Level Geometry

155

Mar 6, 2007 at 6:53 PM

Hey, I have been learning DX9 recently and I am planning on making a simple FPS. However, I need some way to store the level geometry with some static/dynamic objects. What would be the best way to go about it? Can I, for instance, use the BSP file format? If so, where could I find documantiation + editors for it? I want to keep it pretty basic; the geometry won't be too complicated. I don't want to spend the next 4 months figuring and designing it, I am looking for a (fairly) fast and easy method. Thanks!

346

Mar 6, 2007 at 11:09 PM

If you're specifically interested in BSP and level formats, here are two resources I find useful (somewhat alike in practice)
http://graphics.cs.brown.edu/games/quake/quake3.html
http://graphics.stanford.edu/~kekoa/q3/ (linked from the above)

BSP does have a few quirks but it's well understood and ready to go in a certain sense. Unluckly, you cannot really "take it easy". You support it or you don't... you'll have to just from 0 to 100 in a single blow. The amount of effort is dependant on how much machinery you have already.

Volume based scene graphs do have their advantages and on todays HW they're pretty efficient. Portal-based rendering is often very fast but finding optimal portals is a real pain (unless someone manually places them for you). There's nothing really "easy" whatever way you choose. :(

Author

155

Mar 6, 2007 at 11:41 PM

That's interesting. I see BPS is not really a public domain file type, so to speak, and the documentation doesn't seem too thorough either. I don't think it would be the best choice.

[Edited by - Koobazaur on March 6, 2007 11:41:21 PM]

181

Mar 7, 2007 at 1:34 AM

If you want a good editor, try DeleD (www.delgine.com) It's a raw polygon editor (not brush based, like others), and you can take the results, and use whatever space partitioning technique you want on them.

346

Mar 7, 2007 at 10:29 AM

Quote:
Original post by Koobazaur
That's interesting. I see BPS is not really a public domain file type, so to speak, and the documentation doesn't seem too thorough either. I don't think it would be the best choice.

Yes, it badly sucks. If you like UT community content I remember there's a program which is able to load almost everything... I believe it's called UShock or something like that and the code would define the format.

Then there are the various raw "point cloud" formats like OBJ for example or ASE. Both are fare from being optimal for a game engine in general conditions (they are just ok to store a model or something like that but when it comes to a whole "world entity" they are too verbose to be useful). Depending on your needs, translating them to some other format (taking for example mesh replication in account) may be non-trivial.

Good Luck!

Author

155

Mar 7, 2007 at 6:12 PM

Quote:
Original post by Vampyre_Dark
If you want a good editor, try DeleD (www.delgine.com) It's a raw polygon editor (not brush based, like others), and you can take the results, and use whatever space partitioning technique you want on them.

Hmm that looks like it would suit my needs. However, I have a problem using the stuff I exported in my program. It exports fine to an .x file, but when I try to load it with:

 D3DXLoadMeshFromX("deled/scene.x", 				   D3DXMESH_MANAGED, 				   D3D9Device, 				   0, //no adjecency info				   &MaterialBuffer,				   0,				   (DWORD*)(&MaterialCount),				   &mesh );

My function fails. I also noticed that when I open the X file with notepad it's all neat and organized, while the other X file I have (came with my book) that loads without any problems looks all garbled when opened.

Any ideas?

181