Making Models in 4 Dimensions - 4D Golf Devlog #6

#4dgolf

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Music (CC BY 4.0)
Mindseye - A Vibe Nostalgic

[AMan-xztx]

"ok, now that Hyperbolica is finished I'll just do something easy like, idk, golf in 4D?"

several years from now: "now that I've created a time machine I can kickstart the creation of Unreal Engine's 4D project support, this is so I can make the grass texture on this mini-golf course look a little less flat"

[WackoMcGoose]

The phrase "UVW unwrap a tetrahedralized mesh" is _unbelievably_ cursed.

[APaleDot]

"For every triangle you can see, there's probably at least 10x as many that you can't see."
Sounds like someone needs to invent 4D occlusion culling, lol.

[SSM_]

"I don't really want another multi-year project like Hyperbolica, so this will probably be a relatively short and minimalist game that I just spend a couple months on and release." - CodeParade, July 2022

[t_hodge_]

I can already tell the speedruns for this game are going to be INSANE

[DonkoXI]

There is actually a nice way to extrude a shape made of triangles into a shape made of tetrahedra in a way which always guarantees the edges always line up.

The mathematical structure which accomplishes this is called a simplicial set. It's basically a way of organizing simplices and gluing data to form shapes.

The key ideas to how it works are
1) Having the edges of each triangle ordered so that the way they're glued to each other is compatible with that order
2) Keeping track of "degenerate" simplices. For instance, you can consider a line as a degenerate triangle where one edge has length 0. This of course wouldn't need to be rendered. It would just go into the algorithm for tetrahedralizing the prisms.

From here, the Cartesian product of the simplicial interval with the simplicial set which represents your surface will produce a simplicial set for the solid, and all the edges will naturally line up. I believe simplicial sets are implemented in Sage if you want to check it out.

[c]

"They don't look like leaves." Bruh you are inventing 4D leaves, they can look like whatever you want 😂

[Tantandev]

Imagine time traveling back 20 years
to tell people a 4D golf game is real

[nicholasbryant]

Something tells me you're gonna be one of those programmers that falls ass backwards into creating an entirely new standard in generalized engine building that gets picked up by everyone. Like the adoption of quaternions in game physics

[CoughSyrup]

Dude... you are really breaking new ground and discovering new frontiers here. Things that no one has ever done before.
Please keep making these, documenting all the problems you encountered making a 4D game.
I find these problems fascinating. These are problems you wouldn't even know existed unless you were trying to build a 4d game world. So cool.

[PunmasterSTP]

I love how there's so much nonsensical random content on YouTube, but every so often, there's something so brilliant that represents the culmination of so much work, and I happen to be around to witness it!

[veriskemkroya]

I was wondering how this project went along, glad my expectations have been met and you've properly went insane
Keep going!

[Henryernice-private-quotation]

Easy and 4d should not be in the same sentence

[salmiakki]

This channel *really* has a longstanding tradition of glossing over/subtlety flexing/giving for granted really High level math skills and use it as tools for it's projects

[nagger-i]

that intro part is so relatable I resonate so hard with it.

[wolfstale]

Your ravenous desire for long-term gritty pain is both admirable and horrifying. I love your commitment, truly astonishing work. ^^

[ArmanVesona]

New 4D Golf Devlog? I watch it immediately!

[boggo]

I really appreciate how you've kept at this incredible challenge given basically every already complicated aspect of making a game has an extra dimension of all the usual problems except with no intuition about how to address them.

[bionetik]

This channel is just amazing. I have legtimately zero idea (and this is not a hyperbole) how any of the programming or the mathematics behind it work, but just being exposed to these ideas is immensely interesting and the way you present it all and tie it together, with your calm narration and superb explanations is both mindblowing and captivating. Please keep making these, I just wanted you to know how much I appreciate your videos and your work.

[jbsgroup]

I gotta admit, watching these devlogs is incredible not just because of the concept, but because of your dedication to it. So many people try to make ambitious projects like this only to abandon them when they start to run into complex problems or just run out of passion halfway, but you're still going despite having to work with problems most people (myself included) don't even understand because it's a dimension higher and anything we're used to. Truly an inspiration to watch