Atriarch Developer Comments

Player Construction Update by MO, Lead Artist (May 09, 2002)

Recently, as you all know, I have been frantically working on new terrain for us all to wander and explore in Atriarch. At the same time I have also been creating architecture to go along with that terrain. Again, at the same time I have been creating the building blocks for that architecture that will be used for player construction.

Creating these building blocks at first was a little daunting because it started out too literal, meaning the blocks were actually "blocks" and were not based on any existing architecture in the game. It consisted of a couple of basic primitive shapes you would most commonly find in a 3D software package, blocks, cones, wedges, cylinders, etc. But as we have established the look of the architecture for the areas we have in the game so far, making these blocks has become very easy.

Quite simply, I take an existing structure and break it down into it's most basic components, walls, pillars, arches, pyramids, roofs, floors, awnings, walkways, etc. After that I'll add some decorative pieces that the player can add to their structure to make it look a little more "homey", like pots, torches, or any special ornamental features from the original architecture.

Once the pieces are created it's just a matter of creating a scale ratio so the pieces all fit and work together, much like Legos all fit together. The easiest way to do that is to literally cut the original building blocks away from the existing architecture. After that, I'll clean the block up and keep it's texture consistent with it's architectural counterpart. That way, once the model is done, the texturing is almost done for you.

After the blocks are created, I make a test structure to compare it to the original architecture, and then make any adjustments I need to the pieces as I go. Trust me when I say there isn't much more to it then that. You all wanna play with our building blocks now, don't you?

Mo, Lead Artist

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