Why can't Combat Mission look and run as well as Wargame: European Escalation?

[para]

In our case we have done some reworking of the lighting/shadowing components, so maybe this will finally get cleared up for you.

Steve

Will these reworkings be in a update and when will we get it Steve?

[altipueri]

Blimey, I dream of a screen that beautiful. You should try playing on a laptop with Intel HD graphics. Kids, you're just spoilt these days.

[YankeeDog]

My window is on another continent in the big city. and still the greens look pretty darned green. Here's a mid-winter(?) shot of Normandy I just randomly grabbed off google earth street view. would you call that grass Saving Private Ryan green or CM:BN green?

Well, we don't know what the contrast and color saturation settings are on that image, so you really can't say much from that. But in general, speaking as a country boy turned city resident who grew up at a latitude and in an ecology not unlike Normandy, I do agree that we sometimes forget just how vibrant and green these environments can be in midsummer if there's been good rain.

I used to do some theatrical/event lighting, and took courses in lighting design in college. I also like to dabble in photography, another field where understanding light is very important. One of this things these pursuits have taught me is that the perception of color is highly contextual. It's not just environmental factors like amount of ambient light, "temperature" of said light, angle of light, etc. that affect how we see color. How we see and experience colors also depends on mood, health, what we have been looking at immediately prior, etc.

For example: If you spend a long time viewing a scene where a particular wavelength band is predominant (for example, green), this color begins to "wash out" in your perception, similar to the way a strong smell becomes less noticeable over time. So if you've been looking at a verdant green scene for a long time, the greens will gradually seem less vibrant to you, but other colors, especially reds, will become more intense in your perception. But leave that green scene for a few minutes, and then return, and the greens will suddenly seem intense to you again.

Another example: The adrenaline fight-or-flight reaction reduces some of your color perception. So someone that is excited, angry, scared, etc. sees colors less intensely than someone who is calm and relaxed. This is one of the reasons films and video games often like to use a "washed out" color palette; we subconsciously associate a washed-out color template with tension and danger.

Our brains also subconsciously correct our color perception based on expectations. For example, older fluorescent lights tend to emit light with a greenish cast. On first entering a room lit with fluorescent lights from outside, everything looks slightly green. But the vision part of our brain picks up on this, noticing that things we know and expect to be a certain color, such as our friend's faces, are shifted slightly towards green. So an internal correction is made, and our color perception shifts.

So what color palette is "right" for CMBN? Hard to say, and really there is no one answer. Even if a forensic reproduction of the color palette one would typically see in June in Normandy were possible (and it's not), different people will perceive these colors differently depending on mood, what the color of the wall is behind their computer monitor, etc. What's right for one player won't be right for another. Ultimately, if the colors "look right" to you, then they're right.

So I think we do have to cut BFC a little slack here; while it's fine to debate whether the game would look better if the color palette were shifted a bit one way or the other, it's important to recognize there's simply no way they're going to satisfy everyone in this area.

[Mord]

Color grog...

Mord.

[Battlefront.com]

I used to do some theatrical/event lighting, and took courses in lighting design in college. I also like to dabble in photography, another field where understanding light is very important. One of this things these pursuits have taught me is that the perception of color is highly contextual. It's not just environmental factors like amount of ambient light, "temperature" of said light, angle of light, etc. that affect how we see color. How we see and experience colors also depends on mood, health, what we have been looking at immediately prior, etc.

Yup, very difficult. With natural growth there are other factors like if the weather conditions are more/less than average for that time of year. Where I live we have an entire tourist season based around the changing colors of trees in the Fall. Some years it looks like someone spilled a few million gallons of red, yellow, and orange over the forest. Other years it looks like some dumped dirt on everything. One year the "peak colors" last a few days, other times a week or so. Being on a hill or in a valley can produce totally different color results. Etc. All of this means there are hundreds of "correct" answers to whatever color question is asked.

Add to this the hardware dimension. Different cards, screens, etc. produce different color results. In fact, we recently had a tester complain about how awful the colors were compared to real life. Then he found that, for whatever reason, his gamma settings got tweaked. He fixed those and suddenly everything was spot on

So I think we do have to cut BFC a little slack here; while it's fine to debate whether the game would look better if the color palette were shifted a bit one way or the other, it's important to recognize there's simply no way they're going to satisfy everyone in this area.

Slack is greatly appreciated

Steve

[sfhand]

Welcome back Steve,

First off, I'm glad to see your absence from this oh so sweet cesspool wasn't due to hookers and drugs Secondly, the news you all have sprung on us is beyond fantastic :) Thirdly, is there any chance you can give a rough estimate of frame rate improvement due to your new rendering processes? As one who has wished for moveable waypoints for the longest time I find myself most excited - no, not that excited - by the new rendering processes and the new intermediate identification icons (because they were unexpected?).

I don't think one has to be a fanboi to think you guys rock! You are and have been backing it up for a long time.

[Ranger33]

Ranger33,

I agree, those shadows are horrid on your system. But that's just it... the problem is on your system, not others. Kinda looks like you have a lower end card or system by the looks of the rest of the screenshot, though that's just guesswork on my end of things.

Steve

I should have pointed this out, that picture isn't from my system, I took it from a thread on the shadows in the Tech forum. However, it is exactly the same as what I experience on my PC. For the record, my system is fairly high-end, two HD 5770s in Crossfire, 16GB RAM, i-7 Quad Core, can run Crysis almost maxed out at 1920x1080 with no framerate drops, yadda yadda.

From the comments I've seen it seems to be a problem with ATI cards more so than Nvidia. Lucky me I just got a new laptop with a not great but at least not integrated Nvidia card, so maybe I can just switch my CM gaming over to that.

Regardless, I'm off to pre-order CMFI as soon as I get home!

[moeburn]

Well i wasn't really complaining about the color pallette in its realism, more its diversity. I just find it too hard to tell a valley from a hill.

[YankeeDog]

Well i wasn't really complaining about the color pallette in its realism, more its diversity. I just find it too hard to tell a valley from a hill.

Ah. That's definitely a different topic. It might be true that the way the game portrays the differences in elevations could be tweaked to make it easier for the player to see where the changes are.

At the same time, depending on many factors (including lighting), subtle elevation changes sometimes *are* very difficult to see. So we get into an area here where what "looks right" from a realism viewpoint, and what "works well" from a gameplay view point, can be at cross-purposes.

There are also inherent limitations here with depicting a 3D world on a 2D monitor surface. IRL, our eyes are able to see and interpret our 3D world in ways that a 2D image on a monitor can't really emulate.

I can remember for CMx1 there were all sorts of terrain mods that created stark color contrasts between elevations, to make it easier to see subtle changes. Not at all realistic, but definitely made reading the terrain easier.

Personally, I'd love to see some sort of togglable grid feature, which I could turn on to make it easier to read subtle elevation changes, and then turn off when done to keep the game animation "clean". Not a particularly high priority feature for me, but definitely something that would be useful at times.

[MikeyD]

Really, sometimes I wonder how often people go out and stand in an open field these days. When you're on the ground (especially on your belly on the ground) its really not that easy to look toward the horizon and discern every fold and undulation in front of you. Tricks of the light, cloud cover, your own near-sightedness plays a roll. I've been out in the Arizona desert where you couldn't discern a 9 foot deep wash 40 yards in front of you on flat open terrain. Not knowing exactly if that shallow dip up ahead is deep enough to conceal you sounds like 'FOW' to me.

[moeburn]

Really, sometimes I wonder how often people go out and stand in an open field these days. When you're on the ground (especially on your belly on the ground) its really not that easy to look toward the horizon and discern every fold and undulation in front of you. Tricks of the light, cloud cover, your own near-sightedness plays a roll. I've been out in the Arizona desert where you couldn't discern a 9 foot deep wash 40 yards in front of you on flat open terrain. Not knowing exactly if that shallow dip up ahead is deep enough to conceal you sounds like 'FOW' to me.

Right, but again I wasn't complaining about the difficulty with the camera zoomed in on the soldier's point of view. In fact, that's the only way in the game that I can tell the differences in elevation. Its impossible when the camera is further up in the air, looking over the entire battlefield. Unless you have a silhouette of the ground against the sky, it's just too hard to see that hill.

I don't often take plane rides, nor do I work in a skyscraper, but if my memory serves me right, it is easier to tell hills and valleys from a higher viewpoint, like you said.

Part of the problem is that at the moment, I believe shadows aren't cast by terrain, it's just shaded.

[YankeeDog]

Really, sometimes I wonder how often people go out and stand in an open field these days. When you're on the ground (especially on your belly on the ground) its really not that easy to look toward the horizon and discern every fold and undulation in front of you. Tricks of the light, cloud cover, your own near-sightedness plays a roll. I've been out in the Arizona desert where you couldn't discern a 9 foot deep wash 40 yards in front of you on flat open terrain. Not knowing exactly if that shallow dip up ahead is deep enough to conceal you sounds like 'FOW' to me.

Well, yes. At the same time, I, the CM player, have one pair of eyes, and can only look at the map in one location at a time. My pixel force has dozens, sometimes hundreds of pairs of virtual eyes, and each individual pixel soldier is presumably analyzing the lay of the land in his LOS to the best of his ability. And in most cases, my pixel force has probably done some terrain recon prior to the engagement.

For me, some sort of "lay of the land" reading aid would simply speed up gameplay, especially during the setup phase, so that I don't have to spend so much time flying around the map looking for subtle elevation changes that are very important to picking proper deployment locations and movement routes, especially for infantry.

Like I said, it's certainly not an "urgent" feature addition for me. But someday, it would be nice to have some visual aids to help in this area.

[YankeeDog]

I don't often take plane rides, nor do I work in a skyscraper, but if my memory serves me right, it is easier to tell hills and valleys from a higher viewpoint, like you said.

I often take small plane rides (my father is an enthusiastic private pilot), and I do work in a skyscraper. Elevation changes are sometimes easier to see from a higher elevation, but not always. Depends a lot on the angle, quality of light, and viewing angle. For example, at high noon on a hazy day, elevation changes, especially more subtle ones, become much harder to discern. The ground looks like a flat painting.

[moeburn]

I often take small plane rides (my father is an enthusiastic private pilot), and I do work in a skyscraper. Elevation changes are sometimes easier to see from a higher elevation, but not always. Depends a lot on the angle, quality of light, and viewing angle. For example, at high noon on a hazy day, elevation changes, especially more subtle ones, become much harder to discern. The ground looks like a flat painting.

True, which is why most of my custom scenarios take place during the morning and evening.

[Vark]

Might be nice to generate a game map and then have a period military map automatically generated of that area, that the player could refer to for orientation.

[moeburn]

Might be nice to generate a game map and then have a period military map automatically generated of that area, that the player could refer to for orientation.

Or maybe the grid reference lines previously mentioned, with the grid color also changing with elevation, only instead of being toggleable on the live battlefield, the player must click 'briefing' to see a photo of it from a single angle.

[GerryCMBB]

Hello:

I see what MikeyD is saying. But it makes the game very hard for me to play. When I look at a map I see what looks like a flat field. Yet, when I move my troops to the hedge/bocage before it and set up a MG, their LOS is blocked maybe 30 feet into the field.

I know we can plot a waypoint and then try a target from there. But there are so many units to do this for. It becomes an awful lot of work. I understand it is real. But I would prefer to get rid of some of these small undulations and just have the elevations deal more with major hills and valleys.

I even have a mod for gridded grass and I am finding it hard to see these small undulations. Maybe some of us need a detailed video tutorial from one of you expert players on some of these tricky issues.

Sorry for the mini-rant but I am really struggling with the amount of work in the game. On the other hand, there is all this super content coming down the line...

Gerry

[Battlefront.com]

There definitely is something more we should be doing to help with at least basic elevation identification needs. Maybe not good enough to highlight small dips and rises, but at least to get the gist of basic topography.

We actually looked into this for Upgrade 2.0. Unfortunately all of the straight forward concepts are horrid from a game resource needs standpoint. Meaning people would not want to use the feature because it would kill framerate or crash their wee little puter. Obviously it's not worth putting time into something like that!

The primary problem is having this feature capable of being toggled on/off. That requires either banking stuff in VRAM or doing things on the fly. So far we haven't come up with any brilliant technical way to make either work. Not yet anyway!

Steve

[moeburn]

We actually looked into this for Upgrade 2.0. Unfortunately all of the straight forward concepts are horrid from a game resource needs standpoint. Meaning people would not want to use the feature because it would kill framerate or crash their wee little puter. Obviously it's not worth putting time into something like that!

The primary problem is having this feature capable of being toggled on/off. That requires either banking stuff in VRAM or doing things on the fly. So far we haven't come up with any brilliant technical way to make either work. Not yet anyway!

Steve

You see I wouldn't know these things without your replies, thanks once again for the info!

[Redjac]

A certain "other game" on this website (cough Russian) vers 2 and 3 did a pretty good job of rendering elevation to lighting with dynamic shadows. Not to mention some very slick background horizons. The scale and play could be considered comparable to CMBN. Unfortunately, or fortunately for CMBN, superior tac unit AI rests with CMBN.

[Battlefront.com]

A certain "other game" on this website (cough Russian) vers 2 and 3 did a pretty good job of rendering elevation to lighting with dynamic shadows. Not to mention some very slick background horizons. The scale and play could be considered comparable to CMBN. Unfortunately, or fortunately for CMBN, superior tac unit AI rests with CMBN.

Reliance on lighting/shadows definitely is one way to go, but it does come at some costs. It is, actually, the way elevation is visible to CM players now. Without lighting/shadows everything would look flat.

I really hope we can invest some time in the near future to dramatically improve the look of the area surrounding the battlefield. Our technique is nice and low impact on initial programming and framerate/resources, but it's definitely not ideal visually.

Steve

[moeburn]

I really hope we can invest some time in the near future to dramatically improve the look of the area surrounding the battlefield. Our technique is nice and low impact on initial programming and framerate/resources, but it's definitely not ideal visually.

Steve

The way WEE does it is by having the map itself extend beyond the limits of the camera. Or rather, the camera doesn't extend beyond the limits of the map. They actually restrict the facing of the camera so you cannot look at the horizon.

[Battlefront.com]

The way WEE does it is by having the map itself extend beyond the limits of the camera. Or rather, the camera doesn't extend beyond the limits of the map. They actually restrict the facing of the camera so you cannot look at the horizon.

If you saw the CM:SF Alpha in 2006 you would have seen both of these features. Testers HATED both. Made working the game damned near impossible. In fact, the camera position restriction thing lasted into release IIRC, but was vastly more forgiving. We had to change it to be even more forgiving.

There's so much that can be done when you start restricting user options, such as camera heights/angles, number of units, diversity of terrain, etc. These things are simply not options for us.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

Oh, and about the ATI problems. Phil and I just chatted about this and it's as I remember. It affects some customers, but thankfully not even all the ATI users (almost none of nVidia have these sorts of problems). The cause is not easy to deal with because it's poorly executed support of OpenGL. It is extremely hard, very often impossible, for us to work around problems like this.

It's like going to a grocery store that advertises they have milk, but when you get there all the containers are on the shelf actually have yak pee in them. "Hey, it says milk on the carton! And according to your advertising and regulations there should be milk in here!!". The answer back is "We here at Grocery*Mart offer the highest quality products and we value your feedback. Please use our comment box on the way out and don't let the malfunctioning automatic door hit you in the arse too hard. Thank you and go away".

Seriously

We have one ATI user that has things elevate off the ground when he enables Shadows. One. Sucks, but there's nothing we can do.

See, this is why I've been away. You get me ranting about card manufacturers

Steve

[JonS]

I hope I'm misreading this.

I would prefer to get rid of some of these small undulations and just have the elevations deal more with major hills and valleys.

Are you really saying you want to get rid of micro terrain? I think the would be a horrible, horrible step backwards. One of my little joys is accidentally finding that perfect spot where a change of elevation by 1m makes infantry almost invulnerable. I would hate to see them go away. And I think those micro terrain features should be hard to find, so that better/more-diligent players getter a payoff for their efforts, and the rest of us get an unexpected bonus from time to time.

Gross terrain features should be easy and obvious, but not the micro stuff. And, fortunately, there's no need to have a bright dividing line, because CM seamlessly transitions from one end of that scale to the other. Depending on your in-game POV, and your experience, what counts as gross and what's micro will shift. As it should.