A Fast Week

It feels like only six days ago since I had this Friday feeling. Just finished uploading BUILD-G to the alpha testers via Rick (should be up there later for the internal testing crew).  This one makes significant strides in improving AI performance, though we obviously still need to keep working on the nuances. A previous build went out but a BIN file error created some early trouble, so hopefully the new one will resolve all.

This is the fat zombie model using the latest shader tweaks and corrected normal calculations. As you can see from the exaggerated specular, the little details are now picked up such as the base relief effect of the missing chunks of skin and the roundness of the flabby nipple.  Naturally the low polygon nature of the model can be detected around the edges but in motion, at night, running after a player who's just run out of ammo, and making horrific noises will certainly fit the bill in any horror game!

Here is the same shader with the existing character model. You can see we have improved the little details such as the folds in the pants, veins in the hand and ripples in the sleeves, plus you might spot the self-shadowing effect which now uses a PCF technique employing 25 texture look-ups per pixel at the closer ranges, so hopefully this increases the visual fidelity for those hero-shot screen grabs.

While internal testing commences in earnest over the weekend I will be spending some time away from the keyboard digging holes in the garden and getting some fresh air in my lungs.  On Monday, fully recharged, we run the final mile to get this version into shape for a public reveal.  I might however spend a few hours here and there playing with the soldier script to see if I can make him more aggressive and menacing. I have permission from Dave to screw up his carefully balanced character logic ;)