How detailed can a map be in torque??
by Gabriel Perez · in Artist Corner · 12/03/2001 (1:08 pm) · 10 replies
Hello people, hows life been?
I have a question, when mapping for the torque engine, would you be able to make small urban map type with buildings with every floor opened? Like every room, passageway, floor, can be passed through and not lag much? I know adding too much details can make the whole thing lag ontop.
Talking about small, I am talking about alot more bigger than the cs map called de_dust.
I have a question, when mapping for the torque engine, would you be able to make small urban map type with buildings with every floor opened? Like every room, passageway, floor, can be passed through and not lag much? I know adding too much details can make the whole thing lag ontop.
Talking about small, I am talking about alot more bigger than the cs map called de_dust.
#2
12/03/2001 (1:25 pm)
It was touched upon in this thread. But the base answer is yes. From seeing the structures used in Tribes 2 and my own tests with WorldCraft, I really think it's possible. It all stands on the shoulders of the mission designer and structure artist to use the proper techniques (maybe even innovate in areas) and optimize it. It'll be alot more work than just building a map for the Half-Life engine. But even then, you'll have prettier skies in the TGE. ;) Heh
#3
12/03/2001 (1:35 pm)
I haven't gotten around to fully experimenting with TGE yet, but oh pl-ea-ea-ea-eeeease let it not have a heart-attack when I feed it too much. The game I plan to make it really going to push the limits and try to keep up with the times. Sure, FPS on my machine will make it choppy as, but just as long as it still runs and is semi-playable. I would hate for it to crash with such detail, making it impossible to even attempt. My heart would shatter.
#4
I placed 144 of the same tribes 2 building in a map and loaded it. On my athlon 1.2Ghz machine it took approximately 12 minutes to load the map and the memory usage was in the 1.5Gb mark. Once I got into the map, the fps was fine though.
I then did the same thing with the pyramid model from the torque default maps. It loaded in about 10 seconds and memory usage was normal.
Now the only difference in these two tests was the fact that there is no need to calculate interior lighting and interior areas.
I have created a basic city map with little to no interiors and it runs fine. I think if you wanted a city where you could get into every building though, you may have troubles.
Anyone have any more information on this?
12/03/2001 (2:01 pm)
I ran some experiments with some tribes 2 buildings.I placed 144 of the same tribes 2 building in a map and loaded it. On my athlon 1.2Ghz machine it took approximately 12 minutes to load the map and the memory usage was in the 1.5Gb mark. Once I got into the map, the fps was fine though.
I then did the same thing with the pyramid model from the torque default maps. It loaded in about 10 seconds and memory usage was normal.
Now the only difference in these two tests was the fact that there is no need to calculate interior lighting and interior areas.
I have created a basic city map with little to no interiors and it runs fine. I think if you wanted a city where you could get into every building though, you may have troubles.
Anyone have any more information on this?
#5
Subsequent runs of that mission should have been much faster though, as the mission lighting is cached.
12/03/2001 (5:22 pm)
If all 144 buildings where instances of the same building, then it seems the loading should be pretty fast. Thee lighting time could be very slow though, especially if the shapes are complex.... when you say it took 12 minutes to load the map, was most of that time in the lighting?Subsequent runs of that mission should have been much faster though, as the mission lighting is cached.
#6
12/03/2001 (7:53 pm)
Is it possible to distribute the cached lighting with your game, or is it system/graphics card dependent?
#7
Most of the time was in lighting but the thing that worried me was it used 1.5Gb of memory.
My poor hdd was swapping so hard it could hardly do anything else :/
12/03/2001 (10:31 pm)
You are right Tim,Most of the time was in lighting but the thing that worried me was it used 1.5Gb of memory.
My poor hdd was swapping so hard it could hardly do anything else :/
#8
12/04/2001 (12:20 pm)
hey thx for the answering! I finally bought the torque engine. I haven't test it out yet, man installing this baby is sure going to cost alot of time.
#9
If the building did have thousands of potential items to be loaded, can you find out how much ram each item took up? E.g. Load map with one building, then 10, then 100 and guess.
I would guess another way of handling this might be to modify the mission loading to calculate lighting of all installed missions on game install & cache the results. From there, you could load parts of the interiors based on proximity to the appropriate portal, although that might be slower in game.
In the "real world", however, Houston has about 30 large downtown buildings, 50-90 stories each. That is a fraction of what you loaded in the game, but it represents about tens of millions square feet.
My thinking was to create somewhat smaller urban maps, but smooth out the connection transition between servers to accomplish the goal of a large, but seamless map.
Anyhow, perhaps we can compare notes sometime.
Andy
12/04/2001 (12:39 pm)
That seems strage that it took so much ram. According to the overview in the docs, the engine loads a single instance of the item and then only references it from that point on. If the building did have thousands of potential items to be loaded, can you find out how much ram each item took up? E.g. Load map with one building, then 10, then 100 and guess.
I would guess another way of handling this might be to modify the mission loading to calculate lighting of all installed missions on game install & cache the results. From there, you could load parts of the interiors based on proximity to the appropriate portal, although that might be slower in game.
In the "real world", however, Houston has about 30 large downtown buildings, 50-90 stories each. That is a fraction of what you loaded in the game, but it represents about tens of millions square feet.
My thinking was to create somewhat smaller urban maps, but smooth out the connection transition between servers to accomplish the goal of a large, but seamless map.
Anyhow, perhaps we can compare notes sometime.
Andy
#10
12/04/2001 (12:50 pm)
Take a look at this map design for the game I am currently creating http://www.shockrealm.com/matrix/lockesmapdesign.jpg I am wondering if you'd atleast be able to map the buildings at the side of the highway? It should take a while but how the way it seems, it'll be too much. 
Torque Owner Jeff Trier
Simple Distractions Software
I would venture a guess and say that as long as you make good use of portals and keep your buildings Exterior face counts down, you should be able to make a city. But this is a pseudo BSP newbie talking.
-Jeff