Advanced Computer Graphics Project 3

Project 3: Building and exploring graphics levels using WED

Reference for this project: Chapter 3 (Link to page of draft book chapter.)

Make a directory ~/video/project3 in your home directory
Copy the xhero.mdl file to your directory and use it for your player. (You may need to press the control or shift key on your browser when clicking the link, to force the file to download.)
Run the level editor (or world editor, WED) from the MOSAIC menu:

3dGamestudio->LevelEditor

From the menu bar begin a new level (or world):

File->New

Save the file at this point (otherwise the next step may not work)

File->Save ~/video/project3/game3/game3.wmd

Create a new script for your new level

File->MapProperties->Script
And select the A6TemplateProject

Level Design: Design the level shown below:

Figure 1. WED level views.

The level contains four rooms as numbered above.
Dimensions are approximate.
Each room must have:

A separate floor texture
A separate ceiling texture with lights
An appropriate wall texture (i.e., stone block, wood, etc.)

The hallway connecting rooms 1 and 2 must have a sky texture such as skywhite so that shadows are cast at the doorways
The hallway connecting rooms 2 and 3 is a ramp that should climb at least 200 quants before connecting to room 3. The ramp doorway will then be above the floor of room 3, so that the viewpoint from room 3 looking up toward the hallway will look like the left of the figure below, and the viewpoint from the hallway looking down into room 3 will look like the right of the figure below.

Figure 2. Ramp doorway views.

Doorway cuts should use medium cube objects as the cookie-cutters (MenuBar::Object::AddCube::medium).
Set the sun level to (128, 128, 128), and set the ambient lighting level for the game to (128, 128, 128). The azimuth and elevation of the sun should remain the default values of 0 and 60 degrees. These settings should create shadows at the doorway between rooms 1 and 2 similar to the shadow on the ground in front of the player in the figure below.

Figure 3. Shadow cast on ground.

To see the key-bindings, go to the Project Window in WED and select the Resources Tab. Then open the script files folder, and right-click the plBipedInput01.wdl script. Select customize in the pop-up, and the key-bindings will be shown in a new pop-up. Do NOT change these key-bindings.
When you are finished building the level, add the player "hero" with plBiped01 behavior and add camera3rd01 to test the level.
Build, run, and test the level.

Q1 How long does it take for the player to walk (using the "w" key on the keyboard) from room 1 to room 4 along the diagonal hallway?
Q2 What happens when the player walks into room 3 from the ramp doorway?
Q3 Can the player run clockwise (from room 2, to room 4, to room3) around the game?

When the game runs, experiment with the “w,” “a”, “s,” and “d” keys along with the mouse to move around the level.

Obstacles and stairs:

Next, add several cubes of different sizes to see what happens when the player is presented with obstacles and stairs.
Place three small cubes (MenuBar::Object::AddCube::Small) of heights 16, 32, and 64 quants in front of the player as shown below. Use the MenuBar::ScaleButton to adjust the heights.

Figure 4. Three cubes of increasing height 16, 32, 64 quants.

Rebuild and rerun the level.

Q4 What is the largest height cube that the player can step over directly?
Q5 Can the player climb all 3 of the blocks sequentially as a staircase, without jumping?

Experiment with a cube to see where WED complains about a concave object.
Experiment with a cube to see the effect of various settings of texture x-scale and y-scale.
Experiment with adding a sound source (such as "rain" from the work directory that contains vecdemo).

Report and demonstration:

Prepare a 9-page report exactly in the following format;

Cover sheet with names
1 Page summary of project
1 Page Printout from WED showing the level in all 4 views, as in Figure 1 above.
1 Page Printout from the running game showing the view looking up at the ramp doorway from inside room 3, as on the left side of Figure 2 above.
1 Page Printout from the running game showing the view looking down at room 3 from the ramp doorway, as on the right side of Figure 2 above.
1 Page Printout from the running game showing the hallway shadow as in Figure 3 above.
1 Page Printout from the running game showing the three cubes of different height during gameplay, as in Figure 4.
1 Page Printout from SED showing the first page of your game's C-script wdl file.
1 Page Short answers to the following questions:

Q1 above
Q2 above
Q3 above
Q4 above
Q5 above
Q6 What is the unit of time in 3D GameStudio, and how many seconds does the unit correspond to?
Q7 What is the unit of distance in 3D GameStudio?
Q8 If the player turns and walks to his left, would
Q9 What color would correspond to ( 255,255,0)?
Q10 Would setting the x-scale to 2.00 and y-scale to 2.00 for a brick wall texture cause the bricks to appear smaller or larger on the surface?

Demonstration

Show your final game running, and the player "walking up a 2-block staircase"
show your level in WED
Show your game1.wdl code

Copyright © 2005-2007 by Thomas Paul Weldon

ACKNEX, WED, MED, and 3D GameStudio are trademarks of Conitec Corporation.
Microsoft, DOS, MS-Dos, Windows, DirectX, Halo, and Direct3D are trademarks of Microsoft, Inc.
PAC-MAN trademarks or registered trademarks of Namco Limited
Nintendo, Mario, are trademarks of Nintendo
Atari, Pong, are trademarks of Atari
Intel, 8086, are trademarks of Intel Corporation
id, DOOM, and Quake are trademarks or registered trademarks of Id Software, Inc.
Autodesk, 3D Studio, and 3ds Max are trademarks or registered trademarks of Autodesk, Inc.
Alias and Maya are trademarks or registered trademarks of Alias Systems Corp.