3DForge Exteriors

This statement sticks out. My thoughts exactly. My camera control will only go out to 30m and in to 1m for up close. It will zoom in front of something if in front of the camera. I think Cobus is spot on....add some variety so that when the camera is zoomed out and the player is taking a look at the city.....there is 'some' variety. Smaller and Larger all in the same city. It is how it would/should be.

City props that people normally do in cities is always a welcome sight. It there is a prop I will have an NPC behavior designed for it. So the more Cobus adds....grrrrrr.....the more anims and behaviors I need to make.

Once I get my clicking fingers on this I will definitely post some pics.

Cheers

 

I think I've finally found a heightmap on google that I'm happy with and can generally manipulate a little to make it fit as I want it Just need to work on texturing the terrain, adding water - as I feel there needs to be at least 1 dock/harbour somewhere in the game world - and then add in housing, etc. once Cobus releases v1.0

 

@smada luap
Heightmaps are great for getting into the terrain making section of Unity.
Once you see how they behave and what there influence is on the terrain,
you can easily manipulate them in Photoshop so that they work for you in Unity.
Then as you say, do small minor editing and there you go.

I am going to show the L & T building modules next

 

just take my money already and lets go!!!! Stop teasing us all with these wonderful and beautiful things!!!

 

@Archania - use this...



It somehow gets his attention and at least makes him chuckle a bit

 

@smada luap @Archania that does give a good chuckle and does get my attention

 

Starting with textures, which will probably change , on parts of the heightmap. Also sculpting/flattening areas ready for houses, etc. to go. Looks like I'm planning a small harbour area first

 

Hmmm.. Just got a forum notification from BuildR and it got me wondering if the walls and roofs from this could be plugged into BuildR to do some procedural village building.... *ponders*

@smada luap - Looking good! What tool did you use to build that?

 

@Shawn67
The creaton of DunGen https://www.assetstore.unity3d.com/en/#!/content/15682 has contacted me a few weeks ago
He tested the interiors and they work 100% out of the box with his product.
No setup or adjustment required, and he build some procedural dungeons.

Now I do not know how this tool work but it might end up that it could work.

The way I would imagine users like yourself is going to possibly use this, is that you going to build your own library
of Houses, a few Inns, a Town hall or two, some Shops, and save them out as completed prefabs, then as you need them, drag them into a project, and then when you need, drag them into a scene, use as is or becasue any small part can be swopped out quickly make a custom one (maybe save that as a anew prefab and so do cool custom villages and towns.

Now I can easily see users showing there creations here or such and then give or exchange scene files.
So that you sharing build data, not actual bought, paid for contents such as meshes and and textures

You could create so many different sets, you maybe build aa town with lots of flatter building, someone @smada luap maybe does with lots of chimneys and towers and so you can build up aa sets so to speak.

Like you travel in Skyrim, you actually remenber towns by their over all build style/theme that they have specific.

With the 6 base wall textures that will really help as well, so one village all just wood, another just one type stone, another the olde very worn plaster, another newer plaster, or stone ground floors and plaster or wood tops
And then there are the current 5 roof styles to go and mix into that.

This is going to be such a powerful package to really build a HUGE variety of buildings, yet special unique ones to have scenes be memorable each in there own ways.
The 22 fence types, the bridges ... the list is long.

Then comes the FREE updates, the city walls, Cemetery, harbor, marketplace, and so many more.

You will end up with a good consistent look and feel, but very different areas to really have that
"of the same believable Fantasy world " feel adding props and you going to have a lived in look & feel environment.

I really want it to be the best, most complete fantasy environment kit on the asset store.
And with all these things in, even at launch users to be 100% happy with what they pay.

Enough from me, let me do more clicking so I can come show you guys more good stuff

@smada luap it is looking good, once you into using terrain, you not ant to go without it

Cheers
Cobus

 

@Shawn67 - it's just Unity's built-in terrain editor. Nicked a heightmap off a google search and I'm tweaking levels to make some flatter expanses for housing, etc.

Also, this looks a lot better now that I've activated the shadows which I never noticed were missing before.

 

@smada luap
can go back to the textures where you add them and edit, change the scale, the default is 15 I think, make it smaller and the texture is way crisper, basically play around till it is in tune with surrounding props so that they fit together.
You adding it nicely, kind of grass and such on top surfaces where in nature they would be, in corners one would get snow or so if that kind of environments

 

Yup. Not all of these may be the final textures - they're just what I've got to hand at the moment. Once I finalise what textures I'm using I'll tweak the scaling until they look okay at a distance and the tiling isn't obvious at large distances which is evident with these, and others I've tried, even though they're meant to be seamless

 

I recently bit bullet n learnt rtp. It really does transform your terrains

 

Give me chance. It's taken me until now to start to feel somewhat comfortable with unity's terrain tools

 

No disrespect intended Paul - its pretty intimidating to start with isn't it You made a comment about tiling - I have wrestled with terrains for ages and never really found a good solution. Anyways, I was asked to try RTP on a project recently and so I did. It was a bit of a learning curve but am so glad i made the effort - my terrain looks stacks better, and one of its benefits is that it does a pretty good at minimising tiling.

 

No disrepect taken. I'm not naturally creative so it takes me a long time to feel comfortable in using any piece of software that doesn't allow for 'structured' development (think lego building blocks )

 

All very quiet again

 

I think most of us waiting for the next teaser or even better a release note

 

Cobus spoiled us with all the barrage of screenies and now he has us all in withdrawal... heheh

 

@Whippets @Wylaryzel @Shawn67
No no, going to show more stuff soon soon

 

*twitches uncontrollably from withdrawal*

 

And I am back

Been adding the L-shape & T-shape modular parts into the project space (X-shapes will creep in as well).

Why this is time consuming is that there are
- 2 roof textures (Wooden & Slate)
- Roof styles
- 2, 3, 4, 5 wide buildings in the templates (even wider as add-ons)
- Wooden frames that need to be added to match new shapes
- Plinth extensions to accommodate L-shapes , T-shapes & X-shapes

These examples are just quick ones, you can go as many levels as you want to, the modules are designed that way
Add some of the earlier verandas and things start to get even more interesting











Cheers
Cobus

 

Looks pretty cool. Though, are there any plans for different styles of roofs (Like the different walls you have)? But no pressure if it is too much work.

 

@nosyrbllewe
v1.0 will launch with two roof materials
5 styles, from basic to more expensive looking
so that a village can have kind of more rundown looking poorer areas to more upper market zones

This is specifically to have areas that visually look different to each other.

On the road map you will see "thatch" and maybe Clay terracotta tiles can be added as part of a FREE update

PS!!!
Keep in mind the Castles & Cathedrals Exteriors Update will see more roof options added.
we can not have the cathedral have thatch now can we



Cheers
Cobus

 

Ok, sounds great. I like the idea of progressive expensiveness. This will help a lot in creating distinct villages. Thanks.

 

@nosyrbllewe I am glad that you like what you see

It is like real life and also has been done successfully in many titles like Skyrim where you have poorer villages and maybe the townhall and the Chief / Mayor has a double story house with the more elaborate viking type finishing on the roof.

Or maybe the village on the water edge on the plinths that was shown earlier all have the Norse type finish

Many asset packs have one roof and that is it, I am launching with those and then grow them also with customer feedback

Cheers
Cobus

 

bloody 'ell yes!

I'm seeing cloisters, courtyards, all sorts of things. If I can just cut those roofs in half along the apex, I'll be able to do even more.

Champion work Cobus XD

 

@Whippets
I am definitely adding such half items and as I get feedback after release I will grow that folder to include whatever is possible to add with the mesh geometry that I have at hand.

 

Adding "pillars" to the road map from Facebook post.
can be very handy the make nice courtyards, villas entrances to zones and many more

 

Definitely count me in on wanting the halves... The full roof options are looking AWESOME!

 

Hype train refuelled successfully

 

Yup.. Still twitching but not as bad... A little fix is good... heheh

 

These are looking really good

 

Coming together nicely. Wanna tell us what you still need to create till v1? Wanna really get my hands dirty

 

@Wylaryzel
I am sure many are asking this, so here it is.

- Half roofs and arched walls
- Export glassless walls >>> @Teila
- Add glass second material and combine with above
- Chimneys
- Balconies and wooden stairs going to them
- Selection of ready to use houses
- Example scenes - Can not really do small scenes that users can use since they can not "glue" my small piece of
terrain into there scene
- Going to check out how much work to do start of grasses, flowers and Trees (might be in first FREE update rather)

Not that much actually.

Please feel free to comment

Cheers
Cobus

 

Thx for the update - looks like it should't be to long to get our hands wet.

I'm sure as soon as we can buy the asset and play around additional ideas are coming for sure

Still playing with terrains (got TerrainComposer recently - which I only can recommend as it is on sort of sale additionally currently) And the first tests looking promising for the mobiles. So currently, ignore everything I said earlier with regards to tiles for the ground

By the way, will it be useful to utilize ProGrids again for the exterior kit or is it better to stick with your template blocks for building the houses (I assume with vertex snap it will be fast for construction or?)

BR
Wyl

 

@Wylaryzel

Yip, it is close to be complete, well as complete as needed for v1.0 release
The FREE updates each has a name/theme, but will of course include all smaller items that are received via feedback from users like yourself when you use the package.
That I see as a given part of the natural growth of the package.

I have been using vertex snapping while building the exteriors.
I added all those "core" whiter blocks that is for designing and then snapping parts onto, so do not think it would in particular be useful here

Cheers
Cobus

 

I look forward hehe

 

Really looking forward to release!
Btw guys the village interiors is on sale if you have level11.

 

@DoubleLee

Welcome to the thread to you as well, glad that you like what you see.
You and the many others are the people that I build it for, basically going to put Village "LEGO" in your hands

Great, seems that there is going to be a crowd at the shop that day

Added the TODO list to the first post for those that want to see progress of items getting scratched out on list

Cheers
Cobus

 

Haven't added to the burden in a few days, so... 22.5 degree roofing to go with the 45 degree roofing. That'll make a massive difference

 

@Whippets

ROFL yeah, MASSIVE difference to the amount of work

 

Looks like I might have some time to get the terrain prepared once I return home from holiday before Cobus releases v1.0.

Although, knowing how things turn out he'll release before I'm anywhere near ready lol

 

*twiddles thumbs while waiting*

Great work here. Keep it coming. I am however getting shivers thinking about all the cataloging of assets from another one of your Massive Sets. And some of your naming conventions! sheesh. haha!!

To add to Whippets request.....we will need 15 degree roofing to go with the others.

 

@Olander

HAHA, My one eye starts to twitch when I read you comment.
The naming conventions are VERY important as has been with each package.
It is one of the things that has to be right, for me when I build and assemble the packages and at the end for you as dev to be able to make sense of a piece by just looking at the name.
Also things like setting up all the coliders and removing the animations and avatar data and setting to be ready for lightmaping.

They all take time, but I do it once and then it saves 100's of users time and make it a pleasure to work with 3DForge packages.

Working the whole weekend, am going to try knock many items of that list

Cheers
Cobus

 

Aren't you done yet?

*runs off to hide*

 

Hi @smada luap

Busy working on the half roofs and some extra arch parts, nice surprise pieces that I am sure all is going to love, all modular

 

You know the surprise pieces usually get you into trouble. They will trigger thoughts of other things we will want.. heheh

 

@Shawn67

This is actually in response to such great thoughts, I think from you in specific

 

Stop teasing and tell us what you're planning lol