Huckeye on 24/2/2005 at 17:50
Well, AI could not change from internal to external Cells which is more of what T3 is. (Morrowind 4 AI will though :D ) If you ever found a real nasty beast in a crypt you could run to the entrance, leave, heal, and then come back in and fight until almost dead, leave, repeat.
SubJeff on 24/2/2005 at 18:18
This from another thread. I thought it would be more at home here:
Quote Posted by null
Seriously though, we had bigger (at least, the size of a normal TDS mission without the loading zones) levels working on the PC without hitting the property max. You can't throw every object type in there (it's more about lots of instances of the same type), but you'll be a lot better off without the memory restrictions.
Performance, on the other hand, may be a balancing act. Go figure.
Darkwarrior_II on 24/2/2005 at 18:29
Quote:
Seriously though, we had bigger (at least, the size of a normal TDS mission
without the loading zones)
I think that answers a lot of questions, doesn't it? That's really the most important thing I see us getting out of the editor: levels about the size of those in Thief and Thief 2.
Gingerbread Man on 24/2/2005 at 20:34
Quote Posted by deadman
So yes,
Mr. Expectant :p
You keep saying that word. I don't think it means what you think it means.
d'Spair on 24/2/2005 at 20:55
Quote Posted by Darkwarrior_II
I think that answers a lot of questions, doesn't it? That's really the most important thing I see us getting out of the editor: levels about the size of those in Thief and Thief 2.
No, dozens times bigger, because we can make them consisting of dozens of huge sub-maps! :cheeky: I'm getting insane, actually.
Springheel on 24/2/2005 at 21:03
Quote:
I think that answers a lot of questions, doesn't it? That's really the most important thing I see us getting out of the editor: levels about the size of those in Thief and Thief 2.
He said levels about the size of *TDS*. Even without load zones, TDS levels were smaller than those of T1/2.
bukary on 24/2/2005 at 21:09
Quote Posted by Springheel
He said levels about the size of *TDS*. Even without load zones, TDS levels were smaller than those of T1/2.
2 load zones in TDS = 1 load zone in the editor.
2 load zones in the editor = more than 1 T1/2 mission.
:)
ProjectX on 24/2/2005 at 21:13
Quote Posted by deadman
It's time to let the Unreal specialists here see what's what with combining maps, or come up with some global maximums.
deadman.
I've been mapping in the Unreal Engine for 3 years, so I'm a n00b compaired to Ulukai, but from what I've pulled off in Ut2K4 will not be comparable to ThiefIII.
UT2004 was made by the company who made the engine, and as such the engine was probably optimised somewhat for the game.
I realise that "The Flesh Engine" or from now on known as "the changes" was made by Ion Storm and so they'd also be able to change things. But I'm talking about deep-base source code (or out-of-my ass as people prefer to say)
ut2004 (with an acceptable measure of Distance Fog) can pull off a densely-populated forest of dimensions 64kuu x 64kuu (uu = Unreal Units), including terrain and antiportals.
Thief III would die with this. This is probably down to the upgraded AI (although UT2004s AI was nigh on unbeatable for most it wouldn't react to the environment in the same way as the Thief AI should) and the lighting overhaul. Despite the series drop in texture resolution (from 512x512 or 1024x1024 pixels (2048x2048 for skyboxes) to 256x256) there has also been the addition of bump mapping and real-time high-res shadows.
As such I wouldn't recommend trying natural scenes (especially with BSP, eugh...) with ThiefIII., but it should be fine for manor houses and even a whole castle, but as I say it's hard to tell. Only trial and improvement will find the true limits of the engine.
Fingernail on 24/2/2005 at 21:14
Careful now. The T2 absolute limit is 1000x1000x1000 cube with brushes inside it. There are separate object and cell limits for sure, but to say that Thief 3 will be able to construct levels as vast or complex as Calendra's Legacy or indeed the Hammerite Imperium stuff is stretching it a bit, I'd think. These missions are seriously larger than any OM from T1 or T2. And of course, still playable.
How playable a fully-featured mission in T3 would be is still a fairly untested quantity, and would need to be extremely balanced and optimised, according to null.
Still, it's optimistic enough to hope for rejoining missions and creating ones slightly larger than T3 OMs. Just don't hope for the moon at this stage.
Potential hardware upgrades would make it more playable, no doubt, but this hardcoded property limit seems to be the biggest factor in limiting size at the moment, and that won't improve.
