I wanted to showcase my idea for grass. Of course I'll be using tradition 2d grass blades as well to give it more height.


I've created a couple more "landing" areas to access the island over water. This level is going to be huge with either several more islands or a "main" land. Either way, they'll have "Capture" areas. When you capture an area you receive some type of benefit for your team. It might be resources to build more units, a special weapon or unit, or just a strategically more advantageous position.




I really want to see something like the Siege Tanks from Star Craft on this island pounding at incoming boats.

I have some ideas on how to have submarines, but haven't worked out all the details yet (there's already a place to access the island from an under water cavern). The level will eventually also feature atmospheric flight and possibly even a vast space above the planet. Either way, you'll definitely be able to fly from space to ground (I already have the layout figured out and tested. It's quite convincing).

Really neat, dude. I think that the space above the planet is a good concept. Will the ships be operational? Or will they be controled by KEYs?

Fully operational from take-off. To go to space (or vice versa), you'll have to go through several layers of clouds. You'll begin to see the stars the closer you get to the upper atmosphere. Like wise, the sky will fade in on decent. Don't worry though, the islands on the planet will be viewable from space, so you'll know exactly where to land. Hopefully, you'll be able fly around the entire planet. However, you'll only be able to land in the "Battle Zone." Using the planet as a whole is still a strategic move. You should still be able to fly in and out of canyons and such around the whole planet, too.

darn i was about to make a island lol... nice work i cant wait to play it

Keep in mind, this is Jedi Knight we're talking about, and when you start having too big of stuff in one map, and way too much going on, the framerate is litterally destroyed.

I want that then.



This is true though, happens a lot to me.

Don't worry, I'm already ahead of you. I'm using a combination of the RVTCS/LOD's/and Drazen Island's adjoin "turn off" trick. The framerate should remain nice and high. Additionally, I'm trying to see if I can come up with a way for the player to select a "graphics" setting. It should allow at least 3 different culling distances. At the lowest two, particle and some other special effects will be disabled. At the lowest, the undergrowth floral will be disabled.

I'm thinking you could release 3 versions of the level, and I'm pretty sure (from what i remember back in the day) that there is a way to make different versions (wih only those slight graphical differences) to play together.

Of course, that could be memory playing me as I've edited JK, JO, JA, Blood 2, Quake 3, Unreal Tournament, Hexen II, and Neverwinter Nights. So I might be mixing games up lol.

Can you show me this trick, Master CaptBevvil?

That would look pretty good, if not for the giant phallus in the middle. Nice grass.

:banned:

Though it's true the long thing in the middle is weird. What is it supposed to be?

That would be cool if you made it into a giant tree that fell over most of the island, casting a big dark shadow

QFT.

You could make a giant tree where you could walk around in it's branches. ( Or make a Wookie village :p).

... you're building an entire planet?

That's gonna be really laggy, heh.

iv always wanted a entire planet level

Time to build a deathstar...

lol that would rule too

hey while ur at making a death star why not make the galaxie?! lol

I wanted to do that...

By the way, it's impossible to do a planet, as a planet is round. You would fall into space. Death Star would be possible though.

haha, fools, you think that galaxies is the biggest things... It isn't. Nor is a universe!

you should make...

DIMENSIONS!

He could easily make a planet, making strategic use of teleports.. the planet could be gridded out into landing zones.

As he was saying, you go through several layers of clouds as you go into space.. so make one of these layers teleport you into a 'space room', a large sector with a textured planet in the middle.. As I was saying, the planet would have gridded hotspots so that when enter one of the hotspots you're teleported back to the cloud layers above the island.. so you get the illusion of travelling into the atmosphere.

The grids could work as different areas, depending on where you come down on the planet (what hotspot you enter), you'd end up in a different area/island. The island areas could also have hotspots at the side so you can travel across the planet too. A bit like zones in an MMORPG.

If that makes any sense then you're free to use the idea Oh.. and it's also based on the assumption that he's going to have some form of vehicles capable of flight..

A planet wouldn't be impossible, a combination of the walk-on-walls cogs and sector thrust would probably do the trick.

I still can't take the spire in the middle of the island seriously.

I also think you should take advantage of some sprite-grass. It's a great touch that breaks up long stretches of grass.

JediKirby

Hehe. Sector Thrusts. That would be hard.

Uhh, you need to play the DBZ mod. Theres this one where you are on a tiny planet (It's literally a guys house, a tree, and a car with a driveway going all the way around the planet) which you can walk all the way around.

it looks like a mutant breast, but i like the grass.

PhantomCoder (aka Hell Raiser, cogger for DBZ:TDiR) has been working on a big space level and has implemented controlling a ship using the mouse, while I have researched much of the physics (such as the improved walking on walls found in DBZ:TDiR) of the JK engine.

We should chat.

You can usually find us in the #jkhub chat room.

Wow, lots of feed back. Thanks!

I'm going to try to hit a few points:

-The Huge spire in the center is a concealed exaust stack. There's a huge energy core (and base...that I haven't constructed yet) located deep into the island core. This will provide a resource benifit for teams who control it. Your team needs resources to build larger combat and space vehicles. Tanks, Mechs, Boats, Fighters, and possibly even Capital Ships. I'm also considering AI Bot support for some units.

-As I originally posted, I'm going to be using 2d grass as well (grass sprites, though technically not sprites). There will also be flowers, bushes, other trees, vines, rocks, ect. I want players to be able to use these things to their advantage. No one will control the island at start-up. Once it is captured, it'll be fairly difficult to retake. Of course, this depends on how well the current oweners defend it. Being a hot resource spot, it'll be a prime target for the opposing team(s).

-While I've considered "Hot Zones" in the past, I'm not currently considering them now. I may add them as extra areas later via a RVTCS cog patch, but that remains to be seen as yet. The rest of the planet will be autogenerated in some way I have not yet determined (I have a couple options I'm considering). Then it will be textured and things will be put around the planet (such as forests). Since the rest of the planet is just "flyover" area, I can get away with using tricks to simulate complicated tree lines using a well placed 3dos and textures. In short, it shouldn't take long to generate and will still be fairly realistic looking.

Keep the questions and comments coming! If anyone would like to help me (especially on the cogging aspect) please let me know. If nothing else, I really need someone who can do object placement for me. That's something that will be very time consuming at the end.

This looks amazing. If you can do it.

I'd say, continue to work on it, as this would be an incredible map to play.

Do try and keep the framerate up, or else you'll have a really good map that's impossibe to play.

I'm going to release the map in parts and "Patch" as I complete more areas. This will give people something to play as they wait for it to be expanded.

For instance, the first release might just contain the island itself with a couple of control points.

I don't want to use a 'Bleed' system. I do, however, want something similier to Star Craft. When you destroy all of the opposing teams buildings, you win.

I don't know how to write cog, so if anyone would like to take on the task of creating the code for this, please send me a pm.

I'm not sure how to do spawn selection short of having a room each time someone dies where they can choose a switch for the appropriate spawn location. It would have to check to see if the spawn point they selected is valid for their team or not. I would have some type of map(s) in the room to identify where each spawn point is.

Build it and they will come. :p


Seriously, if you can pull all of this together (this could be a cog nightmare), it will be awesome.

Personally, the spire on the island doesn't bother me, but more vegitation could be in order.