Gabester has dropped a few hints about vehicle customization on the forums recently, so here's a place to discuss that... Here are some of my pie-in-the-sky ideas which don't all have to be implemented, but they're there to look at. What should be easy to implement: -Coloring vehicles. This is already pretty easily accomplished in CryEngine. One simply makes the default texture a flat grey, and then use diffuse tinting to color the vehicle. (from CryEngine manual) All these vehicles use the exact same diffuse texture, just tinted differently. So I think it should be somewhat standard that all vehicles should be textured so that diffuse tinting is a possibility. -Decals Again, shouldn't be that hard to implement, I think. It's already quite doable in the sandbox on static objects, one would just have to figure out how to project it on body panels and keep them consistent while deformed. Actually, that may be really difficult, but I digress. What might be more difficult to implement: -Universal, generic compatible parts So, in Kerbal Space Program, for instance, you can attach any part to any other part, regardless of compatibility or usefulness. If you did something stupid, well, the rocket just blows up. I think an essential goal of a vehicle customization feature would be similar compatibility, and similar horrific consequences when they go wrong. Like, I should be able to put a pickup bed on a sedan and get a terrible-looking bastard El Camino. I should be able to put a Beetle engine in a semi and get a crapbox that can't even hit 20 with a 28' dry van trailer. I should be able to add a roof scoop and a spoiler and NOS to a city bus and be able to complete the route in ten seconds flat. But, failing ridiculous modifications, it should be quite possible to do sane, reasonable things as well. Like adding a flatbed to a pickup, or engine swapping, or changing tires for better grip, or suspension raises, or things of that sort. I think this would be possible if every vehicle had some kind of "attachment points" (again, looking at Kerbal Space Program for inspiration here) at which generic parts could be attached.
Maybe not doable this way, since there are parts of the texture that shouldn't be colored (like frame, running gear, interior carpeting, etc.). The way I'd like to do it (if it's possible) would be to have a "color" map (where white = recolored and black = unchanged). Then the game would somehow colorize the texture based on that map, using whatever color you set the vehicle to. As for being able to stick any part on any other part, the really hard part is figuring out how to make the attachments modular and how to work out the positioning. It'd be really easy to set up a billion different parts to work on the same vehicle, but making them all modular and universal might be more trouble than it's worth.
compatibility of parts is great idea, hard but very very good to give realism and hours and hours of testing to do with different combinations of engines, wheels, auto body parts etc ...
I'm looking foward to this ... I think this system can be equivalent to the one in GTA IV , random parts on vehicles etc...
I apologize for the upcoming wall of text here The only way I can imagine being able to just "add" any part onto a vehicle and not just have it as a goofy mesh with no N/B's would be to practically make a new file type. Now in RoR we used .truck files for defining all the parameters of the truck. Well, what if it could be simplified and instead of making the entire truck in just one file, one would simply build the frame in the file (just as you would with any N/B construction) and then just define what nodes would be connected to what part and then have a positioning parameter just like you were positioning a prop in a .truck file. The N/B construction of the part would be defined in the .part file (or whatever it would be) and would just be that one part, like a bumper for instance. Once the positioning was correct in the file, the computer would just automatically add in Beams to connect the piece to the chassis correctly to certain defined nodes in the .truck file. This means that most of the grunt work would be done by the computer, but once it is built it would emulate just like any other vehicle. Now lets say that the vehicle is much wider or longer then the part you wanted to fit to the vehicle. Well, may be in the postilion section there is also a scale section so that it would be correctly stretched and scaled to the vehicle. The world may never know. Now that I read this it sounds rather ridiculously difficult to code. Not only in the game, but it would also be needed in the vehicle editor/builder program as well to be able to define different parts if one was creating from scratch. Just an idea I guess
Yes even I think compatibility is a very good option, we will get some thing new from it, but don't you think it is little bit difficult?
Yeah, i agree with everyone else, customizable vehicle parts would bring a new level of fun and creation to the game
In games where you can do this, I'm pretty sure the vinyl is projected right on to the texture that's UV-mapped to the car. That could work with the recolour-map that Gabe described, or maybe have its own kind of map (because otherwise things that shouldn't be vinyl'd over would get vinyl'd over, like details).
If this is included in the game, I'm going to make a compact tuner truck (most likely with the Ibishu). I hope it looks something like this: (imported from here) On that note, doesn't the Ibishu look like a late 80's Civic?
vehicle customization... actually... (imported from here) in this game you could paint your car, it was basically Microsoft paint on your car. you drove it around. That would be a cool thing to have.
Dayme, memories son! I used to play that game for many hours at a time, back in the past PS2 days. Makes me wanna go trailer racing again. The customisation was pretty cool back then, the freedom was like no other game of its time. Makes me laugh now hehe.
That game was my childhood in a PS2 disk. For some reason, I remember it being called "Test Drive: Eve of Destruction." It maybe a different game, but the cover art looks the exact same. Anyway, for the age of the game, it had some of the best damage and reminds me a lot of what BeamNG looks like so far. All of the cars looked...uh..."imperfectly perfected" with rust and faded paint, as well as cheap wheels and parts. It was remarkably fun and detailed. (imported from here) (imported from here)
The custom paint I agree with, of course. I think they're working on a similar Part system, but I don't think it's as diverse as you said (i.e., I think it's like something you just make for one specific vehicle, currently). I would love to see it broadened, so that we can put any part anywhere. Would help add many more hours of play-time for everyone
While I understand why you'd like to have this universal parts compatibility, I agree with Gabester, its more pain to implement than it's worth. For the parts to be interchangeable every car would have to have attachment points at the same position, where the nodes of the base car's and the upgrade's (ex flatbed) nodes would interconnect. While it could be done for similarly sized cars different size cars couldn't have the same attachment points. I only thought about it for a few moments and I already have a dozen of possible hickups floating around in my head, all suggesting that there would be hell to pay to have this. Of course if they have nothing better to implement I'd welcome it too.
I agree, although it would be very cool to have random parts/good parts on a car, It would unfortunately push back the release date! D:
The Dev's don't HAVE to do this before release, it can easily be done after release as an Update or an Add-on. & while time passes, computers will get faster & faster (hopefully) & the game can Devs can then implement more & more stuff. But this is too much in the future, who knows what the future holds??
Engine swaps sound awesome! I mean, who wouldn't want to drop a turbocharged Cummins into an Ibishu Pigeon!?!
