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Reuben Pearse · (This post was last modified: 2011-10-04, 6:22 by Chris Dee.)

Lego Universe is now available as a free download.

http://universe.lego.com

I had some fun playing this with my kids this week :-)
Some of the control panels in the game are quite similar to the GUI in Lego Digital Designer

It has it's own 3D rendering engine. From reading around it looks like it's based on GameBryo???

I'm wondering if it maybe another possible source of LDraw parts e.g.
- extract 3D models information from Lego Universe client install files
- use something like 3DVIA Printscreen to capture the 3D information whilst the game is running

Bye for now

Reuben
[email protected]
=====================================
Download 3D Lego models and other resources from:
http://www.pearse.co.uk/lego
=====================================

Rolf Osterthun · 2011-09-15, 19:02

Hey Reuben,

Lego Universe is not running on my system Sad

; but the games from TtGames are. And there are many new - but I think mostly custom - parts. E.g. the head of Boss Nass or the head of a Bith or an Ithorian (all Star Wars).

Here is a sample of raw data that might be usefull for an official part:
Minifig Head Top, SW Bib Fortuna: 44363.dat.

Rolf

Reuben Pearse · 2011-09-19, 21:05

Hi Rolf,

You're right - Lego Universe requires relatively high spec graphics capabilities.

Thanks for posting the SW Bib Fortuna head part. I previewed this in MLCad and it looks good. What process did you use to obtain the raw data and convert to a DAT file?

Can some other authors take a look at this part to validate/certify as I'm not sure what the next steps would be to make this an unofficial/official part. Thanks

Here's the Peeron link for the part that Rolf is referring to:
http://www.peeron.com/inv/parts/x578

Reuben

Rolf Osterthun · 2011-09-20, 12:38

Hey Reuben,

as you have mentioned yourself, there are two ways to get the raw data:

Quote:- extract 3D models information from [Lego Universe client] install files
- use something like 3DVIA Printscreen to capture the 3D information whilst the game is running

The meshes are either composed of triangle-stripes or of simple triangles. A triangle is composed of three vertices and each vertex has a normal. Some vertices are defined multiple times but with different normals. I wrote a program that use this informations to generate the lines and optional lines between the triangles.

If there are two triangles next to each other, they have two common vertices (red). If these vertices have the same normals, you can generate an optional line (blue) between them. For the control points you can use each third (not common) vertex of the triangles (green line).

[Image: olineSample1.png]

If the normals of the common vertices differ, you can generate a normal line (blue) between them.

[Image: lineSample1.png]

I hope this is understandable. The algorithm does not look for quads and if there are planar adjacent triangles there is even so an optional line between them.

Rolf

Reuben Pearse · 2011-09-20, 20:18

Thanks for the info. I'm curious as to where you find the mesh information - directly in the game files, or did you use a tool like 3DVia Printscreen?

One tool I've looked at before is Watto Studio Game Extractor - this allows you to investigate and extract 3D models from games files. The latest list of supported games includes the following Lego titles:
Lego Bionicle Heroes
Lego Digital Designer
Lego Loco
Lego Racers
Lego Rock Raiders
Lego Star Wars 2

more info here:
http://www.watto.org/extract/games.html

Cheers

Reuben

Stan Isachenko · 2011-09-20, 20:25

Reuben, Can you share with us this program?

Rolf Osterthun · 2011-09-20, 21:00

Hey,

you are welcome. The Game Extractor came across my way, too. Long time ago... Wink

I have written some tools that can extract information directly from the game files. I have access to all games that were released after Lego Star Wars (included) except for Lego Indiana Jones 2, since I do not own it.

I also tried 3DVia Printscreen on Lego Star Wars 2 with success; but only inside the cantina.

Rolf

Reuben Pearse · 2011-09-21, 7:25

Are you able to share the tools that you've written? I'm sure others would find them useful.

I would be happy to make them available on my website - I'm already hosting download areas for a number of other LDraw related tools (Nils Schmidt's LDraw Pattern Creator and Rolf Redford's LdrDat2DXF andLdrDat2Obj tools). See the following links for details:

http://www.pearse.co.uk/lego/links/ldrawpatterncreator
http://www.pearse.co.uk/lego/links/ldrdat2dxf

Perhaps you could email the programs to me - [email protected]

Cheers

Reuben

Rolf Osterthun · 2011-09-21, 10:26

Hey,

I am sorry, but it is not that easy. The files are stored in archives which needs to be extracted first. Almost each game has an individual format to store the meshes. Inside the graphic files there are often different quality layers for one part and there are often more parts in one file. Etc.

My tools just help me to extract the vertices and triangle information, and the textures. I have (almost) one tool for each format and they are not userfriendly or in a shareable state (at least not yet).

The results of the tools are good but needs to be filtered, joined, rotated, scaled and so on. If there is a parts author, who needs some raw data to start with, to create a part for the parts tracker, I am willing to share.

I would like to share some custom (raw) parts. But I have no idea how to name the files. There are no numbers available Wink

.

By the way: Are parts or models form the games official parts or official models?

Rolf

**Chris Dee** · 2011-09-22, 9:30

Maybe this might be of use - http://aluigi.altervista.org/papers/bms/ttgames.bms . I have no experience of it myself.

Chris

Rolf Osterthun · 2011-09-27, 7:47

Hey,

here comes the first custom part. It is not finished but shareable. It is the helmet of the senate guards.

I have no idea how to name the file nor how the header for a custom part should look like.
Maybe there should be something like:

Code:
0 !LDRAW_ORG Custom_Part

But is this part really custom? It is designed by LEGO but does not exist in real.

Rolf

Rolf Osterthun · 2011-09-30, 10:13

Next:

This one may be interesting for the parts tracker, too. The red areas needs to be reworked.

Rolf

Reuben Pearse · 2011-09-30, 19:46

I tried loading your parts into MLCAD, but it's saying that it can't find stud16.dat
I guess I need to update my LDraw parts library :-)

Is this file available as an individual download?

Reuben

Rolf Osterthun · 2011-10-02, 9:30

Reuben Pearse Wrote:Is this file available as an individual download?

Hey Reuben,

if you mean stud16.dat, yes:

stud16.dat

Rolf

James Wadsworth · 2011-10-03, 21:20

I get an error message saying that "stu216.dat" can't be found. I just took that file you posted, renamed it to stu216.dat and all seems to be fine. Great piece, thanks.

**Chris Dee** · 2011-10-04, 6:22

You should really instal both stud16.dat and stu216.dat. The latter is a low-res version used by renderers that have a fast-draw capability. MLCad checks this.

Or better still install the complete up-to-date official parts library from here.

Chris

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