Non-euclidean maps

[etdarkb]

We usually think in terms of three dimensions and euclidean disposals of rooms and items.

But in the video games there is no need of this limitation.

Think about a TDM FM: you are sneaking around and enter into a room with inside a smaller room,

if you enter in the smaller room you expect to see... a smaller room.

But the magic of computer might show us a larger room instead.

 

And all this kind of crazy stuff.

 

I do not know if it is possible with id tech 4, but would you like to see some fan missions or more 3d games

that uses this kind of alien geometry?

[lostbuthappy]

If you can imagine it, you can build it

I don't think that it is of much importance which architectural theme has been chosen per se. The more important question is why it was chosen. Constantine had some wicked architecture and it worked because there was an explanation in the game world that the player could understand and that added to the overall experience the player had. It's no coincidence that this one is among the most memorable missions of thief.

[etdarkb]

If you can imagine it, you can build it

I do not know, I have a pretty vivid imagination. Can two rooms share the same space while separated?

 

I don't think that it is of much importance which architectural theme has been chosen per se. The more important question is why it was chosen. Constantine had some wicked architecture and it worked because there was an explanation in the game world that the player could understand and that added to the overall experience the player had. It's no coincidence that this one is among the most memorable missions of thief.

I do agree, but the point was not simple strangeness: but a mess in the world geometry.

And yes, the whole idea come out from that lovely mission.

[STiFU]

You would have to setup teleporters if you want to surpass the euclidian disposal of seperate rooms. Funny would also be a "shrinked" player, walking on walls/ceilings etc. Somehow I am thinking of an "Alice in Wonderland"-themed FM right now... Anyway, if you're planning to do stuff like that, I strongly encourage you to support it with a good story and not something like: "You have just been drugged. Fight your hallucinations and get a cure!"... I could very well imagine an insane person though, sneaking its way out of the asylum. Not really thiefy and no proper guardmodels available, but maybe interesting.

 

 

[_Atti_]

Jumping into a wall of water to swim up on it and fall out another place to splash into a well..that almost made me go insane.

 

Btw is a slippery surface achievable in tdm like thief1's ice? those rocked.

[etdarkb]

You would have to setup teleporters if you want to surpass the euclidian disposal of seperate rooms. Funny would also be a "shrinked" player, walking on walls/ceilings etc. Somehow I am thinking of an "Alice in Wonderland"-themed FM right now...

Separate room connected with teleports are the usual solution, but you see... not really mind blowing.

The teleport is of course fantasy but easy to imagine in our brain.

Instead think to two open doors, one very near the other... You sneakily watch inside one and sneakily watch inside the other and you see two large rooms... Of course there should be only ONE room or a wall between instead there nothing like that.

 

Or imagine you leave the room `1' and go in the corridor, open the next door go inside and you are in the room `2'.

Go in the other side of the room `2' and you enter room `1'. What?

 

This kind of things...

 

Anyway, if you're planning to do stuff like that, I strongly encourage you to support it with a good story and not something like: "You have just been drugged. Fight your hallucinations and get a cure!"... I could very well imagine an insane person though, sneaking its way out of the asylum. Not really thiefy and no proper guardmodels available, but maybe interesting.

Ehy! This is a nice story!

[STiFU]

Separate room connected with teleports are the usual solution, but you see... not really mind blowing.

Just to make sure we understand each other correctly: I was talking about how stuff like you described can be realized in Radiant. I was not describing a scene with two separate rooms and an actual big-ass teleporter in one of them... =)

 

 

Let me expand your example with the two doors. Imagine they were linked by a very small mystic U-shaped cave-tunnel in which you'd have to crouch. You pass through there and as you enter the original room again, you suddenly realize that you're in an enormous ballroom instead of the little lumber-room you started your travel from. This could be realized with a teleporter in the U-Tunnel without the player's notice. You have to use tricks like teleporters and cameras in Radiant because the tool is bound to the limitations of our known three-dimensional space. (That second example with the two rooms is a teleporter-trick too of course, or you build the same room again^^)

EDIT: Now that I think of it, I guess you could also pull it off by converting the geometry of the ballroom and the lumber-room to static meshes and out-of-world one of them by a script, but a teleporter would be the easier solution.

 

 

Edited December 29, 2009 by STiFU

[Crispy]

Prey and this indie game have little bits of what you're looking for, although neither takes it to extremes.

[firoso]

Prey and this indie game have little bits of what you're looking for, although neither takes it to extremes.

 

 

I really think this has the makings of an epic FM, I'd say pay homage to the Pagans and to Constantine's Manor. Wierd arcitectures, navigational puzzles playing off teleporters ( head north twice and then left twice link! ). If things get really tricky to pull off cleanly, CHEAT! You're talking about a steampunk universe of magic and metal! If modding magic doesn't work clealy, use the 'real' thing, spice up some hacky stuff by making it a visual element, whatever it takes, but I could totally see this being one of the best early FM's. Just trippy enough to be unsettling, just morbid enough to be creepy, just fantastical enough to be immersive, and all around good enough to be memorable.

 

Really tho I'm thinking a direct nod to constantine's manor, but don't rip it off... Maybe the same sort of premise. Break into the mansion of a know eccentric collector who has a penchant for the exotic and rumors of the black arts in his family's history. But unravel a devious plot, maybe set the player up, maybe even use it as a teaser "prelude" for a campaign or something... Just some ideas.

[demagogue]

Hidden teleports, mirrored areas, triggered architecture, movable/moving architecture, deformed/deforming architecture, shifting/changing gravity would be cool if it works ... lots of possibilities. You can mix things up so backtracking teleports you somewhere else, etc.

 

Interactive Fiction is one genre where alternative geometry has been explored for a long time (since it's text-only; it's much easier to "build"). I can think of a few IF games that played with some interesting ideas ... one I remember well had a model of the landscape in-game (built on a table) that was in fact the whole game landscape, too, so you could drop stuff onto the model that fell in the "real world", pick yourself or NPCs up, solve puzzles using one "world" to solve a problem in the other, etc. Lots of other ideas, too.

[STiFU]

Prey and this indie game have little bits of what you're looking for, although neither takes it to extremes.

Uh that Indie game looks interesting. Gonna check it later. But prey was definitely awesome too.

[plasticman]

There's a thread buried on D3W about faking Prey like portals in Doom: here.

 

The "inventor" later released a testmap for Quake4, but it seems links are no longer valid.

 

Interesting read however. He uses a combination of a teleporter, a portalsky, scripting and such. Would be nice if something like this could be done in a FM, a fitting storyline given.

[STiFU]

All the videolinks are down as well, so I successfully checked for some on

. It looks pretty good aside from some minor issues, like that bow-effect that is sometimes visible on the teleporter and that you actually see the playermesh for a brief moment when you go through the teleporter. Still definitely nice for use in a map like this...

[etdarkb]

The youtube example shows well the idea. I'd put the `prey-like portal' behind an apparently normal door for the maximum effect.

[plasticman]

Remember the clip shows a Quake 4 example. I may confuse things, but I think noone made it that far in Doom. Problem was getting more than just the player to teleport through the portal IIRC.