Moonbo

Here's one I stumbled across while web surfing, mostly just a rehash of the press release though: https://www.pcgamesn.com/the-dark-mod/the-dark-mod-205

Voted :-).

Yep, the modelling is done externally in a 3D modelling program and imported into the engine, with the editor used to place the pieces and add in scripts/material shaders/lighting/etc.

The latest versions of Unreal allow you to make both additive or subtractive levels. Most modern games made using Unreal select additive because brushwork is really only used to block out levels or for things like triggers, with actual 3D models being used for most of the level geometry. Unity has no way to create brushwork and you build levels out of imported models (though there is a terrain system). You can buy an additive brushwork program for Unity called ProBuilder which will be very familiar to anyone whose worked with Hammer/DarkRadiant, though it's not a "pure" brush system but more a dynamic primitive modelling program, so it has its differences.

Hey Chakkman,

Hey Chakkman, Objects from part of the spirit realm can be used in other parts . Let me know if you need a more specific clue.

You might want to check out the DX high rez texture mod (New Vision?), it's a fan project and I'm sure you could get permission to use anything suitable in it.

Hey Cynical, Thanks for the feedback - always good to know what to work on for future projects. -Gelo

I solved a very similar issue by converting the offending brush into a func static.

While I think I'd already come up with the name "Requiem" before I heard this song, it was going to be in the mission soundtrack until I realized it was copyrighted:

Hey Dragofer, I'm really enjoying the mission, but whenever I frob the haybale in the phial dream I get a crash to desktop on the third frob. Is there any fix for this?

I gotta say, I'm really enjoying these reviews. You should consider cross-posting them to the TTLG mega review thread.

Hey Shaz, I'm glad you enjoyed the mission! Sadly, the code is only good for the smashwords Edition though .

Thank you so much fllood!

Hey Petike, Thanks for the detailed feedback!

Much more important than the number of brushes or models in a scene is the number of lights and if they are shadow casting or overlapping. I had instances where, based on the lighting layout, brushwork was actually cheaper than func statics because I could carve up the brushes so that multiple lights didn't hit them vs. if they had been a single FS.

Oh, also turning the patch or some of the surrounding geometry into a func static will occasionally fix it too.

If the sparkles on the patch still happen even after changing the subdivisions a last resort which always worked for me is to add a center subdivision and bulge the center of the patch outward by one unit.

I don't remember the particulars but I think you can create a scriptable object and attach it to entities. The scriptable objects code will then act on the entity it's been attached to. Obsttorte or SteveL are sure to have the details as they both helped me with this on my missions .

Seconded on Underhell, if only for the prologue (chapter 1 was too unlit for me).

If you give upscaled models the spawnarg inline 1, this will stop them from popping off the edges of the screen. They do become non solid though and you can't move them, but its a fix I used a few times.

Hey Pete, thank you for your kind words - I'm glad you enjoyed the mission! -Gelo

If it doesn't need to be an actual AI you could always just use a func_animate. The only tricky bit with those is that you need to line up their heads very precisely to their bodies since they need to be two separate models, but you can check my FM's for examples.

I guess I hid that one too well as I don't think anyone has ever found it:

A very fun and solid mission. I'm going to be a bit critical in my review, but that's only because this was a very good mission and so I thought about it a lot. Don't take any of this the wrong way, it was a job very well done: Visuals Overall the visuals were great to look at, and the whole mission ran very smoothly on my less-than-powerful rig (which really impressed me in some scenes!). Especially the use of the skybox geometry made the city section feel much larger and interconnected than it really was. The scale of the mansion was also just right - I noticed in my missions that I tended to err too much on the side of making things too small, but no problems with that here. Everything was large, impressive, but also believable. Now, onto my critiques. The very pronounced use of strong ambient light colors (and their sharp swings as you moved into new areas) served to almost act like the post-processing filters you see in modern games. For me, this was a bad thing that detracted from the visuals. I've always felt that in modern AAA games (or Thief Deadly Shadow for that matter) all these sorts of filters serve to do is to wash out the colors from the scene. All the natural highlighting and texture detail of objects gets covered over by this omnipresent color scheme, which reduced contrast and made the in-level lighting more flat. Art is subjective, and part of that critique is just preference, but I wanted to mention it. I also noticed quite a few spots where the visual quality of the level took a noticeable drop (overly blocky chunks of geometry (especially on the ceilings), tiling textures, sudden texture cut-offs, and a little bit of z-fighting) . No-one else has mentioned this, so this could just be me being picky and looking at things too closely, but given the really high visual quality of most of the level, running into these sections pulled me out of the experience. Story Chalk this one up to preference again, but I was disappointed by the time I got to the ending. The macro-story suffered from the same issue as Full Moon Fever (another great mansion mission) in that it was all build up with no payoff. A lot is hinted about the nature of the stone, with the light in the tower and the various conversations, but in the end it's just another object that you pick up and leave with. There was no consequence to taking the stone and no resolution to any of the various plot threads surrounding the stone. If this is the first part in a series, you can ignore this critique obviously. That said, the minute-to-minute storytelling through overheards and readables was very enjoyable. I knew who everyone was, what my objectives were, and where to complete them. These fundamentals can be very hard to convey and you did a great job conveying them in a way that made me relate to the cast of characters. The environmental storytelling with the pagan graffiti was also a really nice touch. Gameplay Nothing but praise here :-). New challenges like electric plates were introduced well and changed up the pace of standard TDM gameplay. The faster than normal AI also made the game more challenging, forcing you to ambush people instead of doing the standard "creep up on people" thing. It also raised the chances of having to run into AI more than once before you could take them out, which made the level more tense. The layout of the level was such that I never got lost, and in a level as large as this one, that's a mark of high quality. The only time I got confused is that I thought I needed to flip both of the tower control switches to open the tower door. So imagine my chagrin after circumnavigating the mansion to get to the second tower switch, only to find the door closed. Again, really good mission - had a blast playing int and I hope you make more!