Author Topic: CPU thrifty way of adding forests (Read 958 times)

Sclew · « **Reply #60 on:** April 20, 2002, 05:54:19 AM »

BTW choir-

Il-2 uses a more complicated way of doing this than what you describe.

They layer 5 or six in progressivly larger circles to represent flying over a conifer forest. This gives a feeling of depth and truly appears to be a forest until you get close enough to see the edges of the layers and the gaps in between.

Arguably with AH's ground clutter it might not look as bad- there would be vertical elements dispersed through the layers. But seeing those knife edges of death does indeed look terrible in Il-2.

N1kPaz · « **Reply #61 on:** April 20, 2002, 07:18:01 AM »

http://www.getright.com

great download utility...even allows segmented downloading (a plus for the broadband privledged such as myself) while also featuring download pause and resume for later finishing. its a great utility.

715 · « **Reply #62 on:** April 20, 2002, 12:28:37 PM »

Use of the GPU and DX8 enhancements would really improve the eye candy of AH, but wouldn't that entail a very major and expensive rewrite of the AH graphics engine (which, I believe, currently makes no use of the GPU)? At $14.95/mo is there really enough profit margin for that big of an "R&D" effort? And then there is the issue of disenfranchising people without Radeon or GeForce graphics cards.

hitech · « **Reply #63 on:** April 20, 2002, 03:17:13 PM »

It couldn't be that we already tried puting more stuff on the GPU and it slowed things down could it?

Nah we would never think that far ahead.

Esme · « **Reply #64 on:** April 20, 2002, 09:53:25 PM »

One of the most impressive things about AH, to me, is what you get per megabyte of download - far more than any other game out there that I've seen.

Whilst I'm a bit of a "realism nut" and I'd love photorealistic visuals, all I NEED are visuals sufficient to make my subconscious suspend disbelief about the reality of what I'm seeing. I'd rather extra megabytes go into new planes, or improved strat - or forests GVs can hide in - than in unecessarily fine-meshed terrain or other purely visual frippery. This is where HTC has gotten things so right with AH - just the right level of visual detail so that it looks as good as it works and doesnt involve overlarge downloads.

Gameplay matters more than pretty visuals - WB2 2D is a shining example of this. Looks very poor by todays standards, but plays well enough to be immersive. AH works visually well enough that it seldom jars on the eye, and so the mind sees a world it can treat credibly. More thn that ay be nice, but isnt necessary at all.

Esme