Constructive criticism #1

[Petra Rocks]

It's spelled criticism.  No z. 

[TrueCrusader]

Constructive Critism #2...



Graham seems a little fat... Has he been putting on weight .

One I would make is that the Graphics seem to be pretty Computer intensive. lol I thought my 128MB Graphics  card running on a Pentium 3 833 would stand it lol, But I had to get on my dads comp to play it lol.

I think thats all though. I really like the gameplay, Cant wait for the game to come on!

[Yonkey]

It's spelled criticism.  No z. 

LOL!  Thanks.   *finds it odd that the verb "to criticize" is spelled with a z, yet the noun is not*

Graham seems a little fat... Has he been putting on weight .

Yup, he gained a whole new dimension of weight.

One I would make is that the Graphics seem to be pretty Computer intensive. lol I thought my 128MB Graphics  card running on a Pentium 3 833 would stand it lol, But I had to get on my dads comp to play it lol.

Yikes.  What operating system are you using?  Windows XP's minimum requirement is 128MB, so if you're using that and ran our demo, I'm surprised your computer didn't melt.

[Baggins]

He said 128 meg graphics card, not 128 megs of ram  LOL. :p

There is a big difference heh heh. However that brings up the question of how much ram he has.

[Yonkey]

Ok, then yeah, I'd like to know how much RAM, because his video card is more than capable.  I seriously hope it's not Windows Millennium that's ruining it for him.

[doom saber]

I guess this is the best topic to ask such a question, but after playing the demo and use the eye icon on the Daventry coin, it says that that it is a new edition coin whereas the old one has Edward's face.  However, the Garaham coin exist in kq6.  Is this a continuity error that would be fixed in the future or does the game take place relativity after 6 and 7?

[TheReturnofDMD]

I guess this is the best topic to ask such a question, but after playing the demo and use the eye icon on the Daventry coin, it says that that it is a new edition coin whereas the old one has Edward's face.  However, the Garaham coin exist in kq6.  Is this a continuity error that would be fixed in the future or does the game take place relativity after 6 and 7?

Yes, VI and VII and MOE take place no more than a year before the events of TSL, so it's a relatively recent thing. Oh and by the way, welcome to the forums! Come on in, relax, stay a while...We won't bite 

[Swift]

Overall, it's a very pretty game and shows promise, so kudos for the demo. I did, however, note the following that could be improved on.

The exit hotspots for certain areas (like the town) didn't seem large enough for me to exit the screen properly. I had to position my cursor at specific areas to exit.

There were also a couple of misleading exits, one in the starting room (right side of the screen, where you can't tell at a glance whether you can walk there or if there's a wall), and one at the main gate with the guard dog (left path).

There was no way I could verbally tell the ferryman that I was ready to use the ferry. Clicking the talk icon either showed conversation topics that shouldn't have appeared since I had already proven my identity and paid for passage (he was practically saying "I don't believe you're the king" and "I need money to feed my men, so no"), or there would be no conversation topic except "Goodbye". I found out later that I had to click my hand on the ferry to indicate that I was ready. There should be a "Yes" and "No" option available when he asks if I was ready, as some would think of clicking the talk icon on him to inform him rather than click the hand on the ferry.

I hope it helps.

[TheGreatGraham]

  Can you run the game in Windows ME?  THat's the computer I have.
  If not I can always run it on my dad's XP .
   Same thing for me on the hotspots.  Also, if you move the camera too far out or in tou can see outside the building like your inside the wall, and you can't see anything except a green field Graham standing there.
  I did like the multiple dialogue options, though,a dn the graphics were very nice.

[Yonkey]

Wow!  Really great feedback!

Regarding the exit hotspots (we actually use the term "walk markers"), I agree.  The demo orginally had major problems with poorly placed walk nodes, because as we re-exported a scene or changed the camera, the walk nodes had to be redone as well.  If they were forgotten to be updated, it would result in hard to trigger exit hotspots.

The good news is that we've redone the walk system completely in the current build of the game.  We don't use Torque-defined walk graphs and nodes anymore, we use Maya-defined walk polys and markers.  This allows for much more freedom to explore than in this demo where paths are pre-defined, but the tradeoff is that you'll have to dodge obstacles yourself.

It would be most ideal if we could use both walk polys and walkgraphs, but there is a large amount of complexity involved in each, let alone the combination.  So chances are that walking will work similar to how the Ferry does on the map, rather than how it is working presently.

  Can you run the game in Windows ME?  THat's the computer I have.
  If not I can always run it on my dad's XP .

If you do, you will be doing so at your own risk.  I once asked a team member to try out our demo who was using Windows ME and it caused a blue screen.  When he rebooted, it said something about a Windows critical security file had been corrupted or deleted or something, and he had to reformat his entire computer.

I don't think our game caused all of that, it's more likely that Windows ME can't handle .NET applications properly.  Or, maybe that guy didn't have the 1.1 Framework installed.

In any case, I highly suggest backing up your computer before attempting to run the demo on Windows Millennium, as a safety precaution.

[Baggins]

Yes, VI and VII and MOE take place no more than a year before the events of TSL, so it's a relatively recent thing. Oh and by the way, welcome to the forums! Come on in, relax, stay a while...We won't bite 

Actually VI, VII, MOE up to TSL spans about  two years, in the TSL timeline.

Remember Alexander and Rosella have just turned 21, and their birthday is in December in the TSL timeline.

So that means the dates between KQ6 and TSL are November 1615-December 1617.

2 years isn't that recent, imo. Sure in geological time its recent. But I'm sure its enough time that Graham would have gotten over his face replacing Edward's on a coin...

Also for a bit of Trivia, also depending on which version of KQ6 you play, sometimes its Valanice head on the coin, rather than Graham's, IIRC.

Additionally it probably should be noted, that KQ6 coin was a "copper coin", where as the one in TSL is a gold coin. So seperate types of currency.

So it may just be that the gold coin is newly commissioned, but previously Graham's face or his wife, or both had been comissioned onto Daventry's copper coins.

[Cez]

2 years in that time, considering they don't have the kind of technology we have now, could be easily considered "recent". It took months to cross the seas, whether now we can do it in one day. Don't forget that.

[Baggins]

I think its more a matter that the gold currency seen in TSL was recently commissioned with his face.

Gold is definitely different than the copper currency seen in KQ6, the low denomination.  Gold is certainly worth more.

We never saw a Daventry gold coin in KQ6, so there is no idea what was on the face of one at that time.

I think the big question is if Graham has allowed his treasury to start melting down gold from the Chest of Gold just so the kingdcom could have his face stamped on the new gold coins? 

[Sykodefunkus]

That could be a good idea, cause i did notice the mouse problem with the thousands of icons didn't happen at all the second time I played it.  Of course I probably should check my Graphics card settings and make sure they are set to the most optimal settings to run a game of this magnitude.  I think they're still at the factory setting.

[Petra Rocks]

 I never really meant this to be a general feedback thread, but if the mods don't have a problem it must be all right to proceed. 

And not to nitpick, but while the lead thread on this sub forum spelling was fixed, the subforum description line in general demo thread wasn't. 

[doom saber]

Another question I have is will the final release support a larger number of polygons?  I realize that while the graphics are good, the characters sprites seems a bit outdated comapred to today's standard.  It isn't so bad, considering that you guys work hard on this game and that you are doing it for free.  So if the polygon count remains the same, I understand.

[Rick_Florez]

The polygon counts in the game are not likely to increase that much.  The scenes seen in the demo were some of the first so later scenes may contain more detail if we see the engine can handle it.  Most likely any improvements in graphics will come from new tricks and better textures.

Some graphical limitations have more to do with the oudated engine than anything else. We hope to improve the engine for part 2 but if we changed it now we'ed never get part 1 out.

Rich

[vertefae]

I think the demo looks awesome and hooked me in for the game. I do have a question, when you leave the bookstore area to go to the ferry we're missing the screen with the rose house(Beauty's house). Will that be added later or is it out? You can see the house in the distance of the bookstore.. That was one of my favorite screens it was so pretty.
Awesome job though!! I'm very impressed

[Rick_Florez]

Beauty's house was cut because it didn't play a key role in the story.  I would have loved to put it in but since there is already so much to do it took a back seat.  If we have some spare time we might get around to adding just for the fun of it but its not our top priority at the moment.  It might eventually be added in a patch, but no promises.

On the bright side other Isles have been expanded so it sort of makes up for the few scenes we removed.

[Rick_Florez]

For those wondering there was discussion at one point about switching to the TSE engine but it was widely agreed upon that we should wait until Part 2 before considering it.  This will give it time to become more stable.

Besides even if its a better engine, we would need time to learn how to use all the new functions and it would require even more time to update all the models and graphics to use light mapping and so forth (often this requires modeling a high res version so we'ed have to remodel a lot of things).

We want part 1 out first and foremost, its been a long time coming and we feel its time it sees the light of day.  Don't worry it is a trilogy after all, so there will be plenty of opportunies in the future