March 26, 2019

MyWorld Meetup - 3/16/19

Theme: Whatever you want to talk about!

Announcements:

  • Founding Member program closing
    • Needed a larger reach to get enough funders
    • Doesn’t have much impact on release timelines
    • This means alpha will be open to many more people than previously planned!

Questions:

  • Q (Zauberin): Will MyWorld support mesh shape keys?
    • Answer: Shape keys (mesh morphs) may not be supported in initial release, but are a likely candidate for future releases.
    • Very powerful feature, and we see the need
  • Q (Zauberin): Does MyWorld’s engine support shaders?
    • Answer: Absolutely, yes. The graphics engine we use (jME) has outstanding shader support and a powerful shader node system – something we’ll use with MyWorld’s user-created shader support.
      • Future work will be needed, however, should MyWorld move to a Vulkan-based renderer.
  • Q (Zauberin): Will Daniel be leveraging experience with AI in MyWorld?
    • Answer: Yes, although not in the way the broader computer industry uses AI. MyWorld’s AI will be targeted largely at advanced behaviors for NPCs (non-player characters) & other features game developers will want.
      • For example, one system that’s been designed allows passing on accumulated traits from generation to generation of NPCs – allowing emergent behavioral temperaments, among other things.
      • Unlikely to see neural networks used in MyWorld – they’re powerful, but extremely computationally expensive and about as elegant as fixing a cracked windshield with a sledgehammer.
  • Q (FordLady): How will the Founding Member program closure affect release timeline?
    • Answer: Not much. We never relied on its success, but hoped to accelerate release somewhat. May not need to delay release at all.
  • Q (Zauberin): Will MyWorld support soft-body physics?
    • Answer: Realistic hair/cloth are a high priority. Soft body physics support is planned, but it has some issues that rigid body physics don’t:
      • Fairly computationally expensive
      • Much more expensive to sync over network
      • Soft body physics will probably be restricted to client-side effects (like clothing) that don’t need to be synced (like vehicles do).
  • Q (Zauberin): What will MyWorld’s particle system be like?
    • Answer: Powerful particle system already supported by our graphics engine, will be exposed to scripts/creations (may have some additions added in too!).
      • Particles can be influenced after creation (size, direction, etc)
      • Particles can be full mesh, not just 2D rectangles with images splatted on
  • Q (Zauberin): Will MyWorld support projective decals/lights? (i.e., projecting an image onto a wall).
    • Answer: Yes, but may not make first release.
  • Q (Zauberin): Will MyWorld support volumetric lighting effects? (Fog, atmospheric dust, etc.)
    • Answer: Yes, as part of our photorealistic graphics/environment initiative.
  • Q (Zauberin): Will MyWorld support portals (Graphical “windows” into different parts of the world)?
    • Answer: Not currently on planned feature list, but will investigate. Open to idea.
  • Q (Zauberin): Will MyWorld support cube maps?
    • Answer: Yes (especially for custom materials).
  • Q (Zauberin): Will MyWorld support rendering the Aurora Borealis (northern lights)?
    • Answer: Not something we support yet, but will consider.
  • Q (Zauberin): When making screenshots, it’s useful to be able to automatically hide objects in the background. Will MyWorld support this?
    • Answer: Probably not in core, but this would be very easy to do with a client-side plugin.
  • Q (FordLady): How much of this code is written specifically for MyWorld, and how much uses existing libraries?
    • Answer: General code that’s used heavily in game development largely comes from our graphics engine (jME), but there’s also a lot of fully custom code. Large MyWorld specific features are in-house work, and the design of the entire system is fully custom.
      • (From Daniel): jME is a particular favorite – very powerful, good tools, graphics are fast to work with and develop.
  • Q (Zauberin): Will MyWorld support things like flickering lights?
    • Answer: Yes, definitely. Powerful lighting support will be exposed to users, and doing things like flickering lights will likely be supported through either scripting or highly synchronized effect tracks.
  • Q (Zauberin): Will MyWorld support built-in efficient vegetation?
    • Answer: Definitely yes, and it’s a high priority. There are two aspects to this: (1) efficiently displaying lots of plant models, and (2) automatic placement of those models in believable patterns (so a person doesn’t have to plant a forest by hand). We’re working on support for both of those.
      • Bonus: We’re investigating 3D L-Systems
        • L-Systems are used by biologists to model real world plant growth
        • Using L-Systems in MyWorld would allow quickly creating auto-generated plants that are very believable – and allows direct use of the results of decades of studies by biologists