Q3Map2 w/JKII support

[ydnar]

Those of you who have mapped for Quake 3 or RTCW might recognize this.

 

Q3Map2 is an enhanced BSP compiler based on Id's Q3Map sources.

 

I'm in the process of adding support for Soldier of Fortune II and Jedi Knight II.

 

If you'd like to test it out on your maps, download the latest version + dlls.zip from here:

 

http://shaderlab.com/q3map2/2.3/

 

For more information and feedback, check this thread on the Q3W LE forums:

 

http://www.quake3world.com/ubb/Forum6/HTML/022898.html?

 

 

 

Quick how-to:

 

Create a subdirectory in your GamaData/ folder called "Radiant." Unzip the latest version of Q3Map2 (currently 2.3.0-a12) and the dlls.zip into that directory.

 

Grab a compiler front end with Q3Map2 support such as Q3Map2Toolz by HrO or Q3Map2Build by DLB.

 

Run it with the -game sof2 argument to enable SOF2/JKII support. Future versions will support -game jk2.

 

Don't forget the -fs_basepath "C:/path/to/jkii/gamedata/" argument.

 

 

Suggestions:

 

Use -meta on the BSP phase of compilation and -fast on the lighting phase.

 

Your compiles should be quite noticably faster.

 

 

 

Cheers,

y

[Emon]

Yes! Finally! This will really make compiling A LOT easier and faster.

 

Someone make this sticky, and fast!

[volrathxp]

very cool... I'll be sure to try it out!

[Emon]

Here is a mini tutorial provided by fourwood:

 

http://fourwood.dyndns.org:81/q3map2.txt

[Drakewl]

haha, you made our dreams come true almost, ydnar

 

a big thankie bankie for your work

 

 

your tool will hopefully raise the quality of sp and mp maps somewhat, since you can never get enough quality if possible

[Joben]

Does it improve the quality of the map or just compile times?

(not that thats a small thing )

 

basicaly whats the incetive for getting it and setting it up?

[fourwood]

Originally posted by Joben

Does it improve the quality of the map or just compile times?

(not that thats a small thing )

 

basicaly whats the incetive for getting it and setting it up?

 

With the Q3map2 equiv. of -light -extra -patchshadows, it will be tons faster. It DOES, though, have added features to increase the pretty.

[Joben]

oooooOOOOO!!!!! sign me up for a copy

[ydnar]

- Lighting is faster. Lighting is extremely faster (20-80 times as fast) when the -fast switch is used.

- Radiosity

- Alphashadow/lightfilter shadows (what fourwood showed in his shot)

- High/low-resolution lightmaps via -samplesize, q3map_lightmapsamplesize and _lightmapscale entity keys

- Phong shading

- Lightmap filtering

- Arbitrary lightmap supersampling

- Lightmapped terrain

- Patches in terrain

- External lightmap support (lightmaps up to 1024x1024 pixels)

- Terrain on any entity (not just func_groups)

- Enhanced vertex lighting code

- Cloned bmodel entities

- Smaller BSP filesizes (15-50% reduction, depending on options used, shader settings)

- Lower r_speeds, higher FPS in-game (use -meta switch in BSP phase)

- Cel shading, fur modules

- Fairly good "autocaulk" for obscured brush faces

- Fogging of brush entities

- Much, much improved patch lightmap projection

- Unlimited patch size (really big patches are OK)

- Multiple suns support

- Debugportals, debugsurfaces modes for testing maps

- Pretty stable, good Vis based on MrE's latest code

- Farplane vis culling and _foghull support

- Support for Quake 3, RTCW, Elite Force, SOF2 and JKII

- Linux version *

 

* soon

 

There's more stuff I'm forgetting here...

 

y

[Manquesa]

You said in your first post that you're still working on it, when will it be ready for a final release

[Emon]

To my knowledge, Ydnar is always working on and improving q3map2, there will never be a final release.

[ydnar]

Originally posted by Manquesa

You said in your first post that you're still working on it, when will it be ready for a final release

 

It's usable now, though a couple features have yet to be implemented. There never really is a final version...there's always something new to add or some obscure bug to fix.

 

BTW, where in Alexandria? I grew up there...

 

y

[Emon]

One thing's for sure, it's way better than SoF2Map!

 

I made eight batch files which you can use for your comiling with Q3Map2. Just open the files in Notepad and adjust the paths to your own. Place them in your Base\Maps folder, and drag your MAP file onto the BAT you want to use, and watch it go.

 

You can grab them here:

 

http://emon.netfirms.com/Q3Map2_BATs.zip

[Manquesa]

Originally posted by ydnar

 

BTW, where in Alexandria? I grew up there...

 

y

 

I'm just a few minutes from the Pentagon off 395. I live right next to NOVA community college, Alexandria campus.

[EL3CTRO]

fixed it

[Emon]

No, there's no problem with the BAT files of mine. Your problem is that you removed the %1 and replaced it with your own file, and I assume you are still dragging/dropping the MAP to the BAT file? If so, solve by removing the map name and going back to the %1, or just running the bat.

[idontlikegeorge]

you should know by now emon doesnt make mistakes.

[EL3CTRO]

I just double click on the file, you should know me better than that emon -- Although should radiant have generated the srf file?

[ViNYL_VeNGeaNCe]

Nice!

Cut my compile times down by 75% or more. Looks great too, havent found any probs so far. Thanks ydnar!

[silverwest]

this is weird! with some of my maps, the bat files work fine, but with others I just get a DOS prompt.

[redrain85]

I tried q3map2 last night.

 

Using the -fast option, it cut my "FullVis extra" compile time from over an hour, to just over five minutes! That's more than a 1000% speed increase!

 

Impressive. Most impressive.

 

However, there are a some problems I noticed.

 

1) My map is a hell of a lot darker. I know the manual says -fast has the potential to do this, so I guess I'll have to adjust my lighting.

 

2) I'm using the Imperial Shuttle model in my map. With SOF2MAP it appears perfectly fine, but with q3map2 the textures on the model are missing. I get a black and white grid pattern. I'm going to try messing with the shader file and see what happens.

 

3) Dynamic lights don't work. The lights that are supposed to be flashing, are steady. Maybe this has something to do with using the -fast option? But the manual makes no mention of potential problems with dynamic lights.

[ydnar]

Originally posted by redrain85

I tried q3map2 last night.

 

Using the -fast option, it cut my "FullVis extra" compile time from over an hour, to just over five minutes! That's more than a 1000% speed increase!

 

Impressive. Most impressive.

 

However, there are a some problems I noticed.

 

1) My map is a hell of a lot darker. I know the manual says -fast has the potential to do this, so I guess I'll have to adjust my lighting.

 

You can probably settle it with a couple simple changes, such as making your sky shader use a larger q3map_lightsubdivide (512+) and raising the surfacelight a bit.

 

 

2) I'm using the Imperial Shuttle model in my map. With SOF2MAP it appears perfectly fine, but with q3map2 the textures on the model are missing. I get a black and white grid pattern. I'm going to try messing with the shader file and see what happens.

 

1) Check to make sure the shader is listed in shaderlist.txt

2) Check the shader's path to make sure it's correctly named

 

MD3s generated with the pop'n'fresh MD3 exporter have mangled shader paths (\ instead of /) and bad normals, among other things.

 

 

3) Dynamic lights don't work. The lights that are supposed to be flashing, are steady. Maybe this has something to do with using the -fast option? But the manual makes no mention of potential problems with dynamic lights.

 

This feature (lightstyles), along with finishing the lightgrid is not yet implemented. They will function correctly in a future version.

 

 

BTW, I'm going to QuakeCon tomorrow, so there won't be a new version until next week sometime.

 

Cheers,

y