Bounding boxes

[JasonX]

[Mexicouger]

[leileilol]

You would also have to edit the bsp compiler to accomodate your new bbox sizes. The standard bounding boxes are found in defs.qc

[JasonX]

Where are they defined in hmap2?

[Baker]

[frag.machine]

[rant]
First of all, this isn't directed to anyone in particular. So jasonx, mexicouger, please don't get personal about what I'll say here. I'm just using this discussion as a hook.

In the last months I've seen a lot of people come to this forums, trying to make a HL1/CS/Halo/whatever clone for PSP and whinning about what Quake cannot do. And I notice that many of these modders think they are dealing with some port of the Source engine to PSP.

lesson #1: You're working with Quake, not the HL1/Source engine. so learn MORE about what Quake can and cannot accomplish. There's a lot of resources out there to use as examples. And you have here a small, experient and motivated community of engine coders and modders willing to share knowledge. But always remember, you shouldn't expect people to work in your mod for you - at least, not for free. So be prepared to become the mapper, modeller, 2D artist, sound engineer, QuakeC guy and, if it's the case, even the engine coder.

lesson #2: after learning all you can about Quake, if you realize your idea won't work on it (at least, not exactly in the way you want), you can either change the engine to fit you needs, or change your mod to fit what the engine can do. And you may be surprised with what you can obtain if you "relax" your requirements a bit. Remember, it's better to release a non 100% faithful clone of Halo but that's fun to play than releasing NOTHING. So, that 5000 poly Master Chief model you made (or exported from the original) won't work or makes your PSP crawl and cry ? Use something simpler, then. The bound boxes in Quake suck and don't allow you to make medikits fly in realistic way when you shoot a rocket ? If it's fun, who cares if they are unrealistic ? And, if isn't fun nor fundamental for gameplay, then isn't worth the effort, so forget about it.

So, in a nutshell: be creative, use what you have, explore ALL its possibilities (including adapting your initial ideas to what the available technology can do) and finally, evaluate if it's worth the effort before jumping into the engine modification wagon or just quit whinning about what the engine can't do.
[/rant]

[mh]

Agreed.

There seems to be a conflict of objectives in some cases. Quake is old technology, and that comes with both pros and cons.

The most obvious advantage is that it can, will, and does run on almost anything. It thrives in low-memory situations, doesn't choke on low-powered CPUs, the game data itself is small, fast to install and fast to load. It doesn't try to do anything too complicated so it's reasonably simple to deal with. It's well understood. These are all valid reasons for selecting Quake as a base for a mod.

Disadvantages are that it needs major wrestling and internal surgery to achieve many things outside of it's limits. It's data formats are also limited. Some of the simple things it does, it does them in a fairly roundabout complicated way. There are a lot of things fundamentally wrong with the released source code as-is, and many of these have crept into engine ports without being fixed.

Part of wisdom is knowing when you've made a wrong decision, and knowing to back away from it. If somebody is constantly beating against limits of the Quake engine, then the possibility is there that they've just made a bad choice; maybe the Quake engine isn't suitable for their mod. (Having said that, if they get enjoyment from beating against those limits and fixing them, that's a completely different story. But that approach isn't for everyone. I digress.)

So if that 5000 poly model runs poorly in Quake, remember that Quake was never designed to handle 5000 poly models. You'll need to change it's model format, rewrite the loader, rewrite the renderer, and do a whole bunch of QC to support it. That's the reason why modern games can use 5000 poly models with good performance but Quake can't. Things were different in 1996; 3D acceleration didn't exist, memory was low, performance was low, and Quake was designed around those constraints.

It took Valve almost 10 years to get from Quake to Source after all.

So, like I said, if that model (or whatever else) turns out to be a crucial part of your mod, then maybe Quake is the wrong technology for your mod; maybe an alternative choice that actually supports the things you want to do would be better.

[JasonX]

[Baker]

[Error]

[Baker]

[goldenboy]

[Baker]

[goldenboy]

[goldenboy]