peter_spy

Btw. IMO it would be useful to use .dds images in regular myFM/textures folder structure, so you don't have to replicate that in dedicated dds folder. TDM doesn't use texture quality settings anyway, it's a deprecated Doom3 thing.

If OBJ works correctly in TDM, it should be a recommended format, at least over ASE. Even though both are text-based, OBJ is much more lean, and it compresses faster and better. This is a high-poly cube (24k polygons) saved and compressed in both formats: I haven't tested OBJ with 2.11 yet, but ASE has other downsides, like it has to be exported from a clean scene, and the scene material library can only have materials that are used for a particular model. OBJ should just use what's been assigned to it, and it should use model pivot point instead of world/scene origin point (0,0,0). If that's true, then exporting single models should be much easier now. You won't need a separate clean scene do do your exports.

Ah, it's the Aniso x16 issue. I forgot to turn it down to x8. That's an issue going way back, by the way: sometimes when you look at a surface at acute angles, you get GPU load spikes, without any visible reason. I never had problems with other games going all the way to AF x16. Wonder what's with that in TDM. Anyway, I tested it with uncap FPS and VSync off too. I've never heard my GPU fans being this loud Default material: Geometry: POM:

It's the GPU load percentage. The quality and resolution settings are the same for all setups, I also use the same player start, just press crouch before taking screenshots. The heightmap size is the same size as base textures, which is 2k, but it's a 1-channel greyscale image. When I started walking around, I got to a point where I got spikes with GPU load, like this: I can't figure out why yet.

Default material: With POM: With some elements on geo: These have no LOD, so that 23% GPU load looks a bit sus, maybe there was a hiccup there. All in all, performance stats do look similar. As for POM, it does look pretty cool, 20 steps look good, even without much texture authoring on my end. I sure wouldn't want to model these pebbles by hand

Ah, you meant in the context of making assets for this game (or for any game, really). No argument there.

Yup, AFAIK, automatic hardware tessellation isn't great either. Typically, it creates way too many polygons for the difference it makes, which is again, already controllable via standard modelling workflow & LOD. Did you do any experiments with existing LOD system? I didn't have anything that would be game-ready, but my initial experiments show that this engine could potentially handle massive polycount nicely, if other factors are kept at bay. Would have to get to semi-finished state with that, with some mission scripts, objective and other data set up to see how feasible it is.

Is it with modern RTX cards or with older hardware? I have no idea whether my RTX 3060 is a good candidate, but I assume these RT cores don't work automatically with POM. But yeah, I have a game-ready example with these cobblestones: Normalmaps only: Full geometry: I also have more optimised variants of these. Is parallax shader in the latest dev version, or can I download it separately?

Probably not. In case you didn't notice, game industry played with POM for a short while, and then mostly ditched it, because it's too performance-heavy. POM uses either path or raytracing, and it needs quite a few steps to make the shapes look good and not like a jelly or something. It requires quite a bit of optimisation to reduce tracing steps to be mostly nearby the player and nowhere else. Besides, as GPUs went more and more powerful, and hi-poly to low-poly model workflows were already in use, it was much much cheaper to just add more geo to existing models and use LOD.

All very good points^ AFAIR, when it comes to copyright restrictions for mission content, FM authors can do all rights reserved to anything but new code? This would require an explicit notice in a mission txt file, I guess. Also, this would might need additional point in TOS, like: TDM Team, at their sole discretion, may host such mission on a server, but TDM Team cannot be held responsible for copyright infringement by other users.

Hmmm, to me it sounds like improper use of assets, or not thinking about playable space with assets in mind, modular or otherwise. Never had these problems because I was always able to make assets with proper origin point placement, and with certain grid in mind. Thanks for the explanation though.

That actually makes me wonder. Since TDM installer gives you access to previous versions, why ensure backwards compatibility of every FM in existence, when people can copy their latest TDM pk4s, and perform a downgrade to e.g. a version required upon release? Sure, that requires some hassle, user-side, but keeping track of every FM a big strain on developers. Maybe that would take some of that pressure off.

Shouldn't mappers be able to solve 99% of such problems with either LOD (hide_distance) or func_portals (either with triggers, or portal_dist + func_statics, if they want to cover a closed portal with something)?

IMO it's more like a last resort kind of thing. Like with using LODs for lights – if you have your models and LODs set up well, you'll never really need it.

Yup, this looks consistent with my findings from several years ago.

1st version looks wet, but 3rd one is promising

Hmm, that is a sound explanation to me But yeah, as you pointed out, we are so used to aesthetic conventions from other dark fantasy games, Souls and souls-likes included, that when something looks brand-new, we immediately get sceptical about it. Another thing might be conventions and tricks used when making materials. Quite long ago, I've heard an advice regarding diffuse and specular texture relationship: first off, to take care about all kinds of damage and imperfections that can be seen from any angle, and these typically will be included on both textures: rust, heavy dirt, dry/wet parts, etc. When you're done with that, think about imperfections that could go to specular texture only, things that are visible typically from acute/obtuse angles, with specular highlight doing its work most: dust, micro-scratches, fingerprints, minor water smudges, etc. That really makes a material look interesting So I'm probably biased because of that, and, since artists in other games use these tricks really well too, when I see a material without a specular, or reflection without any mask, my first reaction is like ewww... But that's just me, I guess

For the record, that concept art is awesome!

There you go (and anyone interested, ofc ) https://we.tl/t-nv3TKEQLk8

It looks like super polished metal armor, taken out of the closet once a year to use in a tournament or battle reconstruction event. Very sterile look. I imagine that something a guard wears to work everyday would look much more dull and dirty. Dark Souls & Elden Ring armors are an awesome reference, the material work in particular.

"Have you ever had and experience that disproves it?" Yes. Prey: Mooncrash. I hated it in the beginning, but it grew on me and I ended up loving it. It was basically developers saying: "We get it, but trust us, we want you to be able to experience the simulation in its whole glory. Just give it a go." And they were right, that Prey DLC is superb. I learned that stepping out of my bubble to experience something slightly different can be very rewarding and made me appreciate developer's efforts even more. I'd probably savescum my way through it, but in Mooncrash, dealing with consequences of your failures is more fun / challenge, and without quick reloads you get to see how simulation can respond to it, often with unpredictable and hilarious ways. It's sometimes unfair because of that randomness, but oh boy, it's also super interesting and rewarding, when you actually finish your run by the skin of your teeth. Also, I like checkpoint saves in games, it's an art of its own in game design. When I don't have to think about saving at all, because automatic checkpoints handle it for me in seamless and unobtrusive manner, so I can focus on playing – that's the best scenario for me Btw. there's a whole separate topic in psychology of games related to saving systems. LGS / Ion Storm's Randy Smith made a presentation on compulsive saving / loading, "How to help players stop saving all the time" – something like that I can share it with anyone interested.

There are OG Thief missions where you have a blackjack and you get KO restrictions on higher difficulty levels. This was mostly context-based, i.e. if you sneak into a police station and knock out everyone, someone will notice and ring the alarm, something along these lines. So it's not like having a blackjack in your inventory and having KO restrictions is mutually exclusive.

Why? When I make assets I always use default values, and I think it's pretty much the only way to ensure everything looks the same on all players' computers. Obviously they can set it up as they like, but they have an easy reference point, in case they want to return to intended look. Besides, in order to get consistent results, you have to at least try to assume a model, something that will return somewhat logical results. Since this is non-PBR, it's hard to do; you don't even have any consistency in how models, materials or other declarations were made, nor how mappers use lights in maps.

Try deleting darkmod.cfg and restarting the game. In both TDM versions I currently use, 2.10 & 2.12, the defaults are as above, and the bloom slider is always in this position:

Are you using default bloom settings? I don't remember Gemcutter being that overblown in highlights. These are the defaults: seta r_bloom_blursteps "2" seta r_bloom_downsample_limit "128" seta r_bloom_weight "0.3" seta r_bloom_detailblend "0.5" seta r_bloom_threshold_falloff "8" seta r_bloom_threshold "0.7"