World machine vs world creator vs other tools?

[Millionviews]

Heey!
I have seen another post with these questions but that one is rather old and anno 2016 i would like to see what kind of terrain tools are used today. I am used to work with world machine and i like it very much but the development seems to be on hold. Dev support is not answering the call. What tools are currently most used?
What do you think?

[BoredEngineer]

Will see how good World Creator 2 will be. I’m pretty happy with what WM can do but had to use 3rd party plugins to get results that I need fast. Used it maximum for like 20-30 hours in total and pro license feels a bit like waste of money as dev don’t seams to be active anymore.

[anonymous_user_f77a82de]

stick to max or use mud box

[anonymous_user_f77a82de]

or really i think of a way to go about without having to many poly is sub divide your terrain basically squares and then combine them. SO each square wouldn’t take up to much polys equally…yeah

[nanthrox]

Or you check World Creator 2 - www.world-creator.com which is currently available for the Unity Engine and in September the BETA will start for everybody who pre-ordered it

[Millionviews]

@nanthrox;566667

Or you check World Creator 2 - www.world-creator.com which is currently available for the Unity Engine and in September the BETA will start for everybody who pre-ordered it

I tried the demo version which is v1 i believe but I was not very pleased to work with the software. I think @Chariots is right. WM seems to provide much more control and it is node based. I would love to see the creators of substance designer creating a terrain tool…that might be a game changer as well.

[Maximum-Dev]

WM is cool. But progress and updates seem to have stopped for a long time now. So if you’re going for it don’t expect any support.

[nanthrox]

@Millionviews;567029

I tried the demo version which is v1 i believe but I was not very pleased to work with the software. I think @Chariots is right. WM seems to provide much more control and it is node based. I would love to see the creators of substance designer creating a terrain tool…that might be a game changer as well.

You tried the demo of World Creator 1 and not World Creator 2 which is completely new - check the videos on our website to see it in action. World Creator 1 is outdated but World Creator 2 brings terrain generation to a completely new level.

[Millionviews]

@nanthrox;567345

You tried the demo of World Creator 1 and not World Creator 2 which is completely new - check the videos on our website to see it in action. World Creator 1 is outdated but World Creator 2 brings terrain generation to a completely new level.

I see…so there will be a demo for v2 I assume? Any chance it will include node based editing?

[daveSchoneveld]

wow world creator 2 looks worth checking out when its out for all. I’ve used WM for a long time, but like everyone said, seems dead as theres no news for a year.

[nanthrox]

@Millionviews;569004

I see…so there will be a demo for v2 I assume? Any chance it will include node based editing?

In our very first iteration we had a node based system integrated but after testing it and playing around with it we quickly realized that a node based approach is not a good solution if it comes to create terrains - the current layer based system proofed to be more easy to understand and quickly to navigate - actually all our customers say that World Creator is by far more easy to use than any other terrain generator they own.

So we kept our layer based system and if you look at the few videos we have you can see that it is really easy and straight forward- When we used nodes, it was like “finding the proper node among 80 and more nodes” - actually the whole terrain design got stucked just because all our testers got lost between all the nodes - same when trying to find the proper node that you need to achieve a specific goal.

But nodes are still very powerful - look at our other tool called ShaderTool. Here it really makes sense :). So this was our experience with nodes so far - maybe we will integrate the possibility to switch betweek layers and nodes then propably everybody gets happy

[nanthrox]

@daveSchoneveld;569397

wow world creator 2 looks worth checking out when its out for all. I’ve used WM for a long time, but like everyone said, seems dead as theres no news for a year.

Thank you - I personaly love World Creator, playing around with it all day and it just makes fun to see changes instantly, tweaking variables and so on. I really hope that we get as many feedback as only possible from the Unreal community so that the internal decission gives a big YES

[TriNityGER]

I played around with Terragen in the past, got cool looking results(Though Im not an artist). Apparently they are now working on Terragen4: http://terragen4.com/

[Millionviews]

@nanthrox;569526

In our very first iteration we had a node based system integrated but after testing it and playing around with it we quickly realized that a node based approach is not a good solution if it comes to create terrains - the current layer based system proofed to be more easy to understand and quickly to navigate - actually all our customers say that World Creator is by far more easy to use than any other terrain generator they own.

So we kept our layer based system and if you look at the few videos we have you can see that it is really easy and straight forward- When we used nodes, it was like “finding the proper node among 80 and more nodes” - actually the whole terrain design got stucked just because all our testers got lost between all the nodes - same when trying to find the proper node that you need to achieve a specific goal.

But nodes are still very powerful - look at our other tool called ShaderTool. Here it really makes sense :). So this was our experience with nodes so far - maybe we will integrate the possibility to switch betweek layers and nodes then propably everybody gets happy

I totally agree that a node based system can create a super complex setup where you can get lost very easily. That is why the better node systems offers grouping and collapsing of branches.
How about the idea to have a node based system and use layers to make the individual nodes complexer as you go. For instance: node 1 contains a noise, node 2 an erosion node. I could add several filters (layers) on node 1 and call it the base terrain. I would love to see such a setup. Not only in your tool but general speaking.
Anyways, I am taking another road now as this thread was about WM vs WC.
I will follow WC 2, looking forward for a demo to play around.

[nanthrox]

@Millionviews;570680

I totally agree that a node based system can create a super complex setup where you can get lost very easily. That is why the better node systems offers grouping and collapsing of branches.
How about the idea to have a node based system and use layers to make the individual nodes complexer as you go. For instance: node 1 contains a noise, node 2 an erosion node. I could add several filters (layers) on node 1 and call it the base terrain. I would love to see such a setup. Not only in your tool but general speaking.
Anyways, I am taking another road now as this thread was about WM vs WC.
I will follow WC 2, looking forward for a demo to play around.

Sounds interesting - we will think about this