**1.2.3 Updates for Unreal 4.14
**
Wow, the new update to this engine exposed contact shadows to lights! Since Pixel Depth Offset can now be used correctly with shadows, I’ve made a few changes to some old presets. And on top of that, we have a host of brand new presets all ready to go, taking advantage of the new[er] Triple Color and Tile Tilting features as well as the Large Thin and Herringbone assets! See the changelog below for a list of improvements:
- Added ability to manually specify texture size for Pixel Depth Offset. This removes a lot of instructions from the automated method.
- Added 6 new presets: New Terra, Subliminal, Galaxic, Havana, Advanced Bricks (Cheap), and Excavation. There are now a total of 65 presets to choose from!
- Tweaked colors and features of old presets, most notably Tactician’s colors, and Pixel Depth Offset implemented in the Advanced Bricks and Temple Stone presets.
- Revamped textures for Advanced Bricks (from 512 to 1024) and Stone (1024 to 2048) assets. Now they look incredibly sharp up close, and on higher res monitors 1440p+!
New Terra - A semi-metallic hexagonal preset with triple colors and roughness. This is a very stylish science-fiction surface for sturdy containers, walls, and columns with a sharp WOW factor!
Subliminal - A soft subsurface scattering tile with large tile bases. Reminiscent of glowing translucent ceramics, this surface is great for relaxing spa settings and bright lights.
Galaxic - An out-of-this-world pearlescent/semi-metallic tile surface with glass. This preset uses 1x4 long tiles and multiple features. Great for high-class enigmatic environments and other-worldly living.
Havana - A clean triple-color preset with Herringbone tiling assets. Bold blues and colors are evocative of a fantastic beach-like setting. Useful for tropical spaces, outdoor patios, and clubhouse interiors.
Excavation - A stone preset useful for interesting patio and backyard spaces. This preset uses triple colors to broaden the color range of the material surface. Highly flexible with steep displacement and pixel depth offset, this preset looks gorgeous and works great in many different lighting conditions!
Advanced Bricks (Cheap) - A cheaper version of the Advanced Bricks presets, featuring the same basic assets for less than 1/2 the rendering cost. This preset uses iterative parallax mapping to save on instructions while keeping the same great depth the advanced preset has to offer. Useful for exterior brick walls and buildings.
CYBER MONDAY SALE - 50% OFF, ONLY ON 11/28!
Also, I have an important announcement to make: this preset will be a part of Unreal Marketplace’s Cyber Monday sale! For one day only, this system will be on sale for half off the normal $25 price! That’s right, this entire system can be yours for only $12.50! I normally don’t provide any discounts considering the system is cheap enough as it is, but the Cyber Monday event is something special. Merry almost-Christmas, everybody!
NOTE TO EVERYONE PURCHASING THE 4.14 UPDATE: Ryan B from Epic has confirmed that there is a bug in 4.14 which overturned an optimization that helped compress repeated code in the Material Editor. The bug has been fixed and will be released in the 4.14.1 hotfix, scheduled to come out later. However, since the Perfect Tile System is heavily reliant on repeated code, it will not run as smoothly until AFTER the 4.14.1 update is released. There will be some Parallax Occlusion materials showing up as 300+ instructions, and that complexity is not normal, nor representative of the kind of performance you can get out of this system. I hope that you pardon the temporary performance issues in the new engine and the Cyber Monday event. You should expect to see a 30% performance improvement after the hotfix release.
Here is Ryan B’s explanation of the bug and hotfix: https://forums.unrealengine.com/showthread.php?49169-POM-material&p=624232&viewfull=1#post624232