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[valter.home]

Hello everyone, I studied a bit WME and I created some short 2D game. Now I would like to try with the 2.5D (my real goal) but I need some clarification despite having read the manual.
I tried to load the file geometry.3DS of wme_demo_3d in 3D Max just to get an idea, but one thing is not clear to me: if I have a background.png (or jpg) how I must proceed to create its hidden geometry? I have to load my image and build the geometry around it or first create the geometry, and then draw the imagine to overlap? Have you a link to suggest or a short tutorial that explains the first steps?
I just need a little push on this subject that I know a little then I should be able to proceed with my good will 

Valter

[anarchist]

I did a short test 2.5D game (2 scenes) and will speak from my short experience.

You first create your scene in your 3D program i.e. 3D Studio Max. Then you create a camera and put it where you want to achieve the scene you wish. For instance our scene was a house with a front garden. We set our camera in front of the house, looking at the house.

Having set your camera you then render the scene. By rendering the scene you create your image file, for instance background.png (you can use several formats). Then you export to create geometry.3DS.

You then create a scene in Wintermute. Set the background to background.png and also load geometry.3DS. And you are done 

What Wintermute does (as far as I can guess) is use the geometry.3DS to calculate where the floor, walls, obstacles etc are to be able to place your actor, apply collision detection (e.g. when there is a wall stop moving the character) and where to clip the actor (e.g. where to cut the actor if there is something in front of him).

The connection between geometry.3DS and background.png is the camera you created and exported in geometry.3DS (you must have noticed that you can change the camera in Scene 3D options). You used that camera to render background.png, and so they match.

The user only sees background.png, not knowing what happens under the hood.

Bear in mind that geomtry.3DS does not need to have the full scene. Before you export it, you can remove any details or textures.

[valter.home]

Thank you for your accurately answer. I also seen in the manual that the various objects must have a precise name (walk_xxx, blk_xxx, wpt_xxx.
Yes, I think I can say that if I had the hidden geometry ready I should not have problems integrating them into WME.
But ther's a question that I can't answer, today I tried without luck.
Can I import into 3d studio max a background image instead draw it, and build the hidden geometry on imported image? I ask this because I'm (perhaps) a decent programmer but a very bad graphic.
My idea would be to create a good part of the game using pictures of real places and then show it to some good graphic asking if they are interested in participating.
For this reason, at the moment doing everything myself, I need to spend less time as possible in the graphic to treat the full development of the game, his dialogues, his story.

[anarchist]

What you want is something a lot of us would love to have  But I don't think it is that easy.

[valter.home]

yes, but I'm not asking the hidden geometry to draw itself alone  but only if I can use a background already exists to build the hidden geometry ... I think it's possible but I do not know how ... I'll try to ask in a forum 3ds studio

[NAItReIN]

Hello there, everything is possible to do. Do you know The Lost Crown? Maybe you don't know, but nevermind. See this page: http://www.darklingroom.co.uk/thelostcrown/makingof/.
The most important to answer your question about making hidden geometry when rendered image or any background exists is Creating Saxton: Re-designing reality. I hope it would be hopeful for you.
Good luck.

[valter.home]

This really is a good starting point! Thank you very much.

I offer you a beer  unfortunately virtual 

[valter.home]

Hi! After several tests on many background I can claim to be able to solve the main problems.
But I have a strange behavior of a single background:





As you can see the blue lines represent the hidden geometry that extends to the arrow (I left several triangles because it is so visible).
I then use the option "Find path using 2D elements only" that is the red area and it is smaller than the blue area.
It happens, only in this background and only in this point, the actor leaves the red area and no longer responds to mouse clicks.
This happens naturally because the actor is not within the area warkable 2d but the question is why it comes out? 
I specify that I use dual monitors (three monitors to be exact) and I've read a bug on the dual monitors on the coordinates of the mouse but I do not think there is relation...or yes??

[valter.home]

Solved! (I believe for the moment ...)
This thing is really strange.
I did some tests, I resized with different forms the "floor", added and removed waypoints, changed the character. After several clicks in the area indicated by the arrow character came out of the floor with the result of blocking it and the game.
So I reloaded in 3ds max file geometry.3DS and I scaled the floor walk making it a bit bigger.
I then reloaded the hidden geometry in WME and the character is no longer shifted outside. I also wanted to try to scale back the plan as the origin and nothing has changed, the character finally does not go out from the correct area walk.
These things seem to happen only to me  but it's always good to share these strange experiences.