Black&White 2: Developer Diary #4

It’s time once again for Black & White Studios to embark on the fabulous journey through the development diaries so that you’ll be able to keep abreast of all the goings on in the world of Black & White 2. I’ll be your guide through the entire development process of the game and, lucky you, you get to experience it all from my rather distinct perspective.

John McLean-Foreman

One of the things that always impressed gamers about the original Black & White was the sheer power of its graphics engine. In early demos, Peter Molyneux delighted in demonstrating a camera move where he would begin high in the air with a wide view of the entire Black & White world. He would then slowly zoom down in an unbroken move until he eventually ended up on a barrel that had an apple floating in it -- and in the apple was a worm. It might not sound like much now, but it was extraordinary for the time.

One of the most difficult things that I've come up against in writing these Black & White 2 developer diaries is talking about programming. Programming. Is. Dull. It's naught (ha ha… programming joke) but numbers. If I show you some code, you'll see zeroes and ones, or mad text strings in some kind of bizarre, almost-English language. 3D programming is even more unreadable and even more mathematical than most other types of programming, and frankly, I don't remember anyone ever getting excited about reading math textbooks.

A Greek Harbor anyone?

The bottom line is this: many games have a 3D engine, and that's the code that comes together to power all the visualizations in the game. The Creature, the landscape, the objects, everything that moves, and everything that has been drawn by the artists is rendered by the fabulous little graphics card hidden away in the bowels of your computer, and that card is in turn instructed by the 3D programming code. That's what programming is … instructions on what to do, or in this case, what to draw.

So what are the 3D programmers of Black & White 2 up against? The game needs to be able to simultaneously render thousands of people as well as growing, evolving towns; varying weather conditions; different climates from around the world; landscapes that morph based on player alignment; and, in addition to all that, dynamic landscapes that can been torn asunder by godly might.

Furthermore, when you play some games, you may notice that the camera is usually set at a fixed distance, which means that all the artwork only needs to be created to reflect that single distance. In B&W2, however, the 3D engine has to look just as good down on the ground amid the buzzing insects as it does overlooking the entire landscape from up amongst the clouds, as well as at every point in-between. No small feat.

Given the ambition of the game, I originally had some serious doubts that it would be able to run on a four-year-old machine (B&W 1's "recommended" system is now the target for B&W 2's "minimum" spec). I asked Jonty how exactly he planned to accomplish this, and he explained to me that all he had to do was tell David, our 3D engine guru, that he'd never be able to do it so he might as well not bother. David, as is his way, was totally offended and set about proving Jonty wrong.

David says that there are several things that you need to keep in mind when designing a 3D engine, but first and foremost is that you program everything with the minimum spec machine in mind. Once you get all the base features of the game running at a good framerate, you then have a very, very efficient and scalable 3D engine to run on the high-spec machines. With the amount of processing power that is left over, we can go mad with visual extras and use the hardware to its full potential.

Another aspect that I would never have thought of, but have learned is also vitally important, is the design of the art tools. As David puts it, you can have a great 3D engine, but if you have crap artwork, or no way to properly transfer beautiful artwork into the game, then the final product is still crap. With that in mind, he and the 3D team have worked very hard to create a toolset that is not only easy to use, but allows the artists the flexibility to be inventive within their area of expertise.

Japanese gates!

Francesco, for example, is most definitely not an artist, but he is a gifted mathematician and programmer, and as such he was able to create what seemed to me to be some very realistic-looking water. Once Alberto (one of our artists) got his hands on Francesco's work, though, he created water that was so beautiful that it looked like he had used a completely different water system altogether. That, of course, was only possible because a lot of thought went in to creating effective art tools.

Obviously there's a lot more to a creating a 3D engine than what I have briefly described -- the 3D team explained their *mountain* of work to me in as simple way as possible, and I couldn't help but be impressed and mildly confused (as per usual) by the complexity of it all.

It would be unfair of me not to mention the passion that the 3D team has for innovation and realising Peter Molyneux's design ambitions, because ultimately it's that passion that converts into what we see on screen. In the end it doesn't matter how great you make the technology. If the game runs too slowly or you fail in making it look beautiful, then it's all been a waste of time, and time is something that we're not prepared to waste.