Valkryie Beta 3

[SuperSunny]

I don't intend for this to go on HaloMaps yet!

http://i31.tinypic.com/1h6utw.jpg

This is more or less a way for me to recieve input on how well this performs, FPS-wise. If anyone can help out and post on how it runs, it would be welcoming and great

Basically I've redefined most of the map with dynamic lights, portals (BUGGY, LIKE SEE-THROUGH CAVE DROP BECAUSE OF UNCLIPPED PORTAL), and shader upgrades. Changes here and there. Not much for gameplay, but a bit better than before. (That's why I don't want this on a HaloMaps release).

Lightning for the Teleporter

Here's the readme included:

This is not a final. This is not really for gameplay, although FPS testing can be done with gameplay involved, and would help a lot!

GFX Features:
High Quality Cubemaps
Real Time Reflections
Persistant Dynamic Lighting
Lens Blooms
High Quality Normal Maps

-----------------
I started this off last year at an attempt to push the limits of the Halo Engine, graphically. Hopefully it worked. This release features much better FPS, and many changes to the way I designed the lighting and look. I've focused this map on actually getting a feeling from the environment in it.

My goal wasn't to make a map, it was to make a piece of art, using the powers of colors and contrast.
I don't want this to be judged on gameplay just yet, as I obviously need to make large-scale improvements in that field. One step down, another step to go.
-----------------
AS OF COURSE, with any of my content, this is completely, and freely open-source for the engine. Decompile it, play with it, and do what you wish with it. Most importantly, LEARN from it! I have supplied all the necessary (but not optimized) tags and resources. It's not optimized because of certain edited resources (like the light shader for the hallway), which I simply saved as the original fluorescant.shader in a10, with different statistics.

Otherwise, free to use, and free to learn! Tutorials are coming.http://files.filefront.com/Valkryie+Beta3zip/;9598919;/fileinfo.html

http://i29.tinypic.com/11vli5v.jpghttp://i31.tinypic.com/2w33pd3.jpg
http://i30.tinypic.com/1zeiky0.jpg
http://i26.tinypic.com/10ymh5c.jpg
http://i26.tinypic.com/ida906.jpg
http://i28.tinypic.com/6f836c.jpg

[Sever]

DL'ing. I'll have a review up in a bit. I love the second pic btw - the simple and eloquent contrast is great.

e: Ok, I'm going to start off saying that everything looks godly artistic-wise. I have no qualms with anything that you have created, and nor does my computer (runs everything smoothly). I'm just going to go straight to everything else, since I can find no negative criticism for the artistic aspects. There's the aforementioned unclipped portal, of course, but that should be easy to fix. The piping doesn't look halo-esque, nor do the brick&mortar walls and crates seen in the third pic. The cubemap for at least the top floor (I forgot to check the others) is off - you can see the 'engine temp critical' all along one wall, even though it is only reflected from one point. I guess that's all for now. I spent most of my time basking in the glory of the power-up room. Quite beautiful and tranquil there. Also, that top floor light is damn bright. Bright enough to melt demons.

[chicane]

Honestly, I can't even get the game to run with this map in my folder.

[SuperSunny]

DL'ing. I'll have a review up in a bit. I love the second pic btw - the simple and eloquent contrast is great.

e: Ok, I'm going to start off saying that everything looks godly artistic-wise. I have no qualms with anything that you have created, and nor does my computer (runs everything smoothly). I'm just going to go straight to everything else, since I can find no negative criticism for the artistic aspects. There's the aforementioned unclipped portal, of course, but that should be easy to fix. The piping doesn't look halo-esque, nor do the brick&mortar walls and crates seen in the third pic. The cubemap for at least the top floor (I forgot to check the others) is off - you can see the 'engine temp critical' all along one wall, even though it is only reflected from one point. I guess that's all for now. I spent most of my time basking in the glory of the power-up room. Quite beautiful and tranquil there. Also, that top floor light is damn bright. Bright enough to melt demons.

Hahaha! Thank you!
Any suggestions on the brick and mortar walls? I'm probably going to recreate that section to attribute to a more human-halo-ish design.

Sadly the cubemap problem on the first floor sadly can't be fixed, as the cubemap is limited to cube faces (6).

What are your specs/how was your FPS overall? I've been getting in the hundreds in many scenes now, compared to like 25 before. The only drop-scenes for me would be the demon-melting light, and the other demon-melting light in the bottom floor.

[Ifafudafi]

Just got it and toyed around for a few minutes.

Things I like:

-Ultra-Super-High-Res-Normals!
http://img442.imageshack.us/img442/5403/moarbumpmapsck4.jpg

-Pretty rainbows and dynamic lighting!
http://img143.imageshack.us/img143/8084/rainbowdfn4.jpg


-Dynamic reflections in the metal!
-Increased FoV!
-Just about everything else!


And things that are nitpicky, but could be improved:

-I can see about six individual lens flares in one "hole" here; makes it look a bit inconsistent. I know it's troublesome shaping a perfect flare, but maybe one with an increased radius would look just as good (it'd also save a sliver or two of memory.)http://img125.imageshack.us/img125/1286/dotsqb0.jpg


-MY EYES ARE BURNING :gonk:
http://img137.imageshack.us/img137/8075/yowac2.jpg
http://img517.imageshack.us/img517/4769/owwg0.jpg


-Obvious portalling error.
-Light/dark contrast is a bit too extreme; the dark corridors are virtually lightless (mabye some dim flourescents would fit here) and the light areas, as stated above, are blinding.
-Bump-maps are a bit strange on some textures (especially the bricks underground), but this is more the engine's fault than yours.


Still, I wouldn't have believed the Halo engine was capable of this. An excellent benchmark of just how far we can push this thing until the inevitable H3 port (and then where we can build from after that fails too.)

:awesome:, +rep.

Oh, and FPS wise, I'm running on an nVidia 6600, and while I'll get a few chugs while firing the AR in a highly detailed area, it's very stable, especially compared to several other maps who are much less detailed and yet still chew up FPS.

[SuperSunny]

Thank You!

I'll see what I can improve! I do have a set of lens flares at distant sizes, so I'll probably end up replacing the smaller ones with a bit larger ones to blend properly.

Little UV errors and such will be fixed and shaped up.

A bit of evening of the light shouldn't hurt much, I'll see what I can do.

[n00b1n8R]

one thing I've allways found an issue with is the wholes in the caves that let you see the sky. I wish you'd make them a little deeper and then have a kind of curve back out of them. atm they look like they go up and then just stop.

[Sever]

Agreed. And I'm using an nvidia 8600 (thanks again, Legionaire!) and not getting any framerate drop anywhere. I do, however, play with the framerate locked at 60 (or is it 30? whichever HCE's video settings allows) just for more uniform smoothness. It really helps with some of my ungodly sniper and rocket shots on a different map (one that you, Sunny, are doing the lighting for V2 of it).

[Syuusuke]

Runs smoothly, but there does seem to be something that bugs me...

First my specs:

Windows Vista Ult.
ATI Radeon x1600xt
AMD Athlon 3800+ X2 (yay for dual core.)
2gig of RAM.

I think that's all you need.

So far:
For me, I get a 20 fps drop when firing auto-weapons.
THE WATER ISN'T WATER, but that's ok.

And I got an exception error using your teleporter =/

[Sel]

I have an ATI x1100 (integrated) :(

AMD Turion X2

1.7GB RAM

Runs at 10-20 FPS when looking at those lights that burn your eyes out, I would reccomend removing them and substituting them with something less performance raping and easier on the eyes.

Otherwise the map ran at a decent framerate. (25-30)

I ran this on texture quality high, and particles high, with no specular, shadows, or decals. at 640:480

Also, I noticed render errors on the ladder going down to the bottom floor.

But otherwise, I love you.

[SuperSunny]

I have an ATI x1100 (integrated) :(

AMD Turion X2

1.7GB RAM

Runs at 10-20 FPS when looking at those lights that burn your eyes out, I would reccomend removing them and substituting them with something less performance raping and easier on the eyes.

Otherwise the map ran at a decent framerate. (25-30)

I ran this on texture quality high, and particles high, with no specular, shadows, or decals. at 640:480

Also, I noticed render errors on the ladder going down to the bottom floor.

But otherwise, I love you.

I'll probably look at ways to optimize that one section properly. The render errors are the portal errors that'll be fixed, just a small misplacement on my part ><

I wish I could make the water, "water," but the engine doesn't allow you to use volumetric fog. If I add fog into the water, it ends up placing that same water fog (aka acting like water) from everything starting on the level of the water downwards.


And I got an exception error using your teleporter =/
Whoa! I haven't gotten one yet, that's odd! I'll try going back and forth and seeing if one appears. Odd...

And just to let people know how I run this map, my Halo is set to everything max, with 1280x720 res. I get FPS ranging from 25-150 on this, the 25 drops at the light. The 60-150 is everywhere else.

[{SYS}sarge]

when are you gonna add custom weapons?
because this is really good

[SuperSunny]

when are you gonna add custom weapons?
because this is really good

I'm not adding custom weapons, or modifications to gameplay in anyway. I'd like to keep this Halo 1. The only "Halo 1" change to the original content, would be the additional Xbox Shaders for the Assault Rifle and Flag Pole, and Light's H2 Tele.

[Roostervier]

Hey, it looked great. :awesome:

I didn't have a drop in fps once (although VSync is on).

[Sel]

I have to spread more rep around before I can rep you again D:

Anyway, I played it a second time, and I noticed something.

The reflections dont seem to be affected by active camo, I got the active camo, and looked at myself in the floor, but it had no affect, so that would be something you might wanna fix up.

Also, my card has some odd troubles with reflections with random triangles appearing while in their vicinity, Ive noticed this on other cards in my house not just in this map in the campaign too, does anyone know a fix?

I also noticed that the AR had detail removed from it, and the display is all fuzzy now.

In my opinion you should change it back to full detail, since it is almost no graphics weight compared to other things in this map.

Either way, nice work and I cant wait to rip this if it isnt protected to see how I can achieve the same sexiness with my maps :rolleyes:

[Ki11a_FTW]

http://img517.imageshack.us/img517/4636/sexbackik7.png (http://imageshack.us)
^My new desktop :-P

[Syuusuke]

About the fuzzy AR, I think you have your graphic details on low or medium...

And in the readme, he said it's all free. I like free. =)



AS OF COURSE, with any of my content, this is completely, and freely open-source for the engine. Decompile it, play with it, and do what you wish with it. Most importantly, LEARN from it! I have supplied all the necessary (but not optimized) tags and resources. It's not optimized because of certain edited resources (like the light shader for the hallway), which I simply saved as the original fluorescant.shader in a10, with different statistics.

Otherwise, free to use, and free to learn! Tutorials are coming.

Also I'm liking the eerie-ness.

[Bad Waffle]

MY EXCITEMENT IN THIS MAP IS BUBBLING OVER THE CAULDRON OF PROFESSIONALISM.

WOOT!

omg. Did i just say woot? i havent done that in like, years...

[Sever]

Sonny's work will do that to ya! WOOT indeed!

[Sel]

About the fuzzy AR, I think you have your graphic details on low or medium...

And in the readme, he said it's all free. I like free. =)



Also I'm liking the eerie-ness.


My texture quality is on high :O

[Bad Waffle]

OH wow. I just tested it...and im immensely surprised with how much you pulled off in the Blam engine. Come work on HRH naow.

[Apoc4lypse]

OH wow. I just tested it...and im immensely surprised with how much you pulled off in the Blam engine. Come work on HRH naow.

Agreed with on both statements. Go help them lol.

This is amazing, its graphically the best map I've ever played where I had 60 fps...

an example would be like the h2 maps, I always play on low settings but I would always get like 40 fps tops no matter what, then forget about high graphics settings. On this map I can easily get 60-70 fps on low settings when I'm not doing anything. When shooting or throwing grenades and such I get the occasionally dip to around 40 fps at the most. Then the ocasional dip to 30 fps, only happened near those demon melting lights though (the really bright ones). Then I can even play on high settings, not doing anything I get like 50-60 fps, with flashlight on I get a little lower. Then shooting and grenades brings me to 40 fps, with occasional drops to 30 fps.

The lowest fps I had on high settings was 20 fps near the demon melting lights. Theres also a few spots where itl drop off ocasionally too, but I never actually play seriously on high settings ever anyways so it doesn't matter for me. Truly amazing work graphically and performance wise.

Also my specs are

Ati Radeon 9700 TX with like 128 mb (I need a new card and computer its from like 2003)

Windows xp pentium 4, and 1 gig of ram (the most I can fit on my mother board.)

I'd say my computers pretty old by todays standards, but I've never had trouble playing halo really, except for the h2 maps occasionally, I can play regular halo maps fine, but I always play on low settings to make sure I have good fps. High settings has always given me dips in fps no matter what.

I want to play that map with other people though to see how well itl preform with an actual battle going on though. There was no one playing it right now though and I can't host servers.

[il Duce Primo]

I played it last night. i have to say it ran amazing. Better than most maps that are just boxes. I saw the portal errors but you know about that.

I ran at high and had about 40 fps average but I have an ok graphics card nothing great but not bad.

What I would like to see is some steam coming out of the broken pipes near the broken support beam.

[SuperSunny]

Thank you everyone! This was exactly what I was looking for!

I'll take everyone's ideas into suggestion.

For the AR, nothing has been changed except for the added multipurpose bitmap from the Xbox. The display shouldn't be fuzzy, it comes out fine for me. Odd!

The FPS should increase much more in coming releases, as I'm going to improve portaling and optimizing the way the effects are handled.

Sadly I can't fix the Active Camo problem with the reflections, as it's an engine bug. Maybe something can be done about it in the globals, though.

[JDMFSeanP]

Help with HRH for the love of god, that mod will only be complete if you help.

Great work, +rep

[Sel]

You know, A single player version of this would be pretty cool.

Test how well this works when theres stuff going on.

[Timo]

I lag out in the pillar of autumn area with the massive amount of bloom (down to around 15FPS from 30). Running on a 7600GS 256mb at 1680x1050 with everything on. But that was just with me running around, i'd hate to see my FPS when there's a fight going on. Other than that it looked amazing, just as I expected :-D

[SuperSunny]

I lag out in the pillar of autumn area with the massive amount of bloom (down to around 15FPS from 30). Running on a 7600GS 256mb at 1680x1050 with everything on. But that was just with me running around, i'd hate to see my FPS when there's a fight going on. Other than that it looked amazing, just as I expected :-D

I'll try to portal each individual section in the area. Since the faces are flat it'll be easy. It should boost it well.

[Limited]

Wow thats some hot stuff sunny.

I got everything on high, 1024 x 768 (or whatever the 700* number is)

I get constant 50 FPS on the POA bit, and the other bit I get constant 80. (Usually goes higher but its off scale)

[Con]

Would it be possible to add a small fog volume under the water in that cave? If not, there are other things you could do to make the water look more believable.

[JunkfoodMan]

I wish I could make the water, "water," but the engine doesn't allow you to use volumetric fog. If I add fog into the water, it ends up placing that same water fog (aka acting like water) from everything starting on the level of the water downwards.
There =D

[SuperSunny]

Would it be possible to add a small fog volume under the water in that cave? If not, there are other things you could do to make the water look more believable.

I can try exact portals for the sound effect of water and some FX to imitate the underwater look of water.

[SuperSunny]

I've been playing around with portals and the spawning of certain effects. Basically the FPS just popped up even higher. The only laggy part I experienced was the downstairs pillar light, which can be tweaked as well. I've also been playing around with the lighting some more. Gel maps.

http://i32.tinypic.com/ajwj9c.jpg
http://i29.tinypic.com/96f6ec.jpg
http://i29.tinypic.com/50hzeq.jpg
Gel-Map Specular Love
http://i25.tinypic.com/2qwmqg8.jpg