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FAST Racing Neo out this week (still a December release)

V

Vena

Member
I sat down to read this thread.

At one point I opened up Hecht (Optics) off my shelf to check some stuff.

book.png
Click to expand...

This has been me for the better part of the day while also doing some measurements in the background.
 
blu

blu

Wants the largest console games publisher to avoid Nintendo's platforms.
Sub Boss said:
I thought the technique they were using (randomnly generated geometry or something) was well known for using little memory? it would make sense, and yes this is Shin En ;P
Click to expand...
Not randomly but still procedurally. There's a difference.
 
J

jariw

Member
missile said:
The coloring of the game is a bit off.
Click to expand...

IIRC, Manfred discussed their choice of colors during the E3 Treehouse Live stream. Something like, the whole team was fans of old arcade games, and wanted lots of bright arcade-like colors in the game.
 
M

missile

Member
jariw said:
IIRC, Manfred discussed their choice of colors during the E3 Treehouse Live stream. Something like, the whole team was fans of old arcade games, and wanted lots of bright arcade-like colors in the game.
Click to expand...
I'm all-in for arcade-like colors and appreciate it more than natural colors in
these kind of games. However, the choice of arcade-like colors (the color
tones and their saturation levels) with respect to each other and with respect
to the environment doesn't match together for me. Additionally, the crafts
don't stood out, colors are way too desaturated, and their designs/shapes are
way too similar. From behind they all look the same (almost). Many of the
effects are overdone or too pronounced like the sonic shield, the flashing
gems while hitting, or the very long booster strips. The screen is clutter
with too much unnecessary (non useful) stuff, if you ask me.
 
B

brainchild

Banned
missile said:
I'm all-in for arcade-like colors and appreciate it more than natural colors in
these kind of games. However, the choice of arcade-like colors (the color
tones and their saturation levels) with respect to each other and with respect
to the environment doesn't match together for me. Additionally, the crafts
don't stood out, colors are way too desaturated, and their designs/shapes are
way too similar. From behind they all look the same (almost). Many of the
effects are overdone or too pronounced like the sonic shield, the flashing
gems while hitting, or the very long booster strips. The screen is clutter
with too much unnecessary (non useful) stuff, if you ask me.
Click to expand...


Different strokes, I guess. I think they've done a fantastic job with their use of color and effects. I also think their craft designs are well thought out with lots of little details that car aficionados can appreciate.


I mean, just look at this beauty

CUQTa-aXIAAbnBW.jpg:orig


Perfection.
 
M

missile

Member
brainchild said:
Different strokes, I guess. I think they've done a fantastic job with their use of color and effects. I also think their craft designs are well thought out with lots of little details that car aficionados can appreciate.


I mean, just look at this beauty

CUQTa-aXIAAbnBW.jpg:orig


Perfection.
Click to expand...
If you single things out, they look way good. No question about it. Well, I
don't want to diminish their work/achievement, I rather want to point out that
the representation of the game could be more sound.

If the game is also meant to play online (perhaps competitive) many of the
"smearing" effects become rather distracting.

Let's consider the boost strips again. They are very long and almost uniform
in color. This produces an almost 0Hz region on the screen (and in your eyes)
for a rather long time while approaching the strip and crossing it. This is a
design failure in my book considering you want people to perceive a really
FAST game. Additionally, such regions make your eyes "blind" for a brief
moment (different story). Well, I think they wanted to try something new rather
than copying the standard boost pads seen in many similar games, which is a
complete valid approach. I just want to mention that the strips etc. need more
work. They need structure to pump up the frequency and they need sort of a
velocity-depend filter to filter out time-aliasing (aliased high frequencies
resulting in beat frequencies).

Perhaps this is all nitpicking on an average-gamer scale. xD
 
El Sabroso

El Sabroso

Member
blu said:
Let me also add:
FAST Racing Neo |OT| Sunbathing under F-Zero suns
FAST Racing Neo |OT| F that, Ziro shadow of doubt
FAST Racing Neo |OT| Cleaner than VW
Click to expand...

Just made an adjustment to reference one more thing, needs to be that OT
 
B

brainchild

Banned
missile said:
If you single things out, they look way good. No question about it. Well, I
don't want to diminish their work/achievement, I rather want to point out that
the representation of the game could be more sound.

If the game is also meant to play online (perhaps competitive) many of the
"smearing" effects become rather distracting.

Let's consider the boost strips again. They are very long and almost uniform
in color. This produces an almost 0Hz region on the screen (and in your eyes)
for a rather long time while approaching the strip and crossing it. This is a
design failure in my book considering you want people to perceive a really
FAST game. Additionally, such regions make your eyes "blind" for a brief
moment (different story). Well, I think they wanted to try something new rather
than copying the standard boost pads seen in many similar games, which is a
complete valid approach. I just want to mention that the strips etc. need more
work. They need structure to pump up the frequency and they need sort of a
velocity-depend filter to filter out time-aliasing (aliased high frequencies
resulting in beat frequencies).

Perhaps this is all nitpicking on an average-gamer scale. xD
Click to expand...


You're talking about the motion blur that correlates with boosting along the strips? I mean, you have a valid point about losing visual information during that time (as with all motion blur), so I'm not going to argue with you on that point. However, near as I can tell, the crafts do not coalesce with the boost strips (or the environment for that matter) during these moments. You can still make out the crafts from the boost strips, so I don't see the problem.

More importantly, the visual design here is based on the concept of optical flow, due to traveling so quickly. If you've ever seen movies or documentaries that try to represent time dilation at blistering speeds, you'll notice that they do the same thing. The effect definitely conveys the feeling of speed for most people, so again, I don't see a problem there.

Furthermore, the motion blur is directly tied to velocity, as optical follow (at least Shin'en's implementation of it) is calculated by motion vectors.

Anyway, I'd say the long boost strips indicate good design. The uniform colors help them to stand out amidst the environment when motion blur is activated, and the strips are long so that the player is given enough time to boost through the environment and catch up to other players without relying on saving up boost energy. It's just an accessible and balanced way to play the game without make things too complicated, while still keeping the mechanics engaging.

We'll just have to agree to disagree here. To my mind, this is looking to be their most polished game yet in terms of the intuitiveness and simplicity of their game design. All of the visual elements have a great balance between accessibility and challenge.

Let's not forget that in real life, futuristic high speed racing would look a lot like this

Subz-506e68d419438_hires.jpg
 
B

brainchild

Banned
missile said:
Nope.
Click to expand...

Then I take back what I said, you don't have a single valid argument in that post, aside from the fact that you just don't like the colors.

At least with the motion blur, you could objectively argue that visual information is lost. Without that, your argument is nonsense, as the rest of the image in a given scene retains visual clarity and poses no challenges to gameplay.

Your concern trolling is noted.


EDIT: And just so we're clear (so you don't think I'm just outright dismissing your concerns), the temporal aliasing you describe is very minimal in this game (and is something present to some degree in any content using signal processing). While the pixels that display the boost strips are generally in the same range of color, they aren't exactly the same color, and the sampling rate is nowhere near as low as 0hz, and would still satisfy the Nyquist sampling criterion, as the sampling rate of the boost strips is sufficient to deliver a discrete sequence of samples.

So as I said before, this is a non-issue as far as gameplay is concerned, and is certainly nothing to criticize Shin'en for. Now, with motion blur, that is something that is actually affecting the gameplay, but the degree of temporal aliasing that you describe is only theoretical, and does not apply to this game.
 
Davey Cakes

Davey Cakes

Member
I don't get why there can't just be a release date already. The game is set to release in December, which is one day away.

Just announce it for the third Thursday in December (the 17th) and be done with it. Sheesh.
 
blu

blu

Wants the largest console games publisher to avoid Nintendo's platforms.
Rash said:
I don't get why there can't just be a release date already. The game is set to release in December, which is one day away.

Just announce it for the third Thursday in December (the 17th) and be done with it. Sheesh.
Click to expand...
I don't think that Shin'en's call, or at least not for the larger part.
 
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