Sandbox or Level Editor

[WhiteKnight77]

I know many here are worried about modding abilities for GRAW and what a sandbox editor may mean. As noted GRAW will ship with it along with the scripting tools.

Now some of you ask what the heck is a sandbox editor and with this post, I hope to show you what is possible. Instead of having to have 3d Studio Max which runs $3000 if not more (unless you are a student and can get it cheaper), you have everything neccessary to build a map and tell AI where to go (scripting). Some of you know that I also play Roller Coaster Tycoon 3 and that has a Sandbox Editor and it looks like this at first.

As you can see from the full size pic, all there is to start with is some flat ground along with a main gate, a few people and the first path.

Using the Terrain Tool you can create mountains, hills, streams, rivers, lakes and other terrain features. (I didn't make any to show for this, but the final pics show you a partly finished park.)

A Building Tool allows you to construct building from scratch. With enough thought, one can build quite elaborate buildings with it.

To add rides, you can choose ride tools like the Roller Coaster Tool.

To add food stalls, choose the Food Vendor Tool.

To add vegetation, such as trees and flowers or even bushes the Vegetation Tool is very helpful.

There are other tools such as the Path Tool which allows you to add pathways along with other scenery tools to add lights, trash cans, signs and everything else you would find in a theme park. Add Janitors, Entertainers or Mechanics and define their areas to patrol or rides to tend. You can even import buildings and rides others have created and posted on the net into your own theme park.

Once you get your park done, it may look like this.

Now what does this have to do with GRAW? GRAW, featuring a similar editor (as Far Cry does and has allowed FC modders to create GR maps in it for OE) can get those who can't afford 3dSM and Photoshop into modding. The above park is one I created but have not finished, but want to. I try to build my own coasters though in this park, one is a dev made coaster. I would liek to do something similar for GRAW (should I buy it, I still want to try first) once released.

Who said having this kind of editor is a bad thing? Who knows, there may be another harntrox out there waiting to give us some really good maps and missions to play with more campaigns.

While this does not take into account of adding parts to the game like modders could with Igor, that does not mean it is not possible. Those who are screaming about no mod support needs to try a game with a sandbox editor.

[the.ronin]

Screw GR:AW!! I'm gettin me some Roller Coaster Tycoonage!!

[Sup]

The question is:

Is this editor like RCT3's, or something more complex, like you find on the Unreal and Source engines (and, to a lesser degree, Farcry)?

[RatoN]

that pic is from sanbox editor btw

For hours that will turn in to weeks type of fun

[WhiteKnight77]

See, the FarCry sandbox editor is even more advanced than the RCT3 one. I was using RCT3 as an example as that is the only game I have that has one. It is basically a point and click map editor which is really simple to use, the FC one looks a bit more advanced.

GRIN has already stated that everything in the game already will be usable with the editor.

[smokin]

No doubt this will be a great mapping tool. But Ive always said, I'd trade maps for good missions anyday. Hopefully GRAW's sandbox will allow alot of good scripting to be implimented.

[Snake@War]

Very good post, WK.

Let's just hope it has support for new weapons, missions, gametypes, and ghosts as well....

[Lightspeed]

I am confident that Sanbox Editors are advancing and getting more user frienly all the time.

In this case, we can expect to get an Editor in the same vein as FarCry, which although might seem hard to use, is actually very easy once u get familiar with the tools.

And Im also confident that as in FarCry editor u can create missions from the editor.

lighty

[calius]

Ok I get that but nearly all the time no one has said what examples of "Scripting" can be done with it.

So my question is :

Has anyone who has scripted with these tools / far cry .. give examples of scripting and what tricks can be done with making missions?

Anyone?

(and before you say get the far cry mod I dont have the game).

Edited October 12, 2005 by calius

[=warcloud=]

"Great a sandbox"... i'll bring me bucket and spade.

[Kurtz]

One of the key elements is the ability to place AI on the map, and give them things like paths or patrol zones, ROE, etc. If you do not have a mission editor, your maps are only good for adversarial matches like T vs T. You need the ability to build SP and coop missions.

[calius]

One of the key elements is the ability to place AI on the map, and give them things like paths or patrol zones, ROE, etc. If you do not have a mission editor, your maps are only good for adversarial matches like T vs T. You need the ability to build SP and coop missions.

←

So can it extend to having trigger points for vehicle spawning ... AI changes etc?

IE - go this way and AI does this .... go that way and you trigger trip wire thus AI do that & Patrol vehicles start to look/hunt you ...... that kind of thing?

And objectives ... etc etc.

Edited October 12, 2005 by calius

[smokin]

I just use Farcry as a guage to tell how user friendly the mission scripting is. Just check and see how many SP missions are available and how creative they are. The answer from what I've seen (shelved the game for a while) is not many, and not that creative and all we have are a bunch of bad guys thrown at you.

Does that mean graw will be the same way? I dont know, all i know iss the editor is sandbox-like. But the trend for most games are to give you map making tools, and nothing to really place any substance on those maps.

In a nutshell, I wouldnt trade igor for fracry's sandbox, and definetly not for RvS's unreal editor. Hopefully I wond add Graws tools to the list.

[KRP 56]

No doubt this will be a great mapping tool. But Ive always said, I'd trade maps for good missions anyday. Hopefully GRAW's sandbox will allow alot of good scripting to be implimented.

←

Same here. Since I only play SP a bunch of good looking maps without the ability to script some serious missions doesn't bode well for me.

[calius]

Yes, theres some enemies kill them, oh theres some more kill them ... thats just Firefight Game mode in GR1.

If nothing else, it would be great for scripting game modes to overlay on any map that had objectives in them ... like Harntrox SP MP Game modes and others.

Thats at the very least.

If we can create Jack57 style Campaigns then I could possibly be totaly sold.

[Suli]

"Has anyone who has scripted with these tools / far cry .. give examples of scripting and what tricks can be done with making missions?"

The Far Cry Sandbox Editor and scripting language Lua allow a gamer to create new maps and or missions. It does not work the same way GR did with its easy mission methods though. Come to think of it i do not recall any pure miisions having been released. Just map/missions.

There is considerable power in the level of exposed code for making missions in Far Cry. This does come at a cost of a steap learning curve and greater complexity. It certainly is not a user fiendly 'language' like sytax like GR.

This is a great trade off though for the mass of abilities that the scripting language offers.

I would like to know if the scripting language will be thier own or if it will be a commonly used scripting language. It takes time to learn both the language and the functionality exposed to us. It would be nice and benificial if they coule prerelease some info reguarding this to allow us to get a head start on the learning curve.

I hope that the way missions can be easily shared without having to distribute a map along with it stays from GR.

[smokin]

That bodes well for the tools we migh get IMO. I dont mind a steeper learning curve so long as the ability is there. I would prob prefer it ti be a simple as possible so that mission scripting becomes the focus over map making, but that just my preference.

Unreal editor is the best example of the worst mission editing tools around, great mapping if you like skacking blocks, but SO freakin limiting when it comes to having AI perform a certain way.

[SimDooD]

I'm thinking that GR:AW's sandbox editor is going to be something quite special for us.

This is based on the information at hand so far that Grin has said it would be supplying one as part of the package, and they stated that early on. This would indicate that they have thought beyond just the game itself, and really looked at what extended the life of GR1, which we are still playing (among other things). Face it, most of us have moved on from the standard available missions, and it's the modders/scripters/modellers that have given plenty of hours of continued enjoyment on GR1 (not counting TvT type action, where it's still loads of fun to go kick the crap out of other players, or in my case, get the crap kicked outta me).

Now, IGOR was (in reality) quite a clunky devil, but incredibly powerful in what it could deliver to the user in the way you could mod/script etc. It served an initial purpose: to allow RSE to design and deliver the original GR missions.

Similarly it's modelling capabilities are basically zippo, but it had rudimentary import facilities designed for one purpose: get new models in so that they can be defined as maps, weapons, characters etc. and allow RSE to design and deliver the original GR missions then IT and DS.

I think the release of IGOR was more of an afterthought. Face it, the documentation wasn't first class, although understandable, but RSE gave it all to us anyway. I'm glad they did, because some of the community work that has evolved from it is outstanding.

In reality, it is not (generally) comercially viable for game developers to build 3D creation tools beyond a basic level that may suit a particular need. They mainly use programs like 3DS Max and Maya for the majority of the work, and develop import/export tools that will allow them to get the finished models into the game engine (a la GR's MAX tool). These 3D programs have far more tools available for generating complex enitities (and quicker), and finding people who work with these tools well is easier than finding people you can teach new tools to. The cost of doing this would be horrendous to the business.

Anyway, what I believe we will see is this. A sandbox editor that has rudimentary object creation tools (some preset model types, and land creation tools), an expanded file import/export facility with far better controls (hopefully .MAX format although .3DS would suffice for introducing new objects and lighting), the ability to fully interact with all objects in the sandbox editor, and a full scripting capability matching or exceeding what we have in IGOR at present (scripting is really only a subset of what a total sandbox editor should have anyway).

All this wrapped up in an intuitive interface that will perhaps extend the life of GR:AW for years to come?

My thoughts, and I hope I'm close to the money!

Edited October 18, 2005 by SimDooD

[RatoN]

Hopefully there won’t be limitations as to SP vs. MP like Crytek engine had. Far cry had severe MP limitations for certain types of objects used in the original SP campaign, which took some of the fun out of creating a world (moving objects, triggers, ai’s). Many of us found out the hard way about it, spend months (full time) creating complex map only to find out… And coop attempt all failed with the Crytek engine. Beside these problems that engine was just amazing and Sandbox was easy to use considering the vast number of options offered.

Graw was designed for coop, so this time the only limitations should be our imagination.

Get ready for some epic, grandiose maps dudes.

[4ceReconSniper]

nice post WhiteKnight

[calius]

A sandbox editor that has rudimentary object creation tools (some preset model types, and land creation tools), an expanded file import/export facility with far better controls (hopefully .MAX format although .3DS would suffice for introducing new objects and lighting), the ability to fully interact with all objects in the sandbox editor, and a full scripting capability matching or exceeding what we have in IGOR at present   (scripting is really only a subset of what a total sandbox editor should have anyway).

Bang on and what should be default when released.

Edited October 19, 2005 by calius