Honest Feedback: Enhancing Predecessor’s Visuals and Player Engagement for the Future

[fossil turtle]

I wanted to share some thoughts from myself and a group of dedicated Predecessor players. We've enjoyed the game and appreciate the hard work, but there are areas that need attention as we move forward.

1. Visual Improvements (Map & Environment)
While Predecessor has improved, its visuals feel behind current standards. The ground textures seem outdated, almost like an old PS3 game. Enhancing these textures and adding grass movement or dynamic environmental effects could make the world feel more alive. The jungle needs more atmosphere, such as fog, lighting variation, or denser foliage to make it feel distinct. Overall, the map areas feel too similar, and more visual contrast would help with immersion.

In comparison, Paragon on Unreal Engine 4 for PS4 managed to create a more immersive world with dynamic lighting and detailed foliage. Despite Unreal Engine 5’s capabilities, we’re seeing less environmental detail in Predecessor, which feels like a step back. We understand Unreal Engine 5 is new and appreciate the focus on performance, but there are ways to improve game quality without sacrificing optimization.

2. User Interface (UI) Design
The current UI feels more suited to a mobile game rather than a PC/console MOBA. The old UI was more functional, and we'd love to see a return to a polished, higher-quality interface.

3. Map Evolution & Visual Upgrades
Many players are asking for a new map, but we believe the current one is fine in terms of layout. What we really need are environmental visual improvements. For example, the Brawl map looks simplistic and lacks depth. Upgrading the current map with better lighting and environmental effects would elevate the experience without the need for a complete redesign.

4. Monetization Strategy
The focus on recolor skins for monetization feels like a missed opportunity. We believe adding emotes would provide better value and engagement for players, while still offering a revenue stream. More creative cosmetics would be a welcome improvement over recolors.

5. Communication & Roadmap
One of the biggest frustrations is the lack of communication about the game's future. After the full release, we expected a roadmap with upcoming features, heroes, gameplay changes, and ranked updates. So far, there’s no clear plan, which makes it hard to stay excited. Regular updates or posts about what's in development would keep the community engaged.

Considering the size of the team, the communication and update frequency feel too slow. Clear and consistent communication could help manage player expectations and build trust.

Conclusion
We love Predecessor and want to see it succeed. Addressing these visual, monetization, and communication issues would improve the player experience and help the game thrive. We hope this feedback helps and look forward to future updates.

Thanks again for all the hard work!

[glossy notch]

+1

[tawdry flower]

bump cos https://discord.com/channels/389767672151146498/1300311849916436551

[steady oracle]

How is everyones performance in predecessor? While it mostly runs fine for me I get really bad stuttering especially in the beginning of matches/during team fights. It makes the game feel really bad to play. i got a pretty decent system too. RTX 3090/Ryzen 5800x.

[earnest mulch]

This post was really good and gave great examples of how Predecessor still have to improve graphically in several departments as Map, HUD and main menu UI

[dusk vessel]

Stable 100fps with rare drops to 30 in huge team fights, none stutters were noticed at the beginning 3060/5700x/hdd

[thin lance]

Try updating video drivers if they are not turn post processing to low and effects to low and restart game this made my stutters completely vanish
Game still looks great!

[raven ridge]

Okay Grass in Pred!?

[pastel remnant]

The color and aesthetic of the main menu UI sucks, the old one when Pred was still only on PC was much more professional looking AND the blue fog stage of the menu sucks, I liked seeing the another spot of the map or rather just “Sanctuary” detailed areas in the background. What happened to seeing a whole turret and minions running out to die in the menu? Felt more alive

Whoever is in charge of the UI design, thank you for making it easier to use and simpler to understand but why at the cost of character and quality?

Also can the background in the draft not be the fog or mist realm whatever it is? I’d rather it show me the side I’m on instead of having to read or be told my side. Draft screen should be in a room that looks like Dusk or Dawn side, not specifically in Sanctuary though

[static jetty]

I don't remember where I read it but, the main menu had to be simplified a shitton for PS4, since its idle power usage was rather huge

[fossil turtle]

I don't know what it is, but in Paragon, no matter how many games I played, win or lose, I didn't get bored and quit.

But with Predecessor, the only fun part is winning. The main menu makes me want to close the game and not play again until next time.

Or am I wrong?

[raven ridge]

Super right, it's different as soon as you are ingame

[fossil turtle]

That's why many original Paragon streamers might not even know that Paragon is back under the name Predecessor. I asked one well-known streamer, Myth, why he doesn’t play Predecessor, and his response was that Predecessor doesn’t feel the same as Paragon.

We know the devs are trying to attract players from the Smite and LoL communities because they’re large and established, but in doing so, they don’t realize they’re killing what makes Predecessor unique. Paragon had over 97k players at its peak because it was different from other MOBAs. So why is Predecessor heading in the wrong direction, trying to imitate instead of standing out?

[remote holly]

It was literally addicting

[karmic fulcrum]

nostalgia if paragon lasted till now u would have the same feeling

[thin lance]

Meh

I wouldn't say thier trying to copy them Tbh this is litterally slightly bigger monolith map with

league of legends item system that they seem to be slowly tuning to fit thier game better.

I wouldn't say it's a dirrect copy. In terms of copying smite either. As monolith played very similar to this.

[wet hollow]

Nostalgia + you were 8 years younger. World/times were different. Gamings more addicting when you’re younger.

Less responsibility back then and less developed brain (unless you were 26+ in 2016)

[thin lance]

They need to get away from monolith and give us an inbetween which i think is what this map might have started as but as movespeed and such got tweaked the smaller and smaller the map got. But also their next map needs the natural elevation legacy provided.

Jungle under the lane makes the play making when entering lanes much more Interesting.

[fossil turtle]

I was 18 in 2016

[fossil turtle]

Totally agreed with that
I rally missed this jungle sound from legacy map

[raven ridge]

I think Predecessor is taking this ride like a bamboo shot, takes a little bit of time underground but shoots up in no time

[raven ridge]

Honest & Reliable

[night basin]

this, im 35yo and in all my life only one game got me that addicted and that was og paragon, especially during legacy map. this game was so ahead of its time and still would be.

[wraith bloom]

Really enjoyed reading this and i agree. Step by step we’re making it !

[fossil turtle]

I don’t understand why the devs aren’t more open about map or UI changes. Or what? … “going to ruin the hype”? It feels like each new update is less exciting when you start playing and see minimal work done, with new bugs appearing. Every update feels the same.

Another thing is the UI menu. I remember they mentioned it to us, but we didn’t complain about how ugly the new UI menu would be. Why didn’t the devs create a poll on Discord to ask us about the UI menu changes?

[small oriole]

Why didn’t the devs create a poll on Discord to ask us about the UI menu changes?

They quite literally did

https://discord.com/channels/389767672151146498/1295451973126193273

[fossil turtle]

Or did I miss the opportunity to vote, or am I just too old to remember?

[small oriole]

theres no poll

but theres a thread

and feysky has been pretty active on other threads about UI changes

[fossil turtle]

That’s why most users prefer to see things in announcements rather than sitting and reading through all the threads.

[earnest mulch]

I think he is talking about original Predecessor UI vs the reworked UI we got on September 2023

feysky, is doing changes now, and she is engaging with the community which is something great, but that is something that Omeda could have done at any moment of the past 2 years, but they prefer to maintain silent and say nothing, like if they are going to ruin the hype or something, which is the point Yizfe was making in his first comment

[fossil turtle]

My point is that the devs should use polls in the announcements on Discord, so we can all vote on changes or new features. It would help them see if the community’s on board with their ideas. They could also add a #thread with each poll for us to share more detailed feedback. I’m not much of a Reddit guy, but they could include the Reddit link as well.

[dusk vessel]

It seems to me that during the draft, the map should load in the background, so that after choosing all the characters, we are seamlessly immersed in the gameplay, or, at the very least, through a short cutscene with the appearance of the core and characters

[earnest mulch]

Before the UI rework it was like that, the charge was so fast that we could not see the new character art in the new game loading screen XD

[cursive fog]

Damn, a very good idea.
Why they haven't implemented such a thing yet in the game is something I don't understand.
Especially for a full release title it would who care for the game.

What a shame they haven't added it yet.

[vale kindle]

My pc is already dying because of bad optimization, crashes all the time in the map, before this was not happening

[fossil turtle]

https://youtu.be/sBUK5pZenRM?si=vsT4U9NVCJoRCsnO
Why this old video from pred jungle looks and sound better

[trim zealot]

Why does Paragon look better over 8 years later 😭

[earnest mulch]

They could drop this trailer now, and it would feel like a new graphical improvement with better illumination and extra details in the map

Ngl I prefer this jungle buff layout over the wall we have right now

[fossil turtle]

I dot get it this video was posted 3 years ago from omeda but the jungle doesn't look like the video

[earnest mulch]

It looked like that before, then they did the migration to Unreal Engine 5, and we got a downgrade in the visuals of the game

Here a gameplay from 2021 the Stress test https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YdlMC27gc9Y

There are things that got improved, as its normal with the development of a game, but other things as the illumination, the textures reflections of the material feel like got a downgrade

Now

Then

In the video looks better, and in person would look even better than in video

[night basin]

man its insane how ue5 made the game visually worse

[static jetty]

They make 0 use of the new features is why

[earnest mulch]

And the assets they are using were built for UE4 so its normal for them to look better in UE4

[static jetty]

A lot of it is simply having matching post-processing, fog, lighting

UE5 needs some modification to properly have good prebuilt lighting

[earnest mulch]

Probably are just thing that should have been redone or refined to work properly with the new engine version, but that they didn't so it ended looking worse instead of better with the engine version upgrade

[fossil turtle]

What they need is to hire someone experienced with UE5

[wet hollow]

Yeah they should find someone with 10+ years of experience with UE5

[night basin]

2years after ue5 upgrade, some people finish a complete study during that time... im no expert in ue5 but i imagine it being as complex as shown in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YzdYv2e2K0k maybe someone more experienced can explain to us why it is so hard to create proper visuals in ue5, when you basicly have the map already build and you only need to tweak some elments from it to look good.

i dont expect them to do everything at once but man at least a few improvement steps shouldve been done. i would love to see them making use of light themed to the dusk dawn site of the map. like actually adding dusk or dawn when either team has orb or something. something dynamic.

[trim zealot]

I really don’t quite get it. How does a game look better during a stress test than in full release

I know UE5 is shit, but that’s no excuse. The devs here aren’t even leveraging a lot of UE5 tech to begin with. At least though the game isn’t completely unoptimized garbo that relies on DLSS/FSR for decent performance.

[remote chasm]

U can get better graphic by going to unreal folder