Map Annotations (custom levels)
<div class="IPBDescription">^</div>As a few of us where messing around bug hunting in my level it was discovered map annotations work in custom maps. Where is that information stored?
Would be cool to be able to view it like UWE does as that would help a lot and wouldn't require one to break out a note pad while running through the map and taking notes.
Anyway for custom map builders to get full use of this wonderful tool to it's fullest intent?
Would be cool to be able to view it like UWE does as that would help a lot and wouldn't require one to break out a note pad while running through the map and taking notes.
Anyway for custom map builders to get full use of this wonderful tool to it's fullest intent?
Comments
im getting relatively close to testing as well. write the tool, that would be very useful.
Maps that arent square pose the obvious problem, the result is your markers wont appear in the correct position unless the level your viewing is near totaly square like Tram & Rockdown
how well would it handle the 3d aspect of the map btw? Would it only be able to put the annotations at accordingly minimap locations, or would it be able to sort off display the depth?.
Maybe by having sideways minimaps uploaded aswell, or by letting player adjust the height relation between annotations and the minimap, or how about several layers of top down view minimap?
This assumes mappers will be able to upload minimaps to the srv to see the results in a good way, but maybe you just let players dl some file that they can put in ns2 and then is read when they enable annotations ingame?
I doubt you will use a real 3d engine displaying .level files :P
Maps that arent square pose the obvious problem, the result is your markers wont appear in the correct position unless the level your viewing is near totaly square like Tram & Rockdown<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Does it define it by minimapextents, location or actual geometry? As for testing purposes, making location or minimapextents to a total square wouldn't be the end of the world.
[Make a square minimap_extent (on the x, z plane) for temporary solution. It works for the minimap, I guess it should work for annotations. The square extents also avoids proportion issues when rendering the minimap.]
They are still displayed in the wrong position even if I square it off by using the largest size for both x,y because it screws up the scale for one of the axis.
I have not had a look into and work around yet, I am sure a work around had to be applied to the in game minimap because I noticed a point in the code where x,z and z,y cross over.
I think this has appened because Max/Charlie used one XYZ convention Brian used another.
I think Brian used X = Horizontal, Y = Verticle and Z = Depth compared to X = Horzontal, Z = Verticle and Y = Depth, Something like that.
I like the fist one because its what Blender uses or are a web programmer too... X = Horizontal, Y = Verticle then Z-Index cotrols how close/far something is, aka whats rendered over the top of what.
<a href="http://devin-afshin.com/ns2_annotations.aspx" target="_blank">http://devin-afshin.com/ns2_annotations.aspx</a>
I was going to try to parse using the json version of the output but it was easy enough to write my own loop for it. I believe all annotations for any maps should load from that.
EDIT: Would like to overlay the locations over a minimap but with what barlow said I guess not possible right now?
<a href="http://devin-afshin.com/ns2_annotations.aspx" target="_blank">http://devin-afshin.com/ns2_annotations.aspx</a>
I was going to try to parse using the json version of the output but it was easy enough to write my own loop for it. I believe all annotations for any maps should load from that.
EDIT: Would like to overlay the locations over a minimap but with what barlow said I guess not possible right now?<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
NOICE! you sir, get waffles (#)(#)(#)(#)
edit: added your link to my signature quicklinks :)
I think the best way to handle depths though, would be something like colors of the dot (and you hover to see annotation, and click to filter out) indicating its percentage of the depth bounds you told it the map have, and maybe 1 color to say that its outside, and another to say that its outside in other direction.
Maybe save those images ppl uploaded, and let them select presets from a dropdown box, and edit if they got password they inputed when they saved it first time.
The official maps would obviouslt be an exception.
EDIT:
DAMN its late (well not rly, but I intended to go to bed around 25 am, and its 27 am now) :P
I find myself running the game in one monitor to see annotations and the editor in the other repairing issues.....so laggy when i do that.
If you are a mapper who would like to use this you may send me an overview image of your map and I can add it in. Also because of the map extends I would recommend leaving an annotation in each room so I can get scaling to set correctly.
I should be ready in a few days to release the next test build of one of my levels, I'll PM you the Overview after i rebuild it to match the level when i release.
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->(1) [user] Coordinates(xyz): (93.9, 8.83, 16.92)
[gui]The commander minimap is rather oddly offset to the cursor on this side of the map<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Yes but I believe this is just in-game. It's an issue that has come up recently but because I'm writing my own map extends for each map overview on the site I don't think the in-game glitch is reflected there, and if so it can be easily adjusted. The best way for me to 'calibrate' would be if an annotation was left in the center of a few distant rooms with the room names it could be easily aligned/scaled more accurately until a better solution comes up.