terrain polycount in cryengine 2
polycounter lvl 9
I just now realized im going to have problems when unearthly challenge starts because the terrain in cryengine uses up so much of the tricount budget. Is there any way to bypass this problem? Can i make a terrain mesh and export it into the engine or something and still use the handy paint tools? I guess i can model it and export it just like any other mesh but then i cant use the layer painter and stuff.
Replies
Many engines optimize them in the memory and storage because it can be assumed that except the depth (or height as you will) anything else repeats (loop) in a way.
Try to use Normal mapping instead of huge polycounts etc.
Does Crysis allow custom mesh imports for terrain? Would there be any issues importing a giant custom model with collision?
I guess you could always import a mesh and use it as terrain BUT i dont know if it would be possible to use the neat layer painter tools. But i guess those are just a whole bunch of different UV sets for the terrain so maybe.
If you cant see everything at once (FOV) I think the engine can handle a fair amount of polies as long as you split them into several bigger chunks so that it clips them efficiently.
But I don't think it has anything to do with terrain- just regular mesh import with collision support. Most of the buildings and fine detail stuff in Crysis is done that way. The level editor is just there to create a base for the nature terrain.
doh there it is "import terrain block" off to find out how it works.
However, terrain in CE2 is supposed to occlude everything behind it, so its tricount shouldn't be really that much of a problem.
Also, in case you would like to gain a little bit of tris you can setup occluders on your custom props in 3dsmax. I believe you will find a tutorial on how to do that in wiki on Crymod.
You can also change the terrain resolution by changing the unit-size settings during the map creation.
I would like to write a little bit more, but I don't have an access to the Sandbox atm.
I hope it's going to help you
I don't think so that You can import a terrain-mesh into Sandbox, but You can sculpt or generate Your terrain in other package and just import the heightmap.
TERRAIN / EDIT TERRAIN / FILE / IMPORT HEIGHTMAP.
Nothing to do to optimize the poly's, I know, but can help.
I think the best way is make a terrain under Sandbox anyway.:poly142:
Not for unearthly challenge because that would leave me with 10k tris for everything else in my scene ;p
any fan of ETQW here ? :poly142:
Well , I think that You can find a solution at EARTHSCULPTOR -
easy to use , export in .obj file. , export heigtmap .
You can get the demo with some limites in a map size & terrain texture size ... no matter after export.
Just try it -
http://www.earthsculptor.com/
it's an example of generating some nice terrain as a mesh instead of a terrain system, this can be adapted to any engine I believe.
Here is a screenshot to show my problem.
I deleted most of the terrain and as you can see i turned down the density so its pretty lowres but it still shows it at 168k tris.. I think the problem might be with the water underneath? I dont know if its possible to remove it since it just sortof shows up in my level even when i dont ask for it.
[iWi] and Justin thanks for the tips but it doesnt really help me. Generating a hightmap in another program doesnt change the tricount inside cryengine and generating a terrain mesh in something like worldmachine means i cant use the terrain paint tools that cryengine has wich was my original problem ;p
Not a huge problem tho, ill just texture and build everything in maya.
edit: Hmm nope it shows up again when i press generate surface texture
edit2: the skybox is like 20k tris and the oceans is ~100k :0 can remove the ocean but i guess it would be a bad idea to remove the skybox.
Unearthly challenge ? .... You mean this one ?
http://www.unearthlychallenge.com/2009/en_index.php