How to create Terrain ( .ter ) for TXB3D Games?
by William P Buck · in Torque X 3D · 06/21/2010 (9:02 am) · 4 replies
Hey all,
(skip to bottom for tl;dr question, or read on for specifics of my situation)
I'm just getting my feet wet with the Torque X Game Builders, and am trying to make an isometric shooter in the vein of Konami's "Zombie Apocalypse", complete with some 3D models. My first thought was to try importing 3D into TXB2D (using demo versions, as I didn't want to commit financially to anything until I could see something working), but forum searches seemed to suggest that functionality is mediocre at best, as I saw that David Horn had problems with it.
So, I've moved on to building in TXB3D Demo, with the intent of just having a very small, flat terrain and limited camera mobility (low angle range, limited movement in physical space). However, I'm very much struggling to discover how to simply build a flat hunk of land for my game to exist on.
An old tutorial on TDN suggested I use TGEA's world editor to build myself some terrain, and then grab the .ter file I make in that for use in TXB3D. So, after coming to the understanding that TGEA is the old name for what is now T3D (is this even correct?), I got the demo of that and built me a small, flat hunk of grass with some rock wall boundaries around the outside. I then grabbed the .ter file and tossed it into my C# data/terrain folder, referenced it in the XML as the "endless desert" default terrain is referenced, and to my dismay exceptions were thrown.
I then discovered another forum posting that seemed to suggest there are different "versions" of .ter files, and some may not be compatible with TXB. Whats more, that thread was left hanging, leading me to believe there is no current "solution" for building terrain for TXB3D games.
(skip to bottom for tl;dr question, or read on for specifics of my situation)
I'm just getting my feet wet with the Torque X Game Builders, and am trying to make an isometric shooter in the vein of Konami's "Zombie Apocalypse", complete with some 3D models. My first thought was to try importing 3D into TXB2D (using demo versions, as I didn't want to commit financially to anything until I could see something working), but forum searches seemed to suggest that functionality is mediocre at best, as I saw that David Horn had problems with it.
So, I've moved on to building in TXB3D Demo, with the intent of just having a very small, flat terrain and limited camera mobility (low angle range, limited movement in physical space). However, I'm very much struggling to discover how to simply build a flat hunk of land for my game to exist on.
An old tutorial on TDN suggested I use TGEA's world editor to build myself some terrain, and then grab the .ter file I make in that for use in TXB3D. So, after coming to the understanding that TGEA is the old name for what is now T3D (is this even correct?), I got the demo of that and built me a small, flat hunk of grass with some rock wall boundaries around the outside. I then grabbed the .ter file and tossed it into my C# data/terrain folder, referenced it in the XML as the "endless desert" default terrain is referenced, and to my dismay exceptions were thrown.
I then discovered another forum posting that seemed to suggest there are different "versions" of .ter files, and some may not be compatible with TXB. Whats more, that thread was left hanging, leading me to believe there is no current "solution" for building terrain for TXB3D games.
tl;dr question:
How does one go about creating terrain that can be used in a TXB3D game? (specifically, something simple like a small, flat rectangular plane with boundary walls)
#2
Thanks for the tip :)
Do you know of any reasonably good docs/tutorials on how to use TGE_Terrain_Editor? I'm playing around with it and have gotten painting textures to work, but no terraforming (fiddling with the height doesn't seem to do anything), and also saving .ter files).
I noticed that thread I linked suggested TGE_Terrain_Editor can't direct save .ter files, and suggested you use the TGE Demo, which now links to the T3D demo which I've already tried and failed to get working. That thread is also 2 years old, though :/ What's the current story?
06/22/2010 (8:20 am)
Hey Henry,Thanks for the tip :)
Do you know of any reasonably good docs/tutorials on how to use TGE_Terrain_Editor? I'm playing around with it and have gotten painting textures to work, but no terraforming (fiddling with the height doesn't seem to do anything), and also saving .ter files).
I noticed that thread I linked suggested TGE_Terrain_Editor can't direct save .ter files, and suggested you use the TGE Demo, which now links to the T3D demo which I've already tried and failed to get working. That thread is also 2 years old, though :/ What's the current story?
#3
06/22/2010 (9:56 am)
ok nevermind I got terraforming working (you use the action dropdown along the top, for those curious), and found the .ter file to import it (saves to the same folder as the .mis file you can save, make sure to pull over any textures you use as well!) :) 
#4
06/22/2010 (12:11 pm)
The old Torque Terrain editor is really not very user friendly. I think that TorquPowered could use some real help with all the UI's for all the products. They are very engineer centric.
Torque 3D Owner Henry Shilling
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