SK Mapmaking Tutorial

Mapmaking in SK

Introduction

This tutorial aims to provide a basic method of creating a map using Metasequoia LE and then configuring that map to run in Silver Knights. I would first like to state my sources that have helped me in developing this tutorial. First and foremost should be Sefi-R’s tutorial for creating maps, written in Japanese; it is located at http://sefirmetropolis.hp.infoseek.co.jp/mapsakuseiiriguti.html. Through a machine translator (which is slightly iffy), I was able to get the general gist of how to create a map. Thus, my tutorial will be loosely based on Sefi-R’s. Also, I would like to thank Shuzi on the SK English Forum (who is currently retired from SK), for his very old posts concerning the very first of mapmaking for English players. So, through these two sources (and maybe some other posts that I have read in the SK English forum), and my knack for just experimenting, I was able to get the first step of creating maps for SK. This tutorial is not a tutorial for Metasequoia. I still have a great deal to learn with this program. Thus, I will not spend a lot of time explaining how to create complex models because I am afraid the method that I teach might be too inefficient and thus I would be teaching it incorrectly. Secondly, I do not get into bump maps and generating landscapes, for I haven’t fully learned this as of yet. The topics that I will be covering will be concerning how to develop a basic map with Metasequoia, how to export it to the proper file, and how to configure the INI file that goes with it. That said, I wish you luck in reading this tutorial and happy modeling!

Downloading, Installing, and Configuring Metasequoia and your Map

1. I am using Metasequoia LE 2.3 for modeling, so thus it is easiest if you download that version. If there is a newer version out, you might want to try that after you are comfortable developing maps. Make sure you have a LE version, a freeware, not-for-profit version that does not restrict saving. The version that I’m using right now can be found at http://ex.sakura.ne.jp/~mizno/metaseq/mqle23b.zip.
2. Extract this program into a folder (e.g. C:\Program Files\Meta\) and then extract it AGAIN into another folder (e.g. C:\Program Files\MetaJ\). The purpose of this will be explained in step 4.
3. Open up the first one that you extracted and set it up in English (click Other Language > English). Then go to the Configuration page and select the “System” tab. Under file association, make sure that MQO is selected. This will allow you to easily open up an MQO file in the future to edit it.

4. Now, exit that program and open up the one in the other folder. Set the language to Japanese. Exit it.
5. Now, we are going to create a folder for our map. In it, we will place a configuration file, the model itself (in both MQO and X format), and also all the textures that we need. I created mine as My Documents\testmap\. A great resource for textures can be found at http://perso.club-internet.fr/lemog/lemog_textures/acc_textures01.html. However, let's use these for the sake of conformity. [marble.jpg] [wood.jpg] (Right-Click and select save link and save it to your map folder).

6. Go to your English Metasequoia program and go to the configuration page. Click on system and under “Texture” click Ref and select the folder of the map. Click okay and we are ready to get started!

Creating your Map

1. The first step is to import our textures. You will notice that I added the Material and Object panels to the right-hand side of the screen. You can do this by going to Panel > Material panel and then Panel > Object panel. Then just drag them to the right-hand side of the screen.

2. Click New in the material panel. A new material, mat1 will be created. Double-click it and under texture click Ref and select the first texture that you downloaded (marble.jpg). You can rename the material to “Marble” or something. As you can see, this program automatically highlights something when you put your mouse over it, which can be annoying at first, but you get used to it after a while. Make another material with the other texture that you downloaded (wood.jpg). Now, select the marble material in the Material panel.

3. We must first make the basic plane. Click on the Marble material. Select Primitive and click on Property. Change the size to be 500 x 500 and the segments to be 10 x 10. Click Create. You’ll notice the plane was created with the marble texture. Also, you’ll notice that it was placed in obj1. Objects are like “layers” if you have ever used Photoshop before. You can hide them, lock them, etc. This allows you to distinguish between different parts of your map.

4. Let’s create a cube with the wood material. Click New in the object panel. Make sure that obj2 is highlighted. Also, click on Wood in the Material panel.

5. Now, click the Cube button in the Primitive panel. You can now use the move, scale, etc. features to transform this object. The “Segment” feature allows one to split the object up into many faces. Try some features like the Extrude feature to create interesting objects.

Saving your Map

1. Now, it’s time to save. Unfortunately, the English version does not save the X file with the proper header. So, we are going to save to the regular format (MQO) in the English version, open it up with the Japanese version and save it there as an X file.
2. Save your file in your map folder and label it like testmap.mqo. Make sure it is a MQO file.

3. Open up the Japanese program and open your file (testmap.mqo). Then, make sure that all the objects are checked as “visible.” Then, go to File > Save As. Under the file type box, select Direct 3D Retained Mode (*.x). Save the file as test00.x (you will need to save it as this file name). Now, look at the export dialog box. You will see two numbers at the top left-hand corner; the defaults are .0100 and 0. The former number is the scale ratio, in other words how big the map is going to be in Silver Knights versus how big it is now. The second is the number of decimal places to multiply that by (if there is a bigger ratio needed). We are going to set the size to 100 x 100. Since the map was originally 1000 x 1000, we must set the first number to be 0.1000 and the second one will stay at 0. Now, we can hit Okay and it will export it to an X file. We are finally ready to get to map configuration!

Configuring and Installing your Map

1. We can now start working with test.ini, the file for configuring the map. First, let’s go to our SK folder and go to map est. Then copy the file over to your testmap folder.

2. From there we can start editing it to suit our needs. Please keep all the attributes in the exact same order. Here is a description of all of the attributes and their possible ranges. See the screenshot below for a good set of values to use with our map.
MESH_NUMBER= [1 -> oo] The number of meshes (such as test00.x, test01.x, and so on).
TREE_NUMBER = [0 -> 200] The density of trees that are randomly placed on the map. Use 0 for no trees.
SKY_MODE = [0, 1, 10, 11] Use 0 for regular blue sky, 1 for red sky, 10 for space, and 11 for space with the earth in the background.
USE_FOG = [0, 1] 1 to use fog, 0 not to use it.
USE_WATER = [0, 1] If 1 is selected, all land under the Y coordinate of 0 (i.e. any negative value of Y) will be submerged in water. Essentially, the water level will be at 0.
USE_LIGHT = [0, 1] Use lighting. AMBIENT = [0.0 -> 1.0] The brightness of the shadows.
WATER_REPEAT = [1 - ?] The frequency of the waves. It’s best to leave this at 10.
WORLD_WIDTH = [The Size of Your Map] The size of the map (length and height). For example, a setting of 100 would mean the boundary would be a 100 x 100 perimeter around the map.
WORLD_HEIGHT = [Some height, usually at 100] The height of the boundary.
BACK_RED = [0 -> 255] The fog red value.
BACK_GREEN = [0 -> 255] The fog green value.
BACK_BLUE = [0 -> 255] The fog blue value.
RED_START_X = [-(Width of Map) -> (Width of Map)] The X value of the starting position of the first red team player.
RED_START_Y = [0 -> (Max. Height of Map)] The Y value of the starting position of the first red team player.
RED_START_Z = [-(Width of Map) -> (Width of Map)] The Z value of the starting position of the first red team player.
RED_DIR_X = [-1, 0, 1] The direction (along the X axis) that the second and third player will be placed.
RED_DIR_Z = [-1, 0, 1] The direction (along the Z axis) that the second and third player will be placed.
BLUE_START_X = [-(Width of Map) -> (Width of Map)] The X value of the starting position of the first blue team player.
BLUE_START_Y = [0 -> (Max. Height of Map)] The Y value of the starting position of the first blue team player.
BLUE_START_Z = [-(Width of Map) -> (Width of Map)] The Z value of the starting position of the first blue team player.
BLUE_DIR_X = [-1, 0, 1] The direction (along the X axis) that the second and third player will be placed.
BLUE_DIR_Z = [-1, 0, 1] The direction (along the Z axis) that the second and third player will be placed.
RANS_POS_X = [-(Width of Map) -> (Width of Map)] The X position of the sun.
RANS_POS_Y = [0 -> (Max. Height of Map)] The Y position of the sun.
RANS_POS_Z = [-(Width of Map) -> (Width of Map)] The Z position of the sun.
SHADOW_DIR_X = [-1, 0, 1] The direction of the shadow along the X axis.
SHADOW_DIR_Y = [-1, 0, 1] The direction of the shadow along the Y axis.
SHADOW_DIR_Z = [-1, 0, 1] The direction of the shadow along the Z axis.
LIGHT_R = [0.0 -> 1.0] The red amount in the light color.
LIGHT_G = [0.0 -> 1.0] The green amount in the light color.
LIGHT_B = [0.0 -> 1.0] The blue amount in the light color.

Putting it all Together in the SK Folder

1. So now you have a folder containing all the necessary files, which is the X file, the INI file, and the texture files. You can’t just put this folder into your SK-Ver0.0XY\map\ folder. Instead, you have to “change” the map. Please read on to do this.
2. We will replace our map with the “Map Test” map. First, back up your Map Test folder (it’s an even better idea if you backup your entire SK folder also). Next, go to the map est folder. In it you will see several files. Delete all of them.


3. Then, copy the X file, the INI file, and the JPG files (you don’t need the MQO file) from your new map folder into the SK\map\test\ folder.
4. Now, it is time to test it. Start up Silver Knights, go to Battle Mode, and for the map, choose “Map Test” (this is the map we replaced with our own). If all goes well, your map should load and you will see yourself playing right on it! Congratulations, you successfully completed this tutorial!