Have been sitting around on the forum now for like 1-2 hours, but cant seem to find what a good poly count on static objects are? Cars are like 40-50k right? But how high can one go without getting perfomance issues on static objects? Im considering making bigger and fewer objects for my map. Much easier to make such as tollgates with a small shop at the side as 1 part instead of dividing it into 2 parts.. Easier to get them to fit in IMO! xD
The polycount of static objects is not that important. More important is the collision-mesh, which should have a maximum of 2000 polys each. The main problem that causes lags or slow-downs is that the game-engine can't handle high-poly meshes for calculating the decals (skid marks for example (correct me if I'm wrong))...so the game will start lagging if you are trying to brake. I've seen a lot of converted tracks having this problems...because they have no collision mesh...and the track itself has 300.000 polys. The ALienz-Track for example has one big mesh (~ 280.000) polys. If you disable the decals on this object, the performance is really good!
It depends on how many other objects you are going to have to render at the same time. you might make a super high poly building at the beginning of your map project and all seems well, but by the time you have finished adding all the other stuff your original building might be causing some lag. Its a tricky one to gauge. As long as you have made some lower detail versions for LOD's you should be ok as you can adjust how close you have to be to the model to see the full detail version. If you have lag make it so you have to be closer to see the high detail model. If you still have lag then you will have to reduce the poly count. There is also a big difference between using visible and collision meshes. I made a section of road that was about 8000 polys and it lagged when you skidded on it while it was set to visible mesh. The exact same model with the textures removed and set up as a collision mesh sorted the lag right out. I have had a road with 16000 polys without any lag using a collision mesh. The geometry can be a factor too. Some shapes lag more than others and it seems to be trial and error. I heard long collision triangles can cause lag, so if you have a massively long face in your model it might help to divide it up with some more geometry if lag is an issue. I tend to use visible mesh on really basic models only. Anything with 1000 or more polys I will normally use a collision mesh. Unless its something thin like a lamppost that needs to be bulked up in size to avoid failed collisions. I think any faces less than 300mm wide can fail to collide properly. Just some things to think about
