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[Crossing Eden]

Uh what? They made it look like the model.

They made it look like a photoshopped to hell and back image of the model who's also wearing makeup. Scans like the ones used in this are done with the actress wearing very little in the way of makeup if any.

Designing an attractive person is "sexist"?
What?

Photoshopping women characters who look like actual people to incorporate traditionally attractive features like a smaller nose, no blemishes or wrinkles, smaller chins, and basically every other symptom for standards of beauty is incredibly sexist yes. I don't think people understand, they LITERALLY scanned her in. This is what that looks like:

the person Ryder is based on while attractive does not perpetually look photoshopped and perfect.

 

[Tranqueris]

Of course will you always end up being the one doing all the work in a videogame, but biowares insistence on having all the npcs admiring you is really grating.

It also seems like this admiration is damn near instantaneous according to the preview. I mean, Shepard was the first human specter but even he didn't have people all over him like that. It was more of a "hey, you got this special title and we're giving you a ship" or "hey you've got this special title, can you help me out?"

Also some of this dialogue is giving me a lot of Fallout 4 vibes.

 

[prag16]

I watched an hour of gameplay this morning. There was a scene that basically soured the experience for me, though I kept watching.

Writing is important. I don't just mean text on items, or script itself. I mean writing as a rationalization of characters, systems and mechanics. Every game needs to do this in some way, to frame the unrealistic gameplay elements correctly against a stylized "realistic" universe.

Most importantly, it needs to take a holistic approach to this end. Everything should make sense, especially the things the characters say in the first half hour, when suspension of disbelief is tenuous.

So, when my character - my avatar for the rest of the game - hears the word "adenosine" and says "ADENO-WHA???" I learn two things about them. Either:

They're stupid. This is an astronaut from the year 2185 who is cyber-enhanced out the eyeballs, and is selected among billions of humans to go to a brand new galaxy who doesn't know basic biology.

Or:

They're unfunny. This "joke," where you're perfectly able to say the more complex part of a word, then stumble on the easy part - they did it in Bully too, "SOCIO-WHAT???" AH HURR HURR HURR - is so rote as to be actively destructive to the narrative you're trying to build about this character. Why do they say it? Clearly they can say the word. Is that their sense of humour? It sounds like it's from 1945, ffs.

Why should this be what I have to learn about my character in the first half hour? Is being competent that unrelatable? If you're a game writer and you do this, STOP. Question EVERYthing that you put in a game. Don't make these "jokes."

This "soured the experience for you"? I've taken a college Biology course and I don't know (or don't remember) what adenosine is. I guess that makes me a moron or something? -_-

Nevertheless, this is some next level shit in terms of nitpicking.

 

[ElephantShell]

Hmmmm it's a shame he doesn't seem to like it very much. But to be honest there's not much I could hear that would make me not want to at least try this game given how much I loved ME 2 and 3.

 

[Familienoberhauptvogel]

Of course will you always end up being the one doing all the work in a videogame, but biowares insistence on having all the npcs admiring you is really grating.

I think that's the point, nobody calls you "Wasteland Savior" or anything the whole time.

I feel like Dragon Age is much more guilty of that than Mass Effect. In Mass Effect Shepard, I'm going with male sheard for the sake of this conversation, is given Spectre status as a token not because he's respected by everyone. In ME2 he's still disregarded despite literally saving everyone and only in ME3 they really take him serious, he's still seen as a henchman to Aria nonetheless, well he is her henchman. Not to mention he's still fucking commander despite all his accomplishments as part of the alliance navy.

What little I've seen of Andromeda streams Scott or Sara aren't immediately respected for their title. Instead they have an enormous responsibility pushed on them with little guidance and having to prove themselves.

 

[KORNdoggy]

They made it look like a photoshopped to hell and back image of the model who's also wearing makeup. Scans like the ones used in this are done with the actress wearing very little in the way of makeup if any.

So her entire skull shape and facial proportions changed because she wasn't wearing makeup? Fuck me that's some powerful fucking makeup.

 

[jelly]

What does this model look like without make up.

The face does look a bit bloated but a face map is probably more accurate than your eyes but the texturing, animation that maybe botches it.

Perhaps to accommodate animation, that's were the face went wrong.

 

[brawly]

One thing I will say is Bioware definitely need to rework their character animations for their next game.

I'm sure they will, right after Telltale and Bethesda get a new engine.

 

[Fahzgoolin]

Come on one person doesn't like it and now we have to panic?

No one is panicking. We have all collectively noticed this stuff and it only seems to get worse from the footage all over YouTube today. This article is worth discussing because it brings up bad writing and terrible UI. All of those things can be witnessed in some capacity from the footage.

 

[DouglasteR]

Preorder cancelled.

 

[KORNdoggy]

What does this model look like without make up.

The face does look a bit bloated but a face map is probably more accurate than your eyes but the texturing, animation that maybe botches it.

Perhaps to accommodate animation, that's were the face went wrong.

Maybe when they scanned her face they forgot to remove the comedy fish eye lens? It's frankly the only explanation i have.

 

[AESplusF]

The writing and tone shifts from mere sentence to sentence conversations is just...really awkward and borderline terrible imo. Listen to the video linked if you want to hear it in context. It doesn't help, it just makes it worse imo.

Lines like this:

source: https://youtu.be/Vss92x8YaF0?t=1h37m56s

I mean...it's a valid thing to say...I guess? I'm sorry, my face is tired from dealing with everything? Huh? You could say this is nit picking, but for a game series that prides itself on character interaction, I'm consistently finding the animations, transitions, tone, and writing to be really off putting and bizzare.

I wouldn't call that nitpicking, I mean that looks really bad, worse than I was expecting, completely immersion breaking, if you're not going to feel invested in the characters and the world what's the point.

 

[Captain_Fujisawa]

All put next to each other the photoshop version looks arguably closer to the model

I think it's simply a limitation of the engine that we ended up with the more uncanny looking one one

You would assume they scanned the model to create the in game model, so it should be accurate. To make the comparison fair, the same focal length of lens should be used. Otherwise facial features are distorted to a greater or lesser extent.

The in game shot is wide angle and pulled right in. The shot of the model cropped in close and is this one

https://twitter.com/JaydeeRossii/status/475821551083061248/photo/1

I dunno, let's say it's an 80mm portrait lens, this will flatten the features. Find a profile shot of her and to me the in game model looks accurate. Ryder just isn't photoshopped with perfect makeup.

Here's a film trailer with her in

http://zoryafilms.com/2015/09/15/the-making-of-the-accident-with-jayde-rossi-part-2/

 

[Crossing Eden]

So her entire skull shape and facial oroportions changed because she wasn't wearing makeup? Fuck me that's some powerful fucking makeup.

Have you never done or seen anything involving a photoshoot? This is post editing the face.

What does this model look like without make up.

The face does look a bit bloated but a face map is probably more accurate than your eyes but the texturing, animation that maybe botches it.

Perhaps to accommodate animation, that's were the face went wrong.

Seemingly there are no pictures of the model without makeup, as in, literally with none all at all instead of that "no makeup" make up look.

 

[FrankWza]

So her entire skull shape and facial proportions changed because she wasn't wearing makeup? Fuck me that's some powerful fucking makeup.

Obviously shes a kardashian

 

[Exploratory]

Yeah...but his latest "I played 3 hours of Andromeda and..." thread felt a bit...gross. There's also the fact that I don't think he discloses how he got his hands on a copy. I'm not saying, "RAWR! Bioware is manipulating us!"

I'm just saying there's not a whole lot of transparency other than..."Oh that Shinobi! He's such a super-fan, that guy!"

That cat starts a good many threads about Andromeda.

This is BS. If Shinobi weren't so damn fast I'd make some of those threads too.

 

[Kinyou]

They made it look like a photoshopped to hell and back image of the model who's also wearing makeup. Scans like the ones used in this are done with the actress wearing very little in the way of makeup if any.


Photoshopping women characters who look like actual people to incorporate traditionally attractive features like a smaller nose, no blemishes or wrinkles, smaller chins, and basically every other symptom for standards of beauty is incredibly sexist yes. I don't think people understand, they LITERALLY scanned her in. This is what that looks like:

the person Ryder is based on while attractive does not perpetually look photoshopped and perfect.

You believe that the engine is capable of transferring that 1:1? We've seen plenty of scanned people in games and they don't look as uncanny as what's in mass effect. The character looks significantly worse than the real model, that is simply undeniable.

 

[Kumquat]

Just stopping by to say that this PS is absolute shit and sexist as shit, they took the in-game model and made it look the same as every woman ever, it's the exact same shittastic "I don't actually know what women look like" photoshopping as this so they might as well add boob armor with nipples while they're at it:

, while you're at it, try watching this video.

Except that the person they modeled Ryder after, a real live female who lives on this planet, looks much closer to the one on the right and doesn't have creepy chan eyes.

 

[Ralemont]

Guys can I repeat again that BW tweaked the Sara face after the models face was scanned. Its not a perfectly accurate scan of the model and more importantly wasnt supposed to be.

 

[Familienoberhauptvogel]

This "soured the experience for you"? I've taken a college Biology course and I don't know (or don't remember) what adenosine is. I googled it and it's some kind of drug. Is that actually "basic biology"?

Nevertheless, this is some next level shit in terms of nitpicking.

Adenosine is fairly important to human metabolism in the form of ATP and ADP (Adenosine Triphosphate / Diphosphate). It's not just some kind of drug

 

[Crossing Eden]

You believe that the engine is capable of transferring that 1:1? We've seen plenty of scanned people in games and they don't look as uncanny as what's in mass effect. The character looks significantly worse than the real model, that is simply undeniable.

Frostbite is absolutely capable of translating that 1:1, i'm guessing that it did, however, Bioware had to completely rework the animation tools to suit their needs so i'm assuming that's exactly where the true cause of the issue lies, not in the models themselves but how the animation was made. There's also stuff like lighting, the camera angle/lense type, etc., find me a picture of this model without makeup, and then we can talk about how accurate they were, but until then, absolutely stop comparing PSed to hell and back photoshoots to a digital scan which is the literal opposite.

Except that the person they modeled Ryder after, a real live female who lives on this planet, looks much closer to the one on the right and doesn't have creepy chan eyes.

Yes the photoshopped model looks very similar to the photoshopped in-game model meant to resemble a photoshopped photo. I just know gaming culture just can't be this out of touch with how beauty standards, photo shoots, and photo-editing work. :|

 

[Altairre]

I'm sure they will, right after Telltale and Bethesda get a new engine.

Just let Guerilla Games do all the character designs. One thing that really impressed me in Horizon was how incredible the character models for even random ass NPCs look. The animation in that game is still a little bit weird at times, certainly not on the level of, say, Uncharted but considering that it's a big open world game it's nothing to sneeze at. Just look at this:

That's someone you meet through a side quest.

 

[KORNdoggy]

You would assume they scanned the model to create the in game model, so it should be accurate. To make the comparison fair, the same focal length of lens should be used. Otherwise facial features are distorted to a greater or lesser extent.

The in game shot is wide angle and pulled right in. The shot of the model cropped in close and is this one

https://twitter.com/JaydeeRossii/status/475821551083061248/photo/1

I dunno, let's say it's an 80mm portrait lens, this will flatten the features. Find a profile shot of her and to me the in game model looks accurate. Ryder just isn't photoshopped with perfect makeup.

Here's a film trailer with her in

http://zoryafilms.com/2015/09/15/the-making-of-the-accident-with-jayde-rossi-part-2/

Scan or not the incline of her jaw is just all wrong. My guess is they have a pretty baseline facial rig that both ryder and all female npc's have to fit into due to the nature of their character creator, and it's thrown off her face completely. She looks like a puppet.

 

[Fahzgoolin]

Just let Guerilla Games do all the character designs. One thing that really impressed me in Horizon was how incredible the character models for even random ass NPCs look. The animation in that game is still a little bit weird at times, certainly not on the level of, say, Uncharted but considering that it's a big open world game it's nothing to sneeze at. Just look at this:



That's someone you meet through a side quest.

Yup. Horizon is now my go to comparison. It does such a great freaking job in comparison to other open world games.

I wouldn't call that nitpicking, I mean that looks really bad, worse than I was expecting, completely immersion breaking, if you're not going to feel invested in the characters and the world what's the point.

Yup, it's too bad because those awkward lines and tone switches will take me straight out of the game and make me laugh. After playing through Horizon, this game seems woefully underwhelming. I like the look of the combat, but the story and writing is what I want from this game.

 

[Alpha Centauri]

Guys can I repeat again that BW tweaked the Sara face after the models face was scanned. Its not a perfectly accurate scan of the model and more importantly wasnt supposed to be.

I agree. It is perplexing that they made Male Ryder look EXACTLY like the male model that he is though..

Why didn't they tweak both of them?

 

[zebez]

Damn, a lot of worries in this thread. And I've already preordered 2 copies. Fuck.

 

[J_Viper]

the person Ryder is based on while attractive does not perpetually look photoshopped and perfect.

Have you seen her IG? Her pics that aren't shopped model shots are still ways off from whatever the hell Bioware we're going for with Sara.

And if you're throwing a hissy fit over attractive characters, why is it not a problem that the default Scott Ryder is a handsome dude?

Why are attractive females a problem? Do attractive females not exist in real life? Have I been lied to?

 

[DOWN]

Kind of disappointing that people are taking this one preview as fact and ignoring that most previews are very positive this week. Even sillier when you see that he's recently trashed The Witcher 3 and Inside, making him even further out of consensus than just with this game's previews.

 

[Kinyou]

Frostbite is absolutely capable of translating that 1:1, i'm guessing that it did, however, Bioware had to completely rework the animation tools to suit their needs so i'm assuming that's exactly where the true cause of the issue lies, not in the models themselves but how the animation was made. There's also stuff like lighting, the camera angle/lense type, etc., find me a picture of this model without makeup, and then we can talk about how accurate they were, but until then, absolutely stop comparing PSed to hell and back photoshoots to a digital scan which is the literal opposite.


Yes the photoshopped model looks very similar to the photoshopped in-game model meant to resemble a photoshopped photo.

Ok how about we compare it to a selfie that's very likely not photoshopped

I'd still say the fan photoshop is much closer to that than the ingame model

 

[Captain_Fujisawa]

Scan or not the incline of her jaw is just all wrong. My guess is they have a pretty baseline facial rig that both ryder and all female npc's have to fit into due to the nature of their character creator, and it's thrown off her face completely. She looks like a puppet.

Perhaps yes, maybe it would be amazing if the ability to create your own character was removed.

 

[Composer]

Yup. Horizon is now my go to comparison. It does such a great freaking job in comparison to other open world games.

Yeah, sometimes the face looks good. But the speaking/mouth animation is nowhere near good. Its like a robot mouth moving up and down, no matter what is being said.

People just have it out for Bioware. Around these parts, the bar for being impressed by Bioware's work is significantly higher than other companies. It seems like Bioware would have to release a 12/10 to get any recognition, but Guerrilla Games has barely functioning facial animations for even the main character, and its great!

 

[AESplusF]

The models in Horizon were good, but the facial animation was sometimes very uncanny, still leaps and bounds better than what's in that clip.

 

[Staf]

Just let Guerilla Games do all the character designs. One thing that really impressed me in Horizon was how incredible the character models for even random ass NPCs look. The animation in that game is still a little bit weird at times, certainly not on the level of, say, Uncharted but considering that it's a big open world game it's nothing to sneeze at. Just look at this:



That's someone you meet through a side quest.

Petra! She's cool.

 

[Sushi Nao]

This "soured the experience for you"? I've taken a college Biology course and I don't know (or don't remember) what adenosine is. I guess that makes me a moron or something? -_-

Nevertheless, this is some next level shit in terms of nitpicking.

Like I say, writing is important.

I react the same way when, in a show: "Dr. or scientist mentions common medical ailment/phenomenon"

Main character: "HUH SPEAK ENGLISH PLEASE DOC"

I won't buy or otherwise support media that has writing like this. The onus is on the game writer to improve their craft, not on me to be cool with my character acting dumb/being unfunny.

 

[Dabi]

Lol be easy... it's ONE preview smh

 

[Altairre]

Yeah, sometimes the face looks good. But the speaking/mouth animation is nowhere near good. Its like a robot mouth moving up and down, no matter what is being said.

You're going to look at this conversation and tell me it doesn't look nowhere near good? Like sure, it could always be better but I'd say it looks pretty alright at least.

 

[J_Viper]

I've scanned through some videos, and none of the writing seems THAT bad.

Even with some rough lines here and there, solid voice work can make up for it. If there's ONE thing I trust Bioware with, it's getting great performances from their actors.

I only wish they didn't have Scott's VA go for that bootleg Nathan Drake voice

You're going to look at this conversation and tell me it doesn't look nowhere near good? Like sure, it could always be better but I'd say it looks pretty alright at least.

I played this particular quest the other day and found it crazy how this side-quest giver, who's in the game for five minutes, looks way better than anyone in MEA

Relax guys, I hear there is a new better review aggregator out there that doesn't include Eurogamer so we're good.

Lol, Eurogamer's impressions were positive though, no?

 

[MrBS]

Relax guys, I hear there is a new better review aggregator out there that doesn't include Eurogamer so we're good.

edit: oops should have said RPS, well this will shame me forever

 

[Vire]

Just let Guerilla Games do all the character designs. One thing that really impressed me in Horizon was how incredible the character models for even random ass NPCs look. The animation in that game is still a little bit weird at times, certainly not on the level of, say, Uncharted but considering that it's a big open world game it's nothing to sneeze at. Just look at this:



That's someone you meet through a side quest.

Side quests characters in Horizon that you meet for ten minutes look better than the main character models in this game.

It's embarrassing.

 

[Captain_Fujisawa]

Ok how about we compare it to a selfie that's very likely not photoshopped

I'd still say the fan photoshop is much closer to that than the ingame model

I think that you would need an apples to apples comparison. I'm not saying the in game model is 100% accurate, as has been said Bioware changed it. However without being able to match settings, you can't compare the selfie to that in game shot.

I think this is a pretty good example of why

http://www.danvojtech.cz/blog/2016/07/amazing-how-focal-length-affect-shape-of-the-face/

 

[Composer]

You're going to look at this conversation and tell me it doesn't look nowhere near good? Like sure, it could always be better but I'd say it looks pretty alright at least.

You're hand picking one of dozen conversations that looks good from the game. But the rest looks just as "awful" as the ME:A animations.

PS: I own Horizon in case people are wondering.

 

[Fahzgoolin]

You're going to look at this conversation and tell me it doesn't look nowhere near good? Like sure, it could always be better but I'd say it looks pretty alright at least.

Yup. Not only do they look more human, they are expressive. Is the animation and lip syncing perfect? Heck no, but for an open world game it's downright astounding at times.

You're hand picking one of dozen conversations that looks good from the game. But the rest looks just as "awful" as the ME:A animations.

PS: I own Horizon in case people are wondering.

Maybe this is just subjective territory, but I couldn't disagree with you more.

 

[Crossing Eden]

Guys can I repeat again that BW tweaked the Sara face after the models face was scanned. Its not a perfectly accurate scan of the model and more importantly wasnt supposed to be.

Ofc they're gonna make tweaks for skinning purposes but i'm willing to bet that the in-game one is much more accurate than the abomination that is that gamer beauty standard photoshop nonsense.

Ok how about we compare it to a selfie that's very likely not photoshopped

I'd still say the fan photoshop is much closer to that than the ingame model

She's smiling and there's not a single wrinkle to be found. Her eyebrows and eyelashes are clearly done, there are no bags whatsoever, come on son. You gotta try harder. And as I said in the other thread, lighting, camera work, and the angle are big factors:

I can count at least five instances of this person looking completely different in this one gif based on a glance.

 

[Primethius]

You're hand picking one of dozen conversations that looks good from the game. But the rest looks just as "awful" as the ME:A animations.

PS: I own Horizon in case people are wondering.

No they remotely don't. Horizon has some of the best facial animation in an open world game. It walks all over the current ME:A footage. It still has issues sure, but it's no where close to being ME:A tier.

 

[Tcab96]

I'm not that hyped about ME:A, will probably buy it sometime in the future just to mess around.

But this line:



is fucking depressing once you consider the fact that someone was paid to write that.

That's a line you'd find in a self aware parody.
Or a placeholder that nobody got around to replacing with something not stupid.

I'm not sure I understand. Can someone explain what's wrong with that line?

 

[Joeku]

The writing and tone shifts from mere sentence to sentence conversations is just...really awkward and borderline terrible imo. Listen to the video linked if you want to hear it in context. It doesn't help, it just makes it worse imo.

Lines like this:

source: https://youtu.be/Vss92x8YaF0?t=1h37m56s

I mean...it's a valid thing to say...I guess? I'm sorry, my face is tired from dealing with everything? Huh? You could say this is nit picking, but for a game series that prides itself on character interaction, I'm consistently finding the animations, transitions, tone, and writing to be really off putting and bizzare.

Good lord, if they were going to go for the Nolan North A-voice they might as well have hired Nolan North.

 

[Composer]

No they remotely don't. Horizon has some of the best facial animation in an open world game. It walks all over the current ME:A footage. It still has issues sure, but it's no where close to being ME:A tier.

How many hours of ME: A have you played again?

 

[Altairre]

You're hand picking one of dozen conversations that looks good from the game. But the rest looks just as "awful" as the ME:A animations.

PS: I own Horizon in case people are wondering.

That is simply not true. Most of the conversations that happen during the main quest are on this level. Here's another one from the hunting trial sidequest which I just randomly grabbed of off youtube. Does that really look "awful" to you.

 

[Matt]

I have heard (several times) that development was rough...

 

[Floody]

Yeah, sometimes the face looks good. But the speaking/mouth animation is nowhere near good. Its like a robot mouth moving up and down, no matter what is being said.

People just have it out for Bioware. Around these parts, the bar for being impressed by Bioware's work is significantly higher than other companies. It seems like Bioware would have to release a 12/10 to get any recognition, but Guerrilla Games has barely functioning facial animations for even the main character, and its great!

Pure hyperbole, the lip syncing can be bad at times in Horizon, like it is in every open world with unimportant NPCs, but it was more than fine with Aloy (yet to see anyone come even close in ME:A) and pretty much every other important character was fine too, unless they glitched out, which happened once to me.

Also I saw way more shit fling, over way less, for GG pre-release, then I have aimed at Bioware, most Horizon threads were derailed by someone saying GG have never made a good game, so why would Horizon be any different, then usually nipicking something to prove it, like the tree density isn't good enough. ME:A is usually over bad animations, which Bioware have always been crap at and they haven't showed anything to show they've improved much.