Friday Facts #323 - Animated water

[Henry Loenwind]

This feels so ... unnecessary.

Like most of the .17 changes, tbh.

[Dev-iL]

This feels so ... unnecessary.

As opposed to what? What do you consider the most important feature still missing from the game?

[Koub]

This feels so ... unnecessary.

Like most of the .17 changes, tbh.

I wanted to troll so much answering you, but I'd have to moderate myself if I did, so I'll try to be constructive :

Take a car, and strip it of all what's "unnecessary" for it to be a car. All interior panels, AC, GPS, sound system, whatever is just there for comfort. Is it still a car ? Yes. Would you buy it ? No.
Between "works" and "products that is finished, there is a whole world.

[conn11]

And let‘s not forget, that all of this polish as the HD-graphics is optional, because the player can turn it off.
Seems like a optimal choise how to add such features to a game.

[YadanHubclan]

We need moving trees, passive critters, alien bugs flying here and there, space gulls circling over shores, animal sounds, etc. Make us feel guilty for dumping tons of CO2 in the atmosphere !

[eradicator]

We need moving trees, passive critters, alien bugs flying here and there, space gulls circling over shores, animal sounds, etc.

A richer environmental soundscape would be very welcome indeed. Rustling leaves, buzzing substations, squeaking inserters... Everything should make some subtle sound. Let's call it "the HD Sound Update".

[Bilka]

buzzing substations

https://youtu.be/m2VF-WqsGvo

[eradicator]

buzzing substations

https://youtu.be/m2VF-WqsGvo

The weird thing is that i actually confirmed in-game before making that post. Because i wasn't sure about inserters either. Testing again and for the first 5 seconds i stand next to a substation it's completely silent, after that it starts buzzing. Also: nitpicker award :P.

[Bilka]

The weird thing is that i actually confirmed in-game before making that post. Because i wasn't sure about inserters either. Testing again and for the first 5 seconds i stand next to a substation it's completely silent, after that it starts buzzing.

I knew they had a sound (abused it for a mod at some point) but it also took me some experimenting to catch it on video. Speaking of checking in-game, for me the wind sound represents rustling leaves (otherwise you dont really hear wind). Have you noticed it so far? I had to turn it off because it made the game too realistic for me (lol).

[eradicator]

Speaking of checking in-game, for me the wind sound represents rustling leaves (otherwise you dont really hear wind). Have you noticed it so far? I had to turn it off because it made the game too realistic for me (lol).

Dunno, maybe. Which is kind of my point. If it was a "proper" enviromental leave-rustling my brain should have formed a mental assotiation between the rustling and me standing in a forest in-game. The sound of wind depends on the environment after all.

Also opening up wind.ogg directly it sounds mostly like strong wind, partially almost like a storm, partially during rain in a forest, partially over grassy plains, partially rocky canyon. Overall it feels like the wind sound (i.e. friction between ear+air) is louder than the background (i.e. leaves, rain). A full environmental sounscape would have to differentiate between all these instances and not mix them in a single file.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4KzFe50RQkQ

But ye know, i don't really want to obsess over singular examples. Just generally say that i think that factorio could benefit from more and differentiated environment sounds.

[Unknow0059]

Aaahhh!!! This is fucking amazing. It's incredible how much the act of polishing a game affects its feel.

[Ormy]

If you're looking for a super-efficient animation technique, you could consider colour cycling.

This one's a bit of an intro: The Lost Art of Color Cycling (Youtube)
This one is by far one of my favourite talks about early animation techniques: A GDC talk by Mark Ferrari, an expert artist who employed color cycling for beautiful effects like mist, water, fire, smoke, and even time of day (Youtube)

I was going to suggest this too. Its so simple but the effects can look almost photo-realistic when done well using the tiniest computational cost. Skip to 5:22 in the first video to see what I mean, see how real that water looks? That was in 1986!

[Henry Loenwind]

Take a car, and strip it of all what's "unnecessary" for it to be a car. All interior panels, AC, GPS, sound system, whatever is just there for comfort. Is it still a car ? Yes. Would you buy it ? No.
Between "works" and "products that is finished, there is a whole world.

That's the difference between between "essential to being an X" and "necessary to be fit for purpose". The purpose in this case is to be something that people like to play, and it's a fitness scale, not a binary value.

Anything that's posted in an FFF can be measured against this metric: Does it invoke a feeling of "I want to start a game with this included right now!", a feeling of "oh no, I hope there will be an off-switch when this is rolled out (hopefully in the far future)", or a feeling of "meh, whatever". One of them contributes to the the "fitness" of Factorio of being a good game.

My issue with .17 is that most changes hit the "oh no" and "meh" reactions for me. And looking at the forum threads for those FFFs, I do not feel like I'm too far off from the majority.

[5thHorseman]

My issue with .17 is that most changes hit the "oh no" and "meh" reactions for me. And looking at the forum threads for those FFFs, I do not feel like I'm too far off from the majority.

I believe that that is 100% due to the fact that - for about a year now - Factorio has essentially been done. And I also think this is common in many games (and cars probably), we just don't see that last bit of polish work and only see the finished product.

I know people personally who shied away from Factorio because it didn't look "good" to them. If changes like this will get some of them to buy it is it really a "meh" change? I assume you don't think it's an "oh no" one like so many thought of the recent oil change*.

*car pun not intended.

[Klonan]

That's the difference between between "essential to being an X" and "necessary to be fit for purpose". The purpose in this case is to be something that people like to play, and it's a fitness scale, not a binary value.

Taken piece by piece, one at a time, you can evaluate and say "This doesn't really make me want to play the game more".

Over time, the pieces converge and the bigger picture starts to become more clear, and we can feel that compared to 1 year ago, the game is much more appealing and much better all around