I Want High Poly Models
sepherin
Join Date: 2004-01-30 Member: 25752Members
Join Date: 2004-01-30 Member: 25752Members
<div class="IPBDescription">models</div> I want to play with better textures and models! Can anyone help me. I hate the way N.S looks right now. Is anyone aware of any mod makers who are working up a high poly high texture mod pack or skin pack for N.S? If you do can you please drop the link or forum link to where to find it. GRRR!! I hate low poly textures on my gf4. I spent a ton of money on my video card to play with better textures and graphics. I sure don't want to play N.S with low poly models. Can someone help me?
Thanks
Thanks
Comments
sorry, it's "NS Customisation" now. Check there.
It's no good saying "There are plenty in the customisation forum, go download them", I would like to see a new, high poly set of models which are endorsed by the dev team.
If you really do have such a crappy computer that a few extra polys kill your fps, you can always switch back to the old ones, but I really think that these cases will be the minority; this is half-life, no matter how much you tweak it it's never going to be particularly demanding on your computer.
p.s, I apologise for using the word "spruced"
As for an "official high-poly pack," don't hold your breath. Flayra's commitment has always been to support the largest possible number of players. Additionally, the HL engine itself has limited capabilities; overload it with high-detail models and textures, and eventually it will display poor performance even on top-of-the-line systems. Texture memory is especially easy to overtax.
If you can decipher that paragraph you deserve a generously sized cookie or muffin of some sort. I was lost a while back.
May the rabbits continue!
Stung
The problem with TruForm is that it does this smoothing indiscriminately -- so if it sees a cube, it will attempt to curve it, and you'll end up with a square-ish sphere-ish *thing* that looks all kinds of screwy. The way to avoid it is to disconnect the polygons that you don't want smoothed together -- in the case of our hypothetical cube, each face would be disconnected from its neighbors to preserve the straight edges between them.
On a player model, certain areas would be connected and others disconnected. On the TSA marine, the thigh would be connected, but the thigh-guard (the armor piece) would be separated from the rest of the leg, and its faces would be separated from each other to preserve its sharp edges. The process of adjusting models for TruForm isn't terribly difficult, but it *is* time-consuming and can have complications.
TruForm in action. As you can see, it's generally quite nice on organic models, but can have "rubberizing" effects on mechanical/technological models (like the robot at the bottom):
<img src='http://www.3dconcept.ch/artikel/npatches/quakemodelle.gif' border='0' alt='user posted image' />
The tricky part is actually choosing which ones to unweld to get a good smoothing effect. I've played with a number (including the TF, Armory, etc) and the models really don't lend themselves too well to TruForm due to the way they're optimized.
On the other hand, Kharaa look *beautiful* (excepting Fade claws and Skulk feet) with it turned on. They'd be far more viable for a 'selected' truformable pack than most of the Marine gear seems to be.
Personally, I'd love to have good, simple high-poly models. I'd started work on a high-poly Marine, but then noticed that Maya 5 really didn't have any exporters available at the time, so left off. I need to see if they have anything yet, as it's pretty easy to rework existing stuff in Maya.
High-poly might not have the flexibility of TruForm, but it'd cut down on CPU load immensely by comparison.
What I'd rather see if for Flayra to move the JP-Marine model out of the space assigned to the High-Poly Marine model, so high-poly packs could be proposed. ^_^
Oh, and to get TruForm to NOT smooth an edge, you just unweld the vertices along it. It's just nubcaeks who make their model 100% connected that get the smoothing-all-over thing happening. That's what me and Guspaz mean when we say 'TruForm-Friendly'. You have a sharp edge you want to keep? Unweld the vertices along it. They're already there, after all. Have a smooth section (like a chestplate) you want curved? Leave it welded together, but seperate from the main model.
It's easy once you understand WHAT TruForm is and does. Just no one bothers. :b
So TruForm can be /told/ when to discriminate. As well, I believe it defalts to ONLY smoothing groups that are under a certain angle... so it won't smooth knife points, for example.
It's about a half-hour's more work, even on a complex model. It's just sad that more modellers don't take the time.
gl_picmip "0"
gl_max_size "2048"
cl_cmdrate "999"
GL_TEXTUREMODE "GL_LINEAR_MIPMAP_LINEAR"
fastsprites "0"
gl_playermip "0"
gl_smoothmodels "0"
cl_highmodels "0"
gl_round_down "0"
r_dynamic "1"
gl_dither "1"
was it just a placeholder and people forgot about it or what? <!--emo&???--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/confused.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='confused.gif' /><!--endemo-->
Well, you could try exporting the model out from Maya as a OBJ and then import the file into Milkshape 3d, convert it to either SMD or 3DS and then import that into 3dsmax or keep it in Milkshape 3D and tweak it from there. That is the method I do whenever I want to use Maya for making models instead of 3dsmax or Milkeshape 3D. If you don't have either 3dsmax or Milkshape 3D, you can probably just download MilkShape 3D and pay the guy $20 (much better than paying for 3dsmax which is like 1000 or so). You could also get Gmax but I'm not sure if it supports exporting SMD formats for Half-life or if the plugin that allows you to import SMD would work with Gmax.
-- SavageX
gives you trilinear interpolation. the default is bilinear. btw trilinear only works on the levels in this game as far as i know, it doesn't work on models. models are not even mip-mapped as far as i have seen.
gl_dither "1"
is for 16-bit rendering. you want 32bit rendering coz it looks un-ugly so make this 0.
Well, you could try exporting the model out from Maya as a OBJ and then import the file into Milkshape 3d, convert it to either SMD or 3DS and then import that into 3dsmax or keep it in Milkshape 3D and tweak it from there. That is the method I do whenever I want to use Maya for making models instead of 3dsmax or Milkeshape 3D. If you don't have either 3dsmax or Milkshape 3D, you can probably just download MilkShape 3D and pay the guy $20 (much better than paying for 3dsmax which is like 1000 or so). You could also get Gmax but I'm not sure if it supports exporting SMD formats for Half-life or if the plugin that allows you to import SMD would work with Gmax.
-- SavageX <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
That'd be really great, but I can't find ANY exporters for Maya 5. I can save to an .ma or .mb. That's it.
I know Maya 4 had a direct SMD exporter, and that the source is available... just that no one with the dev suite and Maya 5 seems to have taken the time to re-compile it for the new version.
Extremely annoying.
gives you trilinear interpolation. the default is bilinear. btw trilinear only works on the levels in this game as far as i know, it doesn't work on models. models are not even mip-mapped as far as i have seen. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
You're looking for this command
gl_playermip
I forgot what options it can be set to though.
As for graphics.....a god game doesn't need top-end graphics. I'd take pen and paper RPGs instead of some crappy RPG which focuses mainly on graphics.
no, doesn't <b>need</b>, but they are a nice addition
gl_picmip "0"
gl_max_size "2048"
cl_cmdrate "999"
GL_TEXTUREMODE "GL_LINEAR_MIPMAP_LINEAR"
fastsprites "0"
gl_playermip "0"
gl_smoothmodels "0"
cl_highmodels "0"
gl_round_down "0"
r_dynamic "1"
gl_dither "1" <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
gl_picmip defaults to 0 anyway.
gl_max_size won't work above 512. HL default was 256, Steam might default to 512 however without 512 pixels wide or high textures to display it won't make the slightest bit of difference.
cl_cmdrate is a netcode cvar. It sets the maximum amount of packets the server sends to your client. Anything over 100 doesn't make the slightest difference (the 101 value is a myth and if people actually looked into how HLDS works they would understand it) although setting this too high for your downstream bandwidth could cause loss & affect your gameplay/world view.
gl_texturemode - this surprisingly does affect the texture quality. As Vipr has already said the value given is for Trilinear Interpolation and is the 'best' quality you can get in the HL engine. Add either Ansiotropic Filtering or even Full Scene Anti-Aliasing (FSAA or Smoothvision for us ATi card owners) for 'better' visuals.
fastsprites is a Counter-Strike cvar and affects the method used for rendering the smoke emitted by smoke grenades. It does nothing what so ever in Natural Selection.
gl_playermip same as gl_picmip defaults to 0 as well.
gl_smoothmodels has been removed from Half-Life for some time now (will give unknown command on console)
cl_highmodels non-existent command. I expect you meant cl_himodels which will do nothing in Natural Selection other than make all your Light Marines look as if they have jetpacks even when they don't. It can be used to show more complex details to models if the modeller has added it but I've no idea how as I'm not a modeller.
gl_round_down - not exactly sure what this does but I expect it has to do with texture sampling so the lower the value would be better (0 or 1, think default is/was 3)
r_dynamic 1 is the default IIRC. Switching this to 0 will stop dynamic lights working such as flashlight & a lot of light entities (not texture lights) in maps and make the game look strange.
gl_dither 1 makes the engine render textures in 16bit colour. Setting this to 0 will render textures using 32bit colour which all GeForce & Radeon cards can do so it would be beneficial. Basically as long as you're not playing on a Voodoo card set it to 0. Half-Life did used to need a command line switch of -32bpp to take advantage of this however Steam might not.
To be perfectly honest, other than the gl_texturemode there isn't much you can do to increase the graphical quality of the Half-Life engine that isn't already set as default in the config file(s). Back in the day when Voodoo 2's & GeForce 1's were the standard these type of cvars were used to notch visual quality down slightly to get a more stable framerate. If you want better visuals you'll have more luck tweaking your Graphics Adapter's Advanced Properties (stuff like Anti-Aliasing, Ansiotropic Filtering, Mipmap levels etc). If you own a Radeon chipset card I suggest installing the pre-tweaked drivers from <a href='http://www.omegacorner.com/' target='_blank'>http://www.omegacorner.com/</a>
Also if you install 'high quality' models you might run into trouble if you play in leagues/tournaments as they may enforce file consistency.
In my opinion the NS models & textures are far superior to any other multiplayer Half-Life modification I have played already and if you are really that bothered by visuals maybe you're not playing the right game. Gameplay counts for a hell of a lot more than nice visuals and this mod has a decent amount of both.
I'm on a Radeon 9700 Pro, 2.2ghz Athlon Barton, and a gig of pc3200 at 400fsb, and the only game I ever play is NS!
<!--emo&:(--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/sad.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='sad.gif' /><!--endemo-->
It's nice to have a nice clean constant 85 frames per second (with vsync. monitor at 85hz) at 16x AF 8x AA, but even uber high poly models and real nice high res textures aren't going to slow me down.
EDIT: But none of that matters, because NS > *