[A2597]

I did a search, saw that a year or so ago there was a WiP version of it...

and that 8 months ago someone asked about it again...and it was "A matter of time, but not hte foreseeable future"...

well, 8 months later now. Any word on shadows? That would be, simply put: FRAKING AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Kazan]

they were removed from the engine because they were too farking expensive

[karajorma]

They were removed from the engine because Bobboau only hacked them in to test what was possible. Shadows wouldn't always be that expensive as Bobboau said he learned lots of things as he was adding them and could see all kinds of optimisations that could be made.

As such the code for shadows was never even submitted to CVS in the first place AFAIK.

[IPAndrews]

Shadows too expensive? (looks in the direction of Silent Hill 2 on the PS2). This thread has appeared at a good time actually. I was going to ask about this myself. If there's any way the work on stencil shadows can be resumed then I do believe it's well worth doing. Surely they are the last big important visual effect missing from the game engine. I'm imaginging a small ship casting a large shadow over a bigger ship as it passes in front of a star and it looks very impressive indeed. I can imagine it being an enormous pain to implement but it would be the jewel in the crown. What's more, PCs are getting faster day by day so what's expensive now may be insignificant in a couple of years.

[karajorma]

Like I said I don't think it was the expense so much as the fact that Bobboau knew his code was too shoddy to be committed. Then afterwards he went off to design the material system after which shadows would return in a properly programmed fashion. We're still waiting for both.

[CP5670]

IIRC it was actually Dave who originally brought this idea up.

I don't think you would generally notice shadows cast from one ship onto another (they would need to be in just the right positions), but shadows from ships onto themselves would look really neat. The four big guns and two pillar things on the top of the Hecate, for example, could cast shadows on the rest of the ship.

[A2597]

as IPAndrews said, it is the last major visual element really missing from the game. (Shaders are awesome, don't get me wrong!!!)

Just curious if there are plans to revisit them again in the near future really. Would be SWEET!

[Mathwiz6]

I agree, it would be a good idea to put them in, for preparation or somesuch.

Eventually hardware will be able to support it, and having a code ready for that time would be nice.

[Mars]

And one day there will be real-time photon calculation for games, that doesn't mean they should have the code standing by.

[A2597]

I don't nessasarily mean put the current code in, but maybe revisit them to get them done in a better form...dare I say, even soft shadows?

[Nuke]

dont most current video cards support hardware shadows? i mean seeing as most games sence unreal 2 had shadows, and that they really dont hurt performance that much if you have hardware support for them. shadows just add so much to the game and the imersion hey create in a space sim would be awesome. i think they would look awesome in combination with kazan's planned asteroid revamp.

[Mehrpack]

dont most current video cards support hardware shadows? i mean seeing as most games sence unreal 2 had shadows, and that they really dont hurt performance that much if you have hardware support for them. shadows just add so much to the game and the imersion hey create in a space sim would be awesome. i think they would look awesome in combination with kazan's planned asteroid revamp.

hi,
shadow isnt shadow.

theres serval ways to make shawdows and there are many types of shadows that you generate / programm.

and shadows need doesnt priceless, shadows need every time resource.
some way more, some way less, but isnt priceless.

but yes self-shadowing of the ships will be nice and shadow of other ships too.

Mehrpack

[CP5670]

shadow isnt shadow.

[Chris B. Yond]

If they make good use of the "stencil buffer" they won't cost that much performance.

Honestly I don't think we need them at all. There are just three possible situations involving shadow-casting: ship-on-ship, ship-on-station and ship on asteroid in close proximity. And, in theory, you'll need a very bright lightsource to get a detailed shadow. The "casual sun" won't be enough. If we aim for realism, that is...

[Zacam]

more like:

ship-on-ship, ship-on-self, ship-on-station, station-on-ship, station-on-self, ship-on-asteroid, asteroid-on-ship, asteroid-on-self

Then add the intricacies of lighting with things other than the ambient light source such as warpholes, beam effects, explosions, etc all to dynamically interact with all of the above.

[DaBrain]

Ok.. we got high-res maps, expensive animated effects, spec mapping, glow maps, env mapping and a lot of other things.

There will soon be normal mapping and shader support. Those two will push my mashine to the limit already... self shadows will probably make it unplayable for me.

I don't mind. I won't hold back any feature. I'll probably be able to use all the nice features later with better hardware. So I got something to look forward too. But don't request too much at the same time. Those new features are pefrormance killers! (Excep for pixel shaders, that my speed up things, but I doubt they'll be used only for this. )

[IPAndrews]

* looks back at Silent Hill 2 on the PS2 again *

[IPAndrews]

Ok, ok. Looks we all appreciate it's very complicated. I think anyone with a brain can consider all the objects in your average game of FS2, all the associated polygons, and all the pesky angles when calculating shadows to them. To be honest I wouldn't know how to approach adding shadows into the game engine. I wouldn't even try. My maths is terrible. I'm not going to assume it's enormously expensive though just because I don't know how to do it. I would imagine the expense is dependent on the poly efficiency of your models. So it would work better in say TBP than it would in BSG (that Battlestar would cause a headache).

[Col. Fishguts]

You could use the lower LODs for the "source" of the shadow, y'know.

I still hope that shadows will one day be implemented.

[Flaser]

The "casual sun" won't be enough. If we aim for realism, that is...

That's wrong...

In space that would be more than enough. Remeber there is nothing between you and the lightsource to disperse the light.
Actually far out you could handle the sun as a mere directional lightsource (so shadows would be paralell projections of the sillouettes.)