New Dwemer ornamentation

[Ayreus]

Originally posted by Ibsen's Ghost
Yes, definitely the upper-classes. The idea of puzzle-related machinery sounds intriguing. Will the machinery themselves be the source of the puzzles or are they just a feature appearing in a quest-puzzle?

Close, if I understand you correctly; they're features of the puzzle. The machines I'm working on at the moment are part of a puzzle that spans an entire level, so the design of the machinery has to not only convey its own function but also provide the contextual cues that help the player see how it fits into to the overall problem that they're solving. I guess you could say that they're partially the source of the puzzle, but that would probably be an oversimplification; the machines are related to but not directly the cause of why the puzzle is there or what's really being solved; they're sort of a middle-man. This is one of a few puzzles that we're designing to offer the same level of challenge as the Myst games; in this case, the whole thing is basically a huge logic puzzle. Anyway, sorry if that's a little vague, but I don't want to give away anything I don't have to.

Originally posted by nick_op
I agree with the form follows function philosophy. However, I think you should leave some subtle curves, I've done so with the Steam Centurion, just enough to add a little break from the angular lines.

I think what you mean is probably what I had in mind, but I'll have to take a look at what you've done with the Steam Centurion.

[Ibsen's Ghost]

Originally posted by Ayreus
...This is one of a few puzzles that we're designing to offer the same level of challenge as the Myst games; in this case, the whole thing is basically a huge logic puzzle...

So it's instrumental in solving the puzzle then...? Sounds wonderful. I'm right behind the idea of putting the brains back into RPGs with stuff like this. They should make you think about character's motivations and situations as well. That's something I'm working on with a little quest attached to the Dark Brotherhood mod at the moment. I just can't imagine you getting such stuff with the likes of MMORPGs. I come from the old school of role-players where you had only a set of dice (together with little figures, if you were lucky!) and the unfettered boundaries of your imagination.

[Seniosh]

I rather like it. I must agree that it is a slight bit too curved and flowing to fit in perfectly with MW dwemer. However, it would actually go quite nicely with the Oblivion armor designs.

Also, nobody ever said that the Dwemer have to be cold and heartless. Their architecture incorporates elements of Persian and Babylonian design, so i think it's fair to say that the dwemer could stylistically be expanded, especially the wealthy, upper-class. Especially if one is making untouched interiors of dwemer cities, not the military outposts-type dungeons we were accustomed to visit in Morrowind. The exterior levels of ruins were built for function, but who's to say that the interiors couldn't have had a blossoming artistic culture?

Remember, also the ingame literature which constantly points out how misunderstood and stereotyped the dwemer were as a people - they were not all machines, they were one of the elven races, and much of the perception of them as cold and cultureless is due to the Tribunal's campaign to paint them as heretics in the wake of Red Mountain.

Can you tell i'd love to get a PHD in Dwemer culture?

Anyways, keep going with your designs, they'll make a lovely addition to dwemer ruins.

I could actually see that particular design as a crown, if it was simplified a bit

[Ayreus]

Originally posted by Ibsen's Ghost
So it's instrumental in solving the puzzle then...?

Oh yeah, you better believe it. Glad to see that there's yet another old-school RPG fan who still prefers brain-food over eye-candy

@ Seniosh: Hmm...I'll have to think about that. I guess that's kind of where I was coming from originally, though without the educated lore-based perspective. I think I'll probably still have to maintain that they wouldn't have gotten too fancy with their machines. Maybe a few flourishes here and there, but nothing hard-core Victorian.

[bob196045]

Howdy

Ayreus, pardon my snipping of your post

with regard

I should probably also tone this design down; after reading your post and thinking things over, it doesn't seem like the Dwemer would be terribly artistically-inclined, period

I really didn't mean it that way, I am sure the Dwemer were extremely artistic but in a different manner. A mechanical manner, their drawings and wrok on the machines and devices that they made are far far advanced for what morrowind is, its almost like having picasso in the ice age. I think your drawing has a place, its just finding that place within the Dwemer scheme.

And consider Seniosh as a very good point, the Dwemer desings have been much softer in appearence in the oblivion engine then they were in morrowind

I agree I feel the Dwemer were not cold and heartless (at least not always) and I am and always been an advocate for showing a more personalized Dwemer lifestyle. Maybe this could be a way


Enjoy
Bob

[Ibsen's Ghost]

Originally posted by bob196045
I agree I feel the Dwemer were not cold and heartless (at least not always) and I am and always been an advocate for showing a more personalized Dwemer lifestyle. Maybe this could be a way

In that case, it could be explained away as being the work of some isolated freakish individual amongst the Dwemer (a depraved aristocrat, perhaps) who demonstrated skills that were definitely not in keeping with the rest of them and was generally considered to be quite odd in betraying 'deviant signs of elvishness' that were not in keeping with the cool, calm and functional lines of the Dwemer.

[Ayreus]

Originally posted by Ibsen's Ghost
In that case, it could be explained away as being the work of some isolated freakish individual amongst the Dwemer (a depraved aristocrat, perhaps) who demonstrated skills that were definitely not in keeping with the rest of them and was generally considered to be quite odd in betraying 'deviant signs of elvishness' that were not in keeping with the cool, calm and functional lines of the Dwemer.

How about this? The Dwemer forced their Chimer slaves and POWs to do their artwork for them. Even though that doesn't offer nearly as much depth to expanding their culture as if they were the ones to have done it, but it would be consistent with lore (I think).

Well, I personally like Seniosh's position the best, but of course that's probably because it's a little self-serving for me, lol. Everyone has made really good points, so I guess all that's really left to do is experiment a little and see what fits and what doesn't.

As something of a contrast, a little towards the other end of the spectrum, I came up with a design and made the texture for it last night and today. It was intended to be somewhat on the uninspired side, as if done by someone who wasn't entirely comfortable being artistic but making an A+ effort at it, as I imagine the Dwemer did with everything (EDIT: the A+ effort, that is). I threw the new texture onto a plane in 3ds Max and turned on the advanced DirectX shader so I could simulate for you how it would look in-game. The diffuse, specular and normal maps are straight from the uncompressed texture files, so unless I start going with the uncompressed 8.8.8.8, 32 bpp format they won't look quite as good as this. It's a shame though...DDS compression stinks in general.

Well, anyway, enjoy! It's definitely very pretty, if not quite what we're (probably) ultimately going to shoot for.

http://i37.tinypic.com/2rwx98g.jpg
http://i36.tinypic.com/2q8ocgk.jpg

[Ibsen's Ghost]

Well, I certainly like it. I'm not a lore monkey so I'd definitely include it. :goodjob:

[nick_op]

Originally posted by Ayreus
The diffuse, specular and normal maps are straight from the uncompressed texture files, so unless I start going with the uncompressed 8.8.8.8, 32 bpp format they won't look quite as good as this. It's a shame though...DDS compression stinks in general.

I'd recommend trying your normal maps at 1 quarter the size of the diffuse (e.g. if diffuse is 512x512, normal will be 256x256) and using the 8.8.8.8 ARGB .dds format. Doing so will keep the file size the same, but often increases the quality of the normal map, thus being a win-win situation.

[Coinneach]

perhaps these more artistic designs could be the hallmark of dwemer understanding of themselves in the world, and a kind of 'literal metaphor' of the dwemer being one more cog in the world. Building up their mechanical mythology so to speak - they were obviously industrious and enterprising, so would have asked themselves why they were there as well as how to make steam engines