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Posted

Hello!

I've been looking up info on Atlas terrain and it's proving to be pretty sparse. It's weird because I remember Atlas terrain being one of TGEA's biggest features for a number of reasons. I don't think I ever saw it catch on though. Did it end up not being as good as expected? Anyone who's used it at all for anything?

Posted (edited)

As I recall it suffered due to poor tool support which made the workflow cumbersome compared to the TGE/T3D style terrain. Sad really, as Atlas had some nifty features but ultimately wasn't worth the hassle. 

Edited by Happenstance
Posted (edited)

Ah right. Some of it's coming back to mind, now. I think you couldn't adjust or paint the terrain, or create holes, right?

Not creating holes isn't the worst thing. To this day, a lot of games use props to "zone you in" to an interior area, rather than a direct hole into the terrain. The Elder Scrolls series comes to mind.

But not being able to do "on the spot" terrain adjustment, or editing the texturing would be inconvenient. Especially with the process of getting the terrain into the engine in the first place. I tried the process of exporting from L3DT to Atlas several times and it never worked. I'm sure it's something they could have addressed, had they continued to develop it. Alas.

Ah well.

Edited by Wolfsong3D
Posted
9 hours ago, Wolfsong3D said:

Ah right. Some of it's coming back to mind, now. I think you couldn't adjust or paint the terrain, or create holes, right?

That's right. I believe Atlas also nuked some other useful features, like material sound effects (eg. footstep sounds on snow vs. grass), etc. which meant not only was it a headache getting an Atlas terrain setup & imported into the engine, once you had it in there you'd find certain engine features just didn't work anymore.

Atlas definitely had potential but needed far more work and should've never been released in the state it was ultimately left in.

Posted (edited)

Yeah 😕

Well, the megaterrains are nice, too. It's just 4 regular terrains stitched together, but still gives a lot more to work with, without sacrificing all the things Atlas did.

Edited by Wolfsong3D

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