Some new details, images and conceptual art of Heavenly Sword

[PiNkY]

Prehaps if rather than general 'falling short' you can be more specific and I'll answer?
We haven't shown any PS3 army screenies yet, so arguments about number of peeps etc. aren't possible. As someone whos working stupid hours (a heard that most peeps get weekends off... what a strange idea ;-) ) on this very item, all I can say its give a little longer and then judge us.

That shot was 1080p with no AA, we are now 720p with 4xAA... which seems a fair change. We had FP16 Opaque HDR, we now have NAO32 Opaque HDR.

I'm not picking a fight, I'm genuinely interested... I know exactly what the differences are between how that shot was made and what we have today, so I'm curious why its percieved better back then...

This was in no way ment as an insult . Directly comparing the two, the first thing that strikes me is the difference in scale between what was shown at E3 06 & 05 (thousands of charactors on screen in wide open fields versus tens of characters in your basic brawler setting). Then the drop in resolution. To me, there's roughly the same amount of aliasing on object/character edges in the 720p shots linked earlier and the IGN shot. Especially on such a shader heavy title, if you indeed have it running at full hd without AA at comparable framerates I'd much prefer having that, as for folks with 720p displays there is still some nice SSAA.

 

[Shinjisan]

Hi DeanoC,I don't know if you can answer these questions but since you're reading this thread I'd really like to ask you if you plan to have a new playable demo for TGS and if that isn't the case when we can expect a new trailer with environment exploration.Is the game still on track for Q1 2007?Thanks (hoping you can give at least a few hints)

 

[nAo]

To me, there's roughly the same amount of aliasing on object/character edges in the 720p shots linked earlier and the IGN shot.

Be more patient, the final version will have better AA.

Especially on such a shader heavy title, if you indeed have it running at full hd without AA at comparable framerates I'd much prefer having that, as for folks with 720p displays there is still some nice SSAA.

SSAA is hardly nicer when you just sample at 2X rate and with an ordered sampling grid (but it's granted to be much slower )

Marco

 

[PiNkY]

Be more patient, the final version will have better AA.
SSAA is hardly nicer when you just sample at 2X rate and with an ordered sampling grid (but it's granted to be much slower )

Marco

Well i was refering to the 1080p --> 720p downsampling through the consoles/tvs scaler. That can be considered a form of SuperSampling AA, however it certainly does not imply 2xSSAA. Nevertheless I'd prefer 1080p over 720p at comparable framerates considering how much computational effort is per pixel on next gen games (probably the reason why it's not going to happen, especially with the added per-pixel cost of your CIE <-> RGB transforms ;-)). Nevertheless I don't want to come off wrong, so to make on thing clear: I think you are doing a great job from what i have seen so far, yet I still like your old pics better but will be patient (and buy your game anyways )

 

[Angelcurio]

I have a question about this game. Is it formed by stages or missions, like Dinasty Warriors or Devil May Cry? Or is an open ended adventure title like God of War, where you advance from beginning to end without any problem?

I really hope the latter is the correct answer.

Can i expect this question to be answered someday?

 

[nAo]

Well i was refering to the 1080p --> 720p downsampling through the consoles/tvs scaler. That can be considered a form of SuperSampling AA, however it certainly does not imply 2xSSAA.

I think it does since I don't know any GPU that can supersample an image with a non ordered grid without employing an accumulation buffer.

Nevertheless I'd prefer 1080p over 720p at comparable framerates considering how much computational effort is per pixel on next gen games (probably the reason why it's not going to happen, especially with the added per-pixel cost of your CIE <-> RGB transforms ;-)).

Color conversion cost is relatively low compared to the amount of work that we do to shade each pixel.

Nevertheless I don't want to come off wrong, so to make on thing clear: I think you are doing a great job from what i have seen so far, yet I still like your old pics better but will be patient (and buy your game anyways )

Don't worry, no one is looking for praises here, everyone is entitled to his opinion, I was just trying to address some of your concerns.

 

[Acert93]

HS is a 2007 title and they have not shown much realtime gameplay, so it would be pretty unfair to compare at this point.

But if you are answering questions: That 1080p shot seems to be showing some nice shadowing. If my eyes are not deceiving me on that shot (correct me if they are) it looks like there is self shadowing and/or dynamic objects casting shadows on eachother. e.g. The weapons (e.g. the mace from the gen up front; light is on the left so the shadow on the torso seems to be the mace), armor, and maybe even the flags (directly behind the mace a soldier is mostly shadowed by what appears to be a flag... has to be something dynamic either way as you can see the shadow in his right shoulder yet the two guys in front of him have lit shoulders, so something is casting a chsow on him).

I know things can change, but is the current plan to have

a) self shadowing from dynamic objects with

b) at least 200 or 300 (this shot seems to have even more than that if you look at the side hills, in the back, and in the back hills, plus that large 'ship' that scene is utterly massive)

Just curious. Hard to imagine getting both the sweet/killer animation and fighting system shown at this years E3 /plus/ such huge, massive scenes loaded with such fine detail. HS is looking like a hit just based on the combat system with tens of enemies on screen, if you guys can get hundres upon hundreds with the level of detail shown in the E3 2005 shot

 

[nAo]

There are no static/precomputed shadows, everything is dynamic, everything cast and receive shadows.

 

[mckmas8808]

There are no static/precomputed shadows, everything is dynamic, everything cast and receive shadows.

WOW!

Hey nAo have you seen the new snowy screenshot from your game? Are you allowed to talk about it, being that it's now on the internet and very well known?

 

[macabre]

There are no static/precomputed shadows, everything is dynamic, everything cast and receive shadows.

And theshadows look like they have great quality as well, good resolution and AA. Can you talk about that as well ?

 

[DeanoC]

Can i expect this question to be answered someday?

The problem with asking game related things, is that Sony marketting have a schedule about what is released when and to be honest I don't know exactly what i'm allowed to say, so its safest just to say nothing...

The E3 press (which I am familar with cos I had to talk to journalists) was essentially that the game is a story based non-arena combat game.

 

[DeanoC]

Any idea when some of the screenshots showing huge army scenes are released? Just a little hint, we all wanna see more of HS.

Yep I definately have an idea

 

[mckmas8808]

The problem with asking game related things, is that Sony marketting have a schedule about what is released when and to be honest I don't know exactly what i'm allowed to say, so its safest just to say nothing...

The E3 press (which I am familar with cos I had to talk to journalists) was essentially that the game is a story based non-arena combat game.

Can you talk about the graphical technologies behind this night snow screenshot? This one right here?

It's so beautiful but, I found that it's the only screenshot that you or nAo haven't talked about yet. Why? You guys don't like it?

 

[DeanoC]

This was in no way ment as an insult . Directly comparing the two, the first thing that strikes me is the difference in scale between what was shown at E3 06 & 05 (thousands of charactors on screen in wide open fields versus tens of characters in your basic brawler setting). Then the drop in resolution. To me, there's roughly the same amount of aliasing on object/character edges in the 720p shots linked earlier and the IGN shot. Especially on such a shader heavy title, if you indeed have it running at full hd without AA at comparable framerates I'd much prefer having that, as for folks with 720p displays there is still some nice SSAA.

It wasn't taken as one, I've seen it run at 1080p (on a decent 1080p display) and 720p with 4xAA. To my eye 720p is better... The difference between those screenshots and actually running at 1080p is that those shots have post-processing (motion blur) that I'm suspecting is making the 1080p look better than it does in practice... but clearly we want to make it look as good as possible, so knowing what people think looks better is helpful as we fine-tune towards release.
As marketting kicks into gear leading up to release you will get to see more than just E306 running on the PS3 and hopefully it won't disappoint.

 

[Titanio]

Yep I definately have an idea

Because they've already been taken..? (I can wish..).

What a tease!

 

[DeanoC]

Can you talk about the graphical technologies behind this night snow screenshot? This one right here?
<snip>
It's so beautiful but, I found that it's the only screenshot that you or nAo haven't talked about yet. Why? You guys don't like it?

Its lovely but its just a normal shot to us... (and to be honest hadn't noticed it had been released). Thats just the same tech with different textures and different geometry... Thats what 'pops' out with some decent artists playing with the system.
Thats exactly the same lighting, materials and shadows as E3-06 demo...
Anything particular you want to know? trying to describe the entire rendering engine might take a little while...

 

[mckmas8808]

Its lovely but its just a normal shot to us... (and to be honest hadn't noticed it had been released). Thats just the same tech with different textures and different geometry... Thats what 'pops' out with some decent artists playing with the system.
Thats exactly the same lighting, materials and shadows as E3-06 demo...
Anything particular you want to know? trying to describe the entire rendering engine might take a little while...

Well basically you've already answer most of my questions. Will (if you are allowed to say) the snow deform when Nariko walks on it? I ask because it would just seem to fit being that at E3 you guys showed that everything in the arena could be touched and destroyed.

It would only seem fitting to see the snow deform with footprints when Nariko walked on the snow. Would you be the guy working on that? Would something like that (the snow while fighting) be physics base?

 

[DeanoC]

Well basically you've already answer most of my questions. Will (if you are allowed to say) the snow deform when Nariko walks on it? I ask because it would just seem to fit being that at E3 you guys showed that everything in the arena could be touched and destroyed.

It would only seem fitting to see the snow deform with footprints when Nariko walked on the snow. Would you be the guy working on that? Would something like that (the snow while fighting) be physics base?

Tho we always wanted to do proper deformation for the snow... the likely option will be simplier effects simply because of schedules, most of our time is now on the fun job of getting it all into a shippable state...

 

[mckmas8808]

Tho we always wanted to do proper deformation for the snow... the likely option will be simplier effects simply because of schedules, most of our time is now on the fun job of getting it all into a shippable state...

Will there be any changes in the snow when we walk on it at all? I mean not even properly physics based, but just some circles in the snow to see where you came from?

 

[DeanoC]

Will there be any changes in the snow when we walk on it at all? I mean not even properly physics based, but just some circles in the snow to see where you came from?

I suspect so, but honestly I don't know, we have a finite amount of time to do each level special fx... Now its likely that snow trails are important enough to get some time but its always possible they won't.
Its as simple as that really, lots of 'fine touches' to do, and a finite time to ship... How they are prioritised is part of the fun of shipping...