[smurfbizkit]

Originally Posted by Eradicator

I think they did that for a reason. First in gives the game a slightly cartoony feel which oddly enoguh can help get them a lower rating. Also because of size of the units. In Blitz if you zoom up the skins look awesome, but if you zoom out to much and your settings arent all maxed the skin start to look really bad because of those fine details merge together. Big bold lines help to distiguish and exagerate shapes which is desirable sometimes. Please note that I'm in no way "dissing" Blitz2 :P

I know what you mean, gracktov's skins do tend to get a bit "fuzzy" when zoomed out. His newer skins are much better in that regard, now that he knows about the issue. I try to do my skins so they look good zoomed out first and foremost.

Anyways, it is possible for the units to hold their form when zoomed out...and still have them be realistic looking.

[Flyby]

The game engine samples the textures and this makes them look more blury in the game. I had that problem with the RA2 shapes also...

To counter that effect, you need to increase the contrast and saturation in your textures to a point that they look over-constrasted in Photoshop or PSP.

[Eradicator]

Basically what I was saying, but with more technical jargon :P The game probably also reduces the quality it renders the textures at the farther you zoom from the unit.

[smurfbizkit]

well there is another option, you could go in and edit the mip maps... so that the largest one is how it was initially, and then edit the smaller mip maps

[Eradicator]

Ya, but then those people who needed the lower quality mip maps for the game to run decently might not be able to play Blitz 2 at a reasonable speed.

[Proclone]

Editing the smaller mip maps won't affect performance.

What Smurf is suggesting is actually a really good idea. By making the mip maps custom you would be able to have BOTH really detialed textures when you zoom in AND non-blurry high contrast more-generals-like textures when zoomed out.

And in the end the game would have no change in performance.

[Eradicator]

Well, if you edit their size it would. If thats even possible. I havent messed with the dds format or the mip maps much. And why are you being so hostile?

[Proclone]

Originally Posted by Eradicator

Well, if you edit their size it would. If thats even possible. I havent messed with the dds format or the mip maps much. And why are you being so hostile?

You can't change the size of the mip maps like that.

I'm being "hostile" because you're talking to things you have no clue about.

[Eradicator]

Which is why I didn't think it was possible. Like I said I didn't study the dds format. Or how Generals creates/reads mip maps. Its obviously different than most games where the mip map is not stored in the actualy file. I didn't realise smurf meant go could go into the file and edit the mip maps to be different than the original art wise. I thought he was theorizing about changing the size which would in fact cause a performance change however slight on most machines. No need to get hostile and virtually roll your eyes at me, lol.

[Proclone]