Author Topic: Alpha 8 now available - August 6, 2014 (Read 47137 times)

Unnamed25 · « **Reply #30 on:** August 07, 2014, 08:37:52 AM »

Quote from: Geers on August 06, 2014, 07:21:12 PM

I still find it weird that alpha testers are testing an alpha for alpha testers.

Yo dawg

Xriqxa · « **Reply #31 on:** August 07, 2014, 09:17:15 AM »

Quote from: SpyCreepers on August 07, 2014, 07:46:50 AM

New Features :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_rd1vQjF5L4

Wow. This is truly amazing, I can't wait to test this out on my own.

One question though: How come simulations seem to be a bit limiting? Like, when objects collide, the simulation freezes? I certainly hope this won't be the case for me, I certainly want to try out US2 to it's full potential.

Josh · « **Reply #32 on:** August 07, 2014, 09:22:49 AM »

I've only been using this update for five minutes, and I'm already in love with it! I'm probably going to spend the day on this; it's an amazing update most definitely.

Bla · « **Reply #33 on:** August 07, 2014, 09:28:25 AM »

Cool, all the new features seem to work for me. No fatal flaws.

I was a bit confused when saving the simulation. It doesn't seem to appear immediately when you save it, but if you load another simulation, then it appears under "My sims". I guess it makes sense loading the sim you just saved is kind of pointless, but slightly confusing.

Also some screenshots of frozen Earth (with advanced climate simulation disabled I think) and Earth after transitioning into gas giant (apparently with the surface features still vaguely recognizeable)

Pinkythefoxxywasp · « **Reply #34 on:** August 07, 2014, 09:32:14 AM »

Wow, earth looks very strange in that last screenshot, like someone went into photoshop and used the Warp plugin lol

Xriqxa · « **Reply #35 on:** August 07, 2014, 09:33:27 AM »

That's just the effect that US2 adds to terrestrial planets when they are becoming gas giant planets. This, I think, needs to be changed soon since it's quite unrealistic IMO.

Eras · « **Reply #36 on:** August 07, 2014, 11:28:47 AM »

awww i can't wait for the code *_*

WitheHole18 · « **Reply #37 on:** August 07, 2014, 01:32:18 PM »

Quote from: Xriqxa on August 07, 2014, 09:17:15 AM

Quote from: SpyCreepers on August 07, 2014, 07:46:50 AM
New Features :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_rd1vQjF5L4
Wow. This is truly amazing, I can't wait to test this out on my own.

One question though: How come simulations seem to be a bit limiting? Like, when objects collide, the simulation freezes? I certainly hope this won't be the case for me, I certainly want to try out US2 to it's full potential.

Unfortunately I also suffer from a bug that freezes the simulation during the collisions. Maybe it's a problem with the computer that can not handle the data in a uniform manner.

Breakfestbacon · « **Reply #38 on:** August 07, 2014, 01:48:12 PM »

To Dan and the team:
From what I see, The build is stable and able to use. The only thing that is different is a bit choppy fps. It is probably because I am running this on my laptop, although I remember getting slightly better FPS before. And it does not seem I am affected by the simulation freeze after collisions. That might be something to fix before releasing it to the new alpha testers, but I don't deems that quite nessesary

dechireur77 · « **Reply #39 on:** August 07, 2014, 02:42:47 PM »

The stars are so beautiful in "Universe Sandbox 2". ^^
Beautiful ..

huppy4 · « **Reply #40 on:** August 07, 2014, 05:28:01 PM »

Why the Chinese map also is uncomplete? Why water particles still floating in space？@Dan Dixon I hope you a little bit of science，ok?

Cryo · « **Reply #41 on:** August 07, 2014, 05:30:44 PM »

what do you mean? incomplete?

huppy4 · « **Reply #42 on:** August 07, 2014, 05:48:47 PM »

SpyCreepers · « **Reply #43 on:** August 07, 2014, 10:42:57 PM »

maybe it's the heightmap

Lord DC · « **Reply #44 on:** August 07, 2014, 11:37:52 PM »

You cant come on here demanding something. that's disrespectful.

Xriqxa · « **Reply #45 on:** August 08, 2014, 12:05:07 AM »

Quote from: huppy4 on August 07, 2014, 05:28:01 PM

Why the Chinese map also is uncomplete? Why water particles still floating in space？@Dan Dixon I hope you a little bit of science，ok?

What? So what if your height map is just a little wonky? Florida is a little warped as well, but I don't give a crap.

"I hope you incorporate science."

Geography isn't the only thing in US2. This is an astronomy software (mostly) and a tiny kink in a height map is not much of a priority, don't you think?

And what do you mean, add science? Why does the elimination of one town make you so butthurt enought to say that the whole program is scientifically innacurate? Dan and Co. are working their asses off and you came here to tell them that there is a small error in the map? Not even a compliment? Okay.

SpyCreepers · « **Reply #46 on:** August 08, 2014, 01:12:21 AM »

xriqxa is right. even some island is sunk. it doesn't need to be really accurate. US 2 is an astronomy software.

Cryo · « **Reply #47 on:** August 08, 2014, 01:20:15 AM »

hmm imma bit neutral on this.... it would be nice to have the earth 100% the same as we know it is today, but also can't you just lower the sea level? (Edit)looking back i can see how much of a noob i was)

SpyCreepers · « **Reply #48 on:** August 08, 2014, 01:21:27 AM »

i think it's not the sea level. it's who made the heightmap of earth

Xriqxa · « **Reply #49 on:** August 08, 2014, 01:22:58 AM »

Spy is right. The heightmap is a little off, so a couple islets are nonexistant, but thats no reason to start raging on the forum.

Cryo · « **Reply #50 on:** August 08, 2014, 01:24:47 AM »

Huppy wasnt raging, He or she was just asking to make a tiny edit even though its like the second or third time.

SpyCreepers · « **Reply #51 on:** August 08, 2014, 01:45:04 AM »

heightmaps are not really accurate. it's basically just a high resolution picture consists of grayscale images to make height. it's not really accurate. i've made an earth map for minecraft from heightmap and south america is a bit sunk. so please understand this, huppy.

huppy4 · « **Reply #52 on:** August 08, 2014, 04:54:16 AM »

Ok, I think I have been make you angry. Sorry for you.But many Chinese people don't understand except me.They asked me to talk this problem.

Jim Jam Science Mans · « **Reply #53 on:** August 08, 2014, 05:01:23 AM »

It's one of those changes that can be made later on, I think. Right now the focus is on implementing big features, making sure they work, and refining mechanics and the underlying systems. Small changes like fixing the heightmap, making gas giants have a truly procedural or compositional texture, and the like are really nothing more than polishing the 99% complete thing.

Consider it like a block of stone. First you have a rock, which you have to chisel down into roughly the right shape. But then, you have to get the measurements and proportions right from there. And while you're doing that you don't worry too much about rough little spurs or edges, so long as on the whole it's getting into the right shape. Once you can check everything and find that it's all right angles and equal proportions, then you can chip off the irregularities and surface imperfections.

Geers · « **Reply #54 on:** August 08, 2014, 06:30:56 AM »

Quote from: Cryo on August 07, 2014, 07:49:39 AM

That star it Hum's with power....it speak's to me.....

See a doctor?

C7 · « **Reply #55 on:** August 08, 2014, 10:34:49 AM »

"Why the Chinese map also is uncomplete? Why water particles still floating in space？@Dan Dixon I hope you a little bit of science，ok?"

The heightmap does not have enough depth resolution to perfectly model the elevations of Earth. You're essentially limited to 255 divisions from the bottom of the sea to the highest point on Earth. It's not that they're inaccurate, it's that the data has been rounded to be stored in a texture's color data, that we can then pass to a shader for rendering.

It's like this, because we allow you to dynamically change the water level on planets. If we were using static water, it would be very easy for it to be 100% accurate. Since we're trying to have USÂ² be as interactive as possible, and run in realtime, we have to make some compromises.

(For the curious, who'd like to know why it's 255 levels) Colors in a computer are stored with a color depth, on a modern computer, this is typically 32-bit. This leaves 8bits per channel in Red, Green, Blue, and Alpha. When you convert 8 bits into an integer, you're left with an unsigned integer going from 0-255.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integer_(computer_science)

FiahOwl · « **Reply #56 on:** August 08, 2014, 10:41:21 AM »

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C7 · « **Reply #57 on:** August 08, 2014, 11:15:12 AM »

Quote from: FiahOwl on August 08, 2014, 10:41:21 AM

Do you think you could edit the heightmap for sea level to be at sea level?

Yep, that is indeed the solution. But it's also rather time consuming to manually edit a large texture that needs pixel perfect height values. It's something we can do when we have some spare time to polish things.

crashman1390 · « **Reply #58 on:** August 08, 2014, 11:50:07 AM »

What happened to nova remnants?

smjjames · « **Reply #59 on:** August 08, 2014, 12:26:47 PM »

Whoo, saving and loading, awesome.

Anybody else having the hotspot for the cursor shift off of the cursor when you click the toggle for the displacement mapping?

Edit: It seems to have something to do with having the window resize itself while in windowed mode.