"New year, new URE" - URE:E2 - E2M2 up!

[Zylinderkatze]

On 5/21/2021 at 9:58 AM, Zylinderkatze said:

You get a pile of rubble :D

 

Speaking of rubble..

 

I am redoing the caved-in wall with a little more purpose (and as clean and sector-less as possible).

 

Check it out:

^{Started from the right, working my way left into the FIREBLU.}

 

Like I said, I am trying to use as few sectors as possible to still make it look broken and pushed apart.. however, I am almost tempted to grab some LEGO.. or fire up a physics simulation software (but that would be a whole new can of physically accurately simulated worms).. to get some better idea of how a structure would react to such an impact. Instead of working it out in mah braen.

 

Like.. in that picture, now that I look at it.. chances are that that upper 64 x 64 concrete slab (the one that's still attached to the building, right next to the pointer) would actually be pushed inward rather than expand outward.. unless the actual impact would've been much further away to the left and pushed it aside (and thereby outward) along with other structural compounds.

 

Maybe I will put in the lower slate below it, but at an angle that implies it was pushed in.

 

Am I thinking about this too much? Yes.

 

Should you be used to that by now? Also yes.

 

:D

 

I know this will reach a satisfying state, before the weekend is over, even.

 

But right now the pieces are still rattling. They haven't settled into place yet.

 

Maybe I'll just draw this out on paper instead!

 

Or maybe I should get some sleep >_>

Edited May 22, 2021 by Zylinderkatze

[Omniarch]

8 hours ago, Zylinderkatze said:

Speaking of rubble..

Hmmm, you know what? I'm starting to think Zylinderkatze is a little perfectionistic, jussst a little, a teensy-weensy bit, just a slight tendency ya know?

 

Ach well, no harm in that, its not as though he's spending months fiddling with the same area or anything... oh

 

Spoiler

Spoiler

Spoiler

;)

 

 

 

[ketmar]

7 hours ago, Omniarch said:

Hmmm, you know what? I'm starting to think Zylinderkatze is a little perfectionistic

just imagine if he'll do his maps faster. it would be a cat-a-strophe, we won't have enough time to play them all!

[Zylinderkatze]

10 hours ago, Omniarch said:

;)

I hate you so much right now <3

 

2 hours ago, ketmar said:

cat-a-strophe

And you're second on my list >_<

 

Then again, I guess I am kind of inviting it since my own.. humor is so.. special.

 

 

MOVING ON!

 

Part of the reason why my progress is slow-ish (aside from me obsessing about details) is that my approach is kind of "organic". 

 

I mean- I start off with one section, "feel" it out, see where it goes.. and if it doesn't feel done I move on and return to it later.

 

I wouldn't call it a "short attention span", though, because once I get focused on a particular task, I do go to town on it xD

 

But yeah.. I do go over areas in passes.. adding, removing and changing pieces.. and that definitely doesn't streamline anything.

 

Today, though, this brought me to the actual landing ship:

 

^{Crashed wall on the right, direction of impact towards te left.}

 

I basically only played around with how a VTOL turbine might look.. but at the same time it's looking way too pristine. It would hardly survive a crash through a wall like that. Also there's no rubble or anything yet.. because I want to get the actual shape done before I then deform it with implied damage.. and show it's impact's.. well.. impact on the surrounding area.

 

I can already tell that this room alone is going to take hours.. nay.. HOOOOURRRSS.

 

The ceiling texture (I mean.. flat) is only for contrast right now. Also, when I'm done, it won't be level anymore. Instead there will be bent beams / supports and dislodged covers.. maybe FLOOR4_8 (the metal hexagons). Also, the texture on the ship will potentially not stay "STARG1". Or not only. Also also, I am planning to have a hidden hatch to the inside of the ship behind which you'll get some supplies so you don't start empty-handed. Which is also one of the reasons (aside from the top-mounted VTOLs) why I am putting this landing ship on the inside under an low ceiling, instead of open sky ^^;

 

Enjoy this very early view. The final ship will look nothing like this :D

[ketmar]

27 minutes ago, Zylinderkatze said:

And you're second on my list >_<

ah. so i'm safe now, i guess. i know that you will need to build a perfect torture device for the Number One, and it will take... some time.

[Zylinderkatze]

22 hours ago, Zylinderkatze said:

Maybe I'll just draw this out on paper instead!

 

I actually finally did this.. and realized that -on top of thinking that the VTOL thingies would not have stayed on during the crash through a 68 units thick wall- the "gondolas" also are simply too wide for the designated crash "tunnel".

 

Lookie:

^{Much too wide.}

 

 

For reference: The "inside room with the ship" is the one with the 4 player starts. I already removed the other side of the ship because (for now) I decided that you won't be able to get to the other side of it. I'll just make it look very collapsed instead ^^;

 

As you can see, the "wing stub with downward-facing jet engine of sorts" makes the ship as wide as the whole wall it's supposed to have crashed through. I think I'll just remove that think altogether.. or just mount them straight against the ship, instead of having them on those little wings.. even though I kind of like how they turned out, structurally.

 

This is what it looks like right now:

 

^{Not really satisfied with the texture work on the drive, though.}

 

Also, it obviously still looks way too clean in there. When this thing is done, the floor will be 75% percent rubble and debris :D

 

Also also, I will definitely turn / skew the ship a little bit when I'm done detailing it, because right now it looks like came to a halt exactly at the angle at which is crashed through the wall. Possible, but implausible xD 

 

Man.. I could do so much funky stuff if I left behind the "256 Segs" confines. Like leave the ripped-off drives laying around outside.. but.. Must. Stay. Vanilla! >_<

 

Anyways, I'm at the "not feeling this right now" point with this area so I'll return once the idea has simmered a bit.

 

More on this later ^^;

[Zylinderkatze]

Oh.. I never responded to this..

 

14 hours ago, Omniarch said:

its not as though he's spending months fiddling with the same area

 

I feel personally attacked!

 

I mean.. you're not wrong. But still! xP

 

With this project, though, I did take kind of "upwards of a whole month" of a break from doing anything big on this map (or the whole project, really) and only came back to URE2021 (in the "working on it more than an hour at a time" sense) a few days ago ^^;

 

I'm planning to be done with E2M1 at the end of this month. But that does feel like a bit of a tight schedule with the current progress.

 

...

 

Right now, I am thinking more and more that I might just have the inside room of the crash-site mostly filled with rubble, thereby obscuring the currently undetailed parts of the ship wreck.. but that feels kind of like cheating >_>

[Omniarch]

27 minutes ago, Zylinderkatze said:

I feel personally attacked!

 

I mean.. you're not wrong. But still! xP

Well, at least you will eventually get a good map out of your perfectionism xD

 

I just end up doing nothing besides fiddling endlessly with my increasingly-bloated MBF mod and testing it using No End In Sight maps... that and staring forlornly at my many stylistic prototypes, trying to get my monkey brain to give me ideas for an actual map.

[Zylinderkatze]

Last picture for today..

 

..he said, obliviously, 2 hours before eventually, finally going to bed after an excessive mapping session.

 

No but seriously, I am actually going to go now xD

 

And I'll leave you with this:

^{Added some detail back to the caved-in wall.}

 

As you can see (compared to the last view of the outside wall), the upper concrete slab on the right is now gone (it used to be just above the pointer in the center of the screen). It made way for more rubble (which isn't really that well-aligned yet, though). I added a slab below it's old position and that one actually looks pushed in instead of out. Like I mentioned before :3

 

Also, there's no rocks on the ground yet, which I hope the Gods of Segs Limits will allow me to map out in a way that looks like they spilled out.

 

I didn't check the Segs Heatmap yet. I'm scared xD

 

Now I'll close Doom Editor and go do something else. Maybe something like sleeping?

Edited May 23, 2021 by Zylinderkatze

[Zylinderkatze]

23 minutes ago, Omniarch said:

fiddling endlessly

 

Fiddling endlessly can be a whole hobby in and of itself, too, though.

 

Maybe a little like playing Minecraft solo, you know? You build a house, a whole city, maybe even a kingdom.. and no one ever sees it. It's still fun to tinker and play around with it and see things take shape. And to practice and hone your skill, try out ideas and such.

 

Besides, you still have time.. URE2020 took me 25 years to finish! :D

[Zylinderkatze]

Lazy Monday, busy Tuesday?

 

Questionmark?

 

Yeah.. so.. I didn't do anything yesterday- and not that much on Sunday, either. 

 

But here's the broken wall! I think it's almost done:

^{I am going to add a few more concrete pieces to it though.}

 

I had to reduce a lot and it's still not 100% "Vanilla Safe"..

^{..but I have a few leads.}

 

Right now I am going with what I considered earlier, I pulled forward the open.. overhang(?), seen in the last picture of this thread.. and a little bit in the first picture of this very post, actually.. on the left edge of the screenshot.

 

The outcrop that used to be cut off at a 45° angle is now a straight 90°.. it doesn't look as "dynamic" anymore as it did before.. but that added (or rather, "elongated") wall blocks enough of the level geometry so that Vanilla doesn't scream anymore.

 

This is what it looks like now:

^{Also, there's now a window! Whaddaya know.}

 

The wall is now very visibly "kinda thin", though. That may still change. I'm not 100% satisfied with the whole thing yet. I might even remove the window again.

 

But at least the heat is gone!

 

Gone enough, even, that I might add some more detail back in.. xD

 

NO! No, bad ZK.

[ketmar]

i finally understood why you're doing Vanilla maps. at least with Vanilla there is a hard limit on detailing. with limit-removing you simply will never stop.

 

Spoiler

which will be great, because i love reading your dev diaries. and they will never stop too.

 

[Zylinderkatze]

4 hours ago, ketmar said:

a hard limit on detailing

 

You know.. again, you're not wrong :D

 

I feel like Vanilla does keep me grounded. That said, I've seen the level of detail and interactivity that some more seasoned, experienced or just downright skilled mappers conjure up for Vanilla and it puts me in awe. I know there's still a lot of room to improve, for me ^^

 

But not right now.

 

Right now, I am showing you the last look at E2M1, on a bend in the path leading you out of the crashed interior.

 

It's still a work in progress (what a surprise xD)

^{Also, it looks better in motion.} 

 

Or maybe it's just not the best angle.

 

I just really like how the shadow hitting the grey "computer" turned out.

 

It was just a "lets see how light grey would look in here" test but I enjoyed it so much that now I'm contemplating doing something interactive with that place xD

 

You know how it goes. This will end up turning into a whole new area all of its own..

^{(..don't worry, it won't. I'm on a schedule >_>)}

 

Right now, though, it's time for bed.

 

A-goodnight!

[Zylinderkatze]

14 hours ago, Zylinderkatze said:

it looks better in motion

 

Also, I suppose if something looks only good in motion, it doesn't really look good to begin with xD

 

I'll spend some more time on working out the kinks and making the ceiling-to-wall transition less ..weird?

 

Again, though, it does look good in editor / game.

 

More detail (literally?) in a little while (I'm still at work for another 2 hours).

[Zylinderkatze]

UAC? Is this a joke?

 

Yes.

^{But it fit so nicely xD}

 

Also, I've found that sometimes it can be fun to "map" in the opposite direction of where the player is going. As in.. start off in a hallway like this, then add the detail as you work your way towards where the player comes from (in this case, through / from that door).

 

To me that makes a level feel a little more real⁽™⁾ because not everything is lined up to reveal itself in the best light from the likely angle of approach.. and you might end up with layouts that look.. unusual? I dunno. Just thinking out loud.

 

Thanks for coming to my Ted Talk.

[ketmar]

7 hours ago, Zylinderkatze said:

Also, I suppose if something looks only good in motion, it doesn't really look good to begin with xD

and the opposite is true too. oh, those old CD boxes with great low-res screenshots... ;-) (often faked)

Edited May 26, 2021 by ketmar

[Zylinderkatze]

No update today

 

Well.. except this one..

 

I worked too much today and then kind of just.. slept.

 

And now I am going to go to bed xD

 

To.. relax from the sleeping..?

 

Maybe that helps ^^

[Zylinderkatze]

So the plan that the ship had crashed into a room..

 

..in fact, the room "behind" the broken console of the last picture in this post.

 

Which means there's some technology involved that was broken by the crash. What better thing to do, then, than to pick up the theme (COMPBLUE with warning stripes) and imply to the player how closely they avoided a more severe (deadly) crash, had the ship moved just a little further into the crash site.

 

No actual "impact" modeled (yet), the structure is still pristine:

^{Also, the ship itself has not seen any progress yet ._.}

 

The idea is to add a whole lot of rubble / broken wall segments / debris from the outside into this room (since I can't model it on the outside due to Vanilla constrains ^^).

 

There will be a whole pile of "broken stuff" in the middle of that scene, between the ship (green, on the right) and the "reactor?" (blue, on the left). 

 

Maybe I'll also make it so that it's only "open" (showing the red.. "fuel rods?") due to the crash.

 

Still a long ways from "done" but this was kind of a Eureka! moment for me.

 

Also, through that broken / open part, you can see the Yellow Skull Key which you won't pick up until much later.

 

Yay foreshadowing ^^;

[Zylinderkatze]

Also, the ship- or what will remain visible of it once the crash detailing is done- will undergo a restyling.. the green doesn't cut it. I'll go for a more.. uniformly landing-ship like design.. probably without any STARG* textures.

[Zylinderkatze]

Protection is so important..

 

..especially when dealing with high yield radiation.

 

Here's the last view of the room before I add debris:

^{Maybe don't step right in front of the opening..}

 

Also.. I think somebody who isn't me.. broke off the VTOL engine from the wing.

 

It's probably still around here somewhere..

^{It's a first glimpse at broken ship parts ^^;}

 

It will probably look a lot different when I'm done.

 

But for now: Bedtime!

[Zylinderkatze]

Okay one last picture before I actually go.

 

Obviously, I don't always actually stop mapping when I write that I'm off to bed >_>

 

So here's one look at a "security"-ish door that looks kind of neat:

^{That 3D look, though!}

 

Somehow, the darkened parts on the left of the METAL1, together with the DOORSTOP make it look almost as though there's some more depth going on than there actually is.

 

I will probably change it around some more but I thought I'd share!

 

But now I am actually going to go ^^;

[ketmar]

the art of crafting a story using only linedefs, live action! ;-)

Edited May 29, 2021 by ketmar

[Zylinderkatze]

19 hours ago, ketmar said:

the art of crafting a story

 

Too much praise! But I suppose I do try to make the whole environment seem "plausible" to some extend.

 

Speaking of plausible..

^{(not my best segue.. but also not my worst)}

 

So.. listen, hear me out..

 

..what if.. you ready? ..what if the ship is..

 

Beige.

^{No? Hm. Well I don't know either.}

 

I just wanted to try a few of the Vanilla textures that could be used to imply it being broken / exploded.. seeing how it was shot down and all.

 

Then again, from the level layout, the side that was facing the cannons is on the other side of the ship.

 

So it doesn't make much sense on this side.

 

I may still use it (sparingly) around the frontal impact parts.

 

Actually I think I should finally get around to the whole "rubble & debris" bit before this room gets too structurally complex.

 

And this is basically the result of some.. 20 minute of dabbling or so. I didn't do much "Dooming" yet, today ^^;

[Zylinderkatze]

One last look..

 

..at the level of detail that I can't maintain with Vanilla (sadface)

^{Had to pull the METAL1 wall up to the ceiling to break sight lines.}

 

Even with the sight-breaking line (to avoid HOM hell when you open the door that leaves the room) there is too much detail (or, possibly, not enough sector optimization).

 

Because even though I am not anywhere near done, it's already too hot:

c

^{I mean I want my map to be hot. But not like this.}

 

So I'll probably pull forward the rubble at the end of the ship (lower right) to make the whole area smaller and streamline some of the "broken pieces". Also, because I want to put the broken engine bits back in which are currently removed while I "draw" the debris..

 

I'll get there yet!

Edited May 30, 2021 by Zylinderkatze

[Zylinderkatze]

7 hours ago, Zylinderkatze said:

I'll get there yet!

 

I got there yet!

 

A lot less detailed than I would've liked but Vanilla says "OK!":

^{The "254/256" kind of okay. This'll have to do.}

 

It's "good enough". If I wanted to add more detail, I would have to change too much stuff around to free up the resources.. and I'm at the point where I don't deem it worth that effort anymore xD

 

 

Pending~

 

As a little bonus I am still toying with the idea of "maybe there's a way to get into the ship", because I've been entertaining that thought for a while.. but mapping that out will be another several hours to do it right.. and I'd rather work on the stuff that really needs to be fixed / beautified before I can call this map "done".

 

If I do add it, this is a very early attempt:

^{Using FLAT22 as a control terminal of sorts is a 2010 callback ^^;}

 

Actually, though, the idea was that you could access the inside right away, if you knew how.. and that seems pretty much impossible with the detail count (because the entrance to it is in the line of sight if the before-mentioned "254/256" point).

 

So you might be able to get at it from the other side.

 

I am currently going over all the other remaining areas of the map that I had previously only skimmed. It's looking pretty good so far, though.

 

Sadly, though, it's almost midnight so this is my last post for today.

 

..because it'll be "tomorrow" in 5 minutes xD

[Zylinderkatze]

I'm in the last area!

 

At least in game this is the last room you'll visit.. but it's not the last room I'm working on, sadly ^^;

 

This is a teleporter out of that final area..

^{..it opens up a secret, too!}

 

Basically I'm only sharing this to show three different approaches of tiling the METAL1 texture (inside the teleporter room).. you might have to zoom in.

 

I'm not sure which one to go with.. almost everything else in the final area has it "unaltered". Though now that I'm mentioning it.. I have an idea!

[Zylinderkatze]

Did someone say "Before and After"?

 

No.

 

But here you go!

 

A Gateway shortly before the exit:

 > 

^{From VERY METAL(1) to "oh look that's an actual column thing with a button!"}

 

And an outside area with.. encounters..?

 > 

^{No, it's not just the things that changed. I just didn't display them in the old version xD}

 

It's just some (very) small details added here and there, a bunch of aligning and some height adjustments (going along with the texture alignments).

 

It's all slowly coming to an end for E2M1, then it's onward to a few "100%" test runs and such.. 

 

So.. a few more days, still.

 

Goodnight!

[Zylinderkatze]

"And I oop"

 

Yesterday I removed a slime trail ("things that sound least weird when coming from a level designer") in the first main outside area.. basically the crash site that used to be the start area. All I did was to move 2 vectors.. and later on remove 2 superfluous sectors elsewhere in that area. Then I went on and edited some stuff elsewhere and when I came back later to check the Segs Heatmap.. it was glowing all over the place.

 

^{Update: stop imagining, here's the screenshot ^^}

 

When I then went to that particular area in Chocolate Doom, I only got one HOM (or "undrawable lines / plains" highlighting, rather), though, in one of the two "glowing hot" areas. Is it just a hiccough in UDB? I was a little stumped but I think I've had that phenomenon before during URE2020. It did lead me to cleaning up that area a little further, though.. which I suppose is a good thing :D

 

But in my "frustration" I didn't feel like taking any progress images anymore.. I'll do that later ^^

 

I feel like this area (along with another one that was fine before and suddenly lit up without me changing anything, now that I think back to it) suddenly caused Heatmap flare ups that felt unreasonably strong. 

 

I did save the map before switching to the DrawSegs view, which I think rebuilds the node tree. I didn't trigger it manually, though. I'll have to check later, whether that makes any difference. 

 

 

Update: I opened a backup copy of the map (during URE2020 I started keeping "5 version back" of every wad) and viewing the same area generates the same "heat".

 

It kind of feels as though it now checks for sight lines "with doors open^. and lifts lowered", which I think it didn't do before.

 

I assumed that maybe something changed about how the Visplane Explorer calculates the potential "overflows" but I checked the release notes of UDB and couldn't find anything about it so.. it's probably just that I never checked this again? 

 

Knowing me, though.. I'm not sure how likely that is. I check things a little too often, really xD

 

Cue heavy shrugging.

Edited June 4, 2021 by Zylinderkatze

[Zylinderkatze]

Question time!

 

I figured I'd make this a new post since I need attention it's not 100% related to the last one and I want to avoid a bloated quote (a blote?) for those replying..

 

I understand (or think I do) that the BSP building process is partially affected by the 128 x 128 grid? Or am I making this up? Is it only for in-game checks? My question would be whether it would be much of a gain (assuming it does affect the tree), to make sure that geometry of something small (like a rock "lying around") stays within such a 128 x 128 segment and doesn't cross over into a second one.. so the tree buidling calculation would not have to split it?

 

I understand (with a little more certainty over the first assumption ^^) that- when the map is divided up (into the tree "branches")- it is paramount to split them in such a way to avoid concave shapes. Basically "convex shapes only, plz". How consciously do you Vanilla-safe mappers out there keep that in mind while mapping?

 

^{Eye candy for reference (source), not by me.}

 

Do you go out of your way to build "BSP-friendly" and avoid sectors that will have to be broken down? Does / would that even improve the tree and avoid tree complexity greatly?

 

Thanks!

Edited June 4, 2021 by Zylinderkatze

[Zylinderkatze]

Please stop posting D:

 

Okay last one for now, I'm just kind of on a roll right now ^^;

 

With URE2021, in a bunch of cases throughout E2M1, my first approach was to just make those things that were already there.. prettier.

 

Case in point, this room:

^{That's already the "prettier" version, to avoid misunderstandings.}

 

However, all you really do here (if you find out how to get here), is to hit 4 switches in sequence, each of which opens, raises or otherwise changes something until you can finally activate a console.

 

By which I mean it's pointless. And not much fun.

 

Also, the console triggers something far away, with no visual information.

 

I think the whole sequence was mostly a "look what I can do!", back in 2010.

 

So instead I am probably going to scratch this room completely and instead put something more fun- or at least with fewer switches xD

Edited June 4, 2021 by Zylinderkatze