making master texture index

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worldoffood
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making master texture index

Post by worldoffood »

When designing my levels I noticed quite of few great textures are locked to Descent 1 when using DLE. As well as different saturations of textures in separate .PIG files. I've also encountered quite a few great textures when playing through mods. I find this very limiting and I plan to export/import everything to be accessible at once. Bringing these into Descent 2 would provide the most variety, but allow people to stick to D1 assets if that's their vibe.

My goal is basically to compile all the textures floating around in separate files then share a full index with the community for everyone to use. As far as I know nobody else has done this yet and I believe it would open up many possibilities. I plan to see what I can do about pulling in some DOOM textures or maybe even other games once I get the initial index out. I would obviously include a readme giving credit to all the sources, and provide an opt out if people want to keep their work to themselves.

Not entirely sure how the file interactions are going to work yet, but if I understand properly I can create an empty mission file with all the textures built in. People could then just build off that mission file and rename/change everything to fit their release. I don't see how it would be possible to convert already released mods unless I was able to dump everything into a new .PIG file. I've looked on google and I really have no idea how to modify .PIG, I haven't found any programs at least. As far as importing custom robots or other features, that is still beyond my understanding of DLE as well.

Looking for suggestions of mods with unique texture files! Or tips on how to simplify the process. Or your mods with custom textures you don't want included. If this works out, it could open up descent modding immensely. Hope I can get this done in a reasonable amount of time. Happy hunting! :)
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worldoffood
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Re: making master texture index

Post by worldoffood »

Hey! So. I'm having to do some detail work with resolution and converting to 256 colors. That's not a big deal, and I'm able to pull the important parts from larger images. The problem I'm encountering is that DLE doesn't seem to allow more texture slots as far as I can tell. I only can figure out how to replace current textures.

Not the end of the world, just a change of plans. I'm going to have to upload everything to my google drive, and I'll provide a link anyone can access then pick and choose whatever they want to use. I'm still compiling lots of old and new textures. In a way this is a good thing. I can update continually and improve textures or add new ones without having to worry about version releases.

I'll post a link soon once I get everything more organized. I'm going to have to upload animated textures frame by frame, but I'll keep them well marked.
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worldoffood
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Re: making master texture index

Post by worldoffood »

Wow! Alright. This turned out to be a much larger project than I had anticipated. I hadn't realized how much custom work was already out there, especially in pvp maps. I guess when you don't have to worry about building 20+ maps you have more time to focus on the little details lol.

Everything is available in 64x64 .bmp for your convenience! All the community textures I've found are uploaded on my google drive along with all the D1 textures. Everything should be properly labeled and credited, feel free to let me know if anything needs to be corrected! I run vanilla everything so I converted a few higher resolution images down to 64x64, but for the most part just stuck to stuff that was already the correct size. Each folder is split into categories so you won't be scrolling forever looking for what you want.

I've ripped a ton of Doom textures, but I decided to focus on finishing the community work first. Still got about half the static images left and have to animate the doors. Once I'm finished with Doom I'll probably move on to Heretic or even custom doom mods. Suffice to say this will be an ongoing project and I will continue to update the drive when I have new stuff to add.

Other games have textures I have been looking into as well. Metroid has a wealth of great designs, but the color palettes don't interact well with Descent's rendering engine. I'm going to continue to look into this as well and see if I can mess with color balances until it blends in a bit better.

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/ ... sp=sharing

I hope this can be a great tool for everyone looking to create levels in the future! Seeing the wide range of mods for other games is what inspired to me to do this. I would love to see the possibilities of Descent continue to grow the way Doom or other games have. Hope y'all enjoy and this can give you ideas in the future!

ps. It would be cool to do something similar with all the custom robots I've encountered, as well as sound effects (or even music, but that would have to be handled differently due to how personal making songs is), but I am unfamiliar with those parts of the program still. Cheers for now
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Re: making master texture index

Post by worldoffood »

Hello everyone! I'm just going to continue to post on this thread instead of flooding the boards with new topics.
Not throwing shade, I just like to keep all my modding struggles in one place. :P

Vertigo bots aren't showing up in my levels and I'm not sure why. Running D2x as usual. When I convert the mines to vertigo in DLE everything seems fine, but when I test them they bots are either gone or replaced with D1 bots. I have vertigo and it runs totally normal, so I'm not sure why they aren't showing in other mods. If I have to go without them it's not the end of the world, but I think the wider variety of enemies the better. Any advice is greatly appreciated! I haven't tried to see if they work in dosbox yet, but I'm not sure why it would be any different. Does it have something to do with the .mn2?

I've been making levels at an alarming rate. Using some textures from the database as well as lots of vanilla. I'm really excited with how they're turning out! My level design has improved immensely since my first set of levels. I'm moving much faster with the tools I've learned, and the ass backwards way I was handling lighting before isn't holding me back anymore. Still figuring out how to get a good flicker though. I should have a half dozen or so levels for playtesting/feedback in the next month or two. They'll be up on my google drive in a separate folder. I'll let y'all know when they're uploaded. 8)

Still some weirdness with the palettes on some textures interacting the default Descent filters. A lot of greys look blue. Something about the conversion to RGB then back to Indexed in photoshop. I've had some success with color replacement, but otherwise I have change them in the Descent editor then export to photoshop to get the colors proper. Not sure what y'all use to edit. 256 colors can be picky, but I suppose that comes with the territory.

Until next time,
Cheers!
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Re: making master texture index

Post by Parabolicus »

worldoffood wrote: Mon Sep 27, 2021 1:55 am Vertigo bots aren't showing up in my levels and I'm not sure why. Running D2x as usual. When I convert the mines to vertigo in DLE everything seems fine, but when I test them they bots are either gone or replaced with D1 bots. I have vertigo and it runs totally normal, so I'm not sure why they aren't showing in other mods. If I have to go without them it's not the end of the world, but I think the wider variety of enemies the better. Any advice is greatly appreciated! I haven't tried to see if they work in dosbox yet, but I'm not sure why it would be any different. Does it have something to do with the .mn2?
Yes, the .mn2 needs to be set up correctly for Vertigo. You need to change name= to zname= and in some cases (mostly in source ports) also include the Vertigo .ham (d2x.ham) under the .hog (I'm not sure of the copyright here, but I don't think there is an alternative and other Vertigo missions also do this to my knowledge); it must be renamed to have the same file name as the .hog, however (so if you have foo.hog, it should have a file called foo.ham in it that is just d2x.ham renamed).
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worldoffood
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Re: making master texture index

Post by worldoffood »

Perfect! Thanks for the help, I never would have figured that out on my own.
Small problem though, my file is D2x.hog. I don't have a D2x.ham file.
I tried what you said with hoard.ham but it didn't work.
Could you link a source? Should be an easy fix after that.

Also, your secret door textures are top notch! So many more options for hiding things
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Re: making master texture index

Post by Alter-Fox »

d2x.ham is inside d2x.hog
Ship's cat, MPSV Iberia: beware of cat.
...
Beware my original music, at http://soundcloud.com/snowfoxden.
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