Bsp

[Steve French]

Well I went and decided to learn how to make "mods". A suggestion came up to start out on Quake One. I figured this a pretty good idea seeing the active community and years of resources that have built up. I am running windows 7, so the original quake.exe will not run. I tried winquake and proquake, both of which seem to work fine.

Mapping seemed to be a good place to start, so I downloaded most of the programs I heard about and set about giving them a whirl. Most did not work(worldcraft), or had an interface I didn't like(quark).

Finally I come across one that seemed to work and was user friendly, BSP. My problem is this; when I went to compile the map I made, it gave me the error message "Quake.exe is a 16 or 32 bit program and is not compatible with the version of windows you are running."

I figure okay, so I'll set it to use winquake or proquake instead like I did when I ran into the same problem with Quark. But goddamn, I just can't seem to find how to set BSP to use one of these alternatives. Can this be done? Will I have to use another level editor?

[=peg=]

Check GB's wonderful tutorial

[Steve French]

Well I read the tutorial, and I now have a basic understanding of GTKRadiant. Not really what I was asking though. I needed someone with experience in BSP to tell me how to run a different version of quake after compiling or to tell me that it can't be done.

[Baker]

Change Quake executable in settings to something other than Quake.exe?

[metchsteekle]

change the name of the desired executable to quake.exe?

[Steve French]

I shouldn't have said that I was just getting started, or maybe explained myself better. This seems to have given people the idea I am a barely functioning retard. Going in and changing the settings is not beyond my grasp, and well like most people would, was the first thing I tried when I ran into this problem.

BSP.jpg

There does not seem to be an area to change the quake executable. Only an option to change the game.

So I did some searching and got it figured that I could change the quake executable by editing the windows batch file for compiling in the BSP folder. This at least got the other versions of quake to run. Though the map itself did not start. I get the errors

"Couldn't Spawn Server
Maps/quake1testmap.bsp", and

"Couldn't exec autoexec.cfg"

q1error.jpg

Maybe I am a bit retarded? Maybe there aren't enough resources around as I thought to hold my hand throughout the entire process? Maybe I should just give up and go with GTKRadiant as suggested earlier?

[Steve French]

Though don't get me wrong. I am grateful for everyone who tried to help my through my problem. I understand this is a free forum and nobody has any obligations.

[golden_boy]

Steve French,

don't take it so hard. Mapping and modding for Quake means getting age-old software to do what you want :-/

I feel your pain.

Messing with batch files is totally normal in this environment.

You have downloaded some modern Quake engine now, I assume? That's the first thing you should do. Mappers typically use FitzQuake or its derivatives, QuakeSpasm and RMQengine. There is sort of a specialisation process in modern Quake engines, ie you will have dedicated multiplayer engines / engines preferred by mappers / modding-friendly engines.

If you're on Windows, another really good engine is DirectQ. That's tuned to make the most out of DirectX, while the others use OpenGL.

Anyway, the choice is yours.

BSP is one of the less frequently used map editors, hence why nobody gave you complete pointers at first. If you like it, by all means go with it though! I hear it is very good. Make sure you have the latest version (I say this because there was an update a couple years ago, when everybody already presumed the editor dead).

"Couldn't exec autoexec.cfg"

This is Quake's main user-tweakable config file. It's located in Quake\id1. You can create it if it doesn't exist, but tbh this should not be a critical error...

"Couldn't Spawn Server
Maps/quake1testmap.bsp"

That's weird. I see in the BSP.jpg that your map directory is Quake/\maps, and I think that is wrong. It should be Quake\id1\maps. Maybe it doesn't find your .bsp file.

Which engine are you using? I really suggest something like Fitzquake (0.85), DirectQ, or a recent version of Proquake (not 3.50).

Also, quakeone.com is a good starting place in general, but for questions that are really mapping-specific, func_msgboard migt be another good idea (post in the Mapping help thread). Using both will give you a higher chance of good replies.

Edit: If you're not using Bengt Jardrup's map compiler tools yet, you might want to give them a try.

http://user.tninet.se/~xir870k/

There is a multithreaded version of the Vis program that should help you save compiling time:

http://wantonhubris.com/blog/2009/07...s-for-windows/

and a version of Light that supports coloured lighting (.lit files) called BengtLightColoured:

http://mhquake.blogspot.com/

That might help.

[Steve French]

That's weird. I see in the BSP.jpg that your map directory is Quake/\maps, and I think that is wrong. It should be Quake\id1\maps. Maybe it doesn't find your .bsp file.

This seems to have been the problem. Working fine now. Thanks for all the other advice as well, will look into it.

[R00k]

I use that "BSP" program myself, and it's very nice!
Havent tried Radiant, though BSP has a nice easy to use interface.
Point at something in 3d space to select it, you can then ctrl x to delete or modify it in the top/right/front panes. It takes a little usage to get the hang of it, but you will learn something new each time you use it. I keeps the maps in BSP/Quake/maps
this is also where BSP puts the .map and .bsp files as you make your map.

[Anarchy]

Steve French is a good kitty! bubbles loves you.