Boogalou on 7/4/2005 at 16:28
Ok, I've been fully and completely sucked into this evil editor now. I can't seem to make myself stop tinkering with the stupid thing. I've made a couple really lame missions so far that I would never show anyone. Currently I'm on super tower #3 (don't ask). I'm thinking that maybe by this time next year I might have something worth sharing with people. This thing is time consuming as well as addicting.
So how long does it usually take you guys to complete a FM?
Any interesting stories out there about someone staying up 48 hours straight and finishing an amazing FM? I wonder how long it took that Sledge guy to finish The Inverted Manse?
I'm bored and at work, entertain Boogalou!!! :p
scumble on 7/4/2005 at 16:38
As far as T3ed is concerned, nobody knows. I do think it's a fairly unanswerable question though. You could spend weeks, months or years on one.
Dark Arrow on 7/4/2005 at 16:38
In Dromed, from few weeks to months to a year or two. Ofcourse you can make a crappy fm in a few days and a decent one in that time if you are really good.
SneaksieDave on 7/4/2005 at 17:23
I'm finding confirming (to myself) that it all seems to come down to planning. If you have no plan, it will be a disorganized piece of crap, uninspired, tedious to create, and will taunt you along the whole long process. However, if you have a plan, and a good one, it can come together really fast. T3Ed is fast and largely stable and use of static meshes speeds things along so much that it's almost silly. Years ago, I worked on an area in DromEd for months (never released (never finished)) which took about 2 weeks of nights in T3Ed to reproduce. It's almost half a mission already, because I had a plan of sorts - the old DromEd mission. Now that I've run off my blueprint though, I've stalled. Need to sit down and be disciplined enough to make a floorplan for the next section. Working from the head just doesn't work well, unless you're one of those ultra-talented autistic artistic types.
2003MINI on 7/4/2005 at 18:24
I'm fully expecting my first FM to take me about 6 months or more. I've never used a 3D editor before, so I have a huge learning curve. I have a story line to follow, however, which makes it a bit easier. The layout will be next. I know what I want to do, I just have to figure out how to do it with the editor.
oDDity on 12/4/2005 at 17:28
THe biggest requirement is stamina. The exciting feeling you have now will not be there in 6 months when you're still stuck making the same level. It turns into sheer hard work and a timesink, and that's where the stanina and willpower have to kick in.
THe vast majority of FMs never see the light of day.
OrbWeaver on 12/4/2005 at 17:57
Quote Posted by oDDity
THe biggest requirement is stamina. The exciting feeling you have now will not be there in 6 months when you're still stuck making the same level. It turns into sheer hard work and a timesink, and that's where the stanina and willpower have to kick in.
THe vast majority of FMs never see the light of day.
All the more reason to have a plan. If you've got something to work to, it's easier to see yourself making progress, and more importantly you know when you have finished.
Fingernail on 12/4/2005 at 18:24
It would be quite quick to hack together something playable using all the prebuilt static meshes and textures, but something truly original and unique would take a long time, and require a far greater talent in terms of modelling and texturing than DromEd would. We're not dealing with < 200 polys and 256x256 textures anymore here, remember. Normalmaps, high res textures and new static meshes are what is needed for a truly 'original' feeling FM, to capture the feeling of Calendra's Legacy or the 7th Crystal would take longer simply because the engine is more complex and requires more resources.
This is similar to any next-gen engine, except with many you can still rely to a great extent on CSG/BSP. Unreal relies more heavily on static meshes for detail.
Boogalou on 12/4/2005 at 19:17
Quote Posted by Fingernail
It would be quite quick to hack together something playable using all the prebuilt static meshes and textures! In fact that's what I'm doing at this very moment!
That is a fantastic suggestion. I'm doing the same thing, only I'm using one of the original maps that shipped with the game. See, I'm simply changing all the textures... to different textures! It sounds hard I know, but after awhile it gets easier. Then I'm taking out all of the guards, and putting them in different places! It's awesome, the power to be able to do things like that. If I have time I may add a room or two, I'll just have to see. Hopefully it will be done in time for Komag's fm competition. I'll win for sure.
:cheeky:
