dynamic shadows only on objects you can manipulate

[sk1llfatal]

everything you can somehow manipulate has a "dynamic shadow". you can see this in many scenes of the e32004 full vid. the man sitting at the trainstation, the cranes shadow under the box its carrying and a head or something in the lab, which is on a table, but its shadow is under the table.
furthermore there are no dynamic light sources (please proove me wrong).
i also found something interesting int eh articles section, valve said that the mapper defines the light source for the whole map, and the shadows of all the obejcts and people are heading to the opposite direction.
so with all this said, is the source engine still up2date?

 

[SMT]

Up2date, in addition to not being a real word, is an arbitrary distinction.

 

[sk1llfatal]

yes but take a look at farcry or doom3, with these dynamic lights and all the real time rendered shadows, looks fantastic.
i will love hl2 without this feature, but it wouldve been cool

 

[SMT]

Far Cry has only limited support for dynamic lighting; not all lights are dynamic. Valve asserts that Source is much the same way. Half-Life 2's gameplay is such that it doesn't appear to necessitate fully dynamic environment shadows. Doom 3's gameplay (oh look out, a rocket launcher skeleton IN TEH SH4D0WS!!!) obviously does.

I agree with you that it's a great feature, but there are plenty of cases where great conceptual features turn out to be impractical or unnecessary practical features. Remote Assistance in Windows XP, anyone?

 

[sk1llfatal]

youre right of course, but from what ive seen in all the vids, farcry has far more dynamic stuff than hl2, but well. farcry doesnt have the great physics and facial animations

 

[Crusader]

Hmm.. I don't think setting up one light source and having everything shadow from that is how they are doing it. That would be sub Half-Life technology.

I remember valve saying in an email, that if you shot a particular light it would swing and the shadows it was casting would move realistically.

I must qualify this by saying, that I didn't believe it when I heard it, and assumed the guy from Valve didn't understand the question. But that info did come from Valve.

I guess one of the reasons the binks aren't coming out right away, is that they are fixing some of the issues that have been pointed out such as the lack of shadows for the table etc. before they record them. That way we can't pick them apart like we do everything else! At least, that's my guess.


Edit: Btw, the Doom 3 lighting isn't fully dynamic, either, there are lightmaps in addition to the dynamic lights according to my Doom 3 fanboy friends.

 

[sk1llfatal]

yes i read that too
but look at all the shadows in the vid, they are NOT dynamic, so why should the shadows move around when a lamp swings. i know the email youre talking about, but i dont believe them

 

[mrk]

Far Cry has only limited support for dynamic lighting; not all lights are dynamic. Valve asserts that Source is much the same way. Half-Life 2's gameplay is such that it doesn't appear to necessitate fully dynamic environment shadows. Doom 3's gameplay (oh look out, a rocket launcher skeleton IN TEH SH4D0WS!!!) obviously does.

I agree with you that it's a great feature, but there are plenty of cases where great conceptual features turn out to be impractical or unnecessary practical features. Remote Assistance in Windows XP, anyone?

i find remote assistance and access very useful since i help people out alot via MSN i fins remote assistance very handy in showing people what I am on about in my tech support thank you very much!

 

[Rupertvdb]

they are still bug fixing so we may well be seeing improvements in all these aspects.

 

[SMT]

i find remote assistance and access very useful since i help people out alot via MSN i fins remote assistance very handy in showing people what I am on about in my tech support thank you very much!

It's useful in that particular situation, granted. But the problem is that a vast majority of users either:

A. Don't even know that Remote Assistance exists
B. Know Remote Assistance exists but don't use it

For the above users, Remote Assistance loses its appeal and becomes nothing but a gaping security hole to exploit. But I don't want to take the thread off-topic, so I'm going to shut up at that.

 

[sk1llfatal]

well rupert, its not a bug, its a missing feature

 

[Brian Damage]

That thing with the misaligned shadows was explained as a bug in the map compile, IIRC.

 

[Apos]

valve said that the mapper defines the light source for the whole map, and the shadows of all the obejcts and people are heading to the opposite direction.

Problem is, this doesn't seem to be the case. If you watch the Ravenholm sequence, you see that the shadows of the boards change direction depending on where they are in relation to the light in the shack.

By and large, HL2's lighting quality is much higher quality than other games: it lights characters with soft shadows with all sorts of highlights and specularity and so forth, light as well as shadow. It's not clear whether these high quality effects come only with the lightmaps or only with special dynamic lights, or both, but the bottom line is that they reproduce pretty much the most important element of Doom3: the ability for things to hide in shadows and then slowly creep out of them with the shadow crawling over their body.

The only thing they can't do is cast a shadow from one moveable object/character onto another, which really isn't that big of a deal. And it's something that could be easily upgraded later on.

 

[Shuzer]

Regarding that e-mail, I sent that in and asked. Unfortunately, Rick never said it'd cast shadows, only that you'd see the light bobbing around

That said, we all know HL2 SUPPORTS dyanmic lights.. but unfortunately, my question was neither detailed enough, nor was his response

 

[Apos]

but look at all the shadows in the vid, they are NOT dynamic, so why should the shadows move around when a lamp swings.

Cus source uses a wide variety of different effects in different places.

 

[Feath]

furthermore there are no dynamic light sources (please proove me wrong).

http://collective.valve-erc.com/ind...06159033732043100&question=106159973097589800

 

[lans]

yes i read that too
but look at all the shadows in the vid, they are NOT dynamic, so why should the shadows move around when a lamp swings. i know the email youre talking about, but i dont believe them

No video card can probably handle fully dynamic light sources and shadows...I mean that would eat up your processor. Doom 3 does it best and most, but it too has to use old tech (lightmaps) in places so that those who want to post ("I played the game with a Ti4200!") can at least boast they played the game.

Anyway, I'm sure when Gordon is alone standing in a hallway with no enemies might use dynamic shadows/light sources, but only in some places. Otherwise expect lightmaps.HL2 does indeed support Dynamic lighting as said by Gabe.

 

[Apos]

By the way sk1llfatal: I seeeee you.

 

[sk1llfatal]

thanks for you replies, its just this vid with all the wrong shadows you know.
btw lans:
look at all the emails that were sent to valve. the source engine can handle so much stuff, but they dont use it for whatever reason

 

[PatPwnt]

Doom 3's gameplay (oh look out, a rocket launcher skeleton IN TEH SH4D0WS!!!) obviously does.:

lol lerskatecharacter

 

[RoguePsi]

I understood that both HL2's and D3's engines could handle dynamic lighting but due to the nature of the games, D3 simply uses it more. Plus Source uses other stuff which the Doom 3 engine doesn't, so it cant spend as much processing time on the lighting without making the game suffer.

Probably wrong.

 

[lans]

thanks for you replies, its just this vid with all the wrong shadows you know.
btw lans:
look at all the emails that were sent to valve. the source engine can handle so much stuff, but they dont use it for whatever reason

Their so called "Design choice" - so that lower end systems can handle it. pfft, everyone should by now has to have vid cards that can support the damn game considering it's development cycle.

Gordon has no hands while driving?

Gabe: Design choice.

Gordon has no reflection or voice?

Gabe: Design choice.

Gordon can't give you a dynamic blowjob @ per pixel cumshot?

Gabe: Design choice.

 

[Apos]

Their so called "Design choice" - so that lower end systems can handle it. pfft, everyone should by now has to have vid cards that can support the damn game considering it's development cycle.

Not with all the other stuff its doing. Look at Doom3: it's throwing all its eggs in one basket. I believe them on all the other design choice things. It wouldn't be an engine killer to add them, but they really WOULDN'T fit the game too well.

 

[lans]

Not with all the other stuff its doing. Look at Doom3: it's throwing all its eggs in one basket.

True, if only we could persuade valve to do the same...

 

[Rupertvdb]

man goddamn Deus Ex had reflections, if they wanted to put the bloody things in they would, in fact they have done just not with Gordon, so yes, design choice.

While driving, who the **** knows? But it wouldn't be too hard to make so obviosuly there is a reason behind it.

The last one i thought it could do?

 

[Apos]

True, if only we could persuade valve to do the same...

Er, why? They are throwing so many other great things at us: why ask them to limit everything else just to get one feature they can mostly do the important bits of anyway?

 

[RogueShadow]

mmmm... this thread is scary.

HL2 lights are going to look awesome.
Doom3 lights are likely going to look a little better.

I liked the lights in Quake II?

 

[lans]

Er, why? They are throwing so many other great things at us: why ask them to limit everything else just to get one feature they can mostly do the important bits of anyway?

You got me wrong. You said doom is putting all the eggs in the basket, so I'm just saying that if valve could do the same. I don't remember mentioning that break the eggs into two if the basket get's unstable.

 

[Apos]

You said doom is putting all the eggs in the basket, so I'm just saying that if valve could do the same.

I still don't understand what you are saying then. Putting all your eggs in one basket is a bad thing.

 

[Apos]

HL2 lights are going to look awesome.
Doom3 lights are likely going to look a little better.

Doom3 lighting will act more realistic, like with a character blocking a light and that shadow being cast on another character, or the flashlight casting new shadows.

But HL2 lighting will be much higher quality and have more realistic light quality effects, with radiosity and complex shading effects on the characters.

 

[Rupertvdb]

verrry bad. People should read through the VERC source/HL2 FAQ it gives a wonderful overview of what the game CAN do so they can stop bitching about what they think it can't.

 

[lans]

I still don't understand what you are saying then. Putting all your eggs in one basket is a bad thing.

Oh, that's what you meant.

I wasn't looking at it as a figure of speech, I actually thought you were saying that doom 3 is "adding more features".

 

[RogueShadow]

We don't have the DOom3 engine specs. (we don't right? if i'm wrong can you point it out)

We do have the Source Specs.

It's easier to compare specs, than speculate what it can and can't do based on some video's and screenshots.

http://www.valvesoftware.com/sourcelicense/enginefeatures.htm

I'm looking forward to both games rather equally, i'ts just there's been so much more focus on HL2. Doom3 is being developed with doom3 too, which is kinda cool. you have everything you need right in the game.

 

[Apos]

We know more than enough about the Doom3 engine to know what it can do.

 

[RogueShadow]

#1, who's We?
#2, I assume your not reffering to the leaked version. Post some links plz.

 

[Apos]

Carmack has been very forthcoming about the methods he's using. In addition, yes, the leak did give us a fairly good example of how the basic method works.

 

[M1RAG3]

OMG people, yes, the whole thing about the ligt fixture swinging and then casting dyanimc shadows is TRUE TRUE TRUE!!! I have seen it first hand, so basically, you need to stop talking and just wait for the game to come out... seriously.

 

[Shuzer]

OMG people, yes, the whole thing about the ligt fixture swinging and then casting dyanimc shadows is TRUE TRUE TRUE!!! I have seen it first hand,

No, you haven't. And don't go on to say "OMG I SAW IT IN TEH SOTLEN BUILDZ!!111" because, well, you haven't.

 

[Apos]

I'm telling Valve on both of you! No T-shirts for you!

 

[junco]

what about Thief III ? anyone played it? I have it and as far as i can tell every single light source casts dynamic shadows. in fact without this the game would be a lot harder (you use shadows a lot to figure out where enemies are) runs smooth as silk too.