Quake 3 .map can work in TGE???

#41 If the NULL brushes are not in DETAIL entities, they won't work properly as collision brushes.

#42 Not true

#43 Matthew, you are correct ONLY if the NULL brush does NOT intersect other structural brushes. If it does, it needs to be in a DETAIL entity to avoid rendering issues (e.g. the Hall of Mirrors effect). So I simply make all my collision brushes with the detail entity to avoid this potential problem.

#44 I'm just happy to see so many people working on detailed interiors. Torque (esp. 1.2) is so proficient with outdoor rendering that many people don't think about making serious interior levels which is unfortunate in my view.

1) Interiors, having less visible area than exteriors, tend to render more efficiently allowing a faster framerate.

2) A well designed interior makes for better action. You can force players to get in close to engage their opponent and decide how much cover you want to supply for sneak attacks and evasion manuevers, etc.

#45 Desmond, after a long delay, I finally did what you had stated, however I'm still getting a map2dif error on the first brush. Could I email you my file? Let me know.

#46 Absolutely, NP

#47 @Virtual Campus
I opened your map file and the next to last poly is broken (not sure how it got that way) -- looks like one of the floodlights on the ground got broken during rotation or cutting...anyway, delete the broken poly and try another.

You can see broken polys fairly quickly in the poly list (the poly icons or poly face icons have cut lines thru them):
or you will see green lines on the screens

#48 @Desmond,

Thanks for the help. It worked for that small map. I tried it with the bigger map and removed some 300 broken polys. However, after running map2dif through Quark, I get the following error:

::createBaseWinding: Bad face on brush. < 3 points. DMMNOTE: Handle better?

This map may be too large for the map2dif utility as it takes 10-15 minutes on my P4-1.8 machine.

Let know if you have any advice.

Thanks.

#49 I don't think size is the problem--I've got maps with thousands of polys...the hard limit is 32000 if I remember right. But let me ask: if you're getting the < 3 points error, it sounds like you're not using the latest version of map2dif that handles floating point coordinates. That error is typically caused by a vertex being rounded off (therefore being moved and the face collapses). This might also have been part of all the broken polys. You might try the latest version of map2dif...and if you haven't tried the radiosity enabled version, you should.

Another thought, in QuArK you can group polys, right click on the group in the list window to the left, and select ignore to build (of course, you can also hide, change colors, etc). I would suggest that you ignore to build everything but say, the north of campus, compile the north side, then repeat that process for the south side, and so on.... or do this process by building. This would make the whole process a LOT more manageable and you will be able to locate the error points a LOT easier. I prefer working by building rather than large groups of buildings: makes the editing faster, textures load faster, compiles go faster, etc.

#50 @Desmond,

I've got the latest version of the map2dif utility so that shouldn't be the problem. Could it have something to do with Quark?

#51 Question: if you break your map into smaller groups (as I mentioned above) and use the ignore to build on all groups but one, are there any groups in particular that will not compile?

I think the key here is to make the management of your project more, well, manageable :)

#52 Desmond, I'll check it out. Thanks for your help!

#53 NP, keep us posted on your progress... Tracking down problem brushes has always been a problem--this grouping approach has been the fastest way to find them. But this leads to a new objective: I would like to have map2dif do a better job of reporting which are bad brushes and/or at least not kill the compile process-->rather, simply bypass bad brushes, spit out a report on which ones are bad. This hasn't been at the top of my TODO list but it sure would make everyone's work a bit easier.

#54 Does anyone have the source to map2dif? I would like to take a look at it and see what I can come up with.

#55 Anyone who is a licensed member has the source :)
Got $100 -- then you Got Source :)

#56 I have the source. Where in the source is it located? Does it have to be compiled with the torque engine, or can it be compiled separate?

#57 The map2dif source is located in the tools folder; typically it is compiled with everything else but with the radiosity code added it needs to be compiled separately (for now until we figure out how to make it link properly).