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Compared to Ultima IX Ascension, how big is the gameworld in
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RPGDot Forums > Gothic - General

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oozle
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Joined: 18 Dec 2001
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Here was my config for U9

1024*768, 32-bit, Farclippingplane = 10,000, Midclippingplane = 9000, Compressed textures, Hi-res sky, all lighting settings set on max, all shadows, no skipping of frames, instantaneous lighting updates

Trust me, the game looks awesome. The only exception is the castle in Brittania.

Post Tue Dec 25, 2001 11:25 pm
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Daggerfall has about the same square land coverage as England does. However, there's three games that come to mind if you guys seriously want to debate 'largest game world ever':

Elite
Elite 2: Frontiers
Frontiers: First Encounters

What game world could be larger than a space exploration game with over 2 billion-ish starts, and an average of 5 or so planets and moons in each star system, all of them fully explorable?

Once again, using a random seed to generate retarded amounts of places to go wins the cake, but it doesn't compare to a game where each point of interest is created by hand (ala Morrowind). As far as open-ended game play in a huge world goes, FFE has to win; there's always neat stuff to do every year, and Thargoids to chase down.

Regardless, pound for pound I still think Daggerfall wins as far as having a huge *interactive* game world goes, I've had it since it came out and I still haven't finished the main quest because I get sidetracked exploring stuff.

Gothic is a great game in it's own right however, but the bugs that make the game a pain to play (windows freezing after quitting, Baal Lukor, etc) definetly subtract from the overfall feel of the game. PB did a wonderful job on the game, and I can only hope that Gothic 2 will be just as fun, without the bugs and with a new publisher.
Post Wed Dec 26, 2001 12:46 am
 
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I have played with the max detail settings, especially with the ini settings not available in game. Unfortunately its just not playable at these levels.

Ultima 9's graphics are decent, but not better than Gothic's, including the unplayable "max" details of U9. I realize die-hard fans won't see it that way, who try to defend the game to death despite its obvious shortcomings. You can't deceive the eye. You can't state blanket statement like "Ultima 9's graphics are better than Gothic's" without even explaining why.

It's a matter of subjectivity, but the quick point is that Ultima 9's graphics is NOT superior to Gothic's graphics...at least not from a technical standpoint.

Ultima 9 uses a base palletized texture color pallete, because it was designed from the ground up for glide. Palletized textures are limited to 256 colors. That means Ultima 9's textures in 16bit and 32bit are used primarily for gradients, rather than artisticly created from the ground up for 32bit, which is the case for Gothic's textures.


Take a look at the skybox of Ultima 9, compared to the superior skybox of Gothic. Ultima 9's 2d sky background is just plain ugly, and moves under a tick system independant of framerate. Gothic's skies are much more vibrant and move fluidly with framerates.

Ultima 9's polygon count is considerably smaller than Gothic's. Environmental effects are also used in Gothic. Compare the Snapper in Gothic, which uses emboss bumpmapping, to any creature in Ultima 9.

I could go on an on. Ultima 9 has an inferior graphics engine, that's a fact. Whether the "eyeball" look is better in Ultima 9 for you, then so be it...that is subjective. Personally I didn't like the excessive coloring used in Ultima 9 (and lack of in certain locations)....it was far too cartoony. Gothic has much better use of dynamic lighting than Ultima 9, probably because it makes use of a T&L engine if it is present. Again, Ultima 9 was made from the ground up for glide...which means the target platform was voodoo card owners. The hasty Direct3d mode offered additional properties, but it was just a layer.

In short Ultima 9's graphic engine is an utter disappointment, especially when taking into consideration performance aspects. Gothic proved to have a superior engine with superior performance, a slap in the face to Ultima 9's developers in my opinion. With

Morrowing set for release in spring, I think we'll see game engines for RPG continue to expand and excell in quality.
Post Wed Dec 26, 2001 1:56 am
 
Drakhan
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Ok, here we go. The anonymous user before my post had a lot to say about how Ultima 9 has inferior graphics in every respect, whatever, that’s fine. But one thing still remains that gives Ultima 9 a larger advantage even compared to today’s standards, and that is the sheer size and scale of the game. I’m not going to sit here and say that Ultima has better graphics than Gothic, but when the anonymous user stated that Gothic has more realistic Graphics, and Ultima is to cartoon like, That is all a matter of opinion. In many respects, the cartoon graphics allow for a crisper look. Anyway, it is an ambiguous debate, and graphics are all based on opinion, and the argument is thus pointless.

I am not going to deny that Gothic has a much more fluent engine that Ultima 9 and even that it probably does have better graphics, at least technically anyway. But Ultima’s massive world in combination with its building scale and lighting effects still hold up to many of today’s games. I played through Ultima despite its poor engine. I ran the game on it’s max detail levels and experienced poor frame rates in some areas of the world, (mostly towns), but I still found it to be a very visually pleasing game, and that it one of the reasons that I still play it to this day, despite its choppy engine, and I have never even played any of the previous Ultima games.

Now this is the statement that it seems many people neglect. –Ultima 9 had excellent graphics for its time of release, and Gothic, well,,, though it has great graphics, and an excellent 3D engine, is not really a ground breaking game, graphically at least, it is just where it should be, and its major advantage, like Ultima, is that it has a huge, seamless world.-

Now we come to my opinion. There is one thing that still sets Ultima ahead of ‘Gothic in my opinion, and that is the level of detail in the game. Even though many of the details are derived from texturing, I also refer to the objects found within buildings, houses, etc. There is a lot more “stuff” in Ultima 9, and almost all of it can be manipulated and moved, and I believe that is what made ultima so cool.
Post Wed Dec 26, 2001 4:42 am
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oozle
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When I originally posted this thread my intention was not to start a debate on whether U9 is a superior game to Gothic.

However, since it has turned into one, I may as well add my 2c worth.

1. Ultima IX was released 2.5 years ago. Gothic is a current release.

2. The reason I feel Ultima IX's graphics are visually superior to that of Gothic is b/c in Gothic some of the textures look bland and colourless - go into a forest and you'll see what I'm talking about. Example :

http://newspics.rpgdot.com/imageview.php?dir=gallery/Gothic/Screenshots/&name=gothic13.jpg

In Ultima IX (the castle in Brittain one exception) no single place is similar to another. All areas have their own distinct feature/graphics pallette

3. The shere size of Ultima IX is awesome GIVEN it's visual splendor. I can't comment on Gothic in this sense since I have only played it for 1 week

4. The character models in Ultima IX look better than those in Gothic. BUT, the characters move more fluidly in Gothic and are way more interesting to talk to. The characters in Gothic act more realistically as if they have some purpose to being there. In ultima IX, they are just there to populate the sarroundings and are as dumb as doorknobs.

5. The Sky textures/effects in Gothic are more realistic. However, visually, if you have maximal viewing distance and hi-res sky enabled, I feel the Ultima 9 sky looks better.

6. The voice acting in Ultima IX and music is horrible. Gothic's is pretty good.

7. So far where I am upto, there are more varied quests in Gothic compared to those in Ultima 9. However, the ones in U9 were equally enjoyable

8. The lighting effects in U9 look way better than those in Gothic, even if they are based on an inferior engine.

CONCLUSION : PERSONALLY, I like Ultima IX better. But, Gothic is still a great game.

It all depends on individual tastes.

This has also been debated on Ultima IX's message boards : see here

http://dynamic.gamespy.com/~ultima9/ubb/Forum2/HTML/002438.html







[ This Message was edited by: oozle on 2001-12-26 02:58 ]
Post Wed Dec 26, 2001 8:54 am
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Chlorthos_Dragon
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Hi all,

I've been a fan of the Ultima series as a whole for a long while, and I've played most of the series. It's truly a great roleplaying series. However, I don't think Ultima 9 is a very good game. Most everything within that game debunked and ignored most of the incredible, epic story that the series told through Ultimas 1-8. Gothic is, in many, many ways, a much better game than Ultima 9. I'm never one to believe that graphics make or break a game, and the fact is, U9's and Gothic's graphics are so similar that it's a little useless to debate this. However, it boils down to this: In terms of story, NPC interaction, depth, etc., Gothic is the clear winner. whereas U9 has static NPCs that stand where they are, night or day, rain or shine, Gothic has NPCs with full schedules, realistic behavior. Gothic's NPCs are much more akin to Ultima 7 than Ultima 9. (Ultima 7, to all who don't know, is, IMHO, the best RPG ever made. I won't take time to explain that right now, but it is, trust me.) ANYWAY, to stop my rambling, I think Gothic is ultimately the better game, especially since U9 has so much old code. What most people don't realize is that OSI started making Ultima 9 a little while after 95. That's right folks, they released it 5 years later. What happened was the team originally assigned to Ultima 9 developed a limited 3d engine with an isometric viewpoint. for whatever reason, that team was moved onto the Ultima Online project. (If UO had never been made, U9 would've been a much better game, I think.) Anyway, when they finally got back to U9, they hired new people that didn't know or care about Ultima's rich backstory and history and ignored that to make a Tomb Raider-esque RPG-action hybrid. Gothic is really much more of an rpg than U9 is. The problem with U9 was that they used that old 3d engine that wasn't attuned to 3d hardware. That resulted in some serious lag time. the whole 3-patch fiasco that OSI made was an attempt at taking out all that old code. Even after 3 patches, U9 is buggy as ever. And no amount of patches can fix the god-awful story and dialogue. Anyway, Gothic is much more streamlined and produces a much better framerate than U9.

sorry for the long post



_________________
~Chlorthos Dragon

Ultima Dragons Internet Chapter
www.udic.org

Ultima IX: Redemption Co-Project Leader
http://icdweb.cc.purdue.edu/~fountain/
Post Wed Dec 26, 2001 9:13 am
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oozle
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U9 is much better with the user made dialogue patch in terms of story.

Anyway, I agree that Gothic is more of a 'RPG' than Ultima IX.

The biggest problem with Ultima IX was the greed of EA to rush it out to sale by 1997 Christmas when it was only 75% complete.

Soon after Richard Garriot quit Origin and Origin was no longer.

Personally, I feel that the Ultima IX debacle was one of the most tragic events in the gaming world, especially considering what Ultima IX 'could' have been.
Post Wed Dec 26, 2001 9:25 am
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quote:

The reason I feel Ultima IX's graphics are visually superior to that of Gothic is b/c in Gothic some of the textures look bland and colourless - go into a forest and you'll see what I'm talking about. Example :

http://newspics.rpgdot.com/imageview.php?dir=gallery/Gothic/Screenshots/&name=gothic13.jpg




Go into the forest and you'll see exactly why Gothic is obviously superior to Ultima 9 in every way. I don't know how you play Gothic and with what video card but this is how Gothic looks on my setup:

http://home.nyc.rr.com/csammy/gothic2.jpg

That is at 1280x1024x32, all details max.Obviously if you have a Voodoo based accelerator, it cannot output the same level quality as a Geforce 3, hence I it won't look much better than U9.


If you want to talk about bland textures, lets talk about U9's piss poor engine. Look at this screenshot:

http://home.nyc.rr.com/csammy/U9.jpg

You see those blatantly fuzzy textures? Those "instantly" turn into regular textures (as seen on the right) with movement. That kind of texture handling is EXTREMELY annoying, and especially noticable at distances...Clipping plane set to 10,000 may look nice, but whole point goes down the drain with this engine problem of its texture management.

I also cannot believe anyone would think Ultima 9's sky looks even remotely better than Gothic's, the difference in quality is obviously drastic. Gothic has overlapping layers of cloud movement.....U9 has what appears to be a hastily drawn cloud setting that obviously looks like a static 2D image moving across the sky, brimming with visual artifacts no less. Gothic's sky is artistically and colorfully flawless (as far as games go), and moves quite convincingly against multiple layers.

If you prefer U9's sky to Gothic, then you have strange taste in graphics, or you love Ultima 9 so much you'd go to any lengths for its defense.



As for the screenshot you posted, obviously sand textures are not meant to be incredibly detailed. The area overall looks alot better than similar areas in Ultima 9 and without U9's "instant" texture levels no less. Here's the same area on my own setup:
http://home.nyc.rr.com/csammy/gothic.jpg


quote:

In Ultima IX (the castle in Brittain one exception) no single place is similar to another. All areas have their own distinct feature/graphics pallette

3. The shere size of Ultima IX is awesome GIVEN it's visual splendor. I can't comment on Gothic in this sense since I have only played it for 1 week



You must really like that game....Now that I've finished gothic I decided to replay U9 just to finish it this time, and visual splendor isn't my first choice of words for its graphics. For me its a huge backward step, and I am playing at the highest quality in game levels, with increased properties from the options.ini.

Sorry, I just dont see what you see in Ultima 9's graphics. It's nice, but doesn't hold a candle to Gothic.

quote:

The character models in Ultima IX look better than those in Gothic. BUT, the characters move more fluidly in Gothic and are way more interesting to talk to. The characters in Gothic act more realistically as if they have some purpose to being there. In ultima IX, they are just there to populate the sarroundings and are as dumb as doorknobs.



I disagree here as well. U9's character models have less polygon count and lack special effects applied to them. Some of Gothic's monsters have excellent bump mapped skin textures. I'd love for Phirana to release a dot 3 bump map patch, emboss is nice but not quite as accurate as dot 3 or environmental.

quote:

5. The Sky textures/effects in Gothic are more realistic. However, visually, if you have maximal viewing distance and hi-res sky enabled, I feel the Ultima 9 sky looks better.



Nothing can make Ultima 9's sky look better...the entire skybox is a piece of crap. Statically drawn clouds with an obvious airbrush finish to it isn't my idea of a good skybox. They did not even make an attempt to make a smooth transitioning sky...it moves under a tick system. I really dont see how you can prefer U9's sky over Gothic's....as a matter of fact, I don't see how you can even consider many of the aspects of U9 superior to Gothic, unless you have a crap video card. Skybox, texture detail, models...all are technically superior in Gothic. This usually translates into a visually superior presentation as well, which is plainly obvious for me when comparing these games, but I can see how someone can prefer the lower quality graphics of a game he/she enjoys better. You concentrate on the best qualities of that game, and the worst or least important qualities of the other game...like in the screenshot you posted of Gothic's sand.
Post Thu Dec 27, 2001 4:07 am
 
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One thing I forgot to mention is that Gothic has excellent landscape architecture, whether it be the orc ruins or the area above the new camp....Ultima 9's world may be larger, but it doesn't feel larger, and lacks the kind of architecture and structural landmarks that make Gothic visually pleasing when walking across the land.

Post Thu Dec 27, 2001 4:12 am
 
oozle
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Joined: 18 Dec 2001
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The reason I am biased against Gothic's graphics is for 2 reasons.

I am playing both Ultima IX and Gothic on a ATI RADEON 32SDR.

1. In Gothic, in some areas where you have a large viewing distance, I get blank orangy textures between the sky and the ground. This looks aweful. So - my question is whether this is the game itself or my video card?

2. I have set my viewing distance to 300%. However, when I go on top of a high vantage point (Eg. top of a mountain) there is heaps of fog and culling. This also looks crap.

My question therefore, is how do you fix this? Is this particular to my vid card or is it the game itself?

As to the screens you posted, yes I would agree that Gothic looks better. However, in certain areas I would say Ultima IX looks better than Gothic given the 2 points I made above.

Let me post some screens on what I mean. I'll post within the next hour.


Post Thu Dec 27, 2001 5:12 am
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oozle
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How do I post the screenshot? It's on my C:

[ This Message was edited by: oozle on 2001-12-27 00:15 ]
Post Thu Dec 27, 2001 5:21 am
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I'm not quite sure how your radeon is rendering gothic. You do have a lower end Radeon though, that may explain the anomalies you're experiencing. You'd have to post some screenshots for me to get a better idea of your setup.


If you want to post your own screenshots, you need to host your files somewhere. A good place would be geocities.com, you can open a free account with them and host your files there.
Post Thu Dec 27, 2001 7:35 pm
 
oozle
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The problem was fog! In the manual, it says that users of Radeon cards should disable fog. Once I disabled fog, the graphics are top notch!

Ok, I accept that this game has superior graphics to U9. I just saw the Sect camp at night. Damn - it's good, especially the bluish lighting effects and the clouds moving above.

Anyway, U9 is a good game too, although I do agree Gothic is probably superior (so far to where I've played).



Post Thu Dec 27, 2001 10:13 pm
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