My attempt at making terrain generation

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#1

Since I just recently looked into terrain generation, I thought I’d share what I’ve made with it.

Perlin Noise has given me a fair bit of trouble when trying to implement it. Not sure what exactly I was doing wrong, but it was still kinda weird. I ended up discovering a more simple method of generating natural terrain at this site, however the method I originally thought up looks just as smooth in my opinion.

I started off width a 2D array of 1’s (or some other starting number). Then I used a function that raises the values surrounding inputs (x, y) inside of the 2D array; the closer it is to (x, y), the more the terrain is raised, and vice versa. Call this function multiple times at random (x, y) locations, and I have the height map to generate the terrain. I later found a smoothing function that I used for more smooth looking hills.

I used this to generate a Minecraft terrain (which is free to take), and it worked pretty well. Obviously takes a long time to generate, since it’s creating a couple ten thousand parts, but since only the top layers are being added into workspace it goes a lot faster than one would expect.

A large overview of the Minecraft Terrain generated. Not exactly meant for looking from a distance, but still cool.

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A close up image of the terrain.

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Below the grass is a layer of dirt. Makes for a cool effect c:

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As I said, the map is hollow, but since the information is still stored in a script, you are capable of digging into the map. Just delete the part you click, and make the surrounding parts (if not deleted) visible.

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Then I put a layer of bedrock on the bottom surface.

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I also dabbled in using triangles to generate terrain. I figured I would use the method mentioned above for this, and it looked pretty neat.

source code

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I also made a basic version of what I did in the Minecraft generation (without any smoothing) after somebody asked me how to make terrain. It doesn’t look as neat, but it can be a useful reference (especially since I made some comments on the code as well).

source code

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Tell me what you think :­O

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#2

Very cool! I’ve been experimenting with terrain generation as well, but I can’t seem to make a good pseudo random number generator, and math.randomseed() has a very… small effect.

#3

What if you tried this: math.randomseed(os.time())

#4

What if you tried this: math.randomseed(os.time())[/quote]
I can’t tell if superfighter used math.randomseed() literally, without tick() or os.time() in its brackets. Just thought I’d pitch in 'cause you never know

#5

What if you tried this: math.randomseed(os.time())[/quote]

The thing is, I’m not going for a massive number like that. I need it to be constant, so I have to use a more predictable number that can be accessed and any time. I can do this, but it always acts a bit odd. I’ve tried using just sin and cosine with pseudo random algorithms as well.

#6

If you go here and join the map “Nova” then you can see one of my random terrain generators:

What I do is create a “flat” heightmap in a 2D array and then repeatedly “hill” and “crater” it. It ends up with some really nice looking hills and snaky island-type-things.

#7

What if you tried this: math.randomseed(os.time())[/quote]
[/spoiler]
The thing is, I’m not going for a massive number like that. I need it to be constant, so I have to use a more predictable number that can be accessed and any time. I can do this, but it always acts a bit odd. I’ve tried using just sin and cosine with pseudo random algorithms as well.[/quote]

Kind of confused on what you’re going for here. I’m assuming you want a way to generate the same random numbers given one or more variables? In that case, you could always create a table that stores the random numbers created. That way, if you call a number with the same variables, it’ll check to see if the table exists, and if so, return that number (this is what I did). Otherwise, I found that math.randomseed() works just fine. It’s terrain generation after all, not cryptography :o

[spoiler][code]
math.randomseed(tick()) --Or tick()%7919 if you want a random seed between 1 and 7919 for some reason
local SEED = math.random(1,1000000)
local MAX_X = 100 --In the case of two variables, you’d want to define the highest the first variable can go.

function Random_1Var(x)
math.randomseed(SEED+x)
return math.random()
end

function Random_2Var(x,y)
math.randomseed(SEED+x+y*MAX_X)
return math.random()
end
[/code][/spoiler]

Davidii,
So basically the same thing I did in the Minecraft generation. And to think I thought I was being rather original with that method, haha.

#8

I’ll just leave this here. I love this terrain so much, especially the ocean-type ones; dynamic lighting makes it darker as you go down! :smiley:

Note: StreamingEnabled makes it look weird.

#9

I don’t know why it’s been 7 years since this topic has been discussed. This has been very helpful, thank you!

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