Graphical things that TFC could use.

[yubyub96 68]

I think that TFC is a great mod but theres one thing that it hasn't gone much into, and I'm gonna try to list some ideas here.If you have some ideas too, just post them here and i will add them to the OP(what does OP means? I've always had that doubt)

1-Leaves lighting (here i discussed it more-> http://terrafirmacra...aphical-things/)

Basically what i think about leaves is that they look odd, they have the same lighting values on all their faces, which can make them look weird on the distance, like a big plaster of something instead of a nice tree top.

This might be caused by how Minecraft renders transparent blocks (it happens too with vanilla farming ground which is a transparent block.

EDIT:i tested an snapshot from long ago in which dinnerbone(minecraft dev) remade the whole lighting system, and just as farmland is a transparent block, so are TFC leaves, and on that snaphsot farmland looked like a normal block, meaning that either farmland is no longer a transparent block or transparent blocks will now be rendered properly, which will fix this issue.but dinnerbone removed it and postponed it to 1.5, so lets hope he keeps his promise.

Images

http://i.imgur.com/NFr0d.jpg

here you can see that all the faces of leaves have the same lighting (15)

http://i.imgur.com/BFbJ2.jpg

here they don't, you can see ones darker and other faces brighter, giving you a depth effect.

same lighting on all faces

Same effect

2-Random color stains on stone

I thought of this when i was seeing some pics to make some stones for my pack, i realized that stone is not of the same uniform color in all places (except some cases).I suggest using some random stains to make this effect, the same type of stone but with an slightly different color.This topic discuses something similar but in relation to ore veins->http://terrafirmacra...tion-of-mining/

Real Life examples

here the basalt color is not the same on every piece of stone

3-Random cracks on stone

As some of you have seen, no stone cliff is made of completely uniform stone, there are cracks on the stone.My suggestion will be to make some big crack textures(more than 5, so theres no obvious pattern on the rock) and aply them to the stone randomly, except for raw block that you get by mining them.

Real life examples

http://upload.wikime..._Post_holes.jpg

Perfect example of this

You cant see much on this one, but, DAMN THATS GORGEOUS!!

4-Make grass sides textures individually

Right now TFC makes grass side textures (when better grass is not enabled or not used) by overlapping the biome-color texture over the dirt of that place, which is fine for simple texture packs, but for some more detailed ones, you can't make the grass have shadows under the dirt <---like this

5-Make texture change upon the weather

Have you seen how when you have an snow layer on top of grass, the texture changes, well i suggest making this for more blocks, example: its snowing, layers of snow accumulate on top of trees,wood,and cobblestone, well those textures will change so that they look like if all the block was covered with snow(like how grass does).

And when it starts snowing you will count 1min and all the textures will slowly start changing, to some textures which look like if they were accumulating snow,and some time (2 ingame days) the textures start to go back to normal. this could make a big FPS hit so its open to discussion.

And there should be the same effect but when it rains, make textures look wet.

I've seen in GSLS shaders that they made a code to give this effect(much fancy but similar) only to blocks which are "outside", i wonder if the devs could do the same

6-When water is in a river biome, make it flow

Basically when you have water on a river biome, give it some animation to make it look like its flowing,instead of being static like a big water trench that does nothing.i dont know if this would be possible to code.

7-Mossy blocks

Very simple idea, make every block that is near water grow moss, this moss could extend another 3 blocks, this could be on every block, from dirt to stone and wood.Moss could also grow on high humidity ambients (not sure if thats grammatically correct)

I hope you like my suggestion, plz vote on the poll, or leave a comment.

i know that some of this suggestions are quite hard to implement, I'm not ordering the devs to put this in TFC inmediatly, but i wanted to give them some ideas in the case they wanted to make TFC graphics better.

ps: i used links instead of images sometimes because i couldn't put more images on this topic.

[Kimbblesrath 503]

I am pretty sure no 2, and no 3 could be kind of easily done. Have a set of textures of a stain/crack, and randomly overlay that over stone. I also can't wait for snow piling. I really hope that is implemented. Wasn't it like a hook in Forge that wasn't there anymore that prevented this from happening?

[yubyub96 68]

I am pretty sure no 2, and no 3 could be kind of easily done. Have a set of textures of a stain/crack, and randomly overlay that over stone. I also can't wait for snow piling. I really hope that is implemented. Wasn't it like a hook in Forge that wasn't there anymore that prevented this from happening?

Ho yeah!! snow piling! i remeber that from the good old days of TFC(today is still pretty good), when it started snowing i was surprised by how snow was generated, it was beautiful, the only downside of that is that i could look weird becacuse it had no piling order.

[platanusoccidentalis 35]

Those were indeed the good days.

[Kimbblesrath 503]

Ho yeah!! snow piling! i remeber that from the good old days of TFC(today is still pretty good), when it started snowing i was surprised by how snow was generated, it was beautiful, the only downside of that is that i could look weird becacuse it had no piling order.

No piling order, what? Oh, nvm. Do you mean like just randomly high and low? Well, That wasn't really too much of a problem for me. If each block wasn't more than 2 layers away from each other I didn't mind it. It actually kind of looked better that way.

Those were indeed the good days.

You NINJA'ED ME! And yes, but they are still good, very good, maybe even better today.

[yubyub96 68]

No piling order, what? Oh, nvm. Do you mean like just randomly high and low? Well, That wasn't really too much of a problem for me. If each block wasn't more than 2 layers away from each other I didn't mind it. It actually kind of looked better that way.

You NINJA'ED ME! And yes, but they are still good, very good, maybe even better today.

Yeah, i meant that they could go from 2 to 5, looked weird to me XD

I remember my first night in TFC, i was severely injured by an skeleton and then when i hitted a tree i was so surprised it didnt pop out, but when i started to see what i could do with this i was overwhelmed by the mod.Remeber the old mighty flint tool?

two thing i just didnt liked, terrain generation, its better now but definitely could go even better, and leaves, those havent changed at all, i hope that perhaps that with the new ligthing engine Mojang is working on it will be fixed.

[bsb23 303]

I remember my first night (apologize for the off topic) it was interesting, it took me quite a while to make a house I kept trying to make my normal "hole-in-the-wall" style house and it kept collapsing on top of me. Then decided to try and guess recipes, I put a piece of dirt in the crafting table, and out came a red steel pick axe. You gotta love early alpha.

[dunkleosteus 2,425]

it's funny because you think we'd implement any of this.

[yubyub96 68]

it's funny because you think we'd implement any of this.

Whats bad about them? too much code implied?dont want to waste time purely on graphics?

[Sda215 8]

What's bad about them? Too much code implied? Don't want to waste time purely on graphics?

This suggestion thread has a heavy focus on aesthetics, which is a feature the developers just simply don't have the time to do. Once the core gameplay features are implemented, THEN they can focus on aesthetics. At least, on core aesthetic features.

This clears up the dust?

[killster550 401]

firstly, top question: which suggestion did you likeD (thats a no<<)

also, SDA, while its true, the devs actually do implement gameplay features that have an primarily aesthetic worth (wood chiselling )

[Just_Another_Guy_:) 1,066]

firstly, top question: which suggestion did you likeD (thats a no<<)

also, SDA, while its true, the devs actually do implement gameplay features that have an primarily aesthetic worth (wood chiselling )

Yup, but that feature required major coding work (or at least 15 minutes of copypasting the code of stone for wood...).

[ECC 508]

I have to say, the ideas are not bad... I mean end product wise the stuff proposed is great and adds to the worlds feel.. However the methods proposed... not all of them I can come to love.

Dunk, is this a better way of saying 'stomped' ?

[dunkleosteus 2,425]

most likely. The main problem with things like stains is that they would extend over multiple blocks and start and stop under specific conditions. Minecraft has a lot of trouble rendering blocks differently and rendering continuous effects over multiple blocks.

[GenuineTexan 38]

it's funny because you think we'd implement any of this.

The hell are you so negative for recently? Let people post their suggestions and talk about them. The topic of this thread is "Graphical things TFC could use" not "Things Dunk needs to add to TFC".

most likely. The main problem with things like stains is that they would extend over multiple blocks and start and stop under specific conditions. Minecraft has a lot of trouble rendering blocks differently and rendering continuous effects over multiple blocks.

That's better; discussion with less negativity.

Peace.

[dunkleosteus 2,425]

The hell are you so negative for recently? Let people post their suggestions and talk about them. The topic of this thread is "Graphical things TFC could use" not "Things Dunk needs to add to TFC".

That's better; discussion with less negativity.

Peace.

sorry to both of you, it's just a little difficult sometimes. Coding is what I do for fun, but also a career, and I generally have a good idea of the capabilities of the language, the mod and the game itself, and I get slightly annoyed when people ask things of me that I couldn't possibly deliver, but think they are making a legitimate suggestion. It would be like going to the united nations and saying "Hey, why don't you just give starving people food? That would solve world hunger". The point I'm trying to make is that we get a lot of suggestions for features that are just much more complex than people think they are.

I don't mean to sound insulting to anyone :/

[Enzer 60]

sorry to both of you, it's just a little difficult sometimes. Coding is what I do for fun, but also a career, and I generally have a good idea of the capabilities of the language, the mod and the game itself, and I get slightly annoyed when people ask things of me that I couldn't possibly deliver, but think they are making a legitimate suggestion. It would be like going to the united nations and saying "Hey, why don't you just give starving people food? That would solve world hunger". The point I'm trying to make is that we get a lot of suggestions for features that are just much more complex than people think they are.

I don't mean to sound insulting to anyone :/

Its cool Dunk, maybe you should just keep a standard reply to suggestions like these?

Something along the lines of "Suggestion noted, however it doesn't fall within the scope of the mod/our current capabilities/MC engine's capabilities".

Either way, we can see where you are coming from on this and how it can be frustrating, being the main voice on the forums.

[ECC 508]

PR sucks, sometimes stepping back and doing what the post above says and moving to the 'default' answer may help a bit more.

[GenuineTexan 38]

sorry to both of you, it's just a little difficult sometimes. Coding is what I do for fun, but also a career, and I generally have a good idea of the capabilities of the language, the mod and the game itself, and I get slightly annoyed when people ask things of me that I couldn't possibly deliver, but think they are making a legitimate suggestion. It would be like going to the united nations and saying "Hey, why don't you just give starving people food? That would solve world hunger". The point I'm trying to make is that we get a lot of suggestions for features that are just much more complex than people think they are.

I don't mean to sound insulting to anyone :/

I understand Dunk, sorry for kind of snapping at you. I didn't mean to come off as rude, but I see where you're coming from now. The dev team has built this mod up from the ground and we all appreciate your hard work (or else we wouldn't be posting here!). Thanks for the mod so far and we all look forward to what you've got coming next, even if we do occasionally ask for ridiculous stuff !

[capt_slowpoke 81]

The stains/cracks/etc could be done easily with texture packs if anybody could figure out how to make CTM use mod added blocks. It currently only works on vanilla blocks from what I understand.

[yubyub96 68]

The stains/cracks/etc could be done easily with texture packs if anybody could figure out how to make CTM use mod added blocks. It currently only works on vanilla blocks from what I understand.

Yeah its impossible to get any CTM block, it seems more like a thing of TFC because i have seen that some packs make CTM textures for other mods.

[warfighter67 124]

The leaves I agree with. However, the way TFC implements leaves may make this impossible.

[Biodigious 211]

sorry to both of you, it's just a little difficult sometimes. Coding is what I do for fun, but also a career, and I generally have a good idea of the capabilities of the language, the mod and the game itself, and I get slightly annoyed when people ask things of me that I couldn't possibly deliver, but think they are making a legitimate suggestion. It would be like going to the united nations and saying "Hey, why don't you just give starving people food? That would solve world hunger". The point I'm trying to make is that we get a lot of suggestions for features that are just much more complex than people think they are.

I don't mean to sound insulting to anyone :/

NOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!1! He was so close to being completely converted to the dark side.

[yubyub96 68]

The leaves I agree with. However, the way TFC implements leaves may make this impossible.

Do you mean that the way leaves look right now bothers you?

[abandoned mines 119]

all these suggestions sound awesome to me (especially the cracked stone and staining)