Well, I’m making assets for now but I plan to use them to make a scifi apartment in the style of Mass Effect series (clean walls with panels etc). What I wanted to ask before I start building the actual apartment is how should I make the walls? 3d or simply planes? I’d go for 3d but I’m not sure if I’ll have any lighting problems with non visible faces touching each other (planning to make tileable, modular wall chunks so I can try different layouts on the fly).
So what do you guys think? Are the touching side faces going to be a problem for me so it’d be better to use simple planes for walls? Or I should stick with 3d?
Depends what you want to use them for, if you don’t have any end pieces then you will probably want to close the ends. Here’s some examples of walls for you to have a look at.
Thanks But that doesn’t really solve my problem. From what I see on those links everyone goes for 3d models instead of planes. Doesn’t that create lighting problems? Or because we’re talking modular buildings here (yes I’ll have corner/end pieces) there are no problems because it’s the whole side face that is not visible and touching with the next piece? I understand it’s hard to understand what I’m asking without a screenshot but I don’t have any to provide now
Let’s just say…
Case 1: Part A and Part B of the wall. If I put them together one next to the other they have the side faces touching. Will that be a problem for my lighting in the scene?
Case 2: Part A and Part B again. This time Part B is at 90 angle with the part A so the side face of Part B is touching with part of the front face of Part A. (This I know it creates a problem with lightmaps)
Of course if I use corner/end pieces I avoid the case 2 example. I just want to know if in case 1 I have the same problem. And if I do, is it better if instead of 3d models for parts A and B I use simple planes? Considering I want to go for good details (archviz style) I’d prefer not to use planes and instead use 3d models so I can model the larger details instead of normal mapping everything in a flat plane.
I’d probably need to add some corner pieces if you really want to avoid them touching.
I’m going through the same painful process of trying to figure out just how modular to make my environments.
The approach I’ve settled for is this: Make some generic wall, floor, and ceiling textures like you’d see in a game like DooM 3 or Halflife 2. Then create some basic room layouts and texture the walls with those materials. At this point the room will still look pretty bland but **** good if you were making a game around 2003 or so. Next add a bunch of little details like pipes, floor molding, etc… I’ve looked at some of the models in Crysis 2 a while ago and a lot of their internal rooms are kind of done this way. They model out an interesting room and texture the ceilings and walls and floors separately. And this works in Unreal as well since a static mesh can have multiple materials.
I’ve realized, trying to make things too modular either gets you nowhere or forces you to make boring looking blocky environments where everything is at 90 degree angles like what you’d see in Wolfenstein 3D.
It helps to do both, free yourself from tile sets when designing an arbitrary room so you have an interesting layout. And use tiles for things like hallways and detail objects.
But what do I know, I’m still starting anew with this stuff myself.
There wont be any problems with touching flat walls unless their edge normals do not align.
2 flat planes will transition perfectly, flat + slightly curved - no.
So its possible you just need to make sure normals align.
But that doesn’t really solve my problem. From what I see on those links everyone goes for 3d models instead of planes. Doesn’t that create lighting problems? Or because we’re talking modular buildings here (yes I’ll have corner/end pieces) there are no problems because it’s the whole side face that is not visible and touching with the next piece? I understand it’s hard to understand what I’m asking without a screenshot but I don’t have any to provide now 