Voxeland - Voxel Terrain Tool

@Wright I know you are using your own solution for placement onto terrains. However, I am fans of various developers and their assets on the Unity3D asset store. Adam Goodrich recently released gena and may be worth watching for a potential tool to support in conjunction with the new awesome Voxel Magic combo.

 

Blueberry, thanks, I'll have a look at this tool.

Ascensi, there isn't a built-in obj exporter, but there are plenty third-party solutions. Some of them are free like this script.

I'm afraid it is not possible to make erosion work in 3D, or at least extremely time-consuming. Even a planar erosion isn't an easy task, creating erosion that will do the things you mention will take much more efforts than Voxeland itself. I'm not sure I'm competent enough for that task

 

With most terrain generators I have a main issue. That is when users modify the land manually (say to create a non-flat or even flat village) a change to the generator usually breaks the manually changes.

So I have to potential feature request.

1. Is Voxeland going to have the ability to pin similar to Map Magic? If so, is it going to be pinning areas or chunks? Since if it would be possible to pin chunks without large overhead it'd potentially help in just grabbing a "village" while still generating the surrounding area(s).

2. Terrain Composer has a mechanic where you can use primitive meshes to influence the generator. For example creating a rectangle and placing it on the terrain to add or exclude based on that object. The reason why this works well is that when you create a "village" you can design everything on-top of the primitives then move your finished product onto the terrain. Then the terrain would be generated, then modified to those primitives. Essentially keeping layouts that you've previously created.

 

Actually there is already an area pin feature in Voxeland - the area becomes pinned once you make any change in it, and will not be re-generated anymore. But do not confuse it with the chunk baking - the chunks will be re-created after any deserialization.

Yeah, I know that TC feature. But it's more related to MMWG - I plan to make an editor tool of it (not only the terrain generator) as soon as I will deal with Voxeland integration - and it will work exactly the way described.

 

Ask and Jakob provideth https://forum.unity3d.com/threads/w...res-experimental-preview.438991/#post-2840478

 

This product looks beautiful but I have a few questions:
1) Could this be used to make a spherical voxel planet such as what is done in Space Engineers
2) Can this be used in a multiplayer environment

 

TheAnnihilator, Voxeland cannot be used to create sphere planets, but could be used in multiplayer game.

 

Hey Wright. Any updates on Voxeland-MMPG integration?

best regards

 

I looked through this whole forum and saw previously that controlling an individual voxel's smoothness was possible. Reading further it seems that ability was removed. In voxelands current state, can we control select voxels to be more cubical and not blended into the surrounding voxels? Is there a smoothness property that each voxel owns? To clarify I don't mean perfectly cubical like minecraft, rounded corners/edges would still be acceptable for my needs. This is currently the only hang up I have before I purchase. Thanks.

 

I'm really threw myself into re-making of Voxeland, but unfortunately there's not much to report or show yet. Just finished the new LOD system and going to update the GUI. Couple of weeks ago I've made MM to generate initial noise level for Voxeland, but still it's in raw test mode.

Coltenney, square blocks feature was really removed because it doesn't fit well into Voxeland's architecture, making it difficult to maintain the plugin and develop it further. I'd really like to return this feature since I've got many requests for that, but I cannot promise it - I'll see how it will fit into Voxeland code.

Chamfered edges and corners is definitely a more complex feature than just a cube boxes, so do not expect it at least in near future.

 

Is it likely that we see an earlier patch to fix the fps controller texture switching? It seems like it would be a small fix.

 

Can anyone walk me through the process of once I generate the mesh and then export, but how to reassemble the chunks in the correct position?

 

Hello! And thanks for the wonderful plugin. We are prototyping a cool strategy action puzzle mash up for next gen and your terrain tools is perfect for really gamey terrains!

Unfortunately we have run into an issue where the grass is only applied for the first 10 rows of voxels in the terrain. Would you happen to know what that is about?

 

Write, I'm getting IndexOutOfRangeException when creating a new Voxeland with default settings. As seen in the picture below, you can see the x, z and resulting areaNum values. I cleaned up your code some to try and get a single place to try and fix it. What should I do, return an emptyColumn as ReadColumn does for areaNum being less than 0 or greater than 10000?

Initially it's GetGrassColumn that is throwing the error

PS if you want the code, I can send it to you

 

Well I centralized the code, and made it return emptyColumn on IndexOutOfRangeException(s) and there are still other places in code calling GetArea() that get the same exception. I'm out of ideas. Here's the final code for that area anyway...

 

Dune2, let me clarify it: you are clicking GameObject - 3D Object - Voxeland Terrain and it logs this error instead of creating new terrain? Have you tried this on a clean project?

Jussukka, does this happens in demo scene?

emperor12321, sure. Although it's a bug in a demo script that's supposed to be rewritten by user, but anyways - here is a quick fix.

pixelsteam, are you going to use the baked terrain in the other scene? In this case I think it's better to disable Voxeland component and save Voxeland object as a prefab to use in other scenes with the terrain chunks already aligned.

 

I'm hoping to do this, but this was with a new scene. Yet what's the point of using new projects? It doesn't help me build my game.

And Yes, I did do GameObject - 3D Object - Voxeland Terrain, as your documentation suggests in Voxeland - Readme.

 

Jussukka, does this happens in demo scene?

No, it works fine, until I level the terrain and paint fresh. Then we are back to the broken grass.

 

Dune2, Testing Voxeland with a clear project can help to determine if it is a Voxeland's bug or some compatibility issues with the other plugins or scripts. The only reason I'm asking you about that error is that I cannot reproduce it - obviously I've got the terrain created with no problems, so I need to know the exact conditions when and why that happens.

Jussukka, could you please send me the scene with the broken grass?

 

I redownloaded and installed Voxeland in a completely new project and had the same issue, it completely did not render the starting area but further away chunks loaded

 

Hello, Wright! I'm looking for a plugin that allows to use voxels small size (0.25 meters). Can I customize voxel size, making their size smaller?

 

Can this be used with the A* Pathfinding Pro asset? If so, how do you integrate the two together?

Can I get the name of a texture at a specific x, y, z coordinate? I am able to do that currently for a Unity terrain, and my dynamic spawning system is dependent on that. If I am able to do that with Voxeland, would it also work with the baked mesh option, or would Voxeland need to be active for it?

What's the max terrain size before performance becomes an issue, if I cannot bake it due to needing texture name? I'm aware of the settings where you can build it as the camera gets closer, but I am running a multiplayer game, so the server would always need it fully loaded in. At the moment our terrain size is 2kx2k, and we'll be using that size for a little while I imagine. Someday we may want to do 4kx4k or even 8kx8k.

Can you put different parts of the terrain on different layers? For example the above ground on the Terrain layer, but where cave entrances start and so on into it as the Cave layer.

 

In some cases data file is missing in demo scene. Jaimi found a solution for that - reassign data from the new terrain. That's a really odd thing since horizon chunks use the same data - and they build successfully. What hurts is that I cannot reproduce it.

Lesnikus5, you can scale Voxeland object down 4 times to reduce the block size - but keep in mind that this will greatly increase data and mesh complexity - literally in 64 times!

I have not tried using this asset together with Voxeland.

Yes. You can get the block type at some specific coordinate using voxelandObject.GetBlock(x,y,z) - and then get it's texture using voxeland object blocks array.

I can provide you with a current Voxeland version so you can check if it could be modified to work with A* Pathfinding Pro and test it's size/performance bias. Contact me via email if you'd like to get current version.

In the upcoming Voxeland 5 the visible terrain size would be 60 chunks (30-40 units each), so it will be about 2000-2500 units in total size. Of course not all of that terrain will be build as the pure voxels due to performance reasons, but anyways terrain this will give more than one km of view.

Sure, Voxeland has a true internal voxel data structure. You can dig caves in a cliff and add ground from above. You can even dig a hole, set some specific block in the deep and bury it down - and when you dig it again it still will be there - no surprise for those who played Minecraft, but it far from being reproduced with standard terrain.

 

When you say visible terrain size, what if there isn't a camera in the scene? Such as when running a server for a multiplayer game.

If I bake the voxel into a mesh, would I still be able to access the texture names at a specific point? It sounds like baking will give me the best performance, but I need the texture names.

Is there a way to paint where the mouse is at, instead of having to keep moving the scene view around?

How do I use voxelandObject.GetBlock? Is that world coordinates that it accepts, or how do I convert world coordinates to what voxeland will want? Is the byte value that it returns an index in the types variable in VoxelandTerrain?

 

Hey @Wright I sent you an email, id like to test the latest version, also is it going to be multithreaded?

 

New Voxeland version will use an algorithm similar to one that is used in MMWG - terrain could be generated not only around a camera object, but any object with a certain tag. You can tag multiplayer characters with "Player" tag and land will be created for each of the player.

In current version it is not possible, in the upcoming one it will be more likely available. In fact there will no baking in Voxeland 5 - there will be a "save meshes with scene" toggle that will make the terrain appear instantly on playmode start or scene load.

Could you please clarify this a bit? You can change block types under the cursor in scene view, can't you?

Here is a (pseudo?) code:

Code (CSharp):

1. int myCoordX = Mathf.FloorToInt(myWorldPosition.x*voxelandObject.transform.localScale.x + voxelandObject.transform.position.x);

That's right, GetBlock return value is an index in types array. Don't let the variable type - byte - confuse you - voxeland data is using bytes internally for memory saving.

Yes, it's going to be multithreaded, but it's not ready yet. I will announce the beta test here on forums, hope it will happen in a couple of weeks.

 

Defintely interested in it, also saving features? As I want to build a system that allows me to stream in maps as I need them which are made from hieghtmaps, loaded into voxelland, edited for things like cliffs, overhangs, caves, saved out as a cell or sector, then loaded into Voxeland in game as a cell apart of a larger map.

Also, I would recommend looking into using Megasplat, Its integration which I believe would be very beneficial to voxelland with support for 256 textures. would allow alot of variation with the visual aspect

 

Hi there @Wright ..

I'd like to understand how best to do two things in Voxeland:
(a) extend the voxel data to include additional attributes about the block in the world (eg, state, or health)
(b) what's the "correct" way to inject your own world generation code. I didn't see an obvious hook that provides either a chunk to work on or some coords to work with.

Thanks!

 

Reiika, you probably talking about baking. Voxeland could be baked to standard Unity mesh assets, and then you can load these meshes partly. You can find mesh baking button in an Import and Export section.

twodave, currently Voxeland keep only one per-block data - actually, it is a block type (byte, 0 for non-existent "air" blocks). Each new block attribute will increase the data at least twice (or 5 times for float values). Moreover, data is compressed by stacking together all blocks of a similar type. Using health value will add the new stack factor, making compression less dense, this will additionally increase the data size. I don't really think that adding per-block attribute is a good idea. But I can recommend you using a list of recently touched blocks along with their health values.

Try looking into data.FromMatrix (Matrix3<byte> matrix) method (as well as other methods in Matrix Operation region of Data.cs) - it fills the data using a 3-dimensional matrix. Matrix could be treated the same way as a 3d array except the fact that it has an offset values that determine it's position in data space (and it works much faster since it uses a flat array internally).

 

Is it possible for Voxeland to work with the Vive VR headset?

 

Thanks for the info about the OBJ exporter, I gave it a try and is pretty good except that each obj is positioned at the same location in World Space where as if I modeled a sliced landscape in Zbrush in a particular area then exported it, the parts would correctly align in Unity if I drag and drop all of them into the scene.

Aside from that is there some way in the new Voxeland you can add the ability to generate or attach a tag to all chunks so that a system like InstantOC can disable the render of a chunk if the player camera cannot see it? I understand you have your own chunk streaming/loading but to go a step further, cull the render of a chunk(s) or unload it behind the player or that is hidden by another chunk. VR typically is set to use 90 degree FOV so I'd bump up the culling or streaming to 120 FOV or so to give the system time to load/unload or enable/disable render as you look around and then there is no landscape popping in or out.

Another advantage to allow compatibility of 3rd party assets like World Streamer so we could stream absolutely everything is to allow the custom naming of chunks or specifically the prefix like: Large_Terrain1 Small_Terrain1 rather than the default "Hi Poly" or "Low Poly". I know that's what chunks are named when they are baked but what about in terrain development mode?

 

Hi - I'm a new user, and loving it so far. A couple quick questions... processing/rebuilding large limited terrain sets seems to take forever even on a powerful computer. Is there any way to enable multi-threading (I've got a 12-core Xeon that supports multi-threading, and my computer is mostly idling when Voxeland is calculating)? Also, is there any way to set it so that Voxeland calculations do not pause when the Unity editor app is not primary focus? I notice that if I switch to email or a web browser (or any other app), Voxeland pauses.

 

try go to "Edit > Project Settings > Player" under Resolution check "Run in background*"

 

ArloR, I've seen some VR projects using Voxeland, but I have not tried creating such a project myself, so I cannot guarantee that Voxeland is 100% compatible with VR. I can provide you with a Voxeland copy so you can try it yourself (just mail me to get it).

Voxeland 5 will have the same algorithm for tags, layers and components that MapMagic has. If enabled the chunks will inherit all of the layer and tag settings a main Voxeland object has, and if main object has any other components (scripts) assigned they will be copied to chunks too. The last one means that you can change any chunk property with a help of those custom scripts.

That sounds reasonable. I'm adding custom naming feature in my to-do list.

trilobyteme, current Voxeland version does not support multithreading, but the upcoming Voxeland 5 does.

 

Thanks for the tip, XPAction, that'll definitely help out. And that's great news, Wright, thank you!

 

Hello @Wright are we to expect Voxeland-MapMagic Marriage in 2016? or...

 

Don't forget that it's not just a plugin integration, it's completely new Voxeland. I plan to start beta testing this year if everything will go as planned, or some sort of preliminary alpha if it will not.

 

I'm working on a region in Space (Unity-based virtual world), and really loving what I can do with Voxeland but am running into a few challenges.

First, is there some way I can increase the maximum brush size? 0-6 is a great range when working with a smaller scene size, but in working with something larger (I'm trying to make a group of islands) it would be ideal to be able to start with much larger blocks, and then reduce the size as I get down into the details. If it's possible to tweak the script I'd appreciate some direction, and if not then please consider it for Voxeland 5.

Second, is there a way for me to be able to bake out a 'work in progress' mesh? I tried what you suggested in a reply a few pages back, baking meshes to scene (which bakes and then switches off the script, then I can turn it back on again when I need to resume editing)... but the size of my upload to Space's servers is still huge. Basically, what I'm looking for is the ability to bake or snapshot my work-in-progress so that I can upload to Space and check out the build in-world (with all the lighting, post fx, etc).

Thank you for building and continuing to develop this remarkable tool. I'm still a novice, but having a blast creating and already coming up with great results.

 

I will make the maximum brush size adjustable in v5, for now you can change the line 138 of VoxelandEditor.cs:

Code (CSharp):

1. LayoutTools.QuickInt(ref script.brushSize, "Brush Size:", "", max:15);

Do you mean you want to send Voxeland object to Space instead of baked meshes? Most probably no, I doubt that it has a Voxeland built-in. And I guess there's no way to reduce the mesh size other then compression (I mean manually zipping files) - there is no difference between "final" meshes or "wip" ones - they still are meshes.

 

Ah, that's a good hint. And I thought about it some more and realised I wanted to track the touched blocks anyway, so it will work great as a method for both goals.

(edit: my own stupid, ignore what was here!)

Lastly, a nice to have for v5 would be an option to provide layermasks for VoxelandTerrain.PointOut(). I can just use IgnoreRaycasts layer but it would be nice to be able to explicitly provide a layermask for the ray being cast in VoxelandTerrain.PointOut().

Thanks again for a great and useful engine! Really looking forward to seeing v5!

 

Hey Denis - just wondering, was it your asset used to make the caves in the game RUST?

Reason I am asking is because I am wanting to make a terrain, then sculpt some caves in it using such an asset, the world is hand sculpted and not persistent so would I be able to use your asset for such thing? I mean once I'm done with the caves I can remove the asset right? or then again leave it in the package for future reference

Another question is, once the cave is created using your asset - am I able to then go in with normal assets say rocks, vegetation, and maybe some water/puddles within the cave?

 

Thanks, Wright, I'll give that a shot for modifying the brush size.

I'm open to baking to mesh or assets or whatever I can in order to reduce the file size of a scene/region that gets uploaded to space. I think Voxeland is a perfect fool to create wonderful and unique landscapes, but if it adds 100+ MB to the size of the scene that users will need to download it limits me on where I can use it.

 

trilobyteme, you can use large baked meshes or you can use relatively compact voxel data, but need something on a client side to convert it to meshes, one or the other. Maybe there is a way to compact meshes space support?

DarkXess, I don't know the way caves made in RUST, I have not played it. But you can bake Voxeland terrain to Unity meshes assets and then remove Voxeland scripts. However, I guess you will need Voxeland terrain shaders to display the terrain you've made properly - with triplanar shading and channel blends.

 

What about voxel resolution/size/density? Can you adjust the "size" of the voxels? For example, I may want a voxel to be 1m cubed, or 2m, or 4m, etc? Is this doable? I don't mean all of the voxels uniformly, not have them at mixed sizes.
I realize it would cut down on the "resolution" of the voxel terrain, which is kind of what I'm looking for.

 

Yea I was thinking that it would need to stay there instead of me removing it. So I would just make the terrain, use Voxeland to create the caves then any finishing touches and were good? what about water and items being put inside the cave using your asset, is it possible? Thanks for the answer

 

jc_lvngstn, you can adjust the block size by merely scaling Voxeland object.

DarkXess, all of the objects are children of the chunks they are used at, and they are saved with a scene (not a mesh). Speaking about the water - Voxeland does not have any water engine, so it all depends on a water asset that is used to simulate water.

 

EDIT: Ignore whatever was here, the problem was my own mistake, I suspect I accidentially edited part of VoxelandTerrain.cs without realising it. Sorry for the confusion!

 

np, although I have not seen what was the problem glad you could find it out.

2All: Sorry folks, I don't really like the way MMWG generate Voxeland areas in MMWG/Voxeland alpha version, it's not very reliable and robust, so I guess I have to improve it. Got to make it to move further. I try make such things quite rarely, but I have to delay public test. I'll announce a new ETA as soon as I fully estimate the amount of work.

 

@Wright Ok another try for Voxeland with a different tessellation capable shader - MegaSplat up to 256 textures!
https://www.assetstore.unity3d.com/en/#!/content/76166

I was talking with Jason and in terms of compatibility he said:
I've had several people use MegaSplat on Voxel terrains. The main change to make this work is that the mesh your voxel system generates must meet some special requirements. This is described in the documentation, but basically on each triangle the three vertices must be colored red, green, and blue - such that no triangles have two of the same color. This is what the mesh converter does (author is talking about his own mesh converter) For tessellation to work, you must also ensure that the UV coordinate (unused in triplanar) and normal of each shared vertex are exactly the same (no hard edges), otherwise the displacement will tear the mesh apart.

Could you make this work?

 

Hey There Denis, i recently bought your Asset Voxeland and while it still looks pretty amazing im concerned about the performance when it comes to terrain editing.
My first goal is to implement a Terrain that is fluently editable on runtime. (digging, building and explosions that remove bigger parts of the terrain at once)

However, when im running the demo scene with a chunk size of 30 the editing of the terrain causes major lag spikes of (300 ms or more) i tried reducing the chunk size to 16 or 10 but it could only lower the problem a little. The lag spikes are still noticeable. I also turned off ambient occlusion or tried out new scenes with smaller finite terrains. The lag spikes are still there and interrupt the game flow. Of course larger brushes make the problem even worse.

Is there any chance that this could be improved in the upcoming versions or is there any way to improve this behavior by tweaking the settings?

I'm using Unity 5.5.0f3 (64-bit) and my system should be up to date (i7 4x3,6GHz, GTX980m, 16GB Ram, Win8.1)