2013/05/14 - Blockland r1864

[King Leo]

on that topic, what should they be working on?

attaching our limbs to our bodies? built-in ironsights? a constant, persistent brown bloom filter? dogs?

We had a little discussion on Tophius' server yesterday and came to the conclusion that the building system needs to be improved. It would be especially nice if bricks could be rotated more freely and off-grid. I know we used to have this in pre-retail, but it was too resource hungry and inefficient. I also know that bricks are treated completely different now. But if somehow this could be implemented again, it would seriously lead to a whole new era of Blockland. It would be V23! The above problem is probably my only problem with building in current Blockland, but the issue is pretty severe. I've talked to "professional" builders from MocPages and they said that Blockland would be very interesting, if it weren't for those limitations.
Personally, I would trade both shaders and bots/vehicles for something like this! (I know that isn't an option, I'm only trying to illustrate how much I want this)   

[Ad Bot]

[Bushido]

all i really want at this point is an improved vehicle system

i mean, yes, building is the core of blockland, but simultaneously i feel that building doesn't really have a point unless you can do something with it, and as far as sheer game-osity goes there's like an entire world of stuff we haven't been able to really pull off (go-karts, for one :V) because of the stuff vehicle collisions n whatnot

[King Leo]

The vehicle physics are in such a bad condition that I don't consider Blockland as a possible racing game or driving simulator. Compared to almost any other game with cars in it, our vehicles behave like stuff. I mean, don't even get me started on planes...

I think Blockland should perfect its core mechanics (building) first, then move on to other stuff such as vehicles. That would differentiate use from the rest of the games on the market and give us a unique niche. Currently, the building in BL is just a glorified version of Minecrafts building system, although with more bricks. But we can't really offer anything to those hardcore builders who use LCad or real LEGO. On the other hand, the vehicle physics and weapon systems are quite bad. So noone is gonna choose BlL over, say, Garry's Mod. There are litterally thousands of games that do shooting and driving better than BL. So in order to make BL appeal to a larger audience, I think improved building mechanics is the way to go.

[sir dooble]

I think Blockland should perfect its core mechanics (building) first, then move on to other stuff such as vehicles. That would differentiate use from the rest of the games on the market and give us a unique niche. Currently, the building in BL is just a glorified version of Minecrafts building system, although with more bricks. But we can't really offer anything to those hardcore builders who use LCad or real LEGO.

What sort of suggestion would you have to specialise the Building System then?
Personally, the only way I can see that our system is like Minecrafts is that it's grid-based.

Surely the only thing you could offer to make it more unique would be to remove the grid entirely, as you suggested?
But that would obviously just complicate things greatly and would most likely require a complete overhaul of Blockland or to start from scratch.

I don't know what else you would change about Blockland to accomplish anything more.
Unless maybe it was things like hinges, and bar pieces and clip pieces that fit together, like Lego has?

[King Leo]

What sort of suggestion would you have to specialise the Building System then?
Personally, the only way I can see that our system is like Minecrafts is that it's grid-based.

Surely the only thing you could offer to make it more unique would be to remove the grid entirely, as you suggested?
But that would obviously just complicate things greatly and would most likely require a complete overhaul of Blockland or to start from scratch.

I don't know what else you would change about Blockland to accomplish anything more.
Unless maybe it was things like hinges, and bar pieces and clip pieces that fit together, like Lego has?

That was exactly what I was thinking: removing the grid. Or keeping the grid, but allow for more rotation on the grid. Maybe the bricks could contain information about how they are rotated as well, in addition to where they are placed on the grid. This is most likely not a possibility at this point, as it would require a complete overhaul, as you said. But one must be allowed to dream, right?

[sir dooble]

But one must be allowed to dream, right?

Of course!
It'd be really interesting to see. Would certainly make the game unique.
Ignoring the issues that would come with implementing (or trying to) it would be a great addition to the game.

[ShadowZero]

I remember before Badspot said a long time ago that one day Blockland could have a Technic like system.


It would be nice to have an update based on moving platform bricks or something.

[Jay the Cartoonist]

From what I'm aware of:  The grid is the reason Blockland is stable and efficient.  Without the grid it would lag like a bitch.  This is why beta RTB blockland lagged, and it's why Roblox lags. 

[Treynolds416]

Sorry guys but abandoning the grid is a bad idea and isn't going to happen. We don't really need to discuss this further because it's already been summed up:

But one must be allowed to dream, right?

Of course!

[Renekar]

Ahem
https://twitter.com/Badspot

omfg lol

[MegaScientifical]

This is why beta RTB blockland lagged, and it's why Roblox lags. 

You mean Blockland v0002 in general. Even with more of the game code accessible, mod makers couldn't change much of the code to combat lag caused by an abundance of bricks, since they are all just dynamic objects like the player. As for the grid, it simplifies calculations because the game can assume various things which with dynamic objects it would have to constantly track and calculate. Most significantly, brick positions can be assumed and simply adjusted by whatever specifications a brick has. Rendering them is easier because of this assumption of location. In most cases collision follows the rendering boundaries of a brick, and otherwise can be taken over by an invisible shape. It works much better than having tons of dynamic objects, with the tradeoff that, unlike in real life, we can't toss bricks at each other normally.

[King Leo]

What if bricks still would be static, but with more rotateability? You can rotate the current bricks, after all...

[Darksaber2213]

What if bricks still would be static, but with more rotateability? You can rotate the current bricks, after all...

Bricks aren't static shapes though.

[King Leo]

Bricks aren't static shapes though.

Then make them whatever class bricks are...

[jes00]

Then make them whatever class bricks are...

fxDTSBrick.