New Terrain and Parts Materials Preview Build! Oh YES!

[TheSenorDuck]

@RBLXImagineer

Some materials have changed substantially to make them more realistic, so you may need to make color adjustments or in some cases change the material to something more appropriate for your places.

Wait are terrain materials or part materials going to get changed

[ItsKoiske (Koiske)]

Both are being changed. Read the original post.

[BravenwolfTFS (Braven)]

Oh boy. This is going to take a while, and this post has scared me more than anything.

1. You NEED to keep the older materials as an option. I don’t care if you’re striving for realism here, it is forcing an artstyle change upon every developer on the platform regardless of their desire. As developers, we should not be responsible to fix everything we’ve made over the past several years simply because Roblox broke them without any regard for the previous experience. This would take literal hours, maybe even weeks to do.

The current materials need to stay as a part of Roblox’s engine because of their massive versatility and ambiguity. It will maintain the original, intended experience and artstyle these no-longer-updated games had. I do not want to have to go to my old games only to see them butchered by a lack of consistency and parity with the current materials. If I had that forced upon me, with no way to keep them the same, I would undoubtedly quit. I update my older things quite frequently, even things that are 4 years old now, so I don’t want to have to leave it untouched for it to maintain the old appearance.

2. If this is talking about how materials flat out disappear for lots of bricks when graphics are low, no, it is not. I would rather play on minimal graphics with current materials than with the new ones.

3. FAR, FAR less. The lack of versatility on these new materials is absolutely unacceptable and to be completely honest I’m baffled this was even shipped in the state that it is currently in, no offense to the team. These materials not only have forced color, but also forced brightness. These are so hard to color and use to look correctly that every game is going to have to simulate a nature environment in order to look passable. If you want a cartoony game, everything’s going to have to look like plastic.
   I use wood grain to simulate hair on some of my untextured meshparts. This isn’t possible anymore. I also can’t make white bricks anymore, or blue grass. It is a chore to try and work with.

4. NO, not at all. The amount of inconsistency and loss of fidelity, as well as the general atmosphere, is detrimental. If this was forced on me with no way to opt out, I would quit. The amount of work you are asking me to do to accommodate a non-consensual change on my (and other developers’) end’s is outrageous, considering how many things I continue to use that were designed around the old materials. You are asking me to practically remake the past 4 years of my life on this platform, as well as destroying any way to enjoy things as they were.

5. Plenty, but to be completely honest, I don’t have the energy to list them all, as others have done a far better job. Unless you can get these materials to have far less distinguishability from the current materials, I probably will not be satisfied.

The problems at hand are too many to count. Materials have forced color and brightness. Slate doesn’t even look close to what it was. Concrete looks like rough plastic. Sand looks awful in dark colors, and also cannot be used to simulate fabric or other soft things like blankets.

I could go on and on about my complaints with the new materials, but I won’t, because I don’t expect my critique to go anywhere if realism is all Roblox cares about with these new materials. This is like taking Minecraft and forcing you to use a hyper-realistic texture pack and raytracing shaders with no way to go back to how the game was designed and intended to look.

Please understand me when I say most developers on this platform do not strive for realism. Realistic options would be nice, but the last thing I want is EVERY game on this website to appear realistic. It needs to be up to the developer to decide their artstyle, not Roblox.

6. They decrease the immersion by a long-shot. All of my previous hangout games where I’ve spent years having memories with my friends now look dark and drab. Everything is the wrong color and all of my CSG builds look inconsistent and cluttered now. My withered and decaying builds I made with slate now look like cracked plastic, and the environments themselves are like shadows of their former selves. I’ve never felt so aliennated on this platform.

So no, they do not increase the immersion at all, and decrease it by a lot.

This is why the current materials need to remain accessible, regardless of circumstance. If you want to make new materials, go ahead, I’m completely fine with that idea. I just don’t like the idea of having to rework my content around what Roblox wants. The current materials are very user-friendly and accessible to newcomers and hobbyists thanks to their ambiguity and versatility, unlike the new ones.

As long as we can somehow toggle the material changes, or have them both at the same time (permanently), I am fine with the new ones. Just don’t try to fix something that isn’t broken.

I’d like to close this off by saying that while I know I seem very extreme in this post, I say it constructively and out of passionate frustration. As a passionate developer, I say this out of desire for this update to be something to celebrate, and not to dread.

[vrs2210]

I feel like the materials are way too dark and doesn’t work with eachother

[Grainless_Bread (Degiomo)]

I don’t like the grass texture, doesn’t even look like grass it looks like strands of grass piled together. The decoration grass doesn’t look great on it, the colors don’t even blend together it feels… wrong…

[BravenwolfTFS (Braven)]

@Spectaqual

The overall feeling I get from this post is that there’s this belief that realism is seen as superior, rather than aiming towards the fact that we’re a wide variety of creators with a wide variety of ideas, visions, and styles. The belief that these previous resources need to be “upgraded”, along with all of our games, with drastic changes which don’t follow the already established visions of our art. To me, it implies that this update knows how our games should look better than we do, and that feels disrespectful.

This. Everything you just said here is perfect. I actually could not have said this better myself, even in my essay of a response to this.

@Spectaqual

To me, it implies that this update knows how our games should look better than we do

Especially this part. This is absolutely what I’ve been trying to put into words.

Let developers do their own thing and give them more options instead of less. They know their games better than Roblox does.

[BravenwolfTFS (Braven)]

@Cindering

The wording of that point is very concerning - it makes it seem like once we create a new file, we will never be given the option to access the old materials in that file, or that the option will be taken away at some point in the future. What if we need to add new places to an existing game or create new files locally? The option to use old materials should remain available in all place files and should not be taken away.

This wording also really concerns me. It makes me think that if I ever update an older game, it’ll be forced into the newer materials, or if I update an old model, etc, etc. Absolutely scary wording because of how ambiguous it is.

As someone who relies on admin scripts for games, I’ve had times where it’ll break and I’ll have to update the game or asset to make it even usable again. If I have to update to fix this, it’d force me to use the new materials, something I am vehemently against having to do.

I’d also really like to be able to make new files with the old materials instead of being forced to use the new ones just because “it’s a new place”.

@ruddev_ethan

That being said, my bigger priority is preserving the game that I have been working on for the past two years and plan on continuing support on in the future. This is not an old game that isn’t being updated, so please make sure that it is still possible to preserve the old materials in games consistently being updated as well.

Another good example.

[JaceMorphing (zen)]

Will there be a performance issue? And if yes will there be performance settings or quality settings?

[BravenwolfTFS (Braven)]

@PeZsmistic

Roblox should strive to be faithful to the old materials while still updating them to modern standards so this is not necessary.

I don’t understand why this wasn’t the goal of the project from the beginning. I have no problem with them updating the existing materials to be different with PBR like the new ones, but replacing them outright is completely unacceptable, no exceptions by any stretch of the imagination.

[12mrcool (NorthernCanuck)]

Words can’t explain how excited I am for this, I like the direction that Roblox is going. Can’t wait to jump in and test it out in my latest project. When I build I like realism, I like non Roblox games that look realistic.

However with something another users addressed I feel the current materials should stay and maybe have these in say another sub category. Because by no means is there anything wrong with the current one’s, old builds are made with them in mind, there are multiple factors, ie. Lighting, colour, style, feel.

[BravenwolfTFS (Braven)]

@Rocky28447

Some have said that they think the new materials should resemble their previous versions, but I strongly disagree. This is about pushing the platform forward, not clinging to the past. Custom materials are right around the corner and if people want more cartoony materials, they can feel free to get them back then. New developers should be given higher fidelity and more realistic materials to design their environments with.

I’d like to stop you right there and ask you to please consider:

How will this negatively impact games no longer receiving updates?

How will this impact the visual fidelity and consistency of existing models and games?

Is it really the developer’s responsibility to fix something Roblox broke?

Why do the materials need to be inherently realistic? Do cartoony and custom artstyles which aren’t realistic simply not matter?

Does destroying those cartoonish and custom styles actually move the platform forward, or does it actually inhibit the developer’s ability to make their own experience with the versatility the current materials have?

These are the questions I have for you.

[BronzedMocha (mochondrius)]

Yeah, this is not great. @PeZsmistic explained it more thoroughly than I ever could but these new materials are drastically different, overly realistic, and will ruin old builds. The textures by themselves are not the problem, the fact that you’re replacing the old materials with these makes it an issue. Why not expand the material library to accommodate for both the old and new materials? It doesn’t make any sense to replace these materials with an entirely different style when your whole intention is to add more flexibility to the platform.

If you want to refine the old materials for PBR, then simply stay true to the design. Period.

Since custom materials and custom vegetation are the next steps, then drop the one size fits all method and focus on making the current library more flexible! Add additional materials in smaller batches! Make material packs! Don’t try revamping the style of an already made material and make a new one! Give players more control over the material colors and sizes!

And while you’re at it, give devs control over the current vegetation! The new grass material doesn’t fit the grass vegetation nearly at all compared to the current material. We should be able to set the grass on whatever material we want, change the density, position the grass, and change the colors and sizes.

Optimally, we should replace the full revamp announcements with gradual additions to the library, and focus big updates on more granular controls and new features.

[R1EZO (7Days)]

oh yes look pretty cool yay great and will help devs alot

[Smileeiles]

Solution to this is to pack up the legacy roblox textures

[ORdenDev (orden)]

Tbh I love new materials and they looks really cool, it’s a new level for roblox development and graphic level up! I’m excited to try out this new materials in my game.

[Sir_Numb]

Now that we are talking about the terrain textures,
The Terrain Textures is one big 2048x2048 atlas texture but we are not allowed to upload a 2k image on Roblox. there are many big performance advantages with it especially when you got an atlas texture as the game will have to load just 1 file instead of many others

You can fit so many textures in one image but 1024x1024 is just way too small for something like that

[NinjaPenguinZoneAct1]

Am i the only one who, despite prefering the realistic art-style, think that the new textures look WAY more cartoony than the previous?
Details feel drawn on, transitions seem to drastic between materials and they seem to blend in random sticky out bits, which makes grass somehow take way too much angling to go into dirt as the Grass decoration fades out too early, but dirt also contrasting too much in both size and colour, along with the transition made earlier

alot of them feel really washed out while also being way too vibrant, which gives me honest PTSD from Sonic Forces’ Shading

while the older ones seemed to be one style, blending together nicely with eachother, these new ones feel a bit, miss-mashed, Mud contrasts way too much with dirt, same with leafy grass and default grass

Brick has its textures misaligned between themselves, which, how did this even happen and how wasnt it noticed?? (Same with wooden planks like what)

will say though, this is an early beta, and im pretty sure its gonna become a way better update as it goes along.
Asphalt and Limestone are also pretty damn good, and also probably blend the best. Concrete is nice too.
Rock seems like it has some nice textures, but the displacement always kinda ruined it. however that was a problem with the old one too

Also also,
I’ve only tested the terrain ones, maybe the part materials faired better (which im still excited about the concept of the materials being merged between parts and terrain)

[ittrgrey (Ittr)]

@RBLXImagineer

We are currently going to automatically upgrade all experiences to these new materials. If you open a place you made 3 years ago, your materials will automatically upgrade with no way to revert to the current ones. Is this acceptable, or would you prefer that new experiences get the new materials and existing ones have to be explicitly upgraded?

This is outright unacceptable - these new materials, as nice as they are, should NOT be forced onto old games, and furthermore, if the current ones are kept around, we should further be able to choose to use them in not only existing places, but possibly in new places in conjunction with the new ones.

Not only would this potentially ruin experiences developers have spent years creating, it could also limit the possibilities of what could be created by new developers, which goes against the platform’s remit of “Powering Imagination”.

No other platform this big or significant would even consider such a move - people don’t want or expect to play an abandoned game they liked back in say, 2018, and have it look completely different.

@RBLXImagineer

On lower-end devices, Surface Appearance objects scale to a color. You can simulate this by choosing File > Studio Settings > Rendering > Quality Level > Level 01. Is this acceptable?

I don’t really mind this behaviour either way since it doesn’t impact me in a big way, though one does question if the behaviour of the specular glare on low quality settings should atleast try to look similar to how things are on higher quality settings.

@RBLXImagineer

Looking at the materials for uses other than their specific type (using wood grain for another purpose) do you feel the new materials give you more or less options for using them in your games?

Personally I think the new materials would be better and more varied if they were more consistent in style - I really like the new Brick, Wood, WoodPlanks, and Grass (other than the dark colours/clamping behaviour) materials, but they don’t flow together very well with others (i.e. Slate, Sand), some of which look less realistic than before which completely defeats the purpose of this update.

@RBLXImagineer

Do the new materials better blend with other models and assets in your game?

Under the current “dark colour” behaviour which myself and many others have called out, the new materials currently make things seem less consistent and less well-blended than the existing ones. Would be interesting to see how they’d be without the colour clamping, however.

@RBLXImagineer

Are there any visual bugs introduced by these new materials? If so, please provide images and comparisons.

There are currently some tiling bugs on certain materials (Brick, WoodPlanks) which cause thin white lines to show wherever the texture is tiled.

@RBLXImagineer

Do these materials increase or decrease the immersion you seek in your game?

Under the behaviour in the first preview build, these new materials currently feel like they’re a bunch of different styles cobbled together and don’t provide much of an improvement, if any, to the immersion I seek in my games.

Also, on a side note…

@RBLXImagineer

Some New Part Materials have full color baked into them. We are currently removing some of this to give your more range while still allowing for color matching between terrain and parts

I would personally prefer if there wasn’t any colour matching between terrain and parts, if it allowed for all of the colour baking to be removed, which would be better for everyone. People who like the current colour palette can make things darker again to match, and people who don’t, can enjoy the materials to a far fuller extent.

Hopefully certain changes will be made for the V2 build to maximise the potential for these new materials.

[EdlonNightwood]

Forcibly replacing old textures with these new ones would be an absolute travesty. It completely ruins the aesthetic of old builds in more ways than just the color. Slate and grass are my two biggest complaints, given that they are two of the most prevalent materials, and this update entirely changes their appearance, and consequently the situations they’d likely be used in.

Color also seems to be far more limited. While the baked colors in materials such as grass has been addressed, others such as wood are so dark that it is impossible to make white wood. I tend to avoid materials such as fabric and cobblestone because of their slightly limited range of color, but some of these take that limitation to a new extreme.

As for immersion, there seems to be a conflicting blend of more and less realism on some of the materials. The current materials sit at a comfortable middle ground, for lack of a better description, between realistic and cartoonish. They can feasibly be used for a variety of styles. This is not the case with many of these new materials. Some of them have become significantly more realistic, which looks terrible in games that perhaps aren’t going for an entirely realistic style, whereas others look far more cartoonish, which presents the reverse issue of the more realistic ones. Many of them also lose their definition when viewing from a distance, such as slate and grass, making them look like smooth plastic when not being viewed directly in front of the camera. All in all, the new textures make immersion far more difficult than before.

At the end of the day, I would be happy to have access to both the new and old sets of textures. The option needs to be there though, and some of the aforementioned issues should be addressed. In its current state, though, this update would by no means be a positive change.

[TheDisfunctionalOne]

Looking forward to the new “carpet” texture!