[RELEASED] 3D Scifi Kit Vol 3 official topic!

Thanks @hopeful and @Creepy-Cat. Occlusion is on by default: I do not turn it off , unless you are talking about something other than dynamic occlusion.
You are both right: I should test more before I ask.
So far I use my own LOD on Earth terrain (meshes) which includes textures of different detail, I use proximity sensors to turn parts of the scenegraph active/not active, and I do a few small tweeks, like turn off shadows, specular highlights on some things when not needed.
The AutoLOD sounds interesting, I will take a look.
I'm planning to upgrade to a better dev laptop later this year but it is a good challenge to optimise for this one (2015 dual core i5).

@Creepy-Cat : I think it was _Update 1.06-Station Ptolemy I tried that was too much for my laptop. I reduced it down to a few components as I did not need so much

 

Exactly, when you create a package, you need to fight with many parameters! How many polygons by pieces, number of textures etc...

On the Scifi Kit 3 each objects are "thinked" to be low poly, but not my textures! By default they are 8k if my memory is good... You can reduce them by two (2048 or 4096) without rendering problem. Idem for the metalic map / AO map! did you really need them? If you remove them you can get many FPS.

Usually, the term "optimization" is unclear and misused by people... If i provide a package with only a cube, and, if a user paste 100,000,000 cubes in a scene to make a minecraft clone, this guy will ask me:

"Hey Creepy Cat, i get only 10 FPS, the package is not optimized! It's slow in my scene ...."

In this kind of case, I cannot answer positively! What can I say to the person?

The project "optimization" must be done from start to finish.! Example:

- Objects modeled in low poly.
- Textures capable of being resized.
- Atlased textures, to reduce the number (Only 20 in the case of the kit)
- But above all! A code that optimizes the display! (Frustrum / Occlusion backing)

Many users ignore this step and they think that only graphics should be optimized, and against that, i need to admit to be a bit disarmed

There is a rule in the video game: "We only display what we need to see, and only there, where we can go"

 

Yes, but you need to bake it! Each object modification (moving, rotating etc) need to be fixed by the occlusion backing. And for the station, be carrefull there is a station section with many props inside! And due to the modular conception, you can make your own optimized station!

-Create a prefab copy / Unpack it completly (right button) / And make your modifications (like canon removing / antenna / or others props i put on etc) and resave a prefab in another directory! The kit is a lego box... Adapt it for your needs

 

Optimization is a whole world of its own, and I'm very happy to buy assets from modelers - like Creepy Cat - who are careful with polys, but not making everything squared off. We want to have nice looking shapes, rounded edges where we can, actual curves and so forth. And of course, every time you see a straight line on a mesh, you should be expecting some polygon savings and not a dense mass of unnecessary polys.

We want textures to be big and detailed, because we can reduce the resolution as needed. The easiest thing to do is to shift or ctrl select all the hi-res textures in the texture file and set their resolution lower, en masse. So if you've been given luxuriously large 8k textures, you can drop them down to 2048 while you're working with them, and then adjust them individually later, making LOD materials if needed, as you work on the details of improving your game.

Baked occlusion (or GPU occlusion, raycast occlusion, frustum occlusion, etc.) is only one sort of optimization tactic. I understand it can sometimes be slow (it's slower when you use more objects) and you may need to use a different idea or a combination of tactics to get the best behavior.

Instancing of repeated models can speed things up too, but in some situations it can be a slower efficiency solution. Mesh combining can be faster than instancing when applied to low poly models, if that will work for your case.

Imposters / billboards can be a good solution, though again you have to be careful, because if you are trying to use them too close, the higher texture sizes may spoil your efficiencies.

And there's object pools, too. Where you have a few objects in a pool and you keep reusing them, just changing their transforms. Like, if you have a bunch of crates in a warehouse type situation (cargo hold on a space ship), you can have a small number of them in an object pool and they keep getting moved from room to room as the camera moves along. Or you could have wall panels of the ship in a object pool, and as the camera moves through the ship it keeps moving the old panels ahead into view of the camera, making it look like there's hundreds or thousands of wall panels, when maybe there's only a couple dozen.

So there's a whole lot of different optimizations available. But it's not a one-size-fits-all situation. Each developer needs to work it out for their game.

 

You can also get a big performance boost by baking light maps. You can bake low resolution light maps for testing. In my case, it made a big difference. There are so many techniques to increase performance.

 

Exactly By definition i put the best rendering i can do for the demo maps! With the light explorer you need to hunt the realtime lights and fix them to "backed".

 

For the 1.13 update, i'm working on a new skybox

I'm currently working on the planets sprites scene! In fact, to create a skybox i need two scenes. The first one to create the planets, and the other, to create the skybox scene. It's more work, but the result is really cool!

 

Looks great.

 

I did some reading but I'm stil not sure whether that was asked before or not. Are there any examples scenes in there that demonstrate moving inside the interior of your ships while they're moving and rotating in space? I've been trying to accomplish something like this for so long and I'm curious if there are any examples in there.

Anyways, this package seems really amazing. I think I'll get it soon.

 

I think you need to code some kind of local gravity for a ship which always point down to the bottom of the ship. E.g. add a force to the player in the direction of the bottom of the ship.

 

Hi

For the moment i don't plan anything about this (flight model) because i'm a not good coder I prefer concentrate me on the datas... But i hope one day, to see a real cool game made with my kit , including battles and space combat (when i'll start the military upgrade, but not for the moment).

 

About optimization. My main activity is to create VR experiences for business fairs in which the company where I provide services participates. I don't have time to optimize anything, as it takes time and care. The solution: having a powerful computer with an RTX 2080Ti. And I tell you, even with a card like that, certain applications are slow. In the case of games for the general public, optimization is one of the priorities. It is not enough to have a powerful machine, you have to optimize your game. Ever.

 

Ah, now I see. I have not done any baking before ... except bread and scones :-/
I will do this next time I am working on the framework., thanks CC.

 

My lord creepy cat, beautiful work as always.

I have been away from Unity for quite some time, question, did you ever finish the cargo hold area of the Prometheus ship so you could drive a rover in?

I had a flick through the forum to see if you had but couldn't see any.

Curious

 

Hi, you right i just zap this feature when i released the prometheus update

You can find the ship cargo here : P_Container_02
If i remember it fit the prometheus cargo bay

 

Hey Mr. Creeps, what is the scale you use for the player character with your assets? I thought most games use a unity cube with a scale of x=1 y=2 z=1 as the player size... your stuff seems to require a slightly bigger player character?

 

Hi it's exactly that 1x2x1!

 

When will 3D SciFi Kit Vol 3 support HDRP?

 

When this "thing" will become the official Unity rendering, for the moment, it's not finished/tested IMO...

But you can actually convert it to HDRP, it require a bit of work to convert shader etc, but it's absolutly possible. If i remember, some users do it allready.

HDRP make peoples dreaming, but only a small number of them know exactly what it is And know how to configure this "gaz factory"

Here is a small tutorial to convert a "standard" package to HDRP, as you can see there is nothing impossible in this process

 

Can you post the procedure for upgrading to URP?
(it seems this should be an easier path than HDRP)
More info: I went through HDRP upgrade some shaders didn't work (for me).
I'm in the process of learning how to replicate existing shaders to Shader Graph, just need more time.

 

IMO it's the same for URP! Only shaders changes! I'll try to find a tutorial

 

The next scifi update is almost finish! Just a piece to unwrap and i'll release it!

 

looks fantastic!

 

Thanks

 

Does it have example scenes....oh yes loads!

 

Update 1.13 soon! (upload in progress) stay connected and take care of you!
Sorry for the update delay, but this period is a S*** hole for everyone...

 

Hi

I am planning a small update of the kit soon! In fact, I've always found the land I provided really ugly ....

But making a terrain is one of the really boring things to do, and in the flow of everything I had to do in the kit (and elsewhere) I didn't have time ... I decided to include one new map in the Scifi Kit 3, and what better than a lunar environment closed?

I hope you like it I'm actually converting the ugly old scenes to a better way... This map is funny to run with the rover

With this map you can training/prototype what you want 8K resolution.

 

I reworked also on the Rover scene, i'm working on another Mars map for the kit, it will be added into the next release

 

Cool updates!

 

For the 1.15 update i included a new Mars map

At this occasion i re-make the old (ugly) red planet map, i want include more exterior props! Like for example this new metalic plateforms... I really like my terrain mountains in background! (screenshot without post fx or antialias)

 

I am very much exactly for exteriors, structures!

 

Wait to see the bio dome i'm making! A customer a longtime ago ask me one! But because my old ugly terrain i concentrate me on the spaceship

 

W.I.P i need to finish the biodome floor and doors

 

SHOWCASE:

Constellation ship at work:

 

Excellent! I want to view outside view!

 

Hi !
I'm using your assets for a VR multiplayer game (as a hobby, so right now i'm just having fun )

I implemented some VR interaction, you can control the ship with the joystick. And move inside the ship while it's moving.
I added interaction on the button for testing. And some "ZERO G "movement.
You can find a better example here :

Sorry for the graphics, i had to downgrade it because of VR performance. I'll look into that later.

Just wanted to share how your assets is being used

 

Yeah! That cool to see my 3D buttons in action!

 

very nice, it must be very complex to get the humanoid animations working with the ship "controls" and also get the ship to respond meaningfully.

 

Hey

For the next update, i think include a rocketship like the SpaceX rockets It allow you to make landing via the foldable landing gears I'm searching how to include a cockpit into this...

 

At small scale they look like they could be probes of some sort, maybe carrying a payload.

 

I'll provide a version with and without interior... Like that you could use it like you want Texturing/details in progesss

 

Awesome ! I love it !
I would love to see more "realistic" spaceship. You can try putting horizontal deck inside.
(Because gravity is generated by the truster, so if people want to walk, deck should be horizontal )
I guess the pilote seat could rotate and face the "roof" and be able to control the ship
Here is a little sketch : (i know, i should be an artist )


Of course, it's just an idea !
Thanks for your work anyway

 

We need ALIEN buildings and ships.
Asset store is full of "human" building pack ... but ... alien ... no way ....

like this ? (at 1:26)

 

Thanks for the video! it's always a good reference base Yeah aliens are planed in a second time, i need to finish human first

Of course the rocketship will be modular :

 

A rocketship, need a spacebase launcher

 

Work in progress

 

awesome, the new modular escape-rocket / landing-pod / probe / devastating-bomb i am looking forward to see the interior.

it is very lovely how you continue to add things, step by step! i prefer this approach (like modern agile software development perhaps?) over sets that have planned content, and then just fulfill that. i think you are more exploring and using your time to add more content in a very fluid way. love it! please enjoy your work, because then we can all see the joy also in the results

one gentle point of criticism: what i can see in your videos is that you are directly with keyboard+mouse fly the camera, yes? talk to me if you want me to help you writing a much more smooth camera controller, so that you can continue to do it this way but the videos will look less "jerky" and more professional.

 

Hi

This type of quick video are made on the go,with the music i'm playing! But for the final release i do some better movement with a cool music etc Thanks for your remarks! Yeah i prefer this approach too...

Regards