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Halfblind

[Idea] Doom Editing Academy

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21 hours ago, alowe said:

I don't design all corridors to be cramped for sure, but when I do, it's not bad design but done on purpose.

"Bad design" and "on purpose" are not mutually exclusive concepts. That said, 

 

On 2/20/2018 at 8:53 AM, Fonze said:

all rules can be broken, especially in an art such as this is,

 

Following directions doesn't kill originality in the long term, especially in art as rules are only actually guidelines for success, but while one is still freshly learning something, and yes, even an art form, it is best to follow the directions to learn the foundations as quickly and completely as possible. Does it kill creativity in musicians to learn scales? Or in artists to learn about lightly drawing those circle/oval things they erase later in order to establish proportions? Foundations are generally boring to practice and will always be subtlely shaped by what style is "in" at the time, but the foundations and rules they follow are important to learn for perspective. Once one knows what they're doing, break rules to appeal to emotion or present a particular tone, same as in writing. Even the basic common sense rules of chess can be broken to an advantage, such as a "bad" trade for better position.

 

Still, as you said, some people will assume that rules will break or inhibit their creativity (because they fail to realize the forest for the trees; ) so no guide will ever be good enough as we all draw lines in the sand in different places. But rules don't inhibit creativity, creativity works within any confines and eventually seeks to break free on its own.

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To say my piece, while I agree with Fonze's idea in most cases, I believe Doom mapping can start in the more complex formats. The keys to success here are vision, patience, and most important, practice and playtesting.

 

If a mapper wants to learn zdoom formatting first, I say they should have free reign. However, they should learn the fundamentals of the zdoom format, alongside the basic fundamentals of mapping. Let's be honest here: asides from different features (and slightly altered gameplay), there is not much difference between boom, zdoom, and even udmf, when it comes to the most basic rules.

 

A poorly textured map in boom will look just the same in zdoom, as well as limit-removing. A map that is just squares will play essentially the same in any format, even if things like zdoom can add scripting. Thus, every format shares fundamentals in designing maps. Learning those basic fundamentals is the key here.

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Re: the original OP, I think this is a genuinely great idea.  I'd be happy to contribute, possibly around some of the more advanced UDMF/GZDoom features (as that's what I've been digging into a lot recently).

 

Topics I'd be happy to cover:

  • Inserting 3D models
  • Linedef portals
  • Dynamic lights
  • Shadowmaps
  • Moving actors on NURB splines

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3 hours ago, Bauul said:

Re: the original OP, I think this is a genuinely great idea.  I'd be happy to contribute, possibly around some of the more advanced UDMF/GZDoom features (as that's what I've been digging into a lot recently).

 

Topics I'd be happy to cover:

  • Inserting 3D models
  • Linedef portals
  • Dynamic lights
  • Shadowmaps
  • Moving actors on NURB splines

Concerning items 1 and 5, there has been quite a bit of interest recently being able to include models and how to texture them properly. If you would make those tutorials first, that would help a lot of mappers, including myself.

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7 hours ago, Fonze said:

"Bad design" and "on purpose" are not mutually exclusive concepts. That said, 

 

Following directions doesn't kill originality in the long term...

I think it's just a learning style, like a lifestyle, there is no one method that is right for everyone. I prefer to be self taught and have been doing so for years. Programming. Digital manipulation. Writing music. Writing fantasy novels. Calligraphy. And soon property development. In every case I actually avoid outside influence. With Doom level editing I broke my own rules a little and did some reading up first to get over the initial learning hump. Only 1 day of reading then everything for a year since has been self taught. For me, that is the journey. Most objectives are just a psychological trick to induce travel.

8 hours ago, Nine Inch Heels said:

A lot of that stuff already exists on YouTube, or can be found as a comprehensive guide or writeup either here or over on realm 667 and whatnot, which makes it such that people can digest the information at their own pace. In general I think writeups are better suited than videos, because people don't stumble across language barriers as much. It's really not unheard of that people have issues understanding spoken english, doubly so if the mic may be crap, or there's some sort of accent involved.

I think there is a risk this project idea could get lost in discussion. It might be better for the OP to just start it and see where it goes. No important decision was ever made by committee.

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32 minutes ago, alowe said:

I think there is a risk this project idea could get lost in discussion. It might be better for the OP to just start it and see where it goes. No important decision was ever made by committee.

Well, so far it seems the OP has yet to create such a tutorial and link it here or elsewhere. If that already happened then nevermind what I said, but so far this seems more like "I'd like to have" and less like "I'm gonna make this".

 

Besides, all the tutorials that can be found on YouTube could very well be part of a "compilation" of links that would aim to be such a thing as a guide of sorts. It isn't unheard of that people still use Chubzdoomer's video guides on YouTube for themselves or link them for others. So if this "mapping compendium", let's call it that for the time being, were to take off, it might be a good idea to first look at what's actually there already, and then start filling the gaps where it is due. Some points made by the OP have already been covered to a pretty thourough degree.

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11 hours ago, Nine Inch Heels said:

Well, so far it seems the OP has yet to create such a tutorial and link it here or elsewhere. If that already happened then nevermind what I said, but so far this seems more like "I'd like to have" and less like "I'm gonna make this".

I like your user name. A play on the Quake weapon with sassy threat. Nasty.

 

Personally I've got past the point where I'm going to learn much of much consequence through a guide. But that's only in the limited area of DB2 and ZDoom. Once I've got my new laptop with a bit more processing power I could start doing videos. My point is, this project is way beyond what a single person can do in any effective timescale.

 

What you could do is write up a set of wanted tutorials. I've found that not everything searched for in google is easily found. In my book, if it doesn't exist in a google search then it might as well not exist at all. And word of mouth just isn't good enough. Too slow.

 

You could lay down a set of ground rules, like a maximum video length and to categorise tutorials by subject. E.g. by source port, editor, whether scripting is needed or not, whether lump editing is needed or not. So people know before watching the video (or soon into it) what tools and experience they'd need to be able to do it. I personally find a lot of tutorials have dire quality. Poor microphone use. Bad description and too much happening without explanation. Off the top of my head I can think of about 1000 videos that could be made off the bat and I haven't seen any single resource that even approaches this level, certainly not to any degree of quality.

 

But would it be worth the effort? Doom is such a niche gaming genre (compared to all other platforms and modable games - even platforms run into the hundreds). Most designers I see manage to cobble together their knowledge by a mix of trial and error and picking up the odd piece of info here and there. I wonder if all this proposed resource would lead to more Doom designers. Maybe a handful. Possibly even less than the number of people needed to make the project work.

 

Personally, I'm getting ready for a big building project in the real world. I'm preparing to build 16 apartments in parallel, with experimental water and electric systems installed besides (none of it outsourced, all designed and managed by me directly, from concept to staff hire and maintenance). This is the other problem. RL takes over and people drop out. The knowledge base is only stabilised somewhat by the internet. It is a very geeky environment and that for me is part of it's charm. Otherwise we'd all be modding Minecraft to get kudos from 13 year olds.

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So there's already Doom Builder tutorials in youtube covering the basic and not so basic stuff.
There's any Decorate or ACS tutorials ? The op should search for it in the first place , and could post the playlist here.

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To be honest, a lot of this stuff isn't what I think of as Doom. It's a lot of very source port specific stuff. If you want a GZDoom academy, Eternity or Boom academy, then call it that. This type of messy approach would be very problematic if someone uses the "wrong" source port. Some of the topics I don't even understand or find very vague, like "How to set up the file structure of a standard wad." and "How to use the #include tag."

If I make something for Doom, I expect it to play in loads of source ports in a fairly reasonable manner. A lot of the stuff suggested here is very niche and only works in a few or one select port. I'd be more interested in the science/art of making a good map than knowing how to make a scrollable floor. What makes a map play well, how to make it work well for coop, weapon balance. Even if you're adding new monsters and sprites for a specific source port , what kind of rule of thumb and dev. process should there be to ensure the end product feels balanced and polished. There's not a single sentence in the original list about playability, polish, texture choices, themes, lighting. They might be well-covered in other tutorials, I haven't seen any though, but those are the basics an academy ought to go through.

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