Dear returning Carmageddon fans Image

These last years, the CWA Board assimilated what was archived from many old Carmageddon forums, including the whole of the Official Carmageddon.com Forums.
If you wish to merge any previous account you might have had with your new or existing CWA account, don't hesitate to reach out to us !

Recruitment!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The greatest unfinished sequel ever!
Post Reply
User avatar
GIBona
driver
Posts: 97
Joined: Tue May 14, 2002 3:07 am

Recruitment!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Post by GIBona »


CARMA4? ? ?

Would you like to work in a relaxed but slightly insane atmosphere?

Would you like to work for an independent company devoid of bureaucracy?

Would you like to work somewhere without smog but with plenty of sun, sea and sand?



http://www.stainlessgames.com/recruitment/

Image

User avatar
matt
im new, be gentle
Posts: 1228
Joined: Wed Apr 05, 2000 3:16 pm
Contact:

Re: Recruitment!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Post by matt »

Yeah because they can just be a business trying to make games, anything other than carmageddon4. Hell its not like they were working on Arena AD even as stainless soft. was it?!



I still wanna have a play with that actually.
User avatar
C2 Scientist
jaywalker
Posts: 2059
Joined: Tue Mar 26, 2002 5:00 pm
Location: Finland
Contact:

[Sniff]

Post by C2 Scientist »

Sniff...I'd just like to have realistic lighting in Carmageddon...sniff...why can't I have it? :sad:

Anyway, I dug up the old address of Stainless Games Forums: (which doesn't seem to exist anymore)

http://dev.lets-do-it.homepage.net/snit ... FORUM_ID=1.

Now, when you go to http://dev.lets-do-it.homepage.net, the site is about "Cornwall Marine Network".

But, when you continue the address with "/snitz/", Stainless Games' site appear!

??? :confused: ???
User avatar
autopilot
Travelling Scrap Heap
Posts: 2290
Joined: Mon May 20, 2002 4:00 pm

Re: [Sniff]

Post by autopilot »

realistic lighting? mmm yeah! real time lights on cars and street poles, blinkers, all the goodys!
User avatar
Dark Angel
angelus
Posts: 1938
Joined: Sun Nov 12, 2000 5:00 pm
Location: wales, uk

Re: [Sniff]

Post by Dark Angel »

like tdr? :lol:
User avatar
autopilot
Travelling Scrap Heap
Posts: 2290
Joined: Mon May 20, 2002 4:00 pm

Re: [Sniff]

Post by autopilot »

never played tdr, but like driver (:
User avatar
C2 Scientist
jaywalker
Posts: 2059
Joined: Tue Mar 26, 2002 5:00 pm
Location: Finland
Contact:

???

Post by C2 Scientist »


like tdr?
Do you call the light in streetlights realistic lighting? That's just 4-sided cone with transparent texture! I could do that for C2 if wanted. Trafficlights have lens flare? Heh! Double-triangled flat surface which has another transparent texture mapped into it. Look it from the sides and it doesn't turn to "stare" you, like in NFS4. (Don't remember was it traffic lights, but tunnel lights at least) And shadows? The only shadow in the game seems to be the rectangle under the car. Do you see a shadow on walls when you drive near a lamp post? And those neon-light advertisements... just transparent full-lit texture, not very advanced in my opinion, even if C2 doesn't have full-lit option. And do those advertisements make the environment near it look red? (or whatever colour) No! Car's colour may change, but that's all. Sure, it looks cool, but why does the environment look like that red light didn't even exist?

Are there any lens flares? Do the cars' headlights illuminate the environment in front of them? TDR lighting is weird. Some buildings seem to have blue light in them, but I can't see where the light comes from. (Any lamps?) Sometimes the streets seem to have brighter areas than other streets, but what causes that sudden big light? Somehow I don't think TDR has a real raytracing feature, like most of the modern games. Like, is the area around the streetlight bright? No, no bright "circles" The land shadows I can accept, though.

So, I'm talking about realistic lighting that maybe today's games are starting to feature. If not a bit older games, too.
User avatar
CADster
turbo bastard
Posts: 380
Joined: Thu Jun 28, 2001 4:00 pm

Re: ???

Post by CADster »

GIbona - It requires a move to Britain.



you got pretty defensive there C2

uhhh, a lense flare is a camera lense flaw. unless you have two cameras as your eyes, you should never 'see' lense flares.

you have lighting in TDR. You have a global light and additional area lights (be it omni spot or whatever). you do not have real time ray tracing in TDR. TDR uses vert shading to simulate directional lighting (thats more then what c2 can do)

the 'weird' lighting (as you say) in TDR is actually several lights placed around the level, opening the format would fix this problem (its not even a problem, it was artistic preference. it was the look the powers that be wanted). The car is lit in a different file then the track in TSR (B and I messed with this last thanksgiving, if i remember correctly, the global light sets the lighting for the car). along with the 4 sided street light you could add a spot light, and this would light the surrounding areas (something you can not do with c2)... again, only if the format was opened.

TDR has the ability to protray realistic lighting
User avatar
C2 Scientist
jaywalker
Posts: 2059
Joined: Tue Mar 26, 2002 5:00 pm
Location: Finland
Contact:

Re: ???

Post by C2 Scientist »

Well not maybe exactly "lens flares", but at least some surrounding light outside the precise light source. However you say that in English. Anyway, people who have bad vision (= who need to wear glasses, like me), can see such an effect at dark times, if they take their glasses off. That kind of effect.

So, TDR has the ray-tracing ability, which just isn't used, because it makes frame rates worse? But vertex shading isn't as good-looking. (And that's what is in use currently?) Just a quick comparing of those two lighting modes, vertex vs. lightmap, in Q3A, and you know which one is better: Lightmap. If I've understood this correctly, you could show some visual proof, right? Some nice-looking lighting pictures?

However, because of the modern games and new technology, I've become more demanding... and I'd like to have:

- Those real-time shadows

- Very accurate ray-tracing (includes partial light reflecting from bright surfaces)

Advanced stuff, I know, maybe a bit less could be good start. At least something, right, Autopilot?
User avatar
CADster
turbo bastard
Posts: 380
Joined: Thu Jun 28, 2001 4:00 pm

Re: ???

Post by CADster »

the lense flare is a peeve of mine, i really hate when its used strickly for 'eye candy', its an old as hell trick and i want to see something new .

So, TDR has the ray-tracing ability, which just isn't used, because it makes frame rates worse?
uh, i said it does not have ray tracing (see my other post :wink: ). but if you look at the alpha shots of TDR you can see one pic that has the eagle going past a set of lights... these lights ARE reflected in the car body (uh, only the light, not the geometry of the traffic light frame :crazy: ) so at one time it did have real reflection of some kind. You can also see that it was a much brighter world, and it had the midtownmadness enviromenent map look .....

i dont think any game has 'real' ray tracing yet (or i have not seen it) take FAKK2.... Di's shadow is outlined exactly like ray tracing, but its only on the ground plane.... this is not real, but fake (still looks good IMO) one way this can be done is the body mesh is drawn flat on the ground plane and the texture is replaced for a constant color (usally a vert color). you can see it below.

Image Image

this is not real in the sense that it will race up walls and over other players (as you can see in the pics. the dead green thing does not cast its shadow up the walls of the fountain, nor does the priest cast his shadow over the small light housing).

take reflections. a few games can do real reflections (gothen racing comes to mind, but i dont think its real.. very nice fake thow) but i have yet to see an 'open' game use it (plenty of tunnel racers do, but its easy to fake this effect in a tunnel racing game).

Image

its not real in this pic of Re-Volt either, but it still looks cool. this reflection is done by mirroring the geometry of the car (so its two cars, one under the other) under the ground plane. Using 600 poly cars for this is not taxing, but imagine 3 of AdRs cars mirrored in this manner :shock:

vert shading is not as good (as you said) but its better then no shading at all (shading, not shadows). TDR is too dark, the 'light' side is not 100% and the 'dark' side is 0% (or so it seems). if the tracks could be opened this could be changed (IMO the dark side needs to be at least 75%). light maps are neat, but IMO a detail map would be a cooler addition (im thinking crinkle paint on an engine... drooool !! ). you can fake a light map with the orginal texure (drawing the light and dark areas on the texture map) and it will yeld pretty good results.

The object is not to be realistic but only to look realistic. With enough help i believe the TDR engine can be edited and tweaked to yeild a great racing game (both in looks and performance)... we just need the communities help.

up to the challenge ????
User avatar
Hellspawn73
speed freak
Posts: 578
Joined: Thu Aug 24, 2000 4:00 pm

Re: ???

Post by Hellspawn73 »

Sci-guy..this is what SPAZster was talkin about...more pics are listed under my topic TDR blast from past(courtesy of our good pal D.A. {thanks again for these pics}) [img]http://pm.polygonized.com/dark_angel/td ... me%202.JPG"> [img]http://pm.polygonized.com/dark_angel/td ... me%203.JPG"> [img]http://pm.polygonized.com/dark_angel/td ... me%204.JPG">
User avatar
C2 Scientist
jaywalker
Posts: 2059
Joined: Tue Mar 26, 2002 5:00 pm
Location: Finland
Contact:

Light blurb

Post by C2 Scientist »

CADster: yeah, some tracks are quite dark! When I first played the game, and got to the Slums-environment, I couldn't see almost anything at most parts. Later I tweaked my 3D-accelerator settings to brighter in games. I have also tweaked TDR track's textfiles in the ambient light part, 0.29 -> 1.00, which seemed like daytime brightness, except that shady areas still were pretty dark.

I guess it's still not good to demand very realistic ray-tracing, but at least something like in my old Unreal-level: (same picture as in my Track-talk-topic)

Image

As you can see, the light next to the first arc creates a big (too big!) lightspot. But that kind of lightspot anyway. Hmm, that's something weird I've noticed in many games: If you want light that illuminates areas in long distances, the nearby surfaces become over-lit. Back to the picture, the light behind the arcs creates some shadows because of the thin walls between the arcs. But they aren't accurate: instead of thick black lines, the shadows are round. The opposite of this, is what includes to the accurate ray-tracing.

Those pictures which HellSpawn inserted:

1. pic: I guess that reflection thing is better than nothing, even if it looks somehow twisted! But it's good that lights are reflected.

2. pic: The chrome of the drone cars looks good, and the trafficlights even have the corona I talked about. It just shouldn't be viewable from behind! NFS reduces the size of the corona when viewing from sides, at 90º angle it can't be seen anymore.
User avatar
Dark Angel
angelus
Posts: 1938
Joined: Sun Nov 12, 2000 5:00 pm
Location: wales, uk

Re: Light blurb

Post by Dark Angel »

User avatar
Hellspawn73
speed freak
Posts: 578
Joined: Thu Aug 24, 2000 4:00 pm

Re: Light blurb

Post by Hellspawn73 »

i'll have to scope it when i get home since i'm at work....but in the mean time:

Author: Torus Games

Hits: 0

Date: 31/12/69

Section: TDR Files

Size: 24.Mb

Rating: No Votes



.....eeerrr...ya friends with Dr Evil??? :confused:
User avatar
CADster
turbo bastard
Posts: 380
Joined: Thu Jun 28, 2001 4:00 pm

Re: Light blurb

Post by CADster »

damn cool clip !!!!!

midtown madness meets the carmageddon world

the clip shows several of the errors we still have in the game, so ill guess all the cool stuff the clip showed is still in the game. Opening this up would be the bomb !!!!!

C2 Scientist ... you never answered my question
User avatar
C2 Scientist
jaywalker
Posts: 2059
Joined: Tue Mar 26, 2002 5:00 pm
Location: Finland
Contact:

Re: Light blurb

Post by C2 Scientist »

You mean the "up to the challenge"? I've just finished researching loads of stuff (IMO) of C2, so I wouldn't like start it again on TDR... I wanna use my discoveries, not just figure them out for the fun of it. No... now I'll make tracks.

Besides, I don't even know how to make a cube for TDR! (model conversions, 3D formats, etc) Let alone tracks. I can try converting my future tracks for TDR, if someone figures out the details first. But that one probably won't be me, except if I get bored to C2, which isn't easy. I guess C3 will be released before it!

For new researchers, TDR is a nice big new world to work in. :grin:
User avatar
autopilot
Travelling Scrap Heap
Posts: 2290
Joined: Mon May 20, 2002 4:00 pm

Re: Light blurb

Post by autopilot »

lol that midtown madness.. why are the cars so reflective and shiny, that looks so fake and just plain stupid. its like every car in the street just rolled out of the showroom.. and still have the show room lighting on them :lol:

C2 scientist.. that photo looks very cool btw.. excellent
User avatar
Beroc-Lord of Destruction
road raged psycho
Posts: 1470
Joined: Thu Mar 08, 2001 5:00 pm
Location: here
Contact:

Re: Light blurb

Post by Beroc-Lord of Destruction »

OK... since we are on this subject... and it kinda would pretain to c2 and tdr(if we could build tracks for it) and making better maps in general......

Here is an idea that I came accross... and it means alot more work all over the place if people wanna do it... Shadowmapping...

Image

Not exactly a hard concept, but could be a bit difficult, but here is the basic principle....

Say you have a road, which all roads would look alike, kinda nasty, like c2 and tdr are anyways as far as mapping, but how could you make them different.... Shadowmapping...

OK.. take one poly, apply the road.... the second is a shadow made from various light sources around the map.. like a sun, or lamp, or fire someplace.... Theoretically, the shadow map has to be slightly above the other so it knows that it should be there.... Course, these maps could cover larger areas then what the initial maps do, cos you wouldnt want them chopping off like normal maps.

The pic above is from a shadowing in Max, create all the shadows, or hand paint them in PS or PSP, and apply them to the overlays.... basically, it is a black, ambient colored map with a transparency..... Trust you me... it will turn out completely awesome. AND.... it doesnt take a new game to have it....
User avatar
Dark Angel
angelus
Posts: 1938
Joined: Sun Nov 12, 2000 5:00 pm
Location: wales, uk

Re: Light blurb

Post by Dark Angel »

[font color="purple">yes spawny :lol:</font color>
Post Reply

Check who’s online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 228 guests