Platform Masters development (November 5, 2014) - rainsnow and other updates

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• published: 23 Jun 2016
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Published on Nov 5, 2014 I've made quite a few enhancements in the last week, though generally small improvements. The space bases now have much more detailed buildings than before. Instead of a solid red color, lighting effects aside, they're now detailed and easily distinguished apart. I've also made the swamp water texture for Musan Swamp (not shown). The spruce tree has been updated since it was off on a few fronts which means needing to redo everything that uses the spruce tree (not shown). The biggest change, however, comes with the precipitation. Ronnisa Plains has rain. Nodera Highlands has snow. There are multiple changes that I've made. First, I made the spacing more even and consistent. Second, the range has been extended out to 6 SU instead of 4 SU. Third, the snow has been made much more dense (the rain only slightly more dense). Fourth, and not easily noticed, the rain and snow dynamically change in intensity. In Nodera Highlands, you start with a fairly light intensity but, over the course of a long time span, it increases to a full-on blizzard. Well, it's not a real blizzard as it's missing the time limitation, but the conditions pretty much reduce visibility below 13.2 SU which makes it qualify as a blizzard. Although you can still see sharp-contrast objects, they're very difficult to make out, if you even can at all. The best results come when I speed up the cycles to 120 times real time. Every second that passes by is 2 minutes of real time so it really gives a good sense as to just how gradual the change really is. With the reduced visibility in Nodera Highlands, I had to change the closer ground decals. This now includes a closer-in freeway, complete with cars, and the closest system of exit and entrance ramps you'll see in the entire game. I even thought of a new idea that would enhance other worlds but I'll cover this in a later video when I have it finished. There are actually signs imprinted on the ground decals themselves. In this case, it's speed limit signs or an exit number sign, exit 162 to be exact. It's too far away to be read, however. One other change I made with Nodera Highlands was making the levels closer to the clouds for the lowest point, to put more focus into the clouds, below and above. Don't forget that, if you can get above the clouds, you're in for a nice blue sky. You're probably wondering. Why does it take 2 hours for a full cycle with Nodera Highlands and 30 minutes for Ronnisa Plains? Isn't that way long? Surprisingly, it's not. If you like to explore and/or die often, it can take a while to go through a world. When new levels are loaded or replayed, the world's scenery doesn't get reloaded so the effect continues on regardless. So, if you want to spend 5+ hours grinding for lives and/or score in one of the levels here, go ahead. If you do you'll easily get to see the cycles going through from almost nothing to a full on blizzard or down pour. I tried recording at 60 fps but my system can't keep up in Ronnisa Plains, dropping and inserting a lot of frames with horribly glitched audio. But, I can record 30 fps very well. The funny thing is, under XP, this didn't happen until a 1280x960 resolution. That pesky 30% performance loss with Windows 7 is getting in the way.