first impressions on ga beta 0.9
 

Hi all, Hi Reichart!

Thank you for the beta!

My first impressions:

I really like the goldfish. The movement and collision detection is well done.

I am more sceptical concerning the background. Especially the rock needs bether (higher resolution) textures applied to it.

Overall, a nice product with place for improvements :)

P.S. no bubbles?

regards,
Ewald

I have just splashed out and bought it while it was at a lower price!
Haven't really had time to watch it much so far but where are the bubbles? The sound is there but not the bubbles! I think the fish are great; had a tank of them a few years back and find that these are pretty good.
Mary

The fish don't look quite real - they are missing nostrils, and do a bit too much swimming and not enough cruising (also I think Ginger has a bit of tail rot) - but overall it looks good. I am sure that it will be a winner when finished.

I agree on this...

I like that you can increase/decrease the number of plants shown (welcome to the jungle) :)

how many different fish will be in 1.0?

I agree, the fishtank is a bit small but by adding more plants it seems deeper, makes me feel less guilty for keeping my goldfish on a tiny 15 inch screen...

bubbles are coming later, before version 1.0, Remember it is a beta and a work that is still in progress, but so far it is looking very good :)

How about another plant art? Or a better rock?
It would be nice to have a pool with wishes of plants and rocks to implement...

It would be nice to have a fine selection of the plant, I mean the posibility to have specific amount of specific plants on specified positions in the tank. The actualy more or less plants option could be better...

For a beta, this is awesome. Here’s my first impressions:

The Fish:
1) The fish aesthetics look great. Near perfection.
2) I love how they swim a lot from the background to the foreground and vice versa, so they're not always on a side view like the MA.
3) Their AI is pretty good, except that when they come to the sides or bottom of the tank, they always bump themselves. I'd be great if they'd slow down before slamming into the side.
4) I love how they don't go off the side, and stay within the screen.
5) When they shake their fins it doesn't look natural enough. I mean, the animation is terrific, but it looks like they shake for a few seconds, then pause for a few seconds, etc. So, better swimming AI would be good. (Although maybe I just don’t know fish enough. I’m not sure if they actually do this in real life).

The Tank:
1) I hope there's going to be a 3D version in the future.
2) My first impression was that something didn’t quite look right, but after playing with the options and turning the background black, that made a big difference. So in other words, I don't care for the blue/green background.
3) The plants are great compared to just a still picture of plants. However, when they do flow I have movement lines flowing through it (don't know how to explain it), which makes it look unreal.
4) The option of adding or removing the plants is great.

My overall impression is that this aquarium is amazing. I can't wait to see what the future holds!

This is going to be great! First impression, though, is that a) my plants disappear periodicaly, which (I assume) is because I'm on the demo, and b) the mouth looks wrong. A carp's mouth opens into more of a tube, doesn't it?

Great job guys!
Thanks for the beta. Love the depth of the tank and the plant feature. Hopefully this will lead to more fun stuff in future screen savers. The fish movements are fantastic. I do agree with some of the others in that something doesn’t quite look right with the mouth. They look a bit like zombie fish, but it would be nearly impossible to capture the personality and natural curiosty of live goldfish. The only problem I’ve found so far, is that the bubble volume control doesn’t work on my computer. Anyone else have this problem? Cheers Prolific!
:TU:

It's a nice effort, but it's not MA.

I really really like the way the fish has so many curves and bumps. I also really like the overall layout of the tank.

The fish is a bit cartoon-like. The mouth just makes realism impossible. Would be better to leave the mouth closed unless they plan to make it look like an actual mouth and not a southpark-like hole in the texture. When a mouth moves, other parts of the face and head move too.

The plants are doing a lot of weird pixel and feild effects when they sway. The grass looking plants are almost believeable, but the leafier plants just look like a bad cut and past job.

IS the movement of the fish natural? It seems to float up like a bubble and then has to struggle to get down. Also it seems to shake its tail for comical effect? Is that the way these fish really behave? I never owned that particular type of goldfish.

I tried it, but I did not like it at all. I think I'll stick to MA & MAT.

Just watched the mouths a little more.

It's mostly "Algernon" that has a really bad mouth.

The other two are not nearly as unrealstic. Not perfect but definitely a whole better.

all background elements need to be much more photorealistic (maybe at the sacrifice of moving plants)

I hope the bubbles won't be exactly the same as in MA(T)

Most of the fancy goldfish I've seen do look like they are struggling to stay afloat. They are almost always swimming. Not quite as much tail shaking (though there is a lot of that), but almost constant, steady tail movement. They always seem to be annoying the other more laid back fish in the tank. :)

It may help GA to have at least one less ornate fish in the tank that swims more like a normal fish. It would help add a little diversity.

You must remember that these type of goldfish are a mutation of the real carp. They do not have the slim streamline bodies of their ancesters. Thus they have shorter swim bladders, this does make it hard to stay afloat, some will even swim upsidedown! Goldfish like most fish must continually open and close their mouths forcing water by and over their gills in their respiration. By and large this is a very realistic reproduction of one of natures most love water inhabitant. And I personally am thoughly enjoying this special program.

I guess my biggest problem with the movement is that they all very often shake their tales in unison as if they are on some sort of sequence. It would be nice if they had slightly different timing to their movement. They look like a bunch of synchronized swimmers. I solved the problem by simply removing Ginger and Algernon, and have Oreo swimming alone. The effect is stunningly real. Everyone who has come into my office today has been completely amazed, and everyone is in agreement that Oreo beats all of the MA2 fish hands down.

I would just like to add that it's not that Oreo is better in terms of artistry, it's just that the programming is obviously more sophisticated. This is very exciting, and means many more wonderful things will be coming to both MA, GA and the freshwater aquarium (FA?)

I am quite impressed with the level of quality and realism. It does help to keep Oreo alone in the tank to prevent the synchronicity effect, though.

I wish the background would be a little less "colorful" and the plants and rocks seems a bit fuzzy.

Will development of the goldfish tank be restricted to bug fixes or can we expect to see a step up in realism?

I like it. Very nice for a first beta. :)
The fish are beautiful and i like the swimming movement.
Nice swaying plants.
Looking foward to the next version!

GA second impressions, - on beta 0.9
 

First of all, congratulations to Prolific for getting it out, after a hectic weekend! - Compliments to all concerned! :TU:

Still got the foreground plants hovering above the gravel, (particularly those on the left!) - suspended in the water, - not 'planted' !
Bubble sound volume control does not work on my system.
I still don't like the orange rock, - doesn't look real to me!

The fin movements are now much better ....... overall, an amazing achievement!

Yup, I'm with the collection coordinator on this one. Just Oreo all by himself without Ginger and Algy is the best setup at the moment.

/Tiny Cookie Monster

Nice!
 

Nicely done! I love the swaying plants and the overall look of the aquarium. These fish are definitely more life-like in movement than those in MA2....the MA2 fish look fantastic but move about the tank like robotic zombies IMO. And I have to agree with others on the distracting tail-shaking synchronicity of the goldfish, plus other minor fixes that need done (sound up/down, bubbles, etc.). But this is surely a fine first beta release. Great job!!

Overall - I think the goldfish aquarium looks awesome! My first impressions of the demo (unregistered) are almost the same as Lostboy's:

At first, I thought I'd caught a bug. Then I realized, D'oh - I'm sure they wanted it to look that way. It's sort of funny. Like a real goldfish must do that 1,000 times a day. ...poor little things. :)

I suppose my biggest complaint would be the plants. Especially the long grass on the right. The 'movement lines' are very distracting - no realism at all IMHO. Also, all the plants seem very blurry. They look OK if you're standing away from the screen - far away. Again, overall it's great - this is just my attempt at constructive criticism - take it for what it's worth (nearly nada).

Great feedback! Thanks. Even for those that don’t like it, that is the cool thing about choice, (at least in most countries).


Resolution: We cut the Res in HALF! If not ¼. The program was 10 Megs 15 days ago. It is now 1.5 Megs. We are planning a hi-res version when we do the widescreen. Both will be in the same package most likely. So if you have the bandwidth, and the res, go for it! We may start doing this with all the products.

Mouth: Goldfish do several things with their mouths, we picked one. Next will be gulping, which is different than what they do when just breathing.

AI: I don’t believe in AI, and cognitive science is one of my specialties. Lets call this CL (Computer Logic). The CL in the fish is the exact same for all three right now. We want to improve it all, collisions, moving along the bottom, and how they interact. Then we will start deviating from the norm, and each fish will in fact have different controls. Different Mass, speed, annoyances, and peculiarities.

MA vs GA: For those that compare this to MA…seems pointless, they are “completely” different programs. They have almost nothing in common. Compare MA to the other 10 Salt Water products, yes. Compare Goldfish to…what? Is there another Goldfish Aquarium out there? All that I have seen are…scary…

Misc: The fish don't look quite real - they are missing nostrils
A: Yup, and an anus. We refuse to put in nostrils until we work out the Anal Dynamics

Movement: “The fish do a bit too much swimming and not enough cruising” These are not fish, they are mutants which avoided the problems of Darwinism by skipping survival, by being cute enough to be bought in a pet store.

MORE FISH: How many different fish will be in 1.0?
A: No exact number, but more than a dozen most likely.

?

LOL

GOLDFISH AQUARIUM
 

Very nice! I really like the movement of the goldfish and the plants, this is a great start! I agree with a few people that there is a blurry/fuzzy look to the rock, but that is a very picky. I have had it up for about 30 minutes so far with no problems at all. Thank you. :TU: (I get about 90fps with 3 fish and everything looks smooth and realistic, those tailfins are especially nice!)

Fantastic Job!!!

I love the way the fish can swim behind some of the plants and seem to almost get "caught up" in them before finding their way out. For some reason I can't get the plants to disappear on my system. I press the [ and ] keys and it just kicks me out of the program.

Agreed that some of the plants look a little fuzzy but they're still very cool and I prefer to have them move and be a little fuzzy for now than to have static ones. I really think the plant movement is one of my favorite things about the GA. Except for SA, this is the only aquarium that i've seen with good plant movement. Of course great job with the goldfish themselves also. Really beautiful work. Can't wait to see some more. I bought the full version already.

Rob

Turn off "exit on Mouse" It could be "exit on anything other than spacebar"

I think this will be really cool when the bugs are worked out.
It would be great if there was an Apple snail or a Mystery snail that could move around the tank and on the glass like the Starfish on MA.

Hi, I just joined here..better late than never. This evening I downloaded the free demo.

I had fancy goldfish breeds for apx. 15 years, imports of champion breeds from Asia. I spent aa lot of time over the years watching these man made mutants swim around.

Some early observations of the demo:

It appears as if the swimming pattern is based on observations of fish in a unnatural high stream environment. This is NOT the way these fish should be kept or displayed. Fancy goldfish are bred to swim in still waters to allow their innate patterns to be fully expressed. The displayed repetitive movement of the tail is not at all desirable to any experienced breeders of quality or champion goldfish breeds.
Watch these fish in still waters and much more variety and beauty in swimming patterns will emerge, at the same time much more tranquil and soothing.
If you can bring this out, I think the Asian market will be very impressed.

I missed out on the early beta versions of SS so perhaps a comparison is unfair. A 3 minute demo with one fish is not a whole lot of incentive to purchase, when I started with the SS series the demos seemed to last until you shut them off. Having to type in "lifeglobe" everytime one makes a change in the settings is a bit annoying.
The fish movement seems to be programed to spend a lot of time face on or face away, too un-random in my opinion. The tail movement is impressive but un-natural. I am far from a expert on goldfish movements and perhaps they do move like that but again it seems too scripted.
Sorry..... I will try to like it but so far.........

1. Q: It would be great if there was an Apple snail or a Mystery snail that could move around the tank and on the glass like the Starfish on MA.
A: Yes, we have looking at some really great friends for the goldfish. Thanks for the feedback.

Reichert - pressed M and it seems to let me add/subtract plants now...I could have sworn I had already tried that. Anyway, for some reason I'm still crashing every time I enter Wireframe mode. Sometimes it lets me get through a few of the variations...ie. just fish wireframe, just plants etc...but eventually if I leave it in wireframe mode for about 30 seconds or so the whole thing freezes and the computer refuses to reboot except with a hard power-off shutdown. Not even Cntrl-alt-dlt can revive it. I have a P4 1.6ghz with 512mb ram and an ATI 7500 Radeon card with 64mb. Running Windows XP Home. Any ideas?
Rob

It is always possible that we have a bug, it is beta. But, about 10K people are running it now, and we are not getting emails of similar problems from people. You are running an ATI card, and one of the many ATI models that seem to have the most problems. Here is a whole web site devoted to ATI crashing.

http://www.hardwareanalysis.com/content/topic/1075/

"Most" errors magically happen on ATI systems.

We are planning to start a database, and track every "crash" like this. Although the count is in the single digits, there is a pattern.

It looks very impressive and realistic. I wish there would be more goldfish in the final product instead of just three (I know it takes an aweful lot of time to make even one, and I would rather see quality instead of quantity) . But I am looking foreward to buying it when there is at least 6 different goldfish or one that reminds me of the goldfish I used to have. What would make me want to buy it today would be if I was able to choose what size you want the Goldfish. That would help in creating realsim since no two goldfish are alike. And I could have three smaller versions of the calico and the big momma swimming around.

But I have to say, this is the best beta screensaver I've ever seen =) Great job prolific =) Keep up the awesome work =)

P.S. Is The freshwater Tank by Jim going to have Goldfish that look like these??

And is the Goldfish aquarium going to balance itself out with a few other extra fish to make the tank look more natural. I love the way the Goldfish look by themselves, but if it were my home tank, I would drop in a tetra, guppy, and a gourami.

Thanks for the interesting link Reichart. But, I must say I think there might be a bug involved. I've never had any crashing in any of the Aquarium products in either regular mode or wireframe before, and usually get fairly high frame rates. And I have them all, SSA, AR, SA GA. Of course there's always a first time and it might be the ATI card, but it might be something to look into. Regardless, I've got an easy fix for myself...I just won't put it in wireframe mode and problem solved!

Rob

I have a GeForce4 MX440 and my system also frequently requires a hard power-off shutdown

From other thread! .....
CPU ........ AMD K6-2 500MHz 448RAM
Windows .... 98SE
Motherboard. TMC AI5VG+ 100Mz (VIA MVP3)
Video card . GeForce4 MX440 64mb AGP (Driver 4.13.01.3140)
Sound card . Sound Blaster AWE-32 (Driver 4.38.16)
DirectX .... Version 8.1b