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3 Dimensional Chat / Matrix Resolution

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CrayZemon
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Joined: 16th Jun 2003
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Posted: 3rd Jul 2003 06:09
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Well, I was playing an old DOS game today called Shattered Steel - best described as a game that would have killed MechWarrior2. I couldn't help but notice that this game was made in 1994 and uses some pretty fancy matrixes that can even be deformed by firepower. I also noticed that although the texture resolution of the matrixes was of a lesser resolution than DarkBASIC technology, the tile resolution appears no different. I noticed the same thing playing Terminal Velocity (1994), just that Terminal Velocity's matrixes almost completely matched DB's in quality within a 640/480 resolution.

I describe "tile resolution" as how choppy, say, a hill would be in the same amount of space: the more resolution the less choppy the hill would be. Is it just the DBC, or is Dark Basic itself not very far ahead of games like mentioned above in matrix technology.
Is it possible to make landscapes that are not as choppy? Just curious for future reference.
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Shadow Robert
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Posted: 3rd Jul 2003 06:56
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This is because DarkBASIC & DarkBASIC Professional use the DirectX Matricies which are standard Quad Octree Matrix Patches.

Alot of games now though for the past 3-4years have used something called Terrain Patchs, which is essentially the evolution of the DirectX Matrix ... all they do is have an LOD Setup for On-The-Fly Subdivision, this leaves you with a gorgeously blended terrain without having to have the ENTIRE matrix have the same polycount as it only divides the FOV part of the matrix.

DarkBASIC Pro has this too as DirectX 8.0 was given this ability, however as of yet it doesn't seems to be anywhere close to stable as it can give very odd results when used. And unfortunately we don't have any options over the texture setup per tile like standard Matricies have.

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CrayZemon
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Posted: 3rd Jul 2003 19:07
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Bummer. Would it be viable to produce an engine that models terrain using polygons instead of matrixes. It would be sort of a "polymatrix" function produced by the programmer. Basically, the matrix would be rendered using a sculpted array of triangles that can be of a smaller resolution. The problem I forsee, even with fantastic bsp and clipping, is memory trouble. Any thoughts?

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Shadow Robert
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Posted: 3rd Jul 2003 19:11
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checkout the help on memoryblocks that what i used when i develop my own terrains

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CrayZemon
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Posted: 6th Jul 2003 06:25
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I've been playing around with the "polymatrix" function in my noodle. What kind of trig functions would most effectively be used to develope of "get ground height" from a matrix made out of an array of triangles? Any thoughts?

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Shadow Robert
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Posted: 6th Jul 2003 07:10
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i'd say a 3dmaths dotproduct over the two diagonals then a quick cullman from the tallest to shortest would probably do it

there is a snippet in the code snippets forum, really old like one of the first that deals with the cullman interpolation - that would probably be a good place to start

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