Terrain Improvement (dev branch)

[nodunit 397]

That is crazy effective, by the time you spot them you're dead, it'll become a game of marco polo heheheh, unless you have FLIR :P

[Bashka_IF 1]

Solution

Yay!

there are 2 more - (823,427) , (873,438) - open the image with MSPaint , it shows coordinates

[gliptal 25]

there are 2 more - (823,427) , (873,438) - open the image with MSPaint , it shows coordinates

Dam you're right!

*Real* Solution

Yay!

[Bee8190 10]

Oh btw - I was suprised how well camouflage worked together with the new texture!!! Spot the soldiers

What soldiers??

Awesome stuff ;)

With stuff like this MP - PvP has a hope once again !

[wiresnsnakes 1]

Oh btw - I was suprised how well camouflage worked together with the new texture!!! Spot the soldiers

Thats great!

Just: Im sure the soldiers arent hit by sunlight.

Anyway I recognized something different in the game: the visibility is strongly connected (besides different threatment from sunlight and the colours) with the resolution - and of the colours, of coures - of the groundtexture and the the textures from the soldiers.

From far away they just seem like a few coloured polygons without a texture.

Anyway resolution, texturesettings,FXAA and AF can be used to make the normal view work like thermalvision.

Its impossible to ensure a fair PVP-experience in this regards, without playing with (honest!) friends. :p

Its pretty effective in Planetside 2 to do that, too, but it look really ugly and the viewdistance is very limited anyway/respawn-time fast.

[NordKindchen 12]

I am planning on releasing a Performance test version

That means a version for you to test the impact on your performance.

It will only contain one finished part of the map which gets repeated for every other part. So it wont look well execpt for the original place but you can give me feedback on performance.

What do you say?

[jumpinghubert 48]

very good idea!

[CaptainObvious 95]

What do you say?

I'm eager to test it out! :eek:

[das attorney 857]

I am planning on releasing a Performance test version

That means a version for you to test the impact on your performance.

It will only contain one finished part of the map which gets repeated for every other part. So it wont look well execpt for the original place but you can give me feedback on performance.

What do you say?

Hey man,

I think you should do it.

I have watched your suggestions from the beginning of Alpha and you seemed to get frustrated (understandably) when the issue was recognised but not dealt with.

If you do put out a terrain overlay pack on your own, I would be really grateful on a personal level. (And I think it would be good for you as a person to show what could be achieved). Also, you may get to show BIS how it should be done ;)

No disrespect to BIS obv, but I do think they dropped the ball when it came to the mid textures.

[3instein 10]

I think the idea of releasing a Performance test version is a good idea NordKindchen.

I hope it is not as strong as your test picture,the one with us trying to find the soldiers though, that might be just a tad too much (IMO) and we would never find any of the enemy. :)

All credit to you though Sir,been following your thread from the start,good luck,

Mick. :)

[wiresnsnakes 1]

I would be happy to test, I got a Phenom X4 955 and a Radeon 4890 and 4GB RAM, so I can respond for people with a minimum-requirement-system.

I hope it is not as strong as your test picture,the one with us trying to find the soldiers though, that might be just a tad too much (IMO) and we would never find any of the enemy.

I dont think its too much, but I think there are 2 things to be aware of:

1. The picture isnt very sharp (i guess compression), would it be sharper you would see them tad better.

2. The sun is low and doesnt hit the place directly, which makes them naturally less visible, then with direct impact of sunlight, but still easier then in shadows (which I still painfully miss at higher distances :( ).

Nordkindchen can correct if Im wrong.

Edit: Not to mention, if the detail would be like in reality or at least the distant details in Arma would be as high at higher distances as near you would have a hard time to spot an enemy even if you know in which direction you have to look.

Edited August 24, 2013 by wiresnsnakes

[fragmachine 12]

^ I had no problem with it too. Ive been able to spot soldiers after 8-10 seconds. It should be this way so the camouflage will have a real use.

Idea with the test release is good. Same tactics with Alpha and Beta release been adapted by Jarhead with his JSRS 2.0 project - so it can be really beneficial.

BTW it really looks great right now - just how the vanilla should look like. Congrats!

[gliptal 25]

You even have to consider that human eyes are really good at detecting movement, and not so good at detecting broken still silhouttes.

Yay!

[wiresnsnakes 1]

@fragmachine

So true!

I dont like the game at the moment, cause the missing cover (flat landscape/no micro-terrain/not many objects) on one side and missing concealment at the other (no microterratin/textures/shadows/gass).

Its just suicide, to move through the landscape and just ruin the infantry-gameplay for me. I love to get immersed in games and arma archives that by its aesthetics but the easy visibility at high ranges let me just think how stupid it is to move outside the citys/villages.

Besides realism the game can set more potential free for stealth AND brings recon/intelligence on another level.

[Kakarotto 0]

Just wanted to voice my support for this thread. The lack of detail in distant terrain is IMO one of the most critical issues affecting Arma and has a major effect on gameplay, as besides looking bad, it's often easier to spot enemies far away than when they are close. Something needs to be done, and I hope BIS recognizes the issue's importance for so many of us. And having modern visuals is important to attract new players as well.

NordKindchen, your detailed post explaining and demonstrating solutions is awesome and your dedication is outstanding. I'm really excited to see that BIS devs are now showing interest in addressing the issue and could potentially take ideas from NordKindchen's proposals. I really hope we can get an official solution patched in, and it would be great if they could accept his assistance if necessary.

Edited August 25, 2013 by Kakarotto

[NordKindchen 12]

Now where can I upload huge files for free?

The performance_test version is about 650mb ;)

[CaptainObvious 95]

Now where can I upload huge files for free?

The performance_test version is about 650mb ;)

Google Drive

[dale0404 5]

Now where can I upload huge files for free?

The performance_test version is about 650mb ;)

Dropbox

[wiresnsnakes 1]

Now where can I upload huge files for free?

The performance_test version is about 650mb

AHHH! I cant wait to try it out!

Far more then to see Altis.

Quality over Quantity. ;)

[VanZant 48]

Oh yeah! waiting here.

[NordKindchen 12]

I will not use my preacious dropbox account to upload 650mb of date^^

Thanks for the upload tips though!

Okey here is the Performance_test

Pls remember this is a Performance test.

The texture will not fit to the terrain apart from one part of the island.

Therefore you will see sharp edges between each tile of the map. Thats because its only for performance testing purposes.

It might interest you that I left one part of each tile in its vanilla state so you can see the difference in resolution.

Remember: The final mod will have adjusted textures for each part of the island!

I am eager to hear the your experience on the performance!

On my system it runs quite fine!

Best regards!

[pauliesss 2]

Thank you NordKindchen, downloading now! :)

[gammadust 12]

:rolleyes:

[CaptainObvious 95]

Good grief that file is loading slow :eek: Can't wait can't wait!

[pauliesss 2]

Ok, tested, no performance issues here, but I guess with SSD, 16GB RAM, GTX Titan and i7-3770k@4.5Ghz no problems were expected...the quesion is how will the game perform on mid-low-end PCs.

Nice job by the way, I really like it. :)