I tried to say is that you are going to start working on multiplayer in the near future, so the next release(s) will not contain much new game-content (e.g. in comparision to 0.9). That means that Albert can spend more time on working on the old graphics instead of creating graphics for new entities.

Anyway I am just guessing...

[slpwnd]

What I tried to say is that you are going to start working on multiplayer in the near future, so the next release(s) will not contain much new game-content (e.g. in comparision to 0.9). That means that Albert can spend more time on working on the old graphics instead of creating graphics for new entities.

Yes, that is right There are also things that require very little programming work, but would add to the gameplay significantly (for instance the boiler that can burn oil, level 2 engine, etc.) And he really needs a vacation ...