Flat crowds and vegetation in Racing Games [2021] *spawn*

[Silent_Buddha]

GTSport and GT7 has 3d crowds simulating walking around the track perimeters and up/down the stadiums

https://imgur.com/m9g9jjN

actually all of the crowd/spectators on the track are 3D models, which is probably why the pop-in/out is so aggressive for the stadium crowds.

https://forum.beyond3d.com/posts/2225896/

Look at the crowd close to the camera in the released GT7 footage (0:51 to 0:57 as SNC mentioned), they are almost all just 2D sprites. Some have rudimentary 3-4 frame animations but many are completely static. Which is understandable since there look to be about 500-1000 people in the stands there.

There are a few down closer to the track that are animated 3D models, but very few of them in that scene. There's also a few possible 3D models walking down the aisles in the stands.

Regards,
SB

 

[vspectra]

https://forum.beyond3d.com/posts/2225896/

Look at the crowd close to the camera in the released GT7 footage (0:51 to 0:57 as SNC mentioned), they are almost all just 2D sprites. Some have rudimentary 3-4 frame animations but many are completely static. Which is understandable since there look to be about 500-1000 people in the stands there.

There are a few down closer to the track that are animated 3D models, but very few of them in that scene. There's also a few possible 3D models walking down the aisles in the stands.

Regards,
SB

Just checked again. It looks the same as it did in GTSport. They are 3d models with varying 3d lods depending on camera distance. In GTSport not all spectators move/animate either, but they all were still 3D.

Here is the same stand in GTSport as in that GT7 footage, on Monza Circuit.

 

[zed]

that looks like 2d crowds to me.
I'ld go for less ppl but make them 3d with very simple skeleton (they dont need to walk or move their faces/hands)

 

[Karamazov]

these are 3D

 

[zed]

Are you sure? Then when is eg that guy in cyan shirt 4 or 5x in exactly the same pose

https://developer.nvidia.com/gpugems/gpugems3/part-i-geometry/chapter-2-animated-crowd-rendering

 

[Deleted member 11852]

Are you sure? Then when is eg that guy in cyan shirt 4 or 5x in exactly the same pose

If you look again you'll see every variation of spectator is in the same pose. This probably isn't noticeable in motion because the crowd and the camera is moving. It wouldn't be a good use of CPU time and RAM to for the game to independently animate every individual in the crowd.

 

[Karamazov]

I'm sure they are 3d, ugly 3d but 3d, just like in gts, and ps4 pro version had more 3d crowd than base ps4.

 

[zed]

If you look again you'll see every variation of spectator is in the same pose.

close but not every one
eg look at guy with green jacket
also you would do the skinning on the GPU here, as the skeletons are gonna be simple

 

[davis.anthony]

But it's still an open world title with tons of details everywhere you look, and yes there are crowds in Forza Festival sites in FH4 and FH3. They are 3D and moderately detailed and animated, the avatar and the drivers are fully detailed too.

The point is, racing sims like Forza 7 and GT Sports have pretty limited scope of visuals: just a closed racing track with some crowds here and there, there is simply no excuse in 2022 or 2021 for them to feature cardboard graphics for crowds or trees.

A finite amount of processing power, there's your excuse.

 

[orangpelupa]

A finite amount of processing power, there's your excuse.

And development time / effort / resources probably. Rather than using it for crowds, PD prefer to use it for something else.

 

[milk]

If you look again you'll see every variation of spectator is in the same pose. This probably isn't noticeable in motion because the crowd and the camera is moving. It wouldn't be a good use of CPU time and RAM to for the game to independently animate every individual in the crowd.

Actually, from my experience, the cloned animation looks even more obvious in motion. Our pattern recognition really kicks in and notices the same sets of motion happening simultaneously across the screen.

I wonder if they couldn't just save the animations as vector offsets instead of traditional skinning so they can have each model at a different part of the animation without it costing much performance at all...

 

[Deleted member 11852]

Actually, from my experience, the cloned animation looks even more obvious in motion. Our pattern recognition really kicks in and notices the same sets of motion happening simultaneously across the screen.

I'm thinking of from the perspective as the driver is going to be focussing on the road and any cars around them. Of course, if you're playing this like some homicidal racer, dead set on smashing straight into spectators like your starring in some weird snuff F1 league then yeah..

 

[see colon]

Actually, from my experience, the cloned animation looks even more obvious in motion. Our pattern recognition really kicks in and notices the same sets of motion happening simultaneously across the screen.

I wonder if they couldn't just save the animations as vector offsets instead of traditional skinning so they can have each model at a different part of the animation without it costing much performance at all...

It isn't just the motion, but the colors that stand out. If the animations that are synced were skinned differently, it might not be so noticeable. But they are identical in appearance and animation, so it's easy to pick out.

 

[milk]

It isn't just the motion, but the colors that stand out. If the animations that are synced were skinned differently, it might not be so noticeable. But they are identical in appearance and animation, so it's easy to pick out.

I'm guessing they are in perfect sync precisely so they can reuse the results from skinning across dozens of models. If they were re-doing all the skinning for each instance, I'm sure every instance would be at a different offset of the animations timeline and maybe even playing at slight speed differences.

 

[see colon]

I'm guessing they are in perfect sync precisely so they can reuse the results from skinning across dozens of models. If they were re-doing all the skinning for each instance, I'm sure every instance would be at a different offset of the animations timeline and maybe even playing at slight speed differences.

Maybe. I'm more talking about doing something like a pallet swap so the people all moving aren't wearing the same color shirt.

 

[zed]

And development time / effort / resources probably. Rather than using it for crowds, PD prefer to use it for something else.

I think it would be more time consuming getting the 2d textures looking 'correct' than 3d models

I tried to find a video of the crowds on youtube, not much there, videos are mainly all driving and there the ppl just wizz by so you see nothing
I did find this from 4 years ago though

I was thinking crashes cause then the car slows down, and you will get a chance to see the ppl

Yes the ppl look crap also the headlight but nearly everything else, some stages there I'm going is this real video, I'm guessing within 5 years you won't be able to tell easily

 

[orangpelupa]

Probably they simply reused stuff from older GT?

Like how FH5 reused FH4 steering wheel animation (max -90 / +90 degrees only)