HL2 Map Design Question: Brush or Mesh?

[zaphod]

well there is kind of something similar. There is an entity you can use to convert regular props to physics props, but as far as I know there is no was to turn it back into a static prop.

[Minos]

nice info zappy, thanks

[TomWithTheWeather]

I agree but that's beside my point. In the end you insulted BSP, so I insulted Unreal.

Huh? Because I mearly stated an accurate prediction about the future of predominately BSP/brush based game design, you thought I was trying to slam HL or Quake? I never even mentioned one or the other, or even thought about Unreal for that matter. O_o

Unreal doesn't not have partions or generate partions to decide what to cull automatically. You have to manually zone everything which usually results in different partitions.

Unreal culls on the node level based on how the level designer has zoned the map. Zoning is a method Unreal uses to make sure entire rooms/areas are culled at a time. The only disadvantage Unreal has compared to Quake or HL, is that it's BSP cuts can be a little messier, but it really doesn't matter seeing as how all you're going to do with it is make the basic shell of a room and then populate it with meshes. You don't have to worry about perfect BSP polys with Unreal like you do in Quake or HL. As long as you don't have any HOM's and don't try to create spheres with it, you good to go.

If you want to see it in action, load up UT2004/03 and any indoor map and open the console and type "rmode 1" for wireframe view, then type "show staticmeshes" to turn them off, then move around and watch how the nodes cull. :wink:

If you ever do a .t3d export of an Unreal map and open it up in notepad, you'll see that there is no BSP tree in that file, even though the brush dimensions and locations are there. Then, when you import that .t3d file into an empty workspace in UnrealEd, your brushes show up in wireframe view mode but not in 3D mode. You don't see that BSP tree because it doesn't get exported with all the rest of the map data because you'll have to do a fresh compile after you import anyway.

Not many people know the theory behind BSP and it doesn't make you any less talented or more.

I understand the theory. :!:

On another topic, nice info Zaphod. Gee, look at all those meshes. :wink:

[Taylor]

Surely you can make the clientside physics objects similar on all machines, even if there's randomisation to the fall, all you need to do it make sure all clients have the same seed. It's never going to be perfect unless it sends some information over but... meh. There's not really a lot of place for clientside ones as players like shitting about with scenery anyway, I was playing Doom yesturday and thought it was great punting cans down the hallway with my fists of fury, if I just looked like I was punching air that'd be totally crappy!

Oh, and even id, master of the BSP, define their own visportals now.

[insta]

I'm guessing you define visportals in Source as well.

When the dev-tools were left in the CS:Source beta, you could use different commands to show things that can help during development of maps. One of these were to show portals, which looked like they were placed by the mapper (in doors and such)

Ofcourse, I could be completely wrong and stupid.

[Pericolos0]

so in what category does terrain go?

[Dranore]

I think for terrain it depends on the scale. You can deform flat plains to make terrain or you can make make a mesh of more notable bits of terrain. You can do it either way. Clearly I don't know which way is *best*, but I've seen people do both. Doing it with deformation is alot more accessible to the average mapper though as it doesn't require modeling the terrain.

-Dranore

[zaphod]

No, Hl2 uses exactly the same process as hl1 and quake 1 did for vis. The only difference is that you can create entities called area portals which you can turn on and off and fade in and out to manually close off portals. For instance you can have a door block vis when it is closed by putting an area portal inside of it that is linked to open and close with the door, or have a window that only opens up to viz when you get close enough for the portal inside of it to fade out.

Terrain, or displacement meshes start out life as a normal brush. Once you select one or more faces of the brush you can turn it into a displacement mesh, choosing from a number of preset resolutions. You put a bunch terrain pieces together, with the edges of them them lining up perfectly, and then you can "sew" them together, and use a tool to lower/raise smooth/add noise. Terrain is pretty cheap, probably just a little more expensive than world geometry. It still however adds to your wpoly count, and adheres to the same rules regarding performance.

[Tequila]

Thanks for the heads-up Zaph, great details on Source's inner-workings.

[Dranore]

Just so I know for when the SDK hits... what is the name of the entity that turns static props into physics props?

-Dranore

[zaphod]

phys_convert

[this is the clown]

Thanks for taking some time out Zaphod, to write up some info for us mapcore folk on level editing for source. :wink:

[Dranore]

Yes. Uberdank indeed. Best mapping question response evar.

-Dranore

[KungFuSquirrel]

Cool explanation, Zaphod. Looks like a solid enough system.

Question, though, is there much use for displacement mapping outside of terrain applications? Or is there any sort of comparison to Q3/D3's patch meshes? The patch meshes give a level of control that it would take another piece of software to do in any other engine. When you do need a model, one plugin for Lightwave and you can export to the modeler and bring the model in-game with 2 clicks. Personally, I think combining the patch meshes with models gives you the most control possible over your raw geometry and it keeps pretty much all of it in the hands of a designer in the editor, though most of us can and do build our own models from time to time.

That's another question for you Unreal/Source lackeys - how many of you do your own prop models and how many have the art team do them for you? If you do build them, do you guys texture them as well?

[DD]

We almost never do them ourselves. We can, but it's probably best not since we need to focus on other things.