Game Development Community

Terrain rendering over statics

by Daniel Thornton · in Torque Game Engine · 07/09/2005 (10:57 pm) · 3 replies

Second post here in 20 minutes, and I can't find and don't think there's an answer to this, but the forums are here so I'll ask. I have a problem with terrain underneath dts static shapes rendering over the shapes when mid to far away in the level. It always happens when the terrain level is close to the top of the shape (it's a road) but it never is actually over the shape. I understand that this is a deal with it problem in 3d rendering in a lot of programs, but is proximity the only thing affecting this? Is there some sort of terrain priority in the rendering?
NextNext Thread
PrevPrevious Thread
More from Torque Game Engine


Associate Kyle Carter
#1
07/10/2005 (3:14 am)
The Torque terrain engine (like most terrain engines) does continuous level of detail in order to be able to render what would otherwise be an excessively large number of polygons.

What this means is that further away areas are rendered with fewer polygons.

The side effect of this is that the terrain is effectively moving in imperceptible ways all the time. Imperceptible, but occasionally enough to "cover" a small object that is resting on top of it.

Without touching C++, there's not a whole lot you can do. You can try emptying squares covered by the road, or making sure that the terrain under the road and surrounding areas really is under the road - your problem sounds like you have the terrain under the road but then some adjacent terrain actually rises above the level of the road.

Torque Owner Daniel Thornton
#2
07/10/2005 (9:30 am)
Thanks for answering, makes sense now.

Torque Owner Clark Fagot
#3
07/10/2005 (9:33 am)
You could also try turning off continuous level of detail by setting your screen error to 0 ($pref::terrain::screenError, I think). Of course, then you hit that "excessively large number of polygons" issue Ben mentioned.