Will this be doable in ciV?

[Kyriakos]

Wondering how many polygons a building can realistically have in ciV.

Each of these has from 20.000 to 40.000 polygons, but the entire set goes over a million easily.

 

[Willem]

We have no idea how the graphics engine works yet so I doubt anyone can answer your question.

 

[Keks]

I hope you linked the wrong picture. These look like 2d, but if they are 3d they have way too many polygons. each one of these could be reduced to about 100 polys without any visible loss of detail.

 

[Kyriakos]

They are 3d, made with Bryce (by me). Yes, they have a lot of polygons, but i do not see how they can be reduced, at least with that program

 

[Eastwinn]

One way to reduce polygons is to mimic the look of many polygons with only one polygon and a good texture. This is how it's done in most games. The only disadvantage though is that it will look better at certain angles and distances and the technique is especially noticeable in games because of this. I'm not much of a 3d artist so I couldn't tell you anymore.

A little off-topic but those renders remind me of SimCity 4.. just beautiful isometric art. Great job man.

 

[Kyriakos]

Thank you Eastwinn

They are part of a byzantine empire set i am currently creating.

As for less polygons, and the use of skins, i must say that i am not familiar with that (never used it). I trust that in full 3d games it can be very usefull, but like you said from certain angles it looks less than beautiful.

 

[Eastwinn]

A very simplistic example is a window. You could make it with a bunch of polygons -- the frame, the glass, the sill, the lock. Or you could have a two polygon model, one polygon textured to include the glass, frame, and lock, and one polygon textured like the sill that juts out from it. The latter is how it would be done in a 3d game environment, but the former is how it would be done in a prerendered situation like an isometric game or a movie.

 

[Kyriakos]

I also wonder how ciV will be modded, by what programs. I wish Bryce can mod it, since that is the only 3d rendering program i know how to operate to any sufficient degree.
Also i love isometric games, they have by far the best art, for the reason you mentioned, and the talent of their artists of course

 

[moscaverde]

I wish, these are incredible! Unfortunatelly the screenshots doesn't look like as having so many details.

 

[Kyriakos]

Glad you liked them Moscaverde

Yeah, i agree, the city in the ciV screenshots doesnt look good at all. Some people argued that it is just a placeholder though.

 

[Kyriakos]

Perhaps, if the ciV engine allows for the program i am using to mod the game, i can upload both a highly detailed version and one with less polygons, although in my view much of the magic will be lost then.

Btw i often wondered if the 3d engine was actually needed, do people move around the camera when playing? Personally when i played civ4 for a while i always kept it at isometric, so the full 3d element was lost entirely. At least things looked a bit better that way

 

[Eastwinn]

I think maybe with ciV the full 3D might play a bigger role -- if I were Firaxis I wouldn't design awesome 3D graphics only to show them off from one angle, you know?

 

[Kyriakos]

I agree, but only if they are indeed awesome

 

[Eastwinn]

Aside from the cities, they look pretty great. The cities are definitely concerning but I feel like they'll look better when the release comes.

 

[weekend_warrior]

Those look pretty nice and I'd expect Civ5 citys to look just as good (with considerably less polygons of course.)

 

[Kyriakos]

Let's see

Btw, can you recognise the centerpiece?

 

[Theon]

The city graphics is the only thing I strongly dislike about civ5 at the moment, but I'm sure they'll add more detailed city graphics later. I say this because one of the screenshots actually shows the Collossos under construction, which is amazing. I think this is an awesome feature, which basically confirms that city improvements will be visible on the map as in Civ 4. I wonder how they'll portray the other wonders, completed and under construction.
Even the unfinished Collossos has easily 3 times the detail of one of the random houses that make up a city, so my guess is that the current city graphics are just placeholders.

My only worry is about regional and cultural diversity in city graphics, I don't want to see European(basically medieval) graphics on Greek or Roman cities. I believe this initially was the case in civ4 but they added mediterraenean city graphics in an expansion(correct me if I'm wrong).

 

[Kyriakos]

I am really hoping they will allow for more modding flexibility and not only 3dsmax and blender to create the models, if so i definately shall create a lot of greek buildings, no worries about that

 

[Theon]

Great to see you are so eager to diversify the game
They did state civ 5 would be the most mod friendly version of civilization so far, but I guess we'll have to wait untill they release some information on the modding tools available to the community.

 

[warpstorm]

In general, it is a bad idea to have polygons that are smaller than a pixel for any game. The engine would still need to do all the work to process it, yet you wouldn't see it.