Not actually a game as such, but a fun tech demo. We got a press release about how some game or other is going to have awesome clouds made by a British company. I took a look at their cloud claims, and discovered they really are good clouds. Hell, there’s even a cloud demo! Awesome. Here it is. Just 2mb of the best simulated clouds we’ve ever seen. All games should have them.
Rock, Paper, Shotgun
Skybox Clouds 2: The Encloudening
Posted by Jim Rossignol on October 21st, 2008 at 5:43 pm.
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That’s actually quite cool. I like how the effect of the sun is actually pretty convincing.
If only there was the option to have the clouds where the ground is as well: that way I could whack up the time multiplier and re-create the opening scene from Quantum Leap :)
Doesn’t work on my Vista x64 + HD4850 :(
That’s funky. Even more so because a friend of mine recently finished his PhD on the subject of interactive rendering of realistic clouds: http://evasion.imag.fr/Publications/2008/BNMBC08/
He hasn’t answered me about whether Simul Weather is based on his work, though. There is lots of research on the subject, so it could very well be unrelated.
Damn, that is nice.
Ooh, fluid mechanics in a game. Rather than the jam spillages we saw in, say, Cell Factor.
worked ok for me on Vistax64 and nVidia, if slightly slowly once I started playing with all of the sliders at once.
But then it just disappeared, no sign of it having been installed at all! Where has it gone? Answers on the back of a horse to: Phuzz
Internetland
This is clearly a threat to the existing six-sided sky enclosure industry. Tariffs much be put in place before any more damage is done.
Crashes the instant I run it to be exact here, does not work at all. I got a stable computer with no memmory related errors but the crash I get is memmory related, aka pointer pointing to wrong space….
Hi there, we make this, and thanks for the kind words – anyone with problems running the demo please get in touch with support@simul.co.uk so I can fix it.
Experiencing instant-crash after launch on Vista 64 also (+ Radeon 4870 x2)
I’m thinking DEP-related maybe?
I would love to see this in flightsimulator or something alike, great job getting this done!
I get this error in the logs:
Error – required OpenGL extension is not supported: GL_ARB_color_buffer_float
Anyone one know how to fix this?
Those are cirrus-ly good.
Worked once for me, now won’t run again. (also, uninstaller is a blind link.) (using XP)
Looked nice while it ran..
for me, the game ran fine coming directly out of installation, but the link it placed in my start menu led to a crash.
Directly starting the demo from C:\Program Files\Simul\Weather Demo\Demo.exe did work however.
Weird.
(winxp, sp1 (…) if anyone cares)
As for the clouds. They’re pretty nice. But the looooong delay on the density/scale parameters is a bit meh.
Ah, that was probably my problem too, nonfunctioning shortcuts from start menu. (same as nonfunctioning uninstaller.)
I’m getting that too. I suspect the only solution is new video hardware.
What, no terragen?
Same with the GL_ARB_color_buffer_float error :(
Windows XP SP3 with ATi Radeon X1950 Pro
Maybe it’s an ATI thing then?
Beautiful, I want to use it as a screensaver.
works in XP fine for me
nVidea
Looking a some files, seems done with Cg, only for Nvidia.
http://www.geeks3d.com/?p=375
ATI cards obviously need at least the 8.7 to have GL_ARB_color_buffer_float…
You can use GPU Caps Viewer to check if your card+driver support that opengl extension.
Beauuuuuutiful.
nabeel
They should have sent a poet.
I miss the atmospherics we had in “Dragon Empires” (RIP, 2004). The engine produced some beautiful effects, and no other MMO has really gone for that seamless, realistic-looking world, which is a shame.
Crash and burn.
XP (SP3) ATI 4850 w/ 8.10 installed.
If you alter the roughness slider you can make little fluffy clouds.
And little fluffy clouds.
And little fluffy clouds.
Error – required OpenGL extension is not supported: GL_ARB_color_buffer_float
this isn’t supported by most if not all ATI drivers so i wouldn’t expect this app to run on any ATI cards although i could be wrong it doesn’t run on my work computer anyway, you’d think they’d make thier demo a bit more portable
@Turin Turambar
Cg is just a language that gets compiled into GPU assembly it’s platform independent as long as the complier is.
Actually, I’m not sure if there are any fluid mechanics. I don’t know whether the clouds just change a bit, rather than growing and rolling or whatever depending on atmospheric conditions. But then maybe no-one cares about that sort of thing.
The developers must be British! I haven’t seen that many clouds in a long time. I guess if Australian developers made this they’d get criticised about how constant clear blue skies lack ‘visual interest’.
I fixed the Start Menu link, should work OK now. The GL_ARB_color_buffer_float seems to be the source of problems with ATI cards. This is actually only required for the sky colours, not the clouds; I’ll try and put together an alternative shader for non-float textures, should take a few days.
this happens a lot here where i diss something and the authors standing right behind me :( i should learn to keep my mouth shut
This could change the face (hair? hat?) of gaming forever! It’s beautiful.
Hell, the program as it is, coupled with a simple ocean-wave animation, would make a brilliant screen saver.
silky smooth at 2560×1600 and breathtaking to look at. Crytek, time to take some notes!