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Work in Progress / the neighborhood project

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fancy music
14
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Joined: 27th Sep 2009
Location: in the alpha demo
Posted: 25th Jul 2013 21:42 Edited at: 28th Jul 2013 01:17
hey everyone! welcome to my wip-(finally)

this is my 3rd person project that i have been working on for a long time and even though its not finished i am finally able to show you what i have done so far.

this is a tps that is going to be similar to gta but on a smaller scale.

some of the features i have finished so far are:
-lod system in object buildings and tress
-tree, building, and grass placement editors
-object normal editor(used for trees)
-dynamic grass system(not finished)
-and also one character(also not finished)

and the scale of this game is roughly the size of one neighborhood right now but will be expanded.

note: texturing is one of my weak points so some of the textures used in this project are placeholders or just solid colors. they dont represent the final project.

neighborhood walkthrough:



dynamic grass system:



Sergey K
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Posted: 25th Jul 2013 22:26
looking really impressive!
i like it very much.

yeah i see you have some issue with textures but i belive you will find someone to help you with this massive project..

good luck on the rest.

Stream SnifferTools/Plugins/Models/Games and more!
Chris Tate
DBPro Master
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Location: London, England
Posted: 26th Jul 2013 23:35
It's been a while since someone started a project like this; hope this is one of the few that gets finished.

Quote: "
note: texturing is one of my weak points so some of the textures used in this project are placeholders or just solid colors. they dont represent the final project."


That will be obvious to some. But, you can write and talk all day long about it not being a final project and the need to use placeholders; many people still won't get it! And most will not bother to read before replying, they are only here to talk. Do not waste your time trying to explain the elementary logic of the obvious, only a silly person would assume that you are not using placeholders.

Do the best you can, don't be afraid of learning new tricks and techniques. There are plenty of smart people in the community to ask for advice.

Like Sergey K said, good luck. One simple piece of advice; don't stop!

Did you model the character on your own? Is he animated?

fancy music
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Posted: 28th Jul 2013 01:11 Edited at: 28th Jul 2013 01:19
yea the character has been modeled and animated by me,
and has also been uv mapped and textured by me as well.

also i have uploaded two new videos to youtube. one that showcases my grass system and edited tree and another that just does a quick tour around the neighborhood area.

i have embedded these videos in the first post.

-also the video quality for those videos isnt so great because im still learning how to cap videos accurately in bandicam.
Chris Tate
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Posted: 28th Jul 2013 01:39
Nice; this will look good when done. These kinds of games are tough to create.

Dr Manette
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Posted: 29th Jul 2013 19:02
Very cool, I wanna see where this goes! Any plans for vehicles or pedestrians soon? And what did you use to make you character?

fancy music
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Posted: 30th Jul 2013 02:22
yea im planning on adding both vehicles and pedstrians but next im going to be working on texturing and shadowing to make the game look more realistic.

and i made the character in ac3d, unwrapped it in lithunwrap, then applied the uv to the character back in ac3d, exported it to 3d canvas for rigging and animation and finally imported it into dbpro.

alot of work just for a character and im sure theres an easier way, but thats how i do it for now.

and next i have to apply an ao map and normal map to the character as well as update the initial diffuse texture. im not sure if i need a specular map for a character, plus i dont even know how i would make one
Ortu
DBPro Master
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Location: Austin, TX
Posted: 30th Jul 2013 05:36 Edited at: 30th Jul 2013 05:37
everything needs a specular map! a quick and easy method is make a copy of your diffuse, convert to greyscale, darken it, then raise the contrast. may take some trial and error to get the right values, but it gives pretty good results

Shazam!
fancy music
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Posted: 20th Aug 2013 21:51
sorry guys but i dont really have anything to post right now, but im still working on the lighting and texturing of my levels and characters.

for lighting im trying to combine giles, dark lights, and xnormal and for texturing im still learning how to unwrap in lithunwrap.

i dont know if its just me, but i find it pretty difficult to unwrap in that program and plus it takes several hours to days trying to unwrap one model so i tried unwrapping in ac3d but the problem with unwrapping that way is that ac3d only saves the uv map in a 256x256 size so its hard to paint in all the details.
Chris Tate
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Posted: 20th Aug 2013 23:21
Quote: "ac3d only saves the uv map in a 256x256 size so its hard to paint in all the details.
"


You can import the UV map image into an image editor like the GIMP. In there you can re-size the UV map image to be used as a reference layer and paint onto another layer to be exported as the texture at any size. A 1024x1024 or 2048x2048 character texture should provide enough detail.

seppgirty
FPSC Developer
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Posted: 21st Aug 2013 02:23
Try unwrapping in roadkill
http://www.pullin-shapes.co.uk/page8.htm

there are some tutorials on that page and also on youtube.

there is a stand alone version available.

gamer, lover, filmmaker
fancy music
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Posted: 23rd Aug 2013 21:46 Edited at: 23rd Aug 2013 21:50
just downloaded roadkill, gonna test it out and see how it works.

also ive been working on lighting and i got dark lights and giles to work together. at first i was going to use dark lights but i didnt like the quality of the lightmaps it was producing as you can see in this pic:



so then i tried using giles in combination with dark lights and it produced a better quality lightmap.



i think it looks pretty decent although there could be a few improvments. but the one problem that im having (and this might be just lack of experience) is that when lightmapping a neighborhood i have to combine all the objects into one single object to have the lightmapped applied in giles. im still testing this though so i might be wrong.

also im working on a small demo for you guys to try out later. i just need an opinion on my dynamic grass system and what you think i should improve.
Chris Tate
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Posted: 23rd Aug 2013 23:12
Quote: "so then i tried using giles in combination with dark lights and it produced a better quality lightmap"


My first impression is that the Dark Lights lightmap resolution setting is extremely low; this amongst other things are the cause of the poor quality.

But consider that it will look much better when textured.

Quote: "i just need an opinion on my dynamic grass system and what you think i should improve"


I am not sure how you produced your grass; but the blades are too similar. The majoraty of them should bend at different angles, with groups of them blown at a similar angle.

The longer the grass blade, the more pronounced the bend. Tall grass does not stand straight up; it flaps over due to the weight and wind.

Each grass blade must be a different colour; many of the bent blades tend to be more yellow due to dying off.

Sounds obvious, but the best reference is the real thing. Watch lots of videos of grass footage. Additionally watch videos of video game grass, this is to learn what techniques are used. No need for animation if it would not suit the game, but you could use vertex shaders to animate them like I did.

fancy music
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Posted: 3rd Sep 2013 19:50 Edited at: 14th Apr 2014 17:32
alright sorry for the delay but i barely have a chance to update my own thread.

sept. is going to be a rough month until i can get back up on my feet again. and as a result progress on this thread is going to slow a little but i do have a small demo i want you guys to try out and give me some input/feedback on.

this demo is my work in progress grass system and it has a few options for testing. the demo runs pretty slow on my computer and i just wanted to know what number of frames you guys are getting on your machines with frames capped at 60 and uncapped too. also i want to know if the demo even runs at all because i used vishnu packer to combine it as one exe.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/1gro57uu4o0vh8s/grass%20system.zip

the grass system resembles techniques from these pages:

from vanb-

http://forum.thegamecreators.com/?m=forum_view&t=38867&b=19

from lee's tip-

http://www.thegamecreators.com/pages/newsletters/newsletter_issue_73.html



i appreciate the feedback and look forward to hearing more

note: the grass blades themselves are just placeholders used for testing and wont look like that in the final version of the game
Ashingda 27
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Posted: 3rd Sep 2013 20:13 Edited at: 3rd Sep 2013 20:16
The demo works but the grass didn't display too well. There where patches of them missing or flickering. The fps really takes a dive even with uncapped frames.

As for the demo exe not sure if you know but you can include media or other files into your DBPro project and run it all as one exe. Very clean and simple, also the user does not have to install anything.

Are the grass blades individual objects?

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Chris Tate
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Posted: 4th Sep 2013 02:34
Sorry to hear about the bad news; I hope you find another job soon; although even better would be to find a job in time but to also get more spare time for your game project while job searching. When I was unemployed, I got loads of game dev done.

fancy music
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Posted: 9th Sep 2013 21:04 Edited at: 14th Apr 2014 17:34
anyways yea the grass system has alot of bugs and how it works is that its one object multiplied with vertexdata to simulate multiple grass patches but there are a couple of problems. first its a major fps consumer; it'll reduce my frames to by at least 50% or more(its not fully optimized), second the patches are limited to a certain distance from the player, and third im trying to figure out how i can manipulate the dynamic grass to darken when inside static lightmapped shadows.

so its quite a challenge to address those problems and im still working on it but i think im going to create another grass system thats a little lower quality than the current one and just have the option to switch between high quality and low quality grass and base it off of how these grass systems function.

high quality grass:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pqt3KFkdpqc

low quality grass:

https://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/Displacement_Grass
Chris Tate
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Posted: 9th Sep 2013 21:22
Quote: "have the option to switch between high quality and low quality grass"


Also, mix different techniques together; not all blades need to use the same system; not all real grass blades grow or look similar. Have interpolation between the cheap system and the intense one; based on camera distance. You'll figure something out.

fancy music
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Posted: 6th Oct 2013 22:01
i know its been a minute but i just wanted to let everyone know that im still working on this, its just on hold for know.
Chris Tate
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Posted: 8th Oct 2013 00:53
Looking forward to seeing what you have come up with.

fancy music
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Posted: 25th Oct 2013 21:42
@Ashingda 27 how would you combine it as one exe? cause right now im getting 4 options in dbpro for creating exe's (exe, media, installer, and alone) whats the difference between the four?
Teabone
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Posted: 26th Oct 2013 01:41
This looks fantastic!

(Teabone)
Kingius Returns
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Posted: 27th Oct 2013 14:22
Good shots.

You should make a reverse GTA game where the goal is to STOP the neighbourhood crime, hehe
Ashingda 27
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Posted: 29th Oct 2013 04:35 Edited at: 29th Oct 2013 04:36
Quote: "@Ashingda 27 how would you combine it as one exe? cause right now im getting 4 options in dbpro for creating exe's (exe, media, installer, and alone) whats the difference between the four? "


I guess it also depends which IDE you are using, I'm using the basic IDE. In the media tab you can import stuff into the project. View the attached image.

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fancy music
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Posted: 31st Oct 2013 21:15
yea now i see what your talking about Ashingda...cant believe i havent noticed that before

and my game is coming along pretty good, i just finished an object normal editing program (i will upload pictures soon) and an lod function for trees and buildings. now i just need to smooth out the transition for the lod so the object doesnt just "pop" in and fix the shadows and lighting(again) and upgrade textures.

after all that is completed i will start moving on to more gameplay elements instead of graphic ones starting with shooting mechanics.
gwheycs62egydws
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Posted: 14th Jan 2014 01:32
hi

i just found the posting

it looks interesting

i was looking for "Blitzwerks Terrain" through google images
when the link to this showed up

to move side ways - is to move forward
Since a Strait line gets thin fast
fancy music
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Posted: 15th Jan 2014 19:50
yea i use t.ed for my terrain since i needed a specific shaped terrain for my project. blitzwerks terrain has alot of great features but i found it hard to generate an exact terrain even through heightmaps which is an important factor considering my terrain is based off of an actual neighborhood.
fancy music
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Posted: 13th Feb 2014 00:08 Edited at: 13th Feb 2014 00:10
progress is slow but still going on for this project, i just got finished animation interpolation and now im working on texturing and facial feature and 3d face modeling. edit: yea i know the textures are real crappy right now



ive been using ac3d for a couple years now but i still find it hard model humans correctly especially since i have to model based off of a real persons face.

also i just started picking up c++, not that ill be switching over or anything, i just wanted to learn a new language but i dont how i could incorporate c++ with dark basic just yet.

gwheycs62egydws
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Posted: 13th Feb 2014 00:17
@fancy music

is this your first project with DBP ?

i know i am slowly working on my own which i plan to turn into a
full game ;o)

pending permission from a company who made the first one that was made a long time ago

right now all i have is the land in place

i can move around it but i hope to have more
when i understand a few things

to move side ways - is to move forward
Since a Strait line gets thin fast
Chris Tate
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Posted: 14th Feb 2014 18:02
I know the feeling when progress in a project seems slow; it all takes as long as it needs to take in reality.

The textures might look crappy to you but they are decent placeholders. Texture creation is no weekend task, it can take months for one person to complete the textures for one game level.

C++ is a good choice. Later on you could create your own DBP plugins or perhaps host a DBP viewport like in FPSC and my project.

I really like the houses. How are you going to render your windows?

gwheycs62egydws
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Posted: 14th Feb 2014 18:18
we all have to start some ware

it's not like the old days ware it would have been dun in
dos or even using Quick basic

I know any game I'm starting with is in DBP might have to be
dun in some other programing coding

I've collected a few program to help with Uv mapping
but it seems they are not as quick as i wanted them to be

modeling is easier with all the 3d programs out there

there are lots of example though out the forum that
can help with bits and peaces and speed things up

as for making plugins for DBP that is rile not nessary
every thing is there some ware in the forums or though DBP

liquids and cloth's are the only one's not perfected for DBP
and or at the level they should be with c++

to move side ways - is to move forward
Since a Strait line gets thin fast
fancy music
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Posted: 17th Feb 2014 03:26 Edited at: 17th Feb 2014 03:27
@Resourceful

yea this is my first project. i have other big projects planned but im going to put those to the side until i can get the hang of all aspects of videogame design (texture, modeling, animation, coding, etc).


@Chris Tate

for windows and just glass in general for now i was just planning on using a semi-transparent texture and then later incorporate some specular maps and additional shaders but im going to hold off on shader effects for now.
fancy music
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Posted: 13th Apr 2014 00:53 Edited at: 17th Jun 2014 17:33
sorry guys i know its been a while but i still am working on this just doing alot of concept art for now
fancy music
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Posted: 17th Jun 2014 17:46
heres an old picture that i took last year for my game



UPDATE: i have improved texturing on the buildings and other objects in the neighborhood, and have started to approach building this game in a more modular way to help save some time.

i also tried to work on improving lighting while keeping models sizes relatively small, but the issue with that is when i lightmap objects in dark lights, giles, and even deled, my objects become triangulated and it always increases their file sizes to double the amount of space they were originally. if i could lightmap these objects without triangulation then it would definately increase the speed of my game.

im now in the process of updating my lod system to increase speed and trying to incorporate dark instances to help as well. ( NEW pics and videos soon)
Chris Tate
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Posted: 18th Jun 2014 16:33
Glad to know you are still working on this

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