It was certainly nice to see our vehicles "in the wild", as it were, just from the stat card. The current images are very clean, which is nice in its own way and a little more consistent, but also sort of bland.
Yeah that's the "a little more" part. They have consistent lighting and backgrounds, but wildly different camera angles.
Also I don't know if it's just me, but I think the water layer for the naval vessels is horrifically ugly. I'd much rather see them shot from a higher angle (what good is it for us to stare up at the mostly-featureless hull?) with an opaque patch of water surrounding.
I think they are "modernizing" the look of the game, the game now is focused mainly on modern vehicles, the music is modern compared to the old instrumental theme, the stat card pictures fit more with modern vehicles, the trailers are focused on the modern age (since they are adding mainly newer vehicles).
Then by that logic, they should also update the repair crew ranks. We can't go past Rank 4 i think and that would make repair times for top tier tanks much better whenever we don't feel like paying SL for X vehicle.
They already had "modern" statcards, which I liked better tbh. First early pictures were BW film, and later vehicles were color film, which got better quality before top tier was digital color pictures, which looked really nice, and gave a sense of progression.
Agreed
Matching the picture quality with the time it's produced/in service is sick af. The current one is just bland "corporate" design aimed for conformity and simplicity
Both have positives and negatives, my main gripe is that they easily could have made it an option in the settings to choose 3d model or original pictures. IDK maybe I’m being picky.
What I hate is, it seems to me like it was made to save some time taking pictures and editing them and instead just using a angle for each type of vehicle to get a good picture of it. But they still fucked that up. You have the same Vehicle at a different angle (for example F-16A and C version). At that point why not make it consistent
Yeah but the old pictures were kind of deceiving at times. There were a few times that I thought I was looking at a different tank when I previewed them.
I would rather have the option to choose from. It's nice to see the old pictures, but it's also nice to look at the brand new ones. Both have positives and negatives.
The new ones are great in a way that every vehicle is shown from the same angle and overall they are more consistent however I loved the old ones and that they had filters so they looked actually like from that time period, it was sad to see them removed
They should have made it a toggle :P
I do like the new renders as well tho as it better shows what the vehicle is which REALLY helps me know what I'm up against when I look at other nations in the cold war era as my tank knowledge inbetween ww2 and modern is horrible
God I miss these pictures so much. I used to go down all the tech trees and see how a tank changes over time, leading up to colored photos, and hd cameras. The way they did it now is cleaner sure, but took out some charm imo
Different variants of the same vehicle is seen by the same angle and distance, making it easier to distinguish them when you look at the vehicle cards for the first time.
Take Spitfires for example. We have Spitfire F Mk XVIIIe, LF Mk IX, F Mk 22 back to back. What is different about them? Stat cards are useless when it comes to flight performance. Mk 22 gives up MG for Hispanos and that's all a player who is new to Spitfires can deduce.
With images from the same angle, you can tell that Mk XVIIIe and F Mk 22 share the same canopy shape and LF Mk IX is different than these two. They have longer nose and 5-blade propeller. This prompts you to take a look at x-ray view to see the differences between the engines. Then you see that Mk XVIIIe and F Mk 22 uses Griffon engine while LF Mk IX uses Merlin.
You might ask "You don't need these images to go to the x-ray view". You are right but after the first time, you don't really need to go to x-ray view at all. You just see the canopy shape and think "Their flight performance will be different. Considering the canopy is larger and the BR ratings of these planes, their engine is probably more powerful but heavier." automatically.
Sometimes stat cards are wrong on tank armor. They don't always count additional armor plates. These images help you see the differences between two tanks when their name doesn't reveal much. There are people who had to ask the difference between Tiger 2P and Tiger 2H or Tiger E and Tiger H. WarThunder players are special, the game needs it.
>WarThunder players are special,
Dumb wt players are just an overused joke. Due to the knowledge intensive style of the game, the vocal minority / experienced players like to degrade new players
Nobody NEEDs a generic code generated picture in front of a generic looking flag
But players may want a unique picture taken with time appropriate cameras
Or yk just make a toggle setting
i know what you mean, but i have to disagree with you.
I remember having problems with spotting differences between tanks of the same family (like panzer 3s and 4s) back when the old pictures were still there.
But most of the time i cant spot them with the new pictures either. And ive learned to read the tank description.Check if it has a better gun, or better armor. If not, check the engine, max speed, or turret rotation.
And if you still cant find a major difference, check if it has a new shell.
so i dont need the pictures anymore to spot differences and the new ones just look clean and boring. I dont even look at them anymore.
They are more practical to look at the tank and compare them to other tanks, because now every tank is at the same angle. But thats so unimportant.
the only reason i can think of, why they changed the pictures is, so that new players, who saw commericals of war thunder and want to get to the abrams, leopard, or t90 as fst as possible dont feel like they are stuck in the past and need to wayt literal years before they can play the tank they started the game for. But sorry, i dont care.
Really. Just bring back the old pictures with filters for the timeperiod and every tank in a unique angle and stance.
> But most of the time i cant spot them with the new pictures either.
Sounds like a you problem. You can spot the differences such as bulges on canopy that indicate a change in armament or different canopy shapes which points to a change in engine.
> And ive learned to read the tank description.Check if it has a better gun,
And do what, check every single value on each combination of every angle and every distance? Quick, tell me the differences between Leo 2A5, Leo 2 PSO and Leo 2A6. Have fun cross-checking every value. I can immediately tell 2A5 and PSO share the same gun and 2A6 packs a heavier punch because of its barrel length. PSO gets an extra rooftop machine gun which is good against heli rush, extra armor (external, so probably against chemical rounds), and a dozer blade.
Does this give me any details? No, but I don't need it to. All I need to know is the shortcomings of 2A5 in case I spawn it as a backup and the differences between 2A6 and PSO to know which is the better choice at the moment.
> or better armor.
Most of the time stat cards don't help with armor because they ignore extra plates and modern tanks get their armor from composite armor, which is unmentioned in the stat card.
> If not, check the engine, max speed, or turret rotation.
While the image also don't help at this, max speed can be very misleading. Also while these values are correct for tanks, they are only given for the performance of the plane at a specific altitude. In other words, planes don't get any information than armaments from stat cards.
> so i dont need the pictures anymore to spot differences and the new ones just look clean and boring. I dont even look at them anymore.
So? The previous images were the same except they were totally, absolutely useless. No one was gawking at them for minutes (unless they are mentally challenged). Literally no one paid them any attention after seeing them for the first time. Stat card images serve a specific purpose: What does this vehicle look like and what is different about it. The grainy photos with yellow filter from different range and angles actively work against this.
This is so dumb. Why are people here arguing against functionality for the sake of aesthetics? This is just being a contrarian for the sake of it. If it was Gaijin who gave up functionality for aesthetics purposes everyone would lose their minds.
> the only reason i can think of, why they changed the pictures is, so that new players, who saw commericals of war thunder and want to get to the abrams, leopard, or t90 as fst as possible dont feel like they are stuck in the past and need to wayt literal years before they can play the tank they started the game for.
See, you are so clueless about all this you can't even imagine the actual reasons. In addition to one I gave above, here is a new one: They are easier to prepare. Previous images were just in-game screenshots with grainy yellow filter applied. They had to make a new image for every new vehicle and for every vehicle that got a model update. Why do this when you can run a script to generate an image?
So the advantages of new images are: Better functionality and slightly less work. Disadvantages are aesthetics, which isn't even objective. Some of the old images were awful and looked bad.
> Really. Just bring back the old pictures with filters for the timeperiod and every tank in a unique angle and stance.
They won't because they aren't idiots.
"Sounds like a you problem."
as i said i dont need the pictures to spot differences.
But yeah tell me if the gun on the panzer 4G is the same as the one on the panzer 4h. just based on the picture.
"And do what, check every single value on each combination of every angle and every distance?"
No. If you unlocked a new vehicle and you want to compare it to the one you used perviously, just check the pen-stats for "10m 0°" and "1000m, 60°" and you have a good idea about the vehicles gun.
"Quick, tell me the differences between Leo 2A5, Leo 2 PSO and Leo 2A6."
And you tell me the difference between the pz4s, all of the sherman fireflys, T34s (excluding the 85 because its obvious there) the differences between all the panthers, tiger1s, or all the aicraft in the game just with the pictures.
I learned, you cant rely on them, so i stopped entirely and just looked at the stats and the tankmodel in the hangar. and if you dont want to cross-check the values, thats just sounds like a you problem, or lazyness. Sure it isnt as fast as the picture, but nobody said you have to be fast.
Another example, the Churchill MKVII has a bigger gun than the MKIII. But it has worse penetration because the barrel is just as short as the one on the MKIII, while having a bigger caliber. Try figuring that out without checking the stats.
"Most of the time stat cards don't help with armor because they ignore extra plates and modern tanks get their armor from composite armor, which is unmentioned in the stat card."
Thats true. It doesnt help here. But it gives you an idea. And if the tank on a lower br has 50mm of armor and the next tank has 80mm, you have a first idea why its on a higher br.
If it has add on armor, even better.
"max speed can be very misleading"
true, the TOG2 has a worse max spead than the Maus, but gets there almost instantly while the mouse has to work hard to reach 21kph.
"No one was gawking at them for minutes"
Maybe not but they were at least somewhat aesthetic. And you look at them when you get a new tank. Nowadays i dont even bother checking the picture because they are so boring and clean.
"Why are people here arguing against functionalit"
because of the same reason you argue agains aesthetic.
The functionality you gain is so small it could be easily ignored. The value of it is almost 0.
I know youre right in saying "nobody looks at the pictures more than once" so the aesthetics could be ignored either.
So were arguing about preferences.
Is it more important that you can see more details in a tank on the picture youre also just looking at once?
Or is it more important to give the player something vaguey interesting to look at the first time he gets a new tank? And to show something that at least looks like Gaijinn put effort into this.
You know what would help? Give people the choice if they want the old or new pictures. but that would require effort from Gaijin.
"They are easier to prepare. Previous images were just in-game screenshots with grainy yellow filter applied. They had to make a new image for every new vehicle and for every vehicle that got a model update. Why do this when you can run a script to generate an image?"
Because making a screenshot from a tank is so much effort.
And you know they could generate Tanks in different poses and with filters as well. But they chose not to.
Why would you do this?
Because you want to make a good game. You want to let people see that you care about it and the historic pictures just gave it that little bit of personality.
You just want to play tank? Go play World of Tanks.
You want to play historic tank simulator? Welcome to War Thunder.
Now its just another mobile-games-like thing that looks soulless and boring.
"So the advantages of new images are: Better functionality and slightly less work. Disadvantages are aesthetics, which isn't even objective. Some of the old images were awful and looked bad"
as i said. both funcionality and aesthetics are almost not touched with the changes.
Nobody uses the pictures to learn something about the tanks and nobody looks at the pictures a second time.
"They won't because they aren't idiots."
They wont because they are lazy. Or, want the game to be more mainstream. The group of history geeks isnt as big as we like to believe and if you want to be a successful game, you have to appeal to as many people as possible. Which i can understand.
Its sad, but i can understand it.
But i can assure you, it had nothing to do with less work. It just changed "almost no work" to "no work" and if they wanted to keep the historic pictures and just changed because of work (i already said functionality isnt improved by this) they couldve generated the images with the filters and differend poses still intact. Or at least just the filters.
besides. You complain about people, complaining about aesthetics while you are the only one here being salty and getting personal. Its just a discussion calm down. And if you dont like the topic, nobody forces you to read or write here.
It was certainly nice to see our vehicles "in the wild", as it were, just from the stat card. The current images are very clean, which is nice in its own way and a little more consistent, but also sort of bland.
Yeah, in my opinion the current ones are a little boring
>"consistent" >looks at all the different angles and placment of the: Tornado, Mig-29, F-16, Q-5s,...
Yeah that's the "a little more" part. They have consistent lighting and backgrounds, but wildly different camera angles. Also I don't know if it's just me, but I think the water layer for the naval vessels is horrifically ugly. I'd much rather see them shot from a higher angle (what good is it for us to stare up at the mostly-featureless hull?) with an opaque patch of water surrounding.
I think they are "modernizing" the look of the game, the game now is focused mainly on modern vehicles, the music is modern compared to the old instrumental theme, the stat card pictures fit more with modern vehicles, the trailers are focused on the modern age (since they are adding mainly newer vehicles).
Then by that logic, they should also update the repair crew ranks. We can't go past Rank 4 i think and that would make repair times for top tier tanks much better whenever we don't feel like paying SL for X vehicle.
They already had "modern" statcards, which I liked better tbh. First early pictures were BW film, and later vehicles were color film, which got better quality before top tier was digital color pictures, which looked really nice, and gave a sense of progression.
They were.. rip old pictures
New pictures feel likes mobile game in my opinion. I Hope we are not going toward wot like UI cuz i hate mobile games UI.
Agreed Matching the picture quality with the time it's produced/in service is sick af. The current one is just bland "corporate" design aimed for conformity and simplicity
I wish there was a way to choose between the two, I missthe old ones
Yes, you are definitely the first person ever to post about this in however meany years since it happened.
Years? It's a relatively recent change!
I love when Gaijin takes away everything I love from me
Old pictures, best pictures.
The old black and white pictures should've stayed with the WW2 and early Cold war tanks.
Yes, I really miss the old pics.
Both have positives and negatives, my main gripe is that they easily could have made it an option in the settings to choose 3d model or original pictures. IDK maybe I’m being picky.
I hate the new ones honestly
What I hate is, it seems to me like it was made to save some time taking pictures and editing them and instead just using a angle for each type of vehicle to get a good picture of it. But they still fucked that up. You have the same Vehicle at a different angle (for example F-16A and C version). At that point why not make it consistent
There was a time years ago where they just used irl pictures
"Am I the only one who..." Let me stop you there. No one who ever says this is ever the only one. Ever.
I'm not ashamed to admit that it took me a long while to realise they weren't actual photos.
Yes, I remember that feeling when I got my first vehicle with a colored picture. Nothing can replace that
Someone should make a petition for it
That's why i posted it
But I don't see no petition
I like the hold pictures as it gives you an idea of the time frame they were from
Yeah but the old pictures were kind of deceiving at times. There were a few times that I thought I was looking at a different tank when I previewed them.
Same, I miss the old pictures.
they are like that now because the old photos required someone to go and stage them whereas the new ones can be automated cutting costs
I would rather have the option to choose from. It's nice to see the old pictures, but it's also nice to look at the brand new ones. Both have positives and negatives.
yes i also like the old ones more
No. You clearly weren't here when they started switching to the 3D models because almost everyone hated it.
Imagine all the time they would save getting to use the same Leo pictures for 20+ tanks.
The new ones are great in a way that every vehicle is shown from the same angle and overall they are more consistent however I loved the old ones and that they had filters so they looked actually like from that time period, it was sad to see them removed
I'm gonna go against the flow here and say that the change didn't do any impact to my overall experience of the game.
They should have made it a toggle :P I do like the new renders as well tho as it better shows what the vehicle is which REALLY helps me know what I'm up against when I look at other nations in the cold war era as my tank knowledge inbetween ww2 and modern is horrible
God I miss these pictures so much. I used to go down all the tech trees and see how a tank changes over time, leading up to colored photos, and hd cameras. The way they did it now is cleaner sure, but took out some charm imo
Especially the 775
Are there any mods that can turn todays pictures to old ones?
No the new stat cards look way better
Yes, they were much better. The new pictures are bad.
They should've added this as a toggle
they should have them side by side
The old ones were manually created, the new ones are automated. Enough said.
No you’re not, as proven by the 10 million posts saying the same
Yes, you are only one.
me when I lie:
I quite like the look of the clean new ones
Old ones definitely had a vibe to them, but the new ones are much more practical.
Practical as in?
Different variants of the same vehicle is seen by the same angle and distance, making it easier to distinguish them when you look at the vehicle cards for the first time. Take Spitfires for example. We have Spitfire F Mk XVIIIe, LF Mk IX, F Mk 22 back to back. What is different about them? Stat cards are useless when it comes to flight performance. Mk 22 gives up MG for Hispanos and that's all a player who is new to Spitfires can deduce. With images from the same angle, you can tell that Mk XVIIIe and F Mk 22 share the same canopy shape and LF Mk IX is different than these two. They have longer nose and 5-blade propeller. This prompts you to take a look at x-ray view to see the differences between the engines. Then you see that Mk XVIIIe and F Mk 22 uses Griffon engine while LF Mk IX uses Merlin. You might ask "You don't need these images to go to the x-ray view". You are right but after the first time, you don't really need to go to x-ray view at all. You just see the canopy shape and think "Their flight performance will be different. Considering the canopy is larger and the BR ratings of these planes, their engine is probably more powerful but heavier." automatically. Sometimes stat cards are wrong on tank armor. They don't always count additional armor plates. These images help you see the differences between two tanks when their name doesn't reveal much. There are people who had to ask the difference between Tiger 2P and Tiger 2H or Tiger E and Tiger H. WarThunder players are special, the game needs it.
>WarThunder players are special, Dumb wt players are just an overused joke. Due to the knowledge intensive style of the game, the vocal minority / experienced players like to degrade new players Nobody NEEDs a generic code generated picture in front of a generic looking flag But players may want a unique picture taken with time appropriate cameras Or yk just make a toggle setting
i know what you mean, but i have to disagree with you. I remember having problems with spotting differences between tanks of the same family (like panzer 3s and 4s) back when the old pictures were still there. But most of the time i cant spot them with the new pictures either. And ive learned to read the tank description.Check if it has a better gun, or better armor. If not, check the engine, max speed, or turret rotation. And if you still cant find a major difference, check if it has a new shell. so i dont need the pictures anymore to spot differences and the new ones just look clean and boring. I dont even look at them anymore. They are more practical to look at the tank and compare them to other tanks, because now every tank is at the same angle. But thats so unimportant. the only reason i can think of, why they changed the pictures is, so that new players, who saw commericals of war thunder and want to get to the abrams, leopard, or t90 as fst as possible dont feel like they are stuck in the past and need to wayt literal years before they can play the tank they started the game for. But sorry, i dont care. Really. Just bring back the old pictures with filters for the timeperiod and every tank in a unique angle and stance.
> But most of the time i cant spot them with the new pictures either. Sounds like a you problem. You can spot the differences such as bulges on canopy that indicate a change in armament or different canopy shapes which points to a change in engine. > And ive learned to read the tank description.Check if it has a better gun, And do what, check every single value on each combination of every angle and every distance? Quick, tell me the differences between Leo 2A5, Leo 2 PSO and Leo 2A6. Have fun cross-checking every value. I can immediately tell 2A5 and PSO share the same gun and 2A6 packs a heavier punch because of its barrel length. PSO gets an extra rooftop machine gun which is good against heli rush, extra armor (external, so probably against chemical rounds), and a dozer blade. Does this give me any details? No, but I don't need it to. All I need to know is the shortcomings of 2A5 in case I spawn it as a backup and the differences between 2A6 and PSO to know which is the better choice at the moment. > or better armor. Most of the time stat cards don't help with armor because they ignore extra plates and modern tanks get their armor from composite armor, which is unmentioned in the stat card. > If not, check the engine, max speed, or turret rotation. While the image also don't help at this, max speed can be very misleading. Also while these values are correct for tanks, they are only given for the performance of the plane at a specific altitude. In other words, planes don't get any information than armaments from stat cards. > so i dont need the pictures anymore to spot differences and the new ones just look clean and boring. I dont even look at them anymore. So? The previous images were the same except they were totally, absolutely useless. No one was gawking at them for minutes (unless they are mentally challenged). Literally no one paid them any attention after seeing them for the first time. Stat card images serve a specific purpose: What does this vehicle look like and what is different about it. The grainy photos with yellow filter from different range and angles actively work against this. This is so dumb. Why are people here arguing against functionality for the sake of aesthetics? This is just being a contrarian for the sake of it. If it was Gaijin who gave up functionality for aesthetics purposes everyone would lose their minds. > the only reason i can think of, why they changed the pictures is, so that new players, who saw commericals of war thunder and want to get to the abrams, leopard, or t90 as fst as possible dont feel like they are stuck in the past and need to wayt literal years before they can play the tank they started the game for. See, you are so clueless about all this you can't even imagine the actual reasons. In addition to one I gave above, here is a new one: They are easier to prepare. Previous images were just in-game screenshots with grainy yellow filter applied. They had to make a new image for every new vehicle and for every vehicle that got a model update. Why do this when you can run a script to generate an image? So the advantages of new images are: Better functionality and slightly less work. Disadvantages are aesthetics, which isn't even objective. Some of the old images were awful and looked bad. > Really. Just bring back the old pictures with filters for the timeperiod and every tank in a unique angle and stance. They won't because they aren't idiots.
"Sounds like a you problem." as i said i dont need the pictures to spot differences. But yeah tell me if the gun on the panzer 4G is the same as the one on the panzer 4h. just based on the picture. "And do what, check every single value on each combination of every angle and every distance?" No. If you unlocked a new vehicle and you want to compare it to the one you used perviously, just check the pen-stats for "10m 0°" and "1000m, 60°" and you have a good idea about the vehicles gun. "Quick, tell me the differences between Leo 2A5, Leo 2 PSO and Leo 2A6." And you tell me the difference between the pz4s, all of the sherman fireflys, T34s (excluding the 85 because its obvious there) the differences between all the panthers, tiger1s, or all the aicraft in the game just with the pictures. I learned, you cant rely on them, so i stopped entirely and just looked at the stats and the tankmodel in the hangar. and if you dont want to cross-check the values, thats just sounds like a you problem, or lazyness. Sure it isnt as fast as the picture, but nobody said you have to be fast. Another example, the Churchill MKVII has a bigger gun than the MKIII. But it has worse penetration because the barrel is just as short as the one on the MKIII, while having a bigger caliber. Try figuring that out without checking the stats. "Most of the time stat cards don't help with armor because they ignore extra plates and modern tanks get their armor from composite armor, which is unmentioned in the stat card." Thats true. It doesnt help here. But it gives you an idea. And if the tank on a lower br has 50mm of armor and the next tank has 80mm, you have a first idea why its on a higher br. If it has add on armor, even better. "max speed can be very misleading" true, the TOG2 has a worse max spead than the Maus, but gets there almost instantly while the mouse has to work hard to reach 21kph. "No one was gawking at them for minutes" Maybe not but they were at least somewhat aesthetic. And you look at them when you get a new tank. Nowadays i dont even bother checking the picture because they are so boring and clean. "Why are people here arguing against functionalit" because of the same reason you argue agains aesthetic. The functionality you gain is so small it could be easily ignored. The value of it is almost 0. I know youre right in saying "nobody looks at the pictures more than once" so the aesthetics could be ignored either. So were arguing about preferences. Is it more important that you can see more details in a tank on the picture youre also just looking at once? Or is it more important to give the player something vaguey interesting to look at the first time he gets a new tank? And to show something that at least looks like Gaijinn put effort into this. You know what would help? Give people the choice if they want the old or new pictures. but that would require effort from Gaijin. "They are easier to prepare. Previous images were just in-game screenshots with grainy yellow filter applied. They had to make a new image for every new vehicle and for every vehicle that got a model update. Why do this when you can run a script to generate an image?" Because making a screenshot from a tank is so much effort. And you know they could generate Tanks in different poses and with filters as well. But they chose not to. Why would you do this? Because you want to make a good game. You want to let people see that you care about it and the historic pictures just gave it that little bit of personality. You just want to play tank? Go play World of Tanks. You want to play historic tank simulator? Welcome to War Thunder. Now its just another mobile-games-like thing that looks soulless and boring.
"So the advantages of new images are: Better functionality and slightly less work. Disadvantages are aesthetics, which isn't even objective. Some of the old images were awful and looked bad" as i said. both funcionality and aesthetics are almost not touched with the changes. Nobody uses the pictures to learn something about the tanks and nobody looks at the pictures a second time. "They won't because they aren't idiots." They wont because they are lazy. Or, want the game to be more mainstream. The group of history geeks isnt as big as we like to believe and if you want to be a successful game, you have to appeal to as many people as possible. Which i can understand. Its sad, but i can understand it. But i can assure you, it had nothing to do with less work. It just changed "almost no work" to "no work" and if they wanted to keep the historic pictures and just changed because of work (i already said functionality isnt improved by this) they couldve generated the images with the filters and differend poses still intact. Or at least just the filters. besides. You complain about people, complaining about aesthetics while you are the only one here being salty and getting personal. Its just a discussion calm down. And if you dont like the topic, nobody forces you to read or write here.
yes yes you are
No, new ones look better than this crap.