Hey guys, this is probably the dumbest question you guys have heard so here it goes. Why do you guys keep editing jk? Is there something incredible about the jk sdk or has the whole engine code been released also? Some of the mods for jk are really impressive for the game but they've accomplished what's already in the base of the new games in the series. One thing I like about jk is the old graphics don't take too much hardware power to run, so maybe editing jk allows you to make maps the size of a small section of the death star? Btw if the whole jk engine has been released i'll switch over from ja editing to jk editing maybe

Uh-oh, I feel a flame war coming...

LOL, J/K, but seriously, I feel a lot of it has to do with nostalgia, along with what you said, a good engine to run with.

There are far better games than JK.

Does that mean you shouldn't edit JK if you want to?

No.

If you edit an old game and have fun with it, yay! I would say you don't have to care about the rest, but it's always good that you edit a game which other people do too. If JK was in the same situation like original Castle of Wolfenstein from the 1980's which NO ONE EDITS, editing JK would be useless.

I used to edit JK (or more likely, MotS) because the engine was fun to mess around and I had more fun with its mods than the mods for Quake II for example.

Nowadays I edit Deus Ex, which is a 5-year old game now. I had fun with that game, editing for it is still quite fun, but it's a shame that it has some ridicule restrictions due to its age (no high-res textures, zone limitations). At least once a week some caliph of intelligence pops up and says "LOLZ ITS OLD GAME YOU SHOULDNT EDIT IT".

I like old and new games, I'm not an age elitist. I don't ever see mods as something "you need to accomplish", I just want to have fun playing some mod. Geez.

The engine source has not been released, and the old graphics engine isn't optimized to handle much more than it was originally intended for, meaning performance doesn't scale up linearly with processor/3D acceleration speed.

That said, the JK engine is still edited because:
1) Level editor superior to most in existence for other games.
2) Ease of modification of resources (almost everything is text based).
3) Simple, straightforward but powerful scriping language.
4) Accumulation of knowledge over the years makes for a very comfortable editing environment.
5) The challenge in harnassing the existing capabilities in order to implement new/advanced ideas, and "researching" the engine in order to uncover undocumented features. (That's the part I most enjoyed :p)
6) And, of course, a great and dedicated community. Long live Massassi!

I'm really sorry. I didn't mean to come off as arrogant. I like editing some old games too like Chronotrigger, i'm just wondering what it is about jk editing that makes it so popular. And thanks Fardreamer, so it is the way the game is coded and scripted that makes editing it fun.

I would consider JK editing to be the "poor man's" game to edit because you don't need to shell out a lot of money to get your hands on programs like MS Visual C++, 3DSMAX, Maya, etc. in order to edit the game. Like mentioned already, most of the game's resources are text based which makes it easy to get into and all the editors you need to use for JK editing can all be downloaded off the internet. Simple as that really.

However, I gave up JK editing a LONG time ago because I got fed up with the limitations of the engine and the lack of an active gaming community for the game.

I edit JK because brush engines suck and I could never really figure them out.

Also, SITH2.

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I have some good advice for everyone!!!!!!!!!!!

Worship me cuz IM BACK!!!!!!

And then download illegal songs and movies!!!!!!!! :em321: :

I think people edit it because it's just nostalgic. I'm not an editor, so I can't comment on how hard/easy it is, but most people here that game was out around their 13th birthday if they're one of our older members, and that's about perfect. They grew up on it, I assume, so whatever. I love JK, and I'm glad people still edit it.

Oh, and he'sbackwhatever you're an idiot. Albeit entertaining, since you keep making an idiot of yourself

I was big into single player JK myself, so I'll list what always brought me back to play and create new levels.

1. Story: Star Wars allows for almost any wacky scenario, without bounds. You can really let your imagination fly. Creating something in an modern-day Earth setting limits you to adhere to architecture and settings that exist, or that aren't too extreme. You are really given a lot to expand on in JK.

2. Inefficiency: I think that much of JK's limitations are what makes it so easy to work with. JK's source code can't be edited outside of the game's "cog" interpreter, and therefore compiling isn't much more than creating a container file, which allows for a fast and easy compile.

3. Ease of use: SavageX summed it up pretty well. I started editing when i was 13. I really just edited to edit, never really to complete anything. JED has a quick and easy interface, thats hard to stray from once you get used to it.

4 Its fun: JK just kicks ***. Some of those old single player levels (Boam3, WarZone, Dark Pyramid) still create an awesome experience, even if the game or level sucks (Dark Pyramid really sucked). Theres something great about JK that I just can't put my finger on, and why i still lurk around this place after all these years.

It's easy, fun and simple. Newer games are too fancy/newfangled for my liking.

I also like the graphics more than more recent games. The whole 'everything gleaming and clean' look isn't as cool as JK's more authentic gritty Star Wars feel.

And umm... I don't edit JK.... I edit MotS. <_< >_>

And this is coming from the man who gave Kyle Katarn a shotgun and pipe bombs?

http://media.putfile.com/Fatal-Resistance

Yeah, that's what I thought. Making an almost exact replica of Duke Nukem, along with some Laura Croft flips in JK, defintely shows the engines capabiltites.

Brush engines aren't really that hard. Its just like stacking blocks on top of each other to makes rooms and putting textures on the sides that the player will actually see in the game. Thankfully most game engines today are a mix of both sector and brush so you get the pros of both engine types. I personally can't stand sector based engines because trying to add detail by slicing a sector to bits and having to adjoin sectors walls to connect them is much more of a pain than stacking blocks.

but brush editing just doesn't make *sense*

Brush editing is easier and doesn't frustrate me with ridiculous amount of surfaces, but sectors are still useful. Some engine with both brushes and sectors (like Serious Sam, or so I've heard) could be ace.

Sector based editing doesn't make *sense*

I was weaned on sector editing; it just feels "right" to me. With brushes it was always like "ah crap there's a hole in the world".

Strangely, though, I thourougly enjoy playing with Lego. Which gives me an idea... *starts up Blockland*

It makes complete sense, such statements are the result of ignorance and unwillingness to learn or let go of the past.

Harsh but true, Emon. In my case anyway.

It's often so much easier to edit something your familiar with than really crack down and learn something completely new.

[QUOTE= Sarn_Cadrill]but brush editing just doesn't make *sense*[/QUOTE]



rabbit season...
duck season...
rabbit season...
duck season...

you can see where this is going...

From what little experience I have brush makes a ton more sense than sector; it's like building a house (you put up walls etc.).