Sif - Worst fur effect ever seen in a video game?

[DaLagga]

http://i1.ytimg.com/vi/UB6ZYWJPVFo/maxresdefault.jpg

The first time I fought Sif I kept my distance and assumed that the fur effect was supposed to be some kind of magical energy or something. But becuase I never got very close it was hard to tell. On my second playthrough I got right up in melee range and really noticed just how horrible the fur effect was. In fact, after the fight I went and looked up some videos because I thought that maybe my GPU was coughing up a lung and causing a graphical glitch. But no. That's actually supposed to be his fur.

Now, obvously Dark Souls has very dated visuals. But this effect just makes no sense. It would have looked dramatically better if they had just used a flat texture. Even the zombie dogs in the original RE games had better looking "fur". So my question is, why is this effect so eye-poppingly horrendous? What were they thinking?

[Big McHugeLarge]

Tell you the truth I was always so annoyed with the idiocy of a dog and a sword that I never paid attention. But he does look a little matted, doesn't he?

[Raigavin]

Originally posted by DaLagga:

Now, obvously Dark Souls has very dated visuals. But this effect just makes no sense. It would have looked dramatically better if they had just used a flat texture. Even the zombie dogs in the original RE games had better looking "fur". So my question is, why is this effect so eye-poppingly horrendous? What were they thinking?

How Naive..

Play boss fight without DSfix and you'll see the proper FUR effect on SIF.
(Since you are playing in ultra high resolution, you are breaking it)

[DaLagga]

Originally posted by Raigavin:

How Naive..

Play boss fight without DSfix and you'll see the proper FUR effect on SIF.
(Since you are playing in ultra high resolution, you are breaking it)

First off, if I have to run the game in a blurry resolution to see the "proper" effect, then there's something wrong with the effect. Second, when I first played through Dark Souls I essentially was running without dsfix. My good monitor died so I was on a backup with a 1024x768 native resolution so all I used dsfix for was to adjust the resolution slightly to fit my display (default was 1024x720 IIRC, so not too far off). Regardless of the resolution, the fur effect looks horrendous.

[Geani Talent]

does it really matter?

[Raigavin]

Originally posted by DaLagga:

Originally posted by Raigavin:

How Naive..

Play boss fight without DSfix and you'll see the proper FUR effect on SIF.
(Since you are playing in ultra high resolution, you are breaking it)

First off, if I have to run the game in a blurry resolution to see the "proper" effect, then there's something wrong with the effect. Second, when I first played through Dark Souls I essentially was running without dsfix. My good monitor died so I was on a backup with a 1024x768 native resolution so all I used dsfix for was to adjust the resolution slightly to fit my display (default was 1024x720 IIRC, so not too far off). Regardless of the resolution, the fur effect looks horrendous.

Running the game outside its intended specifications and expecting everything to look absolutely top notch, isn't a good overview.

Game was never meant to run in any resolution above its locked values*, nor have any amounts of SweetFX configuration settings over it.


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Originally posted by SASteve:

does it really matter?

Yes it does, either ways.

[kozo]

much blur

[DaLagga]

Originally posted by Raigavin:

Running the game outside its intended specifications and expecting everything to look absolutely top notch, isn't a good overview.

Game was never meant to run in any resolution above its locked values*, nor have any amounts of SweetFX configuration settings over it.

Again, it looks hideous no matter what resolution you're playing at. Whether at default or 1080p, it is painful to look at. The screenshot I linked is 720p and it still looks terrible. I'm just wondering why they would program such a terrible fur effect when using a flat texture would have been easier, less processing intensive, and looked better.

[Sir Crashalot]

Well tbh I've seem video game dogs that are little more than a square on the old computers/consoles so Sif can hardly qualify for worst looking dog effects. :p

[Loz ~]

Did it change your experience of the game in any way, though?

[Kibbles]

Bad effects on ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ game 0/10

[DaLagga]

Originally posted by Sir Crashalot:

Well tbh I've seem video game dogs that are little more than a square on the old computers/consoles so Sif can hardly qualify for worst looking dog effects. :p

My point is, it isn't just the fact that the tech is outdated. That's not the issue. What I'm saying is why would they go through the extra effort of designing such a crappy fur effect when a flat texture would have been much easier and looked better? Even the dogs in Minecraft are more pleasant to look at than Sif.

Originally posted by Loz ~:

Did it change your experience of the game in any way, though?

It changed the experience I had during that fight. Again, it has nothing to do with low quality graphics because the entire game looks like something out of 2005. The problem is that the fur effect is jarringly bad. It's actually painful to look at. Kind of like staring at an optical illusion or something. I don't know. It's very distracting.

[Lostedge]

Meh, you are doing it wrong. IMO the wolfs animation and fur is excellent.

[Loz ~]

Originally posted by DaLagga:

It changed the experience I had during that fight. Again, it has nothing to do with low quality graphics because the entire game looks like something out of 2005. The problem is that the fur effect is jarringly bad. It's actually painful to look at. Kind of like staring at an optical illusion or something. I don't know. It's very distracting.

But the first time you didn't even pay attention to it, correct? So, it can't be bad enough to ruin the game or worsen it in any meaningful way.

[Dabs McCoy]

Sif is what, 300 years old, right?
of course he/she will have bad fur! that 300 years of grave defending must've soiled Sif's fur, i mean, after 300 years its not like someone will look the same.

[Raw Dawg Frog]

Eh, Sif looks absolutley fine to me, (I don't use DSfix, so I think that may be the problem there), and nothing like it does in your screenshot.