44 replies to this topic

[Mike Jones]

Everything looks pretty much the same in CF as it does in PG so it's a lot easier to create the course the way you want it without having to continually drop into the game.

[axe360]

Now that sounds awesome and like a real time saver... That's what was so tedious in TW's, dropping back into the game after each time you did a bunker, a pond a green, usually several times for each until it was right...

 

I like the way this is sounding and thank you for the quick reply Mike...

 

Axe

[Kablammo11]

Axe, you really ought to take the plunge into Unity rather sooner than later. There are lots of things you can learn from it even now, without the Forge. As Mike says: What you see there is what you get in the game, PG practice mode is for testing the golf playability only, all else is Unity.

[Dazmaniac]

Like K11 says, it's worth dabbling with Unity now to get yourself up to speed.

Some folks seem to think CF is a stand alone program. It is basically a bolt on for Unity developed by PP. So it uses all the Unity functionality but with added extras to make the courses playable in Perfect Golf, as Unity alone cannot do things like tee placement, hole location, out of bounds etc

;-)

[olazaboll]

I havent d/l Unity yet ... I was thinking of wait until CF is released .... but Daz is probably right .... it might be a good thing to learn one or two thing of Unity before CF.... however If I open Unity I have no idea what I shall do ... If some nice person would post a "Unity for Dummies" along with a few practice drills ... it would be super .... 

 

Thx

Ola

[golfcart03]

Hi:

I agree with Axe!!  If it wasn't for the Practice Mode in the TW PC Golf game series, I wouldn't have spent over seven years at testing courses for that series because it would have been very difficult and extremely time consuming to look at every area in and around  the the courses to find all of the areas of possible improvement.

[axe360]

Exactly Mike.. Unless in this course designer there Won't be any areas of improvement, no seams to fix, no raised edges between textures, no tears in the plot, no angular terrain. Do you not smooth and optimize with this CF?

 

I have looked a little at Unity but I agree with Olazaboll, how bout a simple tutorial for us dummies.

 

Also, you mean to tell me that when CF comes out, it will look just like it does in the game? Hence no need to go into the game and resmooth areas or fix bad spots? What the....

 

As I said earlier with the TW's CA, doesn't look anything like being in the game does... Don't get me wrong, this sounds gr8 so far if all this is true..

 

I think Mike was saying that in CF you can do all your work, no need to go in the game to see if there are any errors?  Still confusing, CF, Unity, Unity CF. I understand it is a bolt on so I guess I'll wait for the bolts?

 

Besides, I thought I was told that Unity was the Game Engine.. Lol as you can see there are a few things that need to be cleared up but I can wait until this all comes out.. I'm still designing for that old ass game I like so much..

[Mike Jones]

It is true, we can also supply a module in the editor which you can just drag onto your course and then walk or fly around as you wish. 

 

The most important things you'll need to understand about unity is how to navigate around in the 3d window and also the overall layout which usually consists of 4 parts:

 

The main 3d window where you do all your course building.

 

The 'Hierarchy' - This basically is just a list of all the things on your course such as bridges or lakes and you can just double click these to head directly to that point on the course.

 

The 'Project folder' list -  This is the actual contents of your course folder on your hard drive so it has things like textures you might use and trees, grasses etc. Anything you want to use on your course can just be dragged into this area just like a folder on a computer. 

 

The 'inspector' window - If you click on anything in your 3d window, hierarchy or project folder you will see some information about it pop up in this area. So for example if you click on the sun on your course, you will see all the settings to do with the sun in the inspector window so you can change its brightness, colour etc. It really is quite intuitive and fun once you get the hang of it.

[Kablammo11]

If some nice person would post a "Unity for Dummies" along with a few practice drills ... it would be super .... 

 

I'm not a nice person, dummy!   

Still, if I can be of help.. I would recommend this:

 

- Go to Google, type "heightmap", switch to Google Images and select any square heightmap that tickles your fancy

(best would be 1025x1025 and something with not too much steep slopes. Make sure it is in RAW format. If not, swing by Photoshop to make it greyscale, 16bit, photoshop raw)

 

- Now open Unity and create a new project. At creation, select all the asset packages containing the word "terrain" plus skyboxes.

 

- Now back to the internet (sorry, has to be - keep Unity open). Go to the Unity asset store: 

https://www.assetstore.unity3d.com/#/content/6

Grab this very useful little package that contains more trees, bushes and textures. You will need those. Click "Open in Unity" to import it straight into your new Unity project.

 

- In Unity, create a new terrain (top menu) and make it, say 1500 x 1500 meters (surface for a very large golf course). Doesn't matter, can be smaller or larger. It's just a test run, dummy! You can input the size in the "terrain resolution" feature.

 

- You have your flat, grey terrain now… well done! Go to terrain top menu: Import height map. Select your height map file and click okay. A couple seconds and then some magic happens: Your flat terrain just got very bumpy.

(If the terrain is too steep for you tastes, or too flat, re-import the heightmap and play with the height value until you get a result that you find interesting)

 

So now you are set to go ahead and do several things you will need to do with the CourseForge. By all means, go and watch the Mike Jones Tetralogy of Building a Hole and the 3 Course Forge videos again for pointers about how to proceed. Here's your to do list:

 

• Add a skybox

• Add a directiional light to see something on your terrain.

• Learn how to move about to see your terrain from all angles.

  Practice moving about and getting comfy with the key commands.

• Extensively practice the terrain tools to shape your terrain, to dig and excavate, to smooth and    

  ripple etc…

  For this to be of best use, dream up a golf hole on your terrain and try to alter the terrain to make

  it real.

• Learn how to select and apply textures to the terrain. Try to "color" your grey terrain in matching textures (You can make soft transitions by reducing the opacity

• Learn how to create and place a simple water plane. It will look totally repulsing, btw

• Learn how to paint grass onto your terrain (Warning: Unity default grass looks eewwww… ugly!)

• Learn how to plant bushes (detail meshes)

• Learn how to plant trees

• Learn how to import a mesh object (like a clubhouse) into Unity and how to place it on your terrain

 

All these things are completely basic and very easy to do … once you know how. I could tell you, but I'd rather show you some tough love so that you learn something by trying to sort them out. Only a matter of finding which buttosn in which menus to press...

You will need to know how to do these things before the CourseForge is made available in late 2019 (kidding). And even once you will have the Forge, you will still have to know how to do all this anyway.

 

Any hiccups and snags? Try the old fashioned way of reading up on stuff in the internet, studying manuals and finding them out for yourself, sheesh! Also, click away within Unity, see what happens and indulge in some extensive trial-and-error.

Otherwise, if you want to know something specific, ask me. I'm here all week!

[Mike Jones]

We'll probably be including a base course file with CourseForge so you can just load it up and have a starting point as it will already have a terrain, a sun and some textures etc. I see no reason why we can't provide a bunch of ready made starter plots for people to have some fun with straight away.

 

I know that the content team and I are looking forward to engaging with the community and helping people out along the way. The more people like and use CourseForge the happier I'll be and the more courses everyone else will have to play on!

[axe360]

Sounds gr8! Thanks a bunch K11 gr8 mini tut.. Now, when can we get an Course Design forum going and get some of these gr8 things Pinned so we can easily find them? 

 

And yes I get it. Give a man a fish and he eats for a day, teach a man how to fish and he eats for a lifetime.. However ever!!!!! If it hadn't been for some gr8 community made starter tutorials for the TW's CA, I may not have ever started designing, just saying...

That's why I really like Mikes Idea of some starter plots to get the hang of things...

 

Sorry, I may be jumping the gun on the Course Design Forum hehe..

[Kablammo11]

I have looked a little at Unity but I agree with Olazaboll, how bout a simple tutorial for us dummies.

See above

 

Also, you mean to tell me that when CF comes out, it will look just like it does in the game? Hence no need to go into the game and resmooth areas or fix bad spots? What the....

By George he's got it! The rain in Spain indeed stays mainly in the plane.

 

I think Mike was saying that in CF you can do all your work, no need to go in the game to see if there are any errors?  Still confusing, CF, Unity, Unity CF. I understand it is a bolt on so I guess I'll wait for the bolts?

You will need the game to test play your course (see if its playable under different conditions, all the pins accessible etc). All the gardening, landscaping, infrastructure building, planting, everything that is non-golf-playing takes place in Unity, including desgin control.

 

Unity: Unity is a game development ecosystem: a powerful rendering engine fully integrated with a complete set of intuitive tools and rapid workflows to create interactive 3D and 2D content; easy multiplatform publishing; thousands of quality, ready-made assets in the Asset Store and a knowledge-sharing community

 

CourseForge: The special Unity asset designed to define a golf course within a Unity environment, including playing surfaces, hole layout etc.

 

Sorry for posting out of sync, Axe. Comments keep pouring in… I like the term ecosystem; it best describes what Unity really is.

 

@ Mike: I'm not trying to steal your thunder, here. But you are sleeplessly super-busy with working on the real thing, whereas there is no reason for dummy-stuff to be postponed to when (and after) the real thing is here.

[Dazmaniac]

I feel I have to ask.

 

What are the actual reasons that a version of Course Forge has not been made available?

 

A while back it was Unity 4 compatibility and bug fixing. A while has passed since these reasons for the delay were given and about 20 courses have been created by PP (so the software obviously works). Can the community not have a play on the same current build the Dev Team are using?

 

[olazaboll]

We'll probably be including a base course file with CourseForge so you can just load it up and have a starting point as it will already have a terrain, a sun and some textures etc. I see no reason why we can't provide a bunch of ready made starter plots for people to have some fun with straight away.

 

I know that the content team and I are looking forward to engaging with the community and helping people out along the way. The more people like and use CourseForge the happier I'll be and the more courses everyone else will have to play on!

 

Thank You very much to Kablammo11 for his "kind words"   ... I will follow your instructions carefully ...

Maybe this eventually means I can pull that "converting thing" off and be able to work with my APCD course(s) in CF 

 

.... Also .... The words from Mike I like very much ( qoute above ) .... " I can just load it up " .... I like It ... I like it ..... 

[Dazmaniac]

Thank You very much to Kablammo11 for his "kind words"   ... I will follow your instructions carefully ...

Maybe this eventually means I can pull that "converting thing" off and be able to work with my APCD course(s) in CF 

 

.... Also .... The words from Mike I like very much ( qoute above ) .... " I can just load it up " .... I like It ... I like it ..... 

 

Ola,

 

IIRC, AJ released a vide of the Terrain Importer in action. He did say that unlocked APCD courses can be imported in to Unity/Course Forge from the APCD. It wasn't an instant import, as the importer took quite a while to convert a course, but it put it in CF with the terrain layout and elevations in place. Then it would just be up to you to build the course again with CF.

 

Here's a clip MJ did of him working on an import he did of Crystal Pines.

 

http://www.perfectpa...ing-started-r12

 

[axe360]

Maybe 1 day we can give the Unity and CF 1 name? I know it's 2 things but you have to have them both in order to design courses so why not just 1 name... It is a bit confusing when some talk about Unity and some talk about CF... Or, if it's just me, then disregard..

[axe360]

Ahh Ok Daz, thanks for that video, starting to see now... Looks pretty darn easy to bring in a plot and elevations for the course...Word..

[Stephen Sullivan]

Always felt with APCD that newbie designers like myself were behind the curve with techniques and "The Masters" did not seem inclined to share. It is only since Acrilix video course that I have felt more confident.  It would be nice to think it will be different with CF 

[olazaboll]

Im d/l Unity ver 4.2.1 at the moment ... very slow d/l speed ... but Im getting there ... tried to d/l 4.3.1 ... but no action .... will I be ok for now with 4.2.1 ?

 

Daz: I have seen the vidoes before .. but at the time they were released It felt like it was a too tough task for me ... but now, maybe I feel more confident .... so I give it a try eventually *)

 

What I meant with "I can just load it up " ... was that I liked the idea from MJ to provide us with terrain templates 

 

 

*) ... now a question to the PP team ... probably the dumbest of the year  ... but here it goes :

To convert the APCD file you need to create a jpg using Photo Shop

Im not at all familiar with photo shop ... but I have used MS Paint a lot .... a very simple program I know ... but it also creates jpg's  ... could I use MS Paint to create the jpg ?

[Kablammo11]

I'm not familiar with MS Paint, but if it can convert an image file into a jpg formatted image file, then that's all you need. The jpg-thing is what matters here, not the Photoshop-bit.

(This is not an official "PP Team" response, it therefore requires validation by truly competent insiders, so proceed at your own risk.)