proof of concept map demo

by steve_e on 12/09/2007 11:02, 28 messages, last message: 12/15/2007 01:28, 7967 views, last view: 05/04/2024 21:08

Hi - have been mucking around with Sauerbraten for the past 3 weeks or so and have developed a 'proof of concept' that Sauer will be a suitable tool for a games development course I am writing for our state wide TAFE (college) system here in Western Australia.

I am loving this tool - spent quite a while tryng to find something that was simple to use for a level design unit. I was after something that was cross platform, single and multi player, networkable etc, and, did I mention, simple to use? Oh, and open source...

Anyhow, I lucked on Cube 2 via a forum somehwere when I was searching for other software. After stuffing around with Blender for a number of weeks and the Unreal runtime without a huge amount of rapid success, once I had downloaded Cube 2 I was extremely and pleasently surprised how rapid the development could be. This really suits my purpose of using software in the course I am designing that will enable students to quickly realise their level/map designs without having to build it all from scratch. This way they can concentrate more on design rather than technicalities - Fantastic!

So, anyhow, here is my 'proof of concept'. I wanted to jump between 2 maps, slow down game speed and adjust fog levels. Also I wanted to have a fair bit of environmental sound, tiggerable doors and a sense of narrative. So this is what I came up with:
http://tigerleo.com/igd/cube2/mydemo.zip

Has a couple of key bindings in an autoexec.cfg and a fly.wav sound that goes into the sounds/free folder. Apart from that there are two .ogz and two .cfg files plus a folder of music which unfortunately makes the zipped document blow out to 22.3 MB or so.

This is not a large map as the purpose was just to demonstrate what sort of things can be achieved rather than demonstrating blowing monsters away endlessly.

My first map was way too large and frame rate suffered:
http://tigerleo.com/igd/cube2/stevemap.ogz

Anyhow, thanks for the great software!!

Cheers

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#9: ..

by RealNitro on 12/10/2007 12:04

I'd really like to finish this demo, but I can't find the key anywhere... :-/

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#10: Re: .. 8 & 9

by steve_e on 12/10/2007 12:25, refers to #8

Q009 - With geometry are you refering specifically to the stream and the rough edges? And by texture bugs do you mean the little blue dots? If so, what causes that and how can it be fixed? The height mapping for the stream was trial and error and lack of planning, then stuff ups, deleting cubes without realising it etc etc..

RealNitro - I would like to tell you where the key is, but that would be givingf it away too much, Let me just say that you can see it and it isn't hidden too far from view.

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#11: Re: .. 8 & 9

by ATIRULE on 12/11/2007 01:29, refers to #10

if your on a ati card then its not your faults its bug with ati cards

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#12: Re: .. 8 & 9

by steve_e on 12/11/2007 02:28, refers to #11

Using Nvidia 8800 gts... Sauer states it can not set the Gamma when loading - I am certain I have the latest drivers as I spent a while getting it (the gpu) set up for different devices/applications...

---

6 x 8? - glad I did my times tables in primary school... ;)

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#13: Re: .. 8 & 9

by SheeEttin on 12/11/2007 02:40, refers to #12

Strange... Mind posting the entire output of Sauer while it's starting up?
Also, what's your OS? Windows?

On the map iteslf, I rather enjoyed it, though the carrot and key were a bit too well hidden (the key more so than the carrot). I made quite a bit of use of the slow-motion. Fun. :)
(Incidentally, it'd probably be better to put those settings in the map CFG rather than overwriting autoexec.cfg.)

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#14: Re: .. 8 & 9

by steve_e on 12/11/2007 03:47, refers to #13

Sauer output while starting up:

init: sdl
init: enet
init: video: mode
init: video: misc
init: gl
Renderer: GeForce 8800 GTS/PCI/SSe2 (NVIDIA Corportation)
Driver: 2.1.1
Rendering using the OpenGL 1.5 GLSL shader path
init: console
init: world
init: sound
init: cfg
Could not set gamma (card/driver doesn't support it?)
sdl:
init: localconnect
init: mainloopread map packages\base\met14.ogz (0.1 seconds)
Minig Station by metlslime
game mode is ffa/default

OS is Windows XP SP2

Yeah, wasn't too sure about placing stuff in autoexec - key bindings would not work in the map's cfg. I suppose I should be making a 'mybinding.cfg' and executing that from the autoexec.cfg?

As for the hidden carrot and key - so difficult to test when you know where you have hidden them - everything starts seeming obvious after a while and no matter how much you try to think like someone who hasn't played the map before, you almost immediately go to where you have placed the pick-ups... no doubt why having testers test the gameplay is important.

Thanks for the feedback! Cheers

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#15: Re: .. 8 & 9

by SheeEttin on 12/11/2007 04:17, refers to #14

The nVidia site gives http://www.nvidia.com/object/winxp_163.75.html for that card... Try it (if that's not what you're got).

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#16: nVidia drivers

by steve_e on 12/11/2007 07:29

Thanks for the link to the drivers - still no change with the gamma not being set. Still also gets the funny blue pixels on the stone texture...

Seem to be getting a higher frame rate, so it's not all bad ;) Cheers.

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#17: Follow up to demonstration

by steve_e on 12/13/2007 10:19

Well, I demonstrated my 'proof of concept' example to some of Perth's (Western Australia) High School, TAFE College, University and Industry representatives at a 'digital content industry reference group' meeting yesterday evening (12/12/07):

Strangely, for me, most of the discussion that followed centered around the cube script rather than the rapid development environment that Sauer offers. For sure, the audience recognised the ease of pushing and pulling the cubes and changing textures etc which enables the rapid development of map design for quick realisation of concepts, but it seemed that they were perhaps more impressed with the application of using Cube Script as an intro to scripting in general (which admittedly was not my aim - but, lol, my code is so elegant how could they not be impressed :P ).

My belief is that cube script is simple enough to crack to employ for additional interactivy for the game play, and something that scripting/programming students would not have to spend long to learn a few commands to access the triggers etc, so that was my sell of the language...

I was more concerned in selling Sauer as a tool for students to concentrate on the actual level/game play design and not mechanics of building a level or map. In the end this was generally supported in both the construction of map geometry and scripting in general so in all the demo was a success.

The actual demonstration of the map did not go all that well - I had built and only tested at 1920x1200 and running at 1024x768 for the projector made the movements rather quick and jerky. I had dificulty getting out of the water and was killed in an area where I have not died before causing the level to restart while still in the 'slowmo' mode (game speed 20, fog 64) which I had never done before...

As I was speaking during the demo I had no idea whether the audience was actually noting the triggered change in music tracks and environmental sounds, but some acknowledged that they did.

I ended up hurrying the second 'level' as time was beginning to run long and I was mindful that it was getting late. What was meant to be a 30 minute demo turned into a 70 mminute discussion, which in itself showed that people were paying attention and were wishing to discuss the possibilities of the tool. The main culprit that extended the start of the demo by causing me to restart it 3 or more times was one of my senior lecturing staff who (while playing devil's advocate) kept interupting the beginning of the level so as to draw attention away from the echoed text which formed the narrative - his point was whether the narrative could be recalled at some point if someone missed reading it. My reply was that of course this could be scripted and associated to a key binding and that something like a mission log and pick up list could thus be scripted by the students...

Screen shots I showed from my earlier map attempts, which I explained were very much just straight cubes, texturing, lighting and some built in map models, draw suitably sounding gasps of impression. The water quality Sauer offers was perhaps a favourite and has inspired one of my graphics lecturers to design worlds under water...

An industry rep, who had ealier given a talk on Agile, said he was very familiar with the original Cube and that the company he worked for wasn't too concerned about what tools students would employ in their studies, as long as they had a passion for game design/development, so he felt Sauer would enable them to pursue their passions as an entry level 3D game design tool with relative ease.

Therefore, I guess on reflection, it was a thumbs up to Sauerbraten and we (at my college at least) will be using it as an intro to level/map design, texturing and lighting, and game play scripting in the second half of 2008.

So, thanks for a great tool! It has certainly solved (what was for me) a great problem in determining the software selection for the 3D game engine part of the first stage of the course.

Cheers (if this forum had a thumbs-up smiley I would have used that here!)

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#18: Re: Follow up to demonstration

by Aardappel_ on 12/13/2007 11:45, refers to #17

very cool to hear :)

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#19: Re: Follow up to demonstration

by geartrooper2 on 12/13/2007 12:49, refers to #18

yeah congrats steve and aard.

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#20: Re: Follow up to demonstration

by JadeMatrix on 12/13/2007 13:48, refers to #17

Sounds great! Congrats on spreading Sauer.

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#21: Re: Follow up to demonstration

by MovingTarget on 12/13/2007 17:25, refers to #17

Awesome! I think Aardappel, eihrul, and all the other people who have worked on Sauerbraten deserve a huge thumbs up!

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#22: Re: Follow up to demonstration

by SheeEttin on 12/14/2007 04:10, refers to #17

> the narrative could be recalled at some point if someone missed reading it

Try F11. (Also the number pad's plus and minus.)

As for the rest of it, glad it's sparking interest.

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#23: F11

by steve_e on 12/14/2007 04:39

Cool - especially the plus and minus keys. Only problem is that it displays everything such as changing fog values which perhaps is not in the interest of creating the illusion.

I guess the thing is that it could be scripted which will make students think about what features they should consider when designing their level. Cheers

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#24: Re: F11

by JadeMatrix on 12/14/2007 13:55, refers to #23

Yeah, I hate the fog & fov echoes on the console. Why do they even have to be there?

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#25: Re: F11

by Hirato Kirata on 12/14/2007 15:38, refers to #24

Won't absolutely every variable based command echo when an argument isn't given, or if the argument given is too high or too low a value? I mean, /fog 6000 doesn't echo whole /fog does

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#26: Re: F11

by steve_e on 12/14/2007 15:58, refers to #25

Yeah, you are right - was echoing the edit based commands not the runtime commands...

But still, despite F11/plus/minus, this is the sort of stuff students should be thinking about coding and then doing a key binding to recall the narrative text/pickup list or whatever as not every tool is going to have an 'F11' built in.

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#27: Re: F11

by SheeEttin on 12/15/2007 00:28, refers to #26

> this is the sort of stuff students should be thinking about coding

You have a point there...
I was thinking about this recently, and thought that maybe a GUI, where a new tab is created for each new log entry. Tabs can be created depending on whether or not an arbitrary variable is set, which can be done with trigger aliases, which also allows the log entries to be pickups.

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#28: Re: F11

by steve_e on 12/15/2007 01:28, refers to #27

What a cool idea! I haven't looked at the gui code as of yet, but you have certainly given me more ideas to think of to put into the cube script authoring unit for the games programming stream. Fantastic! Cheers!

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