The overworld map is a HUGE immersion breaker

Seriously, these loading times are ridiculous. Surely I'm not the only one who thinks this.

Are there ANY plans at all to at least tie some hexes together so we don't have so many loading screens?

I'm thoroughly enjoying everything else, and I understand that this is a work in progress. But come on....

 

I agree the loading times are really bad right now. I do not mind the game being broken up into instances, but I am hoping they make huge improvements to the loading times by games release. Waiting a few moments for a new scene to load is one thing waiting a half minute or more is not good though.

 

But loading times <> overworld map. Anyway we all hope that the loading times will be much shorter in a future.

 

Pre-Alpha, give it time folks! sheesh!

 

Oh I know I don't expect the loading times to be good now. I just want them to be much better for release.

 

Yeah, load times are bad now but fully expect them to improve. Just hang in there!

For comparison, on my system:
- Windows, b124, max quality settings, currently @ Owl's Head
- 32-bit = 46 seconds + 3 second in-game "hang" before I can move
- 64-bit = 41 seconds + 3 second in-game "hang"

I'd also expect scenes to load in under 10 seconds when the game has been fully optimized.

 

Yes. It need lots of help. I assume it will get there.

Part of the problem today is that the hexes themselves aren't very interesting. So you fine yourself jumping in and out. This should improve. They also really, really need maps. As right now, you can't really explore the hex because you accidentally zone out or get suck / lost and just want to leave.

I also find still the game unplayable at night. This was OK in Ultima where you'd just hit camp and make it day time. But that doesn't work here. I realize this doesn't bother people playing at midnight in a pitch black computer room, but for others the dark contrast just doesn't work with glare from the screen. It's way too much.

Like anyone else, I'd love to see hexes seamlessly roll from one to the next and have you get to the overland map anytime you're out of combat, rather than having hitting the edge of a hex be the trigger for the overland map.

 

I don't mind it now gives me time to go to the bathroom and maybe get a drink.
Now once the game starts to really get going then I hope the times are shorten.
All good things come in time!

 

Someone please refresh my memory.... were there or weren't there trees on the previous release's Overland Map? I could have sworn there were and they looked considerably different and varied than what's showing up there now.....

 

In Release 7 ?

Here is a screenshot from that version : http://i1252.photobucket.com/albums/hh564/billyze/Screenshot5_zps783495c2.png

 

Ok so there were trees, thanks NRaas I don't think I took any shots of the map last release. So there were trees and that looked considerably different... So why did they replace them with one type of tree where the foliage is flat on top and has one texture used on every tree???

 

Just speculation :

But Chris did note performance issues during Release 7 that related to the trees on the overworld. It is possible they temporarily replaced those objects with something more generic to improve performance this release.

I expect the team will be iterating back over that system once time permits.

 

@ OP

The overworld map was a compromise based on budgetary constraints and limitations of the engine. Portalarium doesn't have the tens of millions it would take to build an open world on the scale of Skyrim/Morrowind/GTA/ArmA with any kind of graphical fidelity (heck, some people still complain about the graphics even with the current scope of SotA). Instead Richard Garriott came up with a clever solution calling back to the earlier Ultimas. The ultimate goal is to give it a sort of feel like Ultimas III-V (and, ignoring combat, I and II) which had dual-scale maps, one for world travel and another for combat and exploring locations. Since we are missing things like being pulled into encounters from foes visible on the world map, a lot of that feel isn't there yet.

I agree that the loading times can be fairly long. Fortunately there is the fact that loading time is affected by the amount of content in the hex you are travelling to -- for example, loading Owl's Head is a fairly lengthy process, while entering a road hex is quite fast. It helps to plan your trips, so that you do as much as possible before changing hexes. I can see it becoming a bit more of the problem in the future, however, when encumbrance/inventory limitation make multiple trips between harvesting locations and home necessary.

The map inside a hex isn't literally the size of the hex, but rather more like a point of interest at that geographic location, so tying outdoor hexes together for world travel doesn't make a lot of sense. However, locations can be (and already have been) tied together for other reasons like the exterior path leading to Owl's Nest and the actual cave, or towns and basements (I imagine there will be more interesting possibilities for tying locations together once they start work on the underworld).

 

Actually I had hoped for more plant life and more diverse plant life for the overland map. I hope that this will be the case with later versions of the map.
If it is a performance issue I have some fears for the immersion factor of the overland map, too as it needs to be much more alive - with more plants, some cloulds drifting by, animals and monsters roaming around, maybe some sealife like whales ships, traveling around, weather effects etc.
But if they have to cut back on trees now due to performance issues I fear that we won't be getting much more diversity on the overland map...

 

I expect we will see a lot more diversity and content both on the world map and in hexes in the future, as it is more about not having the art assets needed to populate the two scales of maps. (Again this goes back to budget. The Unity asset store and crowdsourcing probably helps, but even when they do find what they need assets still need to be adjusted by the Portalarium team to fit SotA's needs.) The world map is still a very early work in progress and has seen little work on optimization. They need to get art assets designed to look good and perform well at the scale and quantity they are displaying, otherwise performance and/or visuals will suffer.

The only serious performance issue that hit so far was inside hexes when players decided to build mazes out of thousands of objects all being lit by dozens of lights sources and casting shadows. They have talked about decoration limits and have already implemented changes on lighting to address this issue.

As far as actual engine limitations go, I suspect (and in this case this is just my opinion, mind you, not confirmed by the devs) that it is more a matter of memory use than performance that will ultimately constrain SotA in the distant future if they remain committed to offering 32-bit builds. (Perhaps they will be able to work around the problem by constraining the visuals on 32-bit clients, but we shall see...)

 

Why not have a slider in game with which you can adjust the foliage in the game? So when you have a very powerful PC you can push it all the way up and have a very detailed world map as well as zones with very dense foliage and if you do not have a very good PC you pull the slider down to have less plants...
The same with shadows: Let us push everything to the limit if we want to.

 

I agree. Those are all good suggestions. (Though, a foliage density slider might be an exploit for some PvP locations if players turn it all the way down.) Another thing I have noticed is that with their current lighting optimization pass there is a lot of pop-in where unlit lots suddenly become lit as you approach. A slider to control the distance at which lights become active would be very welcome for those of us who are hardware enthusiasts.