Models... what poly count should I aim for?

I am creating a game I would like to distribute when finished. I cant seem to get my head around what is a good poly count for my models? Here are my questions:

  1. Do I need to worry about anything else than poly count like vertices?
  2. My level isn’t all that big it’s about size of an average multiplayer level, in game 0.5 mile by 0.5 mile if that makes any sense at all, does that change how many polygons I can use on characters and models?
  3. I am importing my blender model of a house into UE4, should I texture inside blender or in UE4?
  4. Should polygon count differ with characters and other models in game?
  5. What polygon count would you recommend for a building such as a house, I want most systems to run it but I still want my game to look great.

If anyone could shed any light that would be great thanks :slight_smile:

As far as I know best answer is to make a demo scene. I would highly tessellate geometry and try to figure out how ‘high’ I could go if that is an option. It is a tough question especially on PCs if that is one of your platforms. Because PCs vary so widely. answer to this question varies from engine to engine. Sometime you might even have to profile. Remember 16.6 ms = 60 fps.

Aye, Sandboxgod is correct, your best bet is to test early. Additionally, way most modeling is done today is 2 passes, first someone create a high poly model (millions of polys) in a program like mudbox. Then they bake out nice high resolution (2048x2048+ for characters) normal maps. Then another model is made based on high polly model, where far fewer triangles are user, it’s a wide range, but generally 20K - 100K for a character, and much less for just every day objects. A whole house, is hard to say, it’s a house so they vary in size.

Generally speaking, most of your performance concerns will come from complexity of your materials that you apply to your objects. If you look at a lot of our sample art enable wireframe mode and you may be surprised how few triangles a lot of objects have. A lot of detail comes from material and high res normal map mentioned earlier.

You can texture in Blender, we’ll generate a material and import textures when you import FBX. After that you should modify material in UE4 to make it look awesome.

Good luck!

Thanks for incredible help guys! It’s made me understand it a little more :slight_smile:

Also just one more question… when creating my game models can I create very detailed models and then optimise them later to workout what will work best? I’m pretty sure that’s what you’ve just explained to me haha :slight_smile:

Sort of, there are a few options out there for decimating a high res model, but generally they’re never as good as what an artist could have crafted by hand.

What is best way to reduce poly count of a model? In blender I’ve used decimate modifier with mixed results, but so far I haven’t found a better solution…

Hey devel,

You’ll probably get some better responses if you post this as a new question in Everything Else section, since what you are is veering away from topic of original poster.

Best,

Interesting information. So does that mean I’m in an acceptable range? So far my level geometry appears to be sitting at between 15-16K. I’m not being very conscience of my polycount. And I know when I add props, it will increase. But for a FPS adventure game, does this sound like a correct range to aim for?

LOL, I have some Objects with half a million polygons… Clearly, I can’t use those, but that’s what happens when you try to bring Daz Props into UE4… I should have used Decimator before exporting all 2,000 something props… Now I’m at a crossroads… Do I go back and do it all over again with Decimator, or do I just see how it goes with my billions of Polygons… lol. It’s not actually billions but MOST of Daz Props are about 10k-40k Polygons. For just simple small things… People who make objects for Daz throw a billion subdivisions on and don’t think twice about Poly Count. Which is obviously a nightmare for people like me.

I have a similar problem here.I’m just started to develop a game and I am using blender for it.ı’m modelling ı mug for game it’s just a decorative it is not a big deal but ı want to game look nice so mug has to look smooth.and its takes 2k-5k triangles to make it smooth is this count is so much?

Topology Mug down around 500 then bake 5K mug normal map in Blender and apply it to Low Poly version, normal Map will give Low Poly Mug Fake Smooth