Ahhhh!
Thanks for the answers. I can see now that I'll have
to commit to coding an boned actor system. I was
hoping to avoid that, don't we all :), but it looks
like it's required.
On the other hand I can put some of my personal
theories on how an actor system should be designed
into practice so it's not all bad.
Kinda curious though about another thing. What is
everyone considering to be their "target platform"? I
know that my target platform is a 1Ghz w/256MB RAM and
a GeForce II w/64MB RAM equivalent. I figure this
will be the standard system in about 1-2 years. More
likely 1 year.
Thanks again.
ed
--- David <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> You can do all those things.
>
> In reality, the scenegraph is really just a
> hierarchical data storage
> mechanism that allows programmers access to a high
> level abstraction of the
> 3d world. Java3d's engine is constantly pulling
> information from this
> graph, sorting and filtering it and then sending the
> geometry to the card.
> Providing you have set the appropriate compitibility
> bits on the nodes, you
> can alter this scene graph at runtime and see the
> results. Building and
> modifying landscape mesh can be done in real time.
> Modifying the mesh
> vertices can even be done without creating a new
> shape, but you will have to
> recalc your normals for the result to look correct.
>
> Java3d performs better when you can limit the amount
> of changes to the
> scenegraph each frame, because it builds an
> optimized version of the
> scenegraph for rendering. When you make changes, it
> has to rebuild this
> optimized version. To give you an idea of
> performance, our landscape engine
> uses procedural meshes for pieces of the terrain
> which are within a
> configurable range, these are high detail cells,
> with possible overlapping
> textures for overlaying paths and other terrain
> details. Normally these
> mesh cells are built and destroyed as you walk
> through the world, but in the
> case where you are warped or jumped to a location
> where you have no cells
> built, it has to build them all in a radious
> surrounding you. Building the
> submeshes for a radius of 300 meters, where each
> sub-mesh is approx 5 meters
> on a side, along with their textures, takes approx
> 700 ms. Thats on a 700
> MHz machine with a nVidea TNT2.
>
> One thing to keep in mind is that Java3d is not a
> game engine like genesis
> or some of the other 3d libraries out there. It is
> therefore "missing" many
> things from that perspective (particles, etc). But
> all those systems can be
> built.
>
> In regards to animation. You can do it any way you
> want, but other than
> morphing behavior, there is no built in mechanism
> for animation. You either
> build shapes and switch between them, or apply
> transformations (rotations,
> translations) to all the sub-peices to control your
> animation. Morphing is
> just a built in way to interpolate between two
> shapes with the same number
> of verticies and geometries.
>
> Here is an analogy. If using opengl directly is
> analogous to building a
> house from a bunch of trees, Java3d is like building
> a house using pre-cut
> and cured lumber and a truck full of tools. But you
> don't get any pre-fab
> doors, walls, or roofs.
>
> Dave Yazel
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Ice Bone <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> Sent: Sunday, October 01, 2000 12:11 PM
> Subject: Re: [JAVA3D] Everquest
>
>
> Hehehe. That is a very important point since the
> actual number of people working on their own MMORPG
> is
> now five. Please include me as I'm working, with
> some
> friends, on a game we're calling RuneWar. :):)
>
> Personally my biggest concern with Java3D, still
> reading and learning the API so bear with me, is the
> ability to modify the terrain structure in real time
> and manipulating actors.
>
> I need the ability to modify the terrain mesh in
> real
> time so that I can construct "mud builder" tools
> into
> the game interface itself. This is so that my
> building crews can build, excavate, apply textures
> and
> blend textures while in their avatar form and so it
> will get properly rendered by the game engine.
>
> Another point is that I want my players to have the
> ability, with restrictions, to accomplish many of
> the
> same tasks. So that if a Wizard tosses a fireball
> at
> a spot on the ground, it shouldn't remain green.
> It's
> texture should be changed to a burnt one and the
> Z-axis values should be decreased a little (he dug a
> hole in the ground).
>
> Another question I have, which will be answered by
> the
> API no doubt, is how actors are manipulated. I
> already realize that there isn't a particle system,
> which is a little annoying, but actors are pretty
> much
> required to have anything other than utterly static
> displays.
>
> Another thing I was considering was to continue
> working on Java3D but dividing my code into
> rendering
> and game oriented sections and then using JNI to
> interface with an existing library.
>
> For that purpose there are a couple pretty solid
> libraries out there that are written in C/C++ which
> should do very nicely.
>
> Tools such as:
> http://www.egerter.com
> http://www.edgermage.com
> http://www.jet3d.org
> http://www.genesis3d.com
> http://crystal.linuxgames.com
>
> Any answers please?
>
> ed
>
> --- John Wright <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > Setting aside the issue of Everquest's game design
> > (which I personally
> > think is horrible) it has shown that excellent 3D
> > graphics can be done
> > in a massively multiplayer online game. And I
> know
> > at least four people
> > on this mailing list like myself that would like
> to
> > produce this type of
> > game.
> >
> > A big question is "Can Java 3D be used to match or
> > beat Everquest's
> > graphics?" And to that so far I'm favorably
> > inclined, so far I would
> > say Java 3D is definitely up to the task.
> >
> > A key to why Everquest's graphics are so effective
> > is that they have
> > very low polygon count creatures with well painted
> > textures. That
> > certainly can be done in Java 3D. One thing I
> don't
> > see a way to do is
> > to match their lighting effects. EQ has some good
> > lighting effects
> > (setting aside the point that "humans" can't see
> at
> > all at night and are
> > unplayable).
> >
> > As a community another key goal we might want to
> > help each other with is
> > some standard character animations. Java 3D needs
> > an "example" for how
> > to animate a character walking.
> >
> > Also there has been some bashing of the flaws and
> > glitches in Java 3D.
> > We seem easily able to overlook the flaws in a
> smash
> > success like
> > Everquest (have you ever seen the face texture for
> a
> > creature applied to
> > it's butt?). I'd like to see "perfection" as much
> > or more than anyone,
> > but let's face it the industry we are functioning
> in
> > is FULL of bugs.
> > Windows has thousands of bugs, even hardware can
> be
> > very tricky to get
> > just right. Damn I hate to sound like I'm saying
> > bugs are ok, but let's
> > not trash Java 3D when it's no worse than the rest
> > of the industry.
> >
> > - John Wright
> > Starfire Research
> >
> > Steve Pietrowicz wrote:
> > >
> > > Man, I *wish* Everquest had clouds like that.
> > Phew....that's a really
> > > cool URL.
> > >
> > > The clouds in Everquest are actually just
> texture
> > maps, done in some paint
> > > program. I'm not sure which they use. It could
> > have been generated by 3D
> > > Studio Ma. You can turn the clouds off
> > completely (I think), or have one
> > > layer or two layer clouds. It's been a while
> > since I've had one layer
> > > going, but I think they have clouds painted on a
> > blue background. The two
> > > layer effect is using the one layer texture in
> > conjunction with a second
> > > layer of clouds in a texture map with
> transparency
> > turned on. The texture
> > > maps move at different rates, and you get a nice
> > looking cloud
> > > effect. ...At least as nice as current
> Everquest
> > technology can do. I
> > > would expect EQ2 and other games will have even
> > nicer effects.
> > >
> > > Anyway, the cloud textures appear to me to be
> > thrown onto the inside of a
> > > giant sphere that encapsulates the whole outdoor
> > zone that you're in. The
> > > best place to see this effect is on the "good"
> > boat to Kunark, right after
> > > you zone into the Finora Vie area. If you face
> > away from where the boat
> > > will dock, you can see how the sky curves
> towards
> > the edge of the zone.
> > >
> > > I believe they change the tint of the background
> > on the textures as day
> > > progresses to night.
> > >
> > > It's a pretty simple technique, but fairly
> > effective.
> > >
> > > ....At least, that's my guess on how they do
> it,
> > based solely on
> > > observation. :-)
> > >
> > > If anyone here wants to try Everquest, I highly
> > recommend the game. The
> > > graphics aren't state of the art by today's
> > standards (They have to deal
> > > with system requirements for systems that are a
> > year or two old, since
> > > that's when they started it), but the game
> itself
> > is very
> > > compelling. Pretty addictive too. I saw
> > someone's quote on a message
> > > board once... "Everquest makes Crack look like
> > Diet Coke". Man, that's
> > > the truth.... :-)
> > >
> > > Steve
> > >
> > > At 04:02 PM 9/29/2000 -0700, Paul Byrne wrote:
> > > >Hi Dave,
> > > >
> > > >Check out
> > http://vterrain.org/Atmosphere/clouds.html
> > > >
> > > >Rgds
> > > >
> > > >Paul
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > >MIME-Version: 1.0
> > > > >Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
> > > > >X-Priority: 3
> > > > >X-MSMail-Priority: Normal
> > > > >X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE
> > V5.00.2615.200
> > > > >Date: Fri, 29 Sep 2000 18:51:07 -0400
> > > > >From: David <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> > > > >Subject: [JAVA3D] Clouds
> > > > >To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> > > > >
> > > > >Hi all:
> > > > >
> > > > >I have scoured the web looking for techniques
> > for generating clouds ala
> > > > >Asheron's call and Everquest. Even came up
> > blank on Gamasutra. Can anyone
> > > > >toss me a hint? In particular I am looking
> for
> > moving clouds. Should I be
> > > > >using a multi-texture for highlighting a
> plasma
> > function?
> > > > >
> > > > >Dave Yazel
> > > > >
> > > >
> > >
> >
>
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> > general help, send email to
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> of
> > the message "help".
> > >
> > >
> >
>
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> >
> >
>
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