Models vs Brushes

[poLemin]

Hey guys!

 

Today I had a little discussion with a colleague of mine. He wants to create a CSGO map in order to be successful with it in one of the upcoming Operation packages. He asked me to show him some of the maps that were accepted before (he is NOT a CSGO mapper, but a very experienced Level Designer with Unity/3DSMax). He pointed out that most of them are very blocky and you can see brushes used instantly. His approach would be to create the whole level as a mix of numerous models instead of using brushes. Just like we do here at work with Unity. My question now, would that be a viable approach for the Source Engine? I never thought of NOT using brushes in CSGO maps.

 

Thx in advance

Cheers

[Z(Rus)]

if you have mean to make CSGO map without using a brushes, in some cases, this can be done without brushes, example - small map like a box with few barricades (sample fy_snow)
 
but if you want build something like DE_SEASON by Ted and FMPONE, game will be laggy, because brush structure responsible for optimizing the map, http://youtu.be/mIy0Usc8zXU?list=UUiKV_fEUKDc2IxTvTTQLegw

 

it work on all Quake(Q1/2/3/4, nexuiz,xonotic,warsow) and HL/CS(HL1/2,CS,CSS, and all games on source engine)

 

p.s. sorry for my english

[ics]

Regarding Source engine, it depends a lot from the game structure. For example no brushes strategy doesn't work with CSGO. Like Z(Rus) said, brushes are important thing in terms of cutting visibility so too much of the map doesn't draw out immediately. Other engines approach stuff like this differently but for Source, brushes are kind of important.

 

However, if you look Source at games such as L4D2, nearly every building (if not inside the bulding itself), nearly every level is made of displacements, models and func_detail brushes. In L4D2, Valve uses the fog as element to hide the models fade in and out distances and nearly the whole map is drawn out at once. Sure, there are some areas that cut visibility, for example skybox textures and areaportals but if you look at levels such as swamp fever and it's first map, there definitely isn't much of brushwork used that is solid in the map.

 

TL;DR: games like CSGO require brushwork to run great.

[Vilham]

You wouldn't. Source relies on brushes for nearly all optimization.

[poLemin]

Thanks for the quick answers guys!

[ElectroSheep]

Yeah brushes are esential for optimization (source use portalling) and also models lighting is baked into vertices (not good for big surface)

 

 

So you have to make the main architecture with brushes and fil it with models.

[Vaya]

I think it's due to rendering passes?

 

Edit - kind of right according to 3dnj

Edited October 15, 2014 by Vaya

[cashed]

If source had a mesh culling system it would be amazing.

 

You can build quite a bit with modular models and have the basic infrastructure as brushes.

 

Only downside is this can be expensive on custom assets.

[Pampers]

If source had a mesh culling system it would be amazing.

wut, cant be right, you have occluder brushes and stuff like that? years since I've used source now though

[Squad]

 

If source had a mesh culling system it would be amazing.

wut, cant be right, you have occluder brushes and stuff like that? years since I've used source now though

 

 

Func_occluders are performance-heavy though. Maps are not supposed to be filled with them, as it'll make them run only slower.

[Pampers]

but thats what a mesh culling system is

[cashed]

func_occ i assume is very old tech that hasn't been improved enough. Since most engines today have gone mesh based, the mesh culling you see has a much greater importance and has received much more love. 

[PogoP]

People still use brushes?   

[KoKo5oVaR]

People still use brushes?   

:fist: :fist: :fist: :fist: :fist: :fist: :fist: :fist: :fist: :fist: :fist: :fist: :fist: :fist: :fist: :fist: :fist: :fist:

[Deh0lise]

You could do a model based level as long as you place nodraw brushes behind meshes and use different optimization techniques. The problem has always been how models were lit, though with CSGO this shouldn't be a problem, at least in the outside areas.

 

Despite that, you wouldn't end up with a good optimization if you increase a lot the number of tris in the scene, point him to any source based game so he can see the standard. Anyway, optimization or gameplay doesn't seem to be that important for Valve when choosing a map though, so he could have an opportunity just based on the theme and custom content.