2012/02/05 - Shadows and Shaders vs. Interiors and Terrain [Fan Art Too]

[Kill All]

If the only maps are going to be slates, how would the map making community work any more, it might get so low that there won't be a thread for it any more. And the saves for some stuff won't be as realistic as the maps are, the bedroom save is already too small as a save compared to the map. You would have to get tons of print bricks for a build like a map. Interiors and terrains has been with Blockland from the start. Is deleting it all just because of graphics, speed, and some codes that are hard to mess with worth it all? Think about it, please. For Blockland as we know it.

Although we are losing terrains and interiors, their removal will open up many doors which lead to the improvement of Blockland and new features. So you would rather have Blockland stay completely the same for a very long time, rather than having it improve immensely in the same amount of time. The sacrifice of the old is sometimes needed to create something that is new and better. It would also encourage actually building, which the game is based on. Furthermore, terrain builds don't involve using a crap ton of print bricks, and this update will be implemented whether you like it or not.

[Ad Bot]

[Awdax]

Isn't that what it does now?

Maybe, I'm not sure. The only reason I said screenshots would render every shadow sharp and high-quality, is because when playing the game only the shadow edges in your radius would be sharp and high-quality, for performance-sakes. You don't want a screenshot of your build where only the shadows near you are sharp, and the ones far away are blurry.

[Wesley Williams]

Although we are losing terrains and interiors, their removal will open up many doors which lead to the improvement of Blockland and new features. So you would rather have Blockland stay completely the same for a very long time, rather than having it improve immensely in the same amount of time. The sacrifice of the old is sometimes needed to create something that is new and better. It would also encourage actually building, which the game is based on. Furthermore, terrain builds don't involve using a crap ton of print bricks, and this update will be implemented whether you like it or not.

Terrain builds do use a crapton of bricks if you want them to look any good. But don't at all think that this is the end of maps, although it would be best if it was. Blockland maps have never quite fit with bricks. I would recommend that mappers let people utilize their own imaginations, rather than relying on that of others'.

[kompressor]

Good fan art ITT.

[Legodude77]

Did you like my video I made?

[Lørd Tøny]

Good fan art ITT.

What about mine?

[Lørd Tøny]

[kompressor]

This not good fan art ITT.

[David819]

Ontopic: I will miss you bedroom 

Edit: Kompresser your magical you posted above me.

[ThinkInvisible]

Will it be possible to have more than one sun, or shadows radiating from the center of the map?

[Toadzard]

I honestly can't be arsed to read 150 pages so if something's been said already, deal with it.

When I clicked on this topic and I scrolled down, I saw all those fan pages. I had no idea what was going on and if all this was as intense as I thought. Get rid of terrain and interiors? Those are fundamental components in Blockland! As I read more and more, I got more skeptical. Blockland is pretty old. Those shaders would end up looking like crap anyway and it wouldn't be worth the sacrifice.

Then I saw those screenshots and I immediately stuffed by fingers into my mouth to grab my jaw and prevent it from hitting the ground. Maybe that last part isn't real but what is true, is that I'm really impressed. This looks fantastic. I remember when I first got Blockland and with the release of the V9 update, I wondered what the future of the game will be with more content. I never ever ever thought Blockland, as an older game, could look as good as this and I'm completely blown away.

However, terrain and interiors had some decent pros past these developer cons. Skiing on The Slopes? That was probably the first thing I've ever done in Blockland all those years ago. Doing flips and soaring through the air and then tumbling down. That was and still is a lot of fun. So long to that. This is where people will start to protest about using bricks. Except bricks don't have the smooth curves that terrain does. You don't have to learn how to place terrain since it's already placed. Additionally, vehicles on bricks suck. Sometimes they glitch and clip into the bricks, rendering them stuck. Sometimes they manage to go all the way through. Skiing on smoothly curving slopes doesn't seem like it'll be coming back but I hope vehicle and brick interactions will be improved.


I'm also curious as to how the lack of variation in elevation and the removal of the visual elements of interiors and terrain plays in the mind of a new player. Maybe it'll force them to a higher and more intense level of imagination. Or something. Let's face it. Building and especially building decently in Blockland is hard to learn. But I'm not a new player and I can't react except with the sudden removal of things I've grown used to.

I also noticed a pretty funny thing. This new update will focus on the "block" part of the name Blockland whereas previously, it was about the "land".
lololololol

[SWAT One]

Unless Blockland is eventually put on a new engine. Never say impossible!
Right now you can imitate having multiple suns by using particles that float across the sky like in GSF maps.

That only has to do with the sky textures, and you know that.  He's talking about multiple global suns.

Question for kompressor:  with projectiles that have light glow as defined in the scripts have shadows?

[kompressor]

Question for kompressor:  with projectiles that have light glow as defined in the scripts have shadows?

How slow are you prepared for the game to run?

[SWAT One]

How slow are you prepared for the game to run?

I was asking rather will they not have shadows due to that script.

[kompressor]

BTW for those of you not reading the OP, this is offtopic:

"Let's keep both interiors and terrain AND shadows and shaders." -- Check the thread title for a hint on this.

Not having that discussion in this thread.