JK2 The Lost Mission

[McGroose]

Too bad Jedi Outcast has no stealth elements, because they would definitely fit into that kind of map.

"Stealth would be a wiser choice here"

 

Lmao, whatever Kyle.

[TheWhitePhoenix]

"Stealth would be a wiser choice here"

 

Lmao, whatever Kyle.

Pfft, I just did notarget and force drained all of their sorry asses.

[eezstreet]

Okay, I'll leave the extendable walkway as it is.

 

I've started laying down the brushwork for the reactor maintenance halls. Previously you mentioned something about an exit maze--do you think that's what we should use these halls for?

Yeah, I think we should make use of the prefabs that are in cairn_bay2 or cairn_bay. I believe I included those in my PM to you. They're very cool, they have glass floors and big vertical shafts and can be fit together to make a small maze. You could maybe do something like this that matches with the entrance to cairn_reactor somehow. Feel free to edit the entrance to cairn_reactor as you see fit. I think maybe one of these vertical shafts could be a nice place for a lightsaber fight.

[Jedi_Mediator]

Yeah, I think we should make use of the prefabs that are in cairn_bay2 or cairn_bay. I believe I included those in my PM to you. They're very cool, they have glass floors and big vertical shafts and can be fit together to make a small maze. You could maybe do something like this that matches with the entrance to cairn_reactor somehow. Feel free to edit the entrance to cairn_reactor as you see fit. I think maybe one of these vertical shafts could be a nice place for a lightsaber fight.

 

Okay, I've imported the prefab from cairn_bay2 and will start arranging it into a maze. From the shot I posted above, do you think we should include my maintenance hallway concept in the end of the level? I was thinking of including several similar hallways, to break up the monotony of the prefab maze, and maybe put the level transition in one final hallway at the end.

[eezstreet]

Okay, I've imported the prefab from cairn_bay2 and will start arranging it into a maze. From the shot I posted above, do you think we should include my maintenance hallway concept in the end of the level? I was thinking of including several similar hallways, to break up the monotony of the prefab maze, and maybe put the level transition in one final hallway at the end.

Yes, I really like the maintenance hallway. How will you plan on connecting it to the pit area though?

Will you need to modify cairn_dock2 in order to make it more inline with your pit?

[Jedi_Mediator]

The hallway in the shot is currently connected directly to the pit through a door. It's somewhat in shadow, but if you look closely in the shot, you can see a ramp leading to the left off of the main grated walkway. This ramp is where the player enters from after reaching the catwalk at the top of the pit. Does that make sense? We can change it if you want.

 

And I think it would be easier to modify the pit in cairn_stockpile to match the one in cairn_dock2, rather than the other way around. Do you want them to look basically the same? (Also, do you mean cairn_dock1? Cairn_dock2 does not appear to be included in the original game.)

[eezstreet]

Sorry, yes, I meant cairn_dock1.

 

I don't think cairn_dock1 and cairn_stockpile's pit should look the same, I just think there should be doors leading out from the pit so it makes sense.

I think I'm confused though. What I originally meant is that there should be some way of getting to this maze from the big black piece on the ceiling, like a grate or a vent or something. One possible way is to connect it directly to the maze and have the maze lead to the maintenance walkway, which in turn leads to the reactor.

Although I don't exactly know what you have in mind here? I am a bit lost.

[Jedi_Mediator]

This stuff is always tricky to explain in words, so I'll use pictures instead. Here's the flow as it is right now.

 

Pic 1: Player is on the top tier of the pit, ready to jump onto the pipe and then onto the walkway, headed for the door seen center-screen.

Pic 2: Player has reached the walkway. The door opens when the player comes near.

Pic 3: Player has walked through the door and finds themselves in the reactor maintenance hallway.

 

I figured these hallways would function as the Imperials' access to the "maintenance shafts" (AKA the exit maze) for workers coming from different parts of the base. So the player would first enter the maintenance hallway, progress through a small section of maze, reach another maintenance hallway, do some more of the maze, etc. until reaching a final hallway where they will be able to break a vent and enter cairn_reactor. Does this make sense? We could limit the maze to 3 or 4 different sections to keep it from becoming tiresome.

 

Shots are below.

 

 

 

 

 

[eezstreet]

It does make sense. I was on the fence at first about having doors on top of the walkway like that, but I think you made it work nicely. I like how it blends into the maintenance hallway nicely.

 

I think what you've got planned for the last part of the level seems good though. In order to break up the monotony a bit, I recommend inserting a duel area partway into one of the maze sections. I think those vertical sections could be a great spot for that.

[Jedi_Mediator]

Brief update: I've finished the basic layout I had in mind. There are several maze sections, increasing slightly in difficulty as the player reaches the end of the level, with the vertical shafts and maintenance hallways interspersed to add variety. The breakable vent leading to cairn_reactor is in place. There are a few places where we could insert a reborn or shadowtrooper duel, when it comes time to do that. And since I've been using the prefabs, it would be easy to rearrange things a bit if needed.

 

The map is currently playable, but the whole exit area is still pretty bare-bones. Next I'll be working on adding lights and details so it fits visually with the rest of the map.

[Futuza]

Looks good so far, keep up the great work!

[eezstreet]

Brief update: I've finished the basic layout I had in mind. There are several maze sections, increasing slightly in difficulty as the player reaches the end of the level, with the vertical shafts and maintenance hallways interspersed to add variety. The breakable vent leading to cairn_reactor is in place. There are a few places where we could insert a reborn or shadowtrooper duel, when it comes time to do that. And since I've been using the prefabs, it would be easy to rearrange things a bit if needed.

 

The map is currently playable, but the whole exit area is still pretty bare-bones. Next I'll be working on adding lights and details so it fits visually with the rest of the map.

Very nice. Can't wait to see it.

[Jedi_Mediator]

...and I've run into a problem. After doing a light compile, I began receiving the following in-game error:

 

WARNING: RE_AddPolyToScene: NULL poly shader

 

The error spams nonstop at the top of the screen during gameplay, and all models are covered in the black-and-white "missing texture" grid. While trying to find the cause of the problem, I copied the map and tried deleting the entire exit area I've worked on recently, then recompiling. That fixes the error. So something in the area I've been working on is causing the problem...but I have no idea what it could be. I am using only base assets in the map, and I have not installed anything mod-related recently. I've never seen this error before.

 

If anyone knows what causes this error, feel free to enlighten me...but in the meantime, I will keep working to find and eliminate the cause. I need to solve this problem before I can move on with development.

[Ramikad]

...and I've run into a problem. After doing a light compile, I began receiving the following in-game error:

 

WARNING: RE_AddPolyToScene: NULL poly shader

 

The error spams nonstop at the top of the screen during gameplay, and all models are covered in the black-and-white "missing texture" grid. While trying to find the cause of the problem, I copied the map and tried deleting the entire exit area I've worked on recently, then recompiling. That fixes the error. So something in the area I've been working on is causing the problem...but I have no idea what it could be. I am using only base assets in the map, and I have not installed anything mod-related recently. I've never seen this error before.

 

If anyone knows what causes this error, feel free to enlighten me...but in the meantime, I will keep working to find and eliminate the cause. I need to solve this problem before I can move on with development.

 

Reading around, you may want to try and increase your _lightmapscale a bit, and check out the shader that causes it.

[eezstreet]

Did you add some new shader?

[Jedi_Mediator]

I have not created any new shaders, no; I have only been using shaders and textures that were already used in the assets provided by Raven. That's why this error is so puzzling to me.

 

I increased the _lightmapscale to 2 and that did fix the problem, at least for now. I don't understand why this worked, but I think I will have to accept it for now. It will cause lower lightmap resolutions, which will lead to lower visual quality in some areas. This drop in quality will probably not be noticeable most of the time, and if we find any shadows that are noticeably blurry, we should be able to locally change the _lightmapscale in that area without causing the error to return. That's my hope, at least.

 

The good news is that, with this workaround in place, I should be able to resume development! I'll post an update once lighting is added to the exit area.

[eezstreet]

Nice. Glad that fixed it.

[Jedi_Mediator]

Finally time for another update! The entire exit area, at least according to my own layout, is now complete and functional, including the transition to cairn_reactor. @@eezstreet, I will send you the updated files so you can test them, if you want. I will be glad to fix any bugs and/or make any changes as you see fit.

[eezstreet]

Alright! I had a chance to play through it, and here are some notes:

• There are a few bugs and glitches that I saw. Some screenshots at the bottom.
• Force Jump 3 is definitely required as a minimum
• It's far too easy to kill the pit shadowtroopers because they can actually fall and die off of their current positions. While I can maybe fix this in code, a simpler solution might be to move those shadowtroopers down a level
• The pipes on the pit could use some better clipping as to make it easier to get on them.
• The pit elevator starts at the top and doesn't have a way to raise/lower it. Had to use noclip to get past this point.
• The maze was very well done, but it needed some landmarks. It's too hard to tell which doors work and which ones don't, from a glance. Also there's nothing really to tell the maintenance hallways apart. While the point of the maze is to get lost , it was a little too easy to get lost. The grate at the end could use some lighting or something to make it a little more obvious. The maze also felt a bit same-y and got pretty repetitive.
• The maintenance hallways need some ambient sounds

I really like the visuals of the maintenance hallways. When I first got into the maze I was pretty blown away by the looks. It could use a little bit of refining but overall I'm pretty satisfied. With a bit of polish and balancing, it will definitely blend right into the game but still stand out on its own as interesting.

 

Here are some minor goofs that I found:

 

 

This pipe sticks through the floor.

This door Z-fights with the wall above it

These two lifts are inconsistent. One has a caulked underside.

 

 

 

And some screenshots for bystanders:

https://jkhub.org/albums/0OlsC

 

@@Jedi_Mediator

[Jedi_Mediator]

Holy cow, are you testing this in JK2? Where did the dynamic glow come from?

 

Nice finds with those architecture bugs--I will make sure to fix those lifts ASAP. As for the pipe sticking through the catwalk, that is actually the crane "arm" sticking up from the main stockpile room below. As I mentioned before, the arm is so long that it sticks up through the room above it--but if it were shorter, it wouldn't be long enough to extend all the way down to reach the crates. We discussed some possible solutions to this, but I don't think we've decided how to fix it yet. What if we made the crane into a powerful magnet, so that it lifts the crates through the air without having to physically extend?

 

I think the shadowtroopers would still jump to the higher platforms if chasing the player, in which case they would still be at risk of jumping to their deaths. This seems more like an AI problem to me, but we can still move them down a level to see if that helps.

 

I will go ahead and add clipping to the pipes in the pit.

 

The pit elevator has been a problem from the beginning--I've never been quite clear how the developers intended it to work, since the elevator itself doesn't seem to even appear in the first place. I have tried to fix this, but can't figure out what's wrong. If you want, instead of fixing the currently broken elevator, I will just replace that portion of the elevator with parts that work. I might not end up as the devs intended, but at least it will be functional.

 

This is the feedback I needed in regard to the maze. I knew the hallways were pretty repetitive, but I thought that if there were any visually distinctive areas, it would take away the challenge of finding your way. Do you have any ideas about what visuals we could add to the maze, without making it too easy?

[eezstreet]

That's how it will look in JK2:Enhanced I added some shaders that @@ensiform gave me to add dynamic glow, which my compiled version of the engine supports.

 

I think one solution is to maybe use a SCALE Icarus command to make the pipe stretch/squash. Or possibly make a pair of arms that can fold to lower/raise the magnet.

 

I thought about putting a cushion brush at the bottom of the pit, however the AI ignores the fact that there might be a cushion and dies based on height. (Although you could maybe try that and see if it helps)

 

I think the elevator is supposed to start at the bottom and the top of the lift has little "tentacles" that retract. Maybe look at cairn_dock for an example.

 

Maybe some of the visuals could be as simple as different colored lights for each vertical level. Blue on the first floor, green on the second floor, red on the third, and so on, but keeping the white lights in the shafts. Also probably making the locked doors have red lights (different texture choice?)

[Jedi_Mediator]

Well, the new school year started up at the school where I work, so I've been getting distracted from this project for the past couple of weeks. But I have still managed to make most of the alterations you mentioned. I fixed the lifts at the start of the level, fixed the pit elevator, added clipping to the pit pipes, added some simple colored lighting and locked door textures to the maze, made the cairn_reactor entrance more obvious, and added more ambient sounds and distinguishing features to the maintenance hallways.

 

I also added some invisible, NPC-blocking walls to the pit area, to prevent them from jumping off in certain directions while still letting them maneuver between platforms. Hopefully this lessens the problem somewhat. I was curious why the AI fails in this way (i.e. shadowtrooper suicide), and so I played around in cairn_dock1 for a bit. Turns out that you can get them to fall to their death in that pit, too--and that level comes straight from Raven. Curiously, though, it seems far more likely to happen when both shadowtroopers are fighting you at once. It's like they interfere with each other's pathfinding, causing them to miss jumps. Is it very difficult to simply make them invincible to fall damage, either through code or script? I'm not sure there's a surefire way to protect them from themselves using mapping alone.

 

As for the crane arm, I had another idea. I could create a script that triggers just before the player enters the bugged room (the one with the crane arm sticking up), causing the crane arm to move somewhere else--basically hiding it, temporarily, from the player. Then, if the player ever returns to the crane room, it would return to where it had been before the first script was triggered. It's a workaround, not really a fix, but it would get the job done. Does this make sense?

 

I'll PM the updated level to you, @@eezstreet. Feel free to suggest changes/additions to anything I've done so far.

[eezstreet]

Makes sense to me. I'll get to looking at it in a while.

[Ramikad]

Is it very difficult to simply make them invincible to fall damage, either through code or script? I'm not sure there's a surefire way to protect them from themselves using mapping alone.

 

Try with a script:

//(BHVD)
set ( /*@SET_TYPES*/ "SET_NO_FALLTODEATH", /*@BOOL_TYPES*/ "true" );

If that doesn't stop the damage from being taken by the enemies, you can try that script plus a modified cushion shader on the floors, so that it works only on NPCs.

[eezstreet]

Unfortunately the AC in my house is broken and will remain broken for a few days so I won't have time to look at it until then. I'll most likely be away during those few days. I'll let you know what happens.