TF2 Arena Map WIP - Arena HauntedMansion

[kromano]

You still haven't copied the VMF or VMT or whassitextension to the texture's folder yet? Your vein still looks purple.

The real textures for your map look so cool, I wish you'd packed them in for Halloweeeeeeen.
anyone direct me toward some help on putting custom music/sound in TF2 maps like Escherhaus?

pretty-please?
Ambient_Generic. You can also write your own soundscape and have an ambient sound played from a specific proxy location as well, but I was too lazy to do that in Escher. I had a HELL of a time getting the sound to work though, it seems really, really picky in TF2 where sometimes an ambient will play, othertimes the same entity with the same settings won't play anything and has to be deleted and recreated. Here's some info I didn't know (http://forums.fortress-forever.com/showthread.php?t=17731) about sound files in Source.

I think what you're mostly after is learning about soundscapes. Most of the ambience in Source is from soundscape entities which provide wind noises, DSP effects, cricket noises, zombies, gunfire etc playing randomly in the background.

[TheNeverman]

so I need to copy Valve's texture into my texture folder to use it? I can't just reference a material that shipped with the game?

yeah, wish I could of included the custom textures for the halloween match - just didn't have enough time to figure it out before the match day... Burningman is actually handling most of the custom textures, so props to him for his professional help...

As far as sound - when do you use a ambient_generic and when do you use env_soundscape? What's the difference?

And how would I trigger a soundfile to just play once (no loop) at the beginning of the map load?



You still haven't copied the VMF or VMT or whassitextension to the texture's folder yet? Your vein still looks purple.

The real textures for your map look so cool, I wish you'd packed them in for Halloweeeeeeen.

Ambient_Generic. You can also write your own soundscape and have an ambient sound played from a specific proxy location as well, but I was too lazy to do that in Escher. I had a HELL of a time getting the sound to work though, it seems really, really picky in TF2 where sometimes an ambient will play, othertimes the same entity with the same settings won't play anything and has to be deleted and recreated. Here's some info I didn't know (http://forums.fortress-forever.com/showthread.php?t=17731) about sound files in Source.

I think what you're mostly after is learning about soundscapes. Most of the ambience in Source is from soundscape entities which provide wind noises, DSP effects, cricket noises, zombies, gunfire etc playing randomly in the background.

[kromano]

so I need to copy Valve's texture into my texture folder to use it? I can't just reference a material that shipped with the game?
Check the 7z I sent you, all the files are there you just have to copy the text script to the appropriate materials file that references the material file that came with the game.

As far as sound - when do you use a ambient_generic and when do you use env_soundscape? What's the difference?

And how would I trigger a soundfile to just play once (no loop) at the beginning of the map load?
Soundscapes are used for all ambience so that rooms aren't in a vaccuum. In general you should *always* use soundscapes and write your own sound script but in special cases, such as sounds that would trigger on an event like an alarm sounding, you could use an ambient_generic.

For a single play, no loop sound file at the start of (every) round, the easiest solution is an ambient_generic set with the "don't loop" flag on. Look up the entity on one of those entity lists and it'll give you a fair bit of information on how to use it and frequently tutorials on when and why.

[TheNeverman]

made it thru a small roadblock this morning trying to get textures to appear correctly on custom models... still trying to get a handle on sounds though...

more pictures soon...

[TheNeverman]

quick shot from the upper balcony

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3191/3069111301_6330e2925a.jpg?v=0

[diffx]

It's coming along nicely mate, looking forward to play it!

[kromano]

I meant to ask you, Nate, are the railings done as a prop model, or is it an alpha'd texture? It seems too clean, too crisp for a texture.

[TheNeverman]

hey diffx - yeah, I need to crack down and work on it some more to get it moving toward a 'finished' state... damn Fallout3!!!

kromano - the square structure of the railings is geometry and the fancy swirly stuff is alpha'd texture... in-game you can see it pixelate a tad when close to it...

[kromano]

based on that screenshot alone you did a very convincing job with it. I really couldn't tell if it was 3d or not.

Did you touch up the image? I've never been able to get alpha mapped edges that crisp. Anyway, get cracking on it man, or I'll sick Evan on you again to talk your ear off (here's hoping he doesn't read this post. Ahaha, yeah)

[TheNeverman]

thanks bud
=o)

no touch-up involved, the trick to a clean alpha is to paint beyond your mask area a couple pixels (on your color layer) so that you don't get any fringe/halo effect in game (since an 8-bit mask will have an antialiasing effect on the edges of the mask).

I'm sure Evan is busy working on his portfolio
=o)


based on that screenshot alone you did a very convincing job with it. I really couldn't tell if it was 3d or not.

Did you touch up the image? I've never been able to get alpha mapped edges that crisp. Anyway, get cracking on it man, or I'll sick Evan on you again to talk your ear off (here's hoping he doesn't read this post. Ahaha, yeah)

[WyattHarris]

Oh wow Nate, I was running around in game too much to really take a look at what you had made. The railings are primo mate! Integrating the CGS logo in like that is a great touch.
:thumbsup:

[TheNeverman]

wellll, these pics are from beta2 - beta1 (on the server) didn't have the new textures yet...


Oh wow Nate, I was running around in game too much to really take a look at what you had made. The railings are primo mate! Integrating the CGS logo in like that is a great touch.
:thumbsup:

[WyattHarris]

wellll, these pics are from beta2 - beta1 (on the server) didn't have the new textures yet...
Well...

Where's the new release? :arteest:

[TheNeverman]

It's still in the oven...
Had a recent clash of conscience and couldn't decide if I should leave it as Arena or try something else...
hmmmm

[TheNeverman]

Okay, so upon some more thought, and talking with some good folk (Sqizz and Meelo) I've decided to abandon this as an arena map - and make it a ZombeFortress map...
=o)

[diffx]

hey diffx - yeah, I need to crack down and work on it some more to get it moving toward a 'finished' state... damn Fallout3!!!

Yeah Fallout takes a lot of my spare time too. Do you have any version of the map online? Haven't been able to playtest it yet.

[WyattHarris]

Bah, you and your priorities. And hear I am waiting for an update and you've gone and changed the mode and everything. :D

[kromano]

Bah, you and your priorities. And hear I am waiting for an update and you've gone and changed the mode and everything. :DI know, huh? He's totally inconsiderate. Maybe if you posted some PROGRESS sometime we'd be less HOSTILE. I mean, I'd be less hostile.

[TheNeverman]

I think this map is going to be much more suitable in the darker 'mood' of ZombieFortress though...

I have new screenshots to post - will get them up this weekend...

[CooKiez]

Man if my brain is right, 'tomorrow' we play on cg talk server :)
Well tomorrow for me, because here in UK 2:00 in middle of night :(

Anyway Friday night FTW! :D

[TheNeverman]

new, darker lighting for ZombieFortress mode:

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3081/3208455124_fb6ab8cb49.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3467/3208455142_da6529ff0f.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3385/3207607477_08da26201d.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3075/3208081869_43f78588be.jpg?v=0

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3394/3208081943_7de55db3e0.jpg?v=0

[Brainsample]

The new wall around the edge really adds a lot. Love the pumpkins, can you smash them? Placing a small light/pumpkin near the metal/health pickups would make them stand out a little more.

[Shade01]

Man, I'm really digging this. You've managed to take something that at first glance you'd think wouldn't fit the tf2 aesthetic and make it work really well. It looks like something that would be fun to play.

[TheNeverman]

Pumpkins are not smashable (at the moment) might throw some physics on them later - right now just trying to make it 'playable' and then spice it up a bit later.

There will also be lights all over the place to illuminate the paths a bit more... just lots-o-stuff to do to make it playable right now...


The new wall around the edge really adds a lot. Love the pumpkins, can you smash them? Placing a small light/pumpkin near the metal/health pickups would make them stand out a little more.

[TheNeverman]

Thanks Rashad,

I've tried to stick to the slightly skewed proportions of TF2 - and I'm trying to copy the same style of textures (haven't quite mastered it yet).



Man, I'm really digging this. You've managed to take something that at first glance you'd think wouldn't fit the tf2 aesthetic and make it work really well. It looks like something that would be fun to play.

[WyattHarris]

Well, when's the next update? I'm tired of playing that dated copy on the server. :D

[TheNeverman]

hehehe, you and be both man, with those ugly stand-in textures...

I've been working on it the last couple days - close to a "playable" alpha. I'd like to get it up on the server - say next weekend to try out the pacing and spawnpoint positioning?... If your around that is...

[kromano]

hehehe, you and be both man, with those ugly stand-in textures...

I've been working on it the last couple days - close to a "playable" alpha. I'd like to get it up on the server - say next weekend to try out the pacing and spawnpoint positioning?... If your around that is...I don't think Wyatt actually exists. I think he's just a ghost in the machine. The photographs are composites of various other photos found on the internet. He'll be around, he's always around. He's like Skynet, only less deadly in real life, just in TF2.

[Swizzle]

I've seen his steely endoskeleton.
He has the heart of a machine, but that doesn't mean it can't be broken.

[TheNeverman]

look at you two... getting all poetic... whodathunkit?

[kromano]

It's poetry in motion. Speaking of motion, get to work on your darned map, Neverman. We need to see updates! Promises of zombies and arenas and kings of hills. Less words, more action! *cracks whip*

[CooKiez]

Yeah^ Get to work ;D

[Swizzle]

*cough*vaporware*cough*

[kromano]

http://www.coolest-toys.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/02/duke.jpg
Did somebody say Duke?

[TheNeverman]

lol...
nice... it is now my mission to finish this map - just to spite you guys...

[TheNeverman]

found a skybox I like quite a bit more...

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3338/3422349552_426fa0eed4.jpg?v=0

[Brainsample]

Ooh pretty.

[kromano]

Looking good, much better than before. Needs more cube maps, though. Less purple would enhance my calm.

[TheNeverman]

yeah, it's weird - without compiling cubemaps - sometimes the purple appears - sometimes it dosen't... weird eh?

[Swizzle]

I've found that some things will cause the cubemaps to break, while other things don't affect them. Adding things like areaportals and hint/skip brushes doesn't always do anything, but adding models and new visible brushes tends to.

[kromano]

I've found that some things will cause the cubemaps to break, while other things don't affect them. Adding things like areaportals and hint/skip brushes doesn't always do anything, but adding models and new visible brushes tends to.That, I wager, is because portals and hints only modify the vis portion of the map while models and new geometry modify everything. Well, not necissarily models...

[BoostAbuse]

This has a very close feeling to the original Mansion map from Counter-Strike Beta's :) Make sure to add a doorbell players can spam repeatedly just like CS used to.

[TheNeverman]

lol..... ahhhh the doorbell....

ran into a weird shader issue last week involving transparent textures - it's like the drawing order is backwards from certain perspectives

gate and fence look fine here:
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2705/4043765118_f9295363e3_o.jpg

But from this angle - the gate draws over the top of the fence:
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2444/4043030727_95da0e8945_o.jpg

[kromano]

There are so many potential causes for that one and I yet everything seemed fine from what you showed me.

I suggest double checking the shaders for both the fence and the gate to make sure they're lightmappedgeneric and whatever else could be going crazy in there. Or did you solve the problem yet?

[Swizzle]

Oooh, alpha sorting issues. Have you tried using $alphatest? You'll only get fully transparent and fully opaque if you use it, but it doesn't look like you actually need varying levels of transparency on those bars and I've heard that it can solve some alpha sorting issues.

[TheNeverman]

Well, recreated my shaders from scratch and still have the same prob
here's the fence:

"LightmappedGeneric"
{
"%keywords" "tf"
"$basetexture" "hauntedmansion/metals/fence1"
"$translucent" 1
$surfaceprop "metal"
}



and the gate shader:


"LightmappedGeneric"
{
"%keywords" "tf"
"$basetexture" "hauntedmansion/metals/gate1"
"$translucent" 1
$surfaceprop "metal"
}

[TheNeverman]

$alphatest 1 seems to fix the problem - I miss the nice, soft anti-aliasing of the translucent command, but I suppose it's better than the problem it was causing...

[kromano]

I thought you said you'd tried Alphatest already and it didn't work the first time? What's different the second time around...? Well, at least it's fixed.

[zen]

Translucent polygons do not sort with each other within an object, and translucent objects will sort to a limited manner with each other. This is not a valve issue, all current realtime rendering is like this.
This is because translucent does not draw to the depth pass - which is used to sort triangles. They dont draw to depth for the simple reason that every pixel location in the depth pass can only hold one depth value. Translucent materials would imply multiple depth values at every pixel location (you need to know whats behind), and therefor many depth passes. This isnt possible on current hardware/software.

AlphaTest (renders to depth) will fix the issue, along with reducing overdraw. Overdraw meaning that even if your alpha blend material is 100% opaque at some areas, the pixels behind those areas are still be drawn (the background) - and then drawn over! (Your AlphaBlend material).

Another way to help this would be to dissect the object. IE make multiple objects out of it. Generally to get a translucent triangle's depth, the engine will use the object worldspace position (the object's pivot). This helps, but does not perfectly fix the issue.


Nice work, i like the sky!

[TheNeverman]

yeah, i had tried it once before and it didn't work... might of fat-fingered the code or something...


I thought you said you'd tried Alphatest already and it didn't work the first time? What's different the second time around...? Well, at least it's fixed.

[TheNeverman]

thank you for the awesome technical explanation.
it had also been suggested to me to use a model instead of world geometry to fix the problem, but alas, i think this will work fine.

The sky I actually downloaded from fpsbanana
=)
I haven't seen anyone else use it yet...



Translucent polygons do not sort with each other within an object, and translucent objects will sort to a limited manner with each other. This is not a valve issue, all current realtime rendering is like this.
This is because translucent does not draw to the depth pass - which is used to sort triangles. They dont draw to depth for the simple reason that every pixel location in the depth pass can only hold one depth value. Translucent materials would imply multiple depth values at every pixel location (you need to know whats behind), and therefor many depth passes. This isnt possible on current hardware/software.

AlphaTest (renders to depth) will fix the issue, along with reducing overdraw. Overdraw meaning that even if your alpha blend material is 100% opaque at some areas, the pixels behind those areas are still be drawn (the background) - and then drawn over! (Your AlphaBlend material).

Another way to help this would be to dissect the object. IE make multiple objects out of it. Generally to get a translucent triangle's depth, the engine will use the object worldspace position (the object's pivot). This helps, but does not perfectly fix the issue.


Nice work, i like the sky!

[kromano]

Stop stalling! That's two Halloweens that have gone by and this map isn't done yet! Get crackin' boy! If you got time to look up talkin' Cajun, you got time to look up FINISHING THE MAP!

I only know of one playtest that crashed the server, so I haven't even SEEN new versions of your map since the first release last year!

[TheNeverman]

hehehe, well said my friend, well said

We played 15-20 mins this past weekend - I've converted it over to a king-of-the-hill map in order to meet the deadline, but it's still largely unfinished - big skybox holes and floating props all over...

I heard about the server crash, but wasn't present at the time. weird fluke. Vanilla is making some layout suggestions which may reduce the amount of work remaining to be done (making it overall smaller), still have several models and texture work to do, which I enjoy a LOT more than the actual map geometry.... just gotta get my focus back
:)


Stop stalling! That's two Halloweens that have gone by and this map isn't done yet! Get crackin' boy! If you got time to look up talkin' Cajun, you got time to look up FINISHING THE MAP!

I only know of one playtest that crashed the server, so I haven't even SEEN new versions of your map since the first release last year!