Huge terrains not possible?
by Wysardry · in Torque Game Engine Advanced · 04/05/2009 (5:41 am) · 12 replies
I've spent the last few days trying to catch up on the changes since I last visited. Am I right in thinking that it will not be possible to create cross-platform games with huge terrains, as was hoped during the early development of TGEA?
I had been planning to create a game with an area of about 65,000 square miles (168,350 square kilometres), but it seems that Atlas is only an option for Windows users.
Is there any way of including a terrain of that size on multiple platforms using GG tools, or will I need to start searching for another engine?
I had been planning to create a game with an area of about 65,000 square miles (168,350 square kilometres), but it seems that Atlas is only an option for Windows users.
Is there any way of including a terrain of that size on multiple platforms using GG tools, or will I need to start searching for another engine?
#2
It's initially a PITA but you can place (link together) any number of Legacy terrain blocks as you may wish. MegaTerrains makes it a bit easier by allowing you to import a larger heightmap (512 x 512) which is split into 4 terrain blocks -- you can also add as many MegaTerrains as you wish.
Be warned that matching up seams is tedious to say the least.
HINT: graph paper will help you keep up with the placement of your terrain blocks. Once you know the positional offsets for each of your terrain blocks it will be easier in the future to align them.
04/05/2009 (12:27 pm)
Yes, it's true that Atlas terrains don't play nice with Macs.It's initially a PITA but you can place (link together) any number of Legacy terrain blocks as you may wish. MegaTerrains makes it a bit easier by allowing you to import a larger heightmap (512 x 512) which is split into 4 terrain blocks -- you can also add as many MegaTerrains as you wish.
Be warned that matching up seams is tedious to say the least.
HINT: graph paper will help you keep up with the placement of your terrain blocks. Once you know the positional offsets for each of your terrain blocks it will be easier in the future to align them.
#3
04/05/2009 (1:47 pm)
It isn't possible to place different terrain blocks next to each other so there is no repetition though, is it?
#4
To make it easier for the seams to line up in my latest experiment I created a 2048x heightmap and then split that up into 16 different heightmaps for use on 16 different terrain blocks -- 4X the size of one MegaTerrain!
04/05/2009 (2:09 pm)
You can use different heightmaps for every individual terrain block.To make it easier for the seams to line up in my latest experiment I created a 2048x heightmap and then split that up into 16 different heightmaps for use on 16 different terrain blocks -- 4X the size of one MegaTerrain!
#5
04/05/2009 (3:02 pm)
Were you able to place textures in different positions on each terrain block too? If I placed a grass texture (for example) in the top left square on one terrain block, I probably wouldn't want it in the same place on all the others.
#6
04/05/2009 (3:41 pm)
Yeah, all editing, whether it was terrain or texture editing happened on the relevant terrain. The procedural painting/editing tools only work on the 1st Terrain block, but any hand editing/painting will occur as normal where you direct it.
#7
04/05/2009 (3:49 pm)
Oh, and as a side note: each individual terrain block can not only have a specific position, they can have specific sizes (squareSize), and you can also rotate them -- think cliffs or even "overhead" for a cave setting.
#8
I vaguely remember someone posting code which would place different textures depending on terrain height, but I don't recall if it was for TGE or TGEA.
04/05/2009 (5:55 pm)
Thanks. Hopefully some of the process can be automated as there would be tens of thousands of terrain blocks to edit.I vaguely remember someone posting code which would place different textures depending on terrain height, but I don't recall if it was for TGE or TGEA.
#9
I can remember a Terrain Textures By Latitude resource, but out of the box Torque can already procedurally paint by height and/or slope. Again, the procedural tools only worked on the 1st terrain in the mission, but I never tried all that hard to see if I could make them work on the others.
04/05/2009 (10:14 pm)
Hmmm, wow, if you had that many terrain blocks I think you would want some sort of streaming terrain method in place, never mind the loss of precision you would have in the outlying terrain blocks.I can remember a Terrain Textures By Latitude resource, but out of the box Torque can already procedurally paint by height and/or slope. Again, the procedural tools only worked on the 1st terrain in the mission, but I never tried all that hard to see if I could make them work on the others.
#10
are you crazy who needs that many i don't think i could even make it from one end to the other in 1 day maybe not even 1 week. :P you would have to have like super running speed or something and i don't know any machine that could run that many maybe some can but i don't know.
what michael said is much much better to do i think.
04/06/2009 (12:24 am)
"tens of thousands of terrain blocks to edit"are you crazy who needs that many i don't think i could even make it from one end to the other in 1 day maybe not even 1 week. :P you would have to have like super running speed or something and i don't know any machine that could run that many maybe some can but i don't know.
what michael said is much much better to do i think.
#11
If you're going to be doing a flight-sim and don't really need fine-grained collision detection on the terrain, I'd look into the GPU-based clipmap system.
04/06/2009 (1:55 am)
Yeah, a terrain that size is not too realistic with the MegaTerrain system out of the box. You'll probably want to look into a custom solution. Even a streaming system with the basic MegaTerrain structure may be prohibitive.If you're going to be doing a flight-sim and don't really need fine-grained collision detection on the terrain, I'd look into the GPU-based clipmap system.
#12
I don't know of any recent games that large, but Daggerfall was over 63,000 square miles, ran on a 386 and was released in 1996. Apparently someone tried walking from one side to the other and it took them over two weeks in real time.
I'm not 100% sure, but I think elevations were marked every 6 metres.
That's the sort of thing I have in mind, and it would have been much simpler using Atlas.
04/06/2009 (6:17 am)
Yeah, 65,000 square miles is a huge area and would be a lot of work whatever method was used.I don't know of any recent games that large, but Daggerfall was over 63,000 square miles, ran on a 386 and was released in 1996. Apparently someone tried walking from one side to the other and it took them over two weeks in real time.
I'm not 100% sure, but I think elevations were marked every 6 metres.
That's the sort of thing I have in mind, and it would have been much simpler using Atlas.
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