Kupu's thread

[Magrim]

I have no idea if this has been covered but any chance on having light pass though slabs, wedges and whatnot?

 

[Exozen]

I've been wondering about the texture sheets: is there any reason, the default 256x textures for instance, are 216x216 with "extra" texture that appears not to be used?

 

[kupu]

I have no idea if this has been covered but any chance on having light pass though slabs, wedges and whatnot?

Not with our current lighting system, no. The lighting is pre-calculated and considers placed blocks as occupying the entire voxel. Either larger changes to the calculations need to take place or we go with something realtime.

I've been wondering about the texture sheets: is there any reason, the default 256x textures for instance, are 216x216 with "extra" texture that appears not to be used?

Yes, this bleed zone is used as a buffer for our mipmapping and to avoid obvious seams on the blocks edge. We currently have issues of this zone bleeding into the adjacent tiles at lower mipmap levels creating a Moire effect.

 

[therimmer96]

Not with our current lighting system, no. The lighting is pre-calculated and considers placed blocks as occupying the entire voxel. Either larger changes to the calculations need to take place or we go with something realtime.

Doesn't light pass through glass slabs and wedges already?

 

[Ithirahad]

Doesn't light pass through glass slabs and wedges already?

Well, glass, yes. But if you have opaque wedges, a thin hole or whatever where the wedges have open sides facing each other (difficult to explain) the light will not go into and through the gap.

 

[therimmer96]

Well, glass, yes. But if you have opaque wedges, a thin hole or whatever where the wedges have open sides facing each other (difficult to explain) the light will not go into and through the gap.

Oh that's what you mean. I kinda like that, exploiting emissive maps is fun ^_^

 

[Magrim]

I wonder....would there be a way to make opaque blocks behave like glass at certain angles.....prolly not lol

 

[0ldSkull]

Do the latest texture sheet updates imply that rails and transporters will not be animated as originally anticipated? I'd been looking forward to seeing that.
Also minor note, the normal maps may need an update to correlate with the latest texture moves.

 

[kupu]

Do the latest texture sheet updates imply that rails and transporters will not be animated as originally anticipated? I'd been looking forward to seeing that.
Also minor note, the normal maps may need an update to correlate with the latest texture moves.

Oh crap, did i forget to fix those?! I'll check those asap. Thanks for the heads up, my mind has been bogged with menus recently.

As for the animated blocks, it's more a case of seeing at a glance currently unused space on the maps as i'm working on a new texture pack. I would still like to see single face animation. We've not ruled it out.

 

[nightrune]

Hey Kupu,

I think this is probably more of a self serving request then I usually like to do but I think its something to think about.

Its pretty hard to build with asteroids without making it look like a clown car. I'll be adding hull cracks, and other details that should help. The fact is these things are super brightly colored... They hardly fit with anything else. To me it makes sense that the refined carved blocks would be brighter, but maybe make the raw asteroid look a bit more beat up? It is in space after all!

Thanks! Your work is awesome!

 

[Ithirahad]

Yeah, raw rocks probably should be colour-tinted, rather than colour-painted. Like in real life, refining and polishing up the stone should bring out the colour. Besides, game or not, I find that the bright confetti asteroids look awfully silly.

 

[Sven_The_Slayer]

Yeah, raw rocks probably should be colour-tinted, rather than colour-painted. Like in real life, refining and polishing up the stone should bring out the colour. Besides, game or not, I find that the bright confetti asteroids look awfully silly.

From a game design standpoint I imagine it's good practice to make the resources stand out. You can easily identify the type of asteroid from it's color. That being said I do think they could benefit from a little more grit and rough appearance.

 

[nightrune]

From a game design standpoint I imagine it's good practice to make the resources stand out. You can easily identify the type of asteroid from it's color. That being said I do think they could benefit from a little more grit and rough appearance.

Yeah I completely agree.

 

[Ithirahad]

From a game design standpoint I imagine it's good practice to make the resources stand out. You can easily identify the type of asteroid from it's color. That being said I do think they could benefit from a little more grit and rough appearance.

The ores can keep their bright colors, and targeting the asteroid still reveals what it has. Plus, I never said to literally turn all the asteroids grey. I'm just saying to tone down the raw rock.

 

[kupu]

Its pretty hard to build with asteroids without making it look like a clown car. ... To me it makes sense that the refined carved blocks would be brighter, but maybe make the raw asteroid look a bit more beat up? It is in space after all!

I get that. I also agree completely that rocks need to look better in all aspects. Creating a discernible difference between raw and refined rock is required. They will get a full make over in the coming texture set.

However (and i know this will never receive unanimous support) i won't be removing the splashes of "unrealistic" colour in Starmade.
They may get tweaked and refined but Starmade will always remain colourful. The idea of realistic resources, skyboxes or following the trend of other's grey or cinematic palettes for Starmade always seemed... wrong?

It's a hard balance to achieve. I don't want clown car... but i do want to stay vibrant.
Thanks for the feedback.

 

[Ithirahad]

I wouldn't say that grey or cinematic palettes are a 'trend'; they're just a design choice. Also, I like some of the unrealistic colour. Blue frozen dirt, dark blue rock on Mars planets, bright colourful unrefined ores and metal ingots... And the simple skybox style fits the game pretty well. I'm just not sure about the rocks specifically.

As for "realistic resources," I think people just default to that because that's what they're familiar with. What people really want are distinct and meaningful resources, as opposed to identical but differently-colored materials with meaningless names that are used in completely random ways for blocks. Even just having shield blocks made out of Threns and Hattel, and Power Supply computers and modules being made out of Hylat and Fertikeen, would be a start.

Stuff being made out of real-world materials with a few sci-fi materials thrown in would be a bit boring, but in the end, it would serve the same purpose by making the ores and what you can make with them more memorable. Copper, steel, and crystal circuitry for scanner antennae; uranium, steel frame, and blue crystal motherboard for reactors.

 

[petrenko17]

I love colorful games, they look so childish happy. The variety of colors is crucial. Look at minecraft for example. No realistic resoursce pack can beat the default pixel one and in the end, who cares if those textures are real?
Another example are those new teal and pink hulls. Teal-pink ship may look silly or unreal, but if you see a child building it just because those hulls are so colorful, the ship suddenly become cool in its own way.
Most people play gemes because they enjoy playing them not because they look like the normal boring life which we all know.
I would love to see more crazy colorful textures and mobs in the future.

 

[nightrune]

I love colorful games, they look so childish happy. The variety of colors is crucial. Look at minecraft for example. No realistic resoursce pack can beat the default pixel one and in the end, who cares if those textures are real?
Another example are those new teal and pink hulls. Teal-pink ship may look silly or unreal, but if you see a child building it just because those hulls are so colorful, the ship suddenly become cool in its own way.
Most people play gemes because they enjoy playing them not because they look like the normal boring life which we all know.
I would love to see more crazy colorful textures and mobs in the future.

I think there is a balance to be held. I think it would be foolish to swing in a massive different direction, but there is something immersion breaking about the current raw asteroids. Having them be a bit more dull does give a gritty feeling. Especially if it manages to do it at a distance, and then as you get close you are rewarded with lovely colors after you took your time to come look at the asteroids. Then after refining you rewarded with even brighter more elegant textures and colors. That was my intention. So while I agree with you. I believe there is room for improving immersion and kupu is one of the best that could pull it off.

 

[jstenholt]

All asteroids shall henceforth be beige with grey undertones.

 

[Xtremesonicboom]

Honestly, I feel that the colours should be toned down to match with the grittier turn that the game is taking. If you look at the lore that's being developed, and the default ships that are being constructed by Criss and Saber, it definitely supports this. As nice as it would be to hold on to the old colourful asteroids, I feel that in order to fit with the game in the future, the colours need to be toned down. However, I may be wrong. Perhaps there will be a default texture pack like the old Pixel texture pack, where everything was colourful. I dunno. In the end, it's really up to Kupu and the rest of Schine, and anything we don't like we can make our own texture pack for.