PC Alpha 19 Dev Diary

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I know that, once I tried to plant 100 trees around my base and droped to 10 fps. Why are they so resource intensive?
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Trees, water, shadows, etc. are always very resource intensive in games. (I don't know any of the details, all I do know is they are the big three, and there may be more, I'm not entirely sure.)

 
Trees, water, shadows, etc. are always very resource intensive in games. (I don't know any of the details, all I do know is they are the big three, and there may be more, I'm not entirely sure.)
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Yeah but in witcher, skyrim etc you have shitload of them with larger variety and it works fine.

 
I assume voxel limitations then.
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The Trees in this game are very detailed, they have a lot of Tri's so to say. This means if they get to dense the GPU will have to work hard. I have been told they also have a lot of overdraw which is bad for the GPU as well, making it do a lot of extra work for nothing. It is possible to get more trees and decorations in the world, they just need to be lower poly to make that happen. The Witcher 3 uses SpeedTree trees and likely low poly ones. And yeah those games also have no voxel underground so they can go with even denser forests.

 
Its coming along. April or May seems reasonable at this point, but we all know how elusive releases can be.
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Thanks MM, I think a simple roadmap would help with our anxiety a lot and would be very appreciated :) something like star citizen roadmap but much simpler: plain text, updated every 2 o 3 weeks like this:

Graphics

- Upgrade to Unity 2019.3 - Done

- Upgrade to lighting system - WIP, 17 of 22 tasks completed

Weapons and tools

- New AutoShotgun, Machinegun, Steel Club - Done

- New Junk drone - polishing

- Retexture and remodel old weapons - WIP, 8 of 10 tasks completed

Vehicles

- Vehicle mods - done

- New collision system - scheduled

 
The Trees in this game are very detailed, they have a lot of Tri's so to say. This means if they get to dense the GPU will have to work hard. I have been told they also have a lot of overdraw which is bad for the GPU as well, making it do a lot of extra work for nothing. It is possible to get more trees and decorations in the world, they just need to be lower poly to make that happen. The Witcher 3 uses SpeedTree trees and likely low poly ones. And yeah those games also have no voxel underground so they can go with even denser forests.
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What gets me the tree’s still don’t have a base mesh and any tree that falls you see a hollow trunk which I can’t stop thinking on a visual graphical level looks cheap and tacky.

 
Tiling would be one way to do it. (That would also allow faster map generation)

They already shift the origin regularly to avoid floating-point imprecisions.
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Was the shifting origin thing actually implemented? I don't think anyone can get far enough from 0,0,0 to make it an issue any more.

 
Was the shifting origin thing actually implemented? I don't think anyone can get far enough from 0,0,0 to make it an issue any more.
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The numeric precision is still represented in just 7 significant digits.

So on an 16k map, you would have inaccuracies in the 1 mm range at the outer edges.

But that can add up on closeup animations.

Faatal talked about dynamically shifting the origin before. Not sure at what delta-distance that occurs.

 
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If you have ideas about biomes talk about decorations, threats, and rewards that could pertain to the biomes we do have to make them better. Talk about what you would like to see in a plains sub-biome since that is still on the table? What are some reasons that could be developed to visit the specific biomes currently in the game?
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Plains might be a better sub biome of the wasteland, helping to blend the harsh change of scenery.

It could include splat hills with grass on top but rocky looking cliffsides. (and a verions of those could go in the wastelands as well to add some much needed interest.

Kind of like mother nature is taking back the outer edges of the wastelands.

If the biomes are dithered between each other in like early a17, you would get some nice random blends almost making the blended zones looking like even more biomes.

That replaces some of the world diversity we lost.

Wetlands could also then could be a sub biome of the forest.

 
For wasteland, I'd like to see the components for making mines and other explosives being more common as well as the books having to do with explosives and their recipes. I also like that one highway overpass section. I'd like to see a few more varieties of these like maybe an onramp that ends suddenly. I'd also like to see subterranean POI's buried in the rubble like a subways station with maybe 30 meters of tunnel ending in cave in or a mall that you have to lower yourself down into like in The Day After Tomorrow or that one buried mall in the Maze Runner second movie I believe. it would be cool if there were quite a few POI's underneath a few layers of destroyed stone and you'd have to excavate them a bit before getting inside and descending into them.
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*Drinks Grog* now listen here about the wasteland. its a Bland area that i think could use a Nice TLC. sense the area is super dangerous it should be worth going their, stuff like Scrap Piles that when you harvest you get plastic , Electrical parts metal etc. those Radioactive zombies spawn, Dried Oil lakes were cars leaked and its another sources of Oil shale, Trash and tons of Scrapable items from Firges to toasters laying around! Some areas are radioactive and mushrooms grow their.

 
The numeric precision is still represented in just 7 significant digits.

So on an 16k map, you would have inaccuracies in the 1 mm range at the outer edges.

But that can add up on closeup animations.

Faatal talked about dynamically shifting the origin before. Not sure at what delta-distance that occurs.
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Praise where it's due, that appears to be pretty well implemented. I've a tendency to wander the map and I haven't spotted the shift yet.

I'm actually really interested in how it was done. <dusts off decompiler> Damn, if only I had the time. <puts dust back on decompiler>

 
Praise where it's due, that appears to be pretty well implemented. I've a tendency to wander the map and I haven't spotted the shift yet.

I'm actually really interested in how it was done. <dusts off decompiler> Damn, if only I had the time. <puts dust back on decompiler>
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It sure sounds complex, lots of objects to consider.

I wonder if shifting the position of entities around can mess up the physics calculations. I have not seen any evidence of this happening though.

 
I've implemented a version of the same system for myself a while ago so i know the difficulties.

There's a utility function in unity that allows you to move an object without affecting the physics, basically an instant teleport. They may also have a second set of terrain tiles and entities spawned closer to 0,0,0 and teleport the player to the secondary area. If it's done well enough you shouldn't see the change. That will, of course, temporarily double the system resource usage for those areas.

There are a buttload of issues getting this working in a FPS engine, I'm actually impressed :-)

 
Plains might be a better sub biome of the wasteland, helping to blend the harsh change of scenery.

It could include splat hills with grass on top but rocky looking cliffsides. (and a verions of those could go in the wastelands as well to add some much needed interest.

Kind of like mother nature is taking back the outer edges of the wastelands.

If the biomes are dithered between each other in like early a17, you would get some nice random blends almost making the blended zones looking like even more biomes.

That replaces some of the world diversity we lost.

Wetlands could also then could be a sub biome of the forest.
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I imagine the Wetlands could look pretty cool: some small ponds, a few specific decorations/plants, and maybe a Bog Zombie or something like that.

 
Yes, I will have to test around with teleporting objects (or rather all contents of the scene) around, and see if all the forces keep in a plausible range.

I would always be expecting some weird edge cases to appear near moving colliders - when teleporting them, due to small changes in the precision of position and angles. (objects suddenly ejecting into space or getting stuck)

 
Surprisingly few issues unless you start teleporting into another collider. The physics stats of the object remain untouched, it just changes the origin point. It's far too slow to try and move an entire scene in a single frame though.

 
*Drinks Grog* now listen here about the wasteland. its a Bland area that i think could use a Nice TLC. sense the area is super dangerous it should be worth going their, stuff like Scrap Piles that when you harvest you get plastic , Electrical parts metal etc. those Radioactive zombies spawn, Dried Oil lakes were cars leaked and its another sources of Oil shale, Trash and tons of Scrapable items from Firges to toasters laying around! Some areas are radioactive and mushrooms grow their.
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That actually sounds pretty cool. Imagine a limited water source type area but instead of harvesting water with a jar. Its oil. Might be a good incentive for that biome. ?

 
What gets me the tree’s still don’t have a base mesh and any tree that falls you see a hollow trunk which I can’t stop thinking on a visual graphical level looks cheap and tacky.
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As trees are updated they will get solid bottoms.

 
Was the shifting origin thing actually implemented? I don't think anyone can get far enough from 0,0,0 to make it an issue any more.
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Yes. It is on by default. It shifts after 1000m.

 
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