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Day/night cycles?
BarakIII
Member Posts: 800
I've heard that there are no day/night cycles in the game, but are we sure that's for all planets and not just for some planets? As I understand it some of the planets in the game are tidally locked to their sun...meaning the same side of the planet faces the sun all the time. If it's just a case of having a few tidally locked planets then this is really a non-issue. On the other hand if this refers to all planets then yeah, it kind of sucks.
Edit: There's also the issue of some of the 'planets' actually being moons like Nar Shadaa. The day/night cycles on moons would be rather complicated. Not only might they spin, or not, like a planet, but depending on how they move around their planet they may spend time in the planets shadow as well. It may be a more complicated issue than people think.
Comments
It's not in game. I don't like it, but I can understand why is that.
With so many cinematic scenes in the game, it would be extremely difficult to light all of them correctly according to day/night cycle.
I don't even notice day/night cycles, never is a problem for me. The least important feature in a video game for moi.
If it's true I think it has less to do with the cinematics than with the fact that it's a more complicated issue than people may think. Every planet has it's own cycle. Some are tidally locked, others might have cycles very much different than what we experience here on Earth, and like I said in my edit there's the issue of some of the planets actually being moons which makes it that much more complicated.
Night has gone from MMORPGs for years.
Today we have only two day-states of a cycle and that is day with sun and day without sun.
So it doesnt matter anyway if they have it or not...
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Maybe the fact that shadows from static objects with static lighting sources can be static has something to do with it as it could be a relief for people's processing power: shadows can stay in one place rather than move around. (Holy many statics, batman!)
I won't miss playing at nighttime though; I always disliked drab mmorpg nights compared to the bright and happy happy colors of daytime. What I will miss is sunrises and sunsets, I enjoyed those in some mmorpgs. (Lotro springs to mind).
But they said that they will have weather effects and I hope on moving clouds in the skies. That should make up for a lot.
And in case of the moon-worlds, I certainly hope there will be a massive planet up above occasionaly
p.s. Not everything has to be perfectly in line with Newtonian physics to look and feel like an immersive / 'realistic' experience. I can imagine lighting and shadows on a moon-world becoming much too complicated to merrit implementing realistically; considering multiple moving lightsources who aren't all there all the time.
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So the sun is stuck in the same place in the sky?
I want to own property too
This.
Night in (most) current MMO's is a joke, a neat different wallpaper for the sky, but nothing more.
I think it's a lighting issue, it seems they 're doing a lot more with lighting ingame than is usual for an MMORPG (see for a powerpoint of their GDC presentation here). It looks like they have gone for depth and richness of the lighting in preference of a day/night cycle.
The ACTUAL size of MMORPG worlds: a comparison list between MMO's
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums:
Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."
It's kidna complicated how this works..well no not really.
Okay when you land on a planet it's a certain time of day. Lets say the sun is high in the sky and it looks like it's say high noon.
Bright as daisy. Now while your on this planet the sun doesn't move. But then your told to go to a certain spot and wait for a person. Upon arriving at this spot a short cinematic plays showing your character pacing around. Once the cinematic finishes the person arrives and tells you what you need to do and says that you must finish the task before the sun rises again. Now your playing in the dark.
This could be a phased thing where you see other playing, but they are in the light and your in the dark or it could be that it's merely instanced which is akin to how AoC did tortage.
The only thing you don't see is the sun/moon actually moving around the sky and it getting gradually darker. While i would have rathered those in there. I'd much rather days and nights to actually have a purpose beyond how light or dark an area is. Which sadly is how most MMOs are.
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No, it will move down towards the horizon and then move up again towards the opposing horizon. This yields 200% more sunsets and sunrises.
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Sometimes it does both at the SAME time, because the only thing better than a beautiful sunset or sunrise, is a beautiful sunsetrise.
(Since some SW planets have more than one sun, this comment isn't as snarky as it sounds.
)
^_^
This.
There is no other moment of the day when drinking a hot cup of coffee along with a cold beer is more enjoyable (or appropriate for that matter).
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But what if there are 3 0r 4 suns? I foresee an alcohol and caffeine overdose problem.
The ACTUAL size of MMORPG worlds: a comparison list between MMO's
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums:
Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."
What do you mean, 'problem'?
I dunno but sometimes you are saying strange things, Maverick.
*burps*
You must have meant "I foresee an alcohol and caffeine supply problem".
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Yep, that's what I meant, running out of alcohol way too soon
The ACTUAL size of MMORPG worlds: a comparison list between MMO's
The ease with which predictions are made on these forums:
Fratman: "I'm saying Spring 2012 at the earliest [for TOR release]. Anyone still clinging to 2011 is deluding themself at this point."
Why waste time implementing immersive elements like day-night cycles when you can spend it on creating really cool cut scenes? Same thing with free-flight, why not just put in a skimpy rail version and use the extra time to make more movies.
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To tell you the truth, day/night cycles were so insignificant for me in Lotro. I don't think one person cared if it were day or night when in Moria, and end game raids are usually set to a static time of day. Lotro had 3 quests that I remember (all in Bree) that could only be completed at "night", and now all 3 quests can now be done any time of the day because of complaints.
So even though I read your post as sarcasm, I am glad they spent time on other aspects of the game rather than creating something that will have zero impact on game play.
By contrast, the day/night cycles in Fallout 3 and Everquest are highly immersive and nearly impossible to ignore, in my opinion.
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I personnaly only really care for day/night cycles in sandbox games or games where it actually makes a gameplay difference. Other than that I just like looking up to the stars during the night. ^_^
I am sure we will see plenty of stars while in space so that pretty much covers it for me. :P
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IMO any half decent MMO should take the time to implement decent weather features/cycles.
If done correctly it can really add ambiance.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AV8WRqTaEe8
Imagine this on Tatooine
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ii5bL7js6RI
Yeah looks nice. Reminds me of morrowind. There will be weather though: at least they anounced sandstorms on Tatooine and snow on Hoth at the pax presentation of those planets.
*curious is*
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Yeah IMO, weather is totally different than night/day. I agree weather does add to immersion. Deserts should have sandstorms and icelands should have snowstorms. I've always loved rain in my games even when they didn't really do a good job with it.
If I was feeling cynical (and I am) this sounds like more nixing from the big bad bods at EA. This is supposed to be a next-gen game, the messiah of the genre and yet they can't be bothered to make the planets immersive enough with day/night cycles, let alone weather effects? Doesn't sound like Bioware to me, but the money-hungry publisher wanting the damn thing released so they can take baths in some of Blizzard's dollars.
Yeah it's not a big deal, but I for one like environments to be as immersive as possible. Watching a storm roll in while playing Vanguard was one of my best MMO experiences. Bit sad these worlds will be a little more lifeless than I had hoped.
There will be weather effects. Jezus, I am repeating myself over and over on this point.
They say it in this video. (3:15) Also might take some of your misconceptions away
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24 hour realtime day/night simulations SUCK hardcore for anyone with an odd job schedule (not that most nerds could understand that). Weather however is very important for immersion iny m opinion.
There is no day/night cycle because the game engine uses "baked" shadows on scenery. Baked textures have their shadows pre-rendered into the textures to make them look more realistic. A technique invented by Quake along with the portal rendering technique (not Portal as in the game).
The game uses a very simple low polygon engine with painted textures to help with memory issues as those can be compressed down to a minimum. Dynamic light is only apply to dynamic objects (some old school people might be familliar with the term sprite).
What we looking at is a slight upgrade from a WoW type engine with crappy textures, low poly characters and scenery. All to make it run on even the crappiest PC out there, since this has to appeal to the masses to recover it's development cost.
No, it's not an art style decision or whatever else they make you believe. It's also not comlicated to simulate various day/night cycles or do you really believe it would be a huge effort to make the days longer/shorter or even infinite for different planets/moons?
Day/Night and MOST OF ALL weather should be in the game, it is essential for the experience (for me).