EQG Zone Importer

[Zaela_S]

I guess it needs the vertex colors to have any lighting at all. Not sure how much influence they have on how things'll actually look. If you just want to try whatever for now: create a binary file, set the first 4 bytes to "EQGP", next 4 bytes is an integer equal to the number of vertices in your zone TER (should be on the info screen in the tool), then that many 4 byte integers filled with... let's say 0xFFFFFFFF, I think that should be pure white. It's 8 bit ARGB or RGBA or something like that. Then give it the same name as the TER file, except with .lit as the extension, and import it into the EQG.

My internet died a couple days ago (problem's with the wires underground, joy) so I'm not sure when I'll be able to update again.

[Zaela_S]

A rigged model with an animation for me to test with would be helpful. Been burned out a bit lately, haven't accomplished much. The prospect of having to both figure out a format and how to make animations in blender (I have a skeleton hooked up to a cube at least... I think) is just daunting enough to hold me back ;p Need both to test either.

[knowom]

I'm curious if people would be interested in a zone like this if I could design one relatively well in Blender. It would be a little different and not 100% accurate, but generally rather familiar for example I'd knock out a few walls to create pathways to the different mirrored world layouts.

I'd also use the left and right water inlets as a shipping routes pathway to connect the left half to right half among other things. Could also easily knock out 2-4 walls in the middle undecided. In terms of porting druid rings and wizard spires outside the dungeons would probably make a lot of sense.

[IMG][/IMG]

[Packet]

Originally Posted by knowom

I'm curious if people would be interested in a zone like this if I could design one relatively well in Blender.

Good luck.

Originally Posted by Zaela_S

A rigged model with an animation for me to test with would be helpful. Been burned out a bit lately, haven't accomplished much. The prospect of having to both figure out a format and how to make animations in blender (I have a skeleton hooked up to a cube at least... I think) is just daunting enough to hold me back ;p Need both to test either.

Preferred format? I have a few bipedal models that have some rigs and basic animations. It seems like (from my observation of OpenZone & Anim8or conversion) that there are specific sequence names per animation in the set. For instance, the idle animation/sequence would be:

standing_c_100_p01

death animation would be: death_n_100_d05

Without the standing_c_100_p01 sequence, the model comes in as a regular human. I'm not sure if this helps as I don't understand the logic behind the OZ conversion. But I do understand being burned out. My projects typically wear in on me as well which is why I am taking my time with this one. One piece at a time, a little a day... otherwise, I'd become distracted by the nearest shiny object.

[knowom]

Originally Posted by Packet

Good luck.

Thanks think I've got a good planned method on how to go about it in mind starting with a 2D layout basically using square tile faces and subdividing. I'll try to add dimension by extruding and such later and other details, but gotta start someplace. Doesn't look like much yet, but chipping away at the layout slowly. Fairly time consuming carefully counting the tiles to try to ensure they are accurate as they can be at least initially may deviate a bit later so it's not just a carbon copy in 3D. Anyway I'm starting off by removing the water terrain initially. Then I'll try to get the base terrain layout down a bit roughly. I gotta chip away at it in stages otherwise it would just end up being a sloppy mess.

Sneak peak at what I've got started doesn't look like much, but counting those tiles is a real pita, but it's starting to take shape a bit so I'm pretty happy with results thus far.

[Packet]

Originally Posted by knowom

but counting those tiles is a real pita, but it's starting to take shape a bit so I'm pretty

Whenever you're ready to texture that, let me know. I can show you some UV mapping techniques that will make things a lot easier for you.

[knowom]

Originally Posted by Packet

Whenever you're ready to texture that, let me know. I can show you some UV mapping techniques that will make things a lot easier for you.

Yeah defiantly will do once I get to that point. Not trying to rush it I want to get it looking as a right as I possibly can.

Another update btw just finished up with the last bit of water. I also cleaned up the boarder is it starting to look a bit more familiar?


Don't mind the extra stuffs in the background that's mostly just there in case I accidentally screw something up. Here's a peak at how the mountain terrain is beginning to take shape very #Minecraft reminiscent for time being. I just want to get the general layout structure across initially. After that I can work toward beveling, smoothing, fracturing, and contorting it to give it character.



Another screenshot on how it's starting to look. It's defiantly getting closer in feel. I'm pretty glad I decided to give this a try time consuming, but feels worth the time investment. A new yet old yet different type of nostalgia than we've been accustomed to in EQemu. Populating it with spawns will be interesting to say the least. It'll be kind of fun just experimenting with that I think.


New screenshot I'd estimate about 2/5's of this stage of development for the mountain terrain is done with. The sections are defiantly beginning to look more and more familiar.

[Zaela_S]

Originally Posted by Packet

Preferred format?

Erm, anything that blender can import I guess ;p

Originally Posted by Packet

It seems like (from my observation of OpenZone & Anim8or conversion) that there are specific sequence names per animation in the set. For instance, the idle animation/sequence would be:

standing_c_100_p01

death animation would be: death_n_100_d05

For S3D models, it's actually just the last bit that identifies the animation: one letter for the "category," and then two digits for the number. The rest I assume is specific to how OpenZone does things.

EQG models use a slightly clearer system with 4 letters and 1 number. Some are pretty obvious like idle, walk, turn, swim; some understandable but odd like nrun (n?), jmpu (jump up), jmpa (jump forward), crmp ("crumple" to death); others seem like the just picked out some random letters like slpr, gcst (both attack animations ?). Easy enough to figure most of them out by watching the animations of pre-existing models at least, and there's probably a big list in the client or graphics dll that has them all lined up to their in-game id numbers.

[rhyotte]

Cool beans

[knowom]

Finished up the zone layout aside from the tree's basically which not sure what I'm doing with those currently. The mountains obviously need to be shaped more the placement orientation is where it should be at least. For now I'm cleaning up all the excess faces and deleting them, but after that not sure where to begin next.

[Tyen05]

Random info about animations.


- Human, Half Elf, Dark Elf, High Elf, Erudite, and Barbarian use the ElfMale and ElfFemale animations depending on gender, with the exception of certain animations that they already have (e.g. the Barbarian Male and Female have different walk animations)
- HumanMale has Walk, Run, and Idle animations that should be used instead of the ElfMale ones
- ElfFemale has to Turn_01, so has to use the Turn_01 from ElfMale
- Beetle uses Spider animations
- LionFemale uses LionMale animations
- Puma uses LionMale animations
- Gnomes and Halflings use DwarfMale and DwarfFemale animations, with the exception of their own RunJump
- OgreMale uses all the OgreFemale animations
- TrollMale and TrollFemale use all the OgreFemale animations except for their own unique Walk and Run
- BarbarianMale has unique Walk, Run, Idle animations, but uses ElfMale's animations for everything else
- BarbarianFemale only has a unique Walk animation, but should use the BarbarianMale Run and Idle plus ElfFemale animations for everything else

[knowom]

Deleted all the excess faces that I could find. Anyway some statistical information 32,920 verts with 27,510 faces. For comparisons temple of veeshan has 92,913 verts with 30,971 faces. Meanwhile guk bottom has 94,173 verts with 31,391 faces. It'll probably have a bit more faces and verts when it's done, but should be right in line with other zones so that's good to know.

I don't know if I can start to texture it now or if I should start shaping the terrain details height of jaggedness of mountains and the ground terrain.

On a side note this wasn't too hard to develop what I've done so far the most challenging part was trying to keep the tiles accurate, but just take a map that size and doing it free hand how I want would be pretty simple and easy. I learned a fair amount of tricks with blender along the way as well which was nice feels a lot less foreign how to go about level design stuff.

[knowom]

Starting work on all the terrain that juts in or out in spots to further improve both looks and accuracy a bit further. I'm not sure which method I should go with or perhaps even if I should do a cross between the two of them perhaps.

So with that said here's two different screen shots from the bottom corner section of the map. I wouldn't mind a little community input on which of the two people prefer the looks of more. In the mean while I'm gonna work on a hybrid prototype between the two to see how that looks as well.

[knowom]

Here's what a hybrid between the two styles looks. Learning more and more 3D modeling techniques as I work on this and experiment with it a bit. I'm confident I could do my own free hand designs with far less difficulty than this replica challenge has been less room for personal stylization with this depending on how closely accurate you go for.

[Packet]

Hey Knowom. Would you mind posting new pictures in the OpenZone forum? Reason why I ask is because between the both of us, we've derailed the thread quite a bit with our massive screenshots. I'm probably the worst about this. :p

And I'm not trying to exercise any authority or anything (as I have none). Just a friendly request. We should save some room for those needing help.