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On February 20 2010 14:23 Virtue wrote:you made the decision to make it easier on you then how others have it
Correction: You make it easier on yourself than it would be if you used the high settings.
What everybody else uses is entirely up to them and their preferences (and to their computer limitations).
It blows my mind that anyone would consider it unfair to adjust the options that are readily available in the main menu. As I said, each person has their own preferences and it is not your place to tell others how they should set their main menu options, especially when the settings you demand make it difficult for them to play the game and understand what is going on. You seem to restrict others to your own idea of "fun". For you, fun = the flashiest graphics possible. I accept that. Why can't you accept that some people find more fun in being able to compete to the best of their ability?
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Lol you did no read any of my posts it is directed at what is fair for tournaments not what is fun and what i determine as fair is the usage of the higher end graphics playing the game as the designed intended.
Oh you say they only made the high end graphics because it sells, so what you're thing on game-play doesn't sell? i though that all that mattered...
read the long shitfest i had to clarify time after time.
Although i do find it morally pethic for you to mess with the graphics settings so you can see everything, ie setting everything except particles to low put particles on high play on a 16: 9 resolution turn on health bars etc just seems if you can play at higher resolutions all you are doing is playing to win w.e makes that possible it seems rather desperate to me.
I'm no to wild on how having health bars always visible can change gameplay at high level. but that's for another discussion.
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Multiplayer:
If I play multiplayer I generally do so because I want to have fun testing my mechanical skills against other players, rape their mineral line, counter their attacks, outwit them with my strategical skill and so on. I don't really care what graphics I have turned on as long as it doesn't interfere with my game play.
Single player campaign:
I just love Blizzards single player campaigns and if I play the campaign I want to immerse myself with the saga of Starcraft. High-end graphics will most likely boost just that.
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I feel thet protoss specially needs less blicking and exploding things. In big battles its just impossible to follow.
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Right now I definitely prefer medium over high. Everything seem to turn so "gray" and blurry at the higher settings.
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I played the first day on medium graphics (high made me lag during larger fights), and then dropped to low to avoid lag during streaming. I felt more comfortable with the game on low, but that could also have something to do with it no longer being my first day playing. I have yet to try going back up to medium, so I can't say for sure, but I think low DOES help you, simply because the game is unfamiliar, and the lower the settings, the less there is going on on your screen; since they have to make the game play the same regardless of settings, they obviously can't omit any of the crucial graphics, so you're left with the bare minimum--everything you see is important. As things get flashier, you have more trouble identifying the important things from the special effects. At least, that seems logical to me, and seems to be true from very limited experience.
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On February 23 2010 18:21 Virtue wrote:
Oh you say they only made the high end graphics because it sells, so what you're thing on game-play doesn't sell? i though that all that mattered...
rofl do you ever read your posts before you post them?
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Virtue:
First off, yes, I read the whole thread. I'm aware that you are adressing tourneys/competitive play only, and that you have no problem with people on lower end systems using low graphic settings.
You asked earlier on how your logic was flawed, let me demonstrate a few examples:
Premise 1: Better graphics make for more fun
Premise 2: People deliberately lower graphics to improve winning chances
Conclusion: People value winning more than having fun
Premise 1 is false, premise 2 might be.
Premise 1: Low graph settings are only there to allow low end system users to run sc2
Premise 2: Some high end system users chose to run low graph settings
Conclusion: Some high end system users exploits
Premise 1 is false.
This is probably much more elaborate than what was needed, but it seems you haven't realized what causes most peope here to disagree with you. It is not a given that better graphics are desirable. Many people here point out that good graphs helps selling the game, and this is true, but it sells the game to certain kind of audience. I would have bought starcraft 2 even if it wasn't one bit prettier than its predecessor. And even though the graphics are probably breathtaking the first time around, I will hardly notice them (if they function well) once I start to play this game competitively. To my gaming experience aesthetics aren't important. Yes, I would play a board game with no art work if the gameplay was good.
What's just as important to your arguement is your understanding of exploits, and here opinions are merely subjective. I have a hard time seeing how you will make the case that a readily available system setting is an exploit, however - even if I buy the notion that people only chose this to improve their chance of winning. If anything, it points to a flaw in the design of the game's visuals if people chose to avoid them in order to increase their performance. It is not the same case as with a game where the tweaking of graphics make you see through walls/camouflage etc, it is merely a matter of clarity. Everything you see on the screen in sc2 is supposed to be clearly visible (as long as undetected units don't show), and thus tweaking the graphics to enhance visibility isn't an exploit. It is rather a compensation. Worker stack-attacking in sc1 is not a good comparison since it is not a feature that was ever intented in any way.
On the topic of health bars. That's merely a design choice to me, and one that I might and might not disagree with. It's like multiple building/unit selection and intellignt spell casting - it changes the game a lot but it is a deliberate design choice on blizzards part. Making such features unavailable in tournament play is out of the question. It's a vital part of the game mechanics in this sequal, and if you don't like it you should try to have it removed during the beta (yeah, good luck), because it will be a natural part of the game and not something you can remove/ban later on.
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Graphics aren't that important for me in competetive games, but I think SC2 had to make the step into 3D to be a successful game. It's also true, that most of the time, flashier graphics with more effects and stuff, make it harder to focus on whats actually going on and 3D-graphics tend to make controls a bit more difficult, which is especially true for RTS-Games.
I do think that the only advantage of a 3D-game over a 2D-Game is, that it looks better and you can zoom in and stuff, but it serves no advantage at all to the gameplay (considering RTS-Games, because in this genre it's quite easy to make a comparison).
The important thing is, and from what I've seen so far on the beta-streams is, that you find a good balance between the visuals of a game and the gameplay, or in other words: The visuals should never interfere in a negative way with the ability to play the game properly on a very high level. As for SC2, I think Blizzard did a really good Job, although SC2 has to measure up against it's predecessor which was almost flawless in terms of gameplay, simple but awesome visuals and controllability.
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Looks like they just remove the specular/bump maps, the actually models still look the same so it shouldn't effect gameplay. I plan on playing low settings for competitive gameplay as long as low level effects won't hinder me.
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I find having my settings on 100% ultra is too much, my computer can run it, but it does chug in spots so I crank everything down to high and that's absolutely fine.
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Its more like competitive play vs playing for fun.
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United States22883 Posts
On February 23 2010 18:21 Virtue wrote:
Although i do find it morally pethic for you to mess with the graphics settings so you can see everything, ie setting everything except particles to low put particles on high play on a 16: 9 resolution turn on health bars etc just seems if you can play at higher resolutions all you are doing is playing to win w.e makes that possible it seems rather desperate to me.
Your morals are bogus and have no place in competitive play.
There, I said it. No competitive gamer will disagree. SC1 had no modifiable settings to speak of, besides shift+tab, but in every other competitive game on the planet, this is standard practice. We're not even talking about modifying anything or using console commands. We're talking about using the settings available through in-game menus that make information most readily understandable.
Why would you want to impose an artificial limitation on major competitions if extreme graphics are going to make players perform worse?
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The only issue I had initially was that SCV's and reapers looked kinda similar, but now I have absolutely no issue picking out exactly whats what.
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Germany2762 Posts
On February 20 2010 05:57 hoborg wrote:One problem Low has vs High in terms of readability is that the force fields are much harder to see: Low: Ultra: Might be just one setting you can up to fix that, though.
same for scanner sweep. not that seeing it matters as much as seeing a force field, but i noticed the same issue with it.
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How about some High Low Pics of some High Supply armies attacking each other?
There might be rly some differences in seeing whats going on.
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So far the only difficult part of the graphics for me is that I can't really tell which units are being targeted to pull back as the attack animations are either too bulky(too much explosion) or non existent. I liked the little dots from the marine rifles in SC1. Makes it VERY easy to see what unit is attacking what.
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On February 20 2010 05:06 floor exercise wrote:
You probably just didn't take enough time to get used to it
I know when I started playing Heroes of Newerth, which looks strikingly similar to SC2, I found it extremely disorienting and even at times headache inducing.
But a couple days of playing I was completely used to it, and had no complaints
THIS was so true 4 me aswell. just wanted to say  Also i think as for now medium gives best clarity.
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I got a good laugh out of the "the higher the graphics, the x% more fun!" comments :D
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EPT![[image loading]](http://img121.imageshack.us/img121/6403/ff1v.jpg)
![[image loading]](http://img517.imageshack.us/img517/719/ff2u.jpg)
![[image loading]](http://dl.dropbox.com/u/605034/sc2%20screens/screen_low.JPG)
![[image loading]](http://dl.dropbox.com/u/605034/sc2%20screens/screen_medium.JPG)
![[image loading]](http://dl.dropbox.com/u/605034/sc2%20screens/screen_high.JPG)
![[image loading]](http://dl.dropbox.com/u/605034/sc2%20screens/screen_ultra.JPG)
![[image loading]](http://dl.dropbox.com/u/605034/sc2%20screens/screen_low_hp.JPG)
