Next to visual effects, status indicators are omni-present and yet poorly describe the effects and/or don't at all.
Also does not help that the NPC's current target actually blocks the ability to see the really tiny icons on the right side if they extend too far, and that they shuffle all around the screen at a rapid pace making the mouse-over icon text overlay not very effective either. They should each be assigned a fixed position in a location that does not get obstructed by something near-permanently there (target).
Devs: Provide the option to Turn OFF full screen flashes from enemy ship explosions
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When I mentioned my FPS in zones before I'd forgotten that I hadn't been to the Badlands Battlezone.
I went there the other day and from having 60-58 FPS when not in combat, to sometimes as low as 8fps when battle was happening because of all the light-show vomit, I would really like to have some type of slider.
Because of that, now I try to go into zones that have a low population, to avoid the frame loss but also to avoid the light shows.
recently I've started noticing on my Mercury Pilot Escort that when I activate good chunk of my abilities, the amounts of stuff and flashes on the screen makes it realy difficult to have any idea what is happening there.... also when I launch all of them my I see fps dropping rapidly which would never occur in single-player instance in any game I've played and few of them are much newer games than STO :P
so yeah I do agree to some extend with folks wanting an option to disable it/tune it down
somekind of slider going from all->none would be good imo
I would also like a way to keep down the disco effects - my old emergency laptop got problems with no combat maps, when i got to mission, then there is no time to plan any actions - just mash spacebar, or 1/2 buton (when on ground), the enemies are hard to spot anyway
... and my desktop is broken - the motherboard got enough of me.... i think
Hey guys! I'm the lead FX artist on STO. Not new to this subreddit (or Crytpic), but first post as a dev!
The FX team understands the issues that players experience, especially with large powers, and repeatable FX (such as the Destabilized Resonance power), and we try to minimize such things. For example, the power in question has several large AoE damage bursts that resonate from the target entity (the ship you're shooting), for game-play reasons, we have to have an effect that visually represents that to the player. Because of the way the power is designed, this effect plays over and over, and fills a large area.
We do our best to try to balance visual noise and clutter, with cool effects which the players will enjoy using (and feel satisfied with having, since most of you guys do give us your hard-earned cash for cool powers/abilities). We also adamantly insist that the power systems designers keep in mind the "visual fill" that each FX will create when they make their 5km or 10km radius space AoEs!
Does this mean the FX on the Destabilized Resonance ability is "good"? I'd say it definitely needs a touch up, based on player feedback. Will it? Keep reading...
We are aware of many of the FX issues in the game. It's an old game, and some of the FX have been woefully out-dated, and need love. Earlier in the year the FX team pitched an FX overhaul project that will touch on many aspects of the FX visuals in our game. Mainly the visual confusion that comes from having several different visuals that represent the same mechanics.
For example a shield heal FX, should look the same, regardless of where you're getting that effect from; an Undine Rep shield generator, or an Engineering power. The player should be able to tell quickly what's happening with their mechanics, just by looking at the art.
We have lots of things we want to go over, and I hope to write a blog about it in the near future. Due to the incremental nature of the releases, and our schedules, we are hoping to iterate changes over time. One of the first things you can look forward to, will be new shield FX in space, new shield hit FX, and new continuing FX on shields. All new art, cheaper, and hopefully cooler! In the mean time, keep complaining about FX! Seriously! If there is a general dislike for a certain type of effect that's currently in game, harp about it, and we'll swap it out, update it, or change it completely. We want to make the game run smoothly for you, while looking bad TRIBBLE and exciting as possible!
Having said that, we hope that over the last 1-2 years, you've also noticed a marked improvement in FX quality. More interesting new FX for Reputations (not just color shifted versions of old FX), custom all new FX for bridge officers, new cool critter group powers (Iconians and Bluegills were my recent favorites to work on), and others. Sometimes we forget how players experience our FX when we're making them (in massive 20 man space battles, with "ALL OF THE FX" on), so we're happy when you remind us that some things can be a bit much.
edit: see my BOLD text. Keep up the discussion, bring this to there attention. Show them the importance.
Stopping in to add my distaste of DRB effects. I fly escorts zoomed in most of the way and every single time DRB is used I need to look away from my screen for the duration. That effect is an abomination that really should be tossed from the game like a dead cat. Ill settle for an option to just turn it off on my own settings though.
Honestly whoever thought it was a good idea to have an effect that has the potential to flash the entire screen with bright white light in a game that almost always has a black background, has something not right in the head and has no place designing anything for a multi billion dollar industry which, due to sheer numbers, does have a high number of epilepsy and migrane sufferers participating.
Hope this is clear enough, im unsure how I could make it more so. Give us an option to turn off this effect on our end now, we should not have to wait for a complete overhaul of the system to get rid of something that is so hated by the community as a whole, that until I found this thread, I knew it only by the name "epilepsy beam". I have not once seen or heard the words "destabalising resonance" used in game, it has ALWAYS been "epilepsy beam", and has ALWAYS been spoken of with contempt.
Graphic FX Quality is good - for high-end PCs.
For normal users with 5-year old machines it's starts now to be problem....
I (and many other players for sure) would like to have some way to adjust level of displayed FX in the Game Options....
I run a gtx970 with 4gb of memory and the effects spam in the game brings my system to low fps so the excuse of telling people to get a better gpu is nonsense. The game engine isn't great at the best of times and current levels of spam are beyond what it's cable of processing I even get instances of sound effects not working correctly either.
Looking for a dedicated Star Trek community? Visit www.ufplanets.com for details.
There is just one so far, just not on the official STO forums. See Reddit.
Thanks for the link.........
Didn't provide the link since I'm not familiar with this forum's T&C regarding cross-linking other forums' discussions and so err on the side of caution by not linking. I had not seen this new reply at the time but am glad to see someone who understands these concerns from a player point of view. Many of the vfx really are visually appealing just like so much of the other game art (ships, scenery, characters, etc.).
Just last night I discovered a new vfx that I suspect comes from a type of secondary deflector when paired with certain abilities (MES - highly useful for closing rifts on no-cloak ships, or was it polarize hull) I've not used before. It was real nice, but so would the optional ability to tone it all down to enjoy the scene without constant overlays.
A rework of the tool tip icons as mentioned earlier would help too. The manual workaround method of increasing their size a little resulted in severe lag (maybe it was a coincidence). Perhaps a circular overlay where they each are given a fixed position to pop up would work better to prevent their constant rapid shuffling around to avoid a row of icons with large spaces in between. LCARS do have circular icons and so could definitely fit without cluttering, especially as concentric circles as in this picture.
Devs: Provide the option to Turn OFF full screen flashes from enemy ship explosions
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Comments
I went there the other day and from having 60-58 FPS when not in combat, to sometimes as low as 8fps when battle was happening because of all the light-show vomit, I would really like to have some type of slider.
Because of that, now I try to go into zones that have a low population, to avoid the frame loss but also to avoid the light shows.
so yeah I do agree to some extend with folks wanting an option to disable it/tune it down
somekind of slider going from all->none would be good imo
... and my desktop is broken - the motherboard got enough of me.... i think
Sometimes one image is more than thousand words. I question the sanity of the dev who invented the visual effect of the resonance beam .
How about go to your in game settings and reduce the bloom, for simple starters.
A more advanced approach would be attempting to LOWER other of your visual effects.
They even have it so you can just use sliders!
Just...wow.
There is just one so far, just not on the official STO forums. See Reddit.
Thanks for the link.........
For everyones view pleasure:
https://www.reddit.com/r/sto/comments/3w2d52/a_discussion_on_visual_effects/
TOPMOEVFX Wizard 2 points 1 month ago
Hey guys! I'm the lead FX artist on STO. Not new to this subreddit (or Crytpic), but first post as a dev!
The FX team understands the issues that players experience, especially with large powers, and repeatable FX (such as the Destabilized Resonance power), and we try to minimize such things. For example, the power in question has several large AoE damage bursts that resonate from the target entity (the ship you're shooting), for game-play reasons, we have to have an effect that visually represents that to the player. Because of the way the power is designed, this effect plays over and over, and fills a large area.
We do our best to try to balance visual noise and clutter, with cool effects which the players will enjoy using (and feel satisfied with having, since most of you guys do give us your hard-earned cash for cool powers/abilities). We also adamantly insist that the power systems designers keep in mind the "visual fill" that each FX will create when they make their 5km or 10km radius space AoEs!
Does this mean the FX on the Destabilized Resonance ability is "good"? I'd say it definitely needs a touch up, based on player feedback. Will it? Keep reading...
We are aware of many of the FX issues in the game. It's an old game, and some of the FX have been woefully out-dated, and need love. Earlier in the year the FX team pitched an FX overhaul project that will touch on many aspects of the FX visuals in our game. Mainly the visual confusion that comes from having several different visuals that represent the same mechanics.
For example a shield heal FX, should look the same, regardless of where you're getting that effect from; an Undine Rep shield generator, or an Engineering power. The player should be able to tell quickly what's happening with their mechanics, just by looking at the art.
We have lots of things we want to go over, and I hope to write a blog about it in the near future. Due to the incremental nature of the releases, and our schedules, we are hoping to iterate changes over time. One of the first things you can look forward to, will be new shield FX in space, new shield hit FX, and new continuing FX on shields. All new art, cheaper, and hopefully cooler!
In the mean time, keep complaining about FX! Seriously! If there is a general dislike for a certain type of effect that's currently in game, harp about it, and we'll swap it out, update it, or change it completely. We want to make the game run smoothly for you, while looking bad TRIBBLE and exciting as possible!
Having said that, we hope that over the last 1-2 years, you've also noticed a marked improvement in FX quality. More interesting new FX for Reputations (not just color shifted versions of old FX), custom all new FX for bridge officers, new cool critter group powers (Iconians and Bluegills were my recent favorites to work on), and others. Sometimes we forget how players experience our FX when we're making them (in massive 20 man space battles, with "ALL OF THE FX" on), so we're happy when you remind us that some things can be a bit much.
edit: see my BOLD text. Keep up the discussion, bring this to there attention. Show them the importance.
Honestly whoever thought it was a good idea to have an effect that has the potential to flash the entire screen with bright white light in a game that almost always has a black background, has something not right in the head and has no place designing anything for a multi billion dollar industry which, due to sheer numbers, does have a high number of epilepsy and migrane sufferers participating.
Hope this is clear enough, im unsure how I could make it more so. Give us an option to turn off this effect on our end now, we should not have to wait for a complete overhaul of the system to get rid of something that is so hated by the community as a whole, that until I found this thread, I knew it only by the name "epilepsy beam". I have not once seen or heard the words "destabalising resonance" used in game, it has ALWAYS been "epilepsy beam", and has ALWAYS been spoken of with contempt.
For normal users with 5-year old machines it's starts now to be problem....
I (and many other players for sure) would like to have some way to adjust level of displayed FX in the Game Options....
Looking for a dedicated Star Trek community? Visit www.ufplanets.com for details.
Just last night I discovered a new vfx that I suspect comes from a type of secondary deflector when paired with certain abilities (MES - highly useful for closing rifts on no-cloak ships, or was it polarize hull) I've not used before. It was real nice, but so would the optional ability to tone it all down to enjoy the scene without constant overlays.
A rework of the tool tip icons as mentioned earlier would help too. The manual workaround method of increasing their size a little resulted in severe lag (maybe it was a coincidence). Perhaps a circular overlay where they each are given a fixed position to pop up would work better to prevent their constant rapid shuffling around to avoid a row of icons with large spaces in between. LCARS do have circular icons and so could definitely fit without cluttering, especially as concentric circles as in this picture.