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/ Previews /
Shooters / Experience / Page 3
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Glad you decided to join us… if you don't know much about the Whole Experience engine… you're about to be amazed.
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It is true Experience should be a real gem to behold as a shooter with depth, but graphics are an intricate part of a game that can not be neglected if success is to occur, that is, in most cases. If you looked at a screenshot of System Shock 2, and then one of Unreal, which looks more appealing? From a purely visual standpoint, the Unreal one looks better by far. So when it comes to making a game that's going to hook players, it really is instrumental to have stunning graphics - and Experience goes one step beyond that. I'll still spend some time discussing the "WXP" engine's features, but you might be interested in these three exclusive screenshots we snagged, in both uncompressed and compressed versions. For the compressed copy, just click the screen itself; for the uncompressed copy, click "Uncompressed." Makes sense, right?
The first scene shows off an abandoned cyborg silo - and it looks very impressive. The detail and clarity is simply stunning, but it's the overall alien appearance that appeals to me most. The Whole Experience Team has gone beyond the call of duty in truly creating a world within a world… within a world. The other two screenshots showcase "detail textures" being used in Experience. A detail texture is a second (usually grayscale) texture that blends in with the original. When you approach a given object, the detail texture blends in with the original adding amazing detail and clarity unrivaled by most current games. When you're far away, only the base texture is shown to prevent an "overly tiled" effect that wouldn't look too great.
The WXP team is taking a different approach on creating stunning graphics. They have created a converter for Alias PowerAnimator so they can export scenes directly to the game's engine. This means they can output, say, a 16 square-kilometer level from Alias and within a few seconds be able to test it out in the game. There is also built in support for 3D Studio Max and Maya. Included with the game will be a full version of the scene editor. Jeff Connelly explains, "This allows people to bring in geometry from different modeling/animation programs, place lights, sounds, adjust detail textures, cubic environment maps, AI characters, etc… We will also include exporters for Alias, Maya, 3ds Max, and possibly SoftImage. All formats will be open so programmers can create their own converters if they need them."
A lot of thought is being put into making the game easily editable (not to be confused with edible, since that could get us into some law suits if you weren't clear on that). The environments that will be found in Dagoth Moor are enough to make a person salivate with anticipation, but I hadn't seen enough screenshots to really understand just how "alien" the architecture and environments would be compared to our own Earthly surroundings. The Whole Experience team responds: "The structures are all pretty unique. It's a lot of fun to design some weird mud hut with branches growing out of the top or creepy, scummy cyborg facility with demented, half working bio-mechanical experiments lurking about." Neat! It's always great to see developers take an interest in designing the weird and original, because a lot of game environments are very Earth-like in nature - even if they are in an alien world.
The actual WXP engine is loaded to the brim with neat sounding features, most of which don't make sense to me. I'm not an artist, nor do I program, I just play. Nevertheless, I think it's worth bringing up some of these features. The engine will have support for the next generation of 3D accelerators by taking advantage of 3D hardware's ability to process triangle strips and fans to accelerate vertex throughput. Sounds pretty cool, at least. All interaction that occurs is based on real time physical simulations, and the player will even be able to configure the physics for realism or an arcade style. Future 3D accelerators that will support hardware transform and lighting aren't forgotten either, and you can expect Experience supports this also. The list goes on and on… Every vertex in the game can be associated with a transparency value, objects may hold a variety of texture maps, and there is support for animated textures, particle effects, and scriptable hierarchical animation. Characters (and props) can even be animated with bones for single-mesh animations that can be controlled by scripts. Breaking away from the graphical side a bit, both A3d and EAX are being supported. Locations, characters, and even animations can have sounds attached to them, and 3D spatial audio will play a big role in the game.
That really is a mouthful. It boils down to Experience featuring one heck of an impressive engine with all kinds of support for people looking to create their own scenes and levels. We've got a conclusion summing everything up next, and the full interview text is following that.
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