I've struggled with myself for a few weeks now if this topic would be any use posting but i think it's something worthy of being discussed.

I know that gampleay/balancing issues should be the main concern but i still don't want graphical issues getting drowned in the Corvette/Vasari/Red button firestorms completely .


As soon after i started playing the beta i did notice that the texture size of certain ships was dialed down considerably.
Ironclad partially managed to disguise this by limiting the maximum zoom level, fair enough.

But still, some ships like the Advent Flak Vessel look downright atrocious, even without cheating the zoom mechanic by crawling upon it via arrow keys.

And although i sit firmly in the gameplay>graphics camp, it still puzzles me, that Rebellion seems to be the only expansion coming to mind where the graphics are getting worse in some department futher down the production line.

Don't get me wrong, the new shadows and reflections (although some ships look like being made from a solid block of glass, but that's another story) look nice, but i don't know if "nice" is enough to warrant some of the very muddy new textures.


After searching the forums for answers i stumbled upon this old thread https://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/420665 that explains why this cut was made, apparently the 32 bit and 2 gb limit again.


But a small subjective albeit not entirely unimportant part, why i was drawn to Sins years ago, was a good amount of errm... "ship porn" .
Glancing at my gorgeous little toys during a quiet moment didn't get old even after hundreds of games.


So, for what do i want to plead here?
Is there a possibility, that maybe some option to restore the closest zoom and texture level could be integrated before (or even after) release (remember how of an impact the high res texture pack for Skyrim had)... even if it would be paired with a "Warning, using this in MP and/or huge maps will certainly blow up your game, use at own risk exclamation mark" popup?

Or at least redo some of the most ugly textures to look a bit more decent?


I know, all of this can be easily countered by the "during endgame you won't notice individual ships let alone their textures" but if we go down that route we could dismiss the new shadowing system too, arguing that you won't notice it bar some erratic shadows cast on your titan now and then.
And, taken this counter to extreme, why don't ditch all graphics alltogether, the max out zoom sprites would be sufficient and free loads of performance for other things.

Sorry for the brickwall of text and i'm curious for your responses.