Category: Linden Lab

Update, October 9th, 2014: Linden Lab announced that development work on Patterns has been discontinued.

I’m not sure what has happened with the Patterns roadmap; when launched, the original idea was that the product would remain in a Genesis version for about a year prior to progressing to an official “version 1.0” release. However, here we are at the start of 2014, and Patterns is still apparently in Genesis mode with version  0.06 released on Monday January 20th, and the development team promising lots more to come as Patterns progresses.

Not that this is necessarily a bad thing; a lot of what is going on appears to be as a direct result of user input, and the development team are refreshingly engaged with the Patterns community through blog posts, wiki updates, forum posts and live streams. Makes one long for the crazy, heady, communications-rich days of old in Second Life!

The 0.06 update further enhances the Substance Editor introduced at the end of 2013, and which I covered in brief at the start of January. As  explained back then, the Substance Editor allows users to modify the existing surface and other substances (clay, copper, moonstone, etc.), and to create new substances for use in-game. The initial release included the ability to edit the diffuse (texture)  normal (bumpiness) properties of substances.  Version 0.06 adds the ability to edit and modify a number of additional substance properties:

• Specular: the shininess of a substance  – this uses a greyscale  palette with white being the most shiny
• Occlusion: – to map darker and lighter pixels resulting in a texture with an illusion of relief, and so allows the creation of hotspots and shadows on substances.  The brick and bonestone substances are good examples of substances using occlusion maps
• Illumination: defines the glow and light emission effect for materials, using the range of white (most illuminated) to black.  The lava and moonstone substances are good examples of the use of illumination
• Metal:  affects the metallic quality of a substance. The default is black with white being the most metallic.

In addition, the Substance Editor gets an HD mode which doubles the texture resolution when using it, although the release notes indicate this makes using the Substance Editor performance intensive. It is also possible to define the total number of substances you include in a new Substance Pack.

The first part of a new video has been produced to explore the Substance Editor. This is described as “in-depth”, but I have to admit that this first part leaves something to be desired; the new properties in the Editor are glossed over with a “I’ll leave you guys to look these up…” Hopefully, there will be a more detailed look at them in the future as these series progresses, this is only an introduction, after all. However, given there has already been a far more detailed introduction to the Substance Editor already (albeit with only diffuse and normal maps), one has to wonder why the approach in that video was not followed, and a more informative piece produced to kick this new series off; as it is, the initial video is  – frankly – disappointing and waffly.

First Person Camera Lock

Another new element introduced to Patterns is the ability to lock the camera into first person view (consider Mouselook in SL). This is activated via the Scene Settings options (ESC > Scene settings > Lock first person view).

Continue reading “Patterns gets more substance (editing) and other bits” →

Update, October 9th, 2014: Linden Lab announced that development work on Patterns has been discontinued.

Patterns, the PC / Mac Minecraft-esque sandbox building game / application / creative environment from Linden Lab, had originally been aiming for an “official release” of Version 1 around the end of 2013, after a 15-month gestation period as a “Genesis” product, in which much feedback and involvement from Patterns users has been encouraged.

As it stands, the formal release has yet to be made – the latest version being 0.05a – but that shouldn’t be taken to mean Patterns hasn’t been going anywhere over the course of the year. A small (Or what appears small, it could easily be much larger) and very enthusiastic community has developed around it, and the back-and-forth between the Lab’s devs and that community appears to have been lively – including a series of livesteam events, one of which I reported upon back in October (which was the last time I stuck my nose into Patterns).

While the official release has yet to come, November and December did see something of a flurry of activity around Patterns, with videos reviewing some of the progress through the year, as well as some significant updates and news on the future; all of which suggests that perhaps things are now being pushed closer to the point where Patterns gets that all-important “official” release.

As it has been a while since I last covered Patterns. this piece is aimed at rounding-up everything, and may not come entirely as news to everyone, so bear with me as I play catch-up.

The Future

The major news on the future of Patterns initially came on November 27th, 2013, when the Lab issued a letter outlining some of their plans for 2014. While the “first release” was referenced, no actual date as to when this might be was given. However, what was mentioned made interesting reading:

• The introduction of a Substance Editor to modify the existing surface and other substances (clay, copper, moonstone, etc.), and to create your own substances for use in-game
• A character creator to customise / create basic Patterns characters
• A LUA-based scripting system which will “access to script APIs that control game variables such as lighting values and the pull of gravity”
• The promise that “even more functionality will come from the ability to author moving platforms and control behaviour in support of a variety of gameplay types.”

To help illustrate these new features, happyhappygaming, an Admin for the Patterns wiki managed by Curse, produced a little video.

Substance Arrival

This news was followed in December by two releases of Patterns – 0.05 and 0.05a – which introduced the Patterns Substance Editor referred to the “state of the game” letter.

The Substance Editor allows users to create new surface and other substances for use within Patterns either by using the existing substances or completely from scratch. It appears as a new option after logging-in to any version of Patterns from 0.05 upwards, and is actually a separate application to Patterns itself – clicking on the link in the Patterns start-up menu will ask you to confirm you wish to quit and close Patterns and launch the editor.

Once launched, the editor allows you to edit or define a substance, change its properties, such as whether it will crumble or not if a character tries to harvest it, how fast it will crumble, how durable it is as a building substance, what behaviour it has (“bouncy”, “slippy”, etc.), and so on. The editor also allows you to define the diffuse (texture) and normal map for a substance.

The use of an additional tool such as Photoshop or GIMP will likely be required for any modification of existing substances which requires changes to the diffuse and normal maps, but this isn’t actually a huge hardship.

Happyhappygaming has produced a video introducing the basics of the editor, including the use of GIMP for texture modifications, with the promise of more to follow.

An interesting aspect of this is that it appears as though  – like Patterns custom worlds – substance packs created by users can be shared within the Cosmos for others to use and further modify and re-share.

Continue reading “Patterns Future: substance editing and creation, scripting, custom characters and more” →

Update, October 9th, 2014: Linden Lab announced that development work on Patterns has been discontinued.

It’s been a while since I last looked in detail at Patterns, Linden Lab’s desktop sandbox environment for the PC and Mac. Since that time, the game has come on in leaps and bounds, adding many new features and capabilities, including multiple worlds, multi-player options, creatures, new playing modes and more.

The last significant update to the game itself was in May 2013; however, work developing both the game and the supporting websites is continuing – including the creation of a nascent Patterns wiki.

The forums have also had a much-needed overhaul in terms of appearance, although active participation remains small. They do see a reasonable amount of developer activity, particularly where features and updates are concerned – which is hardly surprising given the game is still in its Genesis mode until the end of the year – although responses to questions are perhaps a little slow. It’s been over a month since an “Ask the Devs” thread requested questions on the platform from users, and despite only four questions being asked, replies have yet to be posted.

The Linden Lab team responsible for Patterns recently held a live stream event in September, which they promised would be “the first”, run in association with Twitch TV. How many more there are liable to be is open to question, but it’s an interesting way of reaching out to the Patterns community and gaining feedback. It appears to have garnered a lot of interest.

The stream offered users the chance to see the devs, learn about features and ask questions – such as whether or not the game will gain a character editing mode (the team revealed that while discussions on the subject have been held, and the idea considered, no definite decision either way has been made), together with other questions on the possible future directions for the platform.

At just over an hour in length, the recording has some interesting tidbits for those who are enjoying Patterns. Unfortunately, WordPress.com refuses to let me embed the video, even via Gigya, so all I can do is provide a link.

If the Lab are keeping to their original roadmap for Patterns, the formal release of version one should come around the end of the year.

Related Links

• Patterns website
• Patterns YouTube channel
• Patterns Twitch broadcast
• Patterns on Desura
• Patterns on Steam
• Patterns coverage in this blog