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General discussionOpen world games and draw distance (29 posts)(29 posts)
(29 posts)
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This is my favourite topic
Posted October 20, 2015
I mostly don't care since most good games handle it good enough. Been playing Assassin's Creed II and Brotherhood lately and here it's very distracting...
Posted October 20, 2015
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Crosmando: I find loading screens to be be far more than annoying than draw distance. Not RPGs, but you've got games like Silent Hill and Turok where the low draw distance (ie fog) actually adds to the atmosphere.
Hear, hear. One thing that really annoyed me with NWN2, click on a door, load for 5 mins, realise you didn't want to be inside, another 5mins. Very annoying transitions.

As for draw distance, I don't get this whole need to see 6 million miles away, I am more concerned about the big fecking ogre (am I allowed to use that or has that been IP'd by GW?) trying to dent my !glass! armour.
Posted October 20, 2015
Draw distances has been pretty good in most games imo but default fov has been mostly bad in every game.
Posted October 20, 2015
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hedwards: It depends how short you're talking about. I found it to be hugely distracting when I played Turok, it seemed like the fog came in at about 10m and then you couldn't see anything at all. Same goes for some of the older race games.
I actually kinda liked the close fog in Turok (PC version), it gave a kind of eerie feeling to it, almost like Silent Hill (you never know what is coming out of the fog, even if you hear the sound already...).

In TES Arena the close fog is kinda distracting, but what can you do. I guess the graphics engine was already quite slow as it is when the game came out back in 1994 or so.

On the other side of the scale, I love how far you can see in Serious Sam games (at least the first two). Like in the starting place of the first game, you might get a glimpse of something glimmering faaaar in the desert, wondering if something really could be there. So you start going towards it, and after a few big fights and stuff, yep, there is an oasis with some goodies.

I think those Serious Sam games showed you don¨t need a slow and demanding graphics engine in order to see for miles.
Post edited October 20, 2015 by timppu
Posted October 20, 2015
Nightmare Creatures fan here... Whats all this hulabaloo about Draw Distance?
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Posted October 20, 2015
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Starkrun: Nightmare Creatures fan here... Whats all this hulabaloo about Draw Distance?
Tenchu was one of the same. Blame the hardware i guess. :)

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Antimateria: [...] default fov has been mostly bad in every game.
I agree! And quite irritating when you can't change it.
Posted October 20, 2015
If it does not affect my gameplay, I don't really care about it. Solid fps, stutter-less and smooth gameplay are more important for me.
Posted October 20, 2015
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rtcvb32: I'm reminded of Morrowind, where the draw distance could be like up to 300 feet, or if you had performance issues, as low as like 10 feet and dense fog everywhere.

On the other hand, the lack of far draw distances helped hide the size of the island, because if you can see the whole distance you might be annoyed since it's actually not that big.
I play with MGE (among other mods) and the island doesn't really feel THAT small... I'll TCL myself far into the sky and get scenic views of Vivec and Ebonheart though. It is nice to see how it all fits together.
Posted October 20, 2015
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paladin181: the island doesn't really feel THAT small...
I've heard someone compare the island as being maybe 3 miles long and 3 miles wide (or was it kilometer?). Certainly if you're on foot, that's a big place to be (since you can't ride guar for some odd reason...), but overall it's not that big of a place to be.
Posted October 20, 2015
Someone here never played Superman 64. Oh wait,it's not awful draw distance,it's "kryptonite fog".
Posted October 20, 2015
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hedwards: It depends how short you're talking about. I found it to be hugely distracting when I played Turok, it seemed like the fog came in at about 10m and then you couldn't see anything at all. Same goes for some of the older race games.
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timppu: I actually kinda liked the close fog in Turok (PC version), it gave a kind of eerie feeling to it, almost like Silent Hill (you never know what is coming out of the fog, even if you hear the sound already...).

In TES Arena the close fog is kinda distracting, but what can you do. I guess the graphics engine was already quite slow as it is when the game came out back in 1994 or so.

On the other side of the scale, I love how far you can see in Serious Sam games (at least the first two). Like in the starting place of the first game, you might get a glimpse of something glimmering faaaar in the desert, wondering if something really could be there. So you start going towards it, and after a few big fights and stuff, yep, there is an oasis with some goodies.

I think those Serious Sam games showed you don¨t need a slow and demanding graphics engine in order to see for miles.
I don't know, I found the fact that it was so abrupt to be rather distracting. recent FO games don't have everything disappear all at once, so you have a sense that things are changing. I'd like even more distance, but on games that large, that's not always realistic a the present time.
Posted October 20, 2015
If you don't mind bringing your computer on its knees, Arma's draw distance can be quite impressive.
Posted October 20, 2015
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doomdoom11: Anyone find short draw distance or LOD in open world games distracting?

The only games to do it right for me are Far Cry 4, Witcher 3, Dying Light (On max) Just Cause 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, GTA 5, Sleeping Dogs, Far Cry 2 RDR and Mad Max. I may have forgotten few.

Basically there are so many open world games where the loss of detail is so obvious (looking at you Skyrim and Far Cry 3) and grass/bushes appearing on the ground and trees changing detail as you near a location. I find this approach very distracting and immersion ruining.

Developers should find subtle techniques to render detail while not ruining the immersion in for example in Witcher 3 and Far Cry 4.

Anyone else find badly done draw distance distracting?
Most games only show you detail when you get near so everyone who doesn't have a monster PC can get a decent amount of FPS. Is it immersion ruining? Very much so but it is done for practical reasons.
Posted October 20, 2015
I still prefer details popping up when approaching, than the forced tilt view that goes to top-down when you zoom out from an over-the-shoulder or isometric perspective.

These keep me helplessly trying to zoom in and out, in order to get the camera to face a spot that remains just out of the visual field. Pretty infuriating.
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This is my favourite topic
Community
General discussionOpen world games and draw distance (29 posts)(29 posts)
(29 posts)