Colors just fine for me. The texturing way is the main problem (even if people only notice it in a subconscious way), these painted textures which makes no use of normal mapping or specular highlights is what makes the game resemble WoW. But again, I love the colors.
Btw, these diffuse-only textures are only justifiable by technical requirements, but it just doesn't make sense for me in a game to be released one or more years from now.
Colors just fine for me. The texturing way is the main problem (even if people only notice it in a subconscious way), these painted textures which makes no use of normal mapping or specular highlights is what makes the game resemble WoW. But again, I love the colors.
If you look carefully, that's what makes most of the WoW-look.
I'm almost sure this decision was taken by Blizzard to make everything run super fast on low-end PCs, but I really would have loved to see the graphics from D2 taken to real 3D, current graphic hardware really can pull it off.
I don't think a diffuse or emissive-only shader is fast enough compared to a simple diffuse/normal map shader with a single light interaction to have all of us pay the price.
Just look how UE3 dynamic lighting works on characters. They don't have to make a mesh to interact with X lights, they just take the overall lighting around a character and approximates it to a single directional light + skylight. It's very cheap rendering and much more realistic than an emissive only material.
I also quote UE3 again (and also Valve's Source engine) as other good examples of how also making the textures in the static environment to interact with multiple lights in a precomputed way.
Of course Blizzard programmers are light-years from me, the issue is the decision they took, and how I think it's not worth it except if you want the game to run on computers with really really old graphic cards. (Who can't play HL2 or TeamFortress2 nowadays?).
I really really liked the overall graphic style of what we have seen from Diablo 3 so far. My complains aren't toward the overall graphics or the use of colors, but the way how everything is textured.
Everything seems to be painted, WoW-style, instead of using textures with materials making use of normal mapping, specular reflections, etc. That's what makes me think of WoW, when I see the details on the assets, and how the muscles on the Barbarian are painted and don't react with lighting. Not the overall use of colors.
If you look carefully, that's what makes most of the WoW-look.
I'm almost sure this decision was taken by Blizzard to make everything run super fast on low-end PCs, but I really would have loved to see the graphics from D2 taken to real 3D, current graphic hardware really can pull it off.
I don't think a diffuse or emissive-only shader is fast enough compared to a simple diffuse/normal map shader with a single light interaction to have all of us pay the price.
Just look how UE3 dynamic lighting works on characters. They don't have to make a mesh to interact with X lights, they just take the overall lighting around a character and approximates it to a single directional light + skylight. It's very cheap rendering and much more realistic than an emissive only material.
I really really liked the overall graphic style of what we have seen from Diablo 3 so far. My complains aren't toward the overall graphics or the use of colors, but the way how everything is textured.
Everything seems to be painted, WoW-style, instead of using textures with materials making use of normal mapping, specular reflections, etc. That's what makes me think of WoW, when I see the details on the assets, and how the muscles on the Barbarian are painted and don't react with lighting. Not the overall use of colors.
I have decided to quote myself opinion from other topic, just because I love myself opinion
I also agree with the people not satisfied on the art direction chosen by Blizzard. But it's not something as simple as needing to be "darker" or something about brightness and gamma.
Is the characters textures themselves which are painted in a cartoon way, there is no normal mapping or realistic shaders on the characters and environment (exception the FX which is superb).
To be honest, and ignoring the low resolution issue, the characters from D2 have much better detail and texture.
The art direction, in general, is wondreous, I love how the pics look in the thumbnails and low res videos, but having a Barbarian with painted muscles and no normal mapping?!
I'm sure the overall problem is caused because Blizzard is so focused on making the engine running even on low-end PCs, and they have just decided to not do any sort of advanced lighting/shader interaction.
Any way, from any other perspective, I think I'm gonna love D3 and gonna buy it whether it looks a little like WoW or not.
I also agree with the people not satisfied on the art direction chosen by Blizzard. But it's not something as simple as needing to be "darker" or something about brightness and gamma.
Is the characters textures themselves which are painted in a cartoon way, there is no normal mapping or realistic shaders on the characters and environment (exception the FX which is superb).
To be honest, and ignoring the low resolution issue, the characters from D2 have much better detail and texture.
The art direction, in general, is wondreous, I love how the pics look in the thumbnails and low res videos, but having a Barbarian with painted muscles and no normal mapping?!
I'm sure the overall problem is caused because Blizzard is so focused on making the engine running even on low-end PCs, and they have just decided to not do any sort of advanced lighting/shader interaction.
Any way, from any other perspective, I think I'm gonna love D3 and gonna buy it whether it looks a little like WoW or not.
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It has an untranslated line, and this line doesn't even appear:
"Diablo is defeated. His Soulstone is destroyed, along with Mephisto's, upon the Hellforge."
Is there a way to notify Blizzard?
Btw, these diffuse-only textures are only justifiable by technical requirements, but it just doesn't make sense for me in a game to be released one or more years from now.
I also quote UE3 again (and also Valve's Source engine) as other good examples of how also making the textures in the static environment to interact with multiple lights in a precomputed way.
Of course Blizzard programmers are light-years from me, the issue is the decision they took, and how I think it's not worth it except if you want the game to run on computers with really really old graphic cards. (Who can't play HL2 or TeamFortress2 nowadays?).
If you look carefully, that's what makes most of the WoW-look.
I'm almost sure this decision was taken by Blizzard to make everything run super fast on low-end PCs, but I really would have loved to see the graphics from D2 taken to real 3D, current graphic hardware really can pull it off.
I don't think a diffuse or emissive-only shader is fast enough compared to a simple diffuse/normal map shader with a single light interaction to have all of us pay the price.
Just look how UE3 dynamic lighting works on characters. They don't have to make a mesh to interact with X lights, they just take the overall lighting around a character and approximates it to a single directional light + skylight. It's very cheap rendering and much more realistic than an emissive only material.
Everything seems to be painted, WoW-style, instead of using textures with materials making use of normal mapping, specular reflections, etc. That's what makes me think of WoW, when I see the details on the assets, and how the muscles on the Barbarian are painted and don't react with lighting. Not the overall use of colors.
Is the characters textures themselves which are painted in a cartoon way, there is no normal mapping or realistic shaders on the characters and environment (exception the FX which is superb).
To be honest, and ignoring the low resolution issue, the characters from D2 have much better detail and texture.
The art direction, in general, is wondreous, I love how the pics look in the thumbnails and low res videos, but having a Barbarian with painted muscles and no normal mapping?!
I'm sure the overall problem is caused because Blizzard is so focused on making the engine running even on low-end PCs, and they have just decided to not do any sort of advanced lighting/shader interaction.
Any way, from any other perspective, I think I'm gonna love D3 and gonna buy it whether it looks a little like WoW or not.