Edengrall News

Full tree trunk collision working, you can stand in the branches just fine. The collision only exists when the player is nearby, so it shouldn't affect performance.

Right now my brother is working on the LOD models, we are using an Impostor system, where the LOD model is a dynamic billboard instead of a simplified model, which is even more efficient (but very hard to set up), when he is done we will check how many trees we will be able to have existing in the world at once, but looks like large forests will be possible.

As for which trees we will have, at first there will be 3 dynamic and 2 permanent types

The dynamic trees will grow in the wild and the player will be able to plant them eventually:
-Edenian Lightwood (on the picture) for Softwood
-Dark Oak (background) for Darkwood
-Apple Trees as our first fruit trees.

Permanent trees will exist on the world at fixed positions and cannot be destroyed or added.
-Ladrasil are the fairy trees, these magical trees will have more relevancy when the fairy colony mechanic is fully implemented, they will also be points of interest useful for nativation when the map is expanded due to their unique appearance, here how the trunk looks like (leaves for it are not implemented yet)

-The other tree will be Trees of Wisdom, a magical variant of the apple tree that only exists inside the city of Edengrall, they will replace all the random birch trees inside the city gardens, and they will produce seedless fruits during early summer. These trees were created with alchemy by the founders of Edengrall and the secrets for recreating them is lost with their disappearance.

We need at least two more weeks to get something playable out.

Our trees are coming along, here what we have done so far:

Growth: Like all our crops, the trees begin as tiny saplings and grow slowly to adult size, right now they grow pretty fast (14 days) because we want players to have access to wood, we will slow down the growth based on species when we expand the map.

Seasons: Leaves change colors based on seasons, they also fall during winter exposing the low poly branches.



Cutting: The trees can be cut for wood, the stump has to be dug with a shovel. (need to add particles and sounds)



Wind: Trees are affected by the wind, both leaves and branches move. (need to add leaf particles on strong wings)

What needs to be implemented:

Flower and Fruit cycles: once a year trees that can give fruit will go through flowering and fruit cycles if they are adult.

Hosting critters: We want to make tree trunks spawn points for certain critters.

Tree seeds: Trees will first behave like a crop, you have to plant them in a crop tile and their nutrition/water needs will be very demanding, after reaching the sapling stage they stop growing as a crop, the player has to dig them up and replant in normal soil.

Collision: The trees are not GameObjects for optimization reasons, so we need to add a collision mesh that follows the plant shape, will probably involve lots of capsules.

Level of Detail: We are going to experiment with the Impostor LOD system, but I might just make simplified models for the trees, we have to see what is the most optimal.


If everything goes well the update will be out by the end of the month.

Living tress are progressing well! The tree already grows from a sappling to full tree, the leaves change color and texture during the seasons (unlike crops that change based on when they were planted), they are affected by wind and by the player moving through the leaves.



Next we will add the Axe, make them cuttable, add collision (including in the branches), flowers and maybe fruit too.



While my brother worked on the techinical side of the tree shaders I made a new critter, meet the Shonshon, a cute and funny, cat and bunny hybrid



It spawns on caves during late summer to autumn, and as most other critters of their type, yes they are edible too.

We have started the work on the new trees, they will be cuttable, plantable, grow over time, be affected by wind and change colors with the seasons, we are unsure if fruit tress will come in this update or not, depends how hard it will be to implement, but i think it will work out.



We have started the tests on the new shader for the leaves using simple bushes. The shader can turn a very simple topology into fluffy leaves, here how the test bush model looks like without the custom shader.



This will not only make modeling a lot easier, but will halve the size and complexity of the models used, in comparison, this is the model we are using for bushes currently



We also got the Axe model done and I made the animations, haven't tested them yet ingame, but should be working



The trees we are making will slowly grow in the grasslands and in forest biomes and will be the source of wood, so players won't need the placeholder cart anymore.

Other than the trees we have fixed a few bugs this week and added a new critter, you can find the Sllia on shallow waters during autumn

Features:
Added new Autumn underwater critter
Bugfixes:
Fixed fish culling incorrectly in certain situations
Fixed axolotl swiming animation in the aquarium
Fixed some placed critters incorrectly giving experience when collected back