Sunday, June 24, 2012

working out fractured mesh kinks

Was able to import my 2X4 mesh into UDK and make it a destructible object.  The scale of making something in blender and importing it into UDK is silliness.  I made my object in blend 2 X 4 X 120 units and the thing was a little toothpick in the test environment.

I scaled it up 10 times, it didn't look right at all.

I also need to figure out how to set up defaults, as all I had was a camera that bobbed up and down.  I added in a gun to shoot my 2X4 with, but I didn't have an actor to shoot with.  I added in a little hover copter thing to shoot it with, and it was funny watching nobody pilot it but it got old fast.

I also need to figure out some physics or whatever, as when I blasted out the middle, there were these chunks just hovering in mid air.  When I blasted the whole thing away, its shadow was still there.


Tomorrow, I am going to make a new 2X4 in blender, figure out dimensions.  One person said 20x was good, but I didn't like 10x.  Trial and error I suppose.

Thursday, June 21, 2012

Day 2

Made a 2X4 in Blender, exported it into UDK.  It is 2X4X120.  It'll be a stud for in between walls.

Tried to turn it into a destructible mesh and errored out.

Once I figure out how to get it in, and see how big it looks, I'll make a basic wall.  Essentially, I have it in mind to block out room segments as 10X10 foot spaces.

Wednesday, June 20, 2012

Strike The Earth

So, I have decided to make a video game and blog about making it.  With the success of Minecraft, Dwarf Fortress and other games, I thought to myself "I bet I could do this, too!" There are several reasons why I believe this is the best choice for me.

  • I need a creative outlet.  Although writing is my first choice, every market is absolutely saturated with writers of every stripe.  While I do feel I could become a successful using e-readers, there is also the fact that all of my ideas translate better into video games than novels.
  • Every tool I need to create a video game is absolutely free.  Every physical item I need to buy, I already have.
  • I want to own my own company someday.  With this as my hobby, eventually I will learn everything I need to become successful.  Instead of burning money frying circuit boards in my garage like computer nerds of yesterday, the only cost of screwing things up is time.  And electricity, I suppose.
I will be using the UDK dev kit as my engine.  It so powerful, it being free is stupid.  It's only free if I charge money, if I do charge money I will need to pony up a crushing $99 and after my first 50 grand it is a quarter of my revenue.  People I talk to say "25% of revenue and not profit? That's pretty steep!"  True, but paying a handful of software engineers to create a graphics engine is more expensive.  Also, if I can make over 50 g's in bed with my wife snoring on my shoulder, I'll gladly pay these suckers a quarter for every dollar and laugh all the way to the bank.


For 3-D modeling, where I cannot find a free model of what I need, I am going to use Blender.  I <3 open source.

For textures, there are a stupid amount of free texture sites out there.  Honestly, I don't know why this crap is free but I am not going to look a gift horse in the mouth.


The game itself, I am running with the title "The 5th Floor".  I used to work in a building called "The Shoe", and it was the largest reinforced concrete structure in the world until 1937.  Pretty big deal if you are an architectural historian or are into esoteric crap that might end up on a Daily Double or Final Jeopardy.  The building was a long sort of big and had an arcane room numbering system that left many a poor soul hopelessly lost.  On my breaks, I'd wander the halls and among the different power-walker groups there would be these people standing between 303-J and 305-H and wondering where in the hell 304-A was.  Every day.  They'd go back and forth from the map on the wall to the spot where Harry Potter was going to flub the Fidelius Charm and suddenly an office door would would push its way up and shove doors, windows and drywall out of the way and let the ever vigilant patron go and get their stupid reiki consultation or massage therapy or other mysterious service that requires mystical concealment.  Where then, I would say "It's on the other side of the building, you're here, and A's are down this other hallway," and then I would throw my smoke grenade down and vanish, knowing 12 Grimmauld Place was safe once again from the Death Eaters.  You're welcome, Boy Who Lived.

So, this place in all fairness, was one or two steps removed from a legitimate labyrinth and I thought to myself "this could be like a Doctor Who episode where some alien game show has this Running Man game show where they abduct people and make them go through a Maze-O-Death and they make our Maze out of an office complex, where all the offices have these cubicle rows and so forth, and you have to find a key to unlock the door to go down to the next level.  I want the levels to be procedurally generated like in Nethack, or one of the many Rouge-like clones (Diablo is based off Nethack).
Also, I want to be able to explode cubicles with a rocket launcher.  It'd also be cool to have primitive creatures like zombies and orcs with axes and bows and arrows against you with a modern gun and rocket launcher, and you have to sparingly use your ammunition.

So, that's my idea so far!  Come along for the ride!