Spacemaps needed!

Optimus Prime · Post by **Optimus Prime** » 21 Nov 2005, 18:11

Hi

i really need some kind of spacemaps for the mod Final Frontier. There should be some (more than one for each player) small asteroids for basebuilding and metalproduction and the rest should be spacy.

Is there anyone working on such a map or will do this? That would be very cool!

FizWizz · Post by **FizWizz** » 21 Nov 2005, 18:15

gimme a skybox, and I'll gladly crank out a couple different ones for you.

AF · Post by AF » 21 Nov 2005, 20:26

What happened to stealing the backdrops from HW and HW2? That does about half the work for you.

FizWizz · Post by **FizWizz** » 21 Nov 2005, 20:31

I am not learnt in the process of making skyboxes, so I would not know how to steal nebulae and other good stuff from my HW game

AF · Post by AF » 21 Nov 2005, 20:33

As far as I am aware Homeworld uses soemthign similair to a skybox. The nebulae and dustclouds that ships cna go through are done by the engine ro are models. Some modifications would be useful such as how lightsources are set up etc. I dotn knwo enough about HW2's map format to say, btu I knwo enought os ay we could steal all their space maps if the engien agev us full 3D support and the nebulae system, All we'd need then would eb the resource system and research adn we could do a HW2 mod.

Post by **jcnossen** » 21 Nov 2005, 21:58

It's a nice idea, but it creates yet a new set of license problems to use HW stuff... I think the same result can be achieved with extending the current map system... but yet again it all depends on people spending time on it

FolCan · Post by **FolCan** » 21 Nov 2005, 23:20

I had this program.. it was called Universe or something like

Very good in making space like images you can place stars neblua suns ect

Show look into using it to create sky boxs or images to use as a sky box

Optimus Prime · Post by **Optimus Prime** » 22 Nov 2005, 00:24

but please... if u make such a map.. make NORMAL Metal. Not to less, because the units in FF are expensive and not to much, cause Metalmaps suck the most! Dont let u get 1000 metal in 10 minutes or so. Normal is like Cometcatcher I think.
And dont make the terrain deformable.

FizWizz · Post by **FizWizz** » 22 Nov 2005, 00:58

yeah, I was planning on (loosely) following the maps for FF on OTA. Don't worry about me making metalmaps either, I am not overly generous with my precious metal =). I still need skyboxes though...

Optimus Prime · Post by **Optimus Prime** » 22 Nov 2005, 01:25

u can search in google words like space, universe, stars, planets or so and click on search Pictures.... perhaps u find something u can use as a skybox?

Warlord Zsinj · Post by **Warlord Zsinj** » 22 Nov 2005, 01:44

I think you would be too far removed (a 3rd party map for a 3rd party mod, for a 3rd party development. That's what, 9th party?), and far too obscure to get into any trouble using homeworld skyboxes.

Zoombie · Post by **Zoombie** » 22 Nov 2005, 02:38

Also PLEASE MAKE THE MAPS ZERO GEE!

I'm pretty sure that that makes the wrekage of a capppy ship float forever...i havent tried it casue i cant figure out how to accsess the gravity and other numbers that are cranked in a map.

I could BEFORE the new version, but cant now!

Slamoid · Post by **Slamoid** » 22 Nov 2005, 05:10

Jeeze guys, all yoy had to do is ask...

MSIE only

mufdvr222 · Post by **mufdvr222** » 22 Nov 2005, 06:25

FizWizz wrote:yeah, I was planning on (loosely) following the maps for FF on OTA. Don't worry about me making metalmaps either, I am not overly generous with my precious metal =). I still need skyboxes though...

Welcome to use these two cubemaps if you like, the second one "galacticII.dds" probably looks better imo.

http://www.mufdvr.222clan.com/cubemaps.7z

AF · Post by AF » 22 Nov 2005, 20:21

IE only?! Evil b@$#40

HW2 licensing problems would be applicable only to th map maker, and possibly the distributor, but the mods and the engien it laods onto would be unnaffected.

Caydr · Post by **Caydr** » 22 Nov 2005, 21:12

I'd gladly lend you one of mine, but I'm still twaking my automated cubemap maker... really neat actually, you can't see the seams between the sides or anything and everything is done for you.

AF · Post by AF » 22 Nov 2005, 21:14

I'm sure ther're already tools to do all this stuff to cubemaps. Afterrall they ahve been in use in other engiens for a long time, and you get a selection of plugins and tools for them with the directx SDK.

FizWizz · Post by **FizWizz** » 22 Nov 2005, 22:59

mufdvr222 wrote:
FizWizz wrote:yeah, I was planning on (loosely) following the maps for FF on OTA. Don't worry about me making metalmaps either, I am not overly generous with my precious metal =). I still need skyboxes though...
Welcome to use these two cubemaps if you like, the second one "galacticII.dds" probably looks better imo.

http://www.mufdvr.222clan.com/cubemaps.7z

excellent. I've got a 4 day weekend coming up, so I'll definitely see what I can do. I must give you one warning though. I know that someone else release a picture of a 'space map' that used features for asteroids, making them appear to have an underside. I don't know yet how good it will look just to make little asteroid islands in space, so if it does look bad, I think I'm going to do space platforms like those that were seen in OTAFF. Maybe my suspicion is groundless and they'll look fine, but otherwise you can just consider the map as just a testing map until someone comes out with some absolutely smashing products.

I was talking with Folcan and brought up the idea of doing something like the inside of the Gamma Draconis(?) Nebula in FreeSpace 2, and I'm going to look into doing one like that as well.

If the answer to this question is straightforward, I'd like to know what the format of skyboxes are? I believe that skyboxes are the only part of mapmaking that isn't covered in any of the tutorials or explanations on Spring.

mufdvr222 · Post by **mufdvr222** » 23 Nov 2005, 00:58

I think the format is .dds "direct draw surface".
There is a plugin for photoshop and an app for putting the source images together "cubemapgen" by ATI.
http://www.ati.com/developer/cubemapgen/index.html

AF · Post by AF » 23 Nov 2005, 20:43

hmm, has nobody posted tools from other games yet? Ther're plenty fo games that use nvidia dds format cubemaps, or at least have the ability to generate skyboxes on the fly, such as skygen.

People are also forgetting that HW2 has an active modding and mapping community, that is heavily documented.

Spring RTS Engine

Spacemaps needed!

Spacemaps needed!