Adventure Gamers - Forums

A.A - 18 July 2013 06:32 AM

That was a REALLY encouraging read. Nice to see some positivity about the game, because it’s not getting much from this thread.

Haha, that’s what I was thinking. John Walker’s a tough critic, too.

I quite enjoyed what I’ve played of Moebius so far, namely the Chapter 1 Alpha sent to backers. Haven’t played the Chapter 1 and 2 Beta—I’d rather save as much as possible for the end product. I could tell that the game was coming along well when it was already engaging and fun to play even in its not yet fully polished state. It only gets better from here!

We gamers are nothing if not demanding, but I suspect many of the criticisms that have been raised are out of love and influenced by the high potential already on display for the game . . . quite the opposite from any belief that the game will be poor, in which case people would respond with anger or silent apathy. The feedback here seems more like loving nitpicking in the hopes of making the game even better. (Of course, not all that feedback will be actionable since the game has to get shipped at some point.) Still, it’s certainly true that those of us with positive feedback should probably speak up more about it in this thread and share the love.

For my own part, I’m intrigued by the story and the puzzles, and I’m impressed at how much this game has achieved so far in both detail and scale, even moreso because the team has put tons of production value on the screen with an absolutely tiny budget. The Moebius team must be very dedicated and passionate. Off the cuff, I’d say that this game is probably around #4 among my personal most anticipated adventure game Kickstarters, behind Dreamfall Chapters, Broken Age, and Tesla Effect, and ahead of Armikrog, Broken Sword, Hero-U, Shadowgate, and SpaceVenture. That’s a strong showing among terrific company.

Yawn. More animation/modelling bashing.

How about some comments on whether the story sounds interesting or not, eh?

Lucien21 - 26 November 2013 02:17 AM

I hope the story and puzzles are really good becasue those character models and the animation are awful.

Models are disaster, some really effed up anatomy and textures, lead character is
still bogged down posture. Ain’t gonna bode well for GK revival.

Character on right > Same texture(less?) for jeans and shirt.
On right the hands holding paper.

In above pic check lady’s left hand, wrist/palm/elbow ratio is effed up.
Crazy level of ignorance.

TimovieMan - 26 November 2013 06:26 AM

Looks acceptable to me, though…

Also, why does Malachi Rector remind me of David Tennant?

I agree. It’s an Adventure Game. Let’s not expect AAA type graphics here. The story sounds terrific and the game’s designed by Jane Jensen so gameplay will be good as well. Let’s just enjoy that we’re getting an actual Jane Jensen game for the first time in 14 years and not bicker about graphics.

And yes now that you mention it he does look awfully like David Tennant which is a very good thing imo. I thought he was absolutely mesmerising in Broadchurch. One of the best shows ever imo. Shame he’s not coming back for season 2.

gray pierce - 26 November 2013 09:31 AM

Let’s just enjoy that we’re getting an actual Jane Jensen game for the first time in 14 years and not bicker about graphics.

Didn’t Gray Matter come out just a few years ago?

tomimt - 26 November 2013 12:37 PM

Anyway, Grey Matter came 2010 and it was a proper Jensen game. And had better character art and animation as well.

It could be argued that since she didn’t have full control, it wasn’t a “proper” Jane Jensen game in the sense of GKs. But I wouldn’t make that argument

Anyways, I agree that the graphics are a bit iffy, but then is it really such a big deal? It’s a pretty small-budget game, after all. Maybe the 3D style they chose wasn’t the best choice, but that’s the route they chose and it’s too late to do anything about it now. And I doubt this has as big a budget as Gray Matter had, either.

The first thing I thought when I saw the trailer was that the backgrounds look really good and that the characters could look better but they are certainly not awful. I mean if we are going to zoom on characters and search for bad artwork or animation then we would find that most adventure games have that problem. In the end why I am interested in this game is the story and gameplay and I am sure that will be the games strong point.

I think it’s perfectly valid to critique the graphics in an adventure game, even a low budget one—within reason, of course.  Certainly we can’t expect AAA production values from a relatively low budget, but it’s also important to recognize that video games, even adventure games (excluding interactive fiction, of course), are primarily a visual medium.  Graphics and, more importantly, good art direction are an important part of getting the player invested and immersed in the story of a game.  If the graphics or art direction are distracting, it breaks the player out of the story and makes it harder for them to enjoy the game as a whole.

That said, the most important aspect of good art direction is consistency, not realism, and the graphics in Moebius, while not exactly totally realistic, are definitely consistent across all of the characters.  They ALL have similarly cartoonish proportions, and it’s consistent enough that it certainly seems intentional on the part of the artists.  Whether or not it was the best CHOICE is debatable, but clearly, this style was agreed upon by all involved parties as the direction in which they wanted to take this game’s art. 

I don’t personally have a problem with it, but I totally understand why some people do.  It is wrong to stifle criticism of this aspect of the game just because it’s not the most important aspect to YOU personally.

tomimt - 26 November 2013 03:37 PM

I don’t mind the cartoonish style in 3D myself, the biggest issue I have with Moebius characters is mostly that it looks like a cartoonish style done by someone who doesn’t fully understand how to pull it off so that the propotions looks both cartoonish and aestethically pleasing to the viewer

And that’s a totally valid criticism.  I agree, though for me, it’s not distracting enough to turn me off.  I see the same issue with the character graphics in the upcoming GK1 remake, too—though I actually think it stands out MORE in that case because the prerendered backgrounds feel a lot more realistic as opposed to the Moebius backgrounds, which feel similarly stylized.