3D graphics eBook - Course Materials Repository

Procedural generation 118
• Softimage - a 3D computer graphics application that allows node-based procedural creation and deformation of
geometry.
• SpeedTree – a middleware product for procedurally generating trees.
• Terragen – landscape generation software. Terragen 2 permits procedural generation of an entire world.
• Ürban PAD [6] – a software for creating and generating procedural urban landscape in games.
• World Machine [7] - a powerful node-based procedurally generated terrain software with a plugin system to write
new, complex nodes. Exports to Terragen, among other formats, for rendering, as well as having internal texture
generation tools. See [8]
Space simulations with procedural worlds and universes
• Elite (1984) - Everything about the universe, planet positions, names, politics and general descriptions, is
generated procedurally; Ian Bell has released the algorithms in C as text elite [9]
• StarFlight (1986)
• Exile (1988) - Game levels were created in a pseudorandom fashion, as areas important to gameplay were
generated.
• Frontier: Elite II (1993) - Much as the game Elite had a procedural universe, so did its sequel.
• Frontier: First Encounters (1995)
• Mankind (1998) - a MMORTS where everything about the galaxy, systems names, planets, maps and resources is
generated procedurally from a simple tga image.
• Noctis (2002)
• Infinity: The Quest for Earth (In development, not yet released)
• Vega Strike - An open source game very similar to Elite.
Games with procedural levels
Arcade games
• The Sentinel (1986) - Used procedural generation to create 10,000 unique levels.
• Darwinia (2005) - Has procedural landscapes that allowed for greatly reduced game development time.
Racing games
• Fuel (2009) - Generates an open world through procedural techniques [10]
Role-playing games
• Captive (1990) generates (theoretically up to 65,535) game levels procedurally [11]
• Virtual Hydlide (1995)
• The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall (1996)
• Diablo (1998) and Diablo II (2000) both use procedural generation for level design.
• Torchlight, a Diablo clone differing mostly by art style and feel.
• Dwarf Fortress procedurally generates a large game world, including civilization structures, a large world history,
interactive geography including erosion and magma flows, ecosystems which react with each other and the game
world. The process of initially generating the world can take up to half an hour even on a modern PC, and is then
stored in text files reaching over 100MB to be reloaded whenever the game is played.
• Dark Cloud and Dark Cloud 2 both generate game levels procedurally.
• Hellgate: London (2007)
• The Disgaea series of games use procedural level generation for the "Item World".
• Realm of the Mad God
• Nearly all roguelikes use this technique.
Strategy games