Trying to get an idea on where the max polygon count should be for the game I'm looking to develop. I know the higher the number the slower it runs so I need to set a benchmark computer. I would say dual core, 1 gig Ram, 256Mb video minimum requirement.

I figure using LOD would greatly help the game speed and still using high count characters for life like experience up close. Enviroment in the levels should be nice too, close to life like. Size of the maps will vary, but in general I would say they are small to medium. With maps preloaded on clients computer it should help game speed when playing on-line, right?

With all this in mind, I'm looking for opinions on what software to use for the different parts. For example, characters (Maya), levels (3D MAX), engine (A6, C4) and it doesn't help I don't know C++...LOL, but I know I can learn. Yet, one of the reason I like the A6 is the shorter learning curve with C-script. But some feedback I got from another poster tells me the A6 is falling behind, would love to know if there is an A7 in the works.

Again, thanks for your patience with my questions. I realize that I've bombarded the Forum with newbie questions and to many of you stupid ones.

Noob65

Real difficult question to answer. The max poly count is the highest number of polygons that can be drawn at once without having FPS go to a critically low number. There is no real max poly number out there as it depends on the overall design of the game. Fewer particles, more polygons. Fewer models, more polygons. Optimized scripts, more polygons. The general idea is to get as much detail in polygons, particles, models, and so on and so forth and try to stay at a framerate of 30 fps, 20 minimum. At 15, it gets a little choppy, at 10, its pretty laggy, at 5, it just downright sucks. Just remember, you have to balance details with framerate.

And there is an A7 in the works. Prolly six months to a year from now before it comes out.

Thanks AA,

I understand the difficulty in answering such a question. How many polygons do you think a high end game have?

Noob65

Depends on the type of game. A high end RTS has about 500-1000 polys on a model, to make up for the fact that there will be a lot models drawn at once. An FPS on the other hand can range from 3000-10000 polies as there are fewer models being drawn at once. And you can get a lot of detail in 3000 polys. A really good model is a model that looks like it takes 20000 polys but only has around 3000. A racing game can have 20000 polys on each car.

It also depends on the system. These are all PC specs. I'm not even going to touch PS3, except to say that the new Splinter Cell was so damn good, I thought that it was a movie for the first half of the commercial.

Thanks AA,

I haven't seen PS3 yet, any link? So would you say 20,000 and over is too many polygons? Would the LOD feature help?

Noob65

20000 polys and over is only too many if it lags the computer. If it works and it still allows a broad range of your customer base, go for it. However, it depends on what else is in the game, particles and such. So again, it depends on the game.

LOD would most certainly help. Getting rid of faces you can't even see b/c they are so far away will free up the framerate.

As for the new splinter cell, google it. It was on TV when I saw it.

Thnaks AA,

I'll try to find it.

Noob65

I did some checking of other game engines, the Quest3D states it's able to render 72,500,000 polygons per second (hardware dependent though). So where does A6 stand? At a 30 FPS that would be roughly 2,416,000 polygons, wouldn't that be an incredible detailed game with high quality characters? Or am I wrong in my thinking? I know the video card have to keep up too.

Noob65

Depends on how well the models are built. Often, a 20000 poly model would look just as good and detailed at 10000. I can't seem to find what the official poly limit is, but I know its a good range. Look at some of the good stuff in the showcases, probably Showcase II. If you know your stuff, you could pull off awesome environments and not even hit the poly limit. The difficulty in building a highly detailed world is FPS. There are tricks to lower that though. Somewhere in "game play & game design" there is a thread, probably 2-3 months old, that I started asking about the best way to achieve the best possible framerate.

Thanks AA,

I checked them out earlier and there are some that look awesome. I'm sure there are many way to manipulate the ways to reduce the polygon count and still maintain a crisp look. I just downloaded the A6 30 day trial and played around with it for 20 minutes, very easy to build walls and other objects. Tried to find a way to manipulate shapes and it says that "Bad Manipulation, map doesn't allow concave blocks" when I try to change a shape. Is this a limitaion to the trial version or is this permanent? Haven't figured out how to change to other textures and models yet, or maybe there is only one for demo purposes? Tried to load a tree on the map, but it showed up as a wide thin rectangular box. Well for just 20 minutes worth of play I would say it seems very easy to learn to work this program. Next step would be to read the manual...LOL

P.S Noticed that the different objects in the demo doesn't appear in scale to each other, any way to change the sizes?

Noob65