UPDATE 12-07-2018:
I think I’m almost ready to push this to Epic’s. The final render is done! On top of that, the current scene run at 120FPS everywhere on my side in-engine 4k with a 1080TI, with a polycount going from 500k to 2.5m and draw calls from 500 to 1.5k in-context. It seems like the optimization pass is helping a lot more than anticipated!
Some stats: When englobing the scene (which means the camera is far away and only look from a somewhat top-view, you would never have this PoV in a game without fakes), I’m sitting at ~5m poly and roughly 90FPS.
The double-sided set has 11 modules. 6 has been crafter for exterior meshes, 5 for interior. They’re very similars and should only be used if you want to let players build their own bases, or when you have to implement large, uninstanciated modules in a dynamic lighting setup.
The Scaffold meshes and modules were done back from scratch. The base planks used for these used to have a lot of wasted polygons. I’ve redone then from the ground up and gave a good optimization pass on the ropes. Small warning: To keep consistency throughout the whole Scaffolding setup, I’ve had to change some pivot points. This means that when updating, you’re likely to see modules that have a rather large offset. I’ll have the full list when the patch goes through!
I’ve gone and revamped the lighting of the scene too, to give it a better feeling and better control on screen brightness when navigating.
Of course, there’s a lot of bug fixes mixed in this. Floating modules in the demonstration scene, collisions that have a lot of wasted polygons, etc…
Finally, I’ve remade the interior walls’ textures in 4k, as per requested. All the interior modules have been updated to reflect the new texture – you should notice a lot less of artifacts!
Screenshots:
https://i.imgur.com/BfBEMNU.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/qrnjyzR.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/O2gCrJU.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/hXPvVVK.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/CM2CHd7.jpg
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UPDATE 11-29-2018:
[spoiler]So I’ve been hard at work these past few weeks to give a little overhaul to some elements of the pack, in addition to crafting some two-sided models. Here’s a small preview:
https://i.imgur.com/E1ShU6q.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/81c1nmN.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/03RHuLS.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/7TmL5GO.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/inLtoVK.jpg
As you can see, it’s almost complete. I have some minor bugs to fix first though and perhaps add some more two-sided modules. The lighting has been entirely overhauled in the demonstration map so it’s easier to see in the interior areas - and more beautiful too. I’ve remastered the interior wall modules’ texture from 2048 to 4096 as it was requested a lot. Plus, I’ve edited the normals so it’d look more like a rock and less glitchy in some areas. Plus a lot of little tweaks on materials here and there.
I’ll probably have some baking to do when I do the last few bug fixes, but it’ll be sent to Epic before the end of next week![/spoiler]
ORIGINAL POST:
It’s finally live! You can access it from the official page here: https://www.unrealengine.com/marketp…d-architecture
Here’s a quick tour of the demonstration map in addition:
OLD:
[spoiler]New this week (July 26th 2017):
This is the last week I’m spending full time on this set. I have received some requests to add some modular pieces and I’ll try to add as many as I can. Until everything is done, I will not do another capture of the demonstration level. Instead, this week, I’ll spend more time on the technical aspects of the pack - some of which are of interest to level designer, level artists, props artists and - to some extent - programmers.
First things first, I’ve made three videos this week. One is about showcasing the showroom, where all the modules and props are exposed individually. The other two show how you’d build your modular architecture with a real-time building, for the interior and the exterior. They both are not taking every single piece of architecture, there’s just too many of them for a small video of a few minutes each. Still, it should give you a clear idea of what the pack can and can’t do.
Now, on to what I believe will be the most asked questions.
Q: Any ETA on a potential release for the pack?
A: Not quite. I’m still spending this week polishing and adding last-minute modules, then it has to go through Epic’s validation pipeline. It should then be added to the next Marketplace release, which I suppose would be by the end of August.
Q: Have you thought of a price?
A: Unless something major happens, I plan to sell the pack at US$74,99.
Q: Is it optimized? It seems a lot of detail went into the modeling so I’m a bit worried about performances.
A: You’re right that the modeling has a lot of triangles. But that’s not an issue when there are several LoDs taking care of optimizing everything. For instance, if I take the whole scene in my viewport, I get about 65~70 constant FPS (You may be interested in taking a look at this picture: Imgur: The magic of the Internet ). One important thing to consider with these numbers is that since it’s taken in the editor - IE not in play mode. So vital optimization mechanics like mesh culling are inactive. The performances outside the engine, like in a genuine game build, would be marginally better.
Q: Great, so there are neat LoDs. But that didn’t quite answer the question - what can be expected at run time?
A: Better performances. For the time being, the scene run at about 65~70 FPS when in full screen (1440p) during ALT+P with a GeForce GTX 980. Although again, it’s in-engine and so you have a lot of background processes going on at the same time. This ( Imgur: The magic of the Internet ) screenshot was taken at the most “inefficient” area of the map where mesh culling is somewhat inactive. As soon as you move indoor, the FPS boost to 70FPS+. AA, Bloom and Motion Blur are also activated.
Q: What about the textures?
A: Right now, the scene uses baked lighting. Unreal automatically cap the texture memory to 1000MB, so as soon as this is hit you get a message warning that you’re exceeding the limit. This is not the case with the scene. On the 1 000MB budget, 780MB are used. Again, this includes baked lighting, which generates several thousands of smaller texture maps. There are ~ 3500 actors in the scene. Remove maybe 50 and you have a number of lightmaps being generated. And yet, it’s all fitting within the defined budget and then some, so you should have no issue implementing your characters/props/UI/etc.
Q: I’m sure I saw some vegetation in your screenshots. Why are they not on your stats screenshots?
A: Because they’re very heavy. This pack is not intended to be bought with the intent to have working vegetation. It’s an architecture pack. I’m still weighing if I keep them in or if I remove it altogether.
Q: So what would you say this pack is aimed at - what platform(s)? Even if it’s well optimized, the stats exposed are not what is considered “light”.
A: For Windows/PC gaming. With some light tweaking work, PS4/Xbox One. Definitely not VR or Mobile, or at the very least not without a sizeable experience with the limitations related to these devices. Anything running on modern hardware, basically. Then, with proper settings (removing AA/MB/Post-Process and making LoDs + MIP swap faster) the pack can run without issues on less performing PC hardware.
Q: How long will this pack be supported?
A: For as long as it needs to be. Like the other pack I’ve worked on - Dwarf Fantasy Environment Set, which received an update this summer with a complete overhaul of its textures - I plan to update the pack according to new technologies and upgrades that can substantially make the pack better.
Q: Will there be something included to help me get started?
A: Absolutely. I’ll join a thorough PDF guide on how to use the set, potential pitfall and what to pay attention when using it.
Q: Can I create custom assets? I know how 3D modeling work a bit and I’d like to make my own stuff with your materials.
A: I’ll join the “base” meshes I’ve used when I was crafting the set. This should allow you to make virtually any piece you want. The only limit is your imagination (Not really, texel ratio and polygon count are but hey, don’t let me shatter your dreams!)
Q: How many assets does this pack have?
A: I don’t have the precise final number as I’m still adding some stuff. But as of right now, there are 174 meshes (excluding the 28 terrain assets specific to the demonstration map). From there 174 meshes, 9 are furniture, three are vegetation, three are flags with PhysX, one is a canvas for scaffolding if you want to make your own meshes. For the remaining 159, 12 are optimized merges of smaller architectural meshes to reduce a number of draw calls.
In term of materials, there are 22 unique materials and 13 material instances.
For the textures, there are 110 unique maps. I still need to go through and remove those that I no longer use, so 100 would perhaps be more accurate.
Q: Anything else I should know?
A: The pack was made with a baked lighting pipeline. While it’s certainly usable in a dynamic lighting environment, you’ll need to do additional steps, like making map-specific fakes and dynamic loading that I simply cannot do without direct access to your specific project. That’s really important to understand, just like everything using dynamic lighting, that you’ll have to take additional optimization steps.
New this week (July 19th 2017):
So many things to show. In fact, there’s so many that I had to retake all the screenshots altogether for the exterior (and some parts of the interior architecture) - You can access the high resolution version (1440p) of these screenshots here:
<–Snipped for readability–>
The architecture itself is 95% finished. There’s a missing module here and there to add, some lightmap fixes to do, but what you see here is what you get. I don’t have any plans to change them any further, but if I have enough time, I may add additionnal requested modules. Next week, I’ll have a complete video of the demonstration map and the overview map, so you’ll be able to see in real time how it looks, feel and react to the camera – plus, you’ll get a thorough look at how the modularity works.
I’ve started working on the furniture set. It won’t be anything too fancy, it’s mostly to give some depth to the interior stuff. There’ll be better lighting with torches by next week. I’ve also worked on a shader that uses a baked AO on unique furniture pieces to “hide” the fact that it uses a modular set of furniture pieces. This is how it looks like in the editor:
I wanted to show it in the scene with baked lighting, but there are some issues with the modeling that gives it unrealistic lighting. So I’m working on that today.
For those who wonder about the target price for the pack, nothing is set in stone just yet, but I’m undecided between $69,99 and $79,99. Excluding the terrain, there are 143 modules in the pack plus a few more missing. There’ll be at least ten furniture pieces, 93 texture maps and 20 materials. I’ll also throw in the basic assets used for the modules, so you can craft your own unique pieces if you need to and have some knowledge with 3D softwares. Let me know what you’re thinking!
PS: I think this deserves to be said and shared: The shader used for the grass is almost directly taken from https://forums.unrealengine.com/show…y-Grass-Shader - The modeling is made by me, but not the shader itself. So in full transparency, you can access that link to check out the post and access the scene with the free shader!
EDIT 7/11/17 - Showroom video showcasing current modules:
New this week (July 10th 2017):
Started working on the interior architecture. There’s a lot of things that remains to be done (fix some bugs, tiling issues, baking issues, will rework the doors again), but the backbone is done.
I thought that maybe you’d like to see how the set works in real time (mostly interior), so I recorded a small two minutes in Fraps.
What I’d like to do this week is to basically finish the interior architecture (towers still needs to be done) and start working on the terrain outside. Then next week, it’d be mostly polish and, if time allows it, a small modular furniture set for the interior. Right now, there’s well over a hundred architecture modules and I expect this to keep going up, perhaps close to 150 by the end of development.
Slight Edit: Added corrected LoDs
Good day everyone,
I’ve been working on a medieval architecture set these past few months and I thought it was finally time to expose this on the forum. Those who follow me on Twitter/Facebook probably saw some pictures of it here and there, so here’s a more complete rundown of the current state of things – but first, some screenshots (high resolution album available here Imgur: The magic of the Internet ):
** Access the high resolution album. With new updates, removing the screenshot clutter is necessary! **
So as of right now, the complete scene is populated by 2.5k objects, originating from 70 modular assets. The light is completely baked on Production quality with no signs of trouble with texture memory. There is a total of 14 materials and 47 textures.
With a 980GTX, I run the scene in 1440p at 70 FPS when having the whole thing in camera view. When moving around, the FPS move between 60 and 90. As of right now, there has been no mesh merging, which mean that the amount of draw call is high – but since it’s a demonstration map, I probably won’t do it. In a context where the pack was used in a game, it would be highly recommended to merge similar assets together that are neighboring each others and then do a LoD generation. The meshes are also “omnipresent” for the time being, which means that they don’t “disappear” after a given distance. It’s something else that would greatly benefit the optimization of the pack in a game context, but which is useless in a demonstration map.
Each modular piece have several LoDs, which allows thorough level of precision and quality at any point. Example:
** Pictures has been removed for better readability. Full album with all LoDs at Imgur: The magic of the Internet and Imgur: The magic of the Internet **
This allows the pack to bolster modules with several thousands of polygons without negatively impacting performances. In fact, the scene has roughly 2 million active polygons when entirely seen by the camera, whereas if forced to their basic LoD, the scene has a whopping 25 million polygons. During active gameplay, the count of polygons is moving between 800k and 1.6m.
http://i.imgur.com/HjKNxmH.jpg
With that said, here’s what remains to be done with the pack:
• Create special decals for ashlar walls, to break the visible patterns
• Add 45 degrees (vertical) modular ashlar assets
• Create the whole modular interior architecture
• Add wooden support for structures
• Add courtyard terrain
I’ll keep you updated as much as possible in the following weeks. I’ll try to answer your questions ASAP too.
PS: If you’d be so kind, you can also follow on Twitter and Facebook - https://twitter.com/WolvenDigital and Redirecting... - but obviously it’s not a request. If you find the work here interesting, a little support can go a long way![/spoiler]
