[MUD-Dev] Re: Alternate UOL's

[D. B. Brown]

-----Original Message-----
From: Koster, Raph <rkoster at origin.ea.com>
To: 'mud-dev at kanga.nu' <mud-dev at kanga.nu>
Date: Wednesday, August 05, 1998 7:51 PM
Subject: [MUD-Dev] Re: Alternate UOL's


>You're not going to have a viable 3d engine with 3d meshes for figures
>unless you spend at least two years developing it. Consider the basic
>problem: you need to support 30-40 fully animated 3d figures moving on
>screen at once, in a 3d environment, ideally all with distinct meshes,
>art, and equipment.


I'm actually working on a system used as the front end of a mud.  Generally,
no more than five or six animated objects on screen at once.  That,
combined with highly dynamic data, especially data to be displayed that was
entered as text.

Not that a 3D system will be easy, but it's a better alternative than
trying to put together a 2D system and rely on a steady art income.

>This is an extremely non-trivial problem for a 3d engine. There's a
>reason why folks like 989 Studios (formerly Sony Interactive, makers of
>EverQuest) have been working on it for so long--and are requiring 3d
>acceleration--and still only show 5-6 people at once.

Cavedog's Total Annihilation has done this pretty well, even without
acceleration, but I suspect that the shortcuts taken in their engine
would lessen its effectiveness in the CRPG world.

D. B. Brown