Search Unity

  1. Megacity Metro Demo now available. Download now.
    Dismiss Notice
  2. Unity support for visionOS is now available. Learn more in our blog post.
    Dismiss Notice

Does Unity make game dev too difficult?

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by GarBenjamin, May 18, 2017.

Thread Status:
Not open for further replies.
  1. neginfinity

    neginfinity

    Joined:
    Jan 27, 2013
    Posts:
    13,554
    :D

    Reboot time!

    Let's go back to the beginning:

    I've been interested - since the beginning of this little chat - in ONE thing. Accelerate modeling/animation process to the speed of drawing a sketch. Anything else - absolutely anything else - is unrelated. That includes self-driving cars, voice recognition, google translate, siri, and even blue brain project.

    Also I'm not interested in copying real objects (depth reconstruction - because you'll need to build the damn thing anyway) or stitching textures from 50 thousands of existing photos (because copyright), facial reconstruction (because model release form, model salary and makeup) but a general purpose solution applying to modeling any object from nothing.

    So far, two videos are related to the problem - smooth teddy demo I posted, and muscle routing system I posted, and that's it. Now what?

    In the context of this little chat, I'm only interested in that one specific application, and won't care about any other tech that uses deep learning/neural nets, until I need it (right now I don't). Problem at hand and tools for that, you know? I'm looking for a workflow.

    ---

    Basically, I don't get excited about technologies easily, don't care about "possibilities" (and consider imagining possibilities a waste of time, since a possibility is a thing you can't use right now), and I'm only interested in tools I can use right now for the problem i'm dealing with.
     
    Last edited: Jun 8, 2017
    Martin_H likes this.
  2. mysticfall

    mysticfall

    Joined:
    Aug 9, 2016
    Posts:
    649
    Ok, so what you are getting at is, the same technology that can be used in fighting cancer, driving cars, recognizing a voice, translating natural languages, etc will never be used to accelerate modelling/animation process even in next 15 years because what... you think 3D modelling to be so much more complex and original a process than everything mentioned above? :cool:

    And how come those videos are 'unrelated' to the problem in question, unless you define 'relevancy' as "something that I can purchase off Asset Store right now"? From when this discussion has changed from that of possibility in next 15 years or so to that of general availability right now?

    I have to agree with @neoshaman that you are indeed in denial.
     
  3. neoshaman

    neoshaman

    Joined:
    Feb 11, 2011
    Posts:
    6,493
    skin modifier + mirror + multires + sculpting tool :D


     
    Last edited: Jun 8, 2017
  4. Billy4184

    Billy4184

    Joined:
    Jul 7, 2014
    Posts:
    6,009
    What's the point of arguing about the future? Everyone and their dog has an (in)vested opinion on that. What's important is what we can actually make now.

    I'm always disappointed to see these kind of discussions diverge from small and interesting examples to arguments over the state of some hitherto nonexistent technology that may or may not arise out of what NASA is currently projecting to spend its research budget on after the next general election.
     
    neginfinity likes this.
  5. neginfinity

    neginfinity

    Joined:
    Jan 27, 2013
    Posts:
    13,554
    Tried it. Takes longer than a sketch, results are worse than a sketch.

    This is a very quick, very old and very crappy sketch of mine:
    cat sketch 2.png
    Now, it doesn't look good, but I know no fast way to make something similar looking in a 3d software in the same amount of time. 3d version will take many times longer.


    --------

    @neoshaman:

    Basically, it goes like this:

    In context of game making.
    • "Siri", "Google Translate" - Can I use it in a game? No. Can I make it by myself? No/unlikely. Why? Because I'm not google and don't have have their manpower and processing capabilities. Pass.
    • "Self-driving cars" - Unless I'm making a racing game, I don't see immediate applications. Practical application will probably result in increased CPU/memory use with no improvement. Pass.
    • "Cancer-research" - Cancer research is a good thing, but does not apply to gamedev. Pass.
    • "Depth reconstruction" - So if I want a castle, I'll need to find it and photograph it. Then the damn thing will be probably copyrighted somehow, plus there's no architecture I'm interested in in immediate vicinity.
    • "Face from photo" - Possible copyright issues with original sample data, because I BET the neural network is considered a derived work of a sample data. I'll also need to find a human model. Can I rebuild the data set myself? Unlikely.
    • "Oil painting" - What's the copyright on sample data? might be worth a look if I need to knock off 50 landscape painting in interiors, otherwise not interested. Barely usable
    • "Pix2Pix" - what's the copyright on sample data? How long to build it? Copyright? Doubtful usefullness, most likely wil look too similar to sample, bad or unsuitable.
    • "Face mesh from caricature" - unclear information about face topology (possibly fixed/unusable) sample data rights, possibility of reconstructing sample data, etc.
    ------
    Basically, overall a lot of those technologies look like they can lure in with "possibilities", waste a lot of time and computing power, and result in nothing usable. And that is the problem in general with experimental technologies.

    IN the past I've looked into:

    • Speech recognition. Available frameworks at the moment were S*** and could only deal with pretrained words. Interfacing with them was difficult.
    • Speech synthesis. Very poor result from free/opensource solutions, Limited results with non-free solutions. Licensing troubles.
    • Texture synthesis. Well.. .I did have a patch based texturesyntehsizer lying around, while the texture kinda sorta looks cool and only takes half an hour to produce, it is not really usable anywhere, plus requires hunting for textures on foot.
    • Photogrammetry - massive waste of processing power without expensive gear, studio and cool artifacts to photograph. Does not really save the time unless you own a castle already.

    The samples you listed fall into the same category - hard/expensive to replicate and limited use.

    Technology in teddy and muscle routing vision in comparison looks much more promising (to me at least), and gives impression that it might be worth wasting a month on making a prototype of it. Can't say the same about anything neural net related, plus training sample data requires way too much power.

    And that's basically the reason for high degree of skepticism. I already wasted a lot of time experimenting with something I thought would save me a lot of time in the past, only to waste time and gain nothing.

    So, because of this, I agree with this statement:
    The future isn't here, and does not exist right now. "Possibilities" are distractions that do not exist at this moment. The important things are technology that is available right now and can be used right now.

    At least that's the way I see it.
     
    Last edited: Jun 8, 2017
    Ryiah likes this.
  6. neoshaman

    neoshaman

    Joined:
    Feb 11, 2011
    Posts:
    6,493
    Well no, it 's not inexistant, it's used right now.

    You are arguing the future, I'm arguing the now. :p

    But how long did you learn to make a sketch like that?

    You were surprised by my first model in that other thread, and the second video shared show a rather decent model made quickly. It happen that doing stuff take some learning no matter the tools. I go very quickly with Skin modifier to make organic shapes, so much I want to reproduce it in unity to make a pgc character and animal generator (requirement, I successfully implement convex hull for the point where there is more than 2 edges).

    At the same time I'm more artistically inclined BUTa bad programmer, you would have already implement that tools in unity given the basic are roughly similar to your editor tools, I'm still fighting with the code :eek: I have no idea where to go next with the half edge geometry code I made, Right now I have a code that turn regular mesh structure into half edge geometry (fixing UV and mesh seam), but I don't know how to proceed and make a convex hull (quickhull elude me) and I don't understand the reference on internet.

    I would say it's a case of tool resistance, I'm fine with skin modifier, you are fine with c# :oops:
     
  7. neginfinity

    neginfinity

    Joined:
    Jan 27, 2013
    Posts:
    13,554
    I forgot/don't know. I don't see how it matters, though.

    This is way too slow to be compared to a sketch. What can you do in 30 seconds with skin modifier?

    This is a 30 seconds drawing:
    cat-gesture3.png
    I think it would take 15 seconds with a pencil instead of a drawing tablet.
     
  8. Billy4184

    Billy4184

    Joined:
    Jul 7, 2014
    Posts:
    6,009
    This example would probably benefit from 'knowing' that it's a cat. It would be interesting to try to make a simple generic highres cat model, and try to 'shrinkwrap' it onto the best understanding of what that drawing represents, taking into account the major features common to all cats, such as eyes, nose, ears, tail etc, as well as symmetry, and possibly an understanding of the joints and skeleton as well.

    Perhaps an error heatmap could be created to show where the algorithm had the most trouble, so perhaps more detail could be added there by the artist.
     
  9. neoshaman

    neoshaman

    Joined:
    Feb 11, 2011
    Posts:
    6,493
    But is it rigged?:p

    I can't answer right now, I would have to open blender on the right computer and do a test, but you are saying production ready. Maybe the startup is slower but developing the rest is shorter, maybe the ROI curve is more like a log for 3d and linear for 2d. Because the beneft I'm also seeing is that that 3d cat would also be ready for animation and have all angle correctly drawn. 2d is only faster because you have less return on it (don't move, just one pov). Texturing isn't fast though lol. If I were to make a game quickly with various animals, creatures and characters, I will def go skin modifier. 3d promote reuse and adaptaion much more than 2d.

    That's a whole new debate :eek:

    It mentionned it relative to efficiency and craft familiarity. You can do stuff faster when you are more skilled, even though I was new at modeling at that time i wasn't totally a lapse artist either. It was Garbenjamin thread on minimizing graphic asset with his blocky barbarian.
     
  10. neginfinity

    neginfinity

    Joined:
    Jan 27, 2013
    Posts:
    13,554
    Well, if you manage to make, rig and texture the model in 30 seconds, I'll be probably surprised.

    I'm looking for an equivalent of gesture drawing in 3d. The fastest approach I'm aware of at the moment takes at least 30 to 50 times longer in comparison, and it doesn't really matter how you go about it - box model, edge model, skin modifier, sculpt, etc.

    On paper you can have a hundred little drawings over a course of half an hour. So you can rapidly test idea and discard them. Same applies to traditional animation, by the way. One fast 10..30 second drawing is one animation frame.

    In 3d this doesn't really fly and that makes me think that there might be a flaw in standard 3d workflow. However, programs like smoothteddy from the video I previously looked - THOSE look like it could be possible to make a 30 second 3d sketch gesture drawing in them.
     
    GarBenjamin likes this.
  11. GarBenjamin

    GarBenjamin

    Joined:
    Dec 26, 2013
    Posts:
    7,441
    It probably won't help with the style of art you are making @neginfinity but I am now checking into other alternative modelers. Currently onto voxel modelers now. This suits me well because I am fine with ultra low poly.

    I particularly like the treehouse. But I wouldn't be able to spend that kind of time. That is the whole point... of course if a person spends loads of time on stuff it will look better. Trick is how to get some of that while spending much less time (in my case like virtually no time lol). :)

    We'd need to bring into Blender and remesh and decimate to reduce poly count because would add up to a lot for large detailed objects. But again I am thinking of really low detail so may be fine as it.

    The free MagicaVoxel looks very good. I will test it sometime before the weekend.

     
    Last edited: Jun 8, 2017
  12. Billy4184

    Billy4184

    Joined:
    Jul 7, 2014
    Posts:
    6,009
    Is gesture drawing really faster than rotating bones?
     
  13. sngdan

    sngdan

    Joined:
    Feb 7, 2014
    Posts:
    1,154
    Why don't you make a challenge amongst each other?
    - Say one picks a 3D item to model (that would take a professional something like 2 hours to do it perfect)
    - Challenge 1: create in 45 minutes as good as possible (record workflow)
    - Challenge 2: create in one day as good as possible (show end product)

    Of course skill also comes into play but it's not about winning, it is about demonstrating workflow.
     
  14. GarBenjamin

    GarBenjamin

    Joined:
    Dec 26, 2013
    Posts:
    7,441
    45 minutes? What a huge amount of time! If I can find the right tool I am thinking maybe 3 minutes should be able to make a simple player character / enemy and then another few minutes to animate it.

    Yes my goals are probably extreme but ya know shoot for the stars and may hit the moon. This stuff really shouldn't be this damn hard or at least time consuming. Not to the degree that it is. I agree with @neginfinity completely on that. There is something about doing it on the computer that is just too unnatural and tedious. Hell you could build a freaking cool model using legos faster than in most 3D modeling programs.
     
    Last edited: Jun 8, 2017
  15. Murgilod

    Murgilod

    Joined:
    Nov 12, 2013
    Posts:
    10,083
    In my experience, yes, by a significant margin.
     
  16. neoshaman

    neoshaman

    Joined:
    Feb 11, 2011
    Posts:
    6,493
    Most artist I know would say z-brush, they don't do paper pass anymore lol
    But people using zbrush aren't interesting in small sketch anyway, so there is nothing to compare to.

    Well the rig is automatic with skin mod, because you are effectively creating model with bones!

    There is also spore creature editor :p
     
  17. Billy4184

    Billy4184

    Joined:
    Jul 7, 2014
    Posts:
    6,009
    Bear in mind the level of fidelity that gesture drawing can achieve per time input, and the fact that you can rig a model with IK bones to facilitate things, plus the cost of making sure that your drawing is convertible to your 3D model with a minimum of error.

    At least for me, creating the model, retopologizing and texturing is much more time-consuming than creating a fairly simple animation. With an IK setup creating a keyframe could easily take 30-60 seconds, which is in the vicinity of what @neginfinity said it took to create the gesture drawing of the cat.
     
  18. GarBenjamin

    GarBenjamin

    Joined:
    Dec 26, 2013
    Posts:
    7,441
    If it was easy (as in little technique involved and near 0 error ratio) to rapidly assemble a model out of multiple tiny parts / shapes that might be the way to go. It would allow rapid building of more complex shapes and because all objects were made from the same set of small parts would make the resulting scenes in the game at least somewhat cohesive kind of by default.

    But again even doing such a simple task and selecting that piece.. basically grab it, clone it, move, line it up, etc... that is where these programs fail I think. They make the most basic tasks in real life tedious.

    So basically I am now thinking I need to build my own model editor. Library of a dozen or so predefined shapes that come in a set range of different sizes. And they basically snap together. Something like that may be worth exploring.
     
  19. neginfinity

    neginfinity

    Joined:
    Jan 27, 2013
    Posts:
    13,554
    Cut it down to 60 seconds, and then it'll be interesting.

    Does skin mod add secondary targets for elbows, ik targets and bone shapes? Kinda similar to what Rigify does? A rig without those features is nearly useless.

    Which is not really available in source form, can't be incorporated into your project and does not allow custom parts.
    Again, slower than gestures.

    Yes. The 30 second cat picture is drawn by me. I spent few months practicing gesture drawings, and you can easily outline the figure in this way in 30 seconds. I think with real pencil it would take less than that, with properly trained artist being able to sketch figure in 15 seconds or less. Tablet drawing adds some overhead - because you don't see your hand and need to rely on pen stabilization, which slows things down somewhat. There was a video advertising some sort of animation software (I think it was flipbook) and there a trained animator was sketching frames at speed of 10 seconds per frame (they draw the whole frame from scratch, without moving anything). Roughly in similar fashion.

    I'm not aware of any software or technique capable of doing anything even remotely close to this kind of speed in 3d.

    With 3d "insanely fast" is "less than a hour or two". Models I usually make take a few hours to from start to finish. ZBrush speed sculpts on youtube usually take 2 or 3 hours of real time.
     
    Last edited: Jun 8, 2017
  20. Billy4184

    Billy4184

    Joined:
    Jul 7, 2014
    Posts:
    6,009
    If you have IK control bones on a rigged 3D model (e.g. 2 feet, 2 hands, 2 knees, 2 elbows, head maybe) then how long would it take to craft a quick keyframe? I think 30-60 seconds would be more than enough.

    Personally I think creating the 3D model is far more of a problem than animating it. Model generation from a 5-10 minute sketch, with intelligent retopology, would have a much bigger impact on art development time.
     
  21. neginfinity

    neginfinity

    Joined:
    Jan 27, 2013
    Posts:
    13,554
    Depends on the frame.

    In case you're doing something more complex, it is definitely not gonna cut it. For example, do you remember Witcher 1 combat animations? (skip to 4:30)
     
  22. Billy4184

    Billy4184

    Joined:
    Jul 7, 2014
    Posts:
    6,009
    At some point it might be somewhat faster, but I'm still not convinced it's the bottleneck at all. After all it's just hands/feet/elbows/knees/head placement pretty much.

    Creating and retopologizing a mesh on the other hand is a real pain. You could sketch in 2-3 minutes what it would take an hour to sculpt and retopologize.
     
  23. sngdan

    sngdan

    Joined:
    Feb 7, 2014
    Posts:
    1,154
    Ok guys, here you go, I hope I selected something reasonable (i have no clue in 3D modeling)
    1. The 3D model to recreate - see attachment (background: 1st result that looked nice when googling "easy 3d model"
    2. Time challenge: Re-creation time 3 minutes or less - please record screen and post process
    3. Optional quality challenge: Post video of your final result + the time it took to create it (max 2 hours)
    It does not need to be a re-production, just something that resembles the original, @GarBenjamin I hope to see a cube version from you :)

    PS: the prize a voucher for my free IOS game (just kidding, but I realized that I can generate free download vouchers for a free game, thought that was great)
     

    Attached Files:

  24. neginfinity

    neginfinity

    Joined:
    Jan 27, 2013
    Posts:
    13,554
    I was talking about modeling phase, mostly. Drawing in 2d is significantly faster, that's what 30 second cat is about. Animation phase - after you've done modeling, retepologizing, rigging, adjusting weights, and setting up IK - is not that bad, although preparation time is horrifically long.It still would be nice to have ten fingers during animation phase (meaning a dinosaur input device or something like that), but it is okayish.
     
    Billy4184 likes this.
  25. RicCx

    RicCx

    Joined:
    May 3, 2016
    Posts:
    3
     
  26. neginfinity

    neginfinity

    Joined:
    Jan 27, 2013
    Posts:
    13,554
    Gave it a whirl. I'm not happy with the results.



    The proces in either case feels slow, clunky and non-fluid, unlike drawing.

    Skin modifier version feels close to the truth, but the catch is it is only usable for sculpting, and for polygonal modeling it isn't gonna work.

    Overall it feels like I should be able to define the body with several curves describing boundaries, and not just keep pushing stuff around with pen/mouse.
     
    Last edited: Jun 8, 2017
    sngdan and GarBenjamin like this.
  27. sngdan

    sngdan

    Joined:
    Feb 7, 2014
    Posts:
    1,154
    @neginfinity - very nice, well done. You might not be happy with it but I am sure many others would be, if they could achieve the same - including myself.

    I like a lot that you actually put action to your words, gives you a lot of credibility.
     
  28. neoshaman

    neoshaman

    Joined:
    Feb 11, 2011
    Posts:
    6,493
    BTW would reprogramming someting like smooth teddy hard to reproduce at a core level?

    It's a curve that you close, and basically "extrude" along the plane of the drawing (the camera), using a gradient with a smooth curve. That gradient don't seems hard to compute, it's the internal distance to the edge, can be seen as an heightmap. Another way to see it is to use a tesselation of the shape to find the center of mass of the tesselated triangles.Harder is the smoothing feature between two objects but not necessary for a quick sketch. We can also compute an internal "edge" that would be the peak of the gradient, we can use as "bone" and basically redirect the flow the the drawing through stroke.

    I say that because Neg has already a level editor and it seems like a crude prototype of smooth teddy if we had gesture placement of edge flow?
     
    GarBenjamin likes this.
  29. GarBenjamin

    GarBenjamin

    Joined:
    Dec 26, 2013
    Posts:
    7,441
    Very nice @neginfinity I like the first two results particularly the first one. While I expect you are faster at it because I do very little modeling at all (haven't in a long time) my approach is similar to the first. Box modeling. Block proportioned first. Then faces extrusion, rotations, scaled.

    I will try it in MagicaVoxel but considering I have never used it before I expect I wouldn't be doing a proper job of showing if it works better or not. But I will give it a go after work tonight.

    @sngdan I think at least a few of us would gladly show instead of tell but there is nothing to show until a better method is found. That is the whole point. We already know traditional modeling approach is time consuming.

    I actually think @neginfinity did a fantastic job building the model in 3 minutes. A game world filled with such objects animated moving around would be very cool. But see again this is just the model. Then needs to be rigged. Then animated. Others may want to texture them as well. It is just too much.
     
  30. neginfinity

    neginfinity

    Joined:
    Jan 27, 2013
    Posts:
    13,554
    Here's the research paper:
    http://www-ui.is.s.u-tokyo.ac.jp/~takeo/papers/siggraph99.pdf

    While their java prototype was fairly small - 13000 lines of code, It feels like it would be be fairly complicated. Check 2nd page and afterwards for examples of supported operations.

    The editor I wrote is different, because it is strictly polygonal and technically operates on 2d shapes.
     
  31. GarBenjamin

    GarBenjamin

    Joined:
    Dec 26, 2013
    Posts:
    7,441
    I had that same thought. Of course it be locked into Unity if done in the Editor but would help out all the folks using Unity at least.

    When I figure out what exactly I will be using I'll have to mess around with making such a thing or maybe just contract out the work. Actually I think AGK or C# & Irrlicht Lime would work fine. Hell maybe even Blitz3D or BlitzMax using the minib3d library might work to make such a tool.
     
    Last edited: Jun 8, 2017
  32. neoshaman

    neoshaman

    Joined:
    Feb 11, 2011
    Posts:
    6,493
    I say something LIKE smooth teddy, I didn't say to redo their exact implementation with all teh features, I know the paper, they are on my youtube channel lol.

    Hence why I reference your level editor, you use 2d shape to generate 3d level, I sketch a procedure in my post doing something similar. Though I would have pain to implement it myself and will have to take uncessary step (I would "raster" the shape on a grid, then thin to the center using gradient, then clumsily bring back to 3d as an heightmap, because that's the step I know I can do and I'm not good at programming complex analytic 3d shape.).
     
  33. neoshaman

    neoshaman

    Joined:
    Feb 11, 2011
    Posts:
    6,493
    He is using blender's skin modifier, that's faster than regular box extrusion but do look like it.
     
    GarBenjamin likes this.
  34. neginfinity

    neginfinity

    Joined:
    Jan 27, 2013
    Posts:
    13,554
    Nope, it ain't gonna cut it.

    Aside from the part where you'll have a lot of fun dealing with triangulation of non-convex shapes, the reason why teddy was cool is because you could use drawing interface to make shapes while looking at model from any angle, and you could define form, punch holes and slice things in half using same uniform interface.

    If you're going to try writing your own editor, I'd advise to try recreating teddy. Not to make a 2d path extrusion tool.

    Another interesting possibility is actually Planet Explorer's voxel editor. This used voxel density information which allowed creation of curved shapes. Their editor was not quite finished and lacked several tools, though.

    ------------
    Skin modifier is only used in second video, not in all of them. First video uses box modeling.
     
    GarBenjamin likes this.
  35. sngdan

    sngdan

    Joined:
    Feb 7, 2014
    Posts:
    1,154
    @GarBenjamin

    Yes, I am aware of what else is involved. if you believe you can not learn process from each other, but think that you together come up with a brand new approach - go for it, exciting. Maybe also look at movie studios, they should be pretty sophisticated with all of this.

    I was trying to be practical, i.e. what can help right now with the tools available right now, so it is workflow related not invention related. From following the thread, I thought the main pain point was the modeling, but by all means if that is not the case, extend or alter the competition to animation, unwrapping/texturing, etc... Haha, it's not for me it's for you....
     
    GarBenjamin likes this.
  36. GarBenjamin

    GarBenjamin

    Joined:
    Dec 26, 2013
    Posts:
    7,441
    It's all a pain in the ass. Streamlined api and architecture was my main focus with this thread. But graphics creation because it is always a bottleneck. One I have wrestled with and streamlined as much as I could over the years. But anything that can save time in the development process is good whether it is on the programming side or content creation side. Time saved on one helps with the other.
     
  37. sngdan

    sngdan

    Joined:
    Feb 7, 2014
    Posts:
    1,154
    Yes, but where is the meat?

    What is the outcome of this years of streamlining? It would be great if there is some sharing so we can all learn. I would have assumed someone would ask i.e. More detail about the 2d level process I mentioned....I feel it's so untangible otherwise...
     
  38. Deleted User

    Deleted User

    Guest

    The only thing that really sinks time for me is characters and UV mapping.. Especially because of lightmapping / normal assesement / tangent calculation (MikkT etc.) it has to be right. (or use a proper realtime GI solution)..

    In architecture you're going to want a lot of curved surfaces and that's a complete pain, you can do things like "unitize" the UV's but that depends on you having a perfectly symmetrical quad mapped mesh which just wastes poly's (sure you can retopo after or manually delete loops and it doesn't seem to mess up UV's too much but it adds time and work).

    You can of course go the low poly to high poly / re-topo / sculpt / normal route but in a lot of cases there is no replacement for polygonal displacement (you need enough poly's) and bevel's are also a pain with UV mapping if you have more than one..

    I see it time and time again even in AAA where UV's are messed up all over, like they've started and though this is taking too long screw this. The only real solution I've seen to this somewhat is parametric modelling, which seems rather sweet but doesn't cover characters or very organic meshes (hence megascans etc. comes in handy).. It's all a lot of trickery and knowing exactly how many mesh pieces you can get away with without causing yourself a headache at both ends.

    Automatic mapping 9/10 times is practically useless..
     
  39. GarBenjamin

    GarBenjamin

    Joined:
    Dec 26, 2013
    Posts:
    7,441
    The main result for me is recognizing that complex detailed graphics are not an option nor are they needed... simplify, use references, practice a lot, the popular game dev content generation software sucks for the most part, nothing is as efficient as just using whatever you can find or hiring artists to do the work, forget this stuff get outside away from the computer and enjoy life.

    But I keep thinking sooner or later content creation tools have to improve. I guess only this time around has it occurred to that many people wouldn't want that to happen. Why? Because then the need to buy art assets and hire artists would decrease. That is why I am looking into other industries such as 3D printing where there is a need to make content generation software as easy and fast to use as possible by "normal" folks.

    Basically the solution is either find a better tool for the job, build the tool or hire someone else to build it. So I am looking for the better tool. A better workflow. If that doesn't work out the next step is investigating how much work would be needed to build such a thing basically iteratively prototyping it until it seems like the best approach. Then deciding whether to actually build it or hire someone else to build it.
     
    Last edited: Jun 8, 2017
  40. sngdan

    sngdan

    Joined:
    Feb 7, 2014
    Posts:
    1,154
    No! Try not. Do or do not. There is no try.
     
  41. zenGarden

    zenGarden

    Joined:
    Mar 30, 2013
    Posts:
    4,538
    Indeed not a lot has changed, only talented people gets successfull because of their ideas or talent (Minecraft, Ori,Hyper Light Drifter ...). Talent and skills is what matters.
    You can give someone a character creator tool like Black Desert www.youtube.com/watch?v=8eVhqGh0MqE
    This doesn't mean he will be able to create an interesting story , characters personnality and game content.

    But when you don't have any game idea you really want to make, you'll never stop looking for tools or Apis.
     
    Last edited: Jun 8, 2017
  42. GarBenjamin

    GarBenjamin

    Joined:
    Dec 26, 2013
    Posts:
    7,441
    Right now I am not focused on making any game. Well I do want to make a little medievalish wizardy raycast engine style game demo. Sooner or later I will. There is no rush for it. lol

    My focus now is on checking out tools and apis.

    Here if you want to play a game... have fun.

    Atlantic Crisis
    Treasures of Ali-Gar
    Attack of the Crows

    :)

    Remember measure 200 times, cut once. Okay, that might be a little overkill.
     
    neoshaman likes this.
  43. zenGarden

    zenGarden

    Joined:
    Mar 30, 2013
    Posts:
    4,538
    Yep, you don't have some special game idea, you can evaluate tools and Apis as much as you want, i don't expect any game from you before a long long time lol
    (Or perhaps the raycast game some day).
     
    Last edited: Jun 8, 2017
    GarBenjamin likes this.
  44. GarBenjamin

    GarBenjamin

    Joined:
    Dec 26, 2013
    Posts:
    7,441
    Yep that is the truth for sure. I'm not inspired. Oh I get random thoughts here and there then think about the workload and my mind either turns to forget the computer or better find some tools.

    The MagicaVoxel is the most interesting thing I've seen in a while. I think that will be fun to mess around with. Maybe I'll get a tiny bit of inspiration there. All depends on how the experience goes.

    See it used to be game dev didn't feel like work to me but the past couple of years it has. If I want to do work I'd rather be out mowing the lawn, trimming trees, hauling brush off, etc. There is always some work that can be done. And I think all of that "real world" stuff is something that makes more sense to do. But if I can find a solution so game dev feels like 80% just fun again then it is entertainment and doesn't compete in the "work" category.

    I'm kind of getting back there since I started experimenting with N6 and I *think* maybe MagicaVoxel will help make it fun again too!
     
  45. zenGarden

    zenGarden

    Joined:
    Mar 30, 2013
    Posts:
    4,538
    You need to find a good balance, even if you find the good tools and workflow and would start a game, keep your "real world" activities dominant.
     
    GarBenjamin likes this.
  46. GarBenjamin

    GarBenjamin

    Joined:
    Dec 26, 2013
    Posts:
    7,441
    Absolutely it's just that if I can get it back to feeling like it is mainly fun then problem is solved. I think if I had a different kind of job... like say I was outside working climbing poles running power lines, roofing houses, game warden, etc something basically not only off the computer all day but also outside then at end of my workday I'd look forward to being inside and on the computer more. I think anyway. lol

    So for me there's just multiple reasons why I am where I am. First, I work on the computer all day every day for my job. Second, I love being up active and outside. Third, game dev has felt more like a chore than it has a fun hobby.

    There were a couple of times in the past year when it didn't feel like just more on the computer work to do. So that was promising. I'll see how messing around with MagicVoxel goes. As soon as work is done I am getting outside for a few hours but later tonight I will check it out.
     
  47. gibberingmouther

    gibberingmouther

    Joined:
    Dec 13, 2016
    Posts:
    259
    i had to switch from Game Maker to Unity because Game Maker dumbed things down too much and wouldn't allow me to do what i wanted.
     
    GarBenjamin likes this.
  48. GarBenjamin

    GarBenjamin

    Joined:
    Dec 26, 2013
    Posts:
    7,441
    I played around with MagicVoxel. Getting used to the interface. And I just ended up fumbling around working on a dinosaur thingamabob.



    This took way too long. I think I had definitely went too low detail but I am not an artist to begin with. I only know the stuff I have picked up through many years of having to make graphics for games. But saying that even this with the head, neck and rest of it all animated in a game fine I would use it. But it just takes way too damn long. I spent over 30 minutes making this thing. Granted part of that was because I had never used this software before.

    I actually do kind of like it though. But geesh this was work. lol I will play around with it with some simpler things later. Like use an ultra low res look. Maybe 1/2 to 1/4 the resolution of this one.
     
  49. aer0ace

    aer0ace

    Joined:
    May 11, 2012
    Posts:
    1,513
    I've always thought game development as interesting, challenging, rewarding and fulfilling, but I wouldn't describe it as being "fun". This is what confuses me. If you want fun, play some games and do your outdoor stuff. True, fun is what the end result should be from game development, but to get there, is not necessarily ever going to be "fun".
     
    Martin_H likes this.
  50. Billy4184

    Billy4184

    Joined:
    Jul 7, 2014
    Posts:
    6,009
    Yeah it's a real pain with bevelled hard surface stuff, if there was some way to increase the importance of keeping the main edges straight and the bevels parallel that would really help things along. With 3 bevels it's already a huge time sink to correct things.
     
    Deleted User likes this.
Thread Status:
Not open for further replies.