{"data":{"id":18264,"title":"Squadron 42 Monthly Report: July 2021","rsi_url":"https:\/\/robertsspaceindustries.com\/comm-link\/transmission\/18264-Squadron-42-Monthly-Report-July-2021","api_url":"https:\/\/api.star-citizen.wiki\/api\/comm-links\/18264","api_public_url":"https:\/\/api.star-citizen.wiki\/comm-links\/18264","channel":"Undefined","category":"Undefined","series":"Monthly Reports","images":[{"id":30963,"name":"source.png","rsi_url":"https:\/\/media.robertsspaceindustries.com\/vjhp2njbokvxb\/source.png","alt":"","size":4895804,"mime_type":"image\/png","last_modified":"2023-05-02T18:53:45+00:00","api_url":"https:\/\/api.star-citizen.wiki\/api\/comm-link-images\/30963","similar_url":"https:\/\/api.star-citizen.wiki\/api\/comm-link-images\/30963\/similar"},{"id":31194,"name":"source.png","rsi_url":"https:\/\/media.robertsspaceindustries.com\/dyu8i559admn1\/source.png","alt":"","size":3831731,"mime_type":"image\/png","last_modified":"2023-06-06T16:13:24+00:00","api_url":"https:\/\/api.star-citizen.wiki\/api\/comm-link-images\/31194","similar_url":"https:\/\/api.star-citizen.wiki\/api\/comm-link-images\/31194\/similar"},{"id":31403,"name":"source.png","rsi_url":"https:\/\/media.robertsspaceindustries.com\/p34sp3q2kl01b\/source.png","alt":"","size":3014864,"mime_type":"image\/png","last_modified":"2023-07-04T13:35:01+00:00","api_url":"https:\/\/api.star-citizen.wiki\/api\/comm-link-images\/31403","similar_url":"https:\/\/api.star-citizen.wiki\/api\/comm-link-images\/31403\/similar"},{"id":31536,"name":"source.png","rsi_url":"https:\/\/media.robertsspaceindustries.com\/6u5x9e23ftrw7\/source.png","alt":"","size":3531870,"mime_type":"image\/png","last_modified":"2023-08-01T14:29:26+00:00","api_url":"https:\/\/api.star-citizen.wiki\/api\/comm-link-images\/31536","similar_url":"https:\/\/api.star-citizen.wiki\/api\/comm-link-images\/31536\/similar"},{"id":31783,"name":"source.png","rsi_url":"https:\/\/media.robertsspaceindustries.com\/gaazjx0n1kop2\/source.png","alt":"","size":3223870,"mime_type":"image\/png","last_modified":"2023-09-12T14:59:52+00:00","api_url":"https:\/\/api.star-citizen.wiki\/api\/comm-link-images\/31783","similar_url":"https:\/\/api.star-citizen.wiki\/api\/comm-link-images\/31783\/similar"},{"id":32961,"name":"source.png","rsi_url":"https:\/\/media.robertsspaceindustries.com\/8m2c1vusdb0hj\/source.png","alt":"","size":4757052,"mime_type":"image\/png","last_modified":"2023-10-03T12:11:38+00:00","api_url":"https:\/\/api.star-citizen.wiki\/api\/comm-link-images\/32961","similar_url":"https:\/\/api.star-citizen.wiki\/api\/comm-link-images\/32961\/similar"},{"id":32962,"name":"source.jpg","rsi_url":"https:\/\/media.robertsspaceindustries.com\/4x3lw5w4vk3o4\/source.jpg","alt":"","size":584749,"mime_type":"image\/jpeg","last_modified":"2023-10-31T19:13:02+00:00","api_url":"https:\/\/api.star-citizen.wiki\/api\/comm-link-images\/32962","similar_url":"https:\/\/api.star-citizen.wiki\/api\/comm-link-images\/32962\/similar"},{"id":38000,"name":"source.jpg","rsi_url":"https:\/\/media.robertsspaceindustries.com\/x5aus9nndxu4s\/source.jpg","alt":"","size":1186506,"mime_type":"image\/jpeg","last_modified":"2025-02-05T13:01:54+00:00","api_url":"https:\/\/api.star-citizen.wiki\/api\/comm-link-images\/38000","similar_url":"https:\/\/api.star-citizen.wiki\/api\/comm-link-images\/38000\/similar"},{"id":38060,"name":"source.jpg","rsi_url":"https:\/\/media.robertsspaceindustries.com\/fe6j2ifv3ash4\/source.jpg","alt":"","size":1773870,"mime_type":"image\/jpeg","last_modified":"2025-03-04T15:04:48+00:00","api_url":"https:\/\/api.star-citizen.wiki\/api\/comm-link-images\/38060","similar_url":"https:\/\/api.star-citizen.wiki\/api\/comm-link-images\/38060\/similar"},{"id":38084,"name":"source.jpg","rsi_url":"https:\/\/media.robertsspaceindustries.com\/pgmk7f9gt3j9y\/source.jpg","alt":"","size":2091105,"mime_type":"image\/jpeg","last_modified":"2025-04-01T17:29:16+00:00","api_url":"https:\/\/api.star-citizen.wiki\/api\/comm-link-images\/38084","similar_url":"https:\/\/api.star-citizen.wiki\/api\/comm-link-images\/38084\/similar"},{"id":40391,"name":"source.png","rsi_url":"https:\/\/media.robertsspaceindustries.com\/svep7j1purh1f\/source.png","alt":"","size":5543040,"mime_type":"image\/png","last_modified":"2025-07-01T15:37:40+00:00","api_url":"https:\/\/api.star-citizen.wiki\/api\/comm-link-images\/40391","similar_url":"https:\/\/api.star-citizen.wiki\/api\/comm-link-images\/40391\/similar"}],"images_count":42,"translations":{"en_EN":"This is a cross-post of the report that was recently sent out via the monthly Squadron 42 newsletter. We\u2019re publishing this a second time as a Comm-Link to make it easier for the community to reference back to.\nAttention Recruits,\n\nWhat you are about to read is the latest information on the continuing development of Squadron 42 (SCI des: SQ42).\n\nThanks to the work of dedicated field agents and operatives, we\u2019ve uncovered information on the Aciedo comm relay, the Bengal, Vanduul Warriors, and more.\n\nThe information contained in this communication is extremely sensitive and it is of paramount importance that it does not fall into the wrong hands. Purge all records after reading.\n\nUEE Naval High Command AI (Content)\nAI Content progressed with their work on SQ42\u2019s wildlines, with July seeing them finishing various clean up tasks. Currently, the only remaining characters are specific cases that need in-level implementation. The team also wrapped up the usables for the Aciedo level. Aside from a handful of usables that require further design discussion with the Art team, all usables are now implemented with working blockouts. The designers are currently implementing the new \u2018usables first reaction system,\u2019 which allows NPCs to break out of the usables when being interrupted by the player.\n\nAI (Feature)\nLast month, the AI Feature team primarily focused on reviewing combat, with the aim of refining the existing behaviors and functionality to provide a more intelligible and enjoyable experience. The first part of this was reviewing the settings for perception and reactions to give the designers greater control over how the AI behaves when encountering a stimulus. Next, they worked on the basic combat behaviors, ensuring cover selection is working as intended and that the AI provides the base level of functionality after the first reaction to the enemy. \u201cOften the majority of the technology for improving combat already exists; it\u2019s more a case of reviewing very specific situations and ensuring that the AI behaves as intended and fixing sometimes simple bugs that produce bad behavior. From these beginnings, we hope to do a full review over all of the combat behaviors, which will lead to better and more enjoyable gameplay.\u201d \u2013 AI Feature Team\n\nThey also worked on specific behaviors to enable AI to spread out and surround the player and taunt them while in melee combat. This required changes to the tactical point system to support a new metric allowing them to weight points spread out from other AI. Melee behaviors received attention to ensure they quickly switch to combat when the situation requires too\n\nFinally, the animators continued working on the \u2018speed protocol\u2019 and \u2018polish\u2019 stages for the mo-capped cowering and surrendering animations. This will be useful for both unarmed and untrained AI and the AI combat behaviors currently under review.\n\nAI (Tech)\nAI Tech enabled the planetary navigation system to make connections between adjacent mesh tiles, which is part of the base work to add support for planetary pathfinding. This means that triangles from a navigation mesh tile will create links to triangles from other adjacent tiles at the generation step. They updated the tile generator debug draw to also work with planetary navigation mesh tiles to help them debug issues that could appear during the planet mesh generation step.\n\nWork was submitted to allow NPCs to push a trolley along a path. The work for this includes playing an animation to connect to the trolley, selecting a path, pushing the trolley along the path, disconnecting from the trolley at the end, and moving away. For movement with the trolley, the team considered the size of the agent for collision avoidance and looked at the animations used for pushing it uphill and downhill or when NPC needs to turn the trolley to orient it with the path.\n\nWork was also done to automate testing by extending functionality on the flowgraph to use references to other entities inside the same object container. Related to this, the AI teams began creating small levels and test behaviors that will be enabled later for automated testing, which will ultimately provide better stability to their systems. The previously mentioned collision avoidance work continued in July, this time on performance optimization and creating cleaner functionality. Time was also dedicated to improving quantum travel behavior in a group. Now, the leader checks that all participants (including the player if they\u2019re part of the group) have finished spooling before sending the signal to jump.\n\nDevelopment of the Subsumption editor continued too, with AI Tech adding functionality to watch or modify multiple Subsumption functions from the same view, which was named the \u2018multi-graph view.\u2019 They also adjusted save functionality to work alongside it.\n\nAnimation\nJuly saw the Animation team refactor weapons select and deselect to better work with the new character editor UI. They also continued developing zero-g movement, drunk locomotion, Vanduul locomotion, cowering and surrender, arcade machine state machines, hacking blockouts, and vendor development. (The latter of which is used for getting food, drinks, and other items.) The salvage weapon and useables for medical gameplay were also worked on, and they began refactoring the AI locomotion system to prepare for the new personality-based locomotion cycles, which will ultimately improve realism.\n\nElsewhere, the aircraft carrier launch crew animations were factored to the female character model. Work on vending machine use is in progress, and the team looked at existing assets, closed out any useables requiring further work, and resurrected any worthy but unused usables.\n\nFor facial animation, the team improved facial animation results for the new incoming models, added facial animation to various useables, and supported Narrative on a motion-capture shoot.\n\nArt (Characters)\nCharacter Art finalized work on all \u2018hero\u2019 heads, including Wade, MacLaren, and Mason. They also made a geo polish pass, added an eye assembly, completed a hair refinement pass, and tested a new in-house skin shader. They\u2019ll implement the same procedure as they move onto other character heads later in the quarter. Additionally, they put the finishing touches to Trejo\u2019s outfit, the Concept Team began creating Vanduul warrior variants, and the first pass on the Screaming Galsons was completed.\n\nArt (Environment)\nThroughout July, Environment Art provided support for chapter 4g\u2019s quarterly milestone goals and an internal showcase for all CIG staff. The Bengal\u2019s medical bay is approaching completion:\n\n\u201cWe are extremely pleased with the results as we fine tweak it to hit a standard of quality we aim to set within Squadron 42.\u201d \u2013 Environment Art\n\nFor chapter 19a, the team pushed towards a visual target that will set the tone, style, and quality of the tail end of the campaign. For chapter 7, they began the initial investigation and breakdown into secondary points-of-interest along the critical path, and progress was made on chapters 12, 13, and 15.\n\nAudio\nJuly saw the Dialogue team record additional voiceovers, which are currently being prepared for implementation. Composition also continued, with Pedro Camacho working on music for quantum travel.\n\nEngine\nIn June, the Physics team finished support for compressed meshes. This means the representation of render meshes inside physics is now compressed, leading to memory and bandwidth savings. More code, such as preparation of vertex positions and normals for planetary patches, was also moved from C++ to ISPC to allow for faster processing on the CPU. Further optimizations include pre-allocating mesh blocks to avoid stalls during on-demand allocation, caching the current grid of vehicles to prevent stalls in physics, optimized binding of secondary node data during CGF loading, and a new round of terrain mesh generation improvements. Additionally, the set of analytical SDF primitives supported by physics was extended and torus added. For the renderer, the team continued with the transition to Gen12. A lot of work was completed on the global draw packet cache and related changes on the high-level render and 3D engine code, which will be used to speed up the streaming in of object containers and sharing of data for multiple instances. Additionally, Gen12 received the following changes: support for referencing refraction during rendering, tessellation support in the G-buffer pass, and a ported z-prepass. Several pieces of legacy code were removed to simplify the render pipeline. Also, Gen12 now runs with async shader compilation enabled by default.\n\nVolumetric clouds and atmospheric rendering saw improvements throughout July as well as continued research. For example, runtime cube maps that are used for ambient lighting around the player. Density queries now also include the cloud\u2019s tint at the requested location, which is important for the seamless integration of particles into cloud volumes. Cloud shaping was changed slightly to improve the local vs global read, particularly with regards to combatting the occasional tiled look of cloud details when viewed from orbit.\n\nFor rendering performance, the entire filter chain that reprojects and upsamples raymarching results is being revisited to improve quality so that this performance mode can always be enabled. Lastly, work on SDF integration into the raymarcher (efficient empty space skipping) is still ongoing.\n\nOn the core engine side, work continued on the entity component update scheduler (ECUS). Its internal structure was revisited to allow more than one update within a pass. Several improvements were also made to support and improve the new profiler frontend that was introduced in June. For instance, CPU sampling support was added for Linux builds of the server. Moreover, several tree optimizations were made inside StarHash.\n\nFeatures (Gameplay)\nThe SQ42 Feature team continued their ongoing TrackView support. Added functionality includes a new frame of reference where the content creators can specify what the entities in a sequence are relative to so, when the sequence moves, everything else in the sequence automatically moves relative to it. For example, in an elevator sequence moves, the carriage and all the characters inside move along with it. Development began on the new checkpoint tool \u2013 basic creation and positioning functionality was implemented, which will allow a large amount of scripted setup to be removed. There was also additional support for the weapons track, allowing more control over firing.\n\nGameplay Story\nAt the start of July, Gameplay Story completed a two-day mo-cap shoot and are currently preparing to process the captured animations, facials, and audio. They also continued to work on a variety of chapters, each with a slightly different focus: For chapter 4 they completed maintenance work; for chapter 14 they made a polish pass; and for chapter 18 they worked on scenes for the first time.\n\nHowever, Gameplay Story\u2019s major focus was on chapter 5, where they replaced all placeholder content with new mo-cap animations to bring its scenes up to a particularly high standard.\n\n\u201cIt has been great to see all this work pay off as the entire first half of chapter 05 is now playable from start to finish. This was no easy feat, as there were lots of animations, two walk-and-talk sequences, and plenty of technical challenges involved.\u201d \u2013 Gameplay Story Team\n\nGraphics & VFX Programming\nFor the shader, Graphics and VFX Programming made improvements to the quality of hair rendering in comms calls (though work continues) and refactored the shared code responsible for the depth pass, shadows, motion blur, and silhouette rendering. This will fix various bugs and prepare for some of the Gen12 features and requirements. The reworked render-to-texture post-effect pipeline was completed and is now with the UI artists for testing. This introduces custom bloom, drop shadow, color correction, and brightness adaptation that will apply to all visor and lens UIs, improving the visuals and legibility. The logic controlling the allocation of memory between the various UI screens was also adjusted to maximize quality while sticking to a fixed memory budget.\n\nFor Gen12, various validation issues were fixed along with issues on specific laptops where the dedicated GPU was disabled from the OS\/driver level, meaning the Vulkan renderer wouldn\u2019t initialize. Several architectural amendments were also made to improve the readability and usability of the new renderer.\n\nOn the VFX-programming side, various new features were added such as tinting for space-loop particles based on planetary cloud albedo, new rotation features for particles, and the ability to attach vector fields to characters to achieve effects. The latter includes leaves being pushed around by characters\u2019 feet.\n\nLevel Design\nThe Space\/Dogfight team are currently finalizing how the AI buddy works for space flight, which involves both combat and non-combat ambient behaviors. They\u2019re also in the process of implementing and refining the new features they received last quarter, such as scanning and ping, and how they\u2019re used by the AI. The team also focused on maintaining the handshake between the FPS and social areas of the game to allow continuous play.\n\nMeanwhile, the Social Design Team continued to implement various in-game chapter scenes for review and sign off.\n\nNarrative\nNarrative kicked off the month with a motion-capture shoot in the UK, with several team members attending remotely. They worked closely with the Gameplay Story, Audio, and Animation teams to pick up some of the additional vignettes and conversations mentioned in previous reports. The editorial selects were turned around the following week so the data could start making its way through the pipeline. The team also reviewed several levels with Design to look at updated layouts and flows. Some moments that would benefit from additional scripted content were identified, so drafts were written and passed along so placeholder versions of the lines could be added in-game.\n\nWith additional work being done on the scanning mechanic, Narrative attended several meetings to talk over various topics, such as how various enemy groups will be identified and what kind of information will be visible to the player.\n\nQA\nCinematics relied on QA for recordings of each level so they can ensure scenes are working and are of the intended quality. Support continues for the development teams too, with QA testing changes and updates to the wider project. QA also tested behavior implementation, running daily checklists and reproducing issues so they can be fixed by the relevant teams.\n\nTech Animation\nTech Animation completed their planning for this quarter and are well underway with deliveries. This quarter sees the team coming back to their support roles, assisting in the creation and implementation of key deliverables, including AI combat iteration, usables, and head assets that require art refinements. Additionally, the team took on some interesting challenges, one of which is to create a cross-platform RBF solder to assist in character deformation. The mandate is to create the same codebase to be used in Maya and the engine for improved usability. This will also speed up the processing of Maya animation assets and potentially the game too.\n\nThe team also began alembic cache animation support. While existing tools already support this technology, the team need to further integrate it into the animation toolset for a number of key deliverables.\n\nUI\nThe embedded UI team members supported various HUD-related features, such as the scanning, inventory, and vehicle UI. The core team worked on various tech used across the game, including improved holographic 3D objects, lists, and controls.\n\nVFX\nLast month, the team put the finishing touches to a key location for their internal milestone. This included effects for a key location and a vast interior environment. VFX also helped prototype and test a new tool to allow artists to export positional data from Houdini straight into the game engine. This opens up various opportunities for creating more-complex but flexible art and design setups.\n\nWE\u2019LL SEE YOU NEXT MONTH\u2026","de_DE":"Dies ist ein Cross-Post des Berichts, der k\u00fcrzlich \u00fcber den monatlichen Squadron 42 Newsletter verschickt wurde. Wir ver\u00f6ffentlichen ihn ein zweites Mal als Comm-Link, damit die Community leichter darauf zur\u00fcckgreifen kann.\nAchtung Rekruten,\n\nWas ihr gleich lesen werdet, sind die neuesten Informationen \u00fcber die weitere Entwicklung von Squadron 42 (SCI des: SQ42).\n\nDank der Arbeit von engagierten Feldagenten und Agenten haben wir Informationen \u00fcber das Aciedo-Kommunikationsrelais, die Bengalen, die Vanduul-Krieger und mehr aufgedeckt.\n\nDie in dieser Mitteilung enthaltenen Informationen sind \u00e4u\u00dferst sensibel und es ist von gr\u00f6\u00dfter Wichtigkeit, dass sie nicht in die falschen H\u00e4nde geraten. L\u00f6sche alle Aufzeichnungen nach dem Lesen.\n\nUEE Naval High Command\n\nKI (Inhalt)\n\nDer KI-Content hat seine Arbeit an den Wildlines von SQ42 vorangetrieben und im Juli verschiedene Aufr\u00e4umarbeiten abgeschlossen. Derzeit sind die einzigen verbleibenden Charaktere spezielle F\u00e4lle, die im Level implementiert werden m\u00fcssen. Das Team hat auch die Usables f\u00fcr den Aciedo-Level fertiggestellt. Abgesehen von einer Handvoll Usables, die noch weitere Design-Diskussionen mit dem Art-Team erfordern, sind nun alle Usables mit funktionierenden Blockouts implementiert. Die Designer implementieren derzeit das neue \"Usables First Reaction System\", das es NSCs erlaubt, aus den Usables auszubrechen, wenn sie vom Spieler unterbrochen werden.\n\n\n\nKI (Feature)\n\nIm letzten Monat hat sich das KI-Feature-Team vor allem auf die \u00dcberarbeitung der K\u00e4mpfe konzentriert, mit dem Ziel, die bestehenden Verhaltensweisen und Funktionen zu verfeinern, um ein verst\u00e4ndlicheres und angenehmeres Erlebnis zu bieten. Der erste Teil davon war die \u00dcberarbeitung der Einstellungen f\u00fcr Wahrnehmung und Reaktionen, um den Designern mehr Kontrolle dar\u00fcber zu geben, wie sich die KI verh\u00e4lt, wenn sie auf einen Reiz trifft. Als n\u00e4chstes arbeiteten sie an den grundlegenden Kampfverhalten, um sicherzustellen, dass die Auswahl der Deckung wie vorgesehen funktioniert und dass die KI nach der ersten Reaktion auf den Feind das Basisniveau an Funktionalit\u00e4t bietet. \"Oftmals existiert der Gro\u00dfteil der Technologie zur Verbesserung des Kampfes bereits; es geht eher darum, sehr spezifische Situationen zu \u00fcberpr\u00fcfen und sicherzustellen, dass sich die KI wie beabsichtigt verh\u00e4lt und manchmal einfache Bugs zu beheben, die schlechtes Verhalten produzieren. Von diesen Anf\u00e4ngen ausgehend, hoffen wir, eine vollst\u00e4ndige \u00dcberpr\u00fcfung aller Kampfverhaltensweisen durchzuf\u00fchren, was zu einem besseren und angenehmeren Gameplay f\u00fchren wird.\" - KI Feature Team\n\nSie arbeiteten auch an bestimmten Verhaltensweisen, um es der KI zu erm\u00f6glichen, sich auszubreiten, den Spieler zu umzingeln und ihn im Nahkampf zu verspotten. Dies erforderte \u00c4nderungen am taktischen Punktesystem, um eine neue Metrik zu unterst\u00fctzen, die es ihnen erlaubt, Punkte zu gewichten, die sich von anderen KIs ausbreiten. Das Nahkampfverhalten wurde \u00fcberarbeitet, um sicherzustellen, dass die KI schnell in den Kampf wechselt, wenn die Situation dies erfordert.\n\nZu guter Letzt arbeiteten die Animatoren weiter an dem 'Geschwindigkeitsprotokoll' und dem 'Feinschliff' f\u00fcr die Animationen des Kauerns und des Sich-Ergebens. Dies wird sowohl f\u00fcr unbewaffnete und untrainierte KI als auch f\u00fcr die KI-Kampfverhaltensweisen, die derzeit \u00fcberarbeitet werden, n\u00fctzlich sein.\n\n\n\nKI (Tech)\n\nAI Tech hat das planetare Navigationssystem in die Lage versetzt, Verbindungen zwischen benachbarten Mesh-Tiles herzustellen, was ein Teil der Basisarbeit ist, um Unterst\u00fctzung f\u00fcr planetare Pfadfindung hinzuzuf\u00fcgen. Das bedeutet, dass Dreiecke aus einer Navigationskachel beim Generierungsschritt Verbindungen zu Dreiecken aus anderen benachbarten Kacheln herstellen. Sie haben die Debug-Zeichnung des Kachelgenerators aktualisiert, damit sie auch mit planetaren Navigationsnetzkacheln funktioniert, um Probleme zu beheben, die w\u00e4hrend des Schrittes der Planetennetzgenerierung auftreten k\u00f6nnen.\n\nEs wurden Arbeiten eingereicht, die es NSCs erlauben, einen Wagen entlang eines Pfades zu schieben. Die Arbeit daf\u00fcr beinhaltet das Abspielen einer Animation, um sich mit dem Wagen zu verbinden, die Auswahl eines Pfades, das Schieben des Wagens entlang des Pfades, das Abkoppeln vom Wagen am Ende und das Wegfahren. F\u00fcr die Bewegung mit dem Trolley ber\u00fccksichtigte das Team die Gr\u00f6\u00dfe des Agenten zur Kollisionsvermeidung und schaute sich die Animationen an, die verwendet werden, um ihn bergauf und bergab zu schieben oder wenn der NPC den Trolley drehen muss, um ihn am Pfad auszurichten.\n\nEs wurde auch daran gearbeitet, das Testen zu automatisieren, indem die Funktionalit\u00e4t des Flowgraphs erweitert wurde, um Referenzen auf andere Entit\u00e4ten innerhalb des gleichen Objektcontainers zu verwenden. In diesem Zusammenhang begannen die KI-Teams damit, kleine Level und Testverhalten zu erstellen, die sp\u00e4ter f\u00fcr automatisiertes Testen aktiviert werden, was letztendlich f\u00fcr eine bessere Stabilit\u00e4t ihrer Systeme sorgen wird. Die bereits erw\u00e4hnte Arbeit an der Kollisionsvermeidung wurde im Juli fortgesetzt, dieses Mal mit dem Ziel der Leistungsoptimierung und der Schaffung einer saubereren Funktionalit\u00e4t. Es wurde auch Zeit darauf verwendet, das Quantenreiseverhalten in einer Gruppe zu verbessern. Jetzt pr\u00fcft der Anf\u00fchrer, ob alle Teilnehmer (einschlie\u00dflich des Spielers, wenn er Teil der Gruppe ist) das Spulen beendet haben, bevor er das Signal zum Sprung sendet.\n\nDie Entwicklung des Subsumption-Editors wurde ebenfalls fortgesetzt. AI Tech f\u00fcgte eine Funktion hinzu, mit der man mehrere Subsumption-Funktionen in der gleichen Ansicht beobachten oder ver\u00e4ndern kann, was als 'Multi-Graph-Ansicht' bezeichnet wurde. Sie passten auch die Speicherfunktion an, um damit zu arbeiten.\n\n\n\nAnimation\n\nIm Juli hat das Animationsteam die Waffenauswahl und -abwahl \u00fcberarbeitet, damit sie besser mit der neuen Benutzeroberfl\u00e4che des Charaktereditors funktionieren. Au\u00dferdem wurde die Entwicklung der Null-G-Bewegung, der betrunkenen Fortbewegung, der Vanduul-Bewegung, des Kauerns und der Kapitulation, der Arcade-Automaten, der Hacking-Blockouts und der Vendor-Entwicklung fortgesetzt. (Die Bergungswaffe und die Nutzgegenst\u00e4nde f\u00fcr das medizinische Gameplay wurden ebenfalls bearbeitet und sie begannen mit dem Refactoring des KI-Lokomotionssystems, um sich auf die neuen pers\u00f6nlichkeitsbasierten Lokomotionszyklen vorzubereiten, die letztendlich den Realismus verbessern werden.\n\nAn anderer Stelle wurden die Animationen der Flugzeugtr\u00e4ger-Startmannschaft an das weibliche Charaktermodell angepasst. Die Arbeit an den Automaten ist in vollem Gange und das Team hat sich die bestehenden Assets angesehen, alle Useables, die weitere Arbeit erfordern, geschlossen und alle wertvollen, aber ungenutzten Useables wiederbelebt.\n\nIm Bereich der Gesichtsanimation verbesserte das Team die Ergebnisse der Gesichtsanimation f\u00fcr die neu eintreffenden Modelle, f\u00fcgte Gesichtsanimation zu verschiedenen Useables hinzu und unterst\u00fctzte Narrative bei einem Motion-Capture-Shooting.\n\n\n\nKunst (Charaktere)\n\nCharacter Art hat die Arbeit an allen \"Helden\"-K\u00f6pfen abgeschlossen, darunter Wade, MacLaren und Mason. Sie haben auch einen Geo-Polishing-Durchgang gemacht, eine Augenanordnung hinzugef\u00fcgt, einen Haar-Verfeinerungs-Durchgang abgeschlossen und einen neuen internen Skin-Shader getestet. Die gleiche Prozedur werden sie sp\u00e4ter im Quartal bei den anderen Charakterk\u00f6pfen anwenden. Au\u00dferdem wurde Trejos Outfit der letzte Schliff verpasst, das Konzeptteam begann mit der Erstellung von Vanduul-Krieger-Varianten und der erste Durchgang der Screaming Galsons wurde abgeschlossen.\n\n\n\nKunst (Umgebung)\n\nDen ganzen Juli hindurch unterst\u00fctzte Environment Art die viertelj\u00e4hrlichen Meilensteinziele des Kapitels 4g und bot ein internes Schaufenster f\u00fcr alle CIG-Mitarbeiter. Die medizinische Bucht der Bengalen n\u00e4hert sich der Fertigstellung:\n\n\"Wir sind sehr zufrieden mit dem Ergebnis, w\u00e4hrend wir an der Feinabstimmung arbeiten, um einen Qualit\u00e4tsstandard zu erreichen, den wir innerhalb von Squadron 42 anstreben.\" - Umwelt Kunst\n\nF\u00fcr Kapitel 19a hat das Team auf ein visuelles Ziel hingearbeitet, das den Ton, den Stil und die Qualit\u00e4t des Endes der Kampagne bestimmen wird. F\u00fcr Kapitel 7 begannen sie mit der anf\u00e4nglichen Untersuchung und Aufschl\u00fcsselung der sekund\u00e4ren Interessenspunkte entlang des kritischen Pfades, und es wurden Fortschritte bei den Kapiteln 12, 13 und 15 gemacht.\n\n\n\nAudio\nIm Juli nahm das Dialog-Team weitere Voiceovers auf, die derzeit f\u00fcr die Umsetzung vorbereitet werden. Auch die Komposition wurde fortgesetzt, wobei Pedro Camacho an der Musik f\u00fcr die Quantenreise arbeitete.\nMotor\n\nIm Juni hat das Physics Team die Unterst\u00fctzung f\u00fcr komprimierte Meshes fertiggestellt. Das bedeutet, dass die Darstellung von Rendermeshes innerhalb von Physics nun komprimiert ist, was zu Speicher- und Bandbreiteneinsparungen f\u00fchrt. Weiterer Code, wie z.B. die Vorbereitung von Vertex-Positionen und Normalen f\u00fcr planetare Patches, wurde ebenfalls von C++ zu ISPC verschoben, um eine schnellere Verarbeitung auf der CPU zu erm\u00f6glichen. Weitere Optimierungen beinhalten die Vorab-Zuweisung von Mesh-Bl\u00f6cken, um Stalls w\u00e4hrend der On-Demand-Allokation zu vermeiden, das Zwischenspeichern des aktuellen Fahrzeuggitters, um Stalls in der Physik zu verhindern, optimiertes Binden von sekund\u00e4ren Node-Daten w\u00e4hrend des CGF-Ladens und eine neue Runde von Verbesserungen bei der Terrain-Mesh-Generierung. Zus\u00e4tzlich wurde das Set der analytischen SDF-Primitive, die von der Physik unterst\u00fctzt werden, erweitert und Torus hinzugef\u00fcgt. F\u00fcr den Renderer setzte das Team den \u00dcbergang zu Gen12 fort. Es wurden viele Arbeiten am globalen Draw Packet Cache und damit verbundene \u00c4nderungen am High-Level Render- und 3D-Engine-Code abgeschlossen, die das Einstr\u00f6men von Objekt-Containern und das Teilen von Daten f\u00fcr mehrere Instanzen beschleunigen werden. Zus\u00e4tzlich erhielt Gen12 die folgenden \u00c4nderungen: Unterst\u00fctzung f\u00fcr die Referenzierung von Refraktion w\u00e4hrend des Renderings, Tesselation-Unterst\u00fctzung im G-Buffer-Pass und einen portierten z-Prepass. Mehrere Teile des Legacy-Codes wurden entfernt, um die Render-Pipeline zu vereinfachen. Au\u00dferdem l\u00e4uft Gen12 nun mit standardm\u00e4\u00dfig aktivierter asynchroner Shaderkompilierung.\n\nVolumetrische Wolken und atmosph\u00e4risches Rendering wurden im Juli verbessert und weiter erforscht. Zum Beispiel Laufzeit-W\u00fcrfelkarten, die f\u00fcr die Umgebungsbeleuchtung um den Spieler herum verwendet werden. Dichteabfragen beinhalten nun auch den Farbton der Wolke an der angeforderten Stelle, was f\u00fcr die nahtlose Integration von Partikeln in Wolkenvolumina wichtig ist. Die Wolkenformung wurde leicht ver\u00e4ndert, um das lokale vs. globale Lesen zu verbessern, insbesondere im Hinblick auf die Bek\u00e4mpfung des gelegentlichen Kachel-Looks von Wolkendetails, wenn man sie aus dem Orbit betrachtet.\n\nF\u00fcr die Rendering-Performance wird die gesamte Filterkette, die die Ergebnisse des Raymarching reprojiziert und upsampelt, \u00fcberarbeitet, um die Qualit\u00e4t zu verbessern, so dass dieser Performance-Modus immer aktiviert werden kann. Schlie\u00dflich wird noch an der SDF-Integration in den Raymarcher gearbeitet (effizientes \u00dcberspringen von Leerr\u00e4umen).\n\nAuf der Seite der Core Engine wurde die Arbeit am Entity Component Update Scheduler (ECUS) fortgesetzt. Seine interne Struktur wurde \u00fcberarbeitet, um mehr als ein Update innerhalb eines Durchgangs zu erm\u00f6glichen. Es wurden auch einige Verbesserungen vorgenommen, um das neue Profiler-Frontend, das im Juni eingef\u00fchrt wurde, zu unterst\u00fctzen und zu verbessern. Zum Beispiel wurde CPU-Sampling-Unterst\u00fctzung f\u00fcr Linux-Builds des Servers hinzugef\u00fcgt. Au\u00dferdem wurden mehrere Baumoptimierungen innerhalb von StarHash vorgenommen.\n\n\n\nFeatures (Gameplay)\n\nDas SQ42 Feature Team hat die Unterst\u00fctzung f\u00fcr TrackView fortgesetzt. Zu den hinzugef\u00fcgten Funktionen geh\u00f6rt ein neuer Bezugsrahmen, bei dem die Ersteller von Inhalten angeben k\u00f6nnen, worauf sich die Einheiten in einer Sequenz beziehen, so dass sich bei einer Bewegung der Sequenz alles andere in der Sequenz automatisch relativ dazu bewegt. Wenn sich zum Beispiel eine Aufzugssequenz bewegt, bewegen sich der Wagen und alle darin befindlichen Figuren mit. Die Entwicklung des neuen Checkpoint-Tools hat begonnen - grundlegende Erstellungs- und Positionierungsfunktionen wurden implementiert, wodurch ein gro\u00dfer Teil der geskripteten Einstellungen entfernt werden kann. Es gab auch zus\u00e4tzliche Unterst\u00fctzung f\u00fcr die Waffenspur, die mehr Kontrolle \u00fcber das Feuern erlaubt.\n\n\n\nGameplay Geschichte\n\nAnfang Juli schloss Gameplay Story einen zweit\u00e4gigen Mo-Cap-Dreh ab und bereitet sich derzeit darauf vor, die aufgenommenen Animationen, Gesichter und den Ton zu bearbeiten. Au\u00dferdem arbeiteten sie weiter an einer Reihe von Kapiteln, jedes mit einem etwas anderen Schwerpunkt: F\u00fcr Kapitel 4 haben sie Wartungsarbeiten abgeschlossen, f\u00fcr Kapitel 14 haben sie einen Polishing-Pass gemacht und f\u00fcr Kapitel 18 haben sie zum ersten Mal an Szenen gearbeitet.\n\nDer Hauptfokus von Gameplay Story lag jedoch auf Kapitel 5, wo sie alle Platzhalterinhalte durch neue Mo-Cap-Animationen ersetzten, um die Szenen auf einen besonders hohen Standard zu bringen.\n\n\"Es war gro\u00dfartig zu sehen, wie sich all diese Arbeit auszahlt, da die gesamte erste H\u00e4lfte von Kapitel 05 nun von Anfang bis Ende spielbar ist. Das war keine leichte Aufgabe, da es viele Animationen, zwei Walk-and-Talk-Sequenzen und viele technische Herausforderungen gab.\" - Gameplay Story Team\n\n\n\nGrafik & VFX Programmierung\n\nF\u00fcr den Shader hat Graphics & VFX Programming Verbesserungen an der Qualit\u00e4t des Haar-Renderings in den Komm-Aufrufen vorgenommen (die Arbeit geht allerdings weiter) und den gemeinsamen Code, der f\u00fcr den Tiefenpass, die Schatten, die Bewegungsunsch\u00e4rfe und das Silhouetten-Rendering verantwortlich ist, refaktorisiert. Dies behebt verschiedene Bugs und bereitet auf einige der Gen12-Features und Anforderungen vor. Die \u00fcberarbeitete Render-to-Texture-Post-Effekt-Pipeline wurde fertiggestellt und ist nun bei den UI-Artists zum Testen. Dies f\u00fchrt benutzerdefinierte Bloom-, Schlagschatten-, Farbkorrektur- und Helligkeitsanpassungen ein, die auf alle Visor- und Linsen-UIs angewendet werden, um die Optik und Lesbarkeit zu verbessern. Die Logik, die die Zuweisung des Speichers zwischen den verschiedenen UI-Bildschirmen steuert, wurde ebenfalls angepasst, um die Qualit\u00e4t zu maximieren und gleichzeitig ein festes Speicherbudget einzuhalten.\n\nF\u00fcr die Gen12 wurden verschiedene Validierungsprobleme behoben, sowie Probleme auf bestimmten Laptops, bei denen die dedizierte GPU auf Betriebssystem-\/Treiberebene deaktiviert war, was bedeutete, dass der Vulkan-Renderer nicht initialisiert werden konnte. Es wurden auch einige architektonische \u00c4nderungen vorgenommen, um die Lesbarkeit und Nutzbarkeit des neuen Renderers zu verbessern.\n\nAuf der Seite der VFX-Programmierung wurden verschiedene neue Features hinzugef\u00fcgt, wie z.B. die F\u00e4rbung von Space-Loop-Partikeln basierend auf der Albedo von planetaren Wolken, neue Rotationsfunktionen f\u00fcr Partikel und die M\u00f6glichkeit, Vektorfelder an Charaktere anzuh\u00e4ngen, um Effekte zu erzielen. Letzteres beinhaltet Bl\u00e4tter, die von den F\u00fc\u00dfen der Charaktere herumgeschoben werden.\n\n\n\nLevel Design\n\nDas Space\/Dogfight-Team arbeitet derzeit daran, wie der KI-Kumpel f\u00fcr den Weltraumflug funktioniert, was sowohl k\u00e4mpfende als auch nicht-k\u00e4mpfende Umgebungsbedingungen beinhaltet. Au\u00dferdem sind sie dabei, die neuen Features, die sie im letzten Quartal erhalten haben, zu implementieren und zu verfeinern, wie zum Beispiel Scanning und Ping, und wie sie von der KI genutzt werden. Das Team hat sich auch darauf konzentriert, den Handshake zwischen dem FPS- und dem sozialen Bereich des Spiels aufrechtzuerhalten, um ein kontinuierliches Spiel zu erm\u00f6glichen.\n\nIn der Zwischenzeit implementierte das Social Design Team weiterhin verschiedene Kapitelszenen im Spiel zur \u00dcberpr\u00fcfung und Freigabe.\n\n\n\nNarrative\n\nNarrative begann den Monat mit einem Motion-Capture-Dreh in Gro\u00dfbritannien, bei dem mehrere Teammitglieder aus der Ferne teilnahmen. Sie arbeiteten eng mit den Gameplay-Story-, Audio- und Animationsteams zusammen, um einige der zus\u00e4tzlichen Vignetten und Gespr\u00e4che aufzunehmen, die in fr\u00fcheren Berichten erw\u00e4hnt wurden. Die redaktionellen Auswahlen wurden in der darauffolgenden Woche umgedreht, damit die Daten ihren Weg durch die Pipeline nehmen konnten. Das Team besprach auch mehrere Levels mit dem Designteam, um aktualisierte Layouts und Abl\u00e4ufe zu betrachten. Es wurden einige Momente identifiziert, die von zus\u00e4tzlichen geskripteten Inhalten profitieren w\u00fcrden, also wurden Entw\u00fcrfe geschrieben und weitergegeben, damit Platzhalterversionen der Zeilen im Spiel hinzugef\u00fcgt werden konnten.\n\nDa zus\u00e4tzliche Arbeit an der Scan-Mechanik geleistet wurde, nahm Narrative an mehreren Meetings teil, um verschiedene Themen zu besprechen, wie z.B. wie verschiedene Gegnergruppen identifiziert werden und welche Art von Informationen f\u00fcr den Spieler sichtbar sein werden.\n\n\n\nQA\n\nCinematics hat sich auf die QA verlassen, um Aufnahmen von jedem Level zu machen, damit sie sicherstellen k\u00f6nnen, dass die Szenen funktionieren und die beabsichtigte Qualit\u00e4t haben. Die Unterst\u00fctzung f\u00fcr die Entwicklungsteams geht ebenfalls weiter, wobei die QA \u00c4nderungen und Updates f\u00fcr das gesamte Projekt testet. QA testete auch die Implementierung des Verhaltens, indem sie t\u00e4gliche Checklisten durchf\u00fchrten und Probleme reproduzierten, damit sie von den entsprechenden Teams behoben werden k\u00f6nnen.\n\n\n\nTech Animation\n\nTech Animation hat die Planung f\u00fcr dieses Quartal abgeschlossen und ist mit den Lieferungen gut vorangekommen. In diesem Quartal kehrt das Team zu seinen Support-Rollen zur\u00fcck und hilft bei der Erstellung und Implementierung von Schl\u00fcsselergebnissen, einschlie\u00dflich KI-Kampf-Iteration, Usables und Kopf-Assets, die k\u00fcnstlerische Verfeinerungen erfordern. Zus\u00e4tzlich hat das Team einige interessante Herausforderungen angenommen, eine davon ist die Erstellung eines plattform\u00fcbergreifenden RBF-Lots zur Unterst\u00fctzung der Charakterverformung. Der Auftrag ist es, die gleiche Codebasis zu erstellen, die in Maya und der Engine f\u00fcr eine verbesserte Benutzerfreundlichkeit verwendet werden kann. Dies wird auch die Verarbeitung von Maya-Animations-Assets und potentiell auch das Spiel beschleunigen.\n\nDas Team begann auch mit der Unterst\u00fctzung von Alembic Cache Animationen. W\u00e4hrend bestehende Tools diese Technologie bereits unterst\u00fctzen, muss das Team sie f\u00fcr eine Reihe von Schl\u00fcsselergebnissen weiter in das Animationstoolset integrieren.\n\n\n\nUI\nDie eingebetteten UI-Teammitglieder unterst\u00fctzten verschiedene HUD-bezogene Features, wie z.B. die Scan-, Inventar- und Fahrzeug-UI. Das Kernteam arbeitete an verschiedenen Technologien, die im gesamten Spiel verwendet werden, einschlie\u00dflich verbesserter holografischer 3D-Objekte, Listen und Kontrollen.\nVFX\nLetzten Monat hat das Team den letzten Schliff an einer Schl\u00fcsselstelle f\u00fcr ihren internen Meilenstein vorgenommen. Dazu geh\u00f6rten Effekte f\u00fcr einen wichtigen Ort und eine riesige Innenumgebung. VFX half auch beim Prototyping und Testen eines neuen Tools, mit dem K\u00fcnstler Positionsdaten aus Houdini direkt in die Spiel-Engine exportieren k\u00f6nnen. Dies er\u00f6ffnet verschiedene M\u00f6glichkeiten, um komplexere, aber flexible Art- und Design-Setups zu erstellen.\nWIR SEHEN UNS N\u00c4CHSTEN MONAT...","zh_CN":"This is a cross-post of the report that was recently sent out via the monthly Squadron 42 newsletter. We\u2019re publishing this a second time as a Comm-Link to make it easier for the community to reference back to.\nAttention Recruits,\n\nWhat you are about to read is the latest information on the continuing development of Squadron 42 (SCI des: SQ42).\n\nThanks to the work of dedicated field agents and operatives, we\u2019ve uncovered information on the Aciedo comm relay, the Bengal, Vanduul Warriors, and more.\n\nThe information contained in this communication is extremely sensitive and it is of paramount importance that it does not fall into the wrong hands. Purge all records after reading.\n\nUEE Naval High Command AI (Content)\nAI Content progressed with their work on SQ42\u2019s wildlines, with July seeing them finishing various clean up tasks. Currently, the only remaining characters are specific cases that need in-level implementation. The team also wrapped up the usables for the Aciedo level. Aside from a handful of usables that require further design discussion with the Art team, all usables are now implemented with working blockouts. The designers are currently implementing the new \u2018usables first reaction system,\u2019 which allows NPCs to break out of the usables when being interrupted by the player.\n\nAI (Feature)\nLast month, the AI Feature team primarily focused on reviewing combat, with the aim of refining the existing behaviors and functionality to provide a more intelligible and enjoyable experience. The first part of this was reviewing the settings for perception and reactions to give the designers greater control over how the AI behaves when encountering a stimulus. Next, they worked on the basic combat behaviors, ensuring cover selection is working as intended and that the AI provides the base level of functionality after the first reaction to the enemy. \u201cOften the majority of the technology for improving combat already exists; it\u2019s more a case of reviewing very specific situations and ensuring that the AI behaves as intended and fixing sometimes simple bugs that produce bad behavior. From these beginnings, we hope to do a full review over all of the combat behaviors, which will lead to better and more enjoyable gameplay.\u201d \u2013 AI Feature Team\n\nThey also worked on specific behaviors to enable AI to spread out and surround the player and taunt them while in melee combat. This required changes to the tactical point system to support a new metric allowing them to weight points spread out from other AI. Melee behaviors received attention to ensure they quickly switch to combat when the situation requires too\n\nFinally, the animators continued working on the \u2018speed protocol\u2019 and \u2018polish\u2019 stages for the mo-capped cowering and surrendering animations. This will be useful for both unarmed and untrained AI and the AI combat behaviors currently under review.\n\nAI (Tech)\nAI Tech enabled the planetary navigation system to make connections between adjacent mesh tiles, which is part of the base work to add support for planetary pathfinding. This means that triangles from a navigation mesh tile will create links to triangles from other adjacent tiles at the generation step. They updated the tile generator debug draw to also work with planetary navigation mesh tiles to help them debug issues that could appear during the planet mesh generation step.\n\nWork was submitted to allow NPCs to push a trolley along a path. The work for this includes playing an animation to connect to the trolley, selecting a path, pushing the trolley along the path, disconnecting from the trolley at the end, and moving away. For movement with the trolley, the team considered the size of the agent for collision avoidance and looked at the animations used for pushing it uphill and downhill or when NPC needs to turn the trolley to orient it with the path.\n\nWork was also done to automate testing by extending functionality on the flowgraph to use references to other entities inside the same object container. Related to this, the AI teams began creating small levels and test behaviors that will be enabled later for automated testing, which will ultimately provide better stability to their systems. The previously mentioned collision avoidance work continued in July, this time on performance optimization and creating cleaner functionality. Time was also dedicated to improving quantum travel behavior in a group. Now, the leader checks that all participants (including the player if they\u2019re part of the group) have finished spooling before sending the signal to jump.\n\nDevelopment of the Subsumption editor continued too, with AI Tech adding functionality to watch or modify multiple Subsumption functions from the same view, which was named the \u2018multi-graph view.\u2019 They also adjusted save functionality to work alongside it.\n\nAnimation\nJuly saw the Animation team refactor weapons select and deselect to better work with the new character editor UI. They also continued developing zero-g movement, drunk locomotion, Vanduul locomotion, cowering and surrender, arcade machine state machines, hacking blockouts, and vendor development. (The latter of which is used for getting food, drinks, and other items.) The salvage weapon and useables for medical gameplay were also worked on, and they began refactoring the AI locomotion system to prepare for the new personality-based locomotion cycles, which will ultimately improve realism.\n\nElsewhere, the aircraft carrier launch crew animations were factored to the female character model. Work on vending machine use is in progress, and the team looked at existing assets, closed out any useables requiring further work, and resurrected any worthy but unused usables.\n\nFor facial animation, the team improved facial animation results for the new incoming models, added facial animation to various useables, and supported Narrative on a motion-capture shoot.\n\nArt (Characters)\nCharacter Art finalized work on all \u2018hero\u2019 heads, including Wade, MacLaren, and Mason. They also made a geo polish pass, added an eye assembly, completed a hair refinement pass, and tested a new in-house skin shader. They\u2019ll implement the same procedure as they move onto other character heads later in the quarter. Additionally, they put the finishing touches to Trejo\u2019s outfit, the Concept Team began creating Vanduul warrior variants, and the first pass on the Screaming Galsons was completed.\n\nArt (Environment)\nThroughout July, Environment Art provided support for chapter 4g\u2019s quarterly milestone goals and an internal showcase for all CIG staff. The Bengal\u2019s medical bay is approaching completion:\n\n\u201cWe are extremely pleased with the results as we fine tweak it to hit a standard of quality we aim to set within Squadron 42.\u201d \u2013 Environment Art\n\nFor chapter 19a, the team pushed towards a visual target that will set the tone, style, and quality of the tail end of the campaign. For chapter 7, they began the initial investigation and breakdown into secondary points-of-interest along the critical path, and progress was made on chapters 12, 13, and 15.\n\nAudio\nJuly saw the Dialogue team record additional voiceovers, which are currently being prepared for implementation. Composition also continued, with Pedro Camacho working on music for quantum travel.\n\nEngine\nIn June, the Physics team finished support for compressed meshes. This means the representation of render meshes inside physics is now compressed, leading to memory and bandwidth savings. More code, such as preparation of vertex positions and normals for planetary patches, was also moved from C++ to ISPC to allow for faster processing on the CPU. Further optimizations include pre-allocating mesh blocks to avoid stalls during on-demand allocation, caching the current grid of vehicles to prevent stalls in physics, optimized binding of secondary node data during CGF loading, and a new round of terrain mesh generation improvements. Additionally, the set of analytical SDF primitives supported by physics was extended and torus added. For the renderer, the team continued with the transition to Gen12. A lot of work was completed on the global draw packet cache and related changes on the high-level render and 3D engine code, which will be used to speed up the streaming in of object containers and sharing of data for multiple instances. Additionally, Gen12 received the following changes: support for referencing refraction during rendering, tessellation support in the G-buffer pass, and a ported z-prepass. Several pieces of legacy code were removed to simplify the render pipeline. Also, Gen12 now runs with async shader compilation enabled by default.\n\nVolumetric clouds and atmospheric rendering saw improvements throughout July as well as continued research. For example, runtime cube maps that are used for ambient lighting around the player. Density queries now also include the cloud\u2019s tint at the requested location, which is important for the seamless integration of particles into cloud volumes. Cloud shaping was changed slightly to improve the local vs global read, particularly with regards to combatting the occasional tiled look of cloud details when viewed from orbit.\n\nFor rendering performance, the entire filter chain that reprojects and upsamples raymarching results is being revisited to improve quality so that this performance mode can always be enabled. Lastly, work on SDF integration into the raymarcher (efficient empty space skipping) is still ongoing.\n\nOn the core engine side, work continued on the entity component update scheduler (ECUS). Its internal structure was revisited to allow more than one update within a pass. Several improvements were also made to support and improve the new profiler frontend that was introduced in June. For instance, CPU sampling support was added for Linux builds of the server. Moreover, several tree optimizations were made inside StarHash.\n\nFeatures (Gameplay)\nThe SQ42 Feature team continued their ongoing TrackView support. Added functionality includes a new frame of reference where the content creators can specify what the entities in a sequence are relative to so, when the sequence moves, everything else in the sequence automatically moves relative to it. For example, in an elevator sequence moves, the carriage and all the characters inside move along with it. Development began on the new checkpoint tool \u2013 basic creation and positioning functionality was implemented, which will allow a large amount of scripted setup to be removed. There was also additional support for the weapons track, allowing more control over firing.\n\nGameplay Story\nAt the start of July, Gameplay Story completed a two-day mo-cap shoot and are currently preparing to process the captured animations, facials, and audio. They also continued to work on a variety of chapters, each with a slightly different focus: For chapter 4 they completed maintenance work; for chapter 14 they made a polish pass; and for chapter 18 they worked on scenes for the first time.\n\nHowever, Gameplay Story\u2019s major focus was on chapter 5, where they replaced all placeholder content with new mo-cap animations to bring its scenes up to a particularly high standard.\n\n\u201cIt has been great to see all this work pay off as the entire first half of chapter 05 is now playable from start to finish. This was no easy feat, as there were lots of animations, two walk-and-talk sequences, and plenty of technical challenges involved.\u201d \u2013 Gameplay Story Team\n\nGraphics & VFX Programming\nFor the shader, Graphics and VFX Programming made improvements to the quality of hair rendering in comms calls (though work continues) and refactored the shared code responsible for the depth pass, shadows, motion blur, and silhouette rendering. This will fix various bugs and prepare for some of the Gen12 features and requirements. The reworked render-to-texture post-effect pipeline was completed and is now with the UI artists for testing. This introduces custom bloom, drop shadow, color correction, and brightness adaptation that will apply to all visor and lens UIs, improving the visuals and legibility. The logic controlling the allocation of memory between the various UI screens was also adjusted to maximize quality while sticking to a fixed memory budget.\n\nFor Gen12, various validation issues were fixed along with issues on specific laptops where the dedicated GPU was disabled from the OS\/driver level, meaning the Vulkan renderer wouldn\u2019t initialize. Several architectural amendments were also made to improve the readability and usability of the new renderer.\n\nOn the VFX-programming side, various new features were added such as tinting for space-loop particles based on planetary cloud albedo, new rotation features for particles, and the ability to attach vector fields to characters to achieve effects. The latter includes leaves being pushed around by characters\u2019 feet.\n\nLevel Design\nThe Space\/Dogfight team are currently finalizing how the AI buddy works for space flight, which involves both combat and non-combat ambient behaviors. They\u2019re also in the process of implementing and refining the new features they received last quarter, such as scanning and ping, and how they\u2019re used by the AI. The team also focused on maintaining the handshake between the FPS and social areas of the game to allow continuous play.\n\nMeanwhile, the Social Design Team continued to implement various in-game chapter scenes for review and sign off.\n\nNarrative\nNarrative kicked off the month with a motion-capture shoot in the UK, with several team members attending remotely. They worked closely with the Gameplay Story, Audio, and Animation teams to pick up some of the additional vignettes and conversations mentioned in previous reports. The editorial selects were turned around the following week so the data could start making its way through the pipeline. The team also reviewed several levels with Design to look at updated layouts and flows. Some moments that would benefit from additional scripted content were identified, so drafts were written and passed along so placeholder versions of the lines could be added in-game.\n\nWith additional work being done on the scanning mechanic, Narrative attended several meetings to talk over various topics, such as how various enemy groups will be identified and what kind of information will be visible to the player.\n\nQA\nCinematics relied on QA for recordings of each level so they can ensure scenes are working and are of the intended quality. Support continues for the development teams too, with QA testing changes and updates to the wider project. QA also tested behavior implementation, running daily checklists and reproducing issues so they can be fixed by the relevant teams.\n\nTech Animation\nTech Animation completed their planning for this quarter and are well underway with deliveries. This quarter sees the team coming back to their support roles, assisting in the creation and implementation of key deliverables, including AI combat iteration, usables, and head assets that require art refinements. Additionally, the team took on some interesting challenges, one of which is to create a cross-platform RBF solder to assist in character deformation. The mandate is to create the same codebase to be used in Maya and the engine for improved usability. This will also speed up the processing of Maya animation assets and potentially the game too.\n\nThe team also began alembic cache animation support. While existing tools already support this technology, the team need to further integrate it into the animation toolset for a number of key deliverables.\n\nUI\nThe embedded UI team members supported various HUD-related features, such as the scanning, inventory, and vehicle UI. The core team worked on various tech used across the game, including improved holographic 3D objects, lists, and controls.\n\nVFX\nLast month, the team put the finishing touches to a key location for their internal milestone. This included effects for a key location and a vast interior environment. VFX also helped prototype and test a new tool to allow artists to export positional data from Houdini straight into the game engine. This opens up various opportunities for creating more-complex but flexible art and design setups.\n\nWE\u2019LL SEE YOU NEXT MONTH\u2026"},"links_count":0,"comment_count":5,"created_at":"2021-08-11T18:00:00+00:00","created_at_human":"4 years ago"},"meta":{"processed_at":"2026-04-25 10:00:34","valid_relations":["images","links","translations"],"prev_id":18263,"next_id":18265}}