Headlights were originally only worked into ground, objects (vehicles, buildings, etc) and plants (trees, grass). Water wasn't lit by them. As night darkens, water turns into a black mass that's easy to accidentally drive into. Water uses a refraction texture to show the ground underneath it shimmering, and that already had headlights mixed into it. So, I had to hackishly see if I could get the luminance of the refraction texture to ad-hoc a fake headlight lighting value for water. It sort of worked.. in that the water is lit, but the reflective surface and coloring is gone. It looks like clear pool water now. But,.. it's lit. (This is the equivilent of taking a baked cake and trying to remove the eggs out of it in order to use it for another recipe. Huge PITA)
Headlights were originally only worked into ground, objects (vehicles, buildings, etc) and plants (trees, grass). Water wasn't lit by them. As night darkens, water turns into a black mass that's easy to accidentally drive into. Water uses a refraction texture to show the ground underneath it shimmering, and that already had headlights mixed into it. So, I had to hackishly see if I could get the luminance of the refraction texture to ad-hoc a fake headlight lighting value for water. It sort of worked.. in that the water is lit, but the reflective surface and coloring is gone. It looks like clear pool water now. But,.. it's lit. (This is the equivilent of taking a baked cake and trying to remove the eggs out of it in order to use it for another recipe. Huge PITA)