Voxel calculations on CUDA/OpenCl?

[darkhog]

I've seen some videos of LoU and I can see voxels are kinda big there. Now, I don't know if it is designs decision, computional limitations of mix of box. But if it is even design decision, suggestion still holds up.

How about computing voxels using CUDA/OpenCl? It is certainly faster than normal CPU and may lead to two things:
1) Smaller voxels which means more detailed and less blobby terrain.
2) Higher display range, so you can see farer than now (IDK what actual limit is, but on one video guy showed SETUP file or something like that and distance was set to 50) without getting like 5fps (my pal who owns LoU and who told me about it said that he played with distance a bit and it resulted in significant frame loss so got back to default setting).

[iAreNubcake]

I'm not the person to ask about the specifics, but I believe the larger part of the load from the voxels in rendering then, not calculating the various attributes of them. Calculations are only done with the voxels when something changes in the area, and thus would have no effect most of the time.

At least that is my understanding of it, but you'd have to ask Bishop for the specifics (or Phil).

[SabotageTheFool]

I wish I could understand this magical language you people talk ^_^

[unwoundpath]

Besides, the game is not even optimized yet, so later (way later) you can expect better performance.

[powerofwar]

What he said.

[Jaguar]

There are a few major things here:

1. The voxel engine we're using is all Aaron Bishop's design. Inside and out. No licensing concerns at all, and he has full ownership of it.
2. Because of a desire for big world capabilities, there is some cost to the detail of terrain. Our roughly .5m voxels seem to do a decent job when they are sub-positioned as well.
3. For construction I wouldn't be surprised at (nor would I promise) the thought of a much more powerful building engine, since the buildings can be done as objects rather than terrain elements.

[ZiggyPox]

I only hope there can be mix of bojects neatly connecting with terrain. Door portals or windows for example.