Torque Constructor release - April 9th - for free

I will check that this evening.

I already imported some artworks from Torque-users (map files). So it might be possible. Textures are not visible in the first moment. You have to create a WAD file first. But after doing that all textures appear magically

But I will tell you more later on.

The really good thing with Constructor is: You see shadows right after clicking a button. In WED you can see no shadow maps and that makes lighting a trial and error experience.

sounds good enough to me! I'm gonna download it (after i sleep, it's 3:38AM), lol.

I'm downloading it now, if it works good this could be the tool for me

Edit:
You can open .map files, as frank said you just have to add the textures in a wad

HA! I downloaded it...

Now to test it out...

Who's using which version of 3DGS though?

Does it work with the latest public beta?

I Have tested with 6.50.6

And it worked?

map file can be imported into 3DWS (leadwerks) and exported as wmp

It worked for Frank_G & BStudio, but not for Angel...

I Have Saved my map on the Desktop as a *.map File, this doesnt worked for me, or im stupid ^^... 3D World Studio is not free, so many people cant take this Program to Convert the Map into a *.wmp

cYa Sebastian

Now i have tested it Again... File-> Save as-> Map File... I Have opened it with 6.50.6 an 6.31.4... On both "Damaged Line #xxx" ...

cYa Sebastian

I got the same error...

A6.50.6

A6.50.6, maybe it doesn't work with really complex structures. Will have to test that. In constructor just press save and save it as .map file (dunno if it has a real exporter it just saves as .map)

I Have Tested it with only one Block, i domt think that is Complex

cYa Sebastian

well, i did both (one block and complex structure) but it both worked :S and it's with the 6.50.6 engine

cheats??? don't get it.

With the cathedral example saved as .map i get the error, but with things like one block it doesn't give me that error. It just imports it and when i add a WAD file with the textures even the textures show

edit:
maybe a exporter is possible, just have to figure out the differences between the 3dgs .map files and those of constructor

edit2:
Ok, looked at it. shouldn't be too hard. I'll start on a converter right away

SWEET!

Would be VERY helpful...

especially if you could export lightmaps for static meshes and such, but now I'm just dreaming, lol.

Hey, I've got a idea. Wouldn't it be possible to make a program that converted blocks to models from within the WMP file? For blocks you could simply find their positions, and create 6 meshes.... NVM

If i have understood ure Question right, you would convert Blocks (WMP) to Models (MDL)... Maybe import the .wmp into the MED

cYa Sebastian

Not what I meant... lol.

My idea is possible, but would take to much work...

I Have tested the .map File with the Valves Hammer Editor ,it Works. This Tool is free an good to handle... I dont use the Torque Construction thing, i have more good experience with the Valves Hammer Editor, its easy an fast...

cYa Sebastian

I have been working with the Torque Constructor right now. Here is a little review if you are interested:

The tool is together with the Lawmaker-editor one of the best world editors I used so far. It works very fast and reliable. CSG subtracts don't produce texture movements like WED often does. CSG subtract creates perfect brushes. There is no need to find work-arounds. You can just use it.

Texturing works fast. You don't have to open a properties window like you do in WED all the time. You just see all properties at the left side of the window.

Shadowmaps can be created in a second. Just press a button and you see lights in your windows. Every window can show wireframe, solid, textured, light-mapped and dynamic lighted scenes.

The real-time preview is fantastic and you can move through the scene like you do in a shooter: when you press the right button then you can just move around with WSAD and look with mouse movements.

It is rock stable and did not crash a single time.

I created a house with 6 rooms in 2 floors. It was fun, really. All my friends from MSN already know it

Here is the result:



And now to answer the most important question: "How can I get a level to Gamestudio?"

I exported it to map and imported into WED. It did not work. Then I imported into Quark and exported again as a map-file. Now I was able to load it into WED but all textures are gone. And all lights suddenly have the same color and same range.

So I had to re-work the level and got this in the 3dgs engine (A6.5):



This is not an optimal work-flow. But there are interesting things:

Even when you use many detail-brushes and rotated blocks you will realize that the level compiles much faster as the same level that you create with WED.
I don't know a good reason for that. Maybe it is because of the better precision of the Constructor. Maybe it does a better job with coordinates than WED. WED often has some strange floating numbers instead of integers when you look into a WMP file. This happens even if you use vertex-snapping.

At the end I wish that I could do all level editing in Constructor. But converting files to WMP needs some re-work.

So my idea is:
Create levels in Constructor. Prototype lighting and textures. But do the final texturing and lighting in Gamestudio since you cannot transfer them.

Maybe there are some of you with ideas to overcome this problem? Maybe some experienced Quark users around here can help me?

quite interesting, thanks frank for testing.
do you own milkshape? i'd be interested if loading the map file in milkshape works. if so, converting to a gs-format should be possible, at least it's my first thought that i had while reading your review.

So Frank you gonna push me to collect Torque, i don't want to program ,
but if it has the tools to entire level editying workflow fast and efficient ...

yeah nowadays tools are very important , lot of us are not independant studios with their armada of tool programmer.
and when you can have a complete terrain editor, interior , complete fast quality lightmapping for interior and object on terrain ...
i htink you have just to express yourself and avoid loosing time on conversions
and other time loosing things.


And their license is ok for me i will never sell a game i think
so their fees won't risk to apply to me.

And 3DGS fans , be rassured 3DGS still remain one of my favourites indeed

no demo of their tool , just to play with ?

TheExpert:
Constructor is free. You only have to give them your email address and then you can download it.

Broozar:
Interesting idea. I did not know that milkshape can load and save .map files.

All:
I forgot to mention that Constructor allows to load every arbritary mesh (static meshes as models) into the scene and that those static meshes cast wonderful static soft shadows.

I will show some examples later on.

By the way: Rotating and scaling is so fast in Constructor. All of you who know the in-game editor of Torque already know that you only have to press STRG or ALT to change into these modi. No clicking at buttons necessary. You work with the speed of your thoughts.
You can even rotate in 15 degree steps if you want to make well aligned rotations. Then you have to press Shift wile performing the rotate action.

Nice frank

the problem of BSP based levels is that perhaps not all tools , make lot of unecessar vertexs, i don't know if they have a "join vertex" function ?
i m' not expert in nothing and even less in BSP system

Here are the images of my test level to check static meshes plus soft shadows:

The first image shows you the level without any lighting, flat and ugly:


And here the same scene with one point light creating shadow-maps for blocks and static model-meshes:



This makes quite a difference.

Torque games can be quite beautiful now. The crazy thing about this is: The shader-demo of Torque claims that the shaders work even on top of light-mapped geometry. Imagine this, how beautiful a level can be.

Looking good.
Downloaded it myself but havn't had time to look at it properly so thanks for the reports.

Bought Torque not long after buying GS and yeah, love the in game editor but hated the lack of a consistant help source. Had to spend a week looking for articles and then couldnt apply myself to the scripting.

But, 'beauty' may encourage me to reassess this engine.

When I was messing with torque, my [static] models were casting shadows on geometry. Not sure why yours aren't...

Happy Birthday xXxGuitar511 (man, what a long name!)

Thanks Nems [what a short name ]!

Hopefully we can find a good workflow for converting constructor to 3DGS. [A Free one...]

yeah let's hope so.

[offtopic]
Happy b-day xXxGuitar511
[/offtopic]

Happy birthday from me as well.

The static meshes cast shadows and receive shadows.

I can produce a better example if you like. Here you see only very low-res shadows since this level is big and you see only a little corner of one of 6 rooms. Besides that you can change the resolution of shadow maps in the Torque engine but I did not found a way to change it in Constructor so far.

But if I re-size the scale of the models I can create very sharp shadows if you want a proof
But you can have a look here to see that better shadows can be made:

http://www.garagegames.com/products/torque/constructor/

Regards,
Frank

Has someone already found a way to export geometry and textures from Torque Constructor into WED ?

I have no problems with geometry it works extremly well, however I cant get the textures to apear even after creating a WAD with the same exact textures used in T.Constructor.
Contructor is so far the best tool I've found to create level geometry and I realy would like to use it. I own 3DGS A7 and TGE and use both for learning.

It would be great if I could use one Level Editor that could work OK for both engines.

Regards,
Jose