Now I'm really just showing off.

[bigbadbogie]

Does original BZ2 fit your definition of 'uncanny valley'?

[Nielk1]

Does original BZ2 fit your definition of 'uncanny valley'?

Clearly you don't even know what it means...
No...
It's on the left side of the still ascending slope, clearly.

[bigbadbogie]

It means 'realistic', but not quite 100% realistic.

Well Duh! As if I could reproduce total realism in a 1999 game engine.

Uncanny valley is as good as it's gonna get.

[MrTwosheds]

I think it looks good BBB. Its really hard to get anywhere near realistic looking with bz2 maps, and the chances are if you do the map performance will suck so much nobody will want to play it. Everything is a compromise and the art of it is in putting just enough in there to create an impression of a world that isn't just a lumpy 2d surface with some pools.

[AI_Unit]

It would be nice to see some new features in MP.

[Red Devil]

have you tried the new fog settings yet, b3?

[bigbadbogie]

have you tried the new fog settings yet, b3?

Tried them, yeah. They are unfortunately completely useless because they ignore fogRange settings. Almost all fog in QF2 begins fairly distant from the player.

The most obvious graphical anomaly in QF2, and BZ2 for that matter, is the inability for objects and terrain to 'fade in' as they enter visibilityRange. This was working properly between 1.0 and the early 1.3s and ruined when the DX9 upgrade occurred (around PB4-TA5?). It's been extremely irritating ever since, and the glitch seems to be a very low priority for GSH to fix despite its ubiquitous presence in the game (aside from maps without a skydome at all - which look like total crap).

I'm not sure if the new fog settings would make any difference even if they respected fogRange settings. It's more about how objects fade through it.

Maybe it could be fixed by changing the render-order to put objects and terrain behind opaque fog and in front of transparent fog? (A total guess)

[bigbadbogie]

Perhaps another way could be to always render terrain and objects before the skydome?

[GSH]

BBB- changing fog to be like 1.0 is really hard and would involve putting all the fog calculations back on the CPU (slooooow) or require shaders for everything (giant rewrite). I've got other things to do, and your demands just don't make me want to drop everything to spend months of work to make you (and just about nobody else) happy. Once again, you completely misunderstand what engineering is involved in making things work.

If you want things to fade in, try set fogEnd to visibility range or thereabouts. And make sure your skydome fits within [fogStart..fogEnd].

Otherwise, your "bug reports" are useless handwaving, as you utterly refuse to provide hard data and repro cases - on this and pretty much anything else you complain about. Yapping your mouth on forums about things contributes nothing. Really. Go re-read how I want bug reports.

-- GSH

[bigbadbogie]

No matter what I do, the skydome always cuts through the terrain and objects at the edge of visibilityRange. It's very obvious and there is no workaround at all.

Would rendering terrain and objects before the skydome be possible? Would that be easier than spending months on a hard re-write?

It might not be a perfect solution, but it might help a bit.

[bigbadbogie]

How about instead of recreating the original fog fade-effect, could it be faked by forcing the objects and terrain at the edge of the map to texturally fade out instead?

[General BlackDragon]

Make a test map that demonstrates the issue, and put it on Bugzilla

[bigbadbogie]

Otherwise, your "bug reports" are useless handwaving, as you utterly refuse to provide hard data and repro cases - on this and pretty much anything else you complain about. Yapping your mouth on forums about things contributes nothing. Really. Go re-read how I want bug reports.

-- GSH

I have reported this bug multiple times across multiple bug-reporting platforms over multiple years. I even remember providing a video in about 2008-09 showing you exactly what was happening.

You added the renderSkyBeforeTerrain flag, which helps a little bit except that it causes the sky-dome to cut off more of the terrain (when set to false).

The reason I 'refuse' to offer repro-cases is that I'd need to have released my mod in order to do so.

There are very few things that I ever request for 1.3 patches, considering the insane amount of work that I have put into this game. BZC was given practically everything it needed, and I was thrown the odd bone.

The only reason I'm bringing the skydome issue is because there is no workaround.

I've tried every flag, every adaptation to the skydome, I've even tried creating a fake skydome with the DLL which totally failed (only because it ruined the rendering of every other transparent object on the map). This is pretty much the only problem that I have with BZ2, and I've had it for 4 years.

That's why I complain about it. If I don't complain about it, I'll just keep being ignored. I'm not particularly hopeful that complaining will help, but not complaining is guaranteed not to help.

If I complain, I look whiny. If I don't complain, nothing will ever happen. If I'm going to lose, I'd rather have at least tried.

Make a test map that demonstrates the issue, and put it on Bugzilla

If I thought it would be looked at, maybe.

[GSH]

Videos are only about a half step up from forum yapping in terms of being a useful bug report. As in: almost completely useless.

Lesson to you (and the strat-jerks, as I've said many times over the years): learn to work with programmers, and you get stuff. Especially if it takes 5 minutes to implement, rather than 5 months. Piss them off by providing a useless bug report, and your reports will sit near the bottom of the pile. Your choice.

Anything (like a graphics system rewrite as feared, but, hey, you won't provide any useful test cases to prove that wrong) that's going to be 6+ months of my free time better be damn useful to anyone and everyone playing BZ2. Your mod doesn't rate that kind of importance. Sorry.

-- GSH

[Red Devil]

been a couple weeks since i was messing with the fog setting, but having a high vis range also affects how far away units are to trigger the attack/follow/defend/goto selection cursor; having that triggered by fog range might be better.

...and don't call me 'yeah' - that's someone else.