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Question: which has lowest engine load, DTS or DIF?

by Tim.Holt · in Torque Game Engine · 10/11/2008 (8:57 am) · 6 replies

Here's the scenario: I want to put some buildings around the game play area. Players will never go near them as they are around the edges.

Assuming i modeled the exact same geometry in both, which has less impact on engine performance and frame rate, DTS or DIF? TGE by the way.
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Torque 3D Owner Rubes
#1
10/11/2008 (11:43 am)
I don't have a definitive answer, but I would think using DTS shapes without any collision mesh and good LOD would be the way to go. You can keep the poly count really low if they will remain far away, and you can easily have them not render when they are out of sight.

Torque Owner Tim.Holt
#2
10/11/2008 (1:00 pm)
Given that the buildings don't need collisions, it makes sense about using DTS now that you mention it.

Torque Owner Benjamin L. Grauer
#3
10/12/2008 (4:27 am)
Except if you need lightmaps.

Torque 3D Owner Rubes
#4
10/12/2008 (8:30 am)
Good point...

Associate Steve Acaster
[YorkshireRifles]
#5
10/12/2008 (9:58 am)
You don't necessarily need lightmaps, depending on how far away the player will be. The faces of a DTS will shadow from light sources, they just won't throw shadows onto each other or anything else (like terrain). Fine if the player is viewing it in the far distance, not so hot if it's fairly close by.

Torque Owner Tim.Holt
#6
10/12/2008 (10:06 am)
Actually...

If I could just build a nice environment using DTS, create all the light maps, then capture the whole thing in a nice skybox image and just use it, that would be pretty nice.

I'm guessing it wouldn't be impossible to create a script to generate a set of screenshots that translate into a set of images usable as a screenshot.

What I really wish I had I confess is Valve's Source engine 3d skybox - where you build a little 1/16 scale version of the surrounding environment, place a camera entity in it, and then have the camera capture the skybox image live to use it in the main game area.