Demo Script - TimeWalkOrg/Manhattan GitHub Wiki

A list of demo-ready features in TimeWalk

  • Press "H" to bring up Help Menu
  • Press "T" to see destination time periods
  • 1609: fly by Half Moon (ship sounds, dolphins following boat, seagulls flying out to visit it)
  • 1609: land by seashell midden on south shore, walk through woods to Bowling Green (deer and bear in woods, forest sounds)
  • 1609: fly up to Collect Pond area, walk through Lenape settlement (fireplace sounds, deer grazing across creek)
  • 1664: fly to harbor, land on pier (British ships approaching from south, harbor sounds, seagulls, chickens)
  • 1664: fly by Fort Amsterdam, visit windmill, past Bowling Green up Broadway to the Wall (market sounds at Bowling Green, birds in fields, country sounds)
  • 1776: visit Bowling Green, Wall Street, St. Paul's Chapel, Alexander Hamilton

Orientation email

  • The TimeWalk "Manhattan" project recreates Manhattan through time. 
  • The project recreates historically-accurate terrain, buildings, foliage, sounds, NPCs, weather, time of day, seasons, and events (animations)

In the last 10 months, we have built out these 4 time periods:

  • 1609 (when Henry Hudson arrived)
  • 1664 (Dutch New Amsterdam on the eve of the British take-over)
  • 1776 ( Revolutionary war, Great Fire)
  • 12,000 BC (an aerial overview of the Laurentide Ice Sheet)

See also my TimeWalk overview video from last October.  I'll be updating it soon. Project is in UE 5.3 (haven't updating to 5.4 soon)

  • Open the project and press the Run button

Controls:

  • Press "T" to see Time Travel destinations
  • Choose "1664 New Amsterdam" to start. 
  • Each level (time period) will take 10+ minutes to load (it has to build many local files the first time it loads) WASD keys to move, E for Up, C for down, scroll mouse wheel to accelerate/decelerate
  • "H" for Help menu

In the 1660 level, things to try:

  • Fly around the map:
  1. visit "Wall" at north end of town,
  2. fly south of the Battery and see the 4 British frigates sailing in to surround the city
  3. visit the woods (location-based sound effects of wolves, birds, etc.)
  • "L" key to toggle labels and "ghost" buildings (e.g. Brooklyn Bridge, Empire State Building)
  • "F" key to switch to 3rd person view (with a "colonist" avatar) Walk around the harbor in 1660 (visit Peter Stuyvesant standing by the shore watching the British ships approach)
  • Change the time of day (press "N" to add 4 hours, or -/+ to change minutes)
  • Change the season (press "[" or "]" keys) — sounds and foliage change
  • "M" to bring up reference maps, then </> to change maps.  Need to be up in the air to see these though!
  • "K" to see info on specific buildings (and eventually collect editorial notes from historians who visit TimeWalk)

Performance Notes:

  • It's large (over 100GB), and requires a high-end gaming rig to run fast
  • It does run at 30 fps on my gaming rig (with 96GB RAM, i9 24 core 3.0GHz CPU, Nvidia 4090 card)
  • We haven't optimized the project for loading or performance (or size) yet.  Was planning to do that when we've completed the 1660 level (gardens, etc.)
  • Haven't done a build for any VR headset lately.  Did have earlier version of 1660 level running on my Meta Quest 3 (at low frame rate)
  • Can't build an exe currently.  Fixing that in the next week.  Just run in the editor to check things out.  You can keep up with our bug fixes by pulling the latest copy of "main"
  • 1776 level is still in progress.  It has 2500 procedurally-generated buildings. Working on accuracy, combat FX.