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[Zaratustra]

Man, I should start posting one of these every week just to see you guys explain again and again how 3D IS REALY HARD TO MAEK and/or ASCII RULEZ BECAUSE I USE THE POEWR OF MY IMAGINATIUN.

[Dasleah]

Then put your money were your mouth is. If making a 3D Dwarf Fortress is so easy, come back in a week with what you've got. Hell, 6 months. A year.

[Capntastic]

quote:Originally posted by Zaratustra:
<STRONG>Man, I should start posting one of these every week just to see you guys explain again and again how 3D IS REALY HARD TO MAEK and/or ASCII RULEZ BECAUSE I USE THE POEWR OF MY IMAGINATIUN.</STRONG>

Why did you even post this thread in the first place if you didn't plan on explaining the original post, backing up your suggestion, or really doing anything other than complaining and being all indignant when people dare to ask for an explanation as to why this 3D engine so depserately required a thread in the suggestions forum.   Seriously, I'm trying to have a civil discussion and you're not really reciprocating.

[Sean Mirrsen]

I know what DF can be. DF can be a full-3D ASCII game. With graphics set support. Just make it full 3D made of ASCII symbols. Viewed from top down, with perspective. Landscape can be whole, with just the symbol's texture applied, but all actors will be actual symbols. However, when that's done, anyone who can mod would be able to replace all creature and object models with actual models.

[Coke_Can64]

quote:Originally posted by Sean Mirrsen:
<STRONG>I know what DF can be. DF can be a full-3D ASCII game. With graphics set support. Just make it full 3D made of ASCII symbols. Viewed from top down, with perspective. Landscape can be whole, with just the symbol's texture applied, but all actors will be actual symbols. However, when that's done, anyone who can mod would be able to replace all creature and object models with actual models.</STRONG>

And I hope thats got sarcasm in it 'cuz I belive it already is.  

[Sean Mirrsen]

No it isn't. "Full 3D ASCII" isn't the same as "OpenGL-rendered ASCII", and DF doesn't have perspective, which forces us to view one level at a time.

[Frobozz]

quote:Originally posted by Dasleah:
<STRONG>The vast majority of the engine would have to be re-written, and I can speak from experience that coding something for 3D is far more complex and time-consuming than 2D programming. If Toady dedicated all his time to just making DF 3D, then we wouldn't see another release with any gameplay features for at least[i/] 2 years, I'd guess.</STRONG>

If you speak from experience then you already know that keeping the input/output framework separate from the game code is very important. If done properly, it can allow converting a game with 2D graphics to 3D graphics. Note that 3D graphics doesn't necessarily mean 3D gameplay. I imagine Dwarf Fortress with 3D graphics would resemble an isometric engine in that you'd still be limited to seeing/editing one level at a time. Regardless if the framework is ideally as separate from the game code as possible, it should still be possible to display/manipulate levels other than the one currently being viewed.

[Red Jackard]

You may not realize it, but most 3D looks like total ass. Even some of the newer stuff. 2D is fine, and once the Presentation Arc rolls around several tilesets will no doubt be released.

I see some nice environment screens in your link, but none that have characters...

[ May 22, 2008: Message edited by: Red Jackard ]

[Ubersoldat]

I want to know why this game engine is called "sauerbraten"? Did the developers just pick german words out of a hat and go with the one that looked best, or is there a connection between marinated beef and 3D graphics?

To contribute: A giant NO to 'real' graphics. Assuming Toady will take several more years to get Version 1 out, I don't even want to think how long it'd take if he had to work with a 3D engine as well.

[Sean Mirrsen]

DF already runs a 3D engine, there's just no way to display it in pure ASCII. If all we do is switch the engine to something that can display a 3D scene in realtime, we can keep the game's style. Look at the pictures on the [URLhttp://www.adom.de/]ADOM[/URL] main page to see what I mean (refresh to see a new random picture). I think there was also a roguelike done in this style, but I forgot what it's named.

[Bricktop]

Toady did try to make a game with full 3D graphics. It was called Armok, and it failed because he got bogged down in stuff and it became completely unworkable.

He has already said numerous times that he won't be doing much work on graphics for DF. What he will be doing, (iirc after the Army arc) is creating better support for tilesets. Then if anybody would rather have graphical tile thingies instead of the ASCII graphics, they can either make some tiles themselves or use the countless sets that will no doubt be supplied by the community.

[Haven]

I don't know what the problem seems to be with more detailed graphics in general. Unless the gameplay code is somehow inextricibly tied into the graphics in arcane and mysterious ways, it shouldn't take a huge amount of time to migrate (Creating models may, though). Movements won't have to be particularly altered, just having an animation play of the person running/walking across the square in question (Diablo did it, for instance). The view would stay the same, viewing one level at a time in a coss-section style, with the added benefits of seeing exactly what was below that indiscriminate polkadot/blue haze, as well as being able to zoom in and out and wander through your own fortress corridors.

I've played in a game using this particular engine's predecessor, and would say that even Cube 1 would be perfectly fine for DF, assuming it were compatible. As for the characters, I imagine they haven't done a lot of modeling for them, as they don't really show off the shiney engine. DF, at the moment, is not in true 3D so much as layered, just as in most games, where you aren't really inside a building so much as in a seperate zone that represents the inside.

People seem to assume that gameplay and graphics are somehow mutualy exclusive. With a one-man building crew, this is pretty much the only situation that'd hold true at all in, which is why I rather wish the dev would outsource the drudge work that doesn't have a shot at making the game any more personal (which would include the labor-intensive part of a graphics upgrade) to other freelance game creating souls, who'd be plenty happy to help. Call me insane, but I think his time would be better spent on the nuances of armies than doing code patching that anyone with a coding guide and some spare time could do.

Last off, for the not-insignificant aspect of imagintion... I really don't see how making the graphics more detailed somehow disables one's imagination. It'd be around the same as insisting that whenever you imagine your fort, it's all inhabited by little smiley faces instead of dwarves, and all the walls are just perfectly smooth funny blocks, and the water is a couple ~ signs stuck together. We already know we don't need to settle for what the game gives us in terms of appearance. While graphics need not be a huge priority, I don't see why people are actively hostile towards them.

Of course, I hope the dev doesn't just drop everything and move to 3D migration (the true representation goes LAST in game creation, if I can gague properly). Then again, I'd also hope he'd outsource the things that can't be used for a creative bent to other people.

[Shadowlord]

quote:Originally posted by Dasleah:
<STRONG>It would be a nightmare. The vast majority of the engine would have to be re-written, and I can speak from experience that coding something for 3D is far more complex and time-consuming than 2D programming.</STRONG>

And I can speak from experience that coding something for 3D with procedurally generated models is still pretty easy. (Hell, I've found it easier to program a game to make models rather than making the models myself) But this is a bit of a tangent, so getting back to the main topic...

quote:Originally posted by Dasleah:
<STRONG>he's not a trained coder, and it takes packs of trained coders years to create a working 3D engine.
</STRONG>

DF doesn't need a "3d engine" to have 3d graphics. It's already using opengl for what it does, so getting it set up to use opengl for 3d would not take very long initially. It could use an orthographic perspective set up to look isometric-ish, and simply render floors, hatches, stockpiles, etc as flat floor panels on a tile, walls as solid blocks in a tile, and other things like barrels and beds could either be flat floor panels initially or billboards (textured panels facing the camera, which are transparent in places). And if the art files allowed for assigning models and textures to items, they could be given models and textures by modders later.

quote:Originally posted by Dasleah:
<STRONG>And then what? Well, there's all the content. Everything has to be modelled in 3D, have their textures drawn, the shader code written. Have a look at the default content that comes with DF.</STRONG>

Toady doesn't have to make any of that. He can simply use the existing images and font character images as textures. He can probably use the fixed-function pipeline instead of shaders, or if he does use shaders, I'm sure someone could write him a simple shader that does what he needs (if he doesn't already know how or want to learn how himself). Just about the only thing he might want to do here is to allow assigning models and textures to particular items in the art mod stuff, just like you can already assign images to dwarves, goblins, etc.

quote:Originally posted by Dasleah:
<STRONG>Now, a decent modeller will take about 2 weeks to model a single character. Animation for the basics (walking, running, idling, attacking) may take another week. Texturing another week on top of that. Multiply that by a few hundred and you've got transferring content alone taking a few years.
</STRONG>

Who says you've got to animate anything? Who says you even need a model for critters? If it's always at the same perspective, you can just use a billboarded image.

[Sean Mirrsen]

Did any of you play Total Annihilation? It was an RTS from 1997. It was the first RTS to feature full-3D models for units. That didn't alter the fact that it was still largely 2D - the models were rendered onto sprites in realtime, the terrain was prerendered, and there was no or very little sense of perspective.

DF now is largely the same, minus the 3D models. It's completely flat despite having all three dimensions at its disposal, and the only thing that makes them invisible is the fact that the game tries to follow roguelike standarts in graphics. It's already taken a step off them in most of the other departments, why remain here? DF can be better without losing its style. No one's ever made an ASCII game in full 3D, why not make one now? If DF is fated to be the greatest game in existence, it can just as well be the most rebellious one. It's already beginning to be, to an extent.
Just to clarify, I say "No" to low-quality 3D graphics and models. There's nothing worse that half-done graphics engines. DF's engine should be unique, featuring full 3D merged with mind-boggling ASCII detail. No need for textures, as there are no models. No need for animations for the same reason. DF will remain completely the same, but will be, visually, that much more appealing to the first-time player.
And it can be the same in a different way. Once most of the game is done, it can feature full graphic set support. ASCII symbols and sprites can be replaced by fan-made models and images. That is MY image of DF's future, if you want.

[Mikademus]

quote:Originally posted by Frobozz:
<STRONG>
keeping the input/output framework separate from the game code is very important. If done properly, it can allow converting a game with 2D graphics to 3D graphics. Note that 3D graphics doesn't necessarily mean 3D gameplay. </STRONG>

I have no idea what Toady will do with the Prez Arc but if he follows good game coding conventions and do keep the view and logic separate, and since the game is already in graphics (a character is a tile) then there's principally nothing stopping the game from having a Diablo-ish look, or even full 3D using models as tiles. The point might bear repeating: DF *isn't* a text-mode game - it is a game in full OpenGL where the graphical tiles are pictures of glyphs.

However, if a 3D presenation mode will be included it might be better to use a more estabished 3D engine -like OGRE or Irrlich- rather than Cube, even if the screens look cool enough.