Zones

[PinkDot]

Hello everyone!

 

I have one question - will be zones avalaible in Dark Mod? Or could we be able to change the order of missions in game - I mean skip some or come back later to one we have played depending on what we'll do in game?

 

I'm very happy that you make the Dark Mod, as I've lost my hopes on T:DS editor (and not only me, I suppose....). But please don't hurry so much - I have to finish my DromEd work first....

[New Horizon]

I'm not a coder or mapper myself, but I believe that the Doom editor will probabaly allow for the flexibility of choosing mission order. It's not something we are aiming for in our mini campaign but it shouldn't stop FM authors from doing it.

[sparhawk]

Principally Loading zones are possible in D3. Because of the much bigger mapsizes, this should be no requirement, but the possibillity exists, so that statis of one map can be carried over to the other map.

[Fingernail]

Should be able to build a really huge, and I mean really huge city with several load zones between (considering that D3 can probably handle all of the T3 city sections in one map (bit of a proud boast possibly, but they were pretty tiny)).

[Macsen]

Does Doom 3 save information from the last loadzone when you go into a new area? If I killed a man in loadzone A, and went to loadzone C, when I returned through loadzone B would that man still lay dead?

[Springheel]

That was done in D3, so yes. The more important question is, if a man is *chasing* you as you enter a loadzone, and you return hours later, will he still be in mid-stride? That's how T3 handled it. D3 load zones were usually through elevators, so that situation never happened to me. I'm not sure what would happen.

[sparhawk]

BUt of course only if the code supports it. it's not as if D3 does this fully on it's own. You must preserve the object states.

[Domarius]

Where exactly, in D3 does it use "load zones"?? I completed the entire game - all I ever saw was sequential missions.

 

If you think that returning to Mars City and seeing it all destroyed counts as a load zone *beeeep* wrong. That was a whole new map.

 

I think load zones are an awesome feature and we should make them at some stage if D3 really doesn't have it by default. You can make places of theoretically unlimited size then.

[sparhawk]

No. But the technique form the coding point of view is the same. You can seemlessly enter a map and go back. If you look into the SDK you will see that this can be done, because you can preserve the object states across maps. So this should be possible to do, even though it may not have been used in D3.

[Domarius]

It's essentially "saving the game", really. It's the same process, you just use it when you go from one map to the other. The most unique part not in D3 is associating an "exit" on one map, to another "entrance" on another map.

[Macsen]

So that the player doesn't cheat by going into load zones to escape, we could make it so that every guard BJ'd in the area you've just left has regained consciousness by the time you revisit. This would totally rid the player of any advantage of going through load zones, encouraging him to do so only when his business in the zone he's in is fully complete.

[Domarius]

That's a really nice idea, but it would promote killing them. (Unless you had a no-kill objective)

 

It's certainly an easier solution than checking who's chasing you and carrying them through the portal with you.

 

Although we will want do this eventually. It's certainly not up there with the "never been done before". Even Deus Ex 1 has been doing it.

Edited February 22, 2005 by Domarius

[sparhawk]

Who said that we actively support loading zones? So far we haven't discussed this yet, and this is rather low priority, because first thing is to have ANY working map. We can think about adding loading zones later if there is need to do something special.

[Domarius]

Yeah but its nice to talk about.

[Macsen]

That's a really nice idea, but it would promote killing them. (Unless you had a no-kill objective)

The dead should stay dead, but you're only allowed to kill guards on easy anyway.

 

I don't think we'll need loading zones in a level unless we're planning to do something huge. But it'd nice to talk about the possibilities beyond the first campaign.

[sparhawk]

If people are idle, they should rather focus on the next milestone. We haven't even reached the first, so loading zones are still some way off.

[kingers]

If memory serves there is a large thread on this at DOOM3World.org regarding transfer of data between maps.

[oDDity]

What;'s a ll this talk of load zones.? I thought doom was good enough to make big levels.

FFS, isn't there a game enine in existence to dsayb that can make a fucking level the size of LotP without making player's system spontaneously combust??

[Fingernail]

You should read the post, which was the suggestion of making even larger levels and more free-flowing campaigns.

[sparhawk]

I don't have a problem with loadzones as long as the mapsize is good. In D3 the level transition is rather smooth. You have the impression as if you are running around in one big level, which is ok (same for HL2). The major problem with load zones is, if they are absolutely required, as they were in TDS. If you have a map in TDS only of one zone, then the map would be laughable small, so they were forced to make at least two zones per level just to get a normal sized map (which still is very small considering other maps). In D3 you don't have this limitation, so you can create a map the size of the biggest T1/T2 maps (I assume) and if you THEN employ a load zone it would only make the map even bigger, which would be ok to me if it is used in such a way.

[oDDity]

Don't be ridiculous. Maps even bigger than the biggest T2 maps? There are time considerations to think of. Let's face it, the bigger the level gets, the less quality can be put into every section of it. THere's no point in having gigantic empty maps for the sake of it.

IF doom can handle maps as big as the biggest T2 maps, load zones wil not be an issue.

[Fingernail]

Oddity, imagine we wanted to make a city like the T3 city. We could build it in LoTP size sections (probably smaller, LoTP is very linear really) and link them altogether with load zones...that way, the city would be HUGE as the individual sections would be much bigger than those of T3, and still detailed. And you could have loads of districts all that size, creating a much better city experience.

 

Or you could create a HL2 style campaign where one map leads right off from the end of another, etc. etc., like one adventure rather than a series of small missions.

[oDDity]

Well, this is getting hyprothetical then, and far, far into the future. That wouldn't even be considered to after we'd relessed the main campaign, and would require an army of mappers.

[oDDity]

As for connecting missions together by zones - what's the point? What's the differecne between two separate maps with a fake load zone (i.e you're simply loading the next map) and one mega map connected by actual load zones. Umless you're suggesting you can actually go back to a previosu mission through those load zones and find everythig the way you left it, but with objectives changed based on what you've done in subsequent missions. Anything other than that would be pointless.

[Fingernail]

I think that's what some people might like.