Release Raptor:Level Editor Basics

Step 1: Finding The Level Editor

Not that we want to hide it, but we also don't want it right in the face of everyone who starts the game. So you have to go into the Misc tab of the settings menu and click to turn on the level editor. Then it will appear on the main menu for you from then on.

KEY CONCEPT: Exterior "Doors"

Interior Vs Exterior "Doors"

You might be making a chunk of a level that has one or more rooms in it, and in that you might have some doors. That's all well and good, and those are called "interior" doors. It doesn't mean they are inside -- indeed, there's nothing to say this couldn't be outdoors or a cave. But it means it doesn't leave the current level chunk you're editing.

EXTERIOR doors are very important, though, and have a blue portal marker on them, with a trio of lines pointing outwards from them. These doors are how the level chunk may be connected to other level chunks by the procedural generation.

Minimum of Two Exterior "Doors"

Every level chunk you create MUST have at least 2 exterior doors or it cannot be used by the procedural generation tool. But ideally they should have more than that -- it increases the variability of levels in how they use this level chunk.

Occluder Bounds

Wait a second, I thought we were talking about doors? Yep! This is an important concept related to that. In the bottom rightmost part of the level editor, there is a little OCCLUDE button that you can toggle on and off. This shows a cyan bounding box that defines the size of your level chunk.

This is always a rectangular box. Aka, if you make your level chunk so that it is a diagonal zigzag, that's great and I'm sure will be very fun to play in, but it creates an overall AABB (Axis-Aligned Bounding Box) around whatever you create. When the procedural level generation is happening, no two AABBs can overlap at all. This is done for speed, mainly.

Why do you care, particularly in a section about doors? Well...

Exterior Doors Must Be At The Occluder Bounds Edge And Pointing Outward

This is why you care about the occluder bounds. If you have an exterior door, it has to be on the very edge of this blue box, and pointing outwards. If you place it inside the box somewhere, even though it's on the "edge" of your nice zigzag level, it will cause all sorts of overlapping problems during procedural generation.

When you save the level you are working on, if you notice your exterior door suddenly shooting forward from where you placed it, this is why. It's putting it aligned to the AABB of the Occluder, so that you can actually see the mistake you've made and then decide how to fix it. The alternative is invisible errors that only show up in munged-up levels.

Thematic Questions About Exterior Doors

In a lot of cases, we're trying to create verisimilitude with real-life architecture, right? Aka, maybe we're making an apartment building. So that means that apartments come off of hallways, and stairwells come off of hallways, and apartments do NOT come off of other apartments. If we are neighbors, you don't get to your apartment by walking through mine.

The problem with the above is that it is BORING. We want the feeling of realism, but more interesting paths through the level. What to do? Same as most games: destruction!

In an apartment, for example, please do what you'd normally see and only put in one front door. Make it make sense! Then there are "wall holes" and "ceiling holes" and "floor holes" that you can put in place. Most of the time those will look like ordinary floors or walls, which is great. But other times those will provide a valid way for me to get from my apartment to yours: just bust down the wall.

That breaks up the flow of what would otherwise be very boring levels, and allows for level constructions that are constantly surprising even though they are set in real-world familiar environments.

What You DON'T Have To Think About

You may now be thinking about what I said about rooms having to connect to other kinds of rooms in specific ways to make sense. Aka, there's not a front door of one apartment that opens into another apartment's front door. Don't fret! So long as you set up your level chunk in a way that makes sense when you look at it isolation (aka it only has one front door per apartment), then the procedural level generator logic will know how to use it. The logic about halls and stairwells and all that jazz is defined based on what folder you have saved your work in.

About Backups

Note that the game makes a backup every time you save your level with actual differences in it, so you can save super frequently (these are miniscule) and never lose any work. All the old versions are there in case something gets messed up.

Troubleshooting: Something Doesn't Fit!

1. On the one hand, the object may have an error in its definition that Chris needs to fix. You can go ahead and place the object if it is just slightly off, and he can fix it and your object will self-correct itself.

2. On the other hand, it is more likely in a lot of cases that you have bad rotation on your object. Most objects have a "front" (including walls), and they don't line up properly if you have things with their fronts and backs mixed up next to one another.

2.a. Doorjambs are a common one with this -- you typically just need to rotate them if they stick out of one side of a wall more than the other.

2.b. Walls themselves may seem not to line up sometimes, too. Once again that is a case of just needing to rotate them. There is a little wireframe box that helps show you the "back" of the walls. If those all line up properly, then the walls should as well.

Troubleshooting: Moving Around The Editor Feels Slow!

If you're using the pan and zoom functions, that is indeed a very slow way to get around the editor -- this one or the unity editor, for that matter. The panning and zoom tools are excellent for little detail movements, but that's what they're made for.

The true movement around this space is meant to work like an FPS game. Hold down the right mouse button and then the WASD keys will move you around while you also are able to move the mouse to point where you want. Superduper fast!

Even that only gets you so far, though -- things get hairy when you're near something but it's a bit above or below you. In those cases, that's where teh Q and E keys are your friend. As in many "6 degrees of freedom" shooter games (Descent, etc) -- or the unity editor, once again -- this lets you move up and down.

Between holding the right mouse button down and then using WASD+QE to move and using the mouse to look, you can zip around the levels really really fast.

Oh! Of course, if you're not using the shift key to "run," then of course you'll still be slow as heck in either zoom, pan, or "right-click-hold move mode." This is because often you'll be doing detail work that means you want to not move too fast. But then when you do want to move fast, hold shift and you'll zip over to wherever.

If you've played many shooter games, then most of this should be pretty second-nature except for Q and E.

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