1)Textures don’t obstruct view.
I’m not sure what context you’re using textures in, but in the sense that I’m familiar with textures as having dabbled in game development, point 1 isn’t exactly true.
Some effects in a game look three dimensional but they’re actually flat polygons presented face-on to the player – it’s a bit of trickery to improve performance by reducing the number of polygons. The textures on these polygons use blending and translucency to turn a boring square into an exciting fireball or explosion. Sometimes in boss fights, something glitches for me and the texture disappears, allowing me to see the actual polygon in a solid color or what appears to be some kind of default checkered pattern. This obstructs my view more than the translucent texture and demonstrates that textures may well affect the view of a polygon.
2)Visual clutter isn’t rig dependent
Again, I’m not sure what you mean by this. Everyone has a rig, everyone has the graphics options on their rig set differently. The visual clutter is determined by the graphical options. It stands to reason that visual clutter is then rig dependent.
An example: if I turn all my graphics effects to full, I see fog and mist and bloom and all kinds of pretty things that obscure my view. If I turn all graphic options to their lowest, these disappear and I can see very clearly.
I’ll explain it simply.
1)It is a balance issue. Not every class is equally flashy.
I don’t know if this is true. So much depends on what you mean by flashy, and by what skills are used and in what context.
2)This is an MMO. One player’s ability to see affects everyone around them.
That’s… a flawed statement in several ways. Certainly, a player’s ability to see affects their own ability to play, but it doesn’t follow that it affects everyone, or even anyone, around them. It also doesn’t follow that it affects them negatively, or that it is the sole, or even the largest, contributor to affect the player or those around them. In trying to keep it simple, you’ve introduced too many arguments into one sentence. If you want examples that demonstrate the above points, I can provide them.
Even if we take your argument at face value, it leads to the dubious conclusion that everyone must be forced to see as clearly as possible and I think you can see the natural extension of where your argument is leading (e.g. giant wings → banned).
3)This is a ubiquitous problem. How immersive that gigantic fireballs feel is strictly an opinion issue. Whether you can see a tell or not is not an opinion. It is fact.
True.. but whether or not a player can see a tell, or even whether it matters that they see it, is dependent on many factors, which you’re not exploring. You’re also implying that players must be forced to see tells.
4)Thus, particle effects and animation size aren’t like textures or shaders, as they directly affect the performance of players whether they acknowledge it or not.
I would argue, and have above, that all of these things affect players – and, as above, I dispute your assertion that the effect is inherently negative. I put it to you that the outcome is circumstantial and your blanket statements are muddying the waters.
Thus, this isn’t an aesthetics issue. This is a function issue. As much as I’d like to pretend that we live in super-everybody land where everybody can do whatever they want with no repercussions on anyone else, we don’t. Form and function in this instance are related.
To cut through all this (visual) clutter and get to the core of this argument, people are asking for options in how the game is presented to them. Clearly, everyone has a different point of view stemming from their biology, experience, gaming environment and the very fact of being an individual organism. A single graphical configuration will lead to different outcomes in any two individuals. A single graphical change, like the shrinking of a projectile, may allow one player to see better but it may actually cause another player to see less, adversely affecting their performance and – by your argument – your performance.
It’s not about the fireball. It’s not about the clutter. You’re basically arguing for a one-size-fits-all approach and that’s just unreasonable no matter what the actual subject is.
You’re also ignoring the effect of morale on performance. If someone is forced to play with settings that don’t work for them, they’re going to get less enjoyment from the game and that will make them less determined, less involved, less efficient. Their reactions will slow. They may see tells but they may not react fast enough because they’re no longer invested in the experience.
Your argument also implies, whether you meant it or not, that other players are stupid, that they do not want to improve as gamers, that they are unable to configure their own graphical settings to best suit their needs and that they must be forced to accept a blanket solution for their own good… or yours.
I’m pretty sure that’s not how you actually think and that the above implications are just the results of the usual limitations of inter-human communication.
In the end, there is no harm in making this fireball thing, or any other visual thing, an option. People can choose the size of their balls and get on with the game.
< , they aren’t meteors anymore it’s just like someone is spiting fire from the sky -.-" , make graphic options stop cutting the part I enjoy most of this game for silly to no-good reasons -.-
