14 replies to this topic

[riuthamus]

So, I was toying around with our alpha and realized that block placement seems very off. The placement itself is no different than minecraft. The issue seems to be with our indicator. As of right now it only the face which you are pointing at his highlight. Originally we had a minecraft type of block highlight where the block you were looking at was highlighted. I did not mind it but wanted to improve it... although after spending thousands of hours in minecraft and only twenty minutes in my game I can tell there is something that is "off". So i come to you to see what you guys would think is the best:

Picture of our current setup:


Picture of scenario 1:


With this option the face that is being highlighted would be orange and the block area that would be filled if you placed a block, would be highlighted with the blue.

Picture of scenario 2:


With this option the face that is being looked at would be orange and the block being looked at would be blue.

Picture of Scenario 3:


So, again, not sure what exactly would be the best option. Let me know what you guys think and we can go from there. I also had an idea with some particles but that will be for much later.

Edited by riuthamus, 25 July 2012 - 09:37 PM.

[Mito]

Well, I liked scenarios 2 and 3.

on scenario 1, if you start walking with the block, the highlight would be crazy...

one thing that i've noted is that few players notice the highlight on minecraft.

Why you don't try mixing 2 and 3? make the borders a little thin, and add a little highlight as of scenario 3, but less bright.

although i think that scenario 3 would be strange when moving...

i've assumed that this highlight will display whenever the player looks at a block in his/her range...

I'm enjoying the look of your game, you are planing to add anti-alias to the edges?

[Acharis]

I will say like this, make it like Minecraft. Interace is something you don't want to change (if it is good in other games of the genre and usually it is good), plus, everyone who would play your game would know Minecraft anyway due to its insane popularity so familiar interface is a plus. Generally, interface is not something you want to be original with (unless the genre has a really bad interface and you have a stroke of genius how to improve it).

Yes, they will scream that it is "Minecraft clone". But they will scream this basicly no matter what you do If you want to differentiate from Minecraft do not touch interface, it won't make enough difference, make some fundamental changes in the gameplay (I know, easy to say...)


BTW, it would be interesting to read a topic about your game's gameplay and main design choices.

[Stormynature]

BTW, it would be interesting to read a topic about your game's gameplay and main design choices

i.e. Start a Developer's Journal

[riuthamus]

i.e. Start a Developer's Journal

I have started one, and it is also in my signature. I am just now finding the time to explain what the game is doing and how it works. Over the course of the next month you should see a lot more showing up with it!

I'm enjoying the look of your game, you are planing to add anti-alias to the edges?

Yes, but we are lacking some information on how to get AA working with SlimDX and DX11. Any guides or tutorials you might have would be appreciated.

And, i might try to get some more information out soon. Ultimately the purpose of my project is to make something from the base idea of voxel placement and give it an actual freaking purpose. My goal is to focus on land ownership and war.... as this is what my minecraft server did. I felt very restricted by minecraft and what they allowed to be done and thus why I decided to make a game from that. Again, i will have more details out through my blog and through the blog on this site. Thanks guys for the feedback.

Edited by riuthamus, 26 July 2012 - 07:22 PM.

[riuthamus]

created a blog for the project and added the premise to it. For those who care

http://www.gamedev.net/blog/1513/entry-2254866-the-premise/

not trying to advert but some of you showed interest so i figured I would link you where it was at.

[Mito]

Any guides or tutorials you might have would be appreciated.

well, this is what i found so far:

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/eternalcoding/archive/2011/10/10/discovering-3d-rendering-with-c-and-direct3d-11.aspx - read the comments, the second one explains how to add anti-alias.

http://www.gamedev.net/topic/565475-slimdx-anti-aliasing/ - really old post with some troubleshooting

http://www.rkoenig.eu/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=21:chapter-3-das-erste-echte-3d-objekt&catid=6:directx10-basics&Itemid=3 - german tutorial, but google do a excelent job of translating it (tested via chrome)

if i run into something else i'll let you know.

[riuthamus]

Very good to hear. I will send these to my coders tomorrow. I gave them a look and they seem very well written. Maybe one or two could provide us with the answer we are looking for. Thank you again, i notice you are following most of my topics... would you be interested in helping us test?

[Mito]

well, interested I'm, but I only have time for test at home (i usually post at work). if you don't mind, i can help you.

as for following most of your topics, i usually look the new topics on game design and writing for games and reply to those i find interesting, and voxel based worlds are much interesting, being a programmer, my curiosity about this games rises as i notice how complicated they are.

I'm not stalking you

[riuthamus]

well, interested I'm, but I only have time for test at home (i usually post at work). if you don't mind, i can help you.

as for following most of your topics, i usually look the new topics on game design and writing for games and reply to those i find interesting, and voxel based worlds are much interesting, being a programmer, my curiosity about this games rises as i notice how complicated they are.

I'm not stalking you

Sorry, I did not mean to make it sound like you were stalking! I meant it as a good thing. We will be moving to the testing phase shortly and I will be looking for people who do just like what you do. Post quality posts that can help the production. We are not at that stage just yet since most of the bug testing can be done from myself and the other team members, but when we reach the part with the netcode I will most certainly send you an invite.

I find myself posting a lot at work as well. Helps that I have photoshop there so I can create some quick images to throw up to help explain my stuff. What do you program in? just curious... thanks again, and no worries about the post following. I like to see people interested in what we are doing.

[Mito]

I work with C# but sadly it's not on the game industries, I work with Asp. Net MVC 3, business applications...

I also know a little of Java, C++ and Python, and recently i'm trying to learn JavaScript, but I am considering JavaScript less and less as a language

[riuthamus]

Very cool, always interesting to see what backgrounds people come from.

[quiSHADgho]

Personally I never cared much about AA but if i had to implement it i would go with a seperable screen space technique. That should give you the best performance stability in relation to the resolution you use. I think the most popular ones are MLAA and the newer SMAA which can be found here: (the source code is also available)
http://www.iryoku.com/smaa/

Maybe the whole technique is a bit too high end but adapting some of the ideas should not be that hard.
And there is FXAA which is quite popular at the moment but i think it should be slower and not as good as the two mentioned above.

http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2011/12/fast-approximate-anti-aliasing-fxaa.html
This is just a basic comparison and description of some different techniques and at last a thread from January discussing some of the techniques. Theres also the link to the FXAA whitepaper:
http://www.gamedev.net/topic/618958-anti-aliasing-techniques/

[riuthamus]

qui, some serious stuff there, Thanks for the help. We will go through this and let you know what we add!

[riuthamus]

We ended up going with option2 and 3 combined. The line thickness of 2 was reduce alot as well... so it is less annoying!

@qui none of those tutorials work for a C# project, sadly! Thank you all for the help. I have +1 all of you, so nice to have good help around here.