Team17, the development team behind the iconic Worms franchise, have just released the second of five developer diaries building up to their next Worms title, Worms Revolution. The second development diary has info about landscapes, physics objects and dynamic water. Ian Lindsey, Lead Programmer, goes over how some of the new aspects of the physics engine in Worms Revolution work and how they have improved. You can either watch the Dev Diary on our YouTube Page or read the information bellow. Personally I feel reading is overrated but hey, don’t say we didn’t offer both.
Worms Revolution Developer Diary 2
Worms Revolution – Developer Diary 2
‘Landscapes, Physics Objects and Dynamic Water’Ian Lindsey – Lead Programmer
Q. Worms Revolution looks different yet familiar; can you tell us more about the landscapes?
A. Essentially we wanted to keep the gameplay in 2D like the previous games but we wanted to push
the technology so that it was actually all in 3D for the visuals. It’s not up until recently that we’ve
had the computing power to have the ability to do this, so in this iteration of the game we have 3D
landscapes with the same level of detail as the 2D landscapes that we had previously.
Q. And how are the particle effects different in this game?
A. In Worms Revolution we’ve managed to put together a special smoke rendering system which
has allowed us to do a huge amount of smoke in the game. We have had limitations in the past were
we’ve not been able to do very much particle effects per explosion, in this game we’ve managed
to put together a system where we can have a huge amount of particles and cover the screen with
smoke if we need to so we’re not limited anymore.
Q. In the past there have been objects I’ve had to navigate around; will these be making a return?
A. In Worms Revolution we have a fully featured physics system now in place. In previous games
we’ve had static objects on top of the landscape and they’re actually part of the landscape. In
Worms Revolution these now move around under physics. In Worms Revolution physics objects can
be destroyed and they have extra properties when some of them are destroyed. For example you
can have a lighter that explodes, test tubes which expel poison and also water bottles that can blow
up and produce water.
Q. What’s this new water that we are seeing?
A. In Worms Revolution we have a brand new water system which is custom made. It’s very realistic;
we include properties such as viscosity, compression and also turbulence. The water in Worms
Revolution can push objects around so for chain reactions in this game the water is a very big part of
that. The water affects the worms and the push force, everything is dampened under water and it’s
very difficult for the worms to move around and even jump out of water. Worms don’t die instantly
when they hit dynamic water, but it’s very much like poison they take damage at the end of a turn if
they are in water.
