graphics.....?

[sdkben]

hi to all, i played the demo CM BN, i belive the graphics of veicles and units are very very good., but the landscape and buildings, i think is very very.. poor.. why? it seem come back at 2000!!!

Theatre of War landscape and buildings is more more great ..

[Jaws]

What graphic settings do you have set in options menu? Try best/best and it should be ok

[Redwolf]

Press "]" until things improve.

The landscape looks really horrible if any LOD management kicks in.

[YankeeDog]

What graphic settings do you have set in options menu? Try best/best and it should be ok

... assuming your rig can handle it. For slower rigs, the game automatically scales back the level of terrain detail especially at a distance.

So if you have a machine at or near the minimum specs, you may have to live with a lower level of detail on distant terrain and buildings. Only solution to this is a hardware upgrade.

[MikeyD]

I've joked that people instinctively seem to gravitate to the camera elevation where they start to lose terrain detail then decide to play from that height. Yes, textures look less impressive from 20 feet off the ground and 20 feet back than if you're at ground level inspecting the cracks in the windowpanes.

And new players might notice that the 3D model & texture qaulity defaults to pretty low when you first start-up the game. A visit to the options screen should help.

[Pak40]

While the graphics are generally less quality than a 1st Person shooter, I disagree that they are poor. Anyway, the emphasis in wargames in general is to model the simulation of battle. Graphics in many wargames get less attention than actual game design and mechanics. Also, small independent developers often cannot spare the immense cost to develop fancier graphics.

If you know anything about the original Combat Mission, then you know that there is an extensive modding community. Before long there will be LOTS of building, unit, and landscape mods.

Finally, graphics are not everything. Look at the where the customers are posting on BFC forums. CMBN already has over 40000 posts. All four games of the Theater of War franchise barely total 40000 posts. I'm not knocking TOW, I'm just saying that CMBN is that much more popular for a reason.

[WineCape]

Graphics in certain wargames are not the Alpha/Omega. CM franchise can get away with it, to some large extend. For the FPS crowd, this fidelity is what they see and usually compare all wargames with :

[guachi]

My only graphic issues are the trees. And that's not CM's fault. Decently modeled trees would be a nightmare for any system to handle with all the branches and jillions of leaves.

[wyseman76]

I personally have always equated the CM series to the closest thing in PC based "tabletop" warfare gaming. (Flames of War, Warhammer / 40k, Warmachine, etc..) The games mechanics trump graphics in all respects but with the newer engine the graphics have greatly improved for the betterment of immersion without compromising what is important, the mechanics.

[Vergeltungswaffe]

The reason in a nutshell:

TOW = Checkers

CM = Chess