dim3 Forum

Okay well that thread title probably sounded weird. I can't really think of a better short way to phrase it.

This has been stuck in the back of my mind for a while, and I've been trying to figure out how its done.
How does an engine store and handle a set of dynamic shapes over a map? An example being fog of war. Now, say I can understand this on a simple level, say advance wars, where its all on a grid. But more advance, say in a modern RTS, what does it use? Is it a series of black gradiated shapes over the map that dissapear as directed? Thats the first method I can think of.
Another example is Super Mario sunshine.
If you don't know what it looks like...
Often in the game the level will get covered with paint. It can be of any shape, and objects will respond to its boundaries (for instance slipping on it, or in the screenshot, the guy who sank into it). The paint is dynamically added and deleted, all with very smooth edges.

So does anyone know how this type of thing works?

I think that Super Mario Sunshine uses some sort of custom liquid engine to calculate the behavior of the paint/the water and the characters interacting with it. Remember that the people who wrote the Super Mario Sunshine engine are experienced professionals and that the engine is specially designed for this game. You probably won't be able to do anything like this in Dim3 without changing the source code.

Yeah I know I can't really do it for dim3. I was just wondering on a technical level.