Author Topic: Mods with new areas?  (Read 4009 times)

ScriptKiddie

  • Guest
Mods with new areas?
« on: January 27, 2005, 10:52:33 PM »
Why is it that I can't find mods that are rich in new areas? Am I just not finding them, or is it just that there is little demand for them?

I went through Yovaneth's tutorial on Area Making using DLTCEP and was amazed at how much easier that task has become over the last couple years, After a couple hours dinking with DLTCEP, I am still in awe about the power of this tool, particularly with respect to area editing, my personal preference. I pulled my wife aside to show her the ease with which mods could be made, and within about 45 minutes, had Minsc wandering through a BMP of the Horsehead Nebula that happened to be in My Pictures (granted, with a very blocky search map, and a very limited light map, but still...). About 20 minutes later, we had Jan picking out a good spot for building, Nalia selecting curtains, and our fledgeling Xan NPC pointing out places that would be particularly suitable for committing suicide.

I'm not trying to be insulting, just curious. Why is it that mods tend to focus on NPC interactions, not new areas? Is it just that the modding community prefers the former style game? Granted, IETME was a powerful tool, too, and I'm guessing on a better computer, it wouldn't have crashed nearly as often, but IMO, DLTCEP is just leaps and bounds better (which would be expected being a generation or two newer (am I starting to sound like Edwin? Or Jan?))

Sorry for the digession. Why is it that mods with lots of new areas are so few and far between?

Offline jcompton

  • Niche Exploiter
  • Administrator
  • Planewalker
  • *****
  • Posts: 7246
Re: Mods with new areas?
« Reply #1 on: January 27, 2005, 11:47:12 PM »
Why is it that I can't find mods that are rich in new areas? Am I just not finding them, or is it just that there is little demand for them?

Oh, there's plenty of demand, but...

Quote
I went through Yovaneth's tutorial on Area Making using DLTCEP and was amazed at how much easier that task has become over the last couple years, After a couple hours dinking with DLTCEP, I am still in awe about the power of this tool, particularly with respect to area editing, my personal preference. I pulled my wife aside to show her the ease with which mods could be made, and within about 45 minutes, had Minsc wandering through a BMP of the Horsehead Nebula that happened to be in My Pictures (granted, with a very blocky search map, and a very limited light map, but still...). About 20 minutes later, we had Jan picking out a good spot for building, Nalia selecting curtains, and our fledgeling Xan NPC pointing out places that would be particularly suitable for committing suicide.

Obviously, the Horsehead Nebula isn't going to fit into the game terribly well, which then leads to the question, "who can make suitably appealing areas for the game which will integrate in some sort of reasonably credible fashion?" And it turns out to be a pretty limited range of people.

Also, adding new areas to the worldmap in friendly, uninstallable fashion isn't as easy as, say, plunking a new NPC into the Temple District. There's XNewArea, which is okay but requires TOB and requires starting a new game. I'm also told that highly advanced TP2 ninjas have worked something else out but I haven't taken a close look.
Cespenar says, "Kelsey and friends be at the Pocket Plane? Ohhh yesssss!" http://www.pocketplane.net

Offline Ghreyfain

  • Moderator
  • Planewalker
  • *****
  • Posts: 4705
  • Gender: Male
    • Pocket Plane Group
Re: Mods with new areas?
« Reply #2 on: January 27, 2005, 11:57:15 PM »
Creating Lure of the Sirine's Call took me two days (couldn't tell you how many hours, because I work at a feverish pace for a little while, then get distracted, then go back to the feverish pace) to make, and it "only" includes about 10-15 minutes of game play, and that might even be a generous estimate.  It re-uses five small indoor areas, and has one new indoor area that was just stolen from a larger area already in existence.  So, yeah, in my experience making a mod that includes all aspects of IE editing is quite the endeavour.
Earn Money Sleeping.

Offline Cuv

  • Planewalker
  • *****
  • Posts: 79
Re: Mods with new areas?
« Reply #3 on: January 28, 2005, 02:50:12 AM »
I've got 15 new or drastically altered areas in RTW... and it isnt released yet.   Going on more than 3 years now.   DragonLance has been working about as long also.    New areas are terribly time consuming, as JC says, especially to do them right.  I, too, would like to see more mods with new areas... so if you start working on one now, maybe in a few years it will be ready to play:)

Cuv

Offline jester

  • Here be dragons...
  • Planewalker
  • *****
  • Posts: 2416
  • If you fail, fail gloriously.
Re: Mods with new areas?
« Reply #4 on: January 28, 2005, 03:03:57 AM »
I think (and this is taking into account how much work it is) people find to make their own NPC the most gratifying experience, but I think tweaks and quests are what really expands the game as every NPC who does not sport a sudden death in his quest blocks you for a bifg part or all of the game. Adding a new area is a lot of work for considerable low return in the praise department. Not that that many people could do it properly anyway, I guess.

People should not be afraid of their governments. Governments should be afraid of their people.

Why spend all your day surfing for porn?




Balance in all things
I haven't had this much fun since... the last time.

Offline irenicus

  • irenicus
  • Planewalker
  • *****
  • Posts: 827
  • Gender: Female
Re: Mods with new areas?
« Reply #5 on: January 28, 2005, 04:15:57 AM »
The Darkest day as a few more lands, quests and old NPC friends and new, but the lands (new ones) look like BG1 lands

Offline SimDing0™

  • Back In Black
  • Global Moderator
  • Planewalker
  • *****
  • Posts: 3496
  • Gender: Male
  • Word Enhancer
Re: Mods with new areas?
« Reply #6 on: January 28, 2005, 07:45:08 AM »
A quick check of DLTC reveals that we're somewhere in the vicinity of 60 new areas, with none of significance re-used. Now, that's a good 2 years' work; it's an awkward issue, however, because while people who can produce good area art are very hard to come by, the most time-consuming aspect of creating a new area is probably actually implementing it properly and populating it. It's not entirely necessary to spend the time making each area as complex as something out of DLTC or RTW, so a new area project doesn't have to take years and years (the new area I'm using for QP2, while hugely simple, originally took around 4 hours total for an old TeamBG contest), but the obstacles are sufficient to put a fair number of people off trying, I suspect.

Offline Ghreyfain

  • Moderator
  • Planewalker
  • *****
  • Posts: 4705
  • Gender: Male
    • Pocket Plane Group
Re: Mods with new areas?
« Reply #7 on: January 28, 2005, 09:34:54 AM »
Wallgroups.  Heheheh. >:-(
Earn Money Sleeping.

ScriptKiddie

  • Guest
Re: Mods with new areas?
« Reply #8 on: January 28, 2005, 10:47:54 AM »
OK, fair enough. I understand that making new artwork which doesn't clash with the original is incredibly time-consuming and is somewhere lower on my list of things to do than poking burning bamboo splints under my fingernails. Which is why I was particularly intrigued by Yovaneth's tutorial. I had to go back and reload BG1 to sate my curiousity, but now I'm pretty sure the warehouse he is using is the one with the rats in Candlekeep with the central boxes removed. I'm pretty sure the town hall is the inn in Beregost with the barrels removed. (Since a followup shows how to remove barrels from the TIS without affecting the objects, that is a pretty safe bet.)

And I understand the problem with the world map thing. Outdoor areas are a definite pain. That was why I am particularly intrigued by Weimer's use of a creature to force a LeaveArea in Ritual. While it means that the area is unreachable without speaking with that creature, I don't see any particular reason that bouncing the sides of the map provides any more realism than a cutscene where the guy you talk to walks you to the edge (or into a building) and the script just does a LeaveArea different than the one that clicking on the wheel would do. And it drastically reduces the chances of mods interfering with one another. Picking a static feature to use will result in problems with coordination -- like happened with BP and Desecration picking the same jump point in the graveyard. There are lots of empty spaces in the game to place a creature to do the portaling as was done in Ritual, and it is far less likely that two modders will pick the exact same place to position their .CRE. Even if they do, one or the other (or even a desperate end-user) can alter just the spawn location in the BAF and the two are now compatible. (Assuming they aren't using identically-named .AREs of course.)

I don't really care whether the areas are recycled -- I prefer it, in fact. Lord knows Black Isle reused areas liberally. Take Lich in the Docks (or whatever that was called) -- with a different set of creatures, you get an entirely different experience, though the artwork is the same. The battle with the weres is another example of a reused area that is vastly different despite identical artwork.

I'm still making enough rookie scripting errors that this is still pretty time-consuming. It took me about 6 hours to make and link a half-dozen reused areas and populate them. But on the other hand, I'm ending up with lots of boilerplate BAF and TP2 material so that all I have to do to change stuff is alter a few of the WRITE_BYTE fields in the TP2 and a few parameters in the appropriate BAF. Once I go through the effort of altering the bitmaps, (adding/removing barrels, crates, chests, pillars, etc, then changing the WED file to match) I will have another re-cyclable area that looks somewhat, or maybe even drastically different than the original, but will play differently depending on what and how many creatures are spawned in, and where they are positioned and oriented.

Jeez, and you thought Jan was long-winded. ;)

Offline Ashara

  • Tired
  • Planewalker
  • *****
  • Posts: 784
Re: Mods with new areas?
« Reply #9 on: January 28, 2005, 12:17:04 PM »
While I can find plenty of 'do it yourself in 3 easy steps' tutorials on NPC editing and dialogue coding, so far I have seen not a single tutorial that takes you ground up into ARE creation.

DLTCEP in itself is not a non-novice-user friendly tool and that pretty much makes it a forbidding for me - appart from those hours that one who have no idea how to edit areas will have to invest into figuring things out.

I have also heard that it is difficult to re-edit area to make it look beautiful and that cut-and-paste shows through unless you've got the Skill.

It also should be noted, that IWD areas had been used and reused, and with revival of interest in BG1, BG1 areas stop looking 'just like new'

Plus, factoring in years it takes to do a proper quest mod with new areas you get this:

Prepare to spend a few years of considerable efforts to produce something that people probably won't even play, because it is not BG and risking to have a poor quality of the end product with 'yet another IWD2 re-edited' areas.
Hang in there. I'll try to make you glad you did.
—George R.R. Martin

There is nothing better than imagining other worlds [...] to forget the painful one we live in. At least so I thought then. I hadn't yet realized that, imagining other worlds, you end up changing this one.
-Umberto Eco, Baudolino

Three mods you shall make - one too bad and one to dread and one to love.

Offline jcompton

  • Niche Exploiter
  • Administrator
  • Planewalker
  • *****
  • Posts: 7246
Re: Mods with new areas?
« Reply #10 on: January 28, 2005, 01:19:57 PM »
Cuv asked that I pass along a couple of screenshots to areas he has created but won't be using, and you can have from him upon request. "Areas for free", he calls them.

(http://mods.pocketplane.net/cuvtut/Cuv-area1.jpg)

And

(http://mods.pocketplane.net/cuvtut/Cuv-area2.jpg)
Cespenar says, "Kelsey and friends be at the Pocket Plane? Ohhh yesssss!" http://www.pocketplane.net

Offline Ashara

  • Tired
  • Planewalker
  • *****
  • Posts: 784
Re: Mods with new areas?
« Reply #11 on: January 28, 2005, 02:42:40 PM »
I like the top one. It will just work for Carradoon set-up that we were having problems with. If he does not mind donating I will place a hold on it for Kivan of Shilmista :)
Hang in there. I'll try to make you glad you did.
—George R.R. Martin

There is nothing better than imagining other worlds [...] to forget the painful one we live in. At least so I thought then. I hadn't yet realized that, imagining other worlds, you end up changing this one.
-Umberto Eco, Baudolino

Three mods you shall make - one too bad and one to dread and one to love.

Offline jester

  • Here be dragons...
  • Planewalker
  • *****
  • Posts: 2416
  • If you fail, fail gloriously.
Re: Mods with new areas?
« Reply #12 on: January 28, 2005, 03:47:16 PM »
I always wanted the Soundries to have a seaside view. :D
People should not be afraid of their governments. Governments should be afraid of their people.

Why spend all your day surfing for porn?




Balance in all things
I haven't had this much fun since... the last time.

ScriptKIddie

  • Guest
Re: Mods with new areas?
« Reply #13 on: January 28, 2005, 04:14:11 PM »
Those are beautiful! It would be a shame not to have them in something.

Do outside areas <b>have</b> to appear somewhere on the world map? I don't remember how Ritual handled the world map. I certainly don't mind if they are only accessible through a Twisted Rune-style doorway, or an effect of some item, but I really hate to dink with the world map.

Let me play with some outside areas and see how difficult they are to use. If I can figure it out, I would be most appreciative of any of those beautiful areas.

Incidentally, does anyone know any command-line options to bypass all the splash screens, game selection screens and all? Just "BGMAIN -load MPSave\Mygame" and it just loads it or anything like that?

Offline igi

  • IESDP Guardian
  • Planewalker
  • *****
  • Posts: 124
  • IESDP Guardian
Re: Mods with new areas?
« Reply #14 on: January 28, 2005, 05:01:20 PM »
If those areas are being given away, I'll take them, both.
And any others that anyone has laying around.

Quote
Incidentally, does anyone know any command-line options to bypass all the splash screens, game selection screens and all? Just "BGMAIN -load MPSave\Mygame" and it just loads it or anything like that?

Not that I know of, which is a real shame.
You can disable the movies though, and even edit the chui files, so a few taps of the mouse (without having to aim for silly little buttons) would load something.
NPC: Arg || Galoomp || Thash
Mods: Dark Heart of the Xvart || GbG
Tweak Pack: iiTweak

mcwrench.com
mcwrench.com forums

Offline Cuv

  • Planewalker
  • *****
  • Posts: 79
Re: Mods with new areas?
« Reply #15 on: January 29, 2005, 03:38:16 PM »
If those areas are being given away, I'll take them, both.
And any others that anyone has laying around.


You are welcome to both (as is anyone)... and I have many, many others that I will not be doing anything with.     Problem is... I need a place to upload all this stuff  ::)

Let me tell you a little about the two pictured:

1)   Is exactly the same size as the Beregost area in BG1.   It is only a render.   I 'do' have grid bitmaps to make all the doors.   It can be easily converted to work in either SoA or ToB.   The one pictured has all the doors open.   I have another identical area with all the doors closed but I never got around to make the door bitmaps.   It is a composite area (expertly done, if I do say so myself:)).   It uses elements from BG1, BG2, IWD and IWD2 areas.   I can upload it as a full size JPEG to save space,  then anyone can make it a BMP easily for area conversion.

2)  This is obviously Durlag's Tower... but it has been altered quite a bit.   It is daylight instead of dark, moat is empty.   It is a fully functional area with everything but creatures:  Wall polygons,  a gate that opens and closes... and a secret door.   It also includes 5 levels inside that have been altered too.   I can't remember if the interior levels are complete... but looking at the files,  I believe they are.   The lowest level is a cavern from IWDII that has also been altered.   It includes one ToB compatible creature:   Chimera from IWDII.   All the animation bams are also included renamed to a Wight2 and an Animate.ids updated with all the IWD creature listings.  I had planned this as an alternate stronghold fortress... that the player must first breach to take into his/her control.   A massive battle was planned and a secret entrance, but I abandoned this for lack of time.

They are both free... and I have others.   Please don't ask me to do any further work on them, however :P   Offered As-Is.   Hope someone can get some use out of them.    All I ask is that if you use them in a released mod,  that you kindly give me a credit for the artwork.

Cuv

Offline Ashara

  • Tired
  • Planewalker
  • *****
  • Posts: 784
Re: Mods with new areas?
« Reply #16 on: January 29, 2005, 04:01:50 PM »
I am quite interested in the top area, and it does look expertly made :) Could some kind soul host the files?
Hang in there. I'll try to make you glad you did.
—George R.R. Martin

There is nothing better than imagining other worlds [...] to forget the painful one we live in. At least so I thought then. I hadn't yet realized that, imagining other worlds, you end up changing this one.
-Umberto Eco, Baudolino

Three mods you shall make - one too bad and one to dread and one to love.

Offline jcompton

  • Niche Exploiter
  • Administrator
  • Planewalker
  • *****
  • Posts: 7246
Re: Mods with new areas?
« Reply #17 on: January 29, 2005, 04:23:44 PM »
If Cuv arranges to send them over, I'll put them up.
Cespenar says, "Kelsey and friends be at the Pocket Plane? Ohhh yesssss!" http://www.pocketplane.net

Offline Cuv

  • Planewalker
  • *****
  • Posts: 79
Re: Mods with new areas?
« Reply #18 on: January 30, 2005, 03:12:47 AM »
I will try to catch JC online either today or tomorrow to send him these files.    I'll also dig around and see what other areas I have that are going un-used.    I will hang on to my Borg Cube areas for now... might still work on that projec.   But anything else that isnt RTW related has to go  ;D

Cuv

Vlad

  • Guest
Re: Mods with new areas?
« Reply #19 on: January 30, 2005, 09:46:49 AM »
Quote
Mods with new areas?

Never Ending Journey Second Edition:

http://www.vladp.net/gallery2.html

Offline jcompton

  • Niche Exploiter
  • Administrator
  • Planewalker
  • *****
  • Posts: 7246
Re: Mods with new areas?
« Reply #20 on: January 30, 2005, 03:29:45 PM »
The links to the area files are here:

http://forums.pocketplane.net/index.php?topic=18125.0
Cespenar says, "Kelsey and friends be at the Pocket Plane? Ohhh yesssss!" http://www.pocketplane.net

 

With Quick-Reply you can write a post when viewing a topic without loading a new page. You can still use bulletin board code and smileys as you would in a normal post.

Warning: this topic has not been posted in for at least 120 days.
Unless you're sure you want to reply, please consider starting a new topic.

Name: Email:
Verification:
Type the letters shown in the picture
Listen to the letters / Request another image
Type the letters shown in the picture:
What color is grass?:
What is the seventh word in this sentence?:
What is five minus two (use the full word)?: