I'm tired of gold's limitations but I am in love with its simple interfase. I believe source is pretty much what I should move on to but are there any other programs that are worth having a look at? I've messed with unity a tiny bit.

When I was younger I made some architecture in a program/game called active worlds. I also love the warcraft 3 worldeditor though obviously your pretty limited to what's in the game.

Anyone messed with udk? I only have a 2gb graphics card so don't know if it would handle it well...

Another thing, is terrain easy in source?

Any recommendations? I plan on using them to create architectural levels/buildings, houses, churches etc. with some surroundings. I like the actual fps gameplay aspect of gaming engines as well. Being able to walk around in your space is obviously important.

I think you should ask skals about UT mapping, since he does it at his College.

Source is pretty damn good with effects and everything, and mapping in it is similar to mapping in VHE 3.5, plus its very well made and doesnt have some of the annoying bugs in VHE 3.5.
For instance you can select stuff and if you accidentally click outside of the world (click the void) your selection wont get canceled.
Also players dont go trough the floor once you place em in the 3D screen, and other stuff.

I think you should try source and UT. Mess around with em, you'll find what you like

Also, have you ever mapped for Build engine? (Duke Nukem 3D was using it, very old)

source is SO much nicer.. A lot less buggy than hammer 3.x, and a lot of nice, added features. Lot's of little small things you come to appreciate like undo includes faces you've selected, and hitting esc clears whatever tool or selection you have active...

plus obviously you have a much bigger resource budget in source, but there are still limits and you can still break it!

)

I would love to try mapping for a new engine, but trying new things make me scart.

Warcraft 3 world editor was very fun, but it was a lot more limiting than hammer or unreal editor on what you could create. unreal editor 2 takes more time to use, its a lot less practical than hammer in every way, however it gives you a lot more flexibility and all sorts of effects... the lighting is gay and takes a lot more work to look any good however. Not sure about unreal editor 3.
As for the terrain part, it is the easiest in unreal editor 2, unreal editor 3 is probably the same but with minor tweaks and upgrades.
If you decide to go with any unreal editor, you would need to know how to create models first too, same for textures. It has almost no good default resources like source does.

I'd only suggest mapping for Source if you're willing to correct and live with hammer after every update rape, and quite possibly remake your maps after an update as well.

Wait, "only" a 2gb graphics card? What's in the current market?? I have a gforce FX 6200 / 256MB...

Yeah, i only have 512 thanks for making us feel small.

Move to UDK, it is the way to go.

It will force you to learn other skill sets too, such as modeling and texture work.

i opened a map called dm-sanctuary in that map editor and it works fine i can edit it a little, no freezes, my gpu is gts 450 512 mb ddr5

anyway that unreal mapping sucks i have no clues why i havent removed UDK yet

Anybody map for the CryEngine?

I think I dl'd udk as well. And looked at some of the maps. Yes I just need practical. Like in warcraft 3 where you can edit terrain by dragging your cursor over the ground and holding down left click etc.

There's always Unity, which I know nothing about.

I've used UDK late last year, and let me tell you it had A LOT of issues.

Like in warcraft 3 where you can edit terrain by dragging your cursor over the ground and holding down left click etc.

That's how you do it in UDK / Unreal ed. Or is that what you meant?

Stu said what I wanted to. 2GB is like, as much as you can get without SLI/crossfire.

No there are 4GB cards available, right? They're dual GPU's on a single slot, but they're still single-card [NON-SLI]

I was about to call you wrong but you're right, four such 4GB cards do exist on Newegg for an arm and a leg. http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=40000048&IsNodeId=1&Description=4GB&name=Desktop%20Graphics%20%2f%20Video%20Cards&Order=BESTMATCH

Because if it's not on Newegg then it doesn't exist.

Oh wow, I guess the cards I was thinking of [GTX 295 or something along the lines] were only 2GB. Still, put two of those XFXs in crossfire, and you're pretty future proofed.

Amount of memory isnt the issue these days, its the bandwidth of the memory, which is why Nvidia cost so much more, but is well worth it. I say that ofcourse as an avid ATI owner/operator.

Anybody map for the CryEngine?

I've been mucking around with the editor recently, quite fun for some reason. I'll probably look up more tutorials and hopefully make some structured map.

I had some fun with the cryengine sandbox. It's really fast and easy to create huge maps, and pretty fun since you can insantly jump in what you're editing. But that's about it, it's somewhat limited and hard to create new structures.

well that UDK is not so bad
i started with a little cube just like in hammer, then i noticed that i can extrude the shit, after some time i managed how to texture and rotate things

my first UDK map is "done"
those rocks, aztec stones, waterfall, nature stuff come from UDK package (static meshes) as far as i know u can paint static meshes it is a good shit if u want to add a little colors to the wall (grass, rust)

all i did is that small structure sorrouned by blue lights, there is also another building that has not been shown on the pictureok what i like the most in UDK:

• lighting preview

• better brush control

• i am not sure but when i did a stupid thing with a brush the editor automaticaly added triangles!

• easy to learn

• u can easily scale static meshes a'ka models, props

awesome i'll check it out more.