Old mappers, new game?

icemann said:One of the more annoying but useful things in newer engine games is the use of links. Links are used from one object or marker to another to do a specific action which may be anything from switching on a light, telling a AI (enemies, npc etc) where to patrol to, or even in determining what the player would find on a corpse. [/B]

System Shock2, I found to be considerably harder to edit than the Quake series of games (of which Doom3's engine resembles in terms of mapping principles). As for the links, they aren't wildly dissimilar to Doom's tag system really, and shouldn't be too hard to ajdust to, for anyone. What is more likely to be complicated, is the functions which requires the links between objects to be made.

Agreed totally. System Shock 2 was the hardest game to make levels for, out the games I`ve attempted to do levels for (Duke3D, Doom, Unreal, Quake).

Took me 6-8 months to do my FM (fan mission) Ancient for SS2 (one of the only two FMs released for System Shock 2 so far since SS2s release in 1999 IIRC), which in itself was based off a Doom2 level I had done and released here many years previous to that. Even today I still go back to it, and add some little details to make it look more life-like.

Anyone interested in the FM can grab it here from sshock2.com which comes complete with the original Doom2 version: http://www.sshock2.com/shocked/Missions.asp

Heh, thanks for that. I'll definitely try it out - it's disappointing how few fan missions there is for System Shock 2. From trying the editor out though, I'm hardly surprised. Now all I need is to get SS2 working again on this damn computer.

Shaviro said:

I certainly will. I'm already mapping for Q3, so D3 should be a natural step for me.
Shot of an in-progress map
Another
Yet another

Dude, I'm convinced that your Doom 3 maps are gonna kick so much butt - you can count on me to download and beta test any Doom 3 map(or at least, most of 'em) you'll make.

I'll definitely try out the editor, but actually making finished maps, though, is a different story. All depends on how hooked I get on the editor.
I've tried making a map for classic Doom once and it all went nice and good - almost got me hooked on mapping for Doom. Unfortunately, the moment I started messing around with more "complex" elements (making a staircase leading down to a door, teleporter traps, etc.) the map gradually started falling to pieces and I eventually got fed up with that map.

I'm not intimidated by the complexity and the time it will take to make a Doom 3 map - Hell, most awesome classic Doom maps out there take months to do (I can tell, 'cause I beta tested some of Spike's Underworld maps and watched them progress slowly), but if the editor starts giving me all kinds of annoying shit and if there isn't a decent tutorial to give me the hang of the important functions, it could become an issue.
I tried fucking a bit around with a Q3 editor and all the tutorial taught me was how to do a simple, box-shaped room and a light source. It didn't tell me how the fuck you do something a little more interesting and it didn't tell me how to place powerups (and actually making them freakin' appear in the damn map!). Let's do a bit better next time, huh.

icemann said:
...
Levels for doom 1 or 2 could be done in a day, where as it would take you that same amount of time in newer games to make one room, or possibly even longer for that one room to be finished.

In newer engines, detail and lighting are so much more important than in older ones due to the quality of graphics + believability. By that I mean in making a room or area realistic looking.

...

Yes, of course you can make a doom map in less than a day. But that will be a very small or very blunt map, unless you use lots of 'prefabricated constructs' that you can draw very quickly (One of my favorites was a decent looking ceiling light I could draw in like ten seconds in DCK).

Content creation for next-gen fps games will be more time-consuming because of all the detail and high resolutions. It will be very hard for more advanced mod teams to create new static meshes and models; something that requires you to be very skilled if you want to get anywhere near id's models. There are huge amounts of data that make all the dramatic visuals possible, and that's why the game is being delayed according to id itself.

The fun thing is, though, that we probably will have id's assets to play around with when the game ships, so there will be a huge palette of models and data to populate levels with, just like the original Doom 2. The difference is that the level design will be more like puzzling together various prefabricated pieces and scripting the level progress. It probably isn't the freehand CSG drawing like in worldcraft or the vertex / linedef drawing in Doom 2.

I still think it will be possible to make some good levels, even though the learning curve will be steep at first.

I will definately try this difficult art someday. The map (for sure) won't get ever finished, and so I'll get back to Doom editing. The same thing was with all three Quakes...

Hopefully the editor used for D3 will be something like Q3Radiant, so there will be less of a learning curve for me, but it will still be an extremely long process compared to Doom1/2 editing.

The biggest is becoming too disgruntled when the map just isn't turning out the way I want and so I just push it aside and it gets forgotten. I'll give it a shot anyways, though.

q3radiant was not all that good IMO

I thought Q3Radiant was pretty damn good actually.

It didn't come with any comprehensive tutorials and only a small FAQ, which may have hindered you.

Shtbag667 said:

Hopefully the editor used for D3 will be something like Q3Radiant, so there will be less of a learning curve for me, but it will still be an extremely long process compared to Doom1/2 editing.

The biggest is becoming too disgruntled when the map just isn't turning out the way I want and so I just push it aside and it gets forgotten. I'll give it a shot anyways, though.

D3 features a modified version of Q3Radiant.

Yeah I'll defenitely be editing Doom3. As Shaviro said. I'm already editing with the Q3 engine (RTCW) so it's anatraul step. I dunno what people are talking about though. I find it easier to edit Quake than Doom. The editing itself that is. then there's a bunch of other stuff you need to know for it to work. Like figuring out how the hell you compile the AI of the map. (Kurtis have problems with his maps, he compiled it and all but it won't run in the game as long as the AI file is present)

as for my RTCW editing:
http://darch-angel.com/newcon/shot0004.jpg
unfortunately that's all I have to show atm.. (not even the latest and best looking version of that map) as I've lost the resources to that project. And is working on a new map.

Shaviro. Awesome work.

IMO GTK Radiant was the best Quake/whatnot editor I've used. Worldcraft aint all it's cracked up to be ..