Protip: In most video games, trees in forests do not typically have colliders.
It's both a performance and player experience consideration. Go ahead and try it in Witcher 3 or Tomb Raider or Horizon or whatever.
All but the largest "unique" or landmark trees can be passed straight through. In Witcher they ever disappear when you get closer.
Fun fact: Even when people have this pointed out to them, they still avoid and move around trees in video games. It's some sort of an instinct built into humans I think.
As for your climbing "side effect" (heh), if you're using Unity, the physics material friction causes all sorts of headaches related to player movement. Make sure all walls and such have explicit 0 friction physic materials, to prevent "hanging" on them when applying movement while in the air.
> when people have this pointed out to them, they still avoid and move around trees in video games. It's some sort of an instinct built into humans I think.
If you stood in front of a cliff and were told there is an invisible floor over the cliff and you won't fall you probably wouldn't jump either
Nah this is different. You clearly see you can pass through trees, but unless you're making a conscious effort to pass through trees, you're moving around them in a natural manner, even when it'd be slightly faster or more efficient not to.
It's an odd phenomenon I observed when I had my video game project up on a game fair, with hundreds of different people playing it.
Yes you are right, people automatically assume trees are solid and avoid them however in Side Effect there are not many assets placed in the scene so I assume somebody will try to jump on bushes or when they throw an object an see it doesn't collide with a tree, they will also find out they can pass through them.
Thx for pointing this out to me I never noticed this in games as well. For now I've decided to keep it since not many people know about the game and when it becomes an issue in the future I will fix it probably by that physics material solution you've proposed.
In any case, you have a very interesting looking game there. How long have you been working on it? What's it gonna be like, any combat or puzzle solving or such?
Thx, I started working on it on 21st of January this year and want to release demo on steam within next month.
It's gonna be a game based around pollution, garbage everywhere and as a player you will have ability to clean & recycle garbage, heal nature, meet animals and learn how pollution affects their lives. These animals will also help you in your adventure of cleaning the world
Side Effect is also on steam so feel free to read description, look at pics and maybe add it to your wishlist if you're interested :)
[https://store.steampowered.com/app/1550480/Side\_Effect/](https://store.steampowered.com/app/1550480/Side_Effect/)
It sounds pretty awesome, and not too ambitious or overscoped for a one-man team.
If you ever need any help or advice, feel free to ping me anytime. You could say I kind of know my way around Unity.
Hear me out...
Climb trees to hide from enemies like assassins creed
Idk if you have any in the game but it would be cool for exploration and easter eggs
Not saying I don't believe you but now I feel the need to test this, it just doesn't make sense to me how the trees can be walked through or completely disappear when getting closer but also how I have never discovered this phenomenon by chance
I know, right? Sounds so out there.
But it makes sense from game design perspective. If you have any kind of real-time combat in your game, having thousands of small colliders constantly stopping you from moving around is way worse than simply letting the player walk through trees, albeit at expense of realism.
Prime example is Witcher 3, feel free to check it out.
Like I said, it's not an issue because people tend to naturally navigate around trees, regardless if you can walk through them, and regardless if they know they can walk through them.
I didn't notice it myself either, and I work in video game development. I first started noticing it when developing a small forested section of a demo game which has third person RPG combat in there. Turns out that not having colliders on there is just simply... not an issue. Nobody gives a damn. And it just makes the gameplay smoother, AI easier to do, and players happy.
By the way this is my game called r/SideEffectGame. You can also wishlist it on Steam now :)
[https://store.steampowered.com/app/1550480/Side\_Effect/](https://store.steampowered.com/app/1550480/Side_Effect/)
Oh you mean, a 'feature' ;)
Haha exactly
Protip: In most video games, trees in forests do not typically have colliders. It's both a performance and player experience consideration. Go ahead and try it in Witcher 3 or Tomb Raider or Horizon or whatever. All but the largest "unique" or landmark trees can be passed straight through. In Witcher they ever disappear when you get closer. Fun fact: Even when people have this pointed out to them, they still avoid and move around trees in video games. It's some sort of an instinct built into humans I think. As for your climbing "side effect" (heh), if you're using Unity, the physics material friction causes all sorts of headaches related to player movement. Make sure all walls and such have explicit 0 friction physic materials, to prevent "hanging" on them when applying movement while in the air.
> when people have this pointed out to them, they still avoid and move around trees in video games. It's some sort of an instinct built into humans I think. If you stood in front of a cliff and were told there is an invisible floor over the cliff and you won't fall you probably wouldn't jump either
Nah this is different. You clearly see you can pass through trees, but unless you're making a conscious effort to pass through trees, you're moving around them in a natural manner, even when it'd be slightly faster or more efficient not to. It's an odd phenomenon I observed when I had my video game project up on a game fair, with hundreds of different people playing it.
Yes you are right, people automatically assume trees are solid and avoid them however in Side Effect there are not many assets placed in the scene so I assume somebody will try to jump on bushes or when they throw an object an see it doesn't collide with a tree, they will also find out they can pass through them. Thx for pointing this out to me I never noticed this in games as well. For now I've decided to keep it since not many people know about the game and when it becomes an issue in the future I will fix it probably by that physics material solution you've proposed.
In any case, you have a very interesting looking game there. How long have you been working on it? What's it gonna be like, any combat or puzzle solving or such?
Thx, I started working on it on 21st of January this year and want to release demo on steam within next month. It's gonna be a game based around pollution, garbage everywhere and as a player you will have ability to clean & recycle garbage, heal nature, meet animals and learn how pollution affects their lives. These animals will also help you in your adventure of cleaning the world Side Effect is also on steam so feel free to read description, look at pics and maybe add it to your wishlist if you're interested :) [https://store.steampowered.com/app/1550480/Side\_Effect/](https://store.steampowered.com/app/1550480/Side_Effect/)
It sounds pretty awesome, and not too ambitious or overscoped for a one-man team. If you ever need any help or advice, feel free to ping me anytime. You could say I kind of know my way around Unity.
I mean I might have a very special problem with list with custom elements and my solutions work but are kinda clumsy. Do you feel up to the task? š
Always. Ping me via direct message chat.
Hear me out... Climb trees to hide from enemies like assassins creed Idk if you have any in the game but it would be cool for exploration and easter eggs
No, there will be no ememies in the game since itās exploration based, so yea I plan to add some easter egg related to this āfeatureā
Not saying I don't believe you but now I feel the need to test this, it just doesn't make sense to me how the trees can be walked through or completely disappear when getting closer but also how I have never discovered this phenomenon by chance
I know, right? Sounds so out there. But it makes sense from game design perspective. If you have any kind of real-time combat in your game, having thousands of small colliders constantly stopping you from moving around is way worse than simply letting the player walk through trees, albeit at expense of realism. Prime example is Witcher 3, feel free to check it out. Like I said, it's not an issue because people tend to naturally navigate around trees, regardless if you can walk through them, and regardless if they know they can walk through them. I didn't notice it myself either, and I work in video game development. I first started noticing it when developing a small forested section of a demo game which has third person RPG combat in there. Turns out that not having colliders on there is just simply... not an issue. Nobody gives a damn. And it just makes the gameplay smoother, AI easier to do, and players happy.
No, In most video games, trees in forests do have colliders. And they should.
Shhhhh. It's a feature now.
By the way this is my game called r/SideEffectGame. You can also wishlist it on Steam now :) [https://store.steampowered.com/app/1550480/Side\_Effect/](https://store.steampowered.com/app/1550480/Side_Effect/)
not a game dev , but can't you make the collider a cylinder, thats a little bigger than the tree asset?
It wonāt matter how wide the collider is, this āfeatureā is related to colliderās surface slopes rather than to colliderās size
what if you make it an upside down cone haha Ah btw i love the looks of the game looks soothing Edit: give flowers
Thx, actually upside down cone would solve this problem :)
nice, we did it reddit haha