Baldur's Gate - EE Interview @ Neogamr

Dhruin

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Beamdog's Trent Oster has been interviewed at Neogamr about Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition. There are no surprises, though Trent does confirm the PC as the lead platform:
What can you tell us at this time about the graphical improvements that Overhaul Games has planned for the Baldur's Gate Enhanced Edition?
The first major improvement is going to be the user interface. The old Baldur's Gate interface was created around 640x480 resolution. Even with BG2 the user interface still had elements which were locked to 640x480. We are going in and re-writing the UI system to work for multiple larger resolutions and we are using the iPad 3 (at 2048x1536) as one of our target resolutions so the new UI is going to look amazing. One of our other major improvements was to convert the graphics completely over to OpenGL. By using the hardware present in all devices, we can run BG at higher resolutions and run it faster and smoother that it ever could before.
Our third major enhancement is the addition of the ability to zoom in and out dynamically during gameplay. Zooming out allows the player to be more tactical in the positioning of their party. Zooming in allows the player to search the environment in detail and have greater precision with actions. With regards to the background art and character art, we are limited in what we can do from a purely graphical context as the original art assets were lost. Since we have no 3D models or textures from the original games to go from we have to make the best of what is available.
We are currently researching a few upscaling algorithms to try and improve the quality of the existing assets. We are still experimenting with the game and testing out various ideas on how we can further improve the existing content, but we also took the feedback from MDK2 HD to heart and are focusing our content creation efforts on creating new content, not just prettying up content you have already played through.
Is it safe to say that the game will be released on the PC as the lead platform?
Yes, the PC is the lead platform. We work day in and day out on the PC, so we build the content and test the content on the PC first which really keeps it front and center through our development. The other platforms are built and tested frequently, but by working on the PC it really gets the majority of our attention.
More information.
 
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so besides an UI thats scales true with a higher resolution, not much will be different with the EE. I was really hoping for improved paperdoll and avatar graphics above everything else.
 
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The zoom function sounds interesting, although in practice in these 2D games, zoom often ends up just looking a bit blocky (eg. Desperados) so you end up just zoomed out to the maximum. Shame they don't have the original art.
 
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Its somewhat disappointing to hear that have none of the original assets (how did that happen)? I understand redoing ll the background would be impossible, but I do think they could remodel the avatars and beasts at least (well, I hoped). That said, there are some really good algorithms for up scaling and de-pixelzing pixel art - esp http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/people/kopf/pixelart/
This may work well for there low-res pixel avatar frames. But they need more sprite frames per, since the current animations are really poor.
 
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What a disappointment !!!
This is just a $#ing mod to play on new resolutions. Assets are still the same.
What's the point of making so much noise for that, with a counter and so on.
 
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Glad to hear PC is still the lead platform. With all the annoying iPad hoopla I was starting to wonder and fully expected an announcement that the product would ultimately be for iPad only.

Really don't care about the zooming in and out. Is the EE still to be using the prerendered backgrounds the IE games were known for?
 
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Not as excited as I was when it was first announced but since I replay the IE games pretty much yearly I welcome even these small improvements.
 
What a disappointment !!!
This is just a $#ing mod to play on new resolutions. Assets are still the same.
What's the point of making so much noise for that, with a counter and so on.

I agree, it's total bull! We need to petition Beamdog to "try" a little harder and do something other than a glorified high res patch. I don't want to hear excuses that they do not have the old assets!

Erephine @ One Pixel Productions has a few mods where she she added new animations and touched-up on the avatars. I believe she added flaming swords too! SO, if one dedicated modder can do it, why can't the original members who made the damn game remake avatars or any other part of the game?
 
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OpenGL is nice, I'm playing Avadon in Linux now and I'd like to see BG for Linux too!
 
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Glad to hear PC is still the lead platform. With all the annoying iPad hoopla I was starting to wonder and fully expected an announcement that the product would ultimately be for iPad only.

Really don't care about the zooming in and out. Is the EE still to be using the prerendered backgrounds the IE games were known for?

I love when it is annoying to talk about other platforms just because you don't have it.
 
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Not sure how you extrapolated that from his message rune. I think it's worth keeping in mind that people here are primarily PC gamers to begin with.
 
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Not sure how you extrapolated that from his message rune. I think it's worth keeping in mind that people here are primarily PC gamers to begin with.

I wouldn't waste your time there are a few here that can't take it if you say anything negative about the ipad.
 
It's an enhanced version of the original game, not a remake. I'm not sure what all the bitching is about. Were you people really expecting tham to remodel all those creatures, etc.?

They're increasing the resolution and tweaking the UI, which is what they've said from the beginning. I understand they're also adding a few additional quests, and I'm pleasantly surprised about the new zoom function.
 
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Geez, some of you guys got way ahead of yourselves. I said right back in the beginning it would offer hi res, re-tooled UI and some spell effect tweaks but somehow you decided the whole thing was being rebuilt from scratch?
 
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Exactly what I expected it to be from day 1. They are basically doing nothing and expecting iChumps and android users to hand over the dollars.

I have a little bit of experience with OpenGL and the only reason they would use is so they can target ipad and android. DirectX has the EXACT same functions when it comes to 2D scaling, and infact OpenGL is more complex than the Direct2D way of doing things i.e. load a texture, create a quad, overlay texture on quad, draw the quad - VERUS one line in direct2D.
 
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I still can't understand why pens don't put a halfway descent video card, even descent integrated ones, into laptops. And why to purchase a laptop capable of any gaming even gaming from 10 years ago you need to spend more than an iPad or close to a grand? (don't mention newegg I'm talking about retail like BestBuy). I want a gaming PC I can hook up to my HdTV Tv out or move around my small crammed apartment, I don't have room for. Abig PC box, and already have an iMac and iPad. But why do they have such crappy graphic cards?
 
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I still can't understand why pens don't put a halfway descent video card, even descent integrated ones, into laptops. And why to purchase a laptop capable of any gaming even gaming from 10 years ago you need to spend more than an iPad or close to a grand? (don't mention newegg I'm talking about retail like BestBuy). I want a gaming PC I can hook up to my HdTV Tv out or move around my small crammed apartment, I don't have room for. Abig PC box, and already have an iMac and iPad. But why do they have such crappy graphic cards?

My $400.00 work laptop plays all the IE games, NWN1 and2, TOEE, kings bounty and even the witcher.
 
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