Yet Another Thread Closed At Ttlg

[ascottk]

So, what's up with these uninformed noodleheads popping up at ttlg? Actually it seems to be a general trend at any forum. TDS vs. TDM debates seem to irritate the mods:

http://www.ttlg.com/forums/showthread.php?t=109487

This one was closed by David which was a shame because I was actually enjoying it

 

So I'll start yet another thread about misinformation about the dark mod & thief:deadly shadows

 

Some people were vehemently disagreeing about something or other (the playershadow in d3 for example). The argument consisted of being able to turn the player shadow on. One guy says he never saw it after playing the game three times. Who would want to play d3 three times? Replayability seems nonexistant especially when things started to get predictable very quickly . . .

 

Anyway, just playing the game 3 times doesn't make an expert on the game. I think people need to play it & poke around with config files or mod it in order to make the person more educated. Even then it doesn't make a person an expert.

 

Another thing that came up in that thread is the animations of TDS vs. the classics. I think I was the only person who made/tweaked any new animations since the editor came out for TDS. I have an up close & personal experience with TDS animations & even though they used motion capture that doesn't mean they used it well. TDS animations, to me, seemed like a wheel with a buldge. They were not smoothed out & that shows up in the player animations. str8g8 would probably be the expert on T1 & T2 animations but they seemed very smooth compared to TDS. There shouldn't have been a comparison.

 

Art direction was another thing. TDS just isn't as immersive as the first two. I'll leave that idea there since I probably posted a million pet peaves about this elsewhere.

 

Technology issues. D3 is moddable. TDS wasn't designed with moddability in mind. I was too frustrated with TDS modding in order to continue modding for it. That's why I joined the dark mod

[sparhawk]

If you mean you will open another thread at TTLG, I promise I wont post in it. Or if, only very small things.

 

I think there is a certain tendency on TTLG, when I get involved in a TDS thread that it gets closed down, though I was surprised that it held so long. Anyway, I decided to stay away from such threads. Actually I also held out quite long, because I saw that thread already several days ago when it started and refrained from posting. It doesn't serve any real purpose to post there. People who think that TDS was great (in technical terms) will not die out and there really is no point to it.

[New Horizon]

Rather silly that it was closed actually, nobody was going over the top. It was a 'mildly warm' discussion, nowhere near heated. I was enjoying it too for once, I'm disappointed that they closed it.

[sparhawk]

No criticism on TDS and Moderators please.

[Crispy]

Anyway, I decided to stay away from such threads.

Probably a good idea.

 

While you may well be right, I don't think it's good publicity for people in the mod to be participating in flame wars... and IMO that was turning into a flame war. I haven't agreed with all of the TTLG mod's decisions, but I'm a moderator on a different forum and I can sympathize with David closing that thread.

 

We want to attract everyone to TDM, after all, not just TDS haters.

[ascottk]

I was a little ticked about some misconceived notions some people have/had about the mod. There was some Doom 3 bashing about the animations, which we had little to do with, and having those notions are detrimental to the mod. For those who didn't like the D3 animations, we have very little to do with those! Really

[Springheel]

I still can't fathom how anyone could think the TDS animations are more natural looking than D3....

[Dram]

Guys, if we keep posting there about "TDM is uber! and TDS sucks!", then we'll keep getting responses like

I'll let you in to a little secret. Every time an "I liked TDS" thread is posted it, without fail, ends up with me wanting to bitchslap a few choice members of the Dark Mod team, which is a damn shame.

 

It's better to just not reply at all then get even more negative views to TDM...

[Crispy]

Me neither, Spring, but Dram's right. The guy who thought D3 animations were bad is beyond saving (as the saying goes, "a man convinced against his will is of his own opinion still"), and invoking the ire of the TTLG moderators does not help our cause. Better to roll your eyes silently and leave it at that, I think.

[sparhawk]

I still can't fathom how anyone could think the TDS animations are more natural looking than D3....

 

I also can't believe it. There were some good things in TDS, but the animations were not one of them. HAHA! Today I had a dream about playing TDS, but with different levels not made by the original developers, and it was really beautifull. Well, it was only a dream though.

[OrbWeaver]

Well at least I got to have the last word on how a renderer works. That guy's misinformed technobabble was beginning to annoy me.

 

Unfortunately not. Normal mapping is static in terms of rendering passes required. Normalled pixels require the same number of passes regardless of how much or how little light is being cast on the surface.

 

Seriously, WTF?

[sparhawk]

I think what he means is that it doesn't matter how far the normal extrudes because it will always the same number of passes. Of course.

 

That's similar to saying: It doesn't matter how which colour a pixel is, because it still requires the same number of renderpasses, since the number of required passes is not a function of the colour, it's a function of the number of textures.

 

At least this is the only sense that I could make out in that sentence.

[greebo]

Wow, I just realised that there is a bonehoard screenshot in that thread... I'm all red in the face now, thanks New Horizon!

 

I guess this is the best way to convince all those people on TTLG is to let screenshots or even a demo map speak for the Dark Mod.

[OrbWeaver]

Actually you could be right. It was in response to this:

 

i'm starting to think at least part of it might have to do with normal mapping, especially if there's a texture reflecting lots of light. for example: in gamall's lair, there's a square room next to the room with the long table by the steps from the first room you enter. in this room there's a fireplace and a gaslamp. i was hiding in the corner, and my framerate had gone down the shitter whenever i happened to be looking across the room. the walls were not smooth at all, and in fact there seemed to be quite a bit of light reflection going on- then i doused the gaslamp and my framerate miraculously increased.

 

It does look like the original post was saying that having a rough wall would be slower to render than a smooth wall, which is clearly nonsense and would justify the response about the amount of light not affecting performance.

[OrbWeaver]

Wow, I just realised that there is a bonehoard screenshot in that thread... I'm all red in the face now, thanks New Horizon!

 

That's actually the shadowless performance screenshot I posted in the discussion about optimising shadow counts. Now everybody can see the 91fps and conclude that TDM's performance will rock.

[greebo]

Yeah, I recognised that screenshot. In fact, we added a lot of optimisations since the first internal "release", so it should also be better performing with all the shadows on. Many of the light volumes were intersecting in the first version, this is mostly resolved now.

[oDDity]

I can't believe you guys are still fucking around at TTLG, arguments, closed thread and warnings from NH not to get involved, and promisies that 'I will never take part in a TTLG discussion again' have been going on since the start of the mod.

All you're doing is building up a whole group of people who will be bursting at the seams to find fault with TDM as soon as it's released - and be very vocal about it, with plenty of 'I told you so's'

[Crispy]

Exactly.

[New Horizon]

...and those "I told you so's" will still be wrong, because we've said all along...that the whole damned thing will be available for the community to fix as they please. So if they don't like what we've done...or think it sucks, they can just unsuck it themselves. If all someone can do in the end is complain, then that's their loss.

[sparhawk]

Correct. That's the point of a community project.

[New Horizon]

I also took a look at that thread and really don't see much of a flame war going on, more like some silly disagreements...but nothing more. I would personally like to thank Toolfan for being the first one to stir up the pot though.

[OrbWeaver]

ToolFan must be living in some kind of dreamworld. Everyone is entitled to like TDS (I didn't find it bad at all), but to deny the existence of well-documented faults that are confirmed by the developers is just insane. Perhaps he will soon be taking up a career in politics?

[New Horizon]

Perhaps he will soon be taking up a career in politics?

 

He has a real knack for it, doesn't he?

 

I didn't find TDS that bad either, but I find it annoying that you either have to be rated a hater or a lover of the game. I'm in the middle. I liked it, but I still feel a bit betrayed by Ion Storm for not managing their resources better. They're no newbie company...somebody was smoking too much weed or something.

[Domarius]

Why don't we just make a board here called "Casualties of TTLG"

[New Horizon]

Why don't we just make a board here called "Casualties of TTLG"

 

I was thinking about it...and also thinking about transferring all the posts to our forum. lol