Huge / complex house interior. How to approach?

Unity Engine
1

Hello everyone,
I’m not sure I am in the right forum, but I’ll try anyway. If I’m not, I suppose an admin can relocate my post.

I am currently developing a game that takes place in a pretty big 3 story house with around 40-50 rooms, staircases, furniture, etc. I already have my (empty) house modeled in 3ds max, but I have not applied any materials yet because I don’t know exactly how I will proceed.

I suppose I should isolate each wall into a separate mesh so I can apply materials easily and individually. Should I:

  • keep everything in the same 3ds model and export/import everything at once (and hope everything stays in place)?
  • export wall by wall and import them all in unity and try to place them in the right spot?
  • recreate everything in unity using planes or boxes (I hope not)?

I am open to any suggestion. I really don’t know how to approach this situation. I am hoping to take advantage of Unity’s occlusion culling, so I think there are special considerations to think about. Is there?

How would you export/import the house from 3ds to Unity?

Thanks a lot

2

Hey ThunderMusic,

How you approach this is going to depend on the platform you are developing on. For instance, if you are developing for PC, they will generally be able to handle a lot more than a mobile device, therefore making the house all one object would not be an issue. If you are designing for mobile however, it will be optimal to hide portions of the house that aren’t visible, which I believe works with distinct objects.