[project1dev] Re: Re-useable peices used when building a map?
- From: Chris Riccobono <crysalim@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: project1dev@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 2 Apr 2009 23:34:37 -0700
Yeah, your point about getting our first milestone squared away is
great too. I agree that we need to get this first area done before
anything.
On Thu, Apr 2, 2009 at 9:25 PM, Alan Wolfe <alan.wolfe@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> yeah definitely about the lighting.
>
> And yeah too much repetition of looks would be bad for sure.
>
> we'll definitely handle that.
>
> First step is to get a map made of the area, and then we'll pretty it up and
> that stuff.
>
> One thing to note is we don't have to get it perfect right now, we can come
> back later and fix it up better.
>
> As we go on with the game we'll get better and better at this process (:
>
> On Thu, Apr 2, 2009 at 4:18 PM, Chris Riccobono <crysalim@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>>
>> I think we'll have to reuse a lot of models and textures for sure, but
>> one point I wanted to put out there is that we probably should not do
>> this at the start of the game.
>>
>> Hellgate London suffered a lot from repetition in levels very early in
>> the game, despite how many unique sets and areas they had later on. I
>> know a lot of other games do this unintentionally as well, and we
>> should try to avoid it early on.
>>
>> It is okay to do it later in the game, because the player enjoys more
>> of a sense of familiarity as the game progresses - but while they just
>> start playing, the feeling of "newness" is part of the thrill, and as
>> soon as they come across something repeated they believe it will be
>> like that the entire game (even if that's not true!)
>>
>> To partially alleviate the stress of having to make everything unique
>> near the start of the game, we can make the first areas shorter. This
>> also helps take care of impatient players, and lets us "hook" them
>> with short and sweet plot and enemy bursts.
>>
>> Also to be more specific, we should not replicate the same room more
>> than once in an early area, and static models (like scenery of trees
>> and rocks, enemies, etc.) should be laid out in different patterns in
>> each room so as to not evoke a feeling of repetition.
>>
>> Walls and floors obviously need to repeat though.
>>
>> I also wanted to note that lighting should be prominent in level
>> design, because even the same textures can have a whole new look with
>> just a differently colored/angled light. Our engine has a great
>> lightning system, so lets take full advantage of that.
>>
>> On Thu, Apr 2, 2009 at 10:48 AM, Alan Wolfe <alan.wolfe@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>> > What I meant by re-useable peices is for instance in this cave level we
>> > would have a "straight cooridor" cave section, an "elbow" cave section,
>> > an
>> > "open area" cave section etc and just re-used them to build an area.
>> >
>> > That would make it so the artists only had to decorate a few peices
>> > instead
>> > of having to decorate one large level, it would make it so that builders
>> > wouldn't have to build a lot of temp art for the terrain, and it would
>> > mean
>> > the engine would have to keep less models in memory which results in
>> > less
>> > memory usage and faster rendering times (but so far are rendering times
>> > are
>> > fine).
>> >
>> > After the builders make a map and make it functional with the
>> > pre-defined
>> > peices, the enemies added in, etc, then someone would go through and
>> > decorate the level with props, and then it would get a lighting pass on
>> > top
>> > of that.
>> >
>> > To me this makes the most sense, but what makes sense to the coder
>> > doesnt
>> > always make sense to the artist or scripter. I talked to eric and he
>> > liked
>> > the idea but thougth a hybrid for this would be best since sometimes you
>> > dont want to stick to the strict peices already made, which completely
>> > makes
>> > sense.
>> >
>> > What do you think Kent? Do you think that would work well for building?
>> >
>>
>
>
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