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PresidentMarcos
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Hmm. Problematic, then. Well then how about an irregularly shaped map? Not just a square or a recctangle, but a disc, ellipse, or in the case of my proposal, even a star shape...(four pointed)
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PresidentMarcos
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Like that, but with the upper parts fused toghether. Above the equator, that is. The lower parts stick out like points on a star. Hmm...
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rickontherun_21
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wheres empire earth SSs?
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Leland
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Am I the only one getting deja vu with this discussion? Every two months or so someone suggests "hey, wouldn't it be cool to have a 3d/spherical map" and then we go through the same soccer balls, hexes, triangles, geodesic spheres, distortions and why 2d bitmap squares are the best. It's like an episode of twilight zone where the same things are repeated over, and over, and over again...
quote:
Originally posted by Fosse
A spherical map is just the way to go. Continuous zoom is nice, but doesn't justify 3D all by itself. They could just add more zoom levels if that's all the more that they wanted to add. |
It's impractical to have a huge level of zooms in 2d, because every level has to have its own tile set and unit graphics. And if there aren't enough levels, the effect is jarring and disorienting. Nay, I think that continuous zoom is the reason for going 3d. Spherical or tileless maps and other oddities are good concepts and eventually there will be games that will attempt them in civ-like games, but in the mean time there's absolutely no reason to stick with prehistoric technology just for the sake of nostalgy.
How much justification does 3d need anyway? SMAC was semi-3d, and that was 6 years ago. My opinion is that 3d is the default these days, and 2d is the choice that has to be justified...
quote:
The days of the tiny cylindrical map should be over with. The cylinder is a hanger-on from low power PC days... please Firaxis, let it die. |
Well, from gameplay point of view, cylindrical map (if you have square tiles) is easy and intuitive to use, and civs are traditionally rather abstract games to begin so the unrealism doesn't really matter.
quote:
Originally posted by Trip
I think everyone should be considering how a map of diamonds could be implimented into a spherical map (if at all), because I really see there being no way that Civ 4 will change from diamonds to hexes or anything else. |
Eh? Diamonds are just squares tilted 45 degrees. One other alternative might be to take your average "hex sphere" (like the one vulture showed) and split the hexes into 3 diamonds (you still have those 12 pentagons though).
quote:
Originally posted by Drachasor
Well, one way to deal with distortion is to hide it. You keepthe distortion at the edges or opposite side of the sphere as much as possible, and whenever you move your perspective, it doesn't rotate the sphere as much as it overlays the area you move to on the good part. |
Doesn't work. The distortion is not just in the way you display the map, it's in the fundamental map geometry. What you are suggesting above would require that the map is fundamentally tileless, and the tiles are just an overlay on the real map.
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Fosse
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U.S.A.
Mar 2002
time: 23:37
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quote:
Originally posted by Trip
Doing the map in 3D allows many more zoom levels to be implimented rather easily, and they'll all look just as good as any other, just bigger or smaller. |
I'm not saying that continuous zoom wouldn't be nice, just that it doesn't justify 3d all by itself. A little work on 2d zoom levels (which would be a lot less than a 3d engine) to correct scroll speeds and using graphics that are designed to look better up close would solve those minor problems.
quote:
And that's not all 3D does - it makes it easier on the developers, because instead of creating objects in 3D and rendering them back to 2D (like they did for Civ 3), they can keep them in their native format, which look better and are also more flexible to use in game (rotating, zooming again, etc.). |
Wouldn't that in turn make things harder on most modders? I know that the more advanced the graphics get, the fewer consumers are equiped or skilled enough to make their own... it's a trade off that we'll all think differently about. In my opinion having units that rotate nicely isn't worth not being able to easily create my own.
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Enigma_Nova
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Then get a unit modelling program.
...
Seriously, 3D is mainstream. Is there any financial reason for sticking with 2D?
Why do you even need a Grid, anyway? Give stuff a movement radius and run it as vectors.
I think 3D would be a leap ahead of that old Civ garbage.
Adjust the game to fit the tech, not the other way around.
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Drachasor
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quote:
Originally posted by Leland
[In respone to my comment on hiding the distortion from view]
Doesn't work. The distortion is not just in the way you display the map, it's in the fundamental map geometry. What you are suggesting above would require that the map is fundamentally tileless, and the tiles are just an overlay on the real map. |
Yeah, that's the idea. You keep the distorted geometry as far away from the viewing area as you can, and undistort it when some is looking at it. A sphere is of course fundamentally tileless, and that's why you'd have to handle it in this manner to get a decent sphere.
It's just a little wizardry behind the scenes, basically. It's the only decent way to have a spherical map.
Though, as others have said, there still need to be other types of maps. Flat maps, cylindrical maps (with less restrictions on the X/Y...some sort of Ringworld might be nice to mess with), and donut maps. However, there is room for a spherical map, it is just the implementation would need more work.
-Drachasor
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Enigma_Nova
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Well, Populous managed to do it,
and if a game THAT old can do it then surely Civ IV can manage.
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Leland
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quote:
Originally posted by Drachasor
Yeah, that's the idea. You keep the distorted geometry as far away from the viewing area as you can, and undistort it when some is looking at it. A sphere is of course fundamentally tileless, and that's why you'd have to handle it in this manner to get a decent sphere. |
Right, so why would you want to have that partially distorted tile overlay at all? One might as well render the globe (or the currently visible area) with as much detail as the graphics engine allows and forget about tiles.
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Trip
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Hunt Valley
Apr 2002
time: 00:37
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quote:
Originally posted by Fosse
I'm not saying that continuous zoom wouldn't be nice, just that it doesn't justify 3d all by itself. A little work on 2d zoom levels (which would be a lot less than a 3d engine) to correct scroll speeds and using graphics that are designed to look better up close would solve those minor problems. |
I was just citing the zoom as one of the features of going to 3D. Other types of manipulation, rotation, etc. are possible as well, and all quite easy to access once the 3D engine (which Firaxis has already licensed, so they won't be spending time programming that) is in place.
quote:
Wouldn't that in turn make things harder on most modders? I know that the more advanced the graphics get, the fewer consumers are equiped or skilled enough to make their own... it's a trade off that we'll all think differently about. In my opinion having units that rotate nicely isn't worth not being able to easily create my own. |
All the mod graphics used in Civ 3 are 3D anyways, except for terrain graphics. That would basically be the only difference in the way of doing things, excluding things made easier for modders.
Are you familiar with FLICster?
It's a program necessary to convert 3D models (which are already made by modders and could be easily implimented into Civ 4 if it was 3D) into 2D graphics for Civ 3. It's pretty complicated, and IMO, hard to use (though it's a nice tool to have since nothing else does the job right). With the conversion to 3D, this entire step is taken out of the process.
These days only people really good with graphics can do good mods any more anyways. It's not the days of Civ 2 any more. The days of freelance graphic switching and implimentation by anyone with Paint ended 6 years ago. 
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Enigma_Nova
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To solve the mod problems, Firaxis could simply add a 'mod workshop' akin to their own artists' design interface.
Then the point of easy modding becomes quite moot.
Wouldn't it be better for modders to make just one 3D model than to make a crapload of 2D models?
It gets annoying after a while. :/
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Drachasor
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quote:
Originally posted by Leland
Right, so why would you want to have that partially distorted tile overlay at all? One might as well render the globe (or the currently visible area) with as much detail as the graphics engine allows and forget about tiles. |
My understanding is that there will be a tile system, so it will have to be worked in somehow.
Getting rid of the tile system is a massive change, and would require a lot of diverences to the game, I think. Maybe in ciV or ciVI, but it is too much for cIV....at least considering the other changes I'd like to see.
-Drachasor
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Enigma_Nova
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So we're sticking with the Cylinder?
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Drachasor
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Well, you'd have to deal with distortion on a sphere, but that is manageable, and you can make it so that the player sees very little distortion by moving said distortion around. Difficult, but manageable.
I assume there will be cylinder and donut options though.
-Drachasor
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Enigma_Nova
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I'm sorry, but I don't see how to get a sphere without lots of distortion.
Can someone make something like that in a 3D modelling program and send it to me?
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Enigma_Nova
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I was thinking of that, but do all the squares meet up correctly on the other side?
Or does it end up being a distorted mess?
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Enigma_Nova
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Putting it bluntly,
If you take that hemisphere and glue it onto its own back, you join some squares... and end up with things that aren't squares.
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Drachasor
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Everything is a square there. The thing is that not all the 'squares' look as square-like. All the horizontal circles never cross each other, and all of the vertical circles never cross each other. On the map you see, that means that at the east and west poles, and the north and south, the squares are fairly distorted (the concentric circles from the either the vertical or horizontal poles are much smaller, so the circle effect is stronger).
The other effect is that you won't go around a great circle by always going in a direction normal to one of the sides of the square (east, west, north south) most of the time.
Another way to handle the problem is to have the actual map be a cube, and then distort the image of the cube in the window so it looks spherical. You do keep great "circles" then, and you wouldn't notice the cubical nature really.
Similar things can be done with hexagons (though even the hexagon "square" would be distorted).
Anyhow, the basic idea is to hide the distortion so it feels like a sphere.
Naturally the best way to do a sphere is to get rid of the tile system or dramtically change it (don't have all tiles the same size/shape, and/or same area). I think this is too big a step for cIV though.
-Drachasor
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Enigma_Nova
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quote:
Originally posted by Drachasor
You do keep great "circles" then, and you wouldn't notice the cubical nature really. |
Save for the 8 corners where you can go north, east and south and end up at your starting location. :/
Drachsor: It may look like a sphere, but try combining the hemisphere in your link with itself to produce a sphere.
You'll notice that it doesn't quite fit.
That sphere has a line of squares going around the equator.
Each square has a neighbour on both the north and south.
That in effect creates a series of bands, which can only end up as having the same # of squares around the equator in a small circle around the pole.
It is, in effect, a distorted cylinder.
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Enigma_Nova
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I do what you just did 71 times.
Actually, I take 2-hour naps in between forum browsings, and I always write what's on my mind.
That's the way I become the most prolific.
---
What if, instead of a Cube, they had a more complex-looking thing, sort of like a sphere made from LEGO.
That could work. It would make some pretty @_@ pathfinding, but it could work.
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Enigma_Nova
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I do what you just did 71 times.
Actually, I take 2-hour naps in between forum browsings, and I always write what's on my mind.
That's the way I become the most prolific.
---
What if, instead of a Cube, they had a more complex-looking thing, sort of like a sphere made from LEGO.
That could work. It would make some pretty @_@ pathfinding, but it could work.
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03-07-2004 07:51
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