Vega Strike Forums

spiritplumber wrote:I'd generally like the asteroids to be WC3 style (big, sparse, not moving) and possibly blowuppable.... and hardware fog sounds like a great idea ^_^; also for nebulas...

want something to do?

Try this.

First compile all the Asteroids in
http://cvs.sourceforge.net/viewcvs.py/w ... Asteroids/
in single files with all the LOD’s

Second write a script to generate multiple sizes for the asteroids (scale the model) and apply simple physics to each asteroid created, a few will be big and lumbering, and require massive damage to destroy, and then there are more smaller asteroids, that can be destroyed.

Good suggestion.
And I'd also suggest, rather than mixing them, to use spheroid asteroid for the big mf ones, ellipsoid for medium size, and oblates and complex for smallish ones.
The big, spheroid ones need a texture showing a lot of detail, many craters.
The medium and small can have textures that look like granite rock.
Also, that floating crap in space I otherwise hate so much, would be quite fitting to multiply in numbers within an asteroid field, to represent little pebbles to football size rocks your ship doesn't even feel. But the velocity of them has to be right, that is, it should help you judge the size and distance of the real asteroids, not conflict with the perception...
And hardware fog...
How do we access hardware fog, anyone?

In the engine, I'm not sure.
In OGL, it's a stupidishly thing like glEnable(GL_FOG) (more or less).
But it gets complex since fog isn't present throughout the entire system, so when you get out of the fogish zone... what? in-between? that's tricky.

But you can vary the fog in real time, so no sweat.
So, we gl_enable(GL_FOG) when we enter systems in which there's either nebulas or asteroids, but initially we max out visibility.
As you look at the asteroid field from the distance, we can put an alpha billboard through it so it looks foggy, and as you get closer we increase the amount of hardware fog dynamically.

You just gave me a neat idea.
If I had the time to play with it...
Perhaps I'll just write the basics, and let someone else implement a proof of concept. But I'll do so when the concept has fully developed in my mind - it just popped when I read your post, so I can't really explain now.