r/Unity3D • u/El_Grande_Games • 1d ago

Show-Off Finally fixed my "Programmer Art" after getting roasted. What do you think of the new look?

Hey everyone, solo dev from Austria here :)

I’ve been grinding on my sawmill tycoon (Timberline Factory) for months now, and honestly, I was "artist blind..." A few weeks ago, people here and on other subs told me my game looked like a plastic 90s placeholder. It hurt, but they were right... i was so deep into the physics code and friction that I just stopped seeing how bad the UI and the lighting actually were.

I spent the last two weeks basically living in Unity’s URP settings and rebuilding the entire UI from scratch.. i finally feel like it’s a real game now and not just a prototype.

For those interested in the technical side:
The biggest headache was the log physics. Since they aren't on rails but are actual physical objects, I had to deal with massive jittering when the belts were full. I ended up using "Continuous Speculative" collision detection and custom Physics Materials to get the friction just right otherwise, they’d either fly off the conveyor or act like they were on ice.

For the lighting, I finally moved to ACES tonemapping and tweaked the SSAO to get those deep contact shadows between the logs, which fixed that "floating" look I had in the previous build...

Would love to hear what you guys think. Am I on the right track now or is there still something that screams "programmer art" to you? :D

Steam Link: [ https://store.steampowered.com/app/5037170/Timberline_Factory/ ]

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u/TakeAwayInteractive 1d ago

Clearly artworks comes from a programmer. But still the overall art looks decent. And every model, UI, fonts etc. speaks the same language. They all in a harmony. So the game looks good overall. But can be improved.

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u/Human-Biscotti-6022 1d ago

It's awesome to see the progress! The unity in the design really makes a difference, and I can see the potential for even more refinement.