Sharing idea

[SKEMETH]

I will start this forum by sharing with you what i think about editing in OC.
Keep in mind that what i will write are only suppositions!

Outcast use displacement mapping, so there is a texture for height of the ground and a texture...a real texture, with coulours.

All textures are "btm" files, wich can be opened and extracted with "outcastripper". The textures are marked like that:

tem_a29.btm
tem mean "temple". this mean that the texture is used for shamazaar world
a mean that this texture is a displacement texture, used for the height of the map
29 is the number of texture
btm is the file type.

tem_v29.btm
The only difference with the previous exemple is the "v" instead of the "a". This mean that this time, the texture is the real texture, the one with coulour
As you can see, the two textures got the same number. This mean that the two textures are "the same", that they are used together at the same place

There are other file type for the textures, but i don't know what they do...for the moment

End of the first lesson



Edited By SKEMETH on 04-9-2002 : 17:06

[vincent]

good job skemeth. but when there will be a french forum for mods because i don't understand the half of the words...

[SKEMETH]

For people who don't really understand the idea of displacement mapping and the two textures, here is an example i've just made





As you can see, my V texture is not the same that you can find in the 11.pak, there aren't the 6 littles textures under the big one. These little textures are for mip-mapping and the program choose one of them in function of the distance from the camera (wich is often the player view)

(ps: don't worry if the heigh of my "in game ground" is different from the one in the game, it is because i put a different value in 3DSMAX )



Edited By SKEMETH on 04-9-2002 : 17:59

[MR]

You can make textures by using gMax (a "light" and free version of 3D max)

[SKEMETH]

i don't know gmax (i mean, i know it, but i have never used it)

[Olivier]

If i understand all what you said, we can modify the world as we want ?
I mean if we modify an "a" texture, we can change height, form etc of the ground ?
It would be great but i know the world is make with the assembly of "tiles" but what is the software which allow to put tile on the map (i hope you understand what i want to say...)
Where can we find GMax ? or a shareware of 3DMax ?
Even if we can do new map, how can we put a "link" to them in the game ?
Last question : What about "mesh" ? Can we modify them with 3DMax or GMax ?

Maybe the future of Outcast depend of that !... [8D]

[SKEMETH]

hey!! i've just started today to try to understand how work outcast's level editing, so give me time

for Gmax/3dsmax, go to this adress: www.discreet.com

For the map, i actually try to resolve this pronlem

[Olivier]

well, ok ok do your work, but now, Our future depends on YOU !

[SKEMETH]

Not only on me, fortunately

[Olivier]

[Olivier]

An other question (while Gmax is downloading...): Do we need other software?

[SKEMETH]

dunno, it's MR who said that you need Gmax, not me

for the moment i only need paintbrush (or photshop, it is better )

[jfrey]

It seems that the polygonal indications are hidden in the .lnd files. Maybe there's a link with the "v files" and these strange colored lines...don't you think Skemeth ?

[SKEMETH]

errr...yes, that's possible that the colored lines are sorts of landmark indicating where puting the models...i will see this possibility

[SKEMETH]

ok, i've checked it and the answer is no, the colored lines are not landmark to put 3D models.

The couloured lines are edges...but i don't understand their utility because the displacement mapping is enought...

My others hypotesis are that the coulours are here to "tell" to the program that the zones are uncrossable by cutter...but i don't think so. I also think that it is to say where cutter can hang on

Still searching...



Edited By SKEMETH on 05-9-2002 : 03:27