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Messages - ADV_MD5

#1
Haunting of Deck 12 / Re: Waving plants
September 15, 2019, 05:59:21 PM
here you go:
https://developer.nvidia.com/gpugems/GPUGems3/gpugems3_ch16.html
https://mtnphil.wordpress.com/2011/10/18/wind-animations-for-vegetation/

Two articles specifically on the vegetation system in FarCry. I was interested when reading your post because I thought the easiest option would be via a shader. The second article is a detailed breakdown on the CryTek/FarCry article (which is the first one). It also includes code for a test case.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mb5QVoqFkKo

https://skydrive.live.com/?cid=32374812f02e440e#!/?cid=32374812f02e440e&sc=documents&id=32374812F02E440E%21153

It would be pretty epic to see Megatextures combined with the ago and then a procedural real time grass system like described in http://jcgt.org/published/0004/01/02/paper.pdf
#2
id Tech 4 Discussion / Re: Why so few uses of Id Tech 4?
September 14, 2019, 09:05:22 AM
Quote from: revelator on September 14, 2019, 06:01:18 AM
Agreed idtech4 is a niche product as it is, dependant on the work we put into expanding its capabilities.

Things that may make sense would be to expand the work done on fhDoom's tools to port and expand the toolset.
QT is excellent for that purpose :) as was shown with fhDoom.
Next would be to expand the engines uses by introducing virtual texturing (not nessesarily megatextures, there are other options we can use),
this would push it in a more all purpose direction, though we would still have to expand a few other areas to truely take advantage of the engine.
Physics could be changed to take advantage of bullet or the open dynamics engine ODE, not sure how much work it would take though.

Bump and normal maps can be produced by code but the generated images would lack certain details that artists making them by hand can, but its entirely possible to do.

As for the multiplayer part, idtech 1 and 2 also used this approach so it is not uncommon in id's engines,
however security concerns are definatly valid so maybe change the NET code to SSL based ?.

I admit most grievances i heard about idtechs NET code was about bad performance :P because it does not compress the stream (LAG galore).
Yes. From an engine perspective, I have seen good progress from some devs. Ultimately, I plan on observing the scene before deciding because you have the benefits of dhewm3 being 64bit, fhdoom for the engine, TDM for some improvements and then RBDoomBFG. I plan on observing for awhile longer before making a list and porting the features wanted to the engine of choice. Megatextures are a dead end imho. They were kinda present in d3, but until we would have a way to compress the files and use them effectively, they are a dev trap.

My first project d3 related is actually to work my way through trying to replace the physics with a 3rd party library. Rather than ODE/Newton I had been looking into either Bullet or PhysX due to the fact that they can run some calculations on the GPU (afaik) rather than being purely software. Based on a preliminary glance last night, the physics is rather tightly integrated with the actual game (physics code is built into the game dll on d3). As a result, there is no way to add physics to the engine and have it work with existing mods as a drop in solution.

Yeah. I have seen some tools that will do that, I had previously used Unity3D, and I was using one. It was just an extra level of complexity.

Well, pretty sure that the D3 server model is authoritative. I more meant along the lines of ease of end user use/separation of logic.

That and also, I noticed something when I was looking through the physics. The way that they are synced through the network appears to be quite heavy. Especially if you are using a UDP/snapshot based network and have to worry about fragmentation.
#3
Work pc is running Windows 7,
Home pc/development rig is running Windows 7 and also lubuntu. It is simple and just works. Easy to use package manager and has a benefit. I switched my parents over to lubuntu from windows a few years back, as a result any time they call I know exactly what program/thing for them to use. Also saves me from sshing into their pc all the time.

I have a surface I use for notes. It is running Windows 10. Havnt bothered messing with any dual booting because it does the job great with windows.

I use an iphone, so I have IOS.

I also have a kindle fire that is booting LineageOS (tablet was 30$ last prime day). Bought it and rooted the same day. Flashed a new OS as soon as possible.

I also have a chromebox that I purchased in 2013 or so. I liked the small size and I traveled a lot and would hook it up in hotel rooms to the tv. It was running slitaz then arch linux. All in all it was a pretty nice system, I had purchased the ASUS model due to the extra ram slot and then bought an 8 GB stick. As a result I had a pretty zippy 10gb ram system that cost me less than 250$. It worked great enough for me to run an ide and listen to music/browse the web. It currently just lives in my suitcase for if I ever travel.
#4
id Tech 4 Discussion / Re: Why so few uses of Id Tech 4?
September 13, 2019, 05:51:33 PM
Personally, for myself, I find it hard to justify using Id Tech 4. Quake 1/2 were fairly similar in terms of design and Quake 3 carried many similarities in the source itself. This helped pioneer development on these early idtech engines. Also when they were released we didnt have as many FOSS game projects so they carved a niche.

Doom3 (and id tech 4), has a few key shortcomings.
1) Multiplayer (or lack thereof)
2) When designing D3, the multiplayer code that was present was incorporated directly into the single player code, unlike Q3 with cgame/game. Although there is some simplicity gained from this approach, it sacrifices some security. Additionally, in my personal preference I prefer having two isolated code bases because it helps me separate the client and server logic clearly.
3) Engine. Many modders lack the tools/care to deal with high quality sprites/textures. I personally prefer a simple texture to having to deal with bump/normal maps.
4) I love Carmack to death, but the Physics in D3 did not age well. They are completely software based unlike PhysX or Bullet. You can find some QuakeCon talks on this subject.
5) The niche. D3 engine is very optimized for a very small subset of gameplay.
6) When released, it did not hold the spotlight for long. Gameplay/mod enthusiasts had gotten the UDK in 2009, and then right around D3s release, we also got Wolfenstein Enemy Territory, and the Jedi Academy/Outcast.
#5
Haunting of Deck 12 / Re: Supremacy 3
September 13, 2019, 04:39:09 PM
Looks cool. Glad to see some people keeping D3 alive. I decided to register here because I like the fact that someone is trying to keep the games alive by extending them.

D3+Prey+Quake4+ETQW all have free demos with some assets. Id like to see them all cobbled together into 1 asset pack/1 game.