Normal-mapped detail textures are effective at conveying close-up detail, but don't add too much in the distance. In Overgrowth, the players will spend most of their time looking at the terrain. We want to make it look as interesting as possible, even far away! Here's how the desert terrain looks with just detail textures:
We still have the baked normal map from the high-detail terrain heightmap (before our OffTheGrid simplification), so we might as well apply that in the distance! If we combine the heightmap normal map with the detail normal maps, the lighting should look nice both close-up and far away. This picture shows the detail normal map on the left, the heightmap normal map in the middle, and the combination on the right.
Here's a comparison of the complete rendering using detail mapping on the left, and the hybrid approach on the right. You can see that with the hybrid approach, the ripples on the sand dunes are a lot more defined.
Here's another angle on the desert terrain, showing both detail normal mapping and heightmap normal mapping.
There are a few more ways we could improve the terrain lighting, but I think at this point our base terrain rendering is good enough! With high-quality terrain lighting, we should be able to effectively render a wider variety of terrains than just the rolling hills seen in most games. Do you have any ideas for interesting terrain types that we could use that are not often seen in games? (Permalink)
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Dang, thats epic yo.
I like the houses in the middle distance of the first image. Looks good as always.
wow! looks great!
Looks good. As far as unseen terrain in games, I would say Aussie scrub or bushland. Also, equatorial jungle marsh, like in the Amazon, but that is a lot of work and processing power.
A suggestion to the mapping versus the writers, I assume it's a given, but I'll write it anyways
Try to make landmarks that are unique, and fits your story - If a large battle took place, let us be reminded by some memorial, something that heavily adds to the atmosphere without a large amount of work as such.
I would also really like to encourage people to join the IRC chat on Wolfire, people are friendly and the chat is interesting - Realtime with developers is a thing you should take advantage of when it's there, so do, do do!
sweet, looks very nice!
last pic, is it from the game? or...
That's from our desert fort level, rendered in engine.
Yeah,it looks that good(:
*cough* and you can actually get access to that map if you buy the pre-order ;)
*hint hint*
Terrain Ideas:
-Scotlandish Highlands with Water, Hills and Islands.
-A dessert like Terrain, just with Polar Lights or something.
-A green landscape with huge trees at the horizon.
Good stuff! I got very interested in your game since the deal with UWE. :)
Glad to have you here :) Thanks for the suggestions
it looks so epic
tundra, with small lakes, scrubs and moss.
looks like real, the system specs is lower or bigger than crysis?
oviously lower... no offence
well.... it could be on the same level as crysis.... but we will have to wait to see what else they add to there engine
Wow, this looks really awesome!
Looks fantastic as always. Question though: How will you guys be implementing Anti-Aliasing? And is per-object motion blur in the works also?
OMG so ******* damn realistic.
So real...
Just wanted to say your "Organic Indie Pre-Order Pack" commercial was epic. So epic in fact, that I pre-ordered. Cause you guys rock. Good job! :D