The system for proper layering is already functional and works automatically, adapting to any landscape. Snow initially falls at higher elevations, like mountains and hills, before appearing below. It works perfectly across the entire world, including all objects like houses, barrels, cars, and even people, if necessary. But, as always, there are some things to consider. The biggest issue with the system is projection on objects. If it’s a pre-designed level where dynamic seasonal changes aren’t needed, then this system isn’t necessary, and there’s no issue. But if seasonal transitions are part of the game, it becomes a serious challenge. For instance, imagine there’s grass in the world, and snow begins to fall. Snow might accumulate at the top of a mountain, meaning the grass there should be covered with snow. However, at the moment, all grass across the same level gets covered, not just the grass where the snow actually falls. There’s a potential solution: using an RVT snow mask that forms as the snow appears. Creating it isn’t difficult, but the issue lies in determining the exact positions of grass and other static objects like houses, crates, etc., so that snow coloration appears in those places specifically and not everywhere. This part remains unsolved for now. There are a few ideas, like using Instance Random, but unfortunately, that introduces randomness, which isn’t what we need. For now, this task has been postponed as it’s not critical at this stage. The main thing is to remember to revisit it in the future. Of course, I’m tempted to create volumetric snow, but that would require reworking the character’s logic, buildings, objects, and so on. It’s the classic case of starting with a simple feature and ending up with a massive to-do list. So, for now, I’ll postpone this as well and focus on shader LODs to ensure better performance on low-end PCs.
2024 still test. funny we not all ready have
The system for proper layering is already functional and works automatically, adapting to any landscape. Snow initially falls at higher elevations, like mountains and hills, before appearing below. It works perfectly across the entire world, including all objects like houses, barrels, cars, and even people, if necessary. But, as always, there are some things to consider.
The biggest issue with the system is projection on objects. If it’s a pre-designed level where dynamic seasonal changes aren’t needed, then this system isn’t necessary, and there’s no issue. But if seasonal transitions are part of the game, it becomes a serious challenge. For instance, imagine there’s grass in the world, and snow begins to fall. Snow might accumulate at the top of a mountain, meaning the grass there should be covered with snow. However, at the moment, all grass across the same level gets covered, not just the grass where the snow actually falls.
There’s a potential solution: using an RVT snow mask that forms as the snow appears. Creating it isn’t difficult, but the issue lies in determining the exact positions of grass and other static objects like houses, crates, etc., so that snow coloration appears in those places specifically and not everywhere. This part remains unsolved for now. There are a few ideas, like using Instance Random, but unfortunately, that introduces randomness, which isn’t what we need. For now, this task has been postponed as it’s not critical at this stage. The main thing is to remember to revisit it in the future.
Of course, I’m tempted to create volumetric snow, but that would require reworking the character’s logic, buildings, objects, and so on. It’s the classic case of starting with a simple feature and ending up with a massive to-do list. So, for now, I’ll postpone this as well and focus on shader LODs to ensure better performance on low-end PCs.