Plan for FruitBatInShades
by FruitBatInShades · 11/30/2004 (2:38 pm) · 15 comments
Medieval Pack
I've been hard at work on the content pack, things are coming along but a lot more slowly than I'd like. I seem to be spending more time trying to figuire out rendering problems that actually modelling at the moment.
Latest nearly-done models
To see whats going on in terms of content, check FruitBats content pack out
DIF, I hate DIF!
I've decided that Map2Dif really, really hates me! I swear it's a personal vendetta! Who put AI into map2dif and made it know I was using it? I truely belive that it is the spawn of satan and should be blessed as soon as possible!
I am sooo fed up of light leaks, that turn out not to be light leaks at all. I have found all sorts of strange reasons for them and am now convinced that there is a problem with the light mapping!
I work very studiously, backing up, checking in Torque after every change to the exterior brushes and still things go awry. There are no light leaks in the models, but as soon as you put in lighting, wierd spots start to appear and I don't want to hide them with spotlights etc. I WANT THEM GONE...GRRRRRRRRRRR!
I have discovered an lot about mapping so check out this thread, where I share my hard gained knowledge.
The future
To be honest I am sick to the back teeth of modelling. I am just about ready to delete the whole collection. I am fed up of testing, developing, testing only to find light probs way too far down the line to sort out. They randomly appear at wierd points in the process. I won't have touched any architectural brushes, just add a new light and light leaks appear somewhere in the map 5 miles away!
This is turning into a rant so i'll shut up before I start on people I shouldn't.
Have fun and check out those links if your thinking of DIF modelling, they could save you HOURS of messing about.
I've been hard at work on the content pack, things are coming along but a lot more slowly than I'd like. I seem to be spending more time trying to figuire out rendering problems that actually modelling at the moment.
Latest nearly-done models
To see whats going on in terms of content, check FruitBats content pack out
DIF, I hate DIF!
I've decided that Map2Dif really, really hates me! I swear it's a personal vendetta! Who put AI into map2dif and made it know I was using it? I truely belive that it is the spawn of satan and should be blessed as soon as possible!
I am sooo fed up of light leaks, that turn out not to be light leaks at all. I have found all sorts of strange reasons for them and am now convinced that there is a problem with the light mapping!
I work very studiously, backing up, checking in Torque after every change to the exterior brushes and still things go awry. There are no light leaks in the models, but as soon as you put in lighting, wierd spots start to appear and I don't want to hide them with spotlights etc. I WANT THEM GONE...GRRRRRRRRRRR!
I have discovered an lot about mapping so check out this thread, where I share my hard gained knowledge.
The future
To be honest I am sick to the back teeth of modelling. I am just about ready to delete the whole collection. I am fed up of testing, developing, testing only to find light probs way too far down the line to sort out. They randomly appear at wierd points in the process. I won't have touched any architectural brushes, just add a new light and light leaks appear somewhere in the map 5 miles away!
This is turning into a rant so i'll shut up before I start on people I shouldn't.
Have fun and check out those links if your thinking of DIF modelling, they could save you HOURS of messing about.
About the author
#2
11/30/2004 (3:05 pm)
Very nice work :)
#3
11/30/2004 (3:47 pm)
Nice job Tutti Fruity Bat. Keep up the good work. 
#4
11/30/2004 (3:58 pm)
Could you make a lightweight version of theis pack for the RTS pack?
#5
I just read a great quote that was posted in my departments forum that I feel is pretty relevant:
"I've come to believe that habit is the background against which epiphany happens". -Gregg Bordowitz (New Media Artist)
The stuff is looking good... dont let the roadblocks stop you. :)
11/30/2004 (4:35 pm)
Fruitbat, I gotta hand it to you... despite the problems, your work is looking good. I just read a great quote that was posted in my departments forum that I feel is pretty relevant:
"I've come to believe that habit is the background against which epiphany happens". -Gregg Bordowitz (New Media Artist)
The stuff is looking good... dont let the roadblocks stop you. :)
#6
11/30/2004 (8:07 pm)
Good work fruitinbatshoes, i gotta agree with you that map2dif is evil. I think the mapping/world should be redesigned to compete with the new engines. But thats just my IMO ;). 
#7
Good luck to ya.
-Jase
11/30/2004 (10:39 pm)
Your stuff looks good. I hate to see you held back by map2dif's short comings. Hopefully this stuff will get resolved at some point. Good luck to ya.
-Jase
#8
I know that feeling about sick of modeling , im there every week :)
Dont give up , you doing some real nice work .
All have good and bad days !!
DONT STOP !!
-Billy
11/30/2004 (10:55 pm)
Really good work Fruitbat .I know that feeling about sick of modeling , im there every week :)
Dont give up , you doing some real nice work .
All have good and bad days !!
DONT STOP !!
-Billy
#9
Just a bit fed up with it at the mo. I'm trying to get some help from the map2dif people as we speak, if my 80 room building develops lighting anomolies and I still haven't got a reply by then I am quitting. Hopefully I'll be able to get a response and get some of this sorted!
If any of the map2dif/interiors persons are reading this "I am offering myself as a FREE tester/debugger with full examples and reports"
I can't offer more than that.
12/01/2004 (12:15 am)
Thanks Guys. Just a bit fed up with it at the mo. I'm trying to get some help from the map2dif people as we speak, if my 80 room building develops lighting anomolies and I still haven't got a reply by then I am quitting. Hopefully I'll be able to get a response and get some of this sorted!
If any of the map2dif/interiors persons are reading this "I am offering myself as a FREE tester/debugger with full examples and reports"
I can't offer more than that.
#10
That said, there should be some good map2dif improvements coming down the pipe...
12/01/2004 (9:41 am)
You make it sound like we have people dedicated to map2dif. :) The entire technical staff for Torque is something like 4-5 people, counting _very_ generously. GG itself is only around 15 people! No one is dedicated to any particular task; there's simply too much to do.That said, there should be some good map2dif improvements coming down the pipe...
#11
I think the whole community is praying for a good map2dif ASAP. To get more cool games from the developers i think
the most important thing firstly to give them GOOD, EASY2USE, and fairly DOCUMENTED tools. I hope sometimes all this
things will be true about all the TGE tools.
.
Damn , what the hell the other 10 guys making there ?Catch them and let start them to code map2dif RIGHT NOW !
.
.
8;o)
12/01/2004 (12:41 pm)
BenI think the whole community is praying for a good map2dif ASAP. To get more cool games from the developers i think
the most important thing firstly to give them GOOD, EASY2USE, and fairly DOCUMENTED tools. I hope sometimes all this
things will be true about all the TGE tools.
.
Damn , what the hell the other 10 guys making there ?Catch them and let start them to code map2dif RIGHT NOW !
.
.
8;o)
#13
This stuff is hard, I don't care how good the tools are. Learning Maya, or Max, or Blender is hard. Even Photoshop is difficult. Of course, Quark is not a work of art. Map2dif has problems. But, these processes have been proven to work over the years. I'm not saying it is perfect. But, it does work. Can it be better... yes. Will it be better... yes. In the meantime, it has been used to ship many games. Sometimes this stuff is creaky, but works. We are not Adobe or Microsoft. But, we are trying hard.
12/01/2004 (7:19 pm)
Wait a minute. Did anybody see Tim Aste's content packs? Tim did all of those BEFORE he came to GG. Tim used map2dif. He got NO additional support from GG other than the documentation that is available on this site. Tim's content packs took 28 days of work.This stuff is hard, I don't care how good the tools are. Learning Maya, or Max, or Blender is hard. Even Photoshop is difficult. Of course, Quark is not a work of art. Map2dif has problems. But, these processes have been proven to work over the years. I'm not saying it is perfect. But, it does work. Can it be better... yes. Will it be better... yes. In the meantime, it has been used to ship many games. Sometimes this stuff is creaky, but works. We are not Adobe or Microsoft. But, we are trying hard.
#14
But atleast theres some comfort in knowing you guys are planning to make it better, and I've always been confident that you guys will improve whatever you can, whenever you can. And believe me, I appreciate all the effort you guys have put into everything you have done.
-Jase
12/01/2004 (11:28 pm)
You guys at GG can only do so much at a time. I would like to see improvements to map2dif as much as the next guy, however I understand you guys have a lot of other stuff on your plates. But atleast theres some comfort in knowing you guys are planning to make it better, and I've always been confident that you guys will improve whatever you can, whenever you can. And believe me, I appreciate all the effort you guys have put into everything you have done.
-Jase
#15
Try not to take it too personally. I've worked for only small companies. In my first company I was the only developer for about 90 percent of the time and worked there for 10 years. I designed, developed and supported the product myself and it was a very good product. In this current company, which is a start-up, it's the same situation for about 2 years now. I'm the only developer, supporting and engineering the product. The point I'm making is that I understand what it's like to work with limited funding and time.
Torque is a great product even with it's bugs. But the point that people are trying to make is that even if there are bugs which you can't get to we need a system by which they are documented and work-arounds can be clearly understood. In the case of map2dif, I'm sure the same bug has been discovered many times over. And I have to admit that I was a bit taken back when I saw the release for the RTS pack. It's great and I think it will really add to the community but what about some of the more glaring problems? I keep hearing about changes in map2dif but no more information than that.
It's great that Tim Aste was able to build those building in 28 days. That's wonderful for him. But perhaps he could have done it in 10 days. Also remember that others are not as good as he is and a tools effectiveness should not be measured by the success of the outstanding.
Think of it this way, how much time have you lost responding to these types of rants? How much time as been lost getting games to market due to map2dif lighting problems?
It's not that people are looking for every bug to be fixed, it's impossible and too much. But at least document the work-arounds or let us know what the problems are. It's frustrating spending so much time finding problems that are already known. I know the search can help but for people who are new it's hard to even know what to search. I'm new to this end of development and had light problems but I didn't even know it was light-map problems. I had no idea to search for that term, now I know but before I assumed it was me.
This is getting a bit long winded so I'll stop here. Again, it's not that the product is bad or not appreciated. It's just frustrating spending time discovering something that has already been discovered time and time again.
12/02/2004 (5:44 am)
Jeff,Try not to take it too personally. I've worked for only small companies. In my first company I was the only developer for about 90 percent of the time and worked there for 10 years. I designed, developed and supported the product myself and it was a very good product. In this current company, which is a start-up, it's the same situation for about 2 years now. I'm the only developer, supporting and engineering the product. The point I'm making is that I understand what it's like to work with limited funding and time.
Torque is a great product even with it's bugs. But the point that people are trying to make is that even if there are bugs which you can't get to we need a system by which they are documented and work-arounds can be clearly understood. In the case of map2dif, I'm sure the same bug has been discovered many times over. And I have to admit that I was a bit taken back when I saw the release for the RTS pack. It's great and I think it will really add to the community but what about some of the more glaring problems? I keep hearing about changes in map2dif but no more information than that.
It's great that Tim Aste was able to build those building in 28 days. That's wonderful for him. But perhaps he could have done it in 10 days. Also remember that others are not as good as he is and a tools effectiveness should not be measured by the success of the outstanding.
Think of it this way, how much time have you lost responding to these types of rants? How much time as been lost getting games to market due to map2dif lighting problems?
It's not that people are looking for every bug to be fixed, it's impossible and too much. But at least document the work-arounds or let us know what the problems are. It's frustrating spending so much time finding problems that are already known. I know the search can help but for people who are new it's hard to even know what to search. I'm new to this end of development and had light problems but I didn't even know it was light-map problems. I had no idea to search for that term, now I know but before I assumed it was me.
This is getting a bit long winded so I'll stop here. Again, it's not that the product is bad or not appreciated. It's just frustrating spending time discovering something that has already been discovered time and time again.
Torque Owner Dracola
edit
hmm maybe I should put a bit more encouragement than that
i'm sure things will turn out well (what you have so far is a lot better than anything I could ever dream of making. well maybe you should take a small brake (i do that much to often)