The Lost Hallways Beta (formerly known as Castle of Hell)

[Dessicated corpse]

Why is it there then? What if people think I'm answering someone else when it's really them?

[Anthem]

Holy crap, you quoted the whole page.

In future posts please just reply to people who made long posts with @name.

For instance, if you wanted to respond to eraser you can simply do this:

@eraser

Message.

That being said, you do seem to reject a fair bit of constructive criticism. It's fine that you don't want to utilize everything we suggest, but you have to see it from our perspective. We have no idea what the layout is like because you haven't released a beta. We are commenting on a plethora of screen shots of the same dark areas of the map and trying to help you to the best of our ability. People will stop bothering to help if you blatantly ignore or reject any constructive criticism.

Now, obviously you seem not to think you are rejecting any constructive criticism. I guess that's the down side of communicating through text. The tone of your posts is implied, so for posts like these:

So, these guys were being sarcastic? ...(cont'd)

we get the feeling that you are being a smart ass.

This is a game, and most of the people here are players. You should know by now that people are rather laid back when they communicate with each other. If someone says something sarcastically just take it as lightly as possible.

I saw your topic on the Quake Live forums, and when anyone said anything negative about your map you got pretty pissed off. You have to realize that there will always be people who will not like your work. One of the best parts about this community is that it is accepting of new mappers and willing to help every mapper (regardless of experience or talent) make a better map. It's always good to have a reference other than your own because you may pick up on some great ideas.

Anyway, how are you taking these screen shots? Are you doing /screenshot (in console or through bind) or are you using print screen or a third party program like Xfire? The only way to capture a screen shot of your map in its full integrity is by using the screen shot command in game.

[Dessicated corpse]

I never got pissed off at someone for hating my map, if they hate it I wouldn't really care, I may have called someone a smartass for putting up pointless posts. And I'm not trying to be an asshole at all and I'm not trying to reject constructive criticism. And why is everyone so annoyed at quoting? Why would they have the quote button there if it's that annoying?

I use a bind in-game.

By the way, I don't play Quake Live anymore.

[Anthem]

People are annoyed by the quoting if it includes a page worth of pictures that need to be loaded or text that are easily circumvented by the method I posted above. Notice how I quoted you since you quoted two people in your post: I just typed "...(cont'd)" because quoting is simply to reference a post from a different source. If the post is just above yours (or earlier in the thread) then those who are in the thread are likely to know what you are referencing without quoting the entire source.

[Dessicated corpse]

Yes daddy .

[obsidian]

You also don't have to quote someone if their post is the one directly above your post (or even several posts if continuity permits).

[Dessicated corpse]

I tried the single brush thing which I don't really understand about but it doesn't work. And I'm having trouble aligning the textures of curved surfaces so they blend in with the other textures (as you can see). I've tried messing around with the shifting features on Surface Inspector but they don't work with curved surfaces, they don't do anything at all.

[Dessicated corpse]

And I'm not releasing the map yet, if I do it'll be totally unplayable and will have heaps of bugs in it. Why won't you just ask for the map file instead? Send me a PM if you want to.

[monaster]

As for the not/quote problem:
Allow me to quote myself to explain something again that I had written about only a week ago and that should have made this whole page of
"why?"
"cos of that"
"why?"
"still cos of that"
obsolete but obviously didn't:

Another thing that is totally unrelated to Doom4 or Rage 34 or whatever: if you're replying directly after another person's comment, it isn't necessary to quote every single word that is still visible one centimeter above, the quote tags should help if you're refering to something stated earlier than that. Otherwise it looks distracting and somehow ridiculous just like repeating everything someone else had just said before answering yourself.

I myself might have surely stressed quite some people's patience here with my constant questions about this and that , mostly a dozen at a time and then nothing for a month, but at least I tried to
a) read as much as possible that could prove helpful and has already been written before to avoid that the Q3W oldies didn't have to repeat every basic tutorial
b) remember what I've been told to watch out for (like our dos and donts of quoting for you 8 days ago).

[Dessicated corpse]

Alright! Stop it with the quote argument, it's not a big deal.

I'm redoing the sewage area..






I know it's dark, I'm going to add some more light don't worry.

[Dessicated corpse]

I've mixed 2 skies together using shaders. What do you think?

[Anthem]

I really like the pink part of that sky. I've never tried to mix skies before, so good luck with that.

[Quack]

For your sky shader, try adding
q3map_skylight amount iterations

Look here
http://robotrenegade.com/q3map2/docs/sh ... p_skylight

This will help illuminate an area evenly. If you don't have a moon, sun, or strong directional light source, then you want to increase the q3map_skylight amount which will help add soft ambient lighting. You can still use this in conjunction with q3map_sun or q3map_sunExt. But I would recommend using more intense skylight and less intense sun or sunExt.

[Dessicated corpse]

@Anthem

Thanks, here's the code I used..

textures/skies/tlhsky
{
surfaceparm noimpact
surfaceparm nomarks
surfaceparm nolightmap
surfaceparm sky

q3map_sun 4 3 3 65 290 75
q3map_surfacelight 50
skyparms - 512 -

{
map textures/skies/topclouds.tga
tcMod scroll 0.05 0
tcMod scale 2 2
depthWrite
}
{
map textures/skies/redcloudsa.tga
blendfunc GL_ONE GL_ONE
tcMod scroll 0.05 0.06
tcMod scale 1 1
}
}

@Quack

What's it meant to do? Because I tried it and it's not doing a thing. Am I doing anything wrong?

textures/skies/tlhsky
{
surfaceparm noimpact
surfaceparm nomarks
surfaceparm nolightmap
surfaceparm sky

q3map_sun 4 3 3 65 290 75
q3map_surfacelight 50
q3map_skylight 50
skyparms - 512 -

{
map textures/skies/topclouds.tga
tcMod scroll 0.05 0
tcMod scale 2 2
depthWrite
}
{
map textures/skies/redcloudsa.tga
blendfunc GL_ONE GL_ONE
tcMod scroll 0.05 0.06
tcMod scale 1 1
}
}

[Quack]

Try replacing q3map_surfacelight with q3map_skylight. If you actually read the Q3Map2 Shader Manual, you will see

q3map_skylight amount iterations

This replaces q3map_surfacelight and q3map_lightSubdivide on sky surfaces for much faster and more uniform sky illumination. Amount is a brightness value, similar to what you would use in q3map_sun. Good values are between 50 and 200. Iterations is an exponential factor. 3 is the best value that balances speed and quality. Values of 4 and 5 are higher quality at the expense of higher compile time. Values below 3 are not too useful

Comment out the q3map_surfacelight in your shader if you want to keep it for future testing. For your q3map_skylight, you need to add one more value which is the amount of iterations. Try something like this,

Code: Select all

q3map_sun 4 3 3 65 290 75
//q3map_surfacelight 50
q3map_skylight 50 3

And remember, you will need to adjust the amount of light for both the q3map_sun & q3map_skylight to find a balance so it's not too bright or too dark.

[obsidian]

See here:

http://robotrenegade.com/q3map2/docs/sh ... aders.html


Also Quack, note that the shader manual has a new home and has been updated a fair bit from the old one.

[Dessicated corpse]

@Quack

Done it, nothing's changed with the lighting at all.

[Quack]

@obsidian
Thank you for updating the link and providing a link to the examples about Light Emitting Shaders.

@Dessicated corpse
Read the post that obsidian posted about Light Emitting Shaders, this is very helpful. The change from q3map_surfacelight & q3map_skylight will look similar depending on the size & distance of obstructions that cast shadows or openings that allow light to illuminate an area. These changes will be subtle and difficult to notice, and since q3map_skylight is meant to replace q3map_surfacelight, it will look very similar. Q3Map2 Shader Manual says this about q3map_skylight,

This replaces q3map_surfacelight and q3map_lightSubdivide on sky surfaces for much faster and more uniform sky illumination.

You will only notice significantly faster compile times if you have a big map with a large surface area that is being lit by a sky shader. q3map_skylight does provide more uniform sky illumination, but this depends on the area that you are trying to illuminate. If it looks the same, use q3map_skylight instead and try different amounts of iterations like 1, 2, 4, or 5. Observe any differences and make a note of which one looks best.

I would also highly recommend seeing how an area is lit with only one of the three (q3map_sun, q3map_skylight, q3map_surfacelight). Comment out two of three, compile it, take a screenshot. Do this for all three, like this

q3map_sun 4 3 3 65 290 75

Code: Select all

q3map_sun 4 3 3 65 290 75
//q3map_surfacelight 50
//q3map_skylight 50 3

q3map_surfacelight 50

Code: Select all

//q3map_sun 4 3 3 65 290 75
q3map_surfacelight 50
//q3map_skylight 50 3

q3map_skylight 50 3

Code: Select all

//q3map_sun 4 3 3 65 290 75
//q3map_surfacelight 50
q3map_skylight 50 3

Take these three screenshots and compare each individual light source and see how it lights your area. Then try combining q3map_sun with q3map_skylight, or q3map_sun with q3map_surfacelight. Try experimenting and see what happens. Look for differences and then decide how you want to illuminate the area with your sky shader.

[Dessicated corpse]

I took shots, they all look the same to me.