More Terrain Revelations

(In my previous blog I discovered that loading (x64) 256x terrain meshes loads 4.5 faster than a single 2048x terrain mesh.)

The fun continues! I don't really mean that sarcastically, well sorta, but I am actually rather enjoying discovering, learning and finding how I can push boundaries a little bit at a time in T3D.

So the plan is simple; lay down (x8) 256x separate terrain meshes making a 2048x long strip. I covered in my previous blog that 2048x is the length I'm shooting for as it takes the player about 4 and a half minutes to cross it (in Gideon speed).

After I wrote my last blog I decided to get to work; my level consists of a similar background, but I wanted some elements in it, such as a few pits, maybe some raised ground and a stream. Realizing that I couldn't just lay down the same terrain mesh and modify the one I wanted (thus reflecting the changes on all I assumed) I decided to copy and rename one of the terrain pieces I finished earlier. I did as such, copy and pasted another terrain and changed the file name to point to the new file. T3D loaded it up just fine and I went on my merry carving way.

After carving out my stream and screwing with the river editor for about 15 minutes (anyone know how I can make the water non-see through with a brown surface colour while still having reflections?) I decided to save my work and reload my level. The level loads up and my first terrain mesh has the same stream carving as my second one! 'Wuuuuuuut' I say to myself as I lean into the screen. A thousand reasons flooded my mind and, for whatever reason, I settled on 'it must have some prior associations to the other file, so it's like it's editing both of them at once'. I was only half right.

I wanted to save my previous terrain mesh, so I deleted the secondary and tried to raise it up and smooth it out. My first attempt was pretty poor, so I exited out of the level, didn't save changed, and reopened the level, but my poor first attempt was still there. 'Wuuuuuuut' I said to myself, leaning back in my chair. 'The terrain must auto update and save itself separate from the level'.

I deleted everything, saved the level, went into where T3D stores the terrain files and deleted all of them. Did you know that even if you don't use a terrain in a level T3D still stores it? First terrain you made? BlankLevel_0.ter, made another terrain for goofing around in? BlankLevel_1.ter, made a blank terrain for some testing? BlankLevel_2.ter. I had probably about 30 terrain files sitting around doing nothing. Thankfully T3D associates them with the level name, but regardless I toasted all of them.

After coming home from work today I decided to give it another crack. I made a new terrain file, did what I wanted, saved the level. Still thinking that copy/paste the other terrain file will cause complications I make a new BlankLevel_0.ter and import it into T3D. I go to start sculpting and I notice something:


If you can't see it very well, the area that I'm trying to modify is flat, but the cursor thinks that there's already raised terrain meshing. I look over to the first file; there's raised terrain in that area. It then dawned on me: if you edit multiple terrain files in the same level, the changes will be reflective on ALL meshes. I needed to test this!:

(The first terrain mesh is on the left, that I wrote 'Hey!' on)

Save, Load Map:

(Both terrain meshes, notice that the stream is carved on the first mesh again)

This changes everything. What this means for me is that I have to make each terrain piece completely outside of it's respective level, then import them and never touch them again as long as other terrain meshes are present in the same level.

The idea request that I had in my last blog: 'Have an option to divide any terrain mesh larger than 256x into smaller 256x meshes for faster loading' would be directly affected by this. Ultimately, you could never, ever, make any adjustments to the terrain mesh after splitting it. It would have to be the absolutely last thing that you do in polishing and finalizing your level, and even in that case it'd be absolutely necessary to have a backup file of the original large mesh just to be on the safe side.

I'm pretty sure at this point I don't think I'll run into any more snags, but you never know! I'll continue to post things as I find and test on. As always, your feedback, questions and comments are welcome!