Hey there! So I finally dropped by to write a quick post on our stuff after quite a long hiatus (exactly 3 years, 3 months and 8 days long according to my last post) and Thomas pretty much took over the blog. Right now most of you might be wondering who’s typing even . The name is Luis and I mainly code the tools we use here at Frictional (also the ones you might have been using for making your own Amnesia custom stories) After the quick introduction, here comes a little editor feature showoff.
Tech Feature: Linear-space lighting
Linear-space lighting is the second big change that has been made to the rendering pipeline for HPL3. Working in a linear lighting space is the most important thing to do if you want correct results.
It is an easy and inexpensive technique for improving the image quality. Working in linear space is not something the makes the lighting look better, it just makes it look correct.
Tech feature: Script Overview #2
Second part of the scripting overview.
Tech feature: Script Overview #1
I just recorded a little clip about how scripting works in HPL3. In this film I just talk about the very basic elements of scripting and will follow up with another movie were I talk about some more complex features.
Tech feature: Scripting upgrade
For a couple of months now I have, on and off, worked on some basic tech aspects for the engine. Everytime I was done with one of these I thought it was among the hardest things I would do for the new engine, yet the next feature as always proved more challenging. Terrain geometry was harder to implement than sun shadows, terrain texturing harder than geometry, and so on. Implementing the script system is no different.
Pre-pass lighting redux
After writing the previous post on pre-pass lighting I started doing some tests, to see how it compares to the old deferred renderer. The results that I got where pretty interesting, so thought I might as well share them. Also note that this post might be a bit more technical than the previous.
Tech Feature: Pre-pass lighting
Progress on the new engine, HPL3, is coming along nicely and recently I changed the core rendering system into something called Pre-pass lighting. This switch has been made for a number of reasons, but before I got into that and what pre-pass lighting exactly is, I need to explain how we did it back in the “old days”.
Tech feature: Sunlight with Shadows
Now I am pretty much done with the first major feature for HPl3, the engine that will power our upcoming (and so far super secret) game. This feature is global sunlight along with shadows, a feature not implemented previously. And since it is now implemented you can bet it will an important feature for the secret game 😉
