kuhlka

The editor used to crash a ton, but at this point it is fairly stable as long as I am not clicking away when an autosave kicks on. Saving often in multiple revisions helps as well. Thanks for the notes. I'm gradually tweaking the lighting, mesh detail, and BSP textures as I have time to finish out the map. I know the texture set and modular layout is a large part of why areas look very similar. I wanted to grind out the gameplay and cover first before going in and doing the final visual wash. I might try to destroy part of the cathedral in a later version of the map, but getting the crash-prone terrain to work and finding creative ways to use the meshes to get the look I want are the big hurdles. Is there something special you have to do to prevent terrain from permanently corrupting the level? I've tried to use terrain twice now and both times it somehow corrupted my map so I get a crash every time I load. Luckily, I had a recent revision I could go back to. Btw, Hourences' tutorials are a great resource along with icecreamyou.com. Those two sites alone helped me jumpstart my work in UE3. Having some UE2k4 xp helped a bit too.

I worked today for around 8 hours updating to a new version of the map downloadable here; http://www.budokhan.net/maps/gears/SP_d ... erbeta.zip Here are some screens to show the new lighting and modified entrance and side path cover.

Thanks for the tips. I've got some really bright directional lights trying to reflect the skybox, but I think I need to tweak my postprocessing (as you mentioned) and crank up the lights. I think my ambient is too bright and its made me go lazy on the lighting. My next steps are more detail meshes/decals, another cover pass, and then final lighting. I'll work on it a bit tonight and this coming week.

Good feedback so far. I think I'll look at the entire map on the lighting side and add some more meshes and detail over the weekend. I'll hopefully have some screens to post up next week. I know I just posted this up, but has anyone had a chance to play through it?

What would you suggest for the lighting? I can tweak the post-processing volume to tweak the overall color away from brown, adjust the ambient lighting or remove it completely to make dark areas darker, or tweak individual lights and add accent lights to put in a little more variety in the color of lights.

Here is a semi-polished beta version of my map. Any comments and critique would be greatly appreciated. I worked for 2 months learning the engine (previous 2k4 experience) and figured I'd dive into KISMET. I've got a lot more finish detail to go to make this a 'shippable' quality map, but I think I got the main gameplay down as well as a little story. Download the map here, including instructions for installation; http://www.budokhan.net/maps/gears/duckncover.zip Here are a few screenshots;