Oblivion pictures

[zingbat]

Bethsoft has announced their new game Oblivion in their site and there is also a news column in Gamespy.

This is interested for several reasons. Bethesda claims to have skipped a game cycle and will now develop in paralel to PS3 and XBox2 as well as the PC platform. Their own software is so generic they claim it can be easly adapted to all of these platforms with a minimum effort. I have some doubts however they can do this so easly for the PS3 architecture.

Another interesting fact is the way the AI is planed. Here's a bit of the gamespy article:

"In fact, one of the interesting problems that the team has had to face came about precisely because the AI is so good. According to Howard, the AI has caused guards to decide to eat and go hunting deer, only to get themselves arrested for attacking something. When they fight back against the arresting guard, the other guards see a fight and try to join in. In not too much time, every guard in the town was involved in the scuffle, which left the rest of the town open to thievery by other NPCs, resulting in empty stores. Much of the team's current effort is going into putting sensible governors on the AI's behavior to avoid situations like empty stores that would result in situations that wouldn't be fun for the player."

This way of dealing with AI will complicate things a lot for quest designers who will be forced to become more technical and avoid the scripting aproach in favor of dealing with complex AI entities. In short giving orders to AIs like stand there and wait for the Player wont work anymore, because AIs have their own agenda.

One last interesting info is the use a paralax mapping instead of displacement. This is claimed to be more friendly to consoles and hardware in general.

[blahblahblahh]

Yeah, this is like 7 years behind the curve. Ultima Online had the same kind of issues at launch (and before), so you could either say that the Bethesda people have a lazy marketing group, or that they're a bit thick and don't read prior art (in this case, on what happens with emergent behavioural systems in retail computer games)

[zingbat]

Yes emergent behaviors is not the latest marvel of AI but still I don't see anything like this described in Oblivion hapening in RPGs that will come this year and the next. Both KoToR 2 and VtM Bloodlines are based for the most part in scripted quests.

I think they stick to the old methods because its easier for writers and artists to work with something they have experience with rather than using procedural generated stuff and advanced AI techniques that most writers and artists would be baffled with.

Still Oblivion has given a small step forward and is going to have procedural generated terrain and vegetation that can be later customized with hand-made content.

Games published by our own members! Check 'em out!

[gregorypierce]

Bethsoft has announced their new game Oblivion in their site and there is also a news column in Gamespy.

This is interested for several reasons. Bethesda claims to have skipped a game cycle and will now develop in paralel to PS3 and XBox2 as well as the PC platform. Their own software is so generic they claim it can be easly adapted to all of these platforms with a minimum effort. I have some doubts however they can do this so easly for the PS3 architecture.

I've talked to a few people interested in where you read this.

he Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion is being designed around the Xbox 2 (and the PS3, although the company could not officially confirm any platform besides the PC).

If this is the quote you're using - you (and gspy) may be reading a bit into things.

[zingbat]

I've talked to a few people interested in where you read this.

I use their official forums and read what the devs post in there ocasionaly. If you want to look for yourself go to the Elderscrolls Forum the  Oblivion section and serch for a thread called Dev Posts.

[gregorypierce]

The devs said they were developing for PS3 and Xbox2 and PC simultaneously?

[zingbat]

Yes, they claim that their software is easly portable for any other architecture or console and that they are developing in parallel for the XBox2 and PS3, with different teams of course. I don't think i misread this, if i find the right forum quote i will post it in here.

[gregorypierce]

Thanks. I would be interested in knowing 'who' said that.

[Mojomonkey]

According to the Gamespy article, Todd Howard said they were aiming at the next gen console market, because RPGs take so long that they would reach the tail end of the current gen, and therefore the decided to "go big and go early" for the next gen.

[gregorypierce]

According to the Gamespy article, Todd Howard said they were aiming at the next gen console market, because RPGs take so long that they would reach the tail end of the current gen, and therefore the decided to "go big and go early" for the next gen.

Oh yeah, I know what Todd said. I also know where they are with the various consoles which is why I found it 'interesting' that someone would have said that they were currently developing for all the consoles simultaneously. I think people are inferring a LOT from some of the comments that are being made, but that's the status quo I guess.

Games published by our own members! Check 'em out!

[Breakfast]

Morrowind and Daggerfall are probably my two favourite games ever, certainly the ones that have given me most hours of enjoyment, so I'm really looking forward to Oblivion.

AI is the future of games- there are limits on what you can achieve with pretty much every other element of a game environment- and I'm looking forward to seeing what they can achieve with it. It may not be the most cutting edge system they are working towards but to be honest it would be nice just to play a game where the AI is not totally rubbish.

[zingbat]

Morrowind and Daggerfall are probably my two favourite games ever, certainly the ones that have given me most hours of enjoyment, so I'm really looking forward to Oblivion.

So you are a Daggerfall fan too. I tried to rebuild Daggerfall with a team of other guys once. It was called Daggerfall Revisited. The project utterly failed because we were very naive and were trying to rebuild the game from scratch using Ogre or something like that.

The new project to rebuild Daggerfall is in this site:

http://www.dfworkshop.net

This time is a much more sensate idea. Rebuild Daggerfall exactly the way it was made using DarkBasicPro and using the original data files from a Daggerfall instalation. Interkarma the owner of the site and a couple of others have created a set of tools and dlls to read Daggerfall binary files.

AI is the future of games- there are limits on what you can achieve with pretty much every other element of a game environment- and I'm looking forward to seeing what they can achieve with it. It may not be the most cutting edge system they are working towards but to be honest it would be nice just to play a game where the AI is not totally rubbish.

Thats an interesting question. I don't like to simplify things too much because it tends to get us on the wrong track. People also said once that the future of gameplay is immersion and graphics and it was proven an illusion.

I think the future of games will allways be gameplay. The same gameplay that games like Elite had back in the specrum.

AI maybe had much to a game but if it isn't done with a focus on gameplay then people will not enjoy the game. It's not possible for AI to replace the game designer.

[Breakfast]

AI maybe had much to a game but if it isn't done with a focus on gameplay then people will not enjoy the game. It's not possible for AI to replace the game designer.

On the contrary, one day it will be possible for AI to replace every single one of us.

At that point, we will finally have achieved some degree of Culture.

[Hauk]

I can't wait for this game. The graphics look stunning and the prospect of being able to ride around on a horse in full 3D is something I'm willing to wait for.



Hauk

[blahblahblahh]

being able to ride around on a horse in full 3D is something I'm willing to wait for.

Better than riding around on a dragon?

http://www.planetdrakan.com/

Whenever Rynn takes to the skies, you control Arokh, swooping, swooping, gliding, and attacking with a variety of breath weapons -- fire, ice, magma, poison, lighting, etc.

[nonnus29]

I can't wait for this game. The graphics look stunning and the prospect of being able to ride around on a horse in full 3D is something I'm willing to wait for.



Hauk

Yeah, but you can do that in 'Zelda: Ocarine of Time' for the n-64..........

[Breakfast]

I can't wait for this game. The graphics look stunning and the prospect of being able to ride around on a horse in full 3D is something I'm willing to wait for.  

I'm going to be doing that tomorrow

[Hauk]

Better than riding around on a dragon?

When did this game pop up it's pretty little head up? I've never heard of it. The screens look brilliant. Whats it like flying the dragon?

Yeah, but you can do that in 'Zelda: Ocarine of Time' for the n-64..........

Yeah, but compare the Zelda riding system with the one that's going to come out, and with Bethesdas team of expert devs I'm going to put my money on Bethesda.

Cheers,

Hauk