Weather

[woompa loompa]

I don't know how difficult this is to make, but a nice addition to tracks would be weather or just atmospheric variants such as fog/haze on icy tracks and dust on deserts/countryside.

[MTres19]

That's actually not too hard to do, but it might not turn out the way you're thinking because it's meant to simulate fog, not dust, and it wouldn't really move or anything...

[0zone0ne]

I vaguely remember seeing dust cloud effects blowing off dunes in Shifting Sands, so I'm sure effects like this are possible... The tracks you're thinking of are rather old and I suspect they will receive makeovers sooner or later, so perhaps more prominent weather effects will be added then?

[samuncle]

Hi

I really like your idea and I would like to see it included in SuperTuxKart however there are a few things you don't see.

Let me explain the issue. In order to achieve the effect, several conditions must be required:

1) We can simply randomly enable or not the rain particle system (the most visible thing) so it will "rain" in game when the player launch the race
2) but then if the track as a clear sky we must change the texture of the sky (in order to give it a more cloudy approach)
3) but then if the sun is shinning we must change the sun color and probably even remove it
4) but then we must change the IBL (basically the mood of the track)
5) but then everything will still look dry. In order to add a wet look, we must change the specularity + glossiness of all textures in the track
6) now imagine you want to do this dynamically instead of when the player launches the track and you get an idea of the complexity.

In conclusion:
* Programmers should code a weather system
* 3D artists should adapt all objects to the possible weather conditions
* 2D artists should do sky for all track and for all condition. We have 20 tracks, let's consider 3 weather condition (sunny, cloudy, rainy) which means 60 skybox to do.

Imagine we take only one week to make sure one track is working with the weather system it would take 20 weeks (aka 4 months) of manpower in order to do it.

While I really enjoy the idea (and probably other programmers too) it's not likely we will do it. Why ? well because we have our own great ideas and plans, like networking and submitting the game to steam.

So, while what you describe is possible, the best chance to see it in game is to do it step by step. For instance you could submit a patch that allows the game to know the current weather. That would be a first easy step. Then you can see with 3D artists how we can do this in a track as a test.

I also really want to make a day/night cycle but for the moment, we don't have the time, however I did several tests (like carnival / vs cocoa temple) of night version of tracks to see how it would looks and there is even a ticket.

So as you can see not really an easy task. But you are welcome to put the first bricks and the foundations. We gladly accepted previous side project like the soccer mode who are now part of the main game.

I vaguely remember seeing dust cloud effects blowing off dunes in Shifting Sands

Yes it's possible and it's already done, I'm actually glad someone noticed it, because I was fearing it was too subtle. However doing it dynamically would be difficult.

[woompa loompa]

wow it's really a big problem, much more than I thought. Instead of a full weather system, it might be easier to simply add more subtle atmospheric effects such as ice fog. Ice fog is a side effect of cold places, and it could be added to "cold tracks" without having to change all the textures and artwork.

[woompa loompa]

well because we have our own great ideas and plans, like networking and submitting the game to steam.

Just out of curiosity, are you considering stem only for the purpose of making some money selling the game? If so, what are your plans to monetize it? For example are you thinking about changing license, or just add a price hoping that somebody will pay for it, or maybe are you thinking of paid DLC, or "in-game purchases"?

[MTres19]

The license can't be changed without rewriting any parts licensed under the GPL, because the GPL requires any derivative works to also be GPL-licensed. That is, unless the devs get permission from every person who has ever contributed to STK (including back when it was still TuxKart).

[Auria]

The details of how we are going to go on steam are still to be determined, but STK is and will always remain a free/open-source game no matter what. We sometimes give gifts to thank donators, but there are absolutely no plans at this time for in-game purchases

[0zone0ne]

I don't know if this is possible due to licensing issues (?), but one idea I had was making the donator's package available through DLC on Steam. Because DLC can be updated to include different content each time a new release occurs, this would fix the issue of donators needing to manually request new donation packages whenever the game updates. The DLC store page would need to make it clear what it contained at any given time, and that its contents are likely to change with each version

[QwertyChouskie]

I don't know if this is possible due to licensing issues (?), but one idea I had was making the donator's package available through DLC on Steam. Because DLC can be updated to include different content each time a new release occurs, this would fix the issue of donators needing to manually request new donation packages whenever the game updates. The DLC store page would need to make it clear what it contained at any given time, and that its contents are likely to change with each version

I like this idea too.

[samuncle]

I don't know if this is possible due to licensing issues (?), but one idea I had was making the donator's package available through DLC on Steam. Because DLC can be updated to include different content each time a new release occurs, this would fix the issue of donators needing to manually request new donation packages whenever the game updates. The DLC store page would need to make it clear what it contained at any given time, and that its contents are likely to change with each version

I like this idea too.

We don't know the details but most likely a combination of the two. If it's a minor update like more objects for a track then yes updating is good. Now if it's different tracks and a different package it will most likely be a different down. Note that we always include content from the previous package in the core game.