Greetings from the southern part of Russia! Thank you for giving this tool away for free in Epic Market today! I am an architect student with a low scholarship, and this gift has improved my life
@@maximdenisovich8003 Even when we eventually appear on the Marketplace, the page will still link to our website. So unfortunately these sanctions will still apply.
Looks good! There's the industry standard Houdini + Gaea/World Machine workflow, but it is very labor intensive for a solo developer. You can't afford to spend your limited time on fiddling with Gaea instead of your actual game systems, and this seems to be "good enough" and a lot faster.
I already have the site in favorites, it's my next purchase for ue5, I'm just waiting for a big, well-detailed tutorial to buy it for me so that I understand everyone.
We will soon start a series of mini tutorials. We actually spent almost 3 mo ths on a tutorial, but we weren't fully happy with it, so we didn't publish it.
You can shape them in Errant Landscape by placing brushes. In Errant Landscape we also have a tool that allows shaping the brush along a spline and supports adding the water surface to it. Errant Paths on the other hand is a good tool for making canals. Eventually, we would like to add a Water plugin that would solve that problem elegantly, but that is further away in the future.
This looks extremely promising! I'm wondering if this replaces/integrates with the LandscapeGrass system - if I remember correctly, landscape grass spawns from a seed at runtime and doesn't actually save any positional data to the map file etc. Does this plugin handle non-colliding instances in the same way? And does using the biomes tool actually alter/paint the landscape layers to the landscape and hence any kind of physical material output + landscape grass outputs will function correctly? Regardless, I'll be picking this up and opting in to the Beta's for the other modules. I was considering building a system with the exact same requirements (painting instead of using volumes, customizable spawning behaviours, spawning other blueprints like particles/sounds) but it looks like all the work has been done for me :)
We have our own system for spawning dense objects that we call runtime spawning. It's a matter of one checkbox to decide if a species is spawned offline or in runtime. We tried using the Landscape Grass in the past, but it is tied to the Landscape material which meant slow compilation, unconvenient editing, only one person having it checked out, etc. With our own system it shares the same species logic and assets like our offline spawning. We pregenerate most logic offline, but only spawn instances in runtime. So the procedural spawning logic still has zero runtime cost. We use instancing wherever possible of course. We support colliding and non-colliding meshes in runtime/offline spawning. It's only a matter of streaming performance. We also support Nanite. We don't use landscape layers for storing our data. You can use any landscape material you want. We have our own assets and mask painting.
@@errantphoton Apologies for even MORE questions, but is it possible to paint biomes on top of non-landscape objects, like static meshes? (floating islands, megastructures etc)
I like the roads tool, will check out as soon as I can buy a new computer in some months... Hopefully the roads tool works with landscapes scaled on the z axis with factor 20 (Standard 100 set to 2000) ^^
You could spawn BPs if you wanted, but that would be too slow and would take too much memory. A good way to do it is to implement a separate system for converting instances to BPs the moment you want to interact with them. There are plugins for that on the Marketplace and we are also working on our own system for that.
I think this plugin is fantastic but we couldnt buy it because it lacks features in comparison to cheaper plugins like shaderworld and microverse, we ended up choosing Unity for Microverse when it was on sale. It works very similar to this but much faster with a lot more features
Sorry for the late reply. You can find 3 tutorials on our YT, there is also a livestream that shows how we create a map from scratch. We also have the documentation: documentation.errantphoton.com
But Unreal 5.2 already has similar instruments. And they showed the path transformation of the procedural generated enviroment in their latest shows. Or it works somehow the other way?
PCG is a framework on which you build your own tools. Our plugins provide all these tools to make a full solution. Similarly, you wouldn't consider a web framework the same thing as a finished website. Or you wouldn't consider Blueprints the same thing as a finished game feature. The best way for you to understand the difference is to try to make a map with a few biomes with PCG and redo the same map with our plugins. The difference is even more stark for roads or landscape. PCG doesn't provide any features there. This might change in the future, as people start publishing their own tools made on top of PCG, similarly to how you can buy Blueprint systems for various game features. But one thing that will always be important is how well you can adjust that purchased system to your needs, how intuitive it is, are you afraid to change it, how much time it takes, etc. And we focus on these universal problems in our plugins. Whether that's built on PCG or C++ is less important. PCG is however a very useful framework that we recently integrated with and use as an optional extension to our tools. It's a great way to introduce even more low-level control and programming to the generation process.
You could create a system that manages regrowth, based on the already spawned HISM components and their instances. We don't provide such a system, but it can be implemented.
Do you mean merge as make it one road that has features of both of the input roads? Yes, it can be done by combining Path Templates (Blueprints with meshes) from both Paths, into a new Path. You could even make one complex Path that looks like road A sometimes and other times like road B, C, etc.
Okay just the feature at 2:17 is enough for me to get it. There is no way I can go around to every tree on a hill and fix them one by one without losing my sanity...
Tool looks great. I was wondering how easy the tool would be to use with multiple people at the same time - i.e. if 5 level designers are sculpting or painting the world in different areas at the same time with Perforce. Is that possible?
EW is made for large teams and it tries to checkout as few files as possible, only the areas you edit, etc. All the assets are also granular enough to allow multiple people to edit various aspects of the generation without needing to lock the same file. We have many large teams using EW, so give it a try :)
We discuss high-level differences here: documentation.errantphoton.com/biomes/pcg In general, PCG is a framework. Most of the work is still on you. Stability and performance for large worlds are not there yet. The lack of runtime spawning (around the camera) for the grass is also important. Errant Biomes is a complete solution that works for huge worlds and aims to solve all the edge cases, provide ready-made tools and systems (ex: painting masks, affecting landscape, runtime spawning), debugging/visualization, UI, etc. However, PCG can do certain things we can't do yet, like spawning on top of meshes, full in-game generation (too heavy for grass though) or running custom logic per point. That's also why we integrate with PCG, so that you could use its features where needed. In simple words, Errant Biomes is oriented towards artists who want to start creating levels today. PCG is more oriented towards tech-artists who create PG tools for artists, who then create levels.
This looks amazing. As far as i understand this is editor only or can it update at runtime? Can it e.g. be implemented to make a digging system or respawn looted trees?
Currently it's editor only. But we are developing a runtime solution and it will be released spring next year. All three plugins should have runtime support by then.
We are not focused on importing real world data yet. You could definitely import it, but there would problably need to be a thin layer between our inputs and the raw gis data. Heightmaps can be used directly in our brushes. Splatmaps as well. These can affect weightmaps and Biomes. Splines can be converted to our Paths, but then need some procesing, cleanup to create proper intersections, etc. Most of that can be done in assets and blueprints and is quite high-level. You can also count on our help with such a project.
Yes, we allow overriding the base HISM class that is spawned and stores instances. You can use your own implementation that swaps instances with full Blueprints and performs the interaction.
Yes, you can. You may use standard optimization techniques in Unreal with objects placed using our plugins. So the limitation in terms of map complexity is similar whether you make the map by hand or with our plugins.
So if i want every level to generate itself in real-time (no "pre-made" levels) every time a player starts a new game, that would be possible with this? sort of like minecraft etc?
Not yet. You could do it in Errant Worlds as long as the Editor is present (PlayInEditor when testing your own game). But it won't work in a standalone game yet. We are working towards that though and it will be possible within a few months.
@@cardboardreindeer The landscape part works internally (not in a published release yet). As for Biomes/Paths, we haven't implemented it yet. Overall, we aim to have these features tested, documented and released in 4 months.
Kind of. You could create such a game right now, as long as you run the game in PlayInEditor (with the Editor available). Packaged game wouldn't work. Fortunately, we are in the process of developing in-game generation and should have that around summer 2024.
Amazing!! 😮 I wonder if there's also intergrated RVT and virtual heigtmesh? And if there's any shader functions as triplanar , tiling remover etc? If not... Can I use some of your offered functions like : paths, spawner & landscape altering when placing a house ? Together with some other plugin like Open world, and world creator?
We don't require any special landscape material so you are free to use an RVT material. We provide a simple landscape material as an example, so for more advanced stuff you need to use some other material. The plugin does work with the heightfield mesh. A house can affect landscape/biomes/paths (via landscape brushes, volumes, weightmaps, etc).
Our plugins work with the standard Unreal landscape which isn't really designed for such use case. It could probably be hacked, but this might not be the easiest way to achieve the goal. One way this could done with our plugins is to spawn landscape brushes around the player and only use the landscape as a canvas. Once the player reaches the end of the canvas, you teleport him to the other side. This could be implemented in the Editor right now, and once we add support for runtime it would also be doable in the game.
is path's still in private testing? i see it seems functional in this video, which was uploaded over a year ago, but the website says it will be available in 4-8 weeks. is the website up to date?
PCG is a framework on which you build your own tools. Our plugins provide these tools to make a full solution. We need to wait for people to actually experience PCG and understand what it provides and what they need to implement themselves. Similarly, you wouldn't consider a web framework the same thing as a finished website. Or you wouldn't consider Blueprints the same thing as a finished game feature. The best way for you to understand the difference is to try to make a map with a few biomes and species with PCG and redo the same map with our plugins. The difference is even more stark for roads or landscape. This might change in the future, as people start publishing their own tools made on top of PCG, similarly to how you can buy Blueprint systems for various game features. But one thing that will always be important is how well you can adjust that purchased system to your needs, how intuitive it is, are you afraid to change it, how much time it takes, etc. And we focus on these universal problems in our plugins. Whether that's built on PCG or C++ is less important. PCG is however a very useful framework that we recently integrated with and use as an optional extension to our tools. It's a great way to introduce even more low-level control and programming to the generation process.
We support spawning meshes with collision, both in offlline/runtime mode. Streaming in meshes with collision is more costly though and may cause hitches when there is too many of them. So it's probably best to spawn smaller meshes without collision and add a system on top, which converts mesh instances to a collidable mesh when you are about to interact with it (hit it, cut it, etc). You would have the same problem when spawning foliage with any tool or manually. So it isn't strictly related to our plugins, but we would like to provide an out-of-the-box solution for that in the future.
For now we are focused on in-editor workflows. So you can create higher level proc gen systems on top of it, but they would need to run in the Editor. We plan to investigate in-game generation in the future though.
It's hard to answer this question. We try to spawn meshes in an optimal way (HISM components, etc), but rendering is still done by the engine. The limitations don't come from the tools you use to spawn things, but rather from the scene itself, its setup, number and complexity of the models, optimizations, rendering code, etc.
You need to buy it through our website. We need a more advanced license than what Unreal Marketplace has. But we will have a product page on the marketplace in a few days. But that page will still lead to our website. Once Unreal opens the new, combined Marketplace, we might find an appropriate license there.
Greetings. Hoping you can alleviate some concern; I paused my purchase upon finding the following. From your website's 'Licensing FAQ' : "After one year you will stop receiving updates and bug fixes unless you extend your subscription for another year." I've perused your website & I'm left with the impression that most folk have no idea about this when they're purchasing your product - given you have to either expand the FAQ section or read through the EULA. Seems misleading. You make no mention of a required (it's not... but it is) - subscription - anywhere else; & the EULA doesn't provide much by way of clarification. Nor can I find any mention of how much this "subscription" costs? Hidden Cost is still unethical, even if it's future-dated 12 months out.
It's not a subscription. You get perpetual access to the version you buy and you get 12 months of free updates on top of that. That's a very standard and fair model. Some people seem to expect free updates forever, but this is simply unfeasible as the ongoing cost of development is huge. Even on Unreal Marketplace you don't get updates forever. Creators simply abandon their ver. 1 product and create ver. 2 or drop the support altogether. We don't want to follow such a broken business model. When it comes to adjusting the product to new Unreal versions you have 3 options: - buy the source code and adjust it to new Unreal versions - freeze the Unreal version you're using for a while, pick only the crucial fixes, etc. This way you could reduce the cadence at which you need to buy updates. Once every two/three years for example. - buy the updates to have the newest version and support for the latest Unreal version. Accounting for what I've described, would you have a suggestions on how we could better communicate it on our website? We've tried different approaches, but none works for everyone :/ Also, for users who continue updating in consecutive years, the price will be reduced. Currently it's -30% in the second year, -50% in the third year of updates (much better than "standard").
@@errantphoton I might suggest removing the word 'subscription'. Furthermore, if I navigate *back* from the Stripe checkout screen, I see the 'Order Summary' takes a moment to refresh - "1 year of updates" appears as a line-item detail under 'Individual License.' However, no matter how I go about structuring my purchase, I am left with only "Perpetual License" & "Pay Once, Use Forever." In terms of how to present it to the public, perhaps something along these lines: "This purchase entitles you to perpetual access to [current version only] / [version X.X] + one year of updates, following. At the conclusion of your first year, further updates will require an additional *discounted* purchase. We provide discounted rates for repeat customers: After one year, renewal will imply a 20% discount off purchase-price; followed by 35% in the third year." In regards to the examples of 'broken approaches,' I agree with you & I don't necessarily expect "free updates in perpetuity" - my issue is with the apparent attempt to obfuscate this fundamental information. Your website is - currently - incapable of explaining these details. As a potential customer, I should not have to seek out answers in a comment-section of an advertisement. Hypothetically, if I decided it was time to 'renew' my purchase - for the first time - after 3 years: Would I be charged the 20% or 35% discounted-rate? Is it a reduction 'over time' or per 'number of purchases'? Personally - I'd extract ongoing 'cost-creep' revenue - to cover development & such - out of Studio purchases; where multiple seats are implied in each purchase. Let Solo/Indie Developers have their *perpetual updates/support* & take what you need from 'Larger Entities' to keep your business thriving.
@@elganzandere Thank you for your suggestions! We will look into improving our communication. Our goal was never to obfuscate things, but rather to reduce confusion. Any mention of a word "subscription" was causing a lot of misunderstandings. Also, we clarify that aspect in the first question of our FAQ - "You get a perpetual license which means that you can use the plugins as long as you want. After one year you will stop receiving updates and bug fixes unless you extend your subscription for another year.". But there is always room for improvement. And we certainty don't want to damage the trust. Answering your question about the discount - it is meant for customers who renew their license shortly after it expired. So you would need to pay the normal price after such a long break. We do have occasional promotions however where you can get our plugins at 30-40% discount.
@@errantphoton Beg your pardon, as I missed the end-portion of that FAQ. How does the tool function when importing terrain from pre-existing [.png / .raw] heightmaps ? [Scenario:] [Gaea / TerreSculptor] Terrain Generation : [.png / .raw] : UE 5+ World Partition
For now, we are focused on in-Editor workflows. Runtime deformation usually requires a different approach and different organization of code modules. However, now, that we have our own system for modifying the landscape (not using Blueprint Brushes, writing directly to Edit Layers) the task would be easier. We might look into that in the future.
@@errantphoton Amazing! Sorry for the late reply, youtube didnt notify me of a reply from you. But wow that is amazing to hear! I hope to see it soon! Any news on the paths plugin release?
We provide a library of stamp brushes you can use in your projects. Gaea is still useful if you want to generate your own stamps. You can also download other asset packs with heightmaps and splatmaps and use them in Errant Landscape.
Yes, you can import GIS data to create splines and then generate roads/railroads based on these splines. This process is not automated though - you would need to write some simple blueprint/code to create road actors and set these splines in them. But it should be a few minutes of work.
@@errantphoton interesting, is this tied into your errant worlds plug-in? Or that’ll be a separate system? Maybe you should do a tut on this? Trust me a lot of people have been waiting on a road network automation process even if we have to make a blue print
@@baldwin180 Errant Paths is seperate from the other two plugins, but they work together nicely. I will be happy to make such a tutorial. But this will probably come during the winter once the Beta for Errant Paths started. I will note down this idea.
@@baldwin180 Yes, it is. Errant Worlds is a set of 3 plugins (Biomes, Landscape, Paths). Errant Paths is one of them. But each plugin can be bought separately.
Our tools spawn objects in the level. How these objects are rendered is up to Unreal. We don't affect the rendering. So yes, path tracing works fine with our plugins.
I'm hesitant, it looks great presented like that, but it looks a bit like fluid flux, a great distribution but almost no tutorial to learn how to use it. I did a little research on this one but it's like fluidflux, I found that there are little bits of tutorial here.
This looks amazing. Are there already made biomes in the plugin. If yes, which ones? Also is there a maximum amount of different biomes that you can make?
We don't provide premade Biomes yet - mostly because we would also need to provide own 3D models as well (we can't resell bought assets). We do plan to start providing such Biomes in the future. There is no limit on the number of Biomes you can make.
@@mists_of_time It's not hard at all, but having some basic proficiency in UE5 is helpful. We do have tutorials, documentation, Discord and a new tutorial "from scratch" is coming. Simply sign up for the trial/beta and give it a try :)
This is awesome. Retaining creative control while being able to create big worlds as a single dev.
Greetings from the southern part of Russia! Thank you for giving this tool away for free in Epic Market today! I am an architect student with a low scholarship, and this gift has improved my life
I am not aware of our presence in UE Marketplace :) Can you share a link?
@@sounfedits3256 Yes, thanks for the explanation!
@@errantphotonwill your plugin appear on the marketplace? Due to the sanctions related to the war, I cannot buy a plugin from your sources.
@@maximdenisovich8003 Even when we eventually appear on the Marketplace, the page will still link to our website. So unfortunately these sanctions will still apply.
Looks good! There's the industry standard Houdini + Gaea/World Machine workflow, but it is very labor intensive for a solo developer. You can't afford to spend your limited time on fiddling with Gaea instead of your actual game systems, and this seems to be "good enough" and a lot faster.
You can still use Gaea with this for the stamps
What's Houdini role in terrain generating?
Simulation@@kraney195
my gosh this saves so much time omg, especially when building the rail roads with just a click away
These tools are amazing and your price is fantastic! Thanks so much for having an indie tier :)
looks like I know what I'm setting aside money for and buying asap... (being a solo-dev is so exhausting sometimes. thank you for existing!)
I just need a case soon to have a reason to buy and play! It looks awesome and exactly what I have needed for old projects :) Thank you!
I already have the site in favorites, it's my next purchase for ue5, I'm just waiting for a big, well-detailed tutorial to buy it for me so that I understand everyone.
We will soon start a series of mini tutorials. We actually spent almost 3 mo ths on a tutorial, but we weren't fully happy with it, so we didn't publish it.
Greart to hear!
@@errantphoton
This looks mental
This looks amazing, congratulations!
Looks very proffessional.
damn you and I share names, haven't seen another errant before. Insane work!
Looks super useful, I wish i was in a company so I could get it! looks so so powerful
What is stopping you? We do sell to individual developers as well :)
@@errantphoton I'm not personally able to afford it. Some day perhaps?
@@Rossilaz58 It's free for this month! Remember to get it :)
@@Rossilaz58 Its your lucky day, UE 5.2 has it built in
@@AwakenedG-Music how can i install it?
What i really need is for a plugin to paint the landscape under spawned assets
We will add that this year, I promise :) I also want that feature.
Can you add lakes, oceans and rivers?
You can shape them in Errant Landscape by placing brushes. In Errant Landscape we also have a tool that allows shaping the brush along a spline and supports adding the water surface to it. Errant Paths on the other hand is a good tool for making canals.
Eventually, we would like to add a Water plugin that would solve that problem elegantly, but that is further away in the future.
can you use on planets?
This looks extremely promising! I'm wondering if this replaces/integrates with the LandscapeGrass system - if I remember correctly, landscape grass spawns from a seed at runtime and doesn't actually save any positional data to the map file etc. Does this plugin handle non-colliding instances in the same way? And does using the biomes tool actually alter/paint the landscape layers to the landscape and hence any kind of physical material output + landscape grass outputs will function correctly?
Regardless, I'll be picking this up and opting in to the Beta's for the other modules. I was considering building a system with the exact same requirements (painting instead of using volumes, customizable spawning behaviours, spawning other blueprints like particles/sounds) but it looks like all the work has been done for me :)
We have our own system for spawning dense objects that we call runtime spawning. It's a matter of one checkbox to decide if a species is spawned offline or in runtime. We tried using the Landscape Grass in the past, but it is tied to the Landscape material which meant slow compilation, unconvenient editing, only one person having it checked out, etc. With our own system it shares the same species logic and assets like our offline spawning.
We pregenerate most logic offline, but only spawn instances in runtime. So the procedural spawning logic still has zero runtime cost. We use instancing wherever possible of course.
We support colliding and non-colliding meshes in runtime/offline spawning. It's only a matter of streaming performance. We also support Nanite.
We don't use landscape layers for storing our data. You can use any landscape material you want. We have our own assets and mask painting.
@@errantphoton sounds beautiful! I’ll definitely be purchasing.
@@errantphoton oh one other thing I was curious about - how does it work with the unreal level streaming systems?
@@PrismaticaDev We work with World Partition and Streaming Levels and Data Layers.
@@errantphoton Apologies for even MORE questions, but is it possible to paint biomes on top of non-landscape objects, like static meshes? (floating islands, megastructures etc)
I like the roads tool, will check out as soon as I can buy a new computer in some months...
Hopefully the roads tool works with landscapes scaled on the z axis with factor 20 (Standard 100 set to 2000) ^^
Can you define if the spawned trees are interactable blueprints so players can cut them down?
You could spawn BPs if you wanted, but that would be too slow and would take too much memory. A good way to do it is to implement a separate system for converting instances to BPs the moment you want to interact with them. There are plugins for that on the Marketplace and we are also working on our own system for that.
I think this plugin is fantastic but we couldnt buy it because it lacks features in comparison to cheaper plugins like shaderworld and microverse, we ended up choosing Unity for Microverse when it was on sale. It works very similar to this but much faster with a lot more features
What are the features you were missing?
Is there any tutorial for it? How to use and how it works step in step as newbie?
Sorry for the late reply. You can find 3 tutorials on our YT, there is also a livestream that shows how we create a map from scratch. We also have the documentation: documentation.errantphoton.com
This is sooo good!
But Unreal 5.2 already has similar instruments. And they showed the path transformation of the procedural generated enviroment in their latest shows. Or it works somehow the other way?
PCG is a framework on which you build your own tools. Our plugins provide all these tools to make a full solution.
Similarly, you wouldn't consider a web framework the same thing as a finished website. Or you wouldn't consider Blueprints the same thing as a finished game feature.
The best way for you to understand the difference is to try to make a map with a few biomes with PCG and redo the same map with our plugins. The difference is even more stark for roads or landscape. PCG doesn't provide any features there.
This might change in the future, as people start publishing their own tools made on top of PCG, similarly to how you can buy Blueprint systems for various game features. But one thing that will always be important is how well you can adjust that purchased system to your needs, how intuitive it is, are you afraid to change it, how much time it takes, etc. And we focus on these universal problems in our plugins. Whether that's built on PCG or C++ is less important.
PCG is however a very useful framework that we recently integrated with and use as an optional extension to our tools. It's a great way to introduce even more low-level control and programming to the generation process.
Is it possible to harvest ressources and let them grow back after a timer rus out, via blueprint e.g.
You could create a system that manages regrowth, based on the already spawned HISM components and their instances. We don't provide such a system, but it can be implemented.
is it possible to make two differenct type of roads and merge them at some point?
Do you mean merge as make it one road that has features of both of the input roads? Yes, it can be done by combining Path Templates (Blueprints with meshes) from both Paths, into a new Path. You could even make one complex Path that looks like road A sometimes and other times like road B, C, etc.
Okay just the feature at 2:17 is enough for me to get it. There is no way I can go around to every tree on a hill and fix them one by one without losing my sanity...
Tool looks great. I was wondering how easy the tool would be to use with multiple people at the same time - i.e. if 5 level designers are sculpting or painting the world in different areas at the same time with Perforce. Is that possible?
EW is made for large teams and it tries to checkout as few files as possible, only the areas you edit, etc. All the assets are also granular enough to allow multiple people to edit various aspects of the generation without needing to lock the same file. We have many large teams using EW, so give it a try :)
Whats the difference between this and UE5's PCG feature?
We discuss high-level differences here:
documentation.errantphoton.com/biomes/pcg
In general, PCG is a framework. Most of the work is still on you. Stability and performance for large worlds are not there yet. The lack of runtime spawning (around the camera) for the grass is also important. Errant Biomes is a complete solution that works for huge worlds and aims to solve all the edge cases, provide ready-made tools and systems (ex: painting masks, affecting landscape, runtime spawning), debugging/visualization, UI, etc.
However, PCG can do certain things we can't do yet, like spawning on top of meshes, full in-game generation (too heavy for grass though) or running custom logic per point. That's also why we integrate with PCG, so that you could use its features where needed.
In simple words, Errant Biomes is oriented towards artists who want to start creating levels today. PCG is more oriented towards tech-artists who create PG tools for artists, who then create levels.
This looks amazing.
As far as i understand this is editor only or can it update at runtime?
Can it e.g. be implemented to make a digging system or respawn looted trees?
Currently it's editor only. But we are developing a runtime solution and it will be released spring next year. All three plugins should have runtime support by then.
Is it possible to import real world gis georefrenced roads, vegetation, trees, lakes, Rivers’s and have it generate the assets around that data?
We are not focused on importing real world data yet. You could definitely import it, but there would problably need to be a thin layer between our inputs and the raw gis data.
Heightmaps can be used directly in our brushes. Splatmaps as well. These can affect weightmaps and Biomes. Splines can be converted to our Paths, but then need some procesing, cleanup to create proper intersections, etc. Most of that can be done in assets and blueprints and is quite high-level.
You can also count on our help with such a project.
Does this support foliage interaction? Would i be able to create a subclass for trees thatI can cut down for example?
Yes, we allow overriding the base HISM class that is spawned and stores instances. You can use your own implementation that swaps instances with full Blueprints and performs the interaction.
Look so great, i have a question about optimize, if i use this tool to make level and environment, can i use that level in my game without lag?
Yes, you can. You may use standard optimization techniques in Unreal with objects placed using our plugins. So the limitation in terms of map complexity is similar whether you make the map by hand or with our plugins.
@@errantphoton thank you, i will buy it in next month
So if i want every level to generate itself in real-time (no "pre-made" levels) every time a player starts a new game, that would be possible with this? sort of like minecraft etc?
Not yet. You could do it in Errant Worlds as long as the Editor is present (PlayInEditor when testing your own game). But it won't work in a standalone game yet. We are working towards that though and it will be possible within a few months.
@@errantphoton is this possible now?
@@cardboardreindeer The landscape part works internally (not in a published release yet). As for Biomes/Paths, we haven't implemented it yet. Overall, we aim to have these features tested, documented and released in 4 months.
Is it possible to use this to create a new proc gen level based on a random seed?
Kind of. You could create such a game right now, as long as you run the game in PlayInEditor (with the Editor available). Packaged game wouldn't work. Fortunately, we are in the process of developing in-game generation and should have that around summer 2024.
Thanks for giving tool for free now my map will be greate
I'm afraid you are confusing Errant Worlds with another tool. The Biome tool offered for free on Unreal Marketplace doesn't come from us.
Amazing!! 😮 I wonder if there's also intergrated RVT and virtual heigtmesh? And if there's any shader functions as triplanar , tiling remover etc? If not... Can I use some of your offered functions like : paths, spawner & landscape altering when placing a house ? Together with some other plugin like Open world, and world creator?
We don't require any special landscape material so you are free to use an RVT material. We provide a simple landscape material as an example, so for more advanced stuff you need to use some other material. The plugin does work with the heightfield mesh. A house can affect landscape/biomes/paths (via landscape brushes, volumes, weightmaps, etc).
@@errantphoton is it coming more tutorials regarding landscape object affection?
@@supermattis108 Yes. You can also checkout the livestream on our YT channel.
@@supermattis108 Yes, more tutorials will come
could this system work with an endless runner?
Our plugins work with the standard Unreal landscape which isn't really designed for such use case. It could probably be hacked, but this might not be the easiest way to achieve the goal.
One way this could done with our plugins is to spawn landscape brushes around the player and only use the landscape as a canvas. Once the player reaches the end of the canvas, you teleport him to the other side. This could be implemented in the Editor right now, and once we add support for runtime it would also be doable in the game.
is path's still in private testing? i see it seems functional in this video, which was uploaded over a year ago, but the website says it will be available in 4-8 weeks. is the website up to date?
Yes, it is in Alpha and is being tested by various teams. It's functional, but still a good few weeks away from being a complete solution.
this is amazing
6 months later and UE 5.2 drops with their own version
PCG is a framework on which you build your own tools. Our plugins provide these tools to make a full solution. We need to wait for people to actually experience PCG and understand what it provides and what they need to implement themselves.
Similarly, you wouldn't consider a web framework the same thing as a finished website. Or you wouldn't consider Blueprints the same thing as a finished game feature.
The best way for you to understand the difference is to try to make a map with a few biomes and species with PCG and redo the same map with our plugins. The difference is even more stark for roads or landscape.
This might change in the future, as people start publishing their own tools made on top of PCG, similarly to how you can buy Blueprint systems for various game features. But one thing that will always be important is how well you can adjust that purchased system to your needs, how intuitive it is, are you afraid to change it, how much time it takes, etc. And we focus on these universal problems in our plugins. Whether that's built on PCG or C++ is less important.
PCG is however a very useful framework that we recently integrated with and use as an optional extension to our tools. It's a great way to introduce even more low-level control and programming to the generation process.
@@errantphoton i meant that more as a joke, I understand the advantages of the plugin
@@AwakenedG-Music You forgot a smiley :p The response will hopefully be useful to those who are trying to understand the difference :)
How well does it work with chaos physics system in regards to deformation and destruction
We support spawning meshes with collision, both in offlline/runtime mode. Streaming in meshes with collision is more costly though and may cause hitches when there is too many of them. So it's probably best to spawn smaller meshes without collision and add a system on top, which converts mesh instances to a collidable mesh when you are about to interact with it (hit it, cut it, etc). You would have the same problem when spawning foliage with any tool or manually. So it isn't strictly related to our plugins, but we would like to provide an out-of-the-box solution for that in the future.
Okay. Thank you.
Can all of this be done at runtime? Like, if I implement this into a procedural generation system could I make worlds out of this?
For now we are focused on in-editor workflows. So you can create higher level proc gen systems on top of it, but they would need to run in the Editor. We plan to investigate in-game generation in the future though.
How large the map can be in terms of kms before performance degradation assuming we are working in a high and PC? Thanks!
It's hard to answer this question. We try to spawn meshes in an optimal way (HISM components, etc), but rendering is still done by the engine.
The limitations don't come from the tools you use to spawn things, but rather from the scene itself, its setup, number and complexity of the models, optimizations, rendering code, etc.
... is Biomes only available in UE 5.1 and above? I don't see the option in 5.0.3
It's also available for 5.0. In the license page you should have a link to both versions.
@@errantphoton Ah! Cheers. I'll check it out
Any chance this can take real world heightmaps and biome masks as for ex. Pngs?
Yes it can. Simply import real-world heightmaps and splatmaps as textures in Unreal and use them in our landscape brushes.
@@errantphoton I'll give the trial a try! Maybe we could have a chat about what's possible? :)
@@oskarwallin8715 Sure, join our Discord (link in the trial email or in the footer of our website) and we can chat there. Good luck!
Hi, my question, is it possible to buy it on unreal marketplace?
You need to buy it through our website. We need a more advanced license than what Unreal Marketplace has. But we will have a product page on the marketplace in a few days. But that page will still lead to our website.
Once Unreal opens the new, combined Marketplace, we might find an appropriate license there.
Where did you get the great map?
Greetings. Hoping you can alleviate some concern; I paused my purchase upon finding the following.
From your website's 'Licensing FAQ' :
"After one year you will stop receiving updates and bug fixes unless you extend your subscription for another year."
I've perused your website & I'm left with the impression that most folk have no idea about this when they're purchasing your product - given you have to either expand the FAQ section or read through the EULA. Seems misleading.
You make no mention of a required (it's not... but it is) - subscription - anywhere else; & the EULA doesn't provide much by way of clarification.
Nor can I find any mention of how much this "subscription" costs?
Hidden Cost is still unethical, even if it's future-dated 12 months out.
Yeah, I was planning on purchasing this product in a few days but if this is the case I'll probably not bother.
It's not a subscription. You get perpetual access to the version you buy and you get 12 months of free updates on top of that. That's a very standard and fair model.
Some people seem to expect free updates forever, but this is simply unfeasible as the ongoing cost of development is huge. Even on Unreal Marketplace you don't get updates forever. Creators simply abandon their ver. 1 product and create ver. 2 or drop the support altogether. We don't want to follow such a broken business model.
When it comes to adjusting the product to new Unreal versions you have 3 options:
- buy the source code and adjust it to new Unreal versions
- freeze the Unreal version you're using for a while, pick only the crucial fixes, etc. This way you could reduce the cadence at which you need to buy updates. Once every two/three years for example.
- buy the updates to have the newest version and support for the latest Unreal version.
Accounting for what I've described, would you have a suggestions on how we could better communicate it on our website? We've tried different approaches, but none works for everyone :/
Also, for users who continue updating in consecutive years, the price will be reduced. Currently it's -30% in the second year, -50% in the third year of updates (much better than "standard").
@@errantphoton I might suggest removing the word 'subscription'. Furthermore, if I navigate *back* from the Stripe checkout screen, I see the 'Order Summary' takes a moment to refresh - "1 year of updates" appears as a line-item detail under 'Individual License.' However, no matter how I go about structuring my purchase, I am left with only "Perpetual License" & "Pay Once, Use Forever."
In terms of how to present it to the public, perhaps something along these lines:
"This purchase entitles you to perpetual access to [current version only] / [version X.X] + one year of updates, following.
At the conclusion of your first year, further updates will require an additional *discounted* purchase.
We provide discounted rates for repeat customers:
After one year, renewal will imply a 20% discount off purchase-price; followed by 35% in the third year."
In regards to the examples of 'broken approaches,' I agree with you & I don't necessarily expect "free updates in perpetuity" - my issue is with the apparent attempt to obfuscate this fundamental information. Your website is - currently - incapable of explaining these details. As a potential customer, I should not have to seek out answers in a comment-section of an advertisement.
Hypothetically, if I decided it was time to 'renew' my purchase - for the first time - after 3 years:
Would I be charged the 20% or 35% discounted-rate?
Is it a reduction 'over time' or per 'number of purchases'?
Personally - I'd extract ongoing 'cost-creep' revenue - to cover development & such - out of Studio purchases; where multiple seats are implied in each purchase. Let Solo/Indie Developers have their *perpetual updates/support* & take what you need from 'Larger Entities' to keep your business thriving.
@@elganzandere Thank you for your suggestions! We will look into improving our communication. Our goal was never to obfuscate things, but rather to reduce confusion. Any mention of a word "subscription" was causing a lot of misunderstandings. Also, we clarify that aspect in the first question of our FAQ - "You get a perpetual license which means that you can use the plugins as long as you want. After one year you will stop receiving updates and bug fixes unless you extend your subscription for another year.".
But there is always room for improvement. And we certainty don't want to damage the trust.
Answering your question about the discount - it is meant for customers who renew their license shortly after it expired. So you would need to pay the normal price after such a long break. We do have occasional promotions however where you can get our plugins at 30-40% discount.
@@errantphoton Beg your pardon, as I missed the end-portion of that FAQ.
How does the tool function when importing terrain from pre-existing [.png / .raw] heightmaps ?
[Scenario:]
[Gaea / TerreSculptor] Terrain Generation : [.png / .raw] : UE 5+ World Partition
What about realtime ground deformation, such as mud, and explosion craters
For now, we are focused on in-Editor workflows. Runtime deformation usually requires a different approach and different organization of code modules. However, now, that we have our own system for modifying the landscape (not using Blueprint Brushes, writing directly to Edit Layers) the task would be easier. We might look into that in the future.
@@errantphoton please add that it would be so game changing!
@@KillerHacking1212 We will do that. We already have a working prototype.
@@errantphoton Amazing! Sorry for the late reply, youtube didnt notify me of a reply from you. But wow that is amazing to hear! I hope to see it soon! Any news on the paths plugin release?
@@KillerHacking1212 We hope to release Paths in early September.
Can terrain be edited at runtime?
Not yet. But we should have this feature later this year.
So no need for Gaea with this?
We provide a library of stamp brushes you can use in your projects. Gaea is still useful if you want to generate your own stamps. You can also download other asset packs with heightmaps and splatmaps and use them in Errant Landscape.
Question, can we import GIS data??? Road networks from openstreet map etc?
Yes, you can import GIS data to create splines and then generate roads/railroads based on these splines. This process is not automated though - you would need to write some simple blueprint/code to create road actors and set these splines in them. But it should be a few minutes of work.
@@errantphoton interesting, is this tied into your errant worlds plug-in? Or that’ll be a separate system? Maybe you should do a tut on this? Trust me a lot of people have been waiting on a road network automation process even if we have to make a blue print
@@baldwin180 Errant Paths is seperate from the other two plugins, but they work together nicely. I will be happy to make such a tutorial. But this will probably come during the winter once the Beta for Errant Paths started. I will note down this idea.
@@errantphoton ohhhhh I thought this was included in errant worlds ohhh
@@baldwin180 Yes, it is. Errant Worlds is a set of 3 plugins (Biomes, Landscape, Paths). Errant Paths is one of them. But each plugin can be bought separately.
does Errant Worlds is base on GPU or it still use terrain editor from unreal ?
We modify the landscape on the GPU and also process Biomes on the GPU as much as possible.
isnt available in my dear country and it cost 199 dollars, so, so long guys :')
We are working on making it available worldwide. Which country are you from?
is it compatible with ''path tracer''?
Our tools spawn objects in the level. How these objects are rendered is up to Unreal. We don't affect the rendering. So yes, path tracing works fine with our plugins.
Are you planning a Unity version? :)
No... We want to stay focused on Unreal. This way we can integrate better with the engine, get better performance, UI, etc.
not trying to shit on Unity, but why would they?
Does this support unreal version 5.0?
Yes. 5.0 and 5.1
@@errantphoton Thank you so much!
I'm hesitant, it looks great presented like that, but it looks a bit like fluid flux, a great distribution but almost no tutorial to learn how to use it.
I did a little research on this one but it's like fluidflux, I found that there are little bits of tutorial here.
Check out our livestream and the documentation - documentation.errantphoton.com. We are also on Discord if you need help.
This looks amazing. Are there already made biomes in the plugin. If yes, which ones? Also is there a maximum amount of different biomes that you can make?
We don't provide premade Biomes yet - mostly because we would also need to provide own 3D models as well (we can't resell bought assets). We do plan to start providing such Biomes in the future.
There is no limit on the number of Biomes you can make.
@@errantphoton ok, it makes sense. I'm a beginner in ue5. How hard is to make a new biome? Thank you
@@mists_of_time It's not hard at all, but having some basic proficiency in UE5 is helpful. We do have tutorials, documentation, Discord and a new tutorial "from scratch" is coming. Simply sign up for the trial/beta and give it a try :)
I need it
Cool
epic games the file buy up pls.
A bit expensive...