Hard Light Productions Forums

Modding, Mission Design, and Coding => FS2 Open Coding - The Source Code Project (SCP) => Topic started by: JC Denton on July 19, 2002, 10:11:07 am

Title: Using DX8.1 pointsprites to replace particle trails
Post by: JC Denton on July 19, 2002, 10:11:07 am

By particle trails I mean the little fiery stuff when you hit a target.  Since daveb thought it'd be neat to upgrade the FS2 engine to the DirectX 8.1 standard, here's my proposal:  replace the particle glows with pointsprites.  Several advantages:

1) The effect is much more realistic-looking, complete with the "streaking" effect when the particles are in motion.

2) We can add bits to the code to make for race-specific glowtrails (i.e. gold for Terran, green for Vasudan, red for Shivan)

3) Darn it, it just looks cool. :D

Of course, the major downfall with this technique is that not all video cards support it.  I know it works on a Geforce3/4 (since that's what I'm using), but how's I get user feedback on the effect?  I've got a demo you can download here (http://quantium40.port5.com/other/pointsprites.zip).  Please note you will have to have the latest version of DirectX to even see the effect.

Just a slightly tweaked version of the DX81SDK sample.

As it's currently set, the glow doesn't shoot up very high.  Since the current particle trails in FS2 don't go fountaining out of a corvette when you shoot it, I thought the same should be applied to this.  

There's even a framerate counter in the corner (and this demo supports reflection mapping, but you can turn that off :) )  

I am having problems with it, however.  First and foremost, I can't tell the thing to kill the old particles when they get to so high off the ground.  Therefore, I can't tell it to use zero-gravity in the demo to properly simulate what it'll do in the FS2 engine.  If you want to see the source for it, I'll post up the link.

Title: Using DX8.1 pointsprites to replace particle trails
Post by: phreak on July 19, 2002, 10:19:41 am

this page can not be found

Title: Using DX8.1 pointsprites to replace particle trails
Post by: Bobboau on July 19, 2002, 10:32:01 am

yup, bad link

you'll need to get dx8 into FS first, I'd love to see just this if you can

Title: Using DX8.1 pointsprites to replace particle trails
Post by: LtNarol on July 19, 2002, 10:44:33 am

<- poor; gots a 32meg-16bit-offbrand-peiceofyouknowwhat-10buck 3d accelerator.

Please tell me all I need is DirectX 8.1 for this :D

Title: Using DX8.1 pointsprites to replace particle trails
Post by: JC Denton on July 19, 2002, 10:48:00 am

:o

Oops. :D Typed the filename in wrong.

Try again.

Title: Using DX8.1 pointsprites to replace particle trails
Post by: ##UnknownPlayer## on July 19, 2002, 10:59:00 am

Very pretty, but if we're gonna bring DX8 into Freespace I think we'd need to organize some collaboration - that's a fairly large task. However, if we're doing this may I suggest we also get hardware T&L in there?

Title: Using DX8.1 pointsprites to replace particle trails
Post by: phreak on July 19, 2002, 12:32:27 pm

its not working on my GF2

i have the newest drivers and DX8.1b

Title: Using DX8.1 pointsprites to replace particle trails
Post by: Inquisitor on July 19, 2002, 12:34:34 pm

agreed on the collaboration, and we probably should avoid card specific implementations.

Let's get the DX8 interested coders into a chat some time in the next week, I have some ideas I want to explore on a DX upgrade.

Title: Using DX8.1 pointsprites to replace particle trails
Post by: vadar_1 on July 19, 2002, 12:54:32 pm

Not working for me... i have the latest DX, but i keep getting loads of errors before it crashes. Dispite its so called "brilliance"... you might need to find something more... "universal".

Title: Using DX8.1 pointsprites to replace particle trails
Post by: DTP on July 19, 2002, 01:08:23 pm

invalid file, download again.

dam cache, dont want to restart right now.

Title: Using DX8.1 pointsprites to replace particle trails
Post by: Redfang on July 19, 2002, 01:55:21 pm

If I'd have a better computer, I'd try it out...
 
Radeon 8500 and newer support pointsprites, and I think Radeon 7500 does too (works in 3Dmark2001), but it's very slow with them. I'm not sure if Geforce 2 supports it or not.
 
But I don't think that the particles look too bad at the moment, and this works only on newer video cards so at least it should have an option to turn it on/off. :)

Title: Using DX8.1 pointsprites to replace particle trails
Post by: JC Denton on July 19, 2002, 02:24:08 pm

:sigh: Oh well, another idea of mine that falls on its face...guess this is a "GF3+ and Radeon 7500+"-only trick then...

(http://dynamic4.gamespy.com/~freespace/ubb/noncgi/icons/icon3.gif)IDEA!!!(http://dynamic4.gamespy.com/~freespace/ubb/noncgi/icons/icon3.gif)

We could add this effect (not replace the current one) and add a card capability detect so that if the card doesn't support the pointsprites it'll default to the original particle fx.  The DirectX SDK has pretty good documentation on this "feature-finder" implement.

Title: Using DX8.1 pointsprites to replace particle trails
Post by: phreak on July 19, 2002, 02:49:28 pm

can someone post a screenie so we can see what it looks like?

Title: Using DX8.1 pointsprites to replace particle trails
Post by: JC Denton on July 19, 2002, 04:16:00 pm

Here ya go.  But it's so much better when it's animating. :nod:

(http://quantium40.port5.com/images/particlesprite.jpg)

Title: Using DX8.1 pointsprites to replace particle trails
Post by: phreak on July 19, 2002, 05:08:58 pm

is there some texture that i need to run it?

Title: Using DX8.1 pointsprites to replace particle trails
Post by: JC Denton on July 19, 2002, 07:34:05 pm

no, it all comes prepacked in one little, efficient exe file that I conveniently zipped up to save you some download time.  Everything is built in (but then that may be the problem-GF2s don't support some DX81 features methinks).

Of course, if you have enough money you might be able to pick up a decent GF3 for around/under $100.  That is, if you don't mind running something by PNY or eVGA.

But back to the DirectX upgrade.  What exactly will it involve?

Title: Using DX8.1 pointsprites to replace particle trails
Post by: DragonClaw on July 19, 2002, 08:22:11 pm

I'm using a GeForce3 Ti200...

says "could not load required media"     ???

I have the latest DX8.1 installed...

Title: Using DX8.1 pointsprites to replace particle trails
Post by: DTP on July 19, 2002, 08:28:06 pm

ditto, could not load required media.
---------

media, what media. do we have to place it somewhere special

Title: Using DX8.1 pointsprites to replace particle trails
Post by: Inquisitor on July 19, 2002, 10:41:02 pm

Every DX tutorial set I have ever seen had a card detect function. I could deal with that.

JC, how are you with DX8? I am guessing we need a good, full overhaul first, update DX5 functions to 8, input, graphics, the whole shebang.

Pop into IRC sometime or catch me on ICQ :)

Title: Using DX8.1 pointsprites to replace particle trails
Post by: JC Denton on July 19, 2002, 11:14:28 pm

hmm. okay, try this file (quantium40.port5.com/other/pointsprite_package.zip) and see if it works.  if it doesn't then maybe I'm doing something horrendously wrong and not knowing it.

As for my directx skills?  wanting.  I barely understand C++, but hopefully that'll be remedied in a few months.  If you can point me to an online crash course that'd be helpful.

I'm learning by poking the code and seeing what happens.  Not unlike what Bobboau did, and see where he's at?

Title: Using DX8.1 pointsprites to replace particle trails
Post by: ##UnknownPlayer## on July 20, 2002, 12:55:39 am

If you're learning by poking the code, might I suggest also getting the Half-Life SDK? Taught me a lot through it. It's also faster to compile then the Freespace exe.

Title: Using DX8.1 pointsprites to replace particle trails
Post by: Martinus on July 20, 2002, 08:40:23 am

Quote

Originally posted by ##UnknownPlayer##
If you're learning by poking the code, might I suggest also getting the Half-Life SDK? Taught me a lot through it. It's also faster to compile then the Freespace exe.

Speaking of which doesn't the HL SDK have some of the best networking code available? If so would it not be a fairly hot item to incorporate into FS's engine?

Title: Using DX8.1 pointsprites to replace particle trails
Post by: JC Denton on July 20, 2002, 12:59:37 pm

Well, if I had Half-Life that'd be great, eh? :(

And if I ever got HL that would be one more reason to never leave home.

Title: Using DX8.1 pointsprites to replace particle trails
Post by: Kazan on July 20, 2002, 01:15:47 pm

we already have the freespace 2 TCP/IP code

they just ripped out PXO, we can easily write a new chat server and list server

and it's a good idea, but since so few video cards support it and it doesn't give that much of a visual increase this feature is IMPO pointless