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Improving Graphics Quality of my Game

Discussion in 'Editor & General Support' started by Hitterman, Aug 21, 2010.

  1. Hitterman

    Hitterman

    Joined:
    Aug 21, 2010
    Posts:
    11
    I have set the graphics level to Fantastic but still the graphics look dull. Can someone please provide me tips and tricks to improve the graphics quality and help me to make my game look excellent?

    Here are images:






     
  2. Peter G

    Peter G

    Joined:
    Nov 21, 2009
    Posts:
    610
    Here are some ideas:

    Add shadows. Whether they're realtime or baked, they will make your game look much better.

    Add normal maps to your objects and tweak your shaders to make them resemble their real life counter part.

    Your terrain textures look good. I might add a little unevenness to the ground because most places aren't completely flat.

    And personally, not to be offensive, I think your house textures could use a little work. I mean, many textures in AAA games could even use a little work so that shouldn't be taken personally.
     
  3. chrisPOD

    chrisPOD

    Joined:
    Aug 21, 2010
    Posts:
    27
    the mountains look very natural but some of the textures are a little blury
     
  4. Jesse Anders

    Jesse Anders

    Joined:
    Apr 5, 2008
    Posts:
    2,857
    Hehe...if only choosing Unity's 'Fantastic' option was all that was required to make a game look good :)

    Anyway, you probably already know this, but all the graphics settings really do is determine what features are and are not used; making the game look good is (alas) entirely up to you and your artists. (As for how to do that, the previous posters' suggestions are probably a good place to start.)
     
  5. Hitterman

    Hitterman

    Joined:
    Aug 21, 2010
    Posts:
    11
    I'm really thankful to you guys for wonderful support. The mountains were built using the inbuilt terrain editor and 3rd brush from second row.

    Actually, I'm not a 3D artist. All the models I have used are from free websites like Turbosquid and they are very awful.

    Also, please explain me a bit more regarding "Add normal maps to your objects and tweak your shaders to make them resemble their real life counter part. "

    Actually, I'm new to unity and I have just used for one day hence I don't have much idea about all these.

    Just removed lights and skybox to give it a quick night look!:

     
  6. sybixsus2

    sybixsus2

    Joined:
    Feb 16, 2009
    Posts:
    943
    I'm going to pick up on something PeterG said already. Your scenes are washed out. There's plenty of light, but no shade. Great scenes in games almost always have great lighting and great lighting needs a contrast between light and shade.

    If you're not using Unity Pro then realtime shadows will not be an option, but some really nice lightmaps would still make a big difference. Maybe even a GI bake in something like Gile (www.frecle.net) could be done. It supports some common formats so it should be achievable. If that's a Unity terrain, you won't be able to externally lightmap that, but the rest of the scene could be done, and I think it's the single biggest thing you could do.

    Also, try a less pure light. Instead of the 12 midday, sun high in the sky, white light look, consider an orange sunset evening view or a misty morning mauve sky. Something where you can get some colored lighting, maybe even a bit of mist/fog. That "atmosphere" is the main thing you're missing IMO.

    EDIT: Just noticed your "night" screenshot. Nighttime is another good idea to add atmosphere, but night isn't dark. Well it is, obviously, but not in games. In games, you should be thinking dark blue/purple lighting and maybe some blue-ish fog in the distance too. Trust me, it's much more effective than just darkness.
     
  7. Peter G

    Peter G

    Joined:
    Nov 21, 2009
    Posts:
    610
    If you purchased your models, then they might come with normal maps or bump maps. You can tell because they will have only RGB color or they will be a grayscale image. Unity will read both of those. If you don't have a normal map, you can make your own in a modeler (Blender is free).

    By shader, I mean the shader on the material. Assuming you know how to add a material to an object, then you click on the drop down box in the material inspector and it will give you a list of possible shaders such as "Diffuse, Specular, Transparent" etc.

    And as Sybixsus said. Night is not the absence of all light, so taking your lights out of the scene will lead to only ambient light which is rather dull.
     
  8. Hitterman

    Hitterman

    Joined:
    Aug 21, 2010
    Posts:
    11
    Thanks for the tips Peter and sybixsus2. I'll keep this in mind and will create a new scene in Unity and then I'll post here.

    I'm really thankful to you guys once again :)
     
  9. sereda008

    sereda008

    Joined:
    Dec 10, 2010
    Posts:
    130
    Well, I see that your main problem is lighting and textures. You got the advise on lighting, but not on textures. Personally I use 1024x1024 textures, complete with normal maps. The normal maps I generate using Shader Map pro (a VERY useful program).
     
  10. DamianGto

    DamianGto

    Joined:
    Apr 20, 2011
    Posts:
    159
    Well the other has sad alot how to fix things with maps.
    You can do alot in unity to.
    But what i think of is that the light seems very strange. how did you set it up?
    The light should come from you sun spot on the sky and in the direction from that spot down to the ground.
    Some area should be dark even in standard unity. It looks like the light is coming straight up.
    Maybe even soften the light a bit.
     
  11. staincorb

    staincorb

    Joined:
    Mar 30, 2009
    Posts:
    123
    Hi there

    I didint really read any of the other coments so mine might be doubled.

    I would recomend first of to look how real life things look then try to make the exact same thing for your game. not a copy just same basic ideah.

    Below are two images that you can see one is real the other from a game.

    TEXTURES: Mostly the way I work is every thing should be fine tuned textures. normally when an object is close to another one it will darken there, you can do this by baking the textures in unity PRO, if you do not have PRO, dosent mater, because like main textures have other natural dark places like, Rust, Humidity, Dirt, Moss, Grit, all these are textures, so you have to work with nice textures to do this. I also do this on my terrain, by duplicating my grund texture and darkening it, then painting it dark where it gets close to any other object.

    http://www.google.com.ec/imgres?q=c...09&start=15&ndsp=20&ved=1t:429,r:8,s:15,i:142

    http://www.google.com.ec/imgres?q=c...9&start=75&ndsp=22&ved=1t:429,r:13,s:75,i:353

    The rest, Ilumination, Textures, Object, you just have to try to duplicate what you see in actual life,.
     
  12. JayBlipBro

    JayBlipBro

    Joined:
    Oct 1, 2013
    Posts:
    2
    If your not sure about lightmapping, shaders and baked-in shadows, you could send me the scene file at jayblipbro@gmail.com and i'll see what i can do :)
     
  13. madhavan.r

    madhavan.r

    Joined:
    Apr 4, 2013
    Posts:
    2
    If you are a Pro, import the image effects package, and attach the bloom and flares script to the main camera. If you tweak it a bit, you will get incredible results. Just look at One Late Night graphics. :D