You guys really need to boot up a vanilla client and check how it looks next to MOP/Cata.

They already raised the average texture resolution to what is common with modern MMORPG's, yes check the texture res on new items for WoW and compare it to GW2, you'll find the former higher.

Completely redone their lighting engine, introduced new shading engine, and quite a few post processing effects, what i really miss are some of the more random weather effects that WoW for some reason just abandoned, and turned either to just environment setting, or scripted events.

The big problem with redoing old models is that people have gotten used to how their character looks, allot of them are attached to it and changing that could cause allot of backlash.

The spell effects are quite good, above what most MMO's actually have today.
And the environments are extremely detailed, the problem is that you can't upgrade just a single thing, because then every thing will feel out of place, Cataclysm actually had allot of texture rework for the older world, but even still if you go into older instances and zone you really see a huge difference from what we've gotten used during WOTLK, and Cataclysm.

Originally posted by defector1968

Originally posted by nsignific

To this day it's the only MMO that got the responsiveness of the animations right. The only MMO.

 

To me, personally, that's enough to put it over the top graphically over basically anything eles.

ROFL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hi, Darkfall and Dark Age of Camelot would like a word with you.

Originally posted by Latronus

Originally posted by Johnie-Marz

As for the OP's question:

While WoW makes some minor changes to it's graphics. Water and trees look far better than they did in vanilla. I am curious if there has ever been a game that changed it's graphics engine. (Which WoW would have to do to make any significan graphic changes to the game)

Maybe EQ but I may be wrong.  It's been a very long time since I played that game and if they did it was after I canceled my sub.

DAoC did in their third expansion.

Originally posted by FrodoFragins

If you skipped WOW or Minecraft solely because of the graphics/low-polys then you did yourself a disservice.

 

How many people would have skipped EQ for the same reason?

None, because at the time of launch, EQ was at the cutting edge of graphic fidelity, and helped push video card sales.

And nothing large is lost by skipping WoW, as it doesn't have anything in it that isn't done better by another game.

Originally posted by Jenosyde
The Guy above me must be new

How do you figure? Been here longer than most people on this site.

Originally posted by DavisFlight

If you skipped WOW or Minecraft solely because of the graphics/low-polys then you did yourself a disservice. How many people would have skipped EQ for the same reason?

None, because at the time of launch, EQ was at the cutting edge of graphic fidelity, and helped push video card sales.

And nothing large is lost by skipping WoW, as it doesn't have anything in it that isn't done better by another game.

WoW does transmogrification better than any other game. They have so many armor sets that it works perfect for them and gives players a great reason to do the old raids.

Originally posted by Butcher_Inc
I'd start playing if they gave it the full overhaul. Shame I sold my account or I'd be teabagging pandas atm.

Shame I sold all my accounts that didn't get banned.  Oh wait, no it isn't.... one of the greatest days of my life, was never logging back into wow.

Thing is its a massive investment and costs endless hours of creating and testing, they do not have the manpower to make it.

Titan is playable a developer already confirmed this.
Titan is also devouring funds like no tomorow as their most talented developers are working on it.

WoW and bash me for it all you want is in milking stage.
Cataclysm dint see any contend updates for 10 months...
MoP created even more boring time sinks then any other expansion namely daily quests.
Also WoW can be played on a pentium 3 with turbo and mmx technology, changing that will decrease population.

So my honest answer is no WoW will not ever see a engine update or overhaul.

Let''s see if i can recal this correctly (as this is a topic i have been interesetd in)

It seems that most peopel are not asking for a update to graphics but a engine swap and a new art style.. That will most likley nevr happen. as people have pointed out they are constantly working on updating textures and models (this is in part why Cata was kind of half-baked... A lot went in to updating old zones)

As for player models they are re-doing at least all the classic races but IIRC the hard part (apart from actually manhours) is to strike a good middle ground between new and old to try and alienate as few people as possible. They are also redoing animations (and anyone who have seen the monks know that this is not a badc thing) to introduce a bit more variety in to the pool. (i will try to dig up the qoute on that later. It is still early morning here.)

But fact is that the style of WoW will not change, it might look a bit better but it will still have the same style. (just look at the new cinematic for an example)

Originally posted by Mothanos

Thing is its a massive investment and costs endless hours of creating and testing, they do not have the manpower to make it.

Titan is playable a developer already confirmed this.
Titan is also devouring funds like no tomorow as their most talented developers are working on it.

WoW and bash me for it all you want is in milking stage.
Cataclysm dint see any contend updates for 10 months...
MoP created even more boring time sinks then any other expansion namely daily quests.
Also WoW can be played on a pentium 3 with turbo and mmx technology, changing that will decrease population.

So my honest answer is no WoW will not ever see a engine update or overhaul.

And you know this how? every body is an expert around here  on internal working of companies.

Originally posted by Mothanos

Thing is its a massive investment and costs endless hours of creating and testing, they do not have the manpower to make it.

Nah, I'm pretty sure the problem is that they can't sell it to you which means its going into long-term patch delivery aka they can take their sweet time developing it. But hey, at least we KNOW they're working on and Dwarves are first, followed by Humans and Orcs while everything is, in best case scenario, expected to be out by the next expansion. At least it's not Dance Studio.

Originally posted by nsignific

I'm not realy sure what you're on about, WoW looks gorgeous for the most part, even by today's standards

I disagree. WoW's art has always annoyed me on two fronts. First, how incredibly low pixel and low res everything was. Very mushy armor textures. No matter how colorful it was, having all armors just be a flat mesh with blurry edges was really annoying coming from a game like DAoC that had immaculate armor with depth and high resolution.

The second thing is, I generally dislike the huge shoulderpad huge sword art style. I've never found it breathtaking. I thought it was outdated and crappy looking when it launched, and it looks even more so now. Glad they updated the water to be on par with DAoC's 2002 water.

Now Wind Waker... that's a game that did stylized graphics right...

Originally posted by Johnie-Marz

Originally posted by DavisFlight

WoW doesn't have anything in it that isn't done better by another game.

WoW does transmogrification better than any other game. They have so many armor sets that it works perfect for them and gives players a great reason to do the old raids.

wow has a great variety of armor choices - true

but the method of appearance gear  (transmogrification) is less intuitive than other mmos with that feature

(EQ2, LOTRO, RIFT)

in other mmos, you have appearance gear slots to determine your looks

no need to visit some npc and/or pay a fee

Originally posted by Nadia

Originally posted by Johnie-Marz

Originally posted by DavisFlight

WoW doesn't have anything in it that isn't done better by another game.

WoW does transmogrification better than any other game. They have so many armor sets that it works perfect for them and gives players a great reason to do the old raids.

wow has a great variety of armor choices - true

but the method of appearance gear  (transmogrification) is less intuitive than other mmos with that feature

(EQ2, LOTRO, RIFT)

 

in other mmos, you have appearance gear slots to determine your looks

no need to visit some npc and/or pay a fee

LotRO you have to buy a lot of the cosmetics with real cash and weapons can not be changed.  So each has it's trade off.

Originally posted by Ausare

Originally posted by Nadia

in other mmos, you have appearance gear slots to determine your looks

no need to visit some npc and/or pay a fee

LotRO you have to buy a lot of the cosmetics with real cash and weapons can not be changed.  So each has it's trade off.

 i dont think RIFT has any cosmetics on their store

WoW's graphics engine is so old it's beyond salvation. It has zero scalability too, so they'll need to remake everything. Everything is just paint on flat surfaces instead of high polygon high quality models. It suits their player model, you can play the game on a toaster and you probably won't need to upgrade a single piece of hardware until their die on their own.

It's like those arcade games we were playing as kids, we were nostalgic of them but they really look shitty on any screen bigger than a smartphone. WoW on any screen bigger than 15" and it's fugly and painful to look at.

Wish it had aged more gracefully (ie they had build some scalability into it), but it's more like it was left to rott.

Originally posted by Nadia

Originally posted by Ausare

Originally posted by Nadia

in other mmos, you have appearance gear slots to determine your looks

no need to visit some npc and/or pay a fee

LotRO you have to buy a lot of the cosmetics with real cash and weapons can not be changed.  So each has it's trade off.

 i dont think RIFT has any cosmetics on their store

RIFT needed to do something....their models are crap.

Originally posted by Zeus.CM
Don't foget that engine is really old now, it is very limited today and don't expect wonders.

Updating an old engine into a new one is far from impossible, many game engines have been severly updated with the years.

But as I see it is it more likely that Blizzard also will revamp the graphically updated game and cal it "WoW 2", it would also give them the chanse to change whatever they want with the game without upsetting people too much and mean they might get many old players that quit long ago to buy a new box and give the game a new chanse.

It would of course cost more but I am sure they would earn a lot more as well with it.

Originally posted by Xasapis

WoW's graphics engine is so old it's beyond salvation. It has zero scalability too, so they'll need to remake everything. Everything is just paint on flat surfaces instead of high polygon high quality models. It suits their player model, you can play the game on a toaster and you probably won't need to upgrade a single piece of hardware until their die on their own.

 

It's like those arcade games we were playing as kids, we were nostalgic of them but they really look shitty on any screen bigger than a smartphone. WoW on any screen bigger than 15" and it's fugly and painful to look at.

 

Wish it had aged more gracefully (ie they had build some scalability into it), but it's more like it was left to rott.

To each their own.  I think most of the "realistic" graphics look like crap.  Asian anime looking junk.  I rather have WoW with their graphics matching the Warcraft 3 so it looks like I step from one to the other.  I do not play a game to look for the realistic landscapes I go outside for that.  I play a game for the fun.