I am working on 3D basketball shooting game within this I need multiple player models, basketballs, basketball court and surround environment.
So I have hired a 3d model designer and he did all the work for me and I am satisfied with it but overall I am thinking like my game occupying more graphics resources because in iPhone multiple times I faced memory overflow kind of error too in Xcode.
I want to share details regarding my 3d models so I can get suggestions from your side.
Here I have shared basketball model material and its inspector values, total 3 textures with 2048x2048 resolution used for Base, Metalic and Normal map.
Same thing is true for all 3d models exist in the game like human player, environment etc…
In size some objects are smaller then also it has 3 textures applied with high 2k resolution.
Now I am confused on these points:
Do we need 3 textures for mobile games? specially metalic map texture
Which texture size remain proper for mobile game?
All game objects required multiple textures? for example, an object which don’t have more screen space or view within the camera.
Thank you for your given time to read this question, if you have some knowledge then you can share with me.
2048x2048 texture for a regular basket ball would be an overkill even for a PC game, I think. 512x512 is more reasonable for mobile game. Normal maps and any other additional textures aren’t necessary for such small objects - nobody will notice those minuscule lighting details on basket ball surface on a small phone screen anyway.
But it makes sense to use additional textures for larger objects that will take a lot of screen space. E.g., normal maps can be used to show plank pattern on basketball court floor.
Texture sizes for all other objects should depend on their real-world size relative to each other (bigger objects apparently should have larger textures).
Thank you sir for your valuable feedback
My side next question if you will reply for these then it will clear my mind more precisely.
Generally for mobile game, regular image and normal map will be enough? Because I have noticed that some of my 3d models contain up to 4 different type of textures, check my attached image.
Player’s socks has 4 textures applied, shall I required to keep 2 textures? Base Map and Normal Map
Or just Base Map texture will be enough considering player’s socks size, just all others are unnecessary.
Basically just look at it with and without. If you remove the normal map and it still looks about the same, then you don’t need it. If you remove the normal map and then it ruins the way the game looks, then use it.
Same with the texture sizes. You can easily change them with the import settings, so try lowering the texture size. if the texture still looks fine, then you can keep that lower size. If it suddenly looks too blurry then keep the larger size.
Also, some games use a lower texture size for normal maps than albedo maps because the lower res normal map is a often less noticeable than a low res albedo map.
All these things should be decided on a case-by-case basis. There’s no one rule for everything. Some visuals in your game are more important, some less important. Some textures look ok at lowres, some need to be hires to look good. Some surfaces might need normal maps to look good. Other surfaces it might not make a noticable difference.
I clearly understand what you are saying and thank you for making things even more clear
But you have not replied to my one question that I have asked in my previous post:
Generally for mobile game, regular image and normal map will be enough? Because I have noticed that some of my 3d models contain up to 4 different type of textures, check my attached above image. Player’s socks has 4 textures applied, shall I required to keep 2 textures maximum? Base Map and Normal Map.
