Journal #5744
Posted 15 years ago2009-04-12 00:03:10 UTC
Almost there...
sigh
I have finished the documentation for my new Canyon: Redux level -- it took a bit of work to get the acknowledgements section right, to list all the people who created the textures I used, but it's finally done!
Meanwhile, I have been running the final compile of the level. For consistency, there were just a few minor details which needed tweaking, so I did that last night and started the compile. On my computer at work, with its 3Gb of RAM, the VIS portion of the full compile takes around 14 hours. On my laptop, with its meagre 1Gb - well, let's just say it probably won't be finished today. Neither of my desktop machines has more RAM than that either - although possibly it would compile a little faster on one of those...? Definitely time for a hardware upgrade, methinks!
If all else fails, I'll run the compile overnight at work -- but I won't be back there till Wednesday afternoon at the earliest!
Sometime in the next week, I'll be releasing the darn thing. Until then, I've got screenshots up on my Mapping Page if anybody wants to take a sneak peek...
sigh
I have finished the documentation for my new Canyon: Redux level -- it took a bit of work to get the acknowledgements section right, to list all the people who created the textures I used, but it's finally done!
Meanwhile, I have been running the final compile of the level. For consistency, there were just a few minor details which needed tweaking, so I did that last night and started the compile. On my computer at work, with its 3Gb of RAM, the VIS portion of the full compile takes around 14 hours. On my laptop, with its meagre 1Gb - well, let's just say it probably won't be finished today. Neither of my desktop machines has more RAM than that either - although possibly it would compile a little faster on one of those...? Definitely time for a hardware upgrade, methinks!
If all else fails, I'll run the compile overnight at work -- but I won't be back there till Wednesday afternoon at the earliest!
Sometime in the next week, I'll be releasing the darn thing. Until then, I've got screenshots up on my Mapping Page if anybody wants to take a sneak peek...
3 Comments
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I agree tho, SP maps in general take a SHITLOAD of effort for a relatively short amount of enjoyment by the player... it's like making a movie.
For one thing it's DM, not SP, so I sorta hope people will play it more than once.
I write big documentation because every level I build - every HLDM level - has its own story. It's part of the process. Maybe people want to read the story, and maybe they don't. I write big documentation because it's what I do. When I'm not a level builder, I'm a writer. (Well, gamer, and reader, and general-time-waster, and watcher-of-DVDs, and writer. It's in there somewhere...)
Much of the time involved in FINISHING the documentation - 'cos, y'know, most of it is worthless waffle that nobody will read anyway - is getting the credits right, giving due and proper acknowledgement of all the textures I've used which were made by other people. Getting THAT right is important -- anything less would make me a lowly scumsucker who passed off other people's work as his own!
And sure, I'm sure there are people who think my writing four novels was a waste of time too.
shrug
ETA:
As for why I continue to build levels for goldsource at all ... well, didn't think that would need to be explained on THIS site. But I build 'em for myself and my friends to play, and HL is one of the few games we can run without difficulty at work where we most often play. That's all. I choose to make them available here to give back something to the community from which I learned a trick or two over the years ... but that's a bonus. Certainly the half-dozen or so comments I get on each level are nice - the positive, and even the negative - and they teach me something too, but they hardly repay the months (even, in some cases, years) of work I put into each level. No, I build them for private use!
Since I'm also working on tweaking the SDK, this may well be the last level I release that will work (almost) properly without my PetesDM mod. OTOH, since I've pushed the engine about as far as it can be pushed, maybe it IS time to branch out, to find something else we can put on the machines at work. shrug