The ‘No Running’ sections in Niaowu

Machsi

Machsi

Joined
Mar 6, 2019
I’ve been thinking about the odd placement of these and it seems like it’s a dev trick to allow time for the other side to finish loading textures and objects before Ryo can reach that area. Seems like thats the real purpose of the forced walk segments, which seem a little out of place... basically they act like a load screen without having to sit through a load screen. Is this an accurate assumption on my part?
 
Machsi said:
I’ve been thinking about the odd placement of these and it seems like it’s a dev trick to allow time for the other side to finish loading textures and objects before Ryo can reach that area. Seems like thats the real purpose of the forced walk segments, which seem a little out of place... basically they act like a load screen without having to sit through a load screen. Is this an accurate assumption on my part?
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Yes
 
When I saw the "Do not run" signal in the Gamescom trailer, I thought "What if I run in that section?" and slightly believed about an easter egg like a NPC moaning behind a door.

Congrats to people who figured out since the very beginning.
 
"What about a light that will brighten up even the darkest, gloomiest of rooms?"
 
It's just another thing that separates Bailu from Niaowu. In Bailu I never noticed the loading but in Niaowu it's an annoyance -- not a huge one but it's there. Of course I understand why, because Bailu is smaller with fewer NPCs etc., but that doesn't make it any less annoying.

What's most frustrating is that, even with forced walking segments, they couldn't find a way to load more characters in at once. If you run everywhere, you get the impression of an empty world because NPCs just take forever to load in -- another thing that's much less of a problem in Bailu.
 
orient said:
It's just another thing that separates Bailu from Niaowu. In Bailu I never noticed the loading but in Niaowu it's an annoyance -- not a huge one but it's there. Of course I understand why, because Bailu is smaller with fewer NPCs etc., but that doesn't make it any less annoying.

What's most frustrating is that, even with forced walking segments, they couldn't find a way to load more characters in at once. If you run everywhere, you get the impression of an empty world because NPCs just take forever to load in -- another thing that's much less of a problem in Bailu.
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Yeah Niaowu NPCs are quite ghost like in the way they randomly fade in. Again, i know the team probably tried their best to fix that but limitations were there
 
I don't mind the forced walking to allow loading, I just don't like the way it's designed to fit within the town.

I mean, to gain access to the rest of the town you have to walk through the narrow walkway of a temple. It's such an odd design of a city layout.

I would have preferred walking through a gate or something that makes more sense.
 
The modern Tomb Raider used this technique in a clever way when Lara needs to pass through "narrow sections"
 
Yup. Even then, you can walk into a store and the people inside might be invisible for a second or two before magically appearing.

One thing I noticed was the vast majority of buildings in this game didn't require Ryo to open a door to go inside and I wonder if that contributed to the ghosting.
 
Reprise said:
Yeah, that's exactly it.

They're really annoying to be honest. I'd rather have the load screen back :p
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I actually kind of miss the black load screens. I know they're still in the game but just not as much.
 
lavrentis said:
"What about a light that will brighten up even the darkest, gloomiest of rooms?"
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And is it just me or is the guy selling electronics also on the bottom at the exit of the mini shrine where the light salesman is? I think he's supposed to be on the second floor.
 
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You run into the unloaded NPCs and it’s like you’re hitting walls if you run, regardless of the way these sections help load assets. That is pretty strange and something I’ve never experienced in a game, at least not in years. I found the wide open stores a bit strange as well but assumed that might be true to the setting? I didn’t really want to comment on that in case I was making assumptions about these parts of China
 
Thomasina said:
I don't mind the forced walking to allow loading, I just don't like the way it's designed to fit within the town.

I mean, to gain access to the rest of the town you have to walk through the narrow walkway of a temple. It's such an odd design of a city layout.

I would have preferred walking through a gate or something that makes more sense.
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Yeah...I don't mean to harp on about Niaowu (it has its positives) but they could've improved the feel of the place by making it less...straight. The areas that aren't just straight walkways are much more interesting to explore (the outskirts, the dock area). Shenmue 1 already solved this issue with Dobuita, by simply angling the hallways/streets you run down. I understand this may have been modelled on real port towns, but still, straight lines and grids aren't great in video game levels.

mjqjazzbar said:
You run into the unloaded NPCs and it’s like you’re hitting walls if you run, regardless of the way these sections help load assets. That is pretty strange and something I’ve never experienced in a game, at least not in years.
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It definitely still happens in some games -- the latest One Punch Man game, for example. It's just a lack of open-world-specific technical knowledge, or lack of technical resources, I think. If your entire game isn't built to work as an OW game but you still want huge environments filled with NPCs, you're going to run into issues.
 
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