devlog # 8 // mapmaking, part 2 (plants, blender modeling + refining map visuals)
welcome back to the world of Gamedév!
okay, so, it’s been a couple weeks since the last devlog, but honestly, it feels like years have passed. to let you know a bit of what i’ve been up to, i’ve mainly been reflecting on pursuing further education in a formal setting. for close to a year now, i’ve already been studying computer science and game development pretty intentionally on my own - with the abundant resources available online, it is more than possible to receive a full and competent education without university studies.
however, there are a few things that self-studying does not always make easy or accessible, namely:
a) tangible, structured evidence of the skills you’re learning, in a format others (employers) feel they understand,
b) opportunities to collaborate and build with other people around your skill levels, and
c) in-person connections, leading to further interpersonal and career potentials
these are things that i think university education does tend to provide more consistently, and they are the reason that i am nearly certain i’ll be pursuing more formal education in the coming months. i am mainly waiting to hear back on a funding opportunity, so more details on my plan in the next devlog ..
as far as progress on zodaia, the main thing i worked on this week was getting some new models into the game. as you may remember, in the previous devlog, i had made a number of environmental models .. pretty much entirely out of cubes. the first model, a tree, allowed me to render a stunningly realistic and artistically compelling forest:
it may be difficult to tell, but this is a digitally-rendered forest scene, not a photo; hard to believe, but if you zoom in close, you might see subtle indications that these models were created from geometric shapes. while i did not imagine i could improve upon the flowing asymmetry of the grass or the bold sharpness of the rock faces, i thought i would give it a shot.
putting these placeholder assets temporarily aside, i decided to start with a sort of leafy plant because it seemed like something i couldn’t fuck up too much.
i opened blender, deleted the initial cube, and started with a flat plane, just the default one provided. i then extruded it a couple of times, making a longer, flat plane - it seemed easier to work with the leaf as a flat piece before bringing it more into 3d. i next curved the shape by selecting loop cuts and scaling them down as made sense to me; i didn’t follow any guide, just went along adjusting the shape into something pleasing to me.
once i had a flat leaf that looked nice, i put a loop cut down the length of the leaf, and i rotated the whole leaf up, keeping its base close to the center, where the axes meet. i then pulled this center loop of vertices down, creating an indent in the leaf, then individually adjusted the side vertices up and down to create more depth, as if the leaf were rotated or growing differently along its edges.
and that brought me to this:
i know that is a lot of blender/3d-modeling talk, already, so let me know if you’d like a more in-depth blender introduction; if you support me on patreon, i will definitely make a tutorial so you can know more about the modeling process!
anyhow, once i had this one leaf, i just duplicated it and started manually positioning the leaves to make something that looked decent. i’m sure there is a more perfomant or efficient way to do things, but my goal right now is simply to make - i have spent years trying to conceptualise an ideal way to do everything, which often led to me not making anything at all, but the intention of this blog is for ahn to make. so, this is what i made:
obviously, as this was the first model i’ve made for the game (aside from the hex model, which will also soon get a rework), i couldn’t wait to see the model actually in the game. i made a basic green material, imported the model (as an fbx file) into unity, and simply replaced this with the model in one of the original InteractableObjects - i think i replaced the bush?
already stunning! sincerely, this time. i am in love with the simplicity of this effect - and though i might feel differently later, right now, i love how this plant looks.
next, i continued swiftly on with a tree, since i imagined that is the thing that would be most engaging and also most visually rewarding. in the past, i have created low-poly trees before and absolutely loved the effect, so i also decided i would go for something similar this time.
skipping most of the modeling details, i basically just started with a cylinder and extruded, extruded, extruded and repositioned vertices until i got this shape - it took probably 5 minutes (including the part where i needed to bond the duplicated tree branch by manually creating faces between the central and duplicated branch vertices).
i then added in some icospheres, which i just pulled around and contorted into these shapes, which i (again) duplicated.
after creating materials for the tree bark and the tree top and putting a light in the scene, this was the quick render result.
the difference is absurd, especially considering how little energy it took to make these trees. i created a dark and a light variation once i had the models imported into unity, and will certainly make variations with many more shapes - however, right now, there is only that one tree model in this scene. could you tell? without studying the trees too hard, i think the automatic rotation (included in the procedural generation) gives a convincing effect, as if there are many tree models there.
and since i was coasting on the excitement of having these models complete nearly immediately, i decided to go ahead and do the grass and rock models, too.
again, start with one shape ..
then duplicate and make material ..
et voilà. also featuring the rocks i made.
actually, the first time i imported the model and pressed play, it crashed unity and looked like this:
why? i initially thought it was because i had made the noob mistake of making 3d grass (which i did) instead of using 2d images, but actually, it was because i had also imported a light and camera for each grass model; remember to delete them from the scene in blender before exporting!
with that, i was pretty in love with how everything was going. the environments are starting to look more organic and how i dream of them being.
updated glacier: (not much going on here yet; needs more water effects, snow falling .. but i did update the ice color and transparency to be more distinct from the snow)
desert scene with a very bright weather:
ash biome looking almost exactly the same:
gardens at night with an ambient light:
and two new biomes: the tundra, a mostly frozen, rocky landscape with some plant-growth:
and the cove, dark because it’s inside/a cave:
overall, i am super pleased with these developments and *so* thrilled for the next changes to come.
look out for the next devlog, where i’ll probably be working on a couple more models (or texturing/modeling the hexes?) and especially the more weather-y environmental effects: lighting, post processing, clouds, rain, lightning, water, the sky -- much to come. until then..
with love and hopefully a low poly count,
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