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Just a thought on the WIP-thread (i cant post it there because it would be closed immediatly^^)

you can find really great room design there. nice compositions, custom segments, beautiful designed enviroment.
but whats irritating to me: why nearly zero action-shots???

thats what makes the game finally. all the surroundings are only backgrounds for the gameplay-action. yes, when you do a more puzzle-focusing game its naturally not many action shown in the screenies, but most of us do shooters... and i can count with not even 5 fingers the wip-threads where i see shooter-action. why?

i know its hard to press a button in the biggest bossfight action, but should be possible if you WANT to do good screenies.
even because there are so many threads with sample-vids, its no problem to create action-screens out of it. but the most beautiful surroundings are ... well, absolutley DEAD, even in the most videos.

as long as that is the fact, i as a gamer wont be pushed into playing this thing because i cannot see if the gameplay is of the sort i like.
and as a fpsc-user i am afraid that really good action is not possible to do with fpsc (i know it is, but why dont show this?).
screens with scattering enemies, bulletholes, exploding pieces and ragdoll corpses flying around are much more effective to get attention.

is it because you cant do this in fpsc?
no,i am doing an action-shooter at the moment. looks crap because of the first rule (gameplay first), but gives a lot of fun & action, so it IS possible even for a newb like me.

is it because most developers focusing so much on the optics that they never bring their projects to the gameplay-stage before they get the new ideas for the optics of the next game?
remember first rule: gameplay first! the nice looking and lightned surroundings should be finished as the nearly last right before publishing.

is it because most of you people creating only a few nice looking rooms instead of a game? could be, but i think its not the suggestion of fpsc, use a 3d-prog, solves better.

i dont want to get a shootout with someone, so dont think this is personally. i am just wondering.

my development attitude (not only for games, but also thinking as a pro-designer wich is basically the same in-a-row-development) is to use right-scaled placeholders for nearly everything to develop the whole thing, story, leveldesign and gameplay.
then i start to create atmo, so sounds, lightning and others.
after that i can start on the "gimmicks" as textures, sky and everything else.
with this you can test if gameplay and leveldesign is right (has to be a lot of fun even with simple placeholders so it doesnt depend on the optics wich will only work once, but not for replaying the game. when a simple grey man can scare the sh*t out of you with simply his behavior and placing, you are on the right track. it dont has to have a perfect lightened zombie-texture).

i am wondering if some ( or many) of you start the race from the finnish, or am i wrong? i dont know.


lets discuss how to do game development. where to start, where to end...

just some thoughts out of a totally bugged brain.

1. I make the levels first according to my layout plan and add the enemies and gameplay later on. This procedure allows to keep an eye on framerate and memory cap much better.Shadereffects and final additions to the enemie models such as Vweap models are also done at the end. Then I review the levels and perfect them.

2. It is a developer forum, we all are developers and there is no need to present super epic screenshots to advertise your game. I present media like these to the final audience and in the showcase thread.

Now lets get a closer look at your post



People with that attitude usually lack the skill to create nice looking rooms. I for one need a whole game in mind to create something that looks decent.

We had some bananas on the forum that I suspected to create screenshots only for getting attention and comments but as far as I remember: No one cared. Why? lack of "soul" in the levels.



*falls of chair* In FPSC you lack the possibilitie to add superdeveloped materials or shadereffects or HighPoly Models. Textures are not a "gimmick" but the essential part of 3d visuals.



-Wolf

you are right and the word "gimmicks" used on texture is misplaced^^. its absolutley important for the final visuals, but not for game development.
but thats exactly what i mean. in a WIP-thread i would expect to see lesser developed textures more than lesser developed gameplay.
but when you read through the threads, most critics are on gameplay and leveldesign (not in how it looks, but how it works) except the pure technique-critics.

textures and shaders are one of the last works i would do on the game because there are so many other things that should come first. i dont need a finalised texture/shader to get the game to work, i just need to be sure of the measurements and how much of performance it needs.
for me its like building up a print-advertisement. first i have to think about meaning and story of it, then i have to place everything on the blank sheet to get the point/transport the feelings i want to trigger in the right way, and after that i will insert the final content and highlights (normally i even dont do this as a designer, thats work of my media-formers and print-finalising^^). so i can be sure that i get the point. with a nice look it only can be more better than it is.

revise me if i am wrong.

when i look at the most wip-threads, seems that most people start with the highlightning. it also appears in the fact that there is much more content in the wipthread than in the showcase, wich seems that some of us stop working on projects when the "look" is done.

i know that you are working in a way that allows you to do the final (great looking) textures while building up the segments, but most people here are not that kind of artist as you are when looking on textures.also you know how to fill your levels, but most of the wip-content is nice build up segments but nearly empty rooms without enviroment and "life".

could be that it isnt, but it seems to be. again my intention is not to criticise the people in the wip (cant do this as long as i cant proof to do better ), but to see how people like you do the development to get more wip like yours.

or am i misleaded and wip-thread means "optics in progress" more than "game in progress"? dont know.

For me, the reason I don't take action filled screenshots, is because when I test a level, I'm often too busy fighting the enemy ai to think about taking screenshots!

I always wait until after the combat is finished, then I can concentrate on trying to take decent looking screenshots of my levels.

well then play the game to make screens again AFTER test or play it

that is what i would do when i want to present my work in a WIP.
simply because it shows more of the game and so resonance is more true (you dont have to say after a comment that this and that is misunderstood because of the screens). and it proofs that you give the healthy attention to your own work.

could be that you get resonance to a corridor-pic like "looks boring" simply because you killed the row of 40 stylish enemies before you took the screen.

i think that a wip-thread is done to get response by people who you are interested in, so in this case other developers. and i think everyone of us wants to make sure to get good/true response without posting a playable level.

"hey, here is a really ugly screen of my crap game. hit me and rofl, good for your health. hahahaha...." nop, dont think so^^

EDIT:

WOLF:


but with this you would pay attention on performance without gameplay, so only on visuals, right? but in fact that especially npc eat a lot of performance: do you have in mind how gameplay/mass of npc will be or add gameplay and characters by the limits the graphics will left open? sounds very optic-focused to me. i never played one of your games, wolf, so cant say. could be that you calculate that before even starting work in fpsc, then its ok, but i discovered that you will get great additional ideas while building up in the editor and testplay. thats what scares me so gameplay first, then see whats left for optics. thats how i would develop games.

A couple of things about gameplay screenshots.
First off most of these would be shots of Conker, Colonelx and maybe some of the latest model packs running around in scenery consisting of box placeholders, I would be hard put to tell one game from another.
Secondly how do you show gameplay from a screenshot, this requires video to show reasonably, if at all.
Screenshots show the environment of the game your playing in and for me at least this is more important in grabbing my attention when thinking of buying a game (you cant tell gameplay by looking at the box), when it comes down to it you might not want to show all the characters or puzzles in your game, especially bosses.
If you take a game creation software which has limited available characters you can only make your game stand out by presenting screenshots of your environment, if you want to say the game sucks because the pics dont look great, then your going against your own theory that gameplay is all important, the game can look crap and the gameplay rocks.
All aspects of the game design are important but the first point of contact are screenshots. I know many games dont have great graphics and still sell a bundle but I believe they are fewer than the ones that do.
You can choose to create gameplay first and work on textures, shaders etc later, thats just fine, but you wont get far posting screenshots of that in your WIP thread. Thats what demo's are for and TBH folks wont download your game if it looks crap.

thanks, rolfy.

never thought of that most people will use stock-npc, you are right. i mostly think of custom-npcs because i also want to create customs in my game (if i can get the animations done ).



never my intention to say something like this only because of screenshots. its only that lifeless screens simply dont show what KIND of action the game offers, because i think there can be many differences in that (meleebased, many enemies, less but bigger enemies, tactic based a.s.o.). and thats what you can see out of a row of screens i think, and the "action" is the most you will get (hopefully) in the game.
look at the boxes of pro games, you can find hints like that on the box (just see lostplanet and deadspace, for example. both standing right before me, one with megamonsters in the snow on each screen, the other with some pics of darklightened smaller alien-bunches, not to say that deadspace hasnt any megabosses (1 of them is also there) , but lostplanet is the main one for the giga-enemies ). on the other hand screens can show you a lie simply to sell more copies.

but wolf is right, this is something more for the showcase than the wip, but there also: most pics are of enviroment without anything else.

could be that it would be good to set up some screens of a readybuild enviroment-sample AND in addition some (possibly lower-quality) action-screens later in the thread, but most of the time that doesnt happen, even in showcases. in my opinion both is neccessary to get the right picture of the game.

i think its mostly my fear as a noob to fpsc that real good action that also looks good is not possible to do.

As well as shooting enemies before taking screenshots, there is also the issue of not wanting to give TOO much away about my game.

A lot of the action sequences in my game are plot orientated, and since I'm keeping the majority of the plor a secret, I don't want to give it away by posting screenshots of the action.

As for what kind of gameplay is in my game, I described that in my game's WIP introduction.

More importantly, I don't post screenshots to demonstrate gameplay, I take screenshots to demonstrate my level design.

If I want to demonstate gameplay, I'll release a demo!!

I want to demonstate... How do I do it Bruce? Tell me...please

Cheers,
Anayar

lol demonstate, as opposed to angelstate!!!! I meant demonstrate of course!

Ever tried the games from the veteran developers?

I can guarantee you that it is absolutely possible. Especially with the newer FPSC Versions.

I can only speak for myself, of course, but I showcased the first 2 releases on this forum (Shavra-the escape from Reaper harbour and Deprivation) mostly with environment shots to show the graphics. I didn't even think about showing some combat...it would have been way cooler. Especially because Deprivation had pretty cool combat for its release date.

For later releases like Euthanasia and Thanatophobia, I was showing action to advertise it. (And it worked, judging by the spread of the Euthanasia)

@maho76:

Hmm, if there is anything I could help you with dont hesitate to E-Mail or send me a PM on the german board.



-Wolf

thank you for that offer, wolf.
i am absolutley sure that good looking action could be done, and i think i am on a good way. could be a long road, for sure^^

as you said, it worked on your two releases, and thats what i want to push here. its better even for a wip-thread to show some "filled" screenies in addition to only-enviroment-screens, especially when you use custom media, it gives an additional push to get interested people onboard. i am pretty shure with that.
and thats what a showcase and even wip-thread is made for. forcing interest into your project.

but you guys are also right that finalized envir-screens do the same thing on the other hand and are absolutely usefull. i will do some work on the highlightning before creating the whole game out of placeholders^^, thank you for this.

that are my 2 cents why i opened this thread (so finally born in consense after talking around^^).

EDIT: @bruce (forget to say that)
i think its a very special case to show too much of the story in ONE action screen

All I can say is... dont go to Italy anytime soon mate \

Cheers,
Anayar

In that case level 3 of my game is a very special case lol. The main action section of that level would pretty much give away the plot for the whole game!!

Like I said, if I want to show the action in my game, I'll release a demo.

Meanwhile, my screenshots showcase my game's visuals, because it's the game's visuals that I want C&C for.

If and when I ever want C&C on the action, any demo I release (and there's no guarantee I'll ever release one) will serve that purpose.