by Spike » Tue May 20, 2014 6:54 pm
stencil shadows cannot cast through alpha-tested surfaces. either the _volume_ is shadowed, or it isn't. you'd need to generate geometry for the holes, which would be expensive. its not a case of whether the grates were intended to cast shadows or not, the engine was basically incapable of doing it.
the stuff with the dude looks like the new engine no longer supports whatever no-self-shadow flag doom3 had. stencil buffer or shadowmap, the algorithm should basically be the same (generate ss shadows, draw nss surfaces, add nss shadows, draw ss surfaces. hurrah for updaing 12 sides of a cubemap...).
so that part should at least be fixable.
grates/alpha-tested surfaces casting shadows will make an already-dark game even darker. might need to be restricted to custom/adapted content. I guess it depends how many other lights there are.
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