gamedevlists-design

Re: [GD-Design] A few questions

[Tom H. <to...@3d...>]

At 05:03 AM 9/16/2001, Death Hunter wrote:
>Hello all!
>
>     I have been waiting for such a game list for a long time now. I hope 
> the following questions belong here.
>
>1. When designing games, engine design is very important. So I was 
>wondering what is your method of choice for culling? BSP? Portals? 
>Octrees? Something else?

It depends entirely on the game itself. You need to decide what kind of 
worlds you need to represent, then chose a level description and engine 
style that gives you performance needed to make the game concept work. As a 
(very) general rule of thumb is that BSP and portal engines are good for 
interiors, and octrees / quadtrees (and their derivatives) are good for 
exteriors. You do a lot of culling in interiors, but exteriors are much 
more difficult do things like occlusion or PVS style culling. Since octrees 
are more flexible, I think we're seeing a lot of them used for both 
interiors and exteriors these days. Also, there's a lot of hybrid solutions 
(like octrees at a high level, with leaves containing BSP trees).

Design the game first, then figure out how much you can support with 
different engine types and at what performance. There's always a trade-off 
but until you know what the requirements are, designing the engine it 
really a waste of time.

>2. I am currently trying many different techniques, and I always need some 
>sampla level data. Can you recommend some (preferably free) level editors 
>with ability to export to a custom format, or at least with a good 
>documentation about the available format?

For interior and character modelling stuff, I'd look into the Quake 
editors. There's tons of free ones, and a lot of people that know how to 
use them.

Tom

RE: [GD-Design] A few questions

[Brian H. <pu...@py...>]

 
> It depends entirely on the game itself.

Actually, it really depends on what your product's strength is.  If you
have a great design and need the right technology, then base your
technology on the design.  But, if you have a great technology, try to
derive a design that leverages that technology.

Brian

Re: [GD-Design] A few questions

[Death H. <dea...@ga...>]

> >2. I am currently trying many different techniques, and I always need
some
> >sampla level data. Can you recommend some (preferably free) level editors
> >with ability to export to a custom format, or at least with a good
> >documentation about the available format?
>
> For interior and character modelling stuff, I'd look into the Quake
> editors. There's tons of free ones, and a lot of people that know how to
> use them.

As for modelling tools, I use Milkshape3D. It's not that expensive, and I
need a model editor anyway. Besides, it supports quake, hl, unreal... models
and animations, so I have lots of test data at the bare beginning. But I
still can't decide about the level editor. It seems Worldcraft is the
best... but people also like Quoole, Q3radiant... does any of you have any
experiences with some of them? And a question for Tom: what's the current
number of subscribers to this list?
Thanks, and I hope I'm not bothering too much.
DHunter.

RE: [GD-Design] A few questions

[Tom H. <to...@3d...>]

At 02:23 PM 9/16/2001, you wrote:
>
> > It depends entirely on the game itself.
>
>Actually, it really depends on what your product's strength is.  If you
>have a great design and need the right technology, then base your
>technology on the design.  But, if you have a great technology, try to
>derive a design that leverages that technology.

(It strikes me that almost every single post on the list is going to be 
someone's opinion .. heh)

If your intent is to make a game, then the game should be the most 
important thing and the engine, art, sound, and everything else are the 
tools and materials to make it happen. You design the tools and materials 
to meet the goals of the game. You don't design the game to meet the 
abilities of the engine. However, there are certainly limitations in the 
engine / platform that will most definitely affect the game design and 
those need to be understood, evaluated, and resolved during the design 
process as best as you can.

What Brian says has a lot of merit as well. If you have some technology, 
not enough time to build new technology, and content creators that are used 
to be working with the tools then it makes a lot of sense to try to come up 
with game concepts that will work within the existing engine. However, the 
original poster doesn't seem to have any existing tech, so I go back to, 
"What kind of game are ya making?" :)

Tom