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Old 12-16-2000, 02:50 PM   #8
feldon34
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Join Date: Dec 2000

Location: Rock Hill, SC
Posts: 10,937
Re: I love this program...

Invertebrates are coming! Jim has told me that a banded coral shrimp will be one of the first. I'll quote most of his e-mail here:

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[Jim Sachs]

The movement of the fish was just a quick algorithm to get a version of the Aquarium on the market. I studied real fish for many hours, and put in the minimum number of visual cues to convince the casual observer that these fish were real. I have always planned to refine these movements -- their mouths and gills will move, and you will be able to feed the fish. The fish will exhibit individual behavior characteristic of their species (timid, aggressive, schooling, etc.)

There will probably be about 10 more conventional fish added before I start on the invertebrates. The first invertebrate will probably be a starfish, followed by a banded coral shrimp. The last one will probably be the octopus (could easily be 3000 polygons, and a programming nightmare). I know that people have grand expectations for this simulation, and I'll do my best. But before asking for the moon, take a look at all the state-of-the-art programs that huge teams of programmers and artists have ever produced, even with multi-million-dollar budgets. I think the Aquarium stacks up pretty well even in it's current form. Each of the hundreds of daily requests could take a whole career to fully pursue, and I have to walk a fine line of maximum effect for minimum effort, or I'll never get it done.

Then there are 3 more SereneScreen programs after this one!

There will also be new backgrounds, and a widescreen version with a wider than normal background. Eventually the backgrounds will be modeled in 3D like the fish, which is very time consuming, but will make things easier for new effects I have planned later.

I have also always planned to have pictures of the available fish in the Settings screen, but there are more urgent matters at the moment.

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