DD

UNREAL TECHNOLOGY! I'm guessing 2.5 hybrid or later. 3.0 ! SNAP. Cool shit. Edit: I'm wrong.

Yeah I noticed that when I tried to make a level some months ago... good thing the majority of farcry is outdoors. It also explains why my performance indoors in farcry was noticable worst. At least on my machine and I have a pretty kick ass rig. As far as I know Farcry uses OSP (oct-space-tree, very goo for outdoors/open indoors) or a form of + awesome lod + fog/distance cull + and I think more options for indoors (manual zoning). That's why it can easily go from outdoor to indoor and still cram lots of detail, no? Sandbox is an awesome editor, I wish I could bread lots of features from it, hammer, unrealed, and doom3 editor to form an uber editor. You can do this in hammer, unreal and many other games. I was doing this with hl1 mapping in the past, but after repeated experience I learned I was just producing lower quality/less optimized models by doing so. I still did/would export bsp from the editor just to get scale correct, but I learned to never use the bsp as a base for a model. In hammer, say I wanted to created a water tower then export to max to model it. I would need several brushes to create the different segments or else I would create invalid geometry. The same is true in doom 3 ed (lets say we aren't using any patch meshes). After importing into max you'll find all these needless faces on the backsides of brushes inside parts of the water tower, on boths sides of intersecting planes! Hope that makes sense, anyways that's a real pain to clean up. I think the max payne 2 editor has a feature semi-like what you want. You can select a group of brushes, do some conversion and automatically remove those faces, do some beveling/extruding and other simple stuff, and it will convert those brushes into a model. Then you can instance it all over the place. Even at the point most of the stuff I saw created looked like it needed artist modeling time. BSP or some form of it will always be useful. Especially in heavily indoor games. Outdoor games may use plain distance culls + or manual zoning (VERY TEDIOUS) and get away with it, but that only works in outdoor games. In heavily indoor games you want to cram as much detail as possible in a confined space. Some rooms may be long or just plain big and others small, lots of rooms need to zig zag close to each other, etc. Trying to occomplish a well performing game in that type of enviorment, and do it fast is just way harder and less efficient using modeling programs and no BSP like culling. The workflow, speed, efficency of dev teams using automatically generated nodes/zones for culling using BSP will totally blow away any competitor who thinks they can do the same using max and maybe + manual zoning or distance cull only. They just will not be able to match the detail and performance. Here's a great example: Compare an indoor area of Halo PC, performance and detail, to a game that was released on PC when HALO 1 XBOX was which uses BSP/OSP/the like. The term "BSP" many mappers use refers to in-editor built geometry. To me it means the method used for culling. BSP will not go away, nor will the use of it applied to editor built geometry. Also last I heard on unreal engine 3 was that it was switching back to additive "BSP". This to me implies that they realized it's importance and spent time improving it. And IMO the game epic plans to release using UE3 is NEXT-NEXT Gen.

Grayfox: Were you not banned for being obnoxious some months ago?

I don't think even the doom 3 style of level design will make it past the next-gen or next next-gen. BSP will always be around, you need giant flat planes for walls/halls almost everywhere and it's great for optimization/culling. It's great for core architecture, gameplay flow control. However all the fine details, columns, computers, wires, lights, power plugs, shelves with books, pens, phones, foliage, etc. Those need to be modeled, and regardless of how cool patch meshes are, they simply can't go there. If you could even get that much detail in, getting the UVW map right would be insane, and let us not forget ANIMATIONS. A pipe or railing or thick wiring is ok, and even terrain, but I think going anything beyond that is asking a way too much. Programs like max/maya/etc. have focused on this for years, and artists train on those programs for years. To build an editor with that power would take lots of dev time and training time when it’s really not needed. An all-control-level-designer-program might work in doom3 but comparatively to HL2/farcry/etc., doom 3 is very low detail and simply would not work in those games. Take an average room from doom 3, take away the normals, fog and steam effects, and make it full bright. Now compare it to the same thing in hl2 and that's what I mean. I guess comparing the look of the levels in the two editors would be perfect to explain. Doom 3 relies so much on these things, and although it’s a nice look, I don't think it will make it past these next-gen's. I just don't see an all-in-one editor even getting close to the level of detail next-gen games are hitting. Try to imagine the next doom game on Earth (if there) with the current engine. A mixture of outdoor and indoor areas, office buildings, homes, malls, military bases... Lots of artist time is going to be demanded or it really just won't match the level of detail that generation of games will be at. Unless the majority of the game takes place inside a giant metal military complex and the like, some people like that...

oh man, good stuff.

Clearly de_prodigy is awesome. I'm finding extreme trouble to get lighting to look good in hl2, but Macman taunts me! WHY!? REVEAL YOUR SECRATS! My theory: -light_spot (please give me some range values and settings!) -func_rotating set to additive and non-solid -prop_dynamic for fan model attached to func_rotating -env_glow for glow -env_sprite for little sparkles/dust My theory: -light_spot (please give me some range values and settings!) -prop_static or prop_detail for light, light texture set to unlit somehow -env_glow for glow -decal tool used + cool texture for wall lighting effect? My theory: -light_spot (please give me some range values and settings!) -prop_static, dynamic, or detail used for actual lamp model -env_glow for part of the glow effect -I have no idea how the long 3d glow was done... model? model + shader? Don't tell me it's just a func_illusionary or sprite, it looks way too cool and 3d and round.

He won, sorry. I didn't want him to win but he won, and it's not just because he disapproves of gays and supports Christians. What Michael Moore or SA told you was probably a lie. Even if that was the WHOLE reason, which it's not, if you have to play mind control on a bunch of Christians to assure your victory then that's what you do to win. The guy driving the tank is not a Nazi and he doesn't even come close to serving Hitler. They claim to have been going to a veterans day event, and probably were, but I bet the Soldiers thought it would be funny to scare the protestors. Don't forget, soldiers aren't machines, they're people who do dumb shit for a laugh. Who knows, but what matters is that we can't be sure so it doesn't matter, therefore this thread should be locked and demonstrate that the 1st ammendment means JACK SHIT on the interwabs.

No it's not. Look at the photos. Cell shaded is a unique look where there are solid colors with 1-3 different solid shades for shadows & highlights, no GRADIENTS, on top of the black edges from any angle. Did he actually get the black edges from any angle look? If so thats awesome, but I sitll see gradients which is why I said nay.

Looks good, not cell shaded as you claim but looks nice anyways.

http://www.steampowered.com/index.php?area=news http://steampowered.com/?area=map_contest Use mad teamwork skillz or something. Make the monies! FTW! Although count me out, I'm in crunch

The window texture doesn't match the scale of the window. That window is gigantic! The tons of detail looks great though. GJ sir.

I've got one now too! With Mario 64x4. Bestest handheld evr.

D: !

No he doesn't. I've met Brew. Cool you guys have a dog! Gearbox doesn't have one of those.

Zaph, do you know how the 3d volumetric light beam or halo stuff is put to use? Looks like some crazy shader. It looks amazingly better than a silly sprite.

I can't find one sold out everywhere

Just beat it, I thought it was fucking awesome. The graphics, animations, and tech really gave this game an A+ imo. Story and gameplay B. I think it lived up to the "hype", at least all the valid hype created from marketing and valve not the fan boy hype which is totally invalid anyway. Long story short, GIVE ME HL2 EXPANSION OR HL3 NOW! And wheres my TF2! Good job valve, take less than 5 years NEXT TIME.

I will have your babies now Zaff.

I think G-man is Waldo's cousin. Fkr is hard to spot. I've only noticed him twice but I know I should more. You forgot about the Nintendo:DS. BESTEST HANDHELD EVR!

A good friend of my mine 'n30g3n' works on this mod. He made that booth I believe.

OOOO EMM GEEE!11!! Dog was fucking awesome. I played fetch with AI! I hate valve for there animations working soo flawlessly. !! So jealous. Oh and the girls fighting over Freeman, GOOD STUFF. I'm at Raven port myself, cool stuff. Boat ride awesome, I kicked heli ass. I give Fletch at 10/10 for being WRONG. YOUR OPINION IS WRONG!

[iNSERT]MASTURBATION JOKE[/iNSERT]

How did you export that tank to SMD? Is there a secret max -> hl2 smd exporter going around? GIVE ME if so, plz.

Does anyone know where some good tutorials are on the basics of displacement maps? I figured out how to create them, and sort of paint the heights. But it sucks! I can't find out how to paint multiple layers of terrain on a DM. I can't figure out how to view the terrain in wireframe, editing terrain in textured view sucks! Sometimes I manage to alter the angle of the height paint tool. So it pushes at an odd angle. Zaphy? Also, how to make glass? I tried func_breakable but my brush keeps reseting to brush. !

Who saw it? I thought it was great. The best part about the movie are the songs, try downloading the album from suprnova or something. I give it 4 out of 5 D's. http://www.apple.com/trailers/paramount/team_america/