I had a similar problem before. I ended up baking to a shadow map, and then using the Assign Vertex Color utility copy the map to the vertex alpha. Then I made a shader that multiplied the vertex alpha by the diffuse.
Hi, I'm trying lighten up the load for rendering real-time shadows in a game by baking the shadows for distant objects into the vertices of the models. Really cheap and old school! I'm doing the baking in Max using a Direct light and Assign Vertex colours in the Vertex paint modifier. If I set the light to onmi or spot it…