Spring RTS Engine

The graphics engine is currently pretty damn beautiful, especially if you have shadows turned on.

But there's a sore spot: trees look terrible. They look like random green blotches.

What needs to be done to improve this? Is it textured tree models? If that's the case, I'd love to help. Someone let me know what I can do.

This should be a mtr. Do a search for new trees on this site. If we could they already would have been relplaced.

I think the current trees are great. How much detail do you want?

The 3D trees are pretty. The non-3D trees are pretty sucky.

Make sure your tree detail slider is full. We can't do new trees as features because we don't have model transparency for model textures. As soon as it's done expect to see tonnes of new maps with really nice trees, the modelers we have are itching to do new trees, but it just isn't plausable right now.

the trees aren't _that_ ugly imo....

Nobody tried to actually improve the default tree textures and generation code? They could look a lot better if someone went through the files then prettied them up, and a coder improved the generator to make them fit more into the map, maybe allowing a mapper to define a hue.

custom trees FTW

give us transparacy on some channel for s3o feature's


someone!!!

Someone write a patch!!!

Please Someone, save us....

NOiZE wrote:someone!!!

Someone write a patch!!!

Please Someone, save us....

Although I asked many times no one told me how to get the stuff setup and as I said before also, the blue channel is available.

unless you zoom in all the way, Trees actually look quite realistic. Its just when you zoom in and see how completely ugly they look. *Shudders*

I dunno, they don't look that bad, i mean common people, what more do you want from an RTS engine??? We're talking about a program that supports litterally HUNDREDS AND THOUSANDS of units, a fully polygonal DYNAMIC terrain, AND fully Polygonal features. It does all that with minimal slowdown to boot! How much better do the trees actually need to be??? My ADD is bad enough when i play, last thing i need is to be distracted by how pretty the trees are while i'm getting attacked on both flanks!

This thread is a DILIBERATE atempt on my life...

...anyway, I donk know if anyones considered this butt he current trees do use 1 bit transparance for there leaves and such.... so aslong as your talking about replacing the engin trees, actully putting better models in would be easyier than some people think. Just a case of finding out what formatt he current tress are in (cause there not s3o I'm sure (Im not sure that means)) and remodeling them and upgrading the bmp's with new higher quality ones. I'm sure iof someone asked whoever coded in the teres how come they get transparance (all be it limited, but good enough for starters) he could reveal all.

Making them grow over time would be another cool feature.

aGorm

We have already discussed the retarded tree regrowth.. it was rejected. Stop pushing for it.

As far as replacing a model or redoing a texture... if it was that simple I would have DONE THAT ALREADY.

SJ would be the guy who coded in the trees AFAIK

Personally, I'd like to see all trees made atleast double the size they are currently...

Hmm, that would be neat, I wonder if the devs would allow mods to set a feature multiplier factor?

that way we can scale the features as we see fit.

However, I would like the trees 25% taller. :)

Smoth, if you can't see blatent sarcasm when it's used then you could atleast not be snotty.

And I knever said it was as simple as making a moddel and a texture, I know that, hence why I said we need to ask teh guy who did the Original trees waht needs doing to replace them. They must have a model somerwere and I know were the textures for them are.

Changeing teh scale (but not growing) would be a nice thing to add. But thered have to be an upper limet of trees would clip and look relay bad.

aGorm

aGorm wrote:And I knever said it was as simple as making a moddel and a texture, I know that, hence why I said we need to ask teh guy who did the Original trees waht needs doing to replace them. They must have a model somerwere and I know were the textures for them are.

Those tree textures in the spring bmp file are not the ones for the 3d trees.

Actully.. some of them are. Or they were in there a few versions ago when I checked. None the less, THEY MUST exist somewere, be it on SJ computer, in the svn, in some obscure safty diposit box in swedden, were ever, they do exist.

And besides, Im saying FIND OUT what needs to happen to get the current trees replaced (because at some point in time they must have been models for them and textures) and work somthing out with the programers. Jesss. Quit trying to gun me down.

(oh and if there not the ones were exactly are these textures, because textures dont just magicly appear from thin air you know. Nither do models. And if your thinking somthing like "he thinks the 2d tree sprites are used to texture the 3d trees" then wrong again, there is a bark texture and several leaf textures, some of which im sure are used.)

SO, next port of call is SJ, because even if he didn't make them he can tell us who did, and tell us the fesability of replacing them.

And as a final point, teh matter of wether we do or dont know were the current models and textures are is mute, because what we do know is that spring has trees, which use a leaf texture which has 1bit transparancy. So nothing is imposible here. We just need clarification. (Maybe the trunks are a model and teh leaves are added in the code...)

Enough from me...

aGorm

AFAIK All the tree data is generated