New UT2007 Screens

[Boksha]

My opinion on logical armor...

Who cares -- the game is first person.

You're right, it doesn't matter of you're alone in a map. That's not much fun though.

In slight defense of the logical armor discussion, we need to first understand that this is UT and not, say, MOH. If you're going to apply logic to how the characters look, you also have to apply it to just about all science fiction in general.

I sort of do. For example, I really dislike the LG because it seems to be just a very weird and inefficient way to build a long-range rifle, and doesn't provide anything that conventional weapons wouldn't. Pretty much all other sci-fi weapons in UT and UT2k4 do something a conventional weapon can't, and the LG seems to be the exception. I wouldn't mind the LG as much if it, for example, could charge up shots for more power, or if it was a constant-fire close range weapon like the LG in Quake or the linkgun sec. In short, I feel everything that's sci-fi in UT games should be sci-fi for a reason. There shouldn't be laserguns just because this is the future; I'm OK with laserguns that work completely different from regular weapons (although it wouldn't hurt if there were also regular weapons to go alongside the laserguns so we can actually see the difference)
Anyway, there's a difference between 'logical' and 'realistic'. UT doesn't have to be realistic, but it does need to look at least somewhat believable, and some basic logic really helps to that purpose. For example, it doesn't make much sense how a character's hands and feet are clad in 20cm thick metal armour while his chest is almost completely exposed. It would make much more sense if his chest is completely covered in (lightweight) armour and his limbs are protected by pads. UT nailed this pretty well, as did the new models in UT2k4 (Thundercrash, the Hellions and the Skaarj are very well done), but the UT2k3 models IMO looked rather silly.

[legacy-AL777]

You're right, it doesn't matter of you're alone in a map. That's not much fun though.

What I mean is that you always see, regardless of character, the same amount of space. You never see your own body or armor, so giving armor design a good ol' tsk tsk due to it hindering sight is a rather meaningless argument.

[Boksha]

My point wasn't that Gorges armour obscures my view when I play using his model. My point was that Gorge just looks silly. In a game like Unreal Tournament, being able to react to enemies is essential. An armour that doesn't allow you to look to your sides would therefore be highly illogical and therefore looks silly.
I'd much rather that UT doesn't look silly.

[legacy-AL777]

My point wasn't that Gorges armour obscures my view when I play using his model. My point was that Gorge just looks silly. In a game like Unreal Tournament, being able to react to enemies is essential. An armour that doesn't allow you to look to your sides would therefore be highly illogical and therefore looks silly.
I'd much rather that UT doesn't look silly.

Looks are superficial :heart:

Oh, and besides, wouldn't his tiny head popping out of his huge, bulky armor "look silly" without some type of large shoulder protrusions?

[Boksha]

Looks are superficial :heart:

Sure they are. That doesn't mean they aren't important tho'.

Oh, and besides, wouldn't his tiny head popping out of his huge, bulky armor "look silly" without some type of large shoulder protrusions?

Well, Arclite and his counterpart do look a bit less silly than Gorge and Frostbite. When you see Gorge from behind he looks as if his head is just missing.

[legacy-neojesus]

badasss

[legacy-Zynith]

Well, if there's one thing you can argue about forever it's looks.
Looks... art... call it whatever you like it will allways stay a very subjective matter, thus vary from person to person.

One thing about the characters in UT is that they're generally much more design oriented rather then function oriented, there's a big difference between designing something that solely looks good, and something that looks good and works well.
Personally, I love the heavy proportions on the newer UT characters (there you have it, I L-I-K-E them - not that I'm a huge fan of the Gorgeypoo half-barrel look tough).

Now it depends on the game you're designing rather to choose for function of or raw design. Function is not a problem in realistic war sims because all the functionallity has been tought out for them. Certain fictional games choose for very "logical" functional designs, those game usually have a slightly longer preproduction run.

With UT I don't think Epic ever felt the need to go very indepth about their character designs, not even with UT99. Why not? It's a bloodsport filled with all kinds of crazy gansta freaks, what more do you want? Watch WWF...
There less need for logical design like, let's say Counterstrike.
Just getting the message across is "enough" in this case.
Say you need a design for a horror movie, with a scary creature that's on the screen for 5 seconds.
How are you gonna do that?
*Let's give him a nasty grin! oh wait, five secs...
*Let's give him glowy peeling/cracked skin! getting there...
*Let's give him huge purple spikes and broken chains around his neck! that's better!

Let's say the art director passes the following task over to a concept artist:
We need a bulky armoured workhorse character, we want him strong an heavy, it's a bioengineered human.
Now how should it look? How can we characterize/stereotype him?
Is his bone-structure exagerated? How big should his upper chest be? How much should anatomical detail stand out on the legs? Is his silhouette distinguishable enough? Is his armour too thin? Is his armour too thick? where should detail be emphatised? Which additonal features? How should we build his face? Are joints too restricted? Is the volume distributed well? Do we have enough overall flow in the contour? Is his skin too pale? Is his skin to dark? Is his suit too desaturated? Is his suit to saturated? Are colors complementairy?
Should he have sweat? Where is my Photoshop CDkey? Why the hell don't I have a girlfriend? Where's that pornmag? Why the hell did the order me to put a mohawked babyfoce on this guy? Does the colourpallete match up with other characters? Is the perspective off? Are his proportions correct? The list goes on...

Let's go back to a comment Boksha made, why the hell did they slap on those 2 pieces of armour on his lower limbs?

Say the guy that designed Anubis thought his legs weren't packing enough punch in comparison to the rest of his body, it felt unbalacned. He should look strong but also athletic. He should wear the typical tournament armour. So he put those 2 pieces of armour there to add the volume and make him look more balanced.
He didn't place any armour around the bendable areas and joints because he needs to show of the character is rather athletic and muscular, he's also Egyptian, acient Egyptians didn't wear much - give the guys a break, it's hot in there!

Now you can put as much logic as you want in there, people who look at it want to know; what is it, and does it look cool within the first split second.

If some of you and me think it looks rather silly, that's fine, _you cannot please everyone_ . And like I said before looks are a very subjective matter.

Sorry if my spelling is falling appart, I'm pretty tired, and trow some random IMO's in there...

[Boksha]

Don't worry about the IMOs, I'm well aware this is purely subjective matter. I still think the characters from UT2k3 and UC2 look silly. Basically, if you actually keep practical design in mind when developing characters, you run a much smaller risk of your characters looking silly or cartoonish, because what you end up with will look like what already exists in this world, so people are already used to the look.
And while I agree with you that it's important to get a message across, the first impression I got of Gorge was "What a fool, this guy looks like he can't even move and he can't look to his sides"
And while first impressions are important, we're looking at these characters for hours and hours, and somewhat believable designs just last longer than over the top cartoony and bulky characters with giant pieces of armour glued to their feet and wrists for no apparent reason.

[BigJim]

****, I stopped myself earlier from pressing "submit" because my post seemed too much like a rant, but Zynith, you've got it all there perfectly.

Hell, I'm not even gonna bother adding any more of my own, because that says it all so well, but yeah, it's the exaggerated characteristics that give each of the characters thier well, character.

*EDIT* Christ Boksha, you're fast..

[Boksha]

From my experience, it's the similarities between characters that make the differences between them so much more apparent. For example, all of the UT characters (which were just 4 models with several skins that weren't all that different) looked like real people with character to me, while I thought the characters from Q3a (which ranged from werewolf-air-skater-girls and walking eyeballs to fat undead clowns and living skeletons) all looked the same because they were all so incredibly over the top. Besides, extreme characters like that may be easier to tell apart, but I also feel less connection with them because they look absolutely nothing like what we see in our daily lives.

(edit) Whoah. Did I type that last post in under two minutes? Wicked. :bulb:

[BigJim]

(edit) Whoah. Did I type that last post in under two minutes? Wicked. :bulb:

See? I said you were fast.

[legacy-Snuggins]

I am not too emotionally invested in '07 (I don't think I will be able to run it for some time and will just stick with '04). I don't have much opinion on models and skins because all of it appeals to somebody! I only ask that the player be given more option to force models in whatever fashion they want (enemy/team based, filter out only some models, etc.). Afterall, the hitboxes are all comparable if not the same, each player should be allowed to control their subjective experience if it doesn't affect the objective (serverside) action. :up:

My opinion on the subject of Gorge's shoulderpads and his peripheral vision:
The shoulder pads are big because there are speakers in there!!!! :up:

You can clearly see the music player(F12) on his chest.

As for not being able to see, lol. He just turns his whole body because he is super fast and gene-boosted, lol. If you watch the in-game animations, that is what he does, who need to turn his head to see someone when you can turn your whole body (and arsenal) to face them just as fast!? lol bAnG lol!!1

P.S. The excess lols in the above post were added as satire for typical interweb discussinations and should be taken lightly, lol.

[Xyx]

I think it would be easier (and more comfortable) to just remove his shoulderpads and give the poor man a helmet.

But... but... but... then you could headshot him!

Oh, wait, you can already magically shoot through his shoulder armor. Then what use is the stuff anyway?

[Magwa]

Boksha, would you like to get burning flak popped into your kneecaps or shoulders? The armour protects vulnerable parts of the body. It looks quite logically put together for me.

what difference does it make?? you respawn if you get to many in your knee caps or underpants or up yo basket >>>FFS this huge armour has got to go as do all the silly player models and 99 % of the robots there can be only one and that one is Xan ,he can have a wife or two but no other robots allowed. Part robot part man OK i can live with that...someone did a photo shop of the egyptian,and he stiil looks the same when you put him in a team blue uniform he is back to looking with the stupid... this big armour serves NO practical purpose WHY???because you still only can take 100 damage before death unless you get a shield it makes no difference if you are naked or wearing a sherman tank for a skin 100 health is all you get so what good is it ?? it is no good it is eyecandy...whewwwwwwwwww.done ..

[Apathy]

Heh.. When I first started playing with the LG, I hated it. Now, I actually like it. Seems more badass then a regular sniper rifle. I probably like it now, because it does more damage then the regular sniper rifle atm.

As for the models. All the armor may look pretty, but I think they over did it. I wouldn't mind using a character with some jeans, and a shirt or something lol. Well, Just really light on the armor.. Not fond of the bulky ****. (I shell state my opinion once again that I really hate those jugs.) If I were to wear all that armor, I don't think I could even stand up, let alone bounce off walls.

There were other robots other than Xan in the first UT. There were the War Machine skins. I used one all the time. Xan was just the big bad-*** of them heh.

EDIT - For those of you who say you need a ****load of armor because of whatever reason. The fact that you have NO HELMET OF ANY KIND, totally kills any logic in the thick armor bull****.! FU!