Yeh, what Willem said.

Tbh I found the way unreal uses brushes so much more tolerable once I found out you could vertex edit/order shift them, spent a good while assuming Uengine mappers all did some crazy level of layout planning before touching the editor ;p 

Are there any comprehensive 3d studio max tutorial sites which walk you through most important things, from the very beginniner topics to more advanced stuff and techniques? 

http://www.3dtotal.com/

Is a nice resource for tutorials and general stuff. 

3ds max itself has a load of beginner tutorials which show how to use all the basic things like creating objects and applying modifiers, using the material editor and such. 

Assume you have a curved ramp like this one: http://utmapping.wikidot.com/local--files/smc-hu-floor2/smc-hufloor222.jpg Now, assume you want to bend it in the same way as when this same ramp is being used in Arsenal: so that it not only leads from one side to another, but also also goes upwards, still keeping the edges of both "start" and "end" nicely aligned.

I asked around and Hourences told me that UED has no way to do this directly and that since there are no prefab versions of this mesh bent the way I want, I would have to either 1) export from UED to max, edit mesh and reimport back into UED or 2) create my own mesh, texture it from scratch and import for use in UED.

Is this for real? Am I supposed to be have a modelling package like MAX and know how to use it if all I want is to simply slightly adjust an already existing mesh to suit my task? What about scaling meshes, do I also need a modelling package for this? 

 

You can't bend or warp meshes in UnrealEd, no. You can scale them, flip them or rotate them but you can't actually modify the shape dynamically. Sorry! 

As for scaling them - open the properties of the mesh once it's in the level and open the "Display" category. Fool around with the DrawScale and DrawScale3D fields. Putting negatives into those fields will flip the mesh along the appropriate axis. 

Something I've been curious about:

Seeing as modern games require bigger and bigger time investments to release a map that is at the same level of quality (let alone higher) as the stock maps in the original game, how many people have turned to collaboration instead of doing everything solo from the ground up?

I am asking because, I started playing around with UT3 tech and although I see myself capable of designing the layout, the gameplay and doing *some* detailing and visual work, it is quite obvious to me that in order to make a map that can be comparable to the one found in stock UT3, I would have to either learn modelling in MAX/Maya as well as learn to texture said models (which would probably take at least several months of intense studying before I could *possibly* reach reasonable-looking results) or alternatively I could seek-out someone who already has this skillset and collaborate with said person to work on touching up the map.

I guess wanting to do everything by yourself is partly an ego thing, but is it really reasonable in the days of modern technology? Is it really worth it? Another question: if your resume has a lot of maps done in collaboration with someone, is this a good thing or a bad thing from an industry recruiter perspective? It could be seen as good, because it means you can work in a team environment, but it could also be seen as bad, because it may not be obvious which part of that work you were REALLY responcible for, making it harder to evaluate your own potential as an individual... 

You can do it by yourself but the key would be to use the existing assets (meshes, materials, etc) in creative ways.

Maps are definitely not solo efforts around here. I touched pretty much every map in UT3 at one point or another and I'm pretty sure that's true of every level designer here who worked on it.

Now, a hobbyist LD at home who has all the time in the world can take a few months to crank out a level so it IS doable. It's just tougher. In companies with deadlines and milestones it's not really reasonable anymore. 

Long time Quaker needing some advice how to get started with Quake 1 mapping. I've used BSP and Worldcraft ages ago, but have not kept up with the content creation scene since '98. Can anyone suggest a modern editor and/or tutorial site?

Thx. 

 

 

Are there any sites that have free textured meshes you can dl for use in UT3 maps, kind of like prefab sites? 

illegalfreetexturedmeshesforut3torrents.com/category/kindoflikeprefabsites/ 

 

Why would free meshes be illegal?

Anyway ... Jago, I don't think so. Although that's not a bad idea for a site to start up though. Heh. I think the problem there is that it's a lot of work to create meshes with proper materials that look great so people probably aren't going to want to give them away for free.

What you might do is look for UT3 maps that have custom content in them that you like. Download those and (assuming they haven't been cooked) you might be able to use their custom meshes in your own levels. 

Was a comment on the pro-DRM crowd here. 

does one even exist? ;) 

Has free meshes of various types, but you'd have to convert them to whatever format UT3 uses and most are probably fridges or mobile phones. 

pro-DRM crowd

Don't be an idiot. CHOOSE NON-FUCKTARDERY. 

How legal or ethical would that be though? Sounds alot like stealing (as long as you don't have the authors authorisation). 

If the readme for the level allows it, go for it. Otherwise contact the author and see if they're OK with it. Done. 

This isn't really a mapping problem but it's close enough to not warrant a new thread.

Does anyone know what wad(s) these textures belong to? (they are found in gmsp3 map)

http://img103.imageshack.us/img103/2526/texturesyl8.jpg

The window glass is from DKT.wad but I'm interested in the frame. Thanks, in advance. 

but the window frame looks like it's from the 'middle evil' map.