Tips on space sky maps and other science fiction elements

[IVlatty]

I'm wondering if it's possible to create spherical space sky maps, a la mothership Zeta. I'm really interested in building a little standalone area but trying to get more of a space-faring theme going on. Another idea i had floating around was reduced gravity, I'm curious if it can be done simply or has to be game-wide.

2 pathways im considering right now are tying to make a low-atmosphere, cratered landscape with perpetual night sky map, or just giving up on that and using the nuclear weather to create a new sci fi landscape with regular day and night.

Would love to get some help from anyone experienced with getting new skymaps into fallout, but also keen to hear any ideas that could be done with the fallout assets and mechanics if more sci-if/futuristic space themes were thrown in. At the moment I'm trying to take stock of object themes that are less reticent of 50s tech, for example I've been repurposing the prydwin assets to try make convincing space ship interiors.

It has been an overarching goal to see if I could create a large spaceship interior with fallout assets, and so far I'm still seeing how feasible it would be

 

starting to produce a few images, still very early into testing

 

http://imgur.com/a/hXaLo

Edited January 19, 2017 by IVlatty

[montky]

hello |V|atty (matty? |V| atty?)

 

a sci-fi fallout-y project huh? now that is interesting!

my own mod-fu is not 110%, though you never know what can come from discussions

and brainstorming!

it's been hinted at since Novac in FONV and the museum of freedom in FO4,

but it would be AWESOME to have a new lands mod to play as the enclave in SPACE!

 

now, it depends on what you envisage;

I'd like to see a ship be a form of 'immersive fast travel'

rather than it becoming a mini-game/sidegame to do space,

why? there's a lot of other games that do space really well,

space engineers, no mans sky, star citizen, stardock titles etc.

 

scott manley of Youtube had some neat ideas for mapping stuff from

Universe Sim or stardock stuff etc, onto a surface that other games could use as a ref for 'warping' in their 'skybox' -

he wrote a few handy screen-shot snippets of code here and there,

and has a few awesome ideas,

which might help with your space-faring project (particularly for verisimilitude and attention to details hehe).

ie, if you wanted to show 'warp speed' out the window, you could machinima it in hi-res,

and map that as a batch-render to the nurbsfacegroup as a looping .gif

you could even create your own MCMC random walking dots in GIMP or photoshop indesign etc, and have those move around,

and save that as a .gif or .mov to play on the nurbsfacegroup(the world box).

that's one suite of approaches.

 

as to the asset design -

indeed, exegetically, the 20s through 50s bau/art deco style is awesome.

that sleek kind would mesh well with the dieselpunk retro50s fallout.

 

turning to narratives -

what were you looking to tell?

are the Enclave in space? Vault-Tec? other factions?

did all go well in space, or, are they all dead up there too?

 

Is it like a seedbank or some project which references Stanislaus Braun perchance?

 

I think that would be devastating, to find that, they all died up there too, and it was a slow painful way to go.

the seedbank and other experiments didn't go well, and its very quiet up there.

so, it's good in a way - the Ghouls that left from Novac for parts unknown should be okay on their long, long journey...

 

I think a pretense or 'macguffin', could be an Enclave signal repeater on the moon or elsewhere...

you've gotta shut down that Enclave... it's a failsafe from ol' JohnHenryEden hehe.

 

will the player character be able to have a permanent

settlement in space? that's a little over-the-top, but,

if they sided with the institute + BoS + railroad... its plausible.

they teleport in, or perhaps it explains how

the institute and vault tec acquired teleporters...

[IVlatty]

Hey, thanks for taking the time and giving some feedback. Yep it's Matty, ivlatty is a long habit that has regrettably confused many.

Completely forgot about those ghouls in Novac - also reminded me on what I read about the space program in Fallout, so there is at least some founding in fitting it in the universe.

However right now for me, parity with the fallout universe is not a huge priority. I'm just trying to build some new architecture with mainly clean fallout assets, and hopefully establish either some darker themes for intense, heart-pounding combat.

Blade runner and Star Wars are particular themes in my mind right now, so as I'm designing I'm constantly thinking how I might be able to do or show similar things. Even if it's just the darker, more dangerous but less humerous feeling blade runner has on me over fallout, for example.

If what I produce has no real parity with fallout, I think I'd be happy just doing what I can to make these new areas feel standalone and self sufficient, like adding safe houses and vendors. But for now combat is the real focus, and I'm also designing interiors in the hopes of making a handful of dungeons (set on space ships, in space or crashed) that are much more extensive than anything in fallout or skyrim. Oblivions 'mehrunes razor' dlc would be a good example of what I'm trying to achieve; dungeons with complexity and length that encourage you to take it slowly, or even retreat to re-equip, sell loot etc.

That said I'm still weighing up the feasibility of space scenes as a skybox. I've sourced a few potential files as well as some other methods of obtaining or creating them. The issue right now is working out whether they can be implemented in fallout for a full sphere, just like in mothership Zeta. If that's the case, then a panoramic view looking out from a space ships view port could be very very interesting.

However if that's undoable or not very simple, an easy first step may be using the nuclear fallout weather, possibly making a similar small desert wasteland, with a goal to dot the crashed spaceship dungeons around there.


later today I will share the small space ship interior I have completed, lit and navmeshed, purely for the sake of testing many of these elements, particularly what Npc's to use.

Many ideas in my mind as I've been developing this several weeks now. I will refrain from any more text until something more substantive is produced.

Again thanks for good feedback!

Last minute edit;

Tested the prydwin bridge assets in an exterior world with radstorm weather; the clouds and weather are way too obscured to be feasible. I will need to hunt down other glass panel objects, either vault or the institute. An alternative is to try the bridge object just looking out into a pitch black object space. I will try and detail a bridge with consoles and lights, and see if the blackness is convincing (perhaps a black hole or intergalactic space), as this is the only viewport there will be to suggest you are actually in space.

Another sci fi element from Star Wars I've been eager to look into is lazer projectiles bouncing from objects. So far I haven't found any info on this, has anyone attempted it or know where one would start?

 

i have started collating some stuff into an imgur album for anyone to see, the last few iterations probably wont come to any fruition, but the current setup i have begun could remain permanent as a player HQ and save point. Im doing work often on a laptop so you may see test images at lower quality or res.

 

ive tested a black backdrop and it looks fairly promising.

 

http://imgur.com/a/hXaLo

Edited January 19, 2017 by IVlatty