Shadowing Hate
                                     First-person shooter     Status: Active     Engine: Quake 4     Due: TBA



   - Shadowing Hate Development Page - (071128)

We're very pleased to announce our latest achievements in character models for our boldest game development project,
Shadowing Hate.  Some of you may know our plans to incorporate some very high-detailed models into the project, but
have questioned whether our theories are technically possible or not, understandably.  Well our recent tests prove with
flying colours that indeed our original theories are very possible, and not only that, but possible with even less headaches
and hard work than originally theorised.  I won't try to sum up all of these theories that have already been documented 
with more detail elsewhere, but basically our plan is to turn the original Shadowing Hate character models (which will be 
roughly between 2000-3000 triangles each) into smoothed high-detail versions simply by treating them with a selection of 
mesh operations and redoing skeletal rigging and UV texture coordinates.  This will enable us to achieve a standard of 
detail well ahead of its time, and allow the game to be enjoyed on a level that is not yet practical.  Originally our theories
involved a lot of extra work to clean up these automatic mesh operations, assuming they would destroy the original rig
and UV work.  We have now proven that not only does the theory work, but works well beyond our expectations.  Our old
friend Clobber The Clown is here to demonstrate this theory, in-game, real-time, as a functional MD5 with skeletal 
animations.  Please note that this model is over 5 years old now and hasn't been tweaked or tidied since, only the 
animation itself is new content:-

               SHclobberMD5071128.wmv - 3.2MB

As you can see, the mesh changes dramatically between the 2 versions shown in the video.  From roughly 1100 to 4600
triangles, you can see that _mostly_ the texture and animations are practically the same for each version, with problems 
that require only easy tweaks to fix.  This wouldn't be a big deal normally, but what you are seeing is a proper MD5 mesh
file that has been exported directly to the game engine with properly rigged skeleton and ready to be a functional player
model compatible with the MD5 animations.  Obviously we're not saying this doesn't need any work at all but it's far better
than needing to completely redo rigs and UV layouts, which originally wasn't as much an obstacle as it was a stressful
chore.  This video proves it's not even much of a chore and no longer just a theory, and we really can give players the
definite option of the functional high-detail release that we originally promised.



You can view the previous development page for this project here.



More is available in our team forum. We welcome and encourage your opinions and involvement.