This one is more for those who like to know how games work and have an understanding of 3D modeling but I figured since it was one of the hottest zombie games out there at least a couple of you deadheads might enjoy the read 😉
Techland, creators of the critically acclaimed action survival game, Dying Light, are using Simplygon, the leading automatic 3D optimization solution for digital content creation, in the continuing development of their game. Dying Light is published by Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment and is available on Xbox One, PlayStation 4 and PC.
“We have used Simplygon mostly to reduce polycount on character models and to prepare shadow casting geometry for themâ€, said Rafal Zerych, Asset Manager at Techland. “In most cases the size was reduced to less than 30% for LODs and less than 25% for shadow casters. Simplygon helped us to prepare our main character assets that generate 99% of the NPCs in Dying Light, and weeks of work was done in just a few days.â€
How Simplygon Helped in the Development of Dying Light
The main character assets consist over 20 character models with over 100 elements each. Each element had to be made in a Level Of Detail (LOD) version and an additional 24 had to be made in shadow casting versions. That was just one character model, with animation skinning and fully mapped textures.
For Techland, there was no time for remapping and reskinning and no place for errors. In numbers, Dying Light’s most complicated character asset, with all elements, comes in at 144,988 triangles. Simplygon reduced that to 34,849 in total.
Shadow casting geometry was created in just few clicks with geometry of 28,241 triangles. All 20 character models have about 800,000 triangles in total and this was reduced to around 240,000 triangles in total.
Simplygon is popular amongst developers of mobile games; AAA PC and console games; and large MMOs, and is applicable to any medium where 3D art assets are created or utilized. By automatically generating lower-polygon models that are required for different levels of detail (LOD), an optimization process for making games and visual scenes run smoother, at higher frame-rates, and requiring less data, Simplygon helps digital content creators save important resources where artists would otherwise need to manually re-create large amounts of content.
