peter_spy

Gigagooga released new ambient pack not so long ago, high-quality stuff overall. http://www.ttlg.com/forums/showthread.php?t=147451

I got a basic cubemap material ready, but this one looks like it works better with specularity, so I'd definitely use it, thank you. A subtle glow map for key items looks good too. I don't even have to use textures, just grey solid color is fine. As for the lightning, I've done some experiments and I'll probably stay away from real-time shadows as much as possible. Right now, I'm at the AI and "gameplay lightning" stage for my first location, and I came up with a few ideas. I want to have some player freedom in putting out lights, but the setting is more Victorian and steampunk-ish rather than medieval. The setting is either recently abandoned or overgrown (not sure my modeling skills will suffice here, I was never too good with organics). Using skylights, windows, and other types of "lightning from outside", along with moonlight / before dawn setting is much more interesting visually (baked lightmaps). In terms of gameplay, those light / shadow patterns are also more interesting to traverse than the run-of-the-mill omni lights. Player freedom takes a hit here, but I hope that will be a minor casualty. Further tests will reveal more

Alright, after banging my head against the wall for an hour or two, and seeing how bad I was at level design, I managed to block out something that will look like a small warehouse. Everything is temporary here (except walls and most walkways). There's no lightning or AI, next step will focus on main gameplay.

That model on the left looks exactly like Arcturus', but has more poly and less details, now that's brilliant... If you recreate something from scratch, just by eyeballing the original model or screenshot, that's fine. That's your work. And you can get a bit more creative, so it's not 100% obvious which model you used as the inspiration (you probably won't be able to make the same textures and materials anyway). If you're doing it just for testing, then sure, you can even use those apps for grabbing whole scenes with textures and models, for experimental purposes, I guess. Otherwise, grabbing dubious stuff from shady parts of the Internet isn't helping.

I kind of like both, but I prefer them to be brief and concise. IMO, wiki is in dire need of short step-by-step instructions and brief explanations on how things work, with proper examples. Going through packages shipped with the game or inside missions isn't as useful as one might think, as you still waste a lot of time trying to figure out what was the idea behind particular solution.

Well, they will be mostly notes and maybe some screenshots, as higher production stuff takes much longer to make and edit. For the stuff you requested, light entities might be too advanced for now, as you need to know exactly what you're doing with textures, materials, and light properties. I'd leave that for now. Writing materials and scripts is basically programming, although materials are relatively easy when you just use texture source without any special instructions.

So, these models are from other games but modified? Well, if you want to rip off other authors, do it at your own risk. People from the industry play games and mods too. Someone will notice it eventually, and will be furious about it – and they will take action to protect their assets. Besides, it's just rude and dumb. Want to have something? Make it yourself or ask someone else to do it. As for putting it in Dark Mod model libraries, that's a hell no.

You may want to see this to understand how the folder structure works:

Well, that's something. Rebuilding the whole map every time would be a major pain. Rebuilding lightning is basically recalculating lightmaps, so basically every current and last gen engine uses it. TDS had that option as well, but can't remember what for.

Yup, that's a good start, somewhere around Oblivion or F3 quality level of lightning. Btw. what's the fastest way to preview and rebuild lightning? The DR preview is useless.

You need to have a bit of darkness at wall edges and in the corners, and the light on all surfaces except the window needs to look a bit like a gradient. One omni light will be too simple for that.

Projected, one per wall. One stretched omni with proper falloff would be easier to place, but probably harder to control. The wall with the window would probably be too bright as a result. Will check that next time. Good thing noshadow lights are cheap. A small subtle light at the bed frame would probably a good idea too. And yeah, the window should have proper skin, I forgot to switch it

I don't have time to make a full scene right now but this could be a good start:

I wouldn't worry about "realistic", I would worry about "interesting" instead

Basically what nbohr1more said. Since this is not mission-critical area, you could make the ambient light from the window go at least to the middle of this room. Fake some light bouncing on both walls, floor and ceiling. Even this example from Sir Talbot's Collateral is too subtle. I was thinking more like this: You have projection lights and bounce lights everywhere in this location. Generally, you have to start thinking about and using (faking) indirect lightning in your scenes. There's no engine, realtime or otherwise that will make well-looking a scene with direct lights only. Even architectural renderers like mental ray or vray use stuff like fake light-emitting surfaces near windows to get more light inside a room.

One more thing: this POV in-game cutscene at the end, it's a very useful narrative/gameplay device. You should make a step-by-step tutorial on how to use this and put it on wiki, if it isn't there already. Nevermind, found it

I didn't find any TOS on their site, just a very general disclaimer when I tried to download one of those models. Also, no additional info in the attached text file. Which is kinda shady but... Well, let's see what others have to say on that. As you see, I'm generally very cautious about doing anything with sb else's work. Typically, I don't like when someone does something with my work, without letting me know first or acknowledging authorship (which is very common in photography).

Okay, so you added "free", that's good. Just to be on the safe side, check their EULA or CC license for permission to be distributed in packages, and on what terms. TDM doesn't have locked packages (like UE .upk packages), anyone can open them and use what's inside. Some authors may not allow that kind of distribution.

11 days, that's more like speed mapping Actually you'd want to take it slow. Get used to controls, customize things if need be, go though the AZ tutorial to try out the different game features. Don't be afraid to experiment with those. When you start making your mission, don't spread yourself thin, and value your audience's time. It's better to have 3 main, "content-intensive" locations, connected with corridors that serve as breathers, than 10 locations that are just ok. Also, don't worry about length too much. People have busy lives and tons of responsibilities these days, meaningful leisure time is something of value. You don't need 4 hours of average gameplay. Make it a meaningful hour, or hour and a half, and people will love you. Hell, make it interesting for 30 minutes, and you'll get the "short but sweet" tag and positive reactions as well (see Springheel's new intro mission).

Not only that. Looks like all Biker's posts and threads were deleted.

Um, you know you can hide the lightgem with "g_showhud 0"?

If I was aware of such problem and couldn't fix it, I'd just put the journal on a table or a shelf. One or two additional seconds of gamplay aren't worth the risk of breaking the mission.

Not sure what you mean by "found", but remember, if this is copyrighted or otherwise paid content, you can't include it in TDM. Those are really cool if you made them yourself though.

Here's an idea: have you thought about having your players stream their first and second playthrough? With YT and Twitch you don't have to use recording software or to encode videos, and you'll have faster and better insight on your design mistakes and technical errors.

I think STiFU meant mappers who completed the tutorial more or less recently, but now feel confident with DR enough to know what's wrong with the A-Z course and how to change it, in terms of the outdated stuff.