Seeing the tank projectiles blowing up an contact was very good. I suddenly enjoyed seeing this clever feature implemented into the Beta9. However, I must say the graphical quality of it overall, is pretty much lacking.
Now, as been said, we all understand its still beta stages, and not a finished product. I'd like to think that certain features, such as the tank projectiles striking the object, just merely 'borrowed' the old graphics scheme from AH1 to just give us a taste of how it may be like
So, with that in mind, I'd like to suggest a bit of things.
Pic1, is when the shell strikes the ground. Pic2, is when it hit a tree. Pic3, is a burning airplane.
Now, as I understand, most of these features concerning fire/explosion, seems to use an animation of textures to depict what happens. Then I think that better textures will also increase the effects dramatically. I am not sure if the finished AH2 is planned to use particle effects for fires/explosions/gun flames/hit sprites and etc. , but if the old animated method should remain, I think there could be some improvements.
Currently, as is shown in Pic1, the animation for tank projectiles striking the ground seems to use the same line of animations as gun strikes on the ground. It would be great to see a larger explosion in that case, preferrably one throwing up a bigger cloud of smoke.
As is shown in Pic2, it seems all the tank projectiles striking objects throw off a very large explosion. As I have guessed, it could be because AH2 engine is simply borrowing the set of animated textures as used in AH1.
Then, I suggest to go a step further, and differentiate the contact explosion between AP shells and HE shells.
The current size of explosion seems way too big for even an ordinary HE shell. If we can see smaller, but better textured explosion for HE shells, and another set of texture animations for AP shells, it would greatly increase the GV experience. Seeing an AP shell strike an enemy tank, that throw off a gigantic fiery explosion, would be pretty awkward.
The above mentioned easily applies to hit sprites as well. The '90s game European Air War, also uses animated sprites for depicting hits - when cannons connect, it would throw off small, animated explosions on the surface of the enemy plane, which surprisingly looked very adeqaute even if they were mere globs of textures. Of course it looks better than AH1 hit sprites.
As said, if AH2 is not planning to use a particle effect for hit sprites, then I suggest using hit sprites simular to what we have now(but in higher resolution) for portraying AP rounds, and another set of animated textures for HE rounds.
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The third picture, depicting a burning P-51D, also falls into these line of suggestions.
The following are a few examples of EAW smokes and flames using custom mods:
As you can see, it is clear better in visual quality than the burning P-51D as portrayed in the initial series of pics. Maybe it would be reasonable to discard the current depiction of a long flame by using a single texture to portray it - and shift to what EAW has already done(while the fires are rendered by cutom mods, the basic method of game rendering is unchanged).
I believe the above, is how IL2/FB also depict their fires.
