OA3 Character redux thread
polycounter lvl 14
OpenArena is that one free game that rips off another in the most legal way possible under the GNU GPL v2 Free Software license. It's been around for quite a while and has been quite stagnant as of late.
Over the years it recieved contributions of artwork and maps, however the styles clash and is an overall inconsistent mixed bag in both visual and performance reasons. It's a bit trainwreckian in its creative direction because of its 'take what we can get' approach it had early in the project.
Enter OA3, a fork that aims to attempt to resolve this problem. I have to explain my reasons a bit more here:
- Instead of polycounts of 2000-3000 it's more like 900-1800. MD3 transforms add up to memory usage a lot.
- Anime/manga styled characters, for a clearer proportional readout and cleaner, more colorful appearance. (This is a very fast paced game after all). This is a huge change from the weird semi-realistic comicish style it has now and I believe this will benefit both the core players (the 'play to win' kind makes up the game's majority) and the casual. It's so no one needs to have a big flourescent bright colored model forced, and i don't like to aim for 'rip off id software's look' like most suggest to either. People assume I mean "cel shading". IT IS NOT.
- ONE TEXTURE. Need to save on the texture switching whereever possible to keep FPS high. Staying far away from alpha and alphatest usage. The more textures used on a player, the bigger toll it takes to the framerate as it keeps switching them along. That's a lesson I learned the hard way.
- Normal maps and other standard post-2004 niceties still aren't an option, probably never will be since the target FPS is around 120 at minimum. (A Pentium III 800MHz w/ Geforce2 should be adequate to hit that for q3, however OA currently can't)
- Players will get a specular lighting layer, optionally toggled with r_detailTextures. Alpha channel will be used to denote specular areas only.
- Weapons will be more large, shapely and represent their color more, so the orange shotgun will be oranged, plasma gun purple, etc.
So far, are just two female characters, and i'll need to do a grism remake soon since that's a minimally required model by the source code.
This is "Mermie", pretty much a scary sea monster mermaid thing. OA has "merman" which is just a blue fish man. The uniform is for red/blue teams and is looking quite a bit flar and smudgy.
This is supposed to be "Dark", the obligatory superarmor'd skimpy babe (old model). I've only put in 2 hours on this so far (was gonna work on her yesterday, god damn art procrastination)
I wonder if UVmapping and texturing as I go along the modeling process is a good idea, even if there's an option to make another set of UVs to project the old UVs and texture onto with clone painting or baking.
Constructive criticism, feedback, paintovers, etc are very much appreciated. I know wires are missing, so i'll try to get those up as soon as I can. I'm focusing on handpainting in a single layer still.
Over the years it recieved contributions of artwork and maps, however the styles clash and is an overall inconsistent mixed bag in both visual and performance reasons. It's a bit trainwreckian in its creative direction because of its 'take what we can get' approach it had early in the project.
Enter OA3, a fork that aims to attempt to resolve this problem. I have to explain my reasons a bit more here:
- Instead of polycounts of 2000-3000 it's more like 900-1800. MD3 transforms add up to memory usage a lot.
- Anime/manga styled characters, for a clearer proportional readout and cleaner, more colorful appearance. (This is a very fast paced game after all). This is a huge change from the weird semi-realistic comicish style it has now and I believe this will benefit both the core players (the 'play to win' kind makes up the game's majority) and the casual. It's so no one needs to have a big flourescent bright colored model forced, and i don't like to aim for 'rip off id software's look' like most suggest to either. People assume I mean "cel shading". IT IS NOT.
- ONE TEXTURE. Need to save on the texture switching whereever possible to keep FPS high. Staying far away from alpha and alphatest usage. The more textures used on a player, the bigger toll it takes to the framerate as it keeps switching them along. That's a lesson I learned the hard way.
- Normal maps and other standard post-2004 niceties still aren't an option, probably never will be since the target FPS is around 120 at minimum. (A Pentium III 800MHz w/ Geforce2 should be adequate to hit that for q3, however OA currently can't)
- Players will get a specular lighting layer, optionally toggled with r_detailTextures. Alpha channel will be used to denote specular areas only.
- Weapons will be more large, shapely and represent their color more, so the orange shotgun will be oranged, plasma gun purple, etc.
So far, are just two female characters, and i'll need to do a grism remake soon since that's a minimally required model by the source code.
This is "Mermie", pretty much a scary sea monster mermaid thing. OA has "merman" which is just a blue fish man. The uniform is for red/blue teams and is looking quite a bit flar and smudgy.
This is supposed to be "Dark", the obligatory superarmor'd skimpy babe (old model). I've only put in 2 hours on this so far (was gonna work on her yesterday, god damn art procrastination)
I wonder if UVmapping and texturing as I go along the modeling process is a good idea, even if there's an option to make another set of UVs to project the old UVs and texture onto with clone painting or baking.
Constructive criticism, feedback, paintovers, etc are very much appreciated. I know wires are missing, so i'll try to get those up as soon as I can. I'm focusing on handpainting in a single layer still.
Replies
Mermodel's texture is generally WAY BETTER than dark's so far. Cleaner, better defined planes go a very long way, i think you're geting into too much over-muddy shading on this chick.
This oldschool stuff is cool though, looking forward to more! (I hope there are gargoyles
As for the models, I think "Mermie's" texture can use a lot of love as it is on the muddy side. I would also highly suggest you finish modeling your other character before UVing and texturing. You can always project your current texture onto your new UV layout when you're finished the geometry. Are you working off of any concept art by any chance? I see a bunch of details on your mermaid character that seem random and don't fit the overall design at all. Take for instance the metal bits that completely break the larger shapes up and don't read well from a distance. I also think the colour scheme isn't working either and your textures can use some colour variation in the shading, eg. blue in the darks, pinks in the highlights.
I love Quake III as much as the next guy, but have you ever thought about moving to a handheld platform or to a newer engine? You've been messing about with Quake since I started reading these boards over a decade ago
The sheer crappiness of the OpenPandora is one motivation for the whole redux, and if I did go for a newer engine, it wouldn't be the same phyiscs, weapons etc. it wouldn't translate well and there's already a gamer community relying me for the fate of the project as it is. Switching engines would be an unneccessary thing to do.
120fps on a p3 isn't that farfetched. The players usually want to shoot for 500fps and beyond (for some jumping physics exploit they live by, idk). A Geforce2 or even a Geforce FX5200 at least can pull in 100 on maximum detail on a machine like that because of drivers having a T&L path.
Unfortunately I have to make it up as I go along. No concept art of the redux is available because it doesn't exist since I don't draw and i'm the only active artist on the contributors list.
[ame]