Hey guys,
Get your gaming PCs ready, I've added a HD water simulation! Just kidding, the water code runs fast on slow GPUs as well.
HD Water #2
I've overhauled the way water planes are calculated. This block will be a little technical, if you're not interested in it... just have a look at the screenshot below! I've created a water shader that combines the water texture with a ripple and reflection texture. This results in a dithered reflection of the game world in water planes. Moreover, there's also always only 1 water reflection. Meaning that if you're standing next to a pond and the sea, only 1 of the water areas is used for the reflection calculation. You shouldn't really feel that, because I'm smartly switching between water reflection planes depending on where you're closest to. In my next graphical improvements I plan to implement a sun along with a proper skybox and different light sources. This will allow me to give water reflections even more beauty by reflecting the skybox and sun.
I've developped the entire code on my laptop and tested it on an Intel HD chip (weak GPU) as well as on an NVIDIA GT 940M. Low quality reflections were no problem for the Intel HD chip and the NVIDIA ran both, low and high quality reflections without any issues. Nonetheless, reflections are disabled by default on slower GPUs, which are in laptops mostly. You can increase the water quality (and the quality of reflections) by increasing the Water Quality setting. It works the same way as the Shadow Quality setting.
Here's what the new water looks like:
(https://emps-world.net/img/updates_no_preview/reflections.jpg)
Camera Usability
I've updated the way the in-game camera works. Moving towards a direction (x/y) now cancels out the opposite direction: You don't need to pause when rotating the camera from left to right or vice versa. You're now also able to move the camera's y angle further down. There is now a check for the camera to clip the terrain, so you can no longer view anything that is below the surface. Prior to the update it was impossible to stand on a hill or mountain and look up to your character.
Game changes:- Some issues with the following code have been fixed. There was a problem when using auto retaliate that would give you additional attacking distance when using ranged or magic. Another issue was fixed when attacking players with melee weapons having a greater attacking distance than 1.
- The attack sound for spears has been fixed. Some attack styles had an incorrect one.
- A bug was fixed where the death of bosses was carrying on their current actions. This was happening when Nex died during her flight animation, carrying the damage calculations to her respawn.
- Operating items (games necklace, ferocious ring, amulet of glory, etc.) is now no longer possible while another action is done: agility, alching, etc.
- A bug with instances was fixed where bosses would no longer respawn. This was related to the boss healing during death animation and the game not properly detecting the npc as dead since its hitpoints wasn't 0.
- Auras now correctly cost 20EP.
- The level requirements for Agility's daily tasks have been increased:
- Wildy: level 80+
- Brimhaven: 45+
- Advanced barbarian: 75+
- Weapon configurations for meat tenderizer have been fixed.
- Slayer task messages including plural monster names have been corrected.
- Glacors no longer randomly spawn their minions. There was a bug that they were respawned when Glacors were dead.
- Having a spear equipped no longer bugs following NPCs and players.
Engine changes:- Disabling ground decoration no longer removes walls at the Karamja agility course.
- Water and lava calculations overhauled.
- The dart attack animation is no longer blocking movement.
- A few performance issues with rendering the minimap have been identified and fixed. You should find your game running smoother now.
I'll now start working on our 3rd demon boss dropping new tier 85 melee weapons. It will again be a 4-man group boss challenge. After this boss I'm open for suggestions. I have the Summoning skill in mind, a more difficult firecape minigame (new cape!), a long quest or achievement diaries. I'll probably put a poll online to see which update gains most interest! You can already let me know in a comment below what you'd prefer though. :D
All the best,
Thomy