I saw in another thread that t3d does not support a large map. Why would that be? How big will it support? If its a resource issue, why cant you just load more of the map when needed? I was just curious to what the issues are. Thanks in advance.
Its because Torque 3d only supports a certain resolution for the height maps. I think the max is either 2048 or 4096 i cant remember. A made up example: On a normal map these grid squares may be 1x1 meters (or 3x3 feet, you decide). But if you wanted to make a map 4 times bigger these would become 2x2 meters (or 6x6 feet) and so on. So you need to get the balance correct between scale and detail. Visual example: If the max resolution was 10x10 and i wanted to make a mountain map then i could either have a small detailed mountain (more like a mound) or a huge Everest sized mountain. This is from a top down view with lighter colours showing higher altitudes. Small mountain Big mountain: The big mountain looks a lot more pixilated at this scale, so you would say it is less detailed. So why dont we just use multiple height maps on each terrain? Simple answer, they are not supported. Why not use bigger heightmap textures? Not entirely sure to be honest but it is probably performance related. It may be possible to make a huge flat heightmap and then create the actual map by using meshes above that. The heightmap is still needed since collisions dont work when you drive off the edge of the world until you reach the large indestructible plane under ground.
Thanks for the info, I am still new to all this type of knowledge, I even wiki-ed Heightmap and still not completely clear. I know other engines have huge maps like bethesda, and the one the game Fuel has 5000 sq. miles with no loading screens. One guy on one of the tourgue forums were talking about creating page files for the maps. I need to do some more research as I dont fully understand how torque 3d works with heightmaps.
if by bethesda you are referring to skyrim. It splits the map into multiple segments and only loads the ones around you. As you leave one segment it loads another and unloads the one you've left (or in reality, it tends to load like a 5 segment radius around you so its loading 5 segments away from you at any one time, its actually a parameter exposed in the skyrim.ini file). Fuel likely does the same, although the 5000 sq mile claim has actually been disputed a few times since launch. Torque3d itself I think supports it or can be forced to do it, but BeamNG doesnt yet.
Probably worth adding that many games will also have larger low detail tiles as well. This is so that the mountains in the distance don't go missing once you get out of the normal tile range. They may also use a very similar low res version for the map, a good example would be the test drive series. Torque3D does support multiple heightmaps but BeamNG does not support multiple heightmaps (it actually does but only the original will have collisions enabled, the rest are just for pretties).
