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[Marching Cubes] Infinite Terrain, Infinite Object, Fast and Optimized

Discussion in 'Assets and Asset Store' started by dyox, Aug 22, 2012.

  1. dyox

    dyox

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  2. holyjewsus

    holyjewsus

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    Hey Dyox, great work!

    is the source included with your package?
     
  3. tzvier

    tzvier

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    Is it possible to increase the resolution of the cubes so the terrain is less blocky?
     
  4. dyox

    dyox

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    @holjewsus : Yes , it's the src inclued.In SimplexFractal Terrain Scene , change the value of generators :) and that will make mountains etc...

    @tzvier : Yes it's possible. You can change scale factor of marching cubes.
     
  5. dyox

    dyox

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    New video with multimaterials :

    Marching Cubes : Creative V2 :
     
  6. dyox

    dyox

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    New video with infinite Terrain :

    Infinite Terrain V2 :
     
  7. tzvier

    tzvier

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    Very cool, when will this be available?
     
  8. dyox

    dyox

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    @tzvier : this pack will never be available on the asset store. But you can contact me on skype if you are interested in its operation or otherwise. (Hotboss13)
     
  9. tzvier

    tzvier

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    I will keep that in mind
     
  10. pvloon

    pvloon

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    It looks really good, but at the same time it just screams for normal smoothing!
     
  11. dyox

    dyox

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    Big Planet With Marhing Cubes :
     
  12. diddykonga

    diddykonga

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    If this will never be available for use in another project, can you please move this topic to Work In Progress, thanks
     
  13. dyox

    dyox

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    @diddykonga : No ,i just said i will not sell this package in asset store. However, if someone wants to buy it, I'm willing to talk about it in private.

    This section is : "Assets And Asset Store". This package is an asset :).
     
    Last edited: Aug 24, 2012
  14. Wild-Factor

    Wild-Factor

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    Does it work on IOS ?
     
  15. jc_lvngstn

    jc_lvngstn

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    I like your project, especially how you can have blocks instead of just spherical holes.
    Can you adjust the resolution (is that what you mean by infinite marching object size)? As in...could I have a "region" of 100x100x100 blocks, or a region of just 10x10x10 blocks, and the 10x10x10 block region would take up much less memory?
     
  16. ronan-thibaudau

    ronan-thibaudau

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    Skype request sent
     
  17. dyox

    dyox

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    @Wild Factor : Yes , it work on ios, with good configuration of marching cube.

    @jc_lvngstn : Here is 8*8*8 chunks * 10*10*10 MarchingPoints so every block is 80*80*80 , and you can generate unlimited blocks (here like 180) In video you have around 92160000 Marching Points , the ram usage is around 600 Mo. Scale Factor is to 1.
     
  18. RandAlThor

    RandAlThor

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    @dyox
    Send a pm

    Also do the terrain has a colider so the objects can walk on it?
     
  19. dyox

    dyox

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    @RandAlThor : Yes, in infinite terrain you can see, my character walk on the ground. It's mesh colliders.
     
  20. Nyo

    Nyo

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    Hello. Do you have an idea of the price?
    Is there a trial version that can be tried?
     
  21. dyox

    dyox

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    New Video : Fast Loading


    Marching Size is :

    5*5*5 * 20 * 12 * 20 = 600 000 Marrching Points per block
    27 Blocks loaded.
    27 * 600 000 = 16 200 000 Points

    Loading Texture (materials) + Loading World File + Generating Chunk Mesh = 13 seconds.
     
  22. Vanamerax

    Vanamerax

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    This is cool! :D

    I'm wondering, how did you solve the multi-texturing? Is it done with a shader or are you using multiple meshes / submeshes?

    I'm interested in this :)
     
  23. dyox

    dyox

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    I'm using Triplanar Shader and Submeshes.
     
  24. Wild-Factor

    Wild-Factor

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    I got the price from dyox and it's over-expensif (price of unity pro + ios pro...) for me. And even if it's look good, developping my own is a valid option.
    I give an idea of the price to avoid other dev to loose some time and think this is a valid option because they suppose the price range is like other asset, or like the previous solution: Voxelform.

    I think you should lower your price.

    If you still want to sell at this price, you should anwser this kind of question:
    - You worked with Voxelform ( a 100 euros plugin, wich is 25X lower than your price). Did you use the code of voxelform ?
    Are you sure there no licence/copyright problem with that ? (maybe that's probably why you didn't put the asset on the asset store ?)
    - You work 4 months on it ? Am I right ?
    - What kind of garantee can you give for the support ? Your price range are one of a big company but you are small. Customer should get some kind of garantee that the support will last at least for one year.
    - Can you show a real time demo ? It's easy to make a web application to show your work (like 100% of asset sold). And for me it's a little strange. The Fps is around 25-30fps on your video, but you only have the voxel terrain. If we add some physics, IA, game loop, some animations, particle effect, is the fps still high enough ? How much memory do you use?
    2GB is pretty low for a PC, but a x360, a PS3 or an iphone have 256mo max, so can we see what voxel resolution can we get with this kind of memory ?

    But I must say that's probably the best voxel solution we can find with unity. The price is just too high for the risk you take and asking people to contact you in private is little strange (suspect?).
     
    Last edited: Sep 15, 2012
  25. dyox

    dyox

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    @Wild Factor :

    I do not use any code owned or intellectual property VoxelForm pack.
    The marching cubes patent has now expired since 2005 and is now free to use.
    Some class names or functions may be similar to the project voxelform but it is merely a matter of logic.

    I worked 4 months now on this framework. Ideas, the architecture, the improvements are part of this work.
    If we consider the hourly price of a programmer in a company and the number of hours of development that took me, the price is far below what it would cost a company.

    I have a business and I can provide custom written contracts.
    Contracts will be signed by both parties: Buyer / Seller.

    As in any transaction there is an element of mutual trust.

    Well sure, and I encourage all interested persons to even contact me via skype for screen sharing and real-time test.

    Because of the ease of decompiling the code in unity, I will not provide demo web or executable.All property seller protects against the copying or stealing. There is nothing strange in this process.

    The pack includes a control system of FPS. Which can be fixed in advance or change in game
    My FPS drop when recording video with fraps because I do not have a recent machine. The advantage is that my setup allows to know the limits of my framework and improve accordingly.

    Intel Core2Duo: 2.66 GHZ
    2 GB Ram DDR II - 800
    HD 500 GB 7200
    Geforce 9600 GT

    The memory used depends on the size of the terrain requested and the type of storage used for the field.

    It is possible to store the information of a point on one byte. And therefore the size used will be equal to the size of your terrain.
    However if you want to store more finely on a float and a byte. Your application will be much more memory-intensive.

    Example : Terrain
    5 * 5 * 5 Chunks
    20 * 20 * 20 Points Per Chunk
    Memory Usage : Around 800 Mo.

    There is nothing to suspect, I do not spread my life and the lives of potential buyers on a forum. Again, my pack is reserved to professionals, this approach allows me to filter all requests of non-serious buyers.

    I hope I have been quite clear and structured in my answers.
    And thank you for the interest you take in my work.
     
    Last edited: Sep 17, 2012
  26. J0J0

    J0J0

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    guys this looks fairly suspicious. is it just me or does anyone else recognize those materials from the last voxelform update? dyox if you're doing what it looks like from here, really not cool. you need to clear this up.
     
  27. holyjewsus

    holyjewsus

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    Ooh, the materials... sorry, I thought you were referring to the algorithm itself.
    --deleted comment--
     
    Last edited: Sep 20, 2012
  28. dyox

    dyox

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    @J0J0 : I used the same materials for the demo. I'm programmer, and not graphist. The maretial is used for the demo , i think no one will use it for their games and it's not a problem. The Shader and texture are not created by Mark so ...

    I repeat again. Despite the fact that this pack closely resembles that of a VoxelForm. There are a multitude of approaches to the same technology and should not be trusted. For example, touch phones, they use different technology and the result is the same. Do not worry, I certified the performance of my system MarchingCube 100%.

    Many videos will be offered, so you have the choice to decide for yourself.
    Just being able to see 27 blocks and more on the same map shows that I do not use the voxelform.
     
    Last edited: Sep 21, 2012
  29. dyox

    dyox

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    New video : Marching Cubes Storage : One byte, Shaders , loading, Biomes :

     
  30. jc_lvngstn

    jc_lvngstn

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    Honestly, looks like a different approach than voxelform.

    Being able to have cubic shaped voxels instead of diamond. Also, you can see what looks like layers as the camera rises and lowers in elevation, I never noticed that in voxelform.
     
  31. Democre

    Democre

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    While you are certainly free to price this at whatever price-point you want, I'd have to agree that the price on this is far too high. If you go by the thinking that I quoted above, WoW should cost 10s of thousands to buy, as wells as any other game out there. True, you are making a product, and not a game, but the thinking should be about the same. You will get MANY more buyers if you released around the $100 price point.

    Also at that lower price point, it'd be easier to pay the price than to hack it for most people. So you wouldn't have to worry about decompilation of web players.

    If it were so easy to decompile, then everyone who was interested in this would have decompiled the voxelform web demos. And you'd still have a small customer base.

    It's also only a matter of time before someone else releases a complete solution (editor and runtime suite) for 100x cheaper. If not this guy:
    then someone else will.

    Again, you're free to sell it however you want to, but IMO you'd have a much larger paying customer base if you released this on the asset store for ~$100.
    Think about it this way, for everyone that has contacted you about purchase, how many have actually bought? How many have actually contacted you? How many people do you think are looking for something similar in the asset store? Don't answer these on this thread, because I understand that you don't spread your business in public. Just think about these questions.

    I guarantee you that you'd have much higher visibility on the Asset Store, with the same amount of thread hawking that you do now.
    You wouldn't have to validate any customers or their forms of payment.
    You wouldn't have to manage your own contracts.
    You could actually get featured by Unity (you have zero chance of that now).

    Oh well, I'll wait for the next dev to provide a Voxel solution. Yours is just too expensive and too much of a risk without seeing demos/reviews/anything without having to contact you privately.

    I don't buy anything by going straight to some no name shop and getting a private demonstration and then paying 25x more than I'd expect to pay and then only if I'm professional enough to buy it.

    Unless it's contractually forbidden, I'd actually like to see some of your customers post reviews here. If it is contractually forbidden, shame on you.
     
  32. ronan-thibaudau

    ronan-thibaudau

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    I agree with the previous post, i contacted him thinking the price would be highter than usual but didn't go through with the purchase for the following reasons

    1) Too expensive for the purchase, i'm used to buying highter priced tools but they come with a lot more (priority support etc, he didn't seem to have support in mind and offered , if i remember correctly, 2 month)
    2) While i'm used to those prices i'm used to them from large companies that have a lot of staff including commercial and support staff which justifies the price, this doesn't seem to be the case here and the demo had to wait for him to wakeup because he wasn't ready at noon ish
    3) While it may just have been for the assets as he explains, i did see a voxelform folder within his demo which put me off as i can feel a risk that some of it was used (wether it was the case or not, simply seeing this put me off)
    4) He didn't want to publish to the asset store because apparently it's not possible to publish at that price, when i mentioned the substance database at the same price (3K€ is what i was quoted) he mentionned that he would rather do it himself and sign an actual contract, this is bad business to me as it doesn't allow me to manage this the same way as other licences nor use the same auto update mechanism

    I do wish him well but, in the same mindset as the previous poster, i think it is good to expose to him the issues that may make it so the software doesn't sell, also you should never price software based on "how much work it represents", because the buyer doesn't care, he's buying features, not "hours you've spent into this", and the expected price for a voxel engine is at the bar voxelform has previously set.

    (note : i really wouldn't be shocked with the 3K price, it's not the price in itself, those kind of prices are fine from companies but MUST come with the added value of at least a year of support with 12H response time, contractually guaranteed fixes, update roadmap etc)
     
    Last edited: Oct 10, 2012
  33. dyox

    dyox

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    New Video : Voxels Engine + Marching Cubes. Easy Switch. ::
     
    Last edited: Oct 22, 2012
  34. dyox

    dyox

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    New Video : Voxels Style ::
     
  35. dyox

    dyox

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    New Video : Voxels V4 ::
     
  36. dyox

    dyox

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    Voxels Engine : Big Size + Minimap (fully customizable)
     
  37. dyox

    dyox

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  38. dyox

    dyox

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    Last edited: Nov 4, 2012
  39. dyox

    dyox

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    Voxel Destroying Blocks (under development) :
     
  40. dyox

    dyox

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    Voxel Engine : Light, Shaders, Particles, Loading, Colliders, Minimap