Spring RTS Engine

Hello again!

Some of you may have seen my thread regarding my problems with trees and an earlier mapconv...
http://spring.clan-sy.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?t=12099
...and my subsequent problems with getting later mapconv versions to accept my perfectly legitimate height file. However, those issues aside I'm ready to release my first attempt at map making.

I'm not the most creative nor artistic individual involved, and so in true style it's a recreation of a global map, based upon satellite photography.

It's 40x20 (so pretty large) and has eight fixed starting locations for free-for-all play. For teamplay, an East vs West boxed setup works pretty well from what little playtesting has been done. Original versions used the heightmap to define metal counts and had a large extractor radius to both allow and limit mining in the mountains, but this version now uses metal spots so as to provide a more challenging game.







As you can see, it's still a little rough around the edges. The height and texture map still need a little working on, and the metal may still need a little balancing. However it's available for download now and I'd appreciate any and all feedback.

http://www.ianrstewart.plus.com/taspring/waw_spots1.sd7

Known issues:
-Hovers will not be able to scale the western coast of the American continent(s). Not much I can do here, there's a mountain range in the way!
-Some water textures show above water level, some ground textures show below it. I will have to spend a lot of time tweaking the heightmap to get this just spot on.
-Trees in the water. Until I can figure out why this will compile in an older mapconv but not the most recent one, I see no way around it short of forcing the colour of the water in those affected regions.

Very nice.But i think taking parts of the world map and making maps out of them might supply us with better gameplay.Im sorry to say it but dont expect many to play your map,its just very big.Imagine the battle 40 minuts into the game..
It would slow down completly on most computers.
There are some nice reagions from which good maps can be made.You can make a map of the roman empire at its hight(mediterainean sea and the countries around it with gibraltar).europe obviously.Island maps of ountless regions really..china...africa.. can be awsome..eastern usa nd western europe map(would have to be big).antarctica.. plus there is no need making huge forsests even if they exist there for real.A 20x40 map with forests is unplayable.World map ,i personnaly thing,isnt suitable for spring.Makes for bad gameplay.

DZHIBRISH wrote:Very nice.But i think taking parts of the world map and making maps out of them might supply us with better gameplay.

This is my intention in the long run. My computer really struggles with loading the texture file in gimp, so I need to be in the right frame of mind to be working with it and making regional maps. Rest assured though, I intend to release several smaller and more detailed regional maps.

I also originally built this map at half this size, but found it was far too small to be a realistic map. It's for this reason that I've gone with such a large tilesize... but don't let that alone put you off!

Im sorry to say it but dont expect many to play your map,its just very big.Imagine the battle 40 minuts into the game.. It would slow down completly on most computers.

We've done some limited playtesting on it, and it's not as bad as you might imagine. The map is massive, but provided your computer is better than mine (Athlon XP2500 (oc'd 2.2Ghz (3200+), 1Gb PC3200 DDR, Radeon 9800) you shouldn't have much difficulty. We played one four-man game for almost two hours without any real lag, but your mileage may vary. In one example game, one user hit 70% load, but my own experiences show it topping out around 55% during battles. Given that my own rig is really outmoded now, I see this as a non-issue.

there is no need making huge forsests even if they exist there for real.A 20x40 map with forests is unplayable.

I agree entirely, but it's unavoidable at present. See the link in my first post to know why...

World map ,i personnaly thing,isnt suitable for spring.Makes for bad gameplay.

Oh well, it's your loss. I've found that given that the globe is predominantly water, it makes for interesting if not archetypal spring gameplay. With the high values for tidal and wind energy, it also means the game is faster paced than one might expect from a map this large.

Another world map?

This makes 5! Arugh, look, use you own creativity. Seriously dude. I realize that this probably seems easiest to make for you and a good first time, but quite honestly, making a map like this for your first time teaches you very little, if anything at all.

Try this. Make a small 10x10 or 12x12, from complete scratch. That will be likely to teach you something useful.

My rating:
At least it doesn't suck as hard as Atlantic.

Another world map?

This makes 5!

Really? I've only ever seen one other example of a world map on UF, and the texture resolution was appalling. Plus Atlantic, and ditto for that.

making a map like this for your first time teaches you very little, if anything at all.

The intention was to teach me how the texture and height maps functioned, and it performed this admirably. The tutorials that abound, good though they are once you understand the principles, cannot teach you those principles outright. Coming from having zero experience in graphical work, my only choice was to work from existing graphics. I would highly recommend working from another's map (if you have access to the "source" files) or doing as I did and using satellite photography and topography as a first foray into this field. It removes the necessity of creativity in the first instance.

Make a small 10x10 or 12x12, from complete scratch. That will be likely to teach you something useful.

That's Stage Two.

Stage One: Do something simple
Stage Two: Do something interesting
Stage Three: ...
Stage Four: Profit!

Expect unique maps in the future now that I've got my feet wet. I need to sort out some decent textures to work with myself, and I would rather that my first attempt at a unique map was at least half decent. Right now, the extent of my texturing expertise runs as far as creating a brushed metal effect!

imo the arctic circle, northern sea, scandinavia, or indonesia would make far more itneresting settings than the global map.

AF wrote:imo the arctic circle, northern sea, scandinavia, or indonesia would make far more itneresting settings than the global map.

Antarctica could make a nice, circular, balanced map.

European Theatre (ww1/ww2) or failing that the eastern front (berlin to moscow) please!

Pacific Ocean theatre Pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeease! With larger than the reality straits between japanese and other islands for ships circulation.
VonGratz

European Theatre (ww1/ww2) or failing that the eastern front (berlin to moscow) please!

I put a version of this together, but I'm really not happy with it. If you really want one now, you can get it at http://www.ianrstewart.plus.com/tasprin ... nflict.sd7

Heightmap is awful though, so I'd advise you leave it alone - or edit the smd yourself to a more reasonable value. I'm going to be completely redoing the heightmap on this one, so stay tuned.

VonGratz wrote:Pacific Ocean theatre Pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeease! With larger than the reality straits between japanese and other islands for ships circulation.
VonGratz

I've taken the texture images for this (not the whole pacific, but from the eastern himalayas to the east coast of Australia) and will put something up when I'm finished on Europe.

we have neurope of the entire european continent. Europe is good as it has lots of interesting features but on any sane map size the features are too small and insignificant, making a map fo the whole of europe worse.

AF wrote:we have neurope of the entire european continent. Europe is good as it has lots of interesting features but on any sane map size the features are too small and insignificant, making a map fo the whole of europe worse.

dont get me wrong, neurope is a nice map, but its missing the right 'feel'

frankly id like to see what Camilo can turn out! (if you do decide to do some europe maps, dont forget to do winter versions, yay snow!)

Too many trees, a single forest fire will wipe out most of them (which while cool, defeats the purpose of the trees and causes particle spam and heaps of cpu lag on slower machines).

Hovercraft cant go up -any- shores, and kbots cant even go up a lot of the mountains. Consider lowering the height map a little to allow hovercraft/kbots to cross at more points. There are also a few sticky areas where units cant cross (say, from north to south america) where they probably should be able to (press f2 with a unit selected to see where it can go).

mass trees = lag, especially with forest fires. make maps for playabiity first and appearance second

1v0ry_k1ng wrote:mass trees = lag, especially with forest fires. make maps for playabiity first and appearance second

BURN THE HERETIC!!!!

AF wrote:we have neurope of the entire european continent. Europe is good as it has lots of interesting features but on any sane map size the features are too small and insignificant, making a map fo the whole of europe worse.

neurope is like Europe in the same sense that Mars is like Earth, they're roughly the same size and shape but that's it.

If you want to fight battles on a map of Europe, neurope doesn't really hit the spot; "hey, I'll start in the Britain blob".