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[ScepticMatt]

Core Theme: Procedural generation as much as possible, removing months of extra work.

Terrain Edit: Novigrad, one of 3 main areas
Generated with World Machine
46x46 tiles, 512x512 each (23552^2), 63MB
0.37cm between vertices, ~74 km^2 total (35 times Witcher 2)

adaptive software tessellation (no "wasted triangles")

3 texture layers: Background (e.g rock), Foreground (e.g. snow), Control map (e.g slope)

Terrain shadows

Vegetation:
Custom vegetation generator

pigment map for better blend with ground color

Photoshop-like stamp/brush-Tool for fine tuning

Other:
16 people working on Engine.
Automatic occlusion culling + streaming with Umbra.

Automatic LOD generation with Simplogon. Artist created in Witcher 2, and "they hated it".

Links:
Terrain and vegetation: http://twvideo01.ubm-us.net/o1/vault/GDC2014/Presentations/Gollent_Marcin_Landscape_Creation_and.pdf
Simplogon LOD generator: http://twvideo01.ubm-us.net/o1/vault/GDC2014/Presentations/Balazs_Torok_Speed_Up_Your.pdf
Umbra 3 culling + Streaming: http://twvideo01.ubm-us.net/o1/vault/GDC2014/Presentations/Bushnaief_Jasin_Solving_Visibility_In.pdf

Correct me if wrong, tessellate if old.

 

[drexplora]

geez.. wealth of information!!
Thanks, gonna try and sift through this as quick as I can before the NVidia keynote

 

[iNvid02]

another game falls victim to the downgrade trend, just appalling

 

[ScepticMatt]

another game falls victim to the downgrade trend, just appalling

lol, that's an early shot, it doesn't even have vegetation besides trees.
Edit: If that's I joke post, I missed it

 

[Shining Sunshine]

Well at least there's Witcher stuff from GDC.

 

[Binabik15]

another game falls victim to the downgrade trend, just appalling

Must be because people can stream the PS4 version to Vita!

 

[cheezcake]

another game falls victim to the downgrade trend, just appalling

Please let this be a joke post

 

[RoboPlato]

another game falls victim to the downgrade trend, just appalling

I don't know who's kidding and who's serious about stuff like this any more.

 

[drexplora]

another game falls victim to the downgrade trend, just appalling

that's likely a shot from a dev's editor.
When working with different software, dev's like to strip away the "layers of detail" to make it easier to work on whatever component they are tasked with.

though I suspect you weren't serious

edit: besides aint that top shot using the old witcher 2 renderer?

 

[Phil4000]

another game falls victim to the downgrade trend, just appalling

These are game development alpha slides and are not meant to be marketing material...

 

[Skelter]

Please let this be a joke post

It has to be.

 

[tauke]

Interesting that they use World Machine to generate the world. Only familiar of Terragen or Vue for landscape creation and this is the first time I heard of World Machine.

 

[drexplora]

These are game development alpha slides and are not ment to be marketing material...

LOOK!!
they've done away with textures for better tessellation
downgrade am us!!

 

[FACE]

another game falls victim to the downgrade trend, just appalling

I thought CDPR was one of the good guys

 

[DieH@rd]

 

[Portugeezer]

God dammit

 

[iNvid02]

I thought CDPR was one of the good guys

this is what happens when they have to accommodate the "next gen" consoles

RIP


im kidding, i have complete faith in cdpr

 

[GameAddict411]

is it really difficult for them to release a gameplay demo?

 

[Ciastek3214]

Oh my God the downgrade!

 

[Pop]

Welp, it was good while it lasted.

 

[flyinpiranha]

Glorious. Such a Looooooong wait, though.

 

[injurai]

another game falls victim to the downgrade trend, just appalling

2/10

You were right in thinking points were at stake. But you started with 10 and lost 8 for the shoehorned joke.

 

[anexanhume]

Bethesda has been big on procedural generation for a while. I wonder how much they were lagging them. (was also reminded of Morrowind with the Umbra sword)

 

[FACE]

this is what happens when they have to accommodate the "next gen" consoles

RIP


im kidding, i have complete faith in cdpr

I know

That Umbra link is not working for me.

 

[Fine Ham Abounds]

Really interesting stuff, thanks for the links.

 

[SpacePirate Ridley]

Core Theme: Procedural generation as much as possible, removing months of extra work.

Terrain
Generated with World Machine
46x46 tiles, 512x512 each (23552^2), 63MB
0.37cm between vertices, ~74 km^2 total (35 times Witcher 2)

I know this comparison is known for not being to good but that means the world is as big as Fuel. EDIT The number before miles doesnt mean km.

Makes sense:

Of course this is aprox, with map location for 3 gathered on all the info and videos they have shown (Novigrad and Skellige Islands have appeared on trailers, while Cintra and No Man's land have been hinted).

 

[sunofsam]

So gonna upgrade my CPU/MOBO for this. Goodbye 2500k. Hello???

 

[Thaumaturgic Tomato]

Witcher 3 engine developers kit to be available for $15/month for indies. No royalties and totally beginner friendly graphical node based interface

 

[ScepticMatt]

I know this comparison is known for not being to good but that means the world is as big as Fuel.

You're wrong, it's 74km^2, neither 5500km^2 nor 5500mi^2
Skyrim is 37.1km^2, GTAV is 125km^2
Though how much of that is playable is a different question.

 

[SpacePirate Ridley]

You're wrong, it's 74km^2, neither 5500km^2 nor 5500mi^2
Skyrim is 37.1km^2
Though how much of that is playable is a different question.

Ah my bad, thought the 74 before the miles was km.

 

[dreamfall]

In. My. Veins.

I've got a ton of faith in CDPR. The Witcher 3 is going to be glorious!

 

[Neuromancer]

Why is Cartman in this game?

 

[Aeana]

Procedurally generated world? I'd so much rather a smaller, hand designed world.

 

[ScepticMatt]

Procedurally generated world? I'd so much rather a smaller, hand designed world.

Well to be accurate it's "hand-tuned".

 

[noonespecial]

Hah hah hah at the map dimensions of Daggerfall. I knew it was enormous but I had no idea it was nearly that large. 62,394 square miles? Wow.

 

[Aeana]

Well to be accurate it's "hand-tuned".

Better than procedurally generated on demand, at least.

 

[TheHall]

Procedurally generated world? I'd so much rather a smaller, hand designed world.

Technically, our real life world is procedurally generated, so it should feel more authentic.

ish... sorta.

 

[RoboPlato]

Procedurally generated world? I'd so much rather a smaller, hand designed world.

Me too but the only practical way you're going to get the massive scale that they're going for with Witcher 3 is through procedural generation.

 

[anexanhume]

Technically, our real life world is procedurally generated, so it should feel more authentic.

ish... sorta.

dat tectonics.

The parts that matter will be hand-designed. The procedural parts will be for scale, and not story elements or finely tuned combat encounters.

 

[Neuromancer]

Procedurally generated world? I'd so much rather a smaller, hand designed world.

I would imagine all open world games are procedurally generated on some level these days.

 

[Seanspeed]

Procedurally generated world? I'd so much rather a smaller, hand designed world.

I'm pretty sure its a bit of a mix.

The procedural generation is just to provide a groundwork for the landscape that doesn't involve them having to place every little shrub and dirt hole and elevation change by hand. I'm sure they'll still go over things and probably do a lot of work to the areas around locations, which will likely be mostly hand-done.

 

[SpacePirate Ridley]

Better than procedurally generated on demand, at least.

Yeah, you will still have things like big forests with interesting locations inside like Brokilon.
I think it more like for the majority of trees, rocks and shrubs.

They still need to make it the same as the existing map in the books and games.

 

[Durante]

I'm extremely surprised they used manual LOD modeling in Witcher 2. There have been great algorithms for automatic LOD mesh generation for quite some time now.

 

[eot]

Procedurally generated world? I'd so much rather a smaller, hand designed world.

A good algorithm is going to make a better looking mountain than a 3D artist and do it much more efficiently. The artist can still decide where the mountain is, how big it is, some unique features etc. the procedural generation they're talking about is just there so that no one has to place every single grass sprite in the world and shit like that.

 

[ScepticMatt]

Hah hah hah at the map dimensions of Daggerfall. I knew it was enormous but I had no idea it was nearly that large. 62,394 square miles? Wow.

The map is twice as big as Great Britain, or landmass half as big as Great Britian

 

[drexplora]

procedural generation of game assets for example, is something that helps developer's make rich content filled worlds.
It's something that helps give them more time to work on the things that matter.
It's something that's going to get better and bigger in scope as time goes on, and I imagine it's something that is going to be more widely used as the fidelity and depth in our games increase.

Each gen for example, a developer's list of things to model increases, as more details are transferred from texture to geometry. You either begin to increase your work force, outsource more stuff, or come up with cool efficient tricks that help you produce the assets with minimal or 0 work.

 

[Seanspeed]

So question:

What performance attribute contributes most to limited draw distance and associated LOD? This is something that I feel hurts open world environments the most. How can that be improved?

 

[DieH@rd]

Procedurally generated world? I'd so much rather a smaller, hand designed world.

Just the base look of the world is procedurally made, so that they would not waste time making mountains and river beds. After that comes hand tuning.

 

[sankt-Antonio]

Lots of "Goals" and "Targets" in those powerpoint slides. Funny that the OP cut that out in his crops of pics.

 

[UrbanRats]

So question:

What performance attribute contributes most to limited draw distance and associated LOD? This is something that I feel hurts open world environments the most. How can that be improved?

I'm curious, too.