Game Development Reference
In-Depth Information
2.
Go to Display > Heads Up Display and make sure Poly Count is checked.
The current Grae model is 5394 polygons—not bad; we are already under our budget. As
it's also a way to remove unwanted and unneeded polygons. Removing 100 polygons from
Grae could mean more detail can be added elsewhere in the game—every polygon counts.
Lets recap what we're looking for as we optimize:
Unnecessary Polygons—An unused polygon is one that neither adds to the shape
of the mesh, nor aids in deformation.
Shallow Angles—Polygons that make a shallow angle do add to the shape of the
geometry, but in such a small way that no one would miss them if they were gone.
Most important during optimization is to keep zooming out of your mesh to see how it will
look from the game perspective. Chances are, you will never see Grae's body up close, so
don't leave too much fine detail in the model that would never be seen.
With these objectives in mind, let's begin optimization. Following is a brief overview of
areas that could be optimized, starting from the top and working downward. First, the
wings—they are really as low as they can go. We could reduce them further, but this could
make them deform badly, so leave them alone. Hide them for now so you can concentrate
on the rest of the body.
Head and Inner Mouth
As shown in
Figure 7.50
,
there isn't much we can remove from the head. What we can do
iscollapse afewedges,knockingafewpolygonsoffthecount.Theseedgesarearoundthe
sides of the head, so removing them will not alter the overall shape.
