Age technical requirements?

[DaveRamos]

Just curious: is there a maximum poly count/size of map requirements in making ages? also, what is the blender pluggin i can use to practice/learn creating ages? Will the new H'uru pluggin be based on this?


thanks

DR

[belford]

Same question for texture limits. The Uru Ages are clearly very conservative about textures -- they're repeated, reused, and overlaid wherever possible. Do we know a practical upper limit for texture data in an Age?

[Paradox]

To quote Aloys from the Age Builder forums (because this is a really important point)

Let's do some math 1 pixel = 3 bytes (R+G+B channels encoded on 1 byte each). So one average 512*512 pix texture = 512*512= 262144 pixels * 3 bytes = 786 kilobytes.
Uru asks for a 3d card with 16 meg minimum. 16meg can store roughly 20 512*512 textures. But that is if we don't count avatar textures and GUIs (Ki + menus). When the total size of textures the card has to store goes above its capacity the framerate starts to drop (ie. the game becomes 'choppy') That said, Uru uses Direct X compression for textures (much like JPG) so they take up less space; and that helps a bit. But it's always a good idea to keep in mind the size of textures in an Age. Making and assigning texture is always a delicate balance between performance and visual quality. (much like polygons)
Using a 4096*4096 map brings us near a hundred megs (compression notwithstanding). 'Lower-end' computers will choke on that one.

Now, also keep in mind that Uru supports textures with an Alpha channel, so that would be 4 bytes per pixel.

Ideally, you should never use a texture over 1024 pixels square; and you can usually achieve the same effect using a smaller texture that tiles properly.

As for vertices, the PyPRP plugin current throws an error when it reaches a certain number of vertices on an object. Plasma has an internal limit of 32000 vertices per buffer; but there doesn't appear to be a limit on the number of buffers.

[JulyForToday]

Mm.. I noticed that when the plugin exported that stress test I ran. It had maybe 5 or 6 of those buffers, all near 32000 (a couple dipped down to 28000). But the amount of textures in the age weren't that great (each leaf had a map of 256x128). That may also explain why it didn't have that great a trouble running. Good rule of thumb is that if it won't make things look awful, then reuse what you can, as much as you can.

[Whilyam]

I noticed that Cyan textures are sized based on prominence. For instance in the Cleft, the volcano rim texture is one of the largest along with the desert sand texture and some of the Zandoni textures. Typical sizes are on a standard of 64/128/256/512/1024 (most textures are a combination of those heights and widths).