Assets Critias Vegetation System [Asset Store]

Hello!

'Critias Tree & Grass' is an system that is designed to paint, render and extract millions of instances of foliage without taking into account all the foliage but only the one that is in the proximity of the player.

Based on Unreal's foliage flow and UI and the 'Critias Tree/Grass' systems, I have decided to merge all of them for people who are interested in a all-in-one system, for trees, grass and any other terrain details that you might require in huge quantities.

But that is only a bonus, the core of the system is an super-fast instancing based rendering engine, that batches together foliage based on cells and sends them packed to the GPU so that your game's FPS is happy even with millions of foliage instances!



For a significant performance difference you should use more than 10000 mesh grass instances and more than 5000 trees. Only then you can unlock the full power of the system.

With 'Critias Tree & Grass System' you can:
- Paint your grass/meshes on your objects/terrain
- Extract existing trees or meshes from your scene
- Render at awesome FPS your foliage

Features (V 1.3.0):
- Primitive colliders for navmesh generation
- Add a 'Cleanup' command
- Convert items to native Unity game object format

Bug Fixes:
- Collision duplicating mesh rendering


Features (V 1.2.1):
- YOffset' per-type and not global any more. Works with extraction too
- Code fixes, improved caching

Bug Fixes:
- Changing foliage types from 'OTHER_GRASS' to 'OTHER_TREE' works
- Data does not get duplicated when changing the foliage type any more
- Fixed the 'NullShader' depth issues


Features (V 1.2.0):
- GPU distance foliage bending (experimental)
- Adding foliage instances
- DrawMeshInstancedIndirect with GPU caching
- Runtime hue/color changes
- Grass shadow fade
- Billboard shadows
- Foliage align to terrain in case of heightmap change
- Detail extraction from multiple terrains at once is possible now
- Auto-set the names of the extracted items
- Advanced Foliage Shader 5 integration
- Per foliage type surface align options
- Better painting
- Allow higher and lower densities
- Code examples
- Editor performance optimization
- Documentation notes on common pitfalls like: billboard lighting, foliage normals facing etc...

Bug Fixes:
- Billboard hue variation always matches tree hue variation now
- Various other resource releasing and cleanup bugs are fixed
- Wind not working in certain conditions (could not reproduce any more on my spec)

Features (V 1.1):
- Artist friendly
- Foliage instance batching and culling
- Existing tree and details extracting from terrains
- Hand painting
- Spatial hashed foliage placement. Terrains are not required any more!
- Paint your foliage on absolutely anything! Terrains, objects etc
- Not dependent on SpeedTree only!
- Awesome FPS (actually that's the whole point of this system)
- Smarter billboard batching
- Automatic setup. No need for any fancy setup like the old system
- Per foliage type culling distances
- Per foliage shadow casting
- Global grass density scaler
- GPU Instance calculations, very low CPU overhead
- Possibility to remove trees at runtime (destructible trees)
- Labels - The system will remember from which source it's instances came from
- Hard-drive serialization
- Support for 100k+ tress with collisions
- Support for multiple foliage types
- Instancing support
- Tillable terrain support
- Billboard rotation
- Billboard Tree Y rotation
- Tree/Grass SpeedTree wind
- LOD System for trees
- Animated SpeedTree style CrossFade
- Uber-fast billboard system (SpeedTree only)
- Everything from Critias Grass System
- Everything from Critias Tree System

System:
- Pending (Asset Store)
- Repository

Demo:
- Download here (Windows)

Documentation:
- Documentation here (PDF)

Tutorials:
- Quick setup (Video)
- Advanced setup (Video)

Support:
Found a bug or have some great idea of improvement? No problem, just grab your torch and pitchfork and join me here on the forum!

UI:


Compatibility:
For good performance and support this system will target Unity 5.6.3f/2017+ due to shader managing issues for lower versions. DX11 and any other platform that supports instancing. I would really not recommend this system for mobile, mobile games have enough from the Unity default systems.

The requirements are:
- Unity 2017+
- DX11
- DX11 equivalent graphic API's with instancing support
- GTX570/GTX750TI Golden Sample or equivalent GPU

Other Assets Compatibility:
- Advanced Foliage Shader V5 (Working)

Limitations:
Based on feedback with the other systems it is clear that a good video card with true GPU instancing is required. The minimum GPU would be an GTX570. I've also tested on a GTX750TI Golden Sample with very good results. I'll have a demo shortly where you can test if the performance is good for your PC before downloading the system. And check the PassMark of your GPU. A value higher than 4000 is required.

If it works bad on your PC with instancing on, you can try disabling it and keeping only the tree rendering.

If the system or the demo behaves bad on your machine or on the machines that you are testing on, I recommend to use Unity's build TreeCreator and foliage systems that are designed for very low-end machines!

 

* Reserved *

 

Is it planned to make some interactive stuff like this?:

 

Well, that is more of a shader work than my system's work that batches together a ton of details, but I have added it to the list of user proposed major features.

The only shaders I provide are the SpeedTree grass/tree shaders, the rest of the details use your own shaders that can do about anything.

Where is that screen from?

 

https://www.assetstore.unity3d.com/en/#!/content/36335

Maybe you can allow external shaders to work with your system?
I am not a shader expert, just looking for some amazing environment system

 

Quoting myself: "The only shaders I provide are the SpeedTree grass/tree shaders, the rest of the details use your own shaders that can do about anything."

If the item is not a SpeedTree then the shader that you have assigned to the prefab is going to be used, whatever shader that might be.

 

substance shaders supported for grass?

 

For SpeedTree it uses the default (modified) shaders. For you grass you can use any shader you wish, including PBR shaders.

In the first image the rocks on the terrain have a PBR (standard) material from megascans.

 

For people curious on how this would work, plus the setup, check out the quick tutorial video here.

 

When do you plan on releasing this system?

 

I'll submit it to the asset store review either today, tomorrow or Monday. From then on it is going to be something like around 2 weeks until the asset store at 15$(excluding VAT).

For people in very big curiosity or hurry I think we can arrange something quicker and cheaper right after I submit it to for review (since I want to test it from A to Z before that).

 

Hey please count me in to the "people in a hurry" category I've been using the tree system for a while and can't wait to see the next version! Let me know how we can do that...

 

No probls. I'll make a post here. At the moment I'm writing documentation (/cry).

 

As an update the I have finished the system, I'll submit it for review Monday.

 

Will new system be able to serialize tree data to some kind of ScriptableObject? Currently I'm rewriting Critias Tree System to store all data like terrainData is stored (due to bloated scene size)

UPD: do you have any plans about direct TerrainComposer2 integration? Currently we generate data into Unity terrain system and then we copy it to critias system

 

Yes, that is a bad part of the tree system it has all the data stored in the script. However since it's trees i never thought it might grow too large and I didn't bothered with a scriptable object.

However for the grass system the approach was different. It uses a file on the disk (stored in the 'StreamingAssets') with my internal format. I used 'ScriptableObjects' initially but due to the huge amount of instance data it was crashing quite often and I always had to reimport the scripts to get that ScriptableObject to work.

Long story short, the approach for this foliage system is the same like the grass system. It doesn't use ScriptableObjects since it works really bad at big amounts of data but it uses a file stored in the 'StreamingAssets' that contains all the data.

For integration with any 3rd party tools, I have it on my list, however that would require a strong integration, and that would require the developer of that tool to agree and write the code for the integration. I am not sure if anyone would want to do that. Anyway, In the system I am exposing 2 API's one for runtime and one for edit-time where you can add your data programmatically, whatever that sourre might be.

 

Great! Waiting for it on asset store!

Thanks!

 

It is official, I have just submitted the first version for review, 18 September 2017.

In the meantime, while we wait for the approval, I'll start working on the detailed and advanced tutorial that will try and cover the system from A to Z.

 

Sent PM about early access to your new incredible system ))

 

Hello, I have received your email and responded.

 

I've just uploaded the advanced tutorial video. For those interested on how the system works in-depth and how to set it up, you can check it there.

It covers:

1. General setup and painting:


2. Painting rocks and other details, not only foliage:


3. Painting non-terrains:

 

One thing that would really help sell me on this product would be if it included a tool to convert existing detail mesh painted with Unity's grass system into your system so that it could be easily applied to existing projects without having to repaint all the detail mesh.

 

Yup, two things that critical (must) to have for a better work flow:
- Ability to extract data from exist terrain data (Unity and/or Magic Map).
- Dynamically manipulate bending grass/trees (walking, car/tank running on grass).

 

The system gives that possibility for trees. However for the grass and other details I don't know at the moment how can I convert a detail instance from a splatmap to a world position. I couldn't find any easy to understand information about that mysterious 'GetDetailLayer' and it will take me some more time before I'll be able to decipher it (unless there is some detailed information about that somewhere?).

But I agree that it is a very important feature and I would simple add it as a patch to the system instead of submitting it for a community vote.

For V1 (the one now in review) it will not feature detail extraction, only tree extraction.

I hope that with the first patch I'll be able to fit in the detail extraction too. However, as I said I have to figure it out through trial-and-error since the info about that API is kinda slim.

 

Extracting is possible for trees (check out my previous post).

However the grass interactivity implies shader work not so much as system work and I'll post it as a community vote in the next months after the system is released. Not even UE has it by default

 

I've just tried to rig up a simple extractor for the terrain details and it wasn't as difficult as I thought initially. However it won't come to the asset store with V1, I'll pack it up in V1.1.

One note though. The system extracts all the foliage as instances and those take a whole 4x4 matrix per instance. I don't recommend the technique being used for terrain larger than 4x4km if you plan to pack it with grass.

If you have huge terrains I suggest the procedural placing of assets using the 'RuntimeAPI'. It is not supported by default in the system since the asset store is completely packed with assets that generate procedural data...

 

Do it works with multi terrain ?

 

Yes, the system works with one terrain, multiple terrains or any non-terrains. It is mentioned in the feature list.

 

Will you do a Gaia / Gena integration? Adam has a free api that you can use, I'd buy your asset if it worked with Gaia for sure.
https://forum.unity.com/threads/world-manager-generic-world-management-system.484239/

 

There is a runtime API (not very developed at the moment) and a edittime API and by using those you can dump right into the system instance data from ANY 3rd party world generation data you wish.

However the integration is not very tightly coupled, since the developer of that 3rd party API would require to build his system around my API and I'm sure nobody is willing to do that.

I'm not sure what the manager that you linked does, but it seems to be some sort of manager and not an drawing/generation API. I'll have to look into gaia later to see if it provides some API integration method.

 

The idea of the world manager api is to allow a range of different third party assets to be used together and controlled through one api set. Some of the demos Adam has shown are using unity's timeline to control the world manager api, and through that CTS (shader), Enviro (weather and environment) and Gena (spawning tool). If you were to include a subset of world manager APIs in your product, then your tool could be easily used with any other world manager compliant asset without you making any further changes.
If Unity provided a general purpose api set like this, you would surely support it and we could all reap the benefit, but as Unity haven't, Adam has proposed and implemented one and made the source freely available. Each asset developer only need implement those world manager APIs that they feel are relevant to their product.

 

I've looked into the manager, however I couldn't notice any hooks or something like that that spit out instances of anything. I've saw a lot of hooks for the environment none for the callbacks I need.

However I'll ask on the manager's forum just to be 100% and maybe I'm missing something. Hang on tight, I'm sure that there can be some good solution to this.

The current solution is to generate all your data on the standard unity terrain and after that dump it all in my system (I provide the methods of extracting that data) but yes, I know that it is an necessary extra step that can be simplified.

 

Does this system work with unity's latest Enlighten shadowmask light baking setups in 2017.1?
So it bakes in shadows on the ground then uses realtime shadows in the front. Seems like your tree system would greatly benefit for even more realism so when looking out in the distance you have baked shadows on the terrain ground around the trees and grass.

Also does this work in single pass stereo rendering for all VR headsets such as vive and oculus right now.

 

Absolutely agree that billboard shadows should be on the todo list and the above sounds a highly efficient way to do that

 

When Unity bakes it's lighting it pulls it's required data from either the terrain or from the game objects. It does that internally. So having a bake that takes into account my trees or grass is absolutely impossible at the moment.

It is because the class 'Lightmapping' from Unity DOES NOT allow me any room for injecting or otherwise adding my objects that are stored in my system only as a Matrix4x4 and a reference to a prefab.

One workaround would be to have the trees as normal objects painted on your terrain and have only the grass in my system.

PS: For the VR stuff I think it does, I'm not sure however. I've copied the used shaders with little modifications so it should work like they work by default in Unity.

 

See my previous post too. However the billboards are a different kind of thing, they exist outside my system so it should not be a problem integrating them with the lightmapping scenario.

However due to a bug that appeared in 5.6 (if i can remember correctly) the shadows of the billboards are drawn all over the place instead of having them at their designated location. I'll see to modify the shader to manually include a custom shadow pass to solve the issue. So it is absolutely on the todo list.

PS: However, I'd think that for the scene's dynamism, wind for billboards might be a lot more important than shadows. Looking at some games I'd say that instead of having a ton of static billboards looking at you looking is quite damp and that wind might really add a lot.

 

Got a question about speed tree shaders. Speed tree never updated there shaders to use PBR shaders. Have you had any thought about adding that into there shaders or its not doable with your system?

 

That is more shader work rather than my system's work. However I thought at that and I don't see too big of a problem... The shader 'should' be quite easily modified to support the PBR stuff. However you'll have to provide your own PBR textures to it.

 

This sounds amazing!

"Possibility to remove trees at runtime (destructible trees)" - will I also be able to add trees at runtime?

 

I didn't added the feature to 'add' trees at runtime in V1 (the one that is coming to the asset store now) but since I think that runtime generation of data is very important there will be the possibility to add trees to the system.

I think that I'll add that in V1.1 that also has some other stuff implemented, like detail extraction from the terrain. However the review seems to take ages (already day 10).

So yea, the adding at runtime of grass/trees is planned for version 1.1 that should arrive shortly to the store after version 1.

 

Hi @Assembler-Maze, I've got several other tree-systems and had actively persuaded bug-fixes, features and so on. Today I finally decided to take all the systems for bench-marking, and to be honest, I'm absolutely amazed by Critias.

I haven't done the main test for me, which is running on VR single-pass forward mode; I'll be doing that later today. For normal games, here are some stats:

Demo scene in Gaia (2kmX2km) with around 12k speed-trees.

Critias Tree: Setting up was super easy; (Haven't tried it with TreeCreator or Mesh Trees); Installed folder can be moved (which is really important for me). Need to confirm, but I think I can load it completely off AssetBundle.
Avg 691FPS

AltTrees: Takes a little more time to setup; Works with all tree types. However, paths are hard-coded and can't easily be moved into different location. Loading from assetBundle was a pain with some hacks.
Avg 300FPS (which was brilliant until I benchmarked Critias)

LushLOD: Messy to configure as it only supports TreeCreator. Can be moved to different locations; reading developer's comment, it's unlikely to get any updates.
Avg 180FPS.


This is so strange; AltTree gives me around 500K tris compared to 1.5M tris with Critias; but Critias still gives me better frames with lower CPU;

This is super cool; I've got my fingers crossed to see if it works with VR.

Can't wait for Foliage in the asset store.

 

Hello,

Thanks for the bench-marking info, I appreciate it . I never done it myself comparing it to other system, I've just implemented it by reading on how some AAA studios managed the whole thingy.

For the v count don't worry it seems that instancing does something with it I'm not sure, I'll look into it again, but it seems that it's just a result of using instancing...

Good luck with your projects!

 

@Assembler-Maze, to hell with the V count forgive my french... we care about fps.

couple of quick questions: does foliage support TreeCreator and custom meshes (I'm guessing it does as you wrote not dependant on SpeedTree only)? Then you wrote uber-fast billboard shader for SpeedTrees - what does that mean? So are we saying a scene with 20K speedTrees would be faster than 20K treeCreator?
Wind - is it for speedTree only?

BTW, it works perfectly in Single-Pass Stereo Rendering in Linear mode (ignoring billboard lighting issue)

 

1. Supports any mesh (watch the full video tutorial too) and tree creator
2. Does not support wind for anything else than SpeedTree. However since you can use your custom shaders there's no problem in adding wind to anything. I'll see how I can provide more shaders by default, but I can't promise anything since it's a foliage system not a shader system
3. It's the billboard batching mechanism that is about the same like the one in CritiasTree. And it's kinda better set up and easier to use I think
4. I'm not sure that 20k SpeedTrees would be faster than 20k TreeCreators since my system doesn't care what it renders. The complexity is given by the count of polygons, how well you've set up the LOD's and the shader complexity. The SpeedTree shader is pretty complex, I would expect that it is slower than the TreeCreator shader however I think the SpeedTree due to LOD's have less polygons than TreeCreator.

This optimization issue is a very complicated one, and you should be extra careful when developing your scene. I can give you a few tips on how to get good performance using my system:

Critias Foliage:
- Use SpeedTree with at least 3 LODS, for example 12k verts/4k verts/1k verts
- Don't have a large draw distance for bushes, small trees, keep it withing 20-40m, and only for big trees that give a lot of definition make a larger drawing distance
- Don't use LOD's for things like bushes
- Don't cast shadows with all the tree types
- Always watch for your forests density! You can have a forest that looks exactly the same but with less dense trees that really make a difference for your performance
- Don't base your scene only on trees and grass. Have a good looking terrain too
- Batch your terrain details like grass/pebbles in clumps rather than adding them as individual stones or flowers in the system
- Watch for the details density, don't go overboard with the density. You can achieve the same look with 5 clumps of grass per sq meter or 2 clumps of grass per sq meter. And 2 clumps is a lot less than 5
- Don't cast shadows for all the grass types
- For all you details it's better to add them to my system instead of adding them as GameObjects in Unity
- Don't abuse my system! It's great for trees, bigger rocks, terrain details, grass etc... but don't use it for mountains, modular houses or things that it wasn't designed for

Unity:
- Use LODs for your terrain objects, and make for the second/third LOD that it shouldn't cast shadows. It saves a lot
- Set a larger pixel error for the terrain, trust me it saves a lot
- Use only one terrain
- If you have a modular building encapsulate it in a bounding box that turns it off when not in the view frustum
- Profile, profile, profile!


Those are just some general rules, don't take them as the only things that have to be done, but it should get your running up quite good with my system.

 

I wish assetStore would get on its ass and approve this asset... keeping my fingers crossed every day.

 

Yea, it's kinda frustrating, it's the 3rd week already. I hope that the next week we'll have this live.

 

As a note, the asset is entering the 4th week of review, I really hope that it will reach the store this week.

 

Hope so, looking forward to this.

 

Yea, I hope so too, since V1 is still in review, and I almost finished V1.1 that contains some very nice addons like extracting details (not only trees) from the terrain, plus the removal of some limitations.

 

Does this work something like Map Magic?