MapMagic 2 - infinite procedural land generator

Figured I'd say - is "trees' node supposed to only be for one tree? I feel like I remember MM1 being more than one tree, plus 'trees' is plural lol. (yes I know they aren't turned on right now), was trying to test out the heightmap at 1K increments, so disabled so it was faster lol.

 

It's called Trees because it usually places more than one tree on terrain
Trees Output can output a single type of tree, as well as different trees from the list at random. The mode is switched by enabling/disabling Multi-Prefab toggle in Properties (wiki).

It seems to be some mesh import problem, I doubt if it's related. If you run into the issue once more feel free to send me the graph so I could look into it.

Main Range: the distance of creating the Main (hi-res) chunks (in terrain tiles). Thus, if tile size is 1000 and Main Range is 2, it will create main tiles in 2000 units. (wiki)

I would appreciate if you could write instructions on how to reproduce this issue. At first glance the objects are removed when I unlink Objects output node, but I might be missing something.
BTW unpinning tile and pinning it again will completely remove tile, it's terrain and all child objects. Re-generate just clears generated result and starts generate from scratch, it does not affect tile object.

 

@Wright
I'm hoping this is the last time i'll need to bug you lol. Sorry mate.

For some reason I can't seem to get the Margins correct. I've tried changing margin from low to high values, but it always exists in some way shape or form. I've tried different resolutions as well.
I've tried margins from 4 all that way to 500. 500 makes it smaller, but still a steep sharp line that still couldn't walk up.




I've determined it has come from the Heightmap I imported and using with the 'Import' Node.
I've tried to also mess with the heightmaps texture settings, none of the settings adjustments helped.

 

New video is now available, it's showing the way to add villages to the island. It's part 2 of the Objects module videos.

It's hard to say for sure without seeing the graph. The most typical thing that causes them is using the Blur with large blur or downscale values.

 

@Wright - it happens with just putting the 'import' node directly into the height node. So I know it's definitely coming from that. Perhaps my heightmap is wrong? I am doing a PNG - not sure if that can cause for an artifact like that. I have Paint Shop Pro and despite it can export to raw, it's never seemed to have saved right and turns to only being stretched horizontal lines. So I'm doing PNG.

This is the full size, perhaps you can try it in import and set it to a scale of 10 (1K terrains). And it should show the issue.

 

If you make it 'infinite' they'll never fall off the map.

 

I'm still encountering highly parallel angles in the noise node and it's causing me grief with orthographic cameras. Something that would help a lot with this is a "rotation" property on the noise node. Even just a few degrees hides a lot of the symmetry.

 

Hello there,

I started playing around with MM2 again and it's looking really nice now!
Is there any scripting documentation available like there is for MM1? I want to start with something simple like generating a random terrain as soon the scene loads.

Best regards

 

@Wright
[Sorry this is long] Just trying to be as informative as possible in a single post.

Okay, I just started a new graph with 2 noise and a blend. The issue persists on this too. Actually it's worse.



I've tried changing blend node types, I've tried raising and lowering margins, so something else is going on here.
I even tried making a new scene with a fresh MM2 instance, same problem.

I apologize for all this inconvenience. Perhaps it's the version of Unity I'm using? 2020.1.7f1.

Edit: I don't get it, your demo scenes run entirely fine, no seam issues. I can do the two noise nodes as the same above in my problems and everything is working as it should.
Here's your demo Scene called "Tutorial". I just removed everything and did it exactly as the same above and works.


I did finally get the demo scene to break. The Blend node caused it. So at 0.63 subtraction works good. If I go below I start noticing a Seam growing. The lower I get from around 0.62 and lower it starts to want to grow seams all the way to 0 (0 of course being crazy seams).

I really wished I could understand what really is making this happen. Anything in your demo scenes - works as I'd expect. The moment I make a new scene and try it, bam fail. I even just went and made a new heightmap figuring perhaps that one I made was just bad, not it. I mean it just never fails, every single time.
See - simple - import, straight to height. Seam, giant seam. I've tried curve nodes, i've tried blur nodes, nothing seems to get past this problem.
Seams over every single terrain chunk.

Also, not sure if it's related. But sometimes my character will hit one of these seams and slide down and just fall through the terrain, not sure if that's related or not.

I changed resolution to 257 from 513.
Not sure if this helps you see where the issue is.
Notice how one chunk of terrain is way higher and obviously - isn't connecting for some reason.


But as I've mentioned in previous post - the issue at least for me, can directly relate towards the heightmap. (I'm using PNG) as noted in last post. So not sure if that's the problem at least for my situation. As noted in this post the issue can be repeated with just two Noise generators. But if you import the heightmap and do the replication it should replicate the seam issues.

After looking at the Wiki, someone apparently reported on this same exact problem, or similar to it. https://gitlab.com/denispahunov/mapmagic/-/issues/353

On another note, I just finished purchasing the remaining plugins for MM2. Despite these issues, I know you care about your product, so I don't mind supporting

 

Hi, Denis,

I'm having better luck with MapMagic 2, so I'll probably continue to stick with it for now. I tried going back to the full-priced World Generator version, but other than the plugins I had bought (esp MadMaps), there's little benefit to the old version, and lots to like about the new version. Hoping to post an updated review once I get it all sorted out!

I'm writing now, though, because I'm unable to get any of the "gizmos" to work the way they do in your videos. For the "Objects" package / tutorial video, you manipulate the "Scatter" node while the Scene view is open. The Scatter node has no output at that point. In the Scene window, the Scatter node's objects are represented by green triangles, and they change density/position when you adjust the density.

I seem to recall another tutorial where you showed another useful gizmo -- one that illustrated the levels (height levels/ranges) with colored lines or zones.

I'm using Unity 2019.3.10, in a new installation/project, so there shouldn't be any conflicts with other packages. Is there a setting/option button that I'm not seeing? I've tried messing with the "Generate Terrain Markers" option, but nothing shows up regardless of whether I tag and click objects or just stick with "Around Main Camera."

Please let me know what I need to do in order to activate the preview icons/gizmos you're showing in your tutorial videos. Thanks!

 

Any ETA on Splines (making river or lake system) and Voxeland integration with MM2?

 

Hey @Wright. I purchased many of your assets and they aren’t trivially inexpensive. That’s a few hundred dollars for only a few products. I use Unity professionally across many clients.

If you don’t want to reply or are not going to support your products and respond about this:

https://forum.unity.com/posts/6391028/

Can you give my money back?

 

Do you mean some kind of distort node that will rotate terrain areas based on mask or a constant noise node rotation?

You can change the seed at starting a game on executing this line in Start/Awake/OnEnable:
mapMagic.graph.random = new Noise(seed, permutationCount:32768);
//32768 is initial permutation num for MM noise. For compatibility with
Keep no tiles pinned (otherwise they won't connect with new tiles with new seed).
This script is changing your graph (seed value) every start, this value is stored in graph asset.
Here is the example script.
Speaking on docs I've got plans to do them, but no ETA yet.

I'll appreciate if you could send me that setup with a reproducable issue. I need a scene, a graph, imported map asset and png with and their meta files. (Node: a description of the issue in email will also come in handy - way more handy than mentioning post on forums. I will need only 4+4(meta) files. There's no need to send models or other assets. I will appreciate if you don't compile the unity package with the dependencies).

To apply preview to terrain I click the down-arrow button in the top-left corner of the preview area (just in case - you don't mention you've done it). And make sure you've got Gizmos checkbutton enabled in a scene view.

Hard to say for sure. Currently I'm loaded with bugfixing, modules videos and missing docs. Then I plan to implement using MM as a map editor - in November approx. Then change spline 'engine' - now I'm sure that beizer is a dead end - overcomplicated, too precise, too slow compared with being split in a dozen of strait segments. I've nearly got this new 'engine' ready, but still more bugs than the old one. Plan to switch to it in December, and finish splines in January. Still it's just a plan. Maybe it will go faster, maybe slower - I can't say for now.

Sorry to hear you've got an issue with MM, but please note that you are reporting MapMagic 2 issue in MapMagic 1 thread. The best way to report it is to use idea.informer, however you can still post it here or via email. I would appreciate if you could provide some information about what the problem is. Could you please give some more detail on what you were trying to achieve and what exactly is wrong?

 

I mean rotation like Photoshop or as if I had rotated the terrain. Just a global transform on the whole noise node. It doesn't sound like it would work but it does because the parallel lines get lost in the randomness of the other layers when they don't align with the camera.

Fyi, these lines are exclusive to the Unity noise type. Perlin can sometimes get geometric too but not nearly as bad.

 

@Wright : Really all you have to do is use the import node and change the scale to something other than 1 and connect it to the height output node and seams are on every terrain tile. (I'm on the latest Unity 2020.1.8f1), I've tried both standard and HDRP.

There's nothing complex about the graph that really needs to be sent to you. At least it doesn't seem complex - 2 nodes. Import Node > Change Scale to 2 > Height output > Pin Tiles > Seams.

I've tried raw, r16 and png heightmaps.
I'm sending you a DM on here with a link to the very very short video, within like 2 seconds you see the issue, from there I just change the Import scale and you see the seams on every tile.

 

Many thanks, Dennis! Somehow I missed that trick in the docs and tutorials. Been using MM for many years, now; wonder what OTHER tricks I've been missing out on! ;-)

Speaking of tips and tricks, there may be one or two worthwhile hints that I can pass along for other MM users. First, and most importantly: Unity's new/updated Terrain Tools Package (https://docs.unity3d.com/Packages/c...anual/getting-started-with-terrain-tools.html) fills in the gaps that MM2 still has in terms of its saving/importing/exporting features. This is the PACKAGE, btw, available through your package manager rather than the asset store.

Unity has a couple of great free items on the Asset Store which can be really helpful for post-MM editing:

1. The first is Unity's "Terrain Tools Sample Asset Pack" (https://assetstore.unity.com/packag...nature/terrain-tools-sample-asset-pack-145808), which has some good-quality terrain assets (textures/layers, etc) plus some tools (terraforming brushes, etc) that are helpful when you're ready to fine-tune your MapMagic export by hand.
   
   
2. The other tool is called "Terrain Toolkit 2017" (https://assetstore.unity.com/packages/tools/terrain/terrain-toolkit-2017-83490) and it's a variation/update of a great toolkit/addon that's us old-timers have been using since Unity 4 (or even earlier, IIRC). I got errors with my 2019.3 installation, but it works fine with Unity 2018. This tool can be VERY useful after you manually fine-tune your MapMagic terrain: I use its erosion and noise tools to blend my manual edits with the rest of the map, reasonably seamlessly.
   
   
3. A nice alternative to Terrain Toolkit is Denis's "Erosion Brush" (https://assetstore.unity.com/packages/tools/terrain/erosion-brush-27389#description). I needed to tweak it to work with MM2, but hopefully Denis will be patching it soon...

*****Important***** If you use the workflow method I've described, be sure to limit your changes to the INTERIOR of your main terrain tile. Since you're working outside of MapMagic, any changes to the borders of your main terrain tile may fail to match up with the borders of adjacent tiles that were generated by MapMagic.​

 

Just wondering if the demo/tree shader will be upgraded to URP, or is there a simple fix to it , thanks

 

That's a point. I will see what I can do about it (added to to-do list).

MM2 is younger than a year, and I doubt MM1 has much tricks available. But thanks for paying my attention to it, will try highlight it in docs.

I plan to replace Erosion Brush with the MapMagic Brush. The tool that can paint on terrain with MM graph. In addition to erosion and noise it will paint terrain the way you want, draw roads, grow forests, or do any other actions you set up in a brush graph. I plan to announce more detail later at least when I'll get a working prototype.

Unfortunately currently I have no plans for writing additional shaders for demo assets for all render pipelines. These trees are used to demonstrate the way MM create forests, and it's still could be done if you assign URP/Lit shader to them with Alpha Cutoff.

 

@Wright I'm just curious if you've gotten to check out the message I've sent you.

 

Sorry, missed it among other posts. That's the reason I ask report issues via idea.informer - it's far more convenient to track issues and give feedback on each of them, rather than keep all the forums thread in head at once. I've reported this issue to keep it in mind and avoid missing again.

Here are the steps I've made to reproduce it:
- created a graph with Import and Height output;
- assigned import map (tried several) and changed the scale;
- however still can see no seams - especially the ones with disconnected tiles. Theoretically MM should never ever create the gaps where you can see the skybox;
- changed the resolution to 257, still no change.

I guess you find your issue obvious to reproduce, but the thing might be in some specific detail. It might be the imported map resolution, it might be some specific import scale, it might be terrain tile object accidentally raised or lowered by hand. Every time I release the new version I check it for such an obvious issues, but can't test all the possible cases. This is why I ask for the things required to reproduce it.

 

Hey @Wright,
any ETA on additional margins and the function expose fixes? We're pretty stuck right now because of those. Thanks!

 

Refeas, I'm currently catching up great expose improvements - now it will allow exposing expressions (like 'Size/2+100'), linking different fields to the same exposed value, and yes, working in multi-level biomes/functions. Going to make a video soon.

But next update will be major one (version will be called 2.1.0.) with some core changes - it will take time to finalize all other changes and test it all, so I expect new version in a month or so. However I can provide you an access to GitLab so you could get all of the changes immediately - however I can't guarantee them to be stable.

@All Bundle / 3 modules users: feel free to contact me if you'd like to get access to MM2 GitLab repository (I'll need your order number to do that).

 

Thanks for the reply! It seems I actually still have access to your Gitlab since MM2 closed beta. Is there any graph breakage possibility? If so, I'll rather wait for the official release.

 

Refeas, yes, I have not tested it deeply. Graph backup is definitely must-have when working with GitLab version.

 

Hi Denis.
Wright

I’ve been wondering if i could use multiple raw files as height on different tiles of the terrain.

Can’t found the way directly, so i decided to create 2 mapmagic item and assign 2 different graphs.. Unfortunately they are still always generating the same terrain. Even if they use different Graph and imported Maps raw.

This is probably a bug

Here is the video of the issue:

Mapmagic 2 issue - Multiple Tiles https://youtu.be/ETJVRfLl3kQ

By the way, good job with this new release.

 

franck_Extriple, it won't work this way - you don't have to create two MM objects. Instead you can use two RAW input nodes in one graph, each one with a different offset, and then combine them together using Blend node and additive mode. Just make sure your RAW files have black borders to make them return 0 value where the other file is used.

 

That's true, however I want to make a small playable area that's boxed in so the player doesn't disappear into the infinite.

 

You could wall an area with suitably sized cubes then turn the renderers off. Although the Player couldn't see the walls they wouldn't be able to pass because of the colliders.

 

Heya,

I'm happy enough with the results in one of our games that I would like to use this in a tile-based rpg (think Legends of Grimrock) I'm working on. Is there any built-in way to get the object placement to follow a strict grid? I know that the documentation says its already using cells (since you can manipulate how close/far from the edge of the cell something is, if I remember right) ... how hard would it be to enforce the size of those cells in world units? I'm curious if this can be used to generate realistic looking maps that still follow a grid-like structure.

Assuming I have a 3x3 tile size, if I create a 300x300 size terrain, that would be 100x100 tiles. Is there any way to force the object spawning nodes to use a 100x100 grid size in a case like this? (Obviously whatever numbers make sense per map, just giving an example).

Thanks so much!

 

If the area is small then might it be handy to use pinned terrain only?
If not then MM will generate terrains in a background anyways, it doesn't really matter whether player reached the edge or not.

Scatter should work that way - if a density is below the cell square then it will make object appear only on some cells, while will miss it on others.

 

Hi, can you please tell me how to make the terrain joints not visible ??? I made a terrain of 8000X8000 and 430 high, in Size (tiles) of 500. I have put the import module, and I have imported the raw of my terrain, everything ok. But now I find stripes all over the terrain, between the joints of the terrain. Obviously the textures are very bad where the terrain meets. Can you tell me how to fix this? ... Thank you.

 

Quick question: Is your spline tool something that can work in the graph, or is it something set up in the editor? Meaning, can it dynamically generate paths between random objects spawned using your Objects module?

I also see that its being re-worked and should hopefully be ready in January ... I'm just curious where its going (and if its worth picking up now for my use-case).

 

Yes you can use it to dynamically generate splines between random points in the graph, but the whole thing is still in development, I didn't use it because the results are not good enough yet.





Here I generated random points, then flatten the terrain at this points and generated splines in between.

 

@Wright Is there any way I can read the height data inside a BiomeNode from outside the BiomeNode (i.e. the TerrainHeight)?

And then there is another much more important thing, I have reported this more than once, but the problem is still not fixed, it is extremely annoying and makes MapMagic not really usable for me.
I have recorded the whole thing in a video to make it easier to understand. This happens all the time in connection with MapMagic and MicroSplat. I have tried it in several projects and in different Unity versions, I keep running into these errors when creating the MapMagic terrain.

This is the Material Setting for the MicroSplat Shader, everything should be fine here..


These are the settings of MapMagic, also nothing special here.

 

I've got a report of Import node welding issues in negative areas (where X or Z is less 0) and fixed those issues, but this fix will be available only in a new version - can't release a downloadable quick fix because too many files changed.

MicroSplat compatibility is a tricky subject. It has lots of different modules (and they change from time to time). I can't promise that all of the MS features will be supported, but at least core module should work fine. Have you tried the demo scene, are there any issues with it?

 

@Wright
Thankyou for your fast reaction.
I can't say that, I have to test it in a separate project because I don't want to load the demo content in my final project. But I can do that tomorrow in a completely new HDRP project.

Anyway your answer is not sufficient. You write very clearly: "Out of the box compatibility with: CTS, MegaSplat, MicroSplat, Vegetation Studio Pro."

I only use two modules of MicroSplat, that is MicroSplat itself and MicroSplat HDRP. This problem has been occurring for some time in several versions of Unity.

I also talked to @JasonBooth and tried to solve the problem with him, he clearly says that you are responsible for the integration of MicroSplat through the MicroSplat node. if you promote "out of the box" compatibility, it should be expected that longer existing bugs will be fixed too.

If it helps you, I can give you access to my git repo. it is not very sensitive material in the project.

 

can we stamp mesh object into the terrain?

Right now I convert meshes to height maps, then use the Stamp node to add them to the terrain. But I'm wondering if I can skip that step and just assign a mesh to be "stamped" into the terrain itself?

 

Things I love:
- Super easy setup
- Variety that you can quickly adjust
- Well designed and good interface

Issues I've had:
- Plugin works great everywhere else, but it won't infinitely generate terrain in WebGL build. Any thoughts?
- When I export to WebGL I get the errors below. (Can fix it by deleting the native plugin, but I'm not sure what effect that has on the final build.)


Error 1:

Plugin 'NativePlugins.dll' is used from several locations:
Assets/MapMagic/Tools/Plugins/NativePlugins.dll would be copied to <PluginPath>/NativePlugins.dll
Assets/MapMagic/Tools/Plugins/x86/NativePlugins.dll would be copied to <PluginPath>/NativePlugins.dll
Please fix plugin settings and try again.

UnityEditor.Modules.DefaultPluginImporterExtension:CheckFileCollisions(String)
UnityEditorInternal.PluginsHelper:CheckFileCollisions(BuildTarget)
UnityEngine.GUIUtility: ProcessEvent(Int32, IntPtr)

Error 2:

UnityEditor.BuildPlayerWindow+BuildMethodException: 2 errors
at UnityEditor.BuildPlayerWindow+DefaultBuildMethods.BuildPlayer (UnityEditor.BuildPlayerOptions options) [0x002bb] in <1fe7a3c0284a456b9681b7a93141c89a>:0
at UnityEditor.BuildPlayerWindow.CallBuildMethods (System.Boolean askForBuildLocation, UnityEditor.BuildOptions defaultBuildOptions) [0x00080] in <1fe7a3c0284a456b9681b7a93141c89a>:0
UnityEngine.GUIUtility: ProcessEvent(Int32, IntPtr)


Any solutions would be great, but I like the plugin either way and I think it's a great asset. Would definitely recommend! Thank you for creating it and continuing to support it. The video series on YouTube is also very helpful!

 

The issue might really be in compatibility with MS HDRP module. I plan to do some upgrades for MS compatibility in next version, but still can't promise make it work perfectly with all the modules. I will look into MS HDRP compatibility after I'll make these changes and see what I can do about it.
Thanks for pointing out that you were confused by the description on the AS page - but MM is really compatible with MS core, the link in the description points to MS core, and no MS modules mentioned. However I admit that I've got to do something with this description if it might confuses users.

You are doing it the right way. MM has no way to convert meshes to heightmap - it got to have a renderer or something to do that. It's a bit out of the scope of MM. So the only way out is to render height map in the other tool.

 

@Wright I bought the Map Magic 2 bundle a few days ago. It's a fine tool. That said, a few pages ago, people have been asking for hints how to write custom nodes and you postponed the answer, since you had limited time. Did I miss it or are we still waiting for that? If so, could you at least post a condensed version of it? Something along the lines of "Create a new script, inherit from this, override that and use these attributes for the Editor UI ..." would probably be enough to get started. Or maybe you could even provide the source code of a minimal node with a single input and output, we could use as a template to adapt? Thanks.

Edits: Typos.

 

I'm writing the instructions on how to create the nodes, and return to this page from time to time. It's still convoluted and unstructured, and I'm sorry for that, but at least it contains some basics:
Custom Generator

 

Thanks a lot and no worries, that already looks quite helpful.

 

I need a flat terrain. Should I set the terrain height to zero? Will that cause problems with colliders or raycasts?

 

Yes, you can set the terrain height to zero or any other height using the Constant node. I'm not aware of any collider or raycast problems related with this.

 

michaelcmartino, you've got to turn off native code for WebGL in Window - Map Magic - Settings - disable C++ Native code.

I've got email notification about your post on Tuesday, but it was not in a thread when I've tried to answer it. I've checked twice, and could not find it even after answering other posts. And now it appears right where it originally should be. Sounds like a cop-out, but it's really so

 

Hi Wright, i also came across that issue. I'm not sure the fix you mentioned on idea informer will fix it, since it doesn't seem to do with the negative coordinates you mentioned? Here is what id did:

• Create a Unity Terrain with 513 Heightmap (selected in the inspector)
• Draw something on it
• Export it as 16-bit .RAW File directly from the terrain
• Re-Import it as Map Magic Matrix Asset
• Used import node with 4x scaling on a 4x4 tiles Map magic instance with tile size 513
  
• Cried
• Retried with 4x4 preview tiles of 257 size, which shows the same seams.

Please see the attached screenshot. If you need to know more, just let me know.

 

It has been a while that I was wondering what was happening but now I can replicate the bug.

Sometime when I use the object's node, it become unusable like if it was disconnected and the objects (or multiple objects) doesn't spawn in MM2 anymore.
I found out that if I modify the LOD of the original prefab objects (either a tree that I use as an object or a rock), it break the node where the prefab was in.
Refreshing or cloning the node doesn't work so I have to delete it and do another one from scratch.
I also don't get any error in the console.

 

I think I've encountered a bug while building to ios. This is a new project with a fresh MM2 install.

- Unity 2019.4.13
- Windows 10
- MapMagic 2.0.8

Plugin 'NativePlugins.dll' is used from several locations:
Assets/MapMagic/Tools/Plugins/NativePlugins.dll would be copied to <PluginPath>/NativePlugins.dll
Assets/MapMagic/Tools/Plugins/x86/NativePlugins.dll would be copied to <PluginPath>/NativePlugins.dll
Please fix plugin settings and try again.
UnityEditor.Modules.DefaultPluginImporterExtension:CheckFileCollisions(String)
UnityEditorInternal.PluginsHelper:CheckFileCollisions(BuildTarget)
UnityEngine.GUIUtility: ProcessEvent(Int32, IntPtr)

 

Thanks for reporting this, I'll look into it. As a workaround you can just remove Assets/MapMagic/Tools/Plugins/x86/NativePlugins.dll file. It should not affect anything unless you are not going to perform Windows x86 builds.

Exactly, that's the excellent way to reproduce the issue. Fixed for the next version, please let me know if I should compile a quick patch for you.

Yes, it's the issue from ideainformer, fixed for the next version. Surprisingly it involves too many changes, so I can't release a quick patch for this.

Don't know the final release date of 2.1.0 yet, so I guess I'll try to merge current version with bug fix changes and make 2.0.9.

 

Thanks for the offer. I can wait for the next update if it come soon since this is not game breaking.