Morrowind style...

[Farrowlesparrow]

This isn't really Hl2 related but its map related. Ive just started work on a few maps. There isn't a big amazing story, but I'm trying out a map system similar to that in the game of Morrowind. I'm not sure how many people have played the game, but in that when you entered a building, instead o just walking in, it would load up its own little map. Then when you are outside you travel between lots of different cells. Obviously it works different in Halflife but I'm just testing out the idea to see if it works. It seems that, with regards to interiors anyway, it would allow for a lot more detail, and you could also incorporate a lot less linear play into a map/map series. Anyway, for those of you that actually understood what i meant, it would be nice if i could have you opinions and suggestions on the matter. Thanks.


PS I think something similar has been attempted with a few mods but I'm not sure if they pulled it off. I cant remember.

 

[=Coy0te=]

seems like a cool idea!!! When your done with one of the maps please give me a link that I can download it off even if it is in very early statges and i mean very early I just want to see how this would work in the HL engine:bounce:

 

[Farrowlesparrow]

Yay. Positive feedback. Ive only jsut started i the same time i posted that. So it doesnt ahve any level changes or anything in it yet...il try to find somewhere to get it hosted when its further on though

 

[Archangel]

hm...remember that Morrowind needs lots of RAM, or it will run jerky. The loading times between the cells slow the gameplay and are alittle annoying.

 

[Stone]

hmmm, sounds interesting, If all goes well you could become famous my friend...no ok not really, but i'd like to see the results of it, sounds good

 

[dawdler]

It should be in *theory* possible, but one need to reduce map size. A full cell HL2 size would be to much to load in an outdoor enviroment. It wouldnt be very fluent transition... The Morrowind cells are relativly small outdoor and larger indoor.

But the foremost problem: You have to alter the entire system of loading levels outdoors. You need to load them in a huge circle pattern around you dynamically, and that's quite different from standard HL style.
Indoors should work just fine, its the same system as HL.

 

[Farrowlesparrow]

Ive been thinking about the exterior. With the way Hl map works, at the moment i would just have to make the map, then ad parts of the surrounding areas, but make it so the level changes before you reach the edge.

Hail my drawing skills!
Imagine that the inner box is the actual map you can walk around in and do stuff. Now imagine that the outer box is how big the whole map actually is. So, you can see it, but when you move over tha inner line it loads up the next bit.

Very inefficient to be honest...but it seems like a nice idea. Anyway, im just trying this for Halflife. Just to see how it works. i dont plan on doing any coding or anything, this is purly done with mapping.

EDIT: damn stupid thing. Picture doesnt work prperly. Il re do it.

 

[dawdler]

So you mean overlapping squares? Yeah, that can work... But it wont be an exact world (you have a single start point in the new one, no matter where you exit the old). Or a system like Zelda OOT have? (emulated, hehe)

 

[Farrowlesparrow]

Yeah, overlapping suares is basically what i meant. TO be honest, this isnt rellay meant to be all that practical, i just wanted to see if it could be done in the HalfLife engine.


Oww. My head hurts. Ive jsut been working on the exteriors and i really am getting a headache.

 

[dawdler]

Everything can be done with an engine you have source to

The easiest and best looking way would still be circle loading though, and relativly short view range. I'm sure it can be done, its just a matter of loading on the fly. The stupid theory is that if each cell has a list with cells and positions within the circle, you just load the extra cells that arent already loaded, and remove the cells that arent listed and is loaded. This way you get a countinous HL map.
Of course, the mapeditor would be crap for it, you'd have to model each cell individually without looking at the other... Not to mention piecing together that list.

 

[UDHA]

Morrowind runs like a sloth with arthritis only because it was never coded well, it was just left un-optimized, similar to the Doom3 Alpha, however, Doom3 is going to be optimized, I'd say all games are, but Morrowind was done poorly.

 

[dawdler]

Originally posted by UDHA
Morrowind runs like a sloth with arthritis only because it was never coded well, it was just left un-optimized, similar to the Doom3 Alpha, however, Doom3 is going to be optimized, I'd say all games are, but Morrowind was done poorly.

Depends on how you look at it. Morrowind was capable of rendering around 100,000 polygons (and that's raw, it doesnt remove any backfaces, it lits and animate everything) at 15 fps on a 700mhz/GeforceDDR. Can Doom III do that? Can HL2 do that? Do you know ANY engine that can do that?
At anyrate, that isnt the issue at hand...

 

[Farrowlesparrow]

100,000 polygons? Wow thats quite impressive actually, i never realised that. It always ran so well on my crappy computer as well

 

[Nostradamus]

sounds like a god idea..kind of....think i would grow tired of the waiting...

but how will you do the transistion between maps..that is what confuzes me

 

[dawdler]

Originally posted by Farrowlesparrow
100,000 polygons? Wow thats quite impressive actually, i never realised that. It always ran so well on my crappy computer as well

Yeah, I know
I made a small flying island (my own 1337 modelling) and built a castle on top of it (with a cool , along with a waterfall running down on tiny floating islands with rocks on (and it was so high up you couldnt see it from below, it looked really cool) and a few buildings and trees, I beleive the total amount of polys on the cell was around 150-200k in the end (you have to count away the ground beneath, though it was mostly ocean), and yes you could see every single poly on max viewrange. It was still playable, but much on the limit, could drop to lower than 10 fps sometimes. Still, that was on a crappy GeforceDDR. A G4 might have handled it (the ATI cards cant really, the Morrowind engine does not favor their hardware design).

 

[Cunbelin]

Just a thought, what if you used a scaled map for the exterior, say 1 unit equals 1 foot, that gives you over 3 cubic miles to work with, you lose some precision when placing models, but if you are using a mesh instead of brushes there isn't really a problem. Then you can have maps for interiors that have a smaller scale allowing you more precise model/object placement.

Though I could be wrong, you figure if player placement stays the same despite scaling you should be able to place models however you want, and if you are able to do that, you could theoretically skip even loading the interiors. Of course to have true variety in that much space you are talking massive amounts of data to load, perhaps too much for most computers.

My bad at 1ft per unit you end up with around 6 cubic miles.

 

[Cunbelin]

Wow now I want to try working on this scale. I mean you could never get that full draw distance, but I think with some tricks you could get a close aproximation. Heh damn you've just inspired the first really solid mod idea I've had for this game.

 

[dawdler]

How about a mix? 18 cubic miles (28km) is still not enough for a real ground world. But it is if you use the sky!!! Use floating islands, and build them higher on top of each other. Do massive bridges in between. This will create a huge world, that would be like 10 times as large as a terrain world. The greatest gain: No borders! Since each island will be nonuniform and have no edge (except the edge of course, but it wont have a map edge) you create an illusion of a world even if its contained inside a box.

 

[Cunbelin]

uh I'm sorry but 18 miles for a game is fuxing huge, if your character is able to travel a whole mile in two minutes (that is like a flat out sprint in real life beating all current world records) you are talking over a half an hour to travel across the whole of the map, this is if you move in a straight line, not counting moving up or down, or having to zig due to impenetrable areas, nor does it account for enemy encounters.

 

[Farrowlesparrow]

Im sorry....I havent got a clue what you guys are talking about.

 

[dawdler]

Originally posted by Farrowlesparrow
Im sorry....I havent got a clue what you guys are talking about.

Hehe
Well, the main thing was that unlike HL, HL2 can apparantly scale pretty easy (and Gabe said the physics scaled automaticly). So you could in theory make a CRAPLOAD bigger maps than normal HL2. The loss would be precision of placing and terrain smoothness (dependant on upper limit for the intersection tool). You could make HUGE maps not needing to build them in cells. Of course, you'll want quite a bit of fogging (like Morrowind)... But maybe not as much, since it will LOD...
For example, imagine the E3 video, buggy section. Now imagine you where only as tall as the buggy wheel... Now imagine walking to the docks

 

[Farrowlesparrow]

Ohh. I thought you were still talking about normal Halflife.

I get ya now.

 

[synth]

you could take advantage of the fact that not only is the width and length of the map much larger, but the height is too. so you could actually have a world all the way across, then sky above it, then another world just above the sky that they teleport to when they hit the edge of the bottom part.


BTW, what's that thing you can place like a wall so it doesn't draw any objects behind what it's covering when you look at it? it really cuts down ploy counts and lag times.

 

[dawdler]

I beleive the technical term is: SuperDuperHighTechAwesomeApparatusOfBlockingPolys

Anyway, it isnt as important in HL2. Gabe said that props cull automaticly when you dont see them... If one got a huge level, portals might help a bit.

 

[Nerdy]

If u have heard of the mod Quest for HL they use something similar
when u goto enter a building it teleport you to a room far above the part of the level to allow better detail in maps and for their diablo like view

 

[OCybrManO]

I made a map in HL that was multi-layered (I only made 4 extra layers... one for extending each side of the level... but in HL2 you could probably make extensions for those layers too) and the transitions felt almost seamless because I took the time to make the edges of the levels you were being transported to and from look exactly the same.
You also had to make sure the player could never see the end of the world... that was slightly trickier. I deleted it because I had no use for it.

In HL2 you could also use camera screens to aid in making the world look seamless.

With the new possible height of the HL2 levels you could easily have enough room to make a level with a total area that is 9 times the area of a standard HL2 level... and that's without scaling anything.