Is the water that bad?

[toshimoog]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rUgw3cfEGfE

2. What don't people like about the water? It looks fine to me.. it moves.. has waves.. is semi-transparent and is reflective.... that's water, right?

The water itself looks REALLY nice, but there's one small disappointing thing:
The reflections are completely false. Square Enix seems to have faked the reflections and they don't reflect what's actually above the water. It is a false texture to make it "look like" you are seeing reflections; it is an illusion!

It's not so BAD, but I would have thought that making real reflections would be reasonable.

[Cairdeas]

The water itself looks REALLY nice, but there's one small disappointing thing:
The reflections are completely false. Square Enix seems to have faked the reflections and they don't reflect what's actually above the water. It is a false texture to make it "look like" you are seeing reflections; it is an illusion!

It's not so BAD, but I would have thought that making real reflections would be reasonable.

Its better then the "Duplicate the Topside on the bottomside to simulate mirrors."

I've seen so many games recently where if you turn off clipping and go behind what appears to be a Mirror Surface like a marble floor or waxed floor, if you go under the floor its actually just a semitransparent texture with the room duplicated and mirrored on the otherside to simulate a mirror effect on the floor.

[toshimoog]

Its better then the "Duplicate the Topside on the bottomside to simulate mirrors."

I've seen so many games recently where if you turn off clipping and go behind what appears to be a Mirror Surface like a marble floor or waxed floor, if you go under the floor its actually just a semitransparent texture with the room duplicated and mirrored on the otherside to simulate a mirror effect on the floor.

haha dang, really? I didn't know that, that's pretty funny.
Now watch, Square Enix will probably catch on and replace the "fake reflections" with exactly that xD

actually, that seems like a really smart & easy way to make reflections, because isn't that basically all you need to show? Assuming you don't turn off the clipping, it sounds like the best way to do it (unless you're standing on a slanted surface I guess, then you'll probably have to fix some stuff).

[Sasse]

Is the water that bad?

Nah.

/thread

[Kallera]

Better drink at the bar just in case, that's what its there for!

[Jinko]

Water is fine in the black shroud, it sucks pretty bad in Limsa and Ul'dah area's tho.

[Feldt]

What the hell you want from the water O.o? It's perfectly fine >,<

But seriously if you want to drink go to bar or somewhere... drinking this might kill you D:

[Eekiki]

Even in Black Shroud and places where the water looks reflective, it is not really reflective. It is texture-mapped to appear reflective.

Makes for good screenshots, but once you look at it closely it loses its impressiveness.

That said, this is just about the least of this game's problems at the moment. ^_^

[DAOWAce]

That said, this is just about the least of this game's problems at the moment. ^_^

It's by no means the worst, but neither is it the least.

Limsa is the worst looking city in the entire game, which is obvious because they designed it first. I assume they went to Ul'dah next and designed the ferry during the process, which has the worst looking water in the game that I've seen so far. The boat isn't even moving through the water FFS, it's just an animated texture/model being moved through another big water texture, you can see the two water textures overlap eachother.

It's been 6 years, but I swear FFXI had more impressive graphics for its time, and more realistic water. Could be wrong though.

Trackback: http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...phics-in-FFXIV

[Eekiki]

The water in Black Shroud looks nice, but it does not accurately reflect the world around it. It's almost as if there is a generic picture the water is programmed to display as its "reflection".

The sea around Limsa gets the job done, but it's zero improvement over FFXI's water. This is supposed to be a "next-gen" game, yet the water is still PS2 quality?

The ferry in general is abysmal, and not only because of the water. But Yoshida has acknowledged that, and it'll be fixed eventually.