A few weekends ago my wife had to go to school to do some work while I was stuck at home for a couple of hours by myself. Usually this time is boring, or spent doing chores...but this time I felt like diving into the DA Toolset to get some work done on my MOD.
I fired it up and was working on some of the basics when I realized something: I don't really know how to add areas to the game. I mean, I know how to add the pre-rendered areas, but I don't know how to create my own! This would be a problem. Some of the areas and things I had envisioned would require creations of my own hand...
So I browsed to the Wiki and started poking around a little until I found a resource that showed me how to utilize the "level designer" -- this was fantastic. I finally found something I could use for my MOD that would allow me to create my own level. The problem with the level designer is that it is VERY confusing. There is a lot of information going on in the level designer, and not a lot of information explaining what it all does, what it is, or how to make it all work.
I would have to start basic.
I fired up a "day time, field" level and I did some more searches and figured out how to create "sunlight" to indicate that it was, in fact, during the day. Progress. Then, I started to mess around with the land scape a little bit. I used the morph tools and got comfortable with the way they allowed me to change the landscape. I messed with the texture painters and finally when I was ready to put my vision to life...I got stuck again.
"Where the heck is...everything?" I thought. I knew about placeables, but I didn't necessarily want to use placeables. I wanted to use something else..something like, environmental...you know? I wanted to put down boxes, and rubble, and fence posts, things like that..
A few more searches on the Wiki revealed that there is a way to put placeable "props" into the world by browsing to the specific directory and utilizing the tool that comes with the DAT..perfect, the only problem is that there is NO idea what anything is unless you're really good at reading code names.
I did a little more searching and found that there is an application that someone wrote which works wonderful with the Toolset. The application goes into the databases and allows the user to browse through the categories of the system and look at all of the placeable items prior to putting them into the world. It's set up in a way that it helps you find which folder, which item, and which name the item is under.
I then spent the next hour or so browsing through the database, looking at all of the awesome items I might want to include in my new level:
-Bails of hay, check.
-Fences, check.
-Wagon? Check.
-Old rubble? Check.
There were so many items.. I started to finally put my artistic side to use and instead of finding an item, placing it, lining it up, and then finding another item, rinsing and repeating, I decided to take another approach. Instead, I started placing all of the items onto the level at the same time in a giant pile and I figure I can then sort through them together later on, as I paint the landscape with my props.
The bad news is, I haven't had a lot of time to work on the editor while being sick and working on a lot of other art projects..so I haven't made any progress on my MOD for a long time. It's starting to feel scary...if I don't keep practicing I might lose out on how to properly work with the toolset, which can compromise the completion of the MOD..
At any rate, I will continue to work on it as soon as I can!
No comments:
Post a Comment