General game asset and environment questions

[Arcuru]

Hey guys, this is my first post here. I only recently came across this forum.

As always is the case with new members I'll most likely ask questions that have been asked many times but I have done a little searching already. Many thanks in advance for anyone who takes the time to answer. I mostly use Maya, Mudbox and UDK so my questions relate to those packages mostly.

Floating Geomtery:

When making low poly game assets is it acceptable to have floating pieces of geometry? For example, below is a low poly gun I made recently:



The wooden plates on the sides of the grip are not welded to the main body of the gun, they simply float on top of the geometry. I know already that this is wasting texture space but are there any other reasons why this is bad, does it cause rendering issues in engines? If so, how does it differ from say having the slide not attatched for animation?


Texturing Modular Environments:

Up until now, everything that I've textured I've given a separate texture sheet. I've heard that for environments you would combine the textures for many objects into one texture sheet. Is this correct? What is the workflow for this?

Would you create the texture sheet before creating the assets then match the UVs of the object to the texture sheets? Does this just go for the colour map or would you do this for the specular and normal maps too?

How would this work in UDK, you would still have to make a separate material for each object but just using the same texture sample?

Distorted specular in UDK:

Here is another low poly gun I made:



When imported as a Skeletal Mesh in UDK I get the following issue (I've added a constant 10 to the specular channel to make it easy to see):



That surface should be flat. Does anyone know why I'm getting this? Is it the Skeletal Mesh import settings or is it some other issue (possibly floating geometry)?

Creating Rubble/Modular Pieces of Broken Buildings

I'd like to create some destroyed urban environments but I'm unsure of a couple of things:

• What would be the workflow between Maya and Mudbox (would I UV unwrap the base object then sculpt or unwrap after the scuplt?)
• What would generally be the poly count for such pieces (say 128 to 512 units).
• Can I use the lower level (level1) mesh as the game mesh or is retopologising necessary?
• Any tips on what shapes to make the pieces so they look natural?

Curved Modular Geometry

What is the best was to create curved modular pieces: floor tiles, walls and seating for example?

Thanks again in advance, guys and gals.

[ninersix]

[quote=Arcuru;144605].

Floating Geomtery:

Generally you want to weld your pieces together. In some cases it can cause z-fighting if you don't.
For the gun as you said, having the grips floating above is wasting texture space.
The amount of polys used to have the grips welded is minimal, so really should be joined to the pistol.
There are instances in which joining pieces together is not suitable due to the amount of tris needed, depends on the model and its surface.

Texturing Modular Environments:

Yes you can create texture sheets before modeling and vice versa, depends how you like to work.
Each texture sheet you use requires a drawcall. The less textures you have the less drawcalls you make, thus improving performance.

Creating Rubble/Modular Pieces of Broken Buildings

Create high poly
Create low poly
Unwrap low poly
Bake

Poly count is relevant to how big the model is.
Retopolgy most likely would be needed if you are talking about using subdivided models from a sculpting package.