WIP in WIP, post your level screenshots!

Quote from rockdude86

It's so... smooth.

Just turned down the lightmapscale. Its a simple way of adding lots of interesting detail to an otherwise bland area.

Mmm... I'd always thought that degraded performance too much. I guess I'll fiddle around a bit.Ooo, to make up for that, would you scale up the lightmaps in places that are not going to be lit? Would that help at all?

Lower lightmapscale will add time to vrad during compile, so only use it on the surfaces where you know you will get some really neato shadows.

Scaling up lightmapscale won't really do much, since the default of 16 is already pretty high.

isnt it about lightmaps being low that gives you more quality :wink:

Isn't that what I'm saying?

See my last post for how it affects performance:)

You should increase the lightmap scale for some areas though, and definitely for water. Set it to something ridiculously high, like 8192, as although the look of the water isn't affected by the scale, it shaves (for me at least) minutes off RAD.

So the water doesn't use lightmaps at all then? Seems odd that if that is the case the compiler bothers to calculate them for water surfaces

I've seen too much confusion over the whole increase/decrease lightmap scale thing because some people are referring to the resolution and others refer to the scale. When people say make a higher resolution lightmap they mean you decrease the lightmap scale, and vice versa.

that was my point exactly with wat insta said, just fucking around :wink: (dutch humor )

seems those kind of things get people confused. english is confusing sometimes...

(edit) that water/lightmap thing is pretty weird indeed... maybe something to ask valve? i bet its just a stupid bug they didnt bother to remove because of them jumping on their schedules n shit

It's not just a VRAD problem, it affects performance in-game.

Look at the wireframe screenshots part way down in this thread:

http://%7boption%7d

i really dont know about this but could you make a screen with the example you mentioned but then with the water?? cause i really doubt its the same thing. but if so shame on valve...

I was under the impression that the lightmap is projected against the actual face. So increasing the resolution/decreasing scale would simply create a larger file size to cache in memory. Meaning that if you dramaticaly increase the resolution you could get some memory hit. I dont know why they'd break up the faces for a VIS like process.

However I do agree with someone who posted at the wiki site about the crispness of shadows. Increasing the resolution improperly could cause major artifacts in the level in my opinion. If one wall has really dark shadows and you decreased the scale so that the shadows are crisp, but other shadows in the same room or even the level are really blurry then you could break continuity. I personaly would notice the difference and call you on it. What alex did was correct in increasing the lightmaps on a wall the needed them and therefor was able to keep continuity while increasing detail on an otherwise bland wall.

There is probably a maximum size of the lightmaps - eg. 128x128 luxels - and so when a face of too large a size for one lightmap to fit is made, then the surface is tesselated into smaller faces - one per lightmap. I've no idea if that is correct by the way, just one of the likely reasons as far as I can tell.

but would that increase the actual geometry or simply create more lightmaps?

Maybe the way their rendering system works it has to have a face per lightmap, I don't really know.

yeah thats true *or atleast it seems logical to me* but its not the way vice versa luckily :wink: source engine lighting is just plain oldschool with some nice new effects...

Ok, this map just made it to alpha, I'm not gonna release it until it's beta, but I need input, so PM me and we can take the links and so there. I already have a few people that have tested this map and gave me some good pointers and so, but more are always welcome!

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quake 3 BOOOO

Looks ok, kinda blocky if you ask me.

The 3rd last screen looks really cool with the archways and destruction. Also the lighting in that area seems much better then others.

I've seen better from you.

Then again maybe your shooting for that style. An In-game Play test is what it needs in my opinion.

This map was made with the intent to play good, hold a high framerate and look unique in someway, the skybox and overall style is kinda unique for Q3 I think.

But as you said, I have done graphicly better things.

Edit: I'm working on getting some unique graphical ideas out with good gameplay for Q3, I have another pretty cool idea in the works. But It must play good, else I won't do it. I'm saving my graphical skills when I make an engine killer for Q4 later. I have gotten my level design job, I don't need to work on my port as much, and I don't have the same time now, I need to prior what I do. However, it's very inspiering working with this, so I get alot of good ideas at work, that I can't apply there, since we don't make "DM" games and probably never will either.

Needs more shadows and warmer light. Furthermore I think the map looks very playable but not something I'd be attracted to play, somehow. Can't really tell why, but I think it's the lightning.

I love your skyboxes tho! And from you I'd also expect better things, but hey, these are only screenshots so what do I know, right?

Nice progress hip! I dig it.

Quote from BlueCoatKarma

It's not just a VRAD problem, it affects performance in-game.Look at the wireframe screenshots part way down in this thread:

http://%7boption%7d

Does that have anything to do with texture scale?

Quote from Dark

quake 3 BOOOO

Quake 3

It looks very nice to me, though some of the textures are a tad streched. and it is a little blocky, but since you're focusing on gameplay that's fine. I like the feeling you've made though. Unusual for a Q3 map.

Yaaaaay. A FarCry map. Decided to pick up Sandbox again yesterday and almost finished with this today. I know it looks like just about every other FC map in existance, but it's the first time I've made a FC map I'm actually proud of, so boo.

No gamma adjustment.

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FarCry, CryTek, CryEngine... and those aaaaawesome waves in FC:Instincts Predator

gotta love those colors!