Large map project - advice wanted
I'm going to attempt what will be quite a big project, at least for me anyway. It's going to involve learning a lot about the creation tools over what will no doubt be quite a long period of time. Before I start I'd just like to see what kind of help and advice people might be able to offer to get me started off on the right foot.
The broad strokes are:-
-I want to recreate the town I live in. Not brick for brick - at first I'm just concerned with getting streets mapped out and getting some basic buildings in place. Once I've got this far I can flesh it out til my heart's content.
- I want it to be kind of top down 2.5D (think Diablo/Pokemon/Animal Crossing).
This is it for now. I'm getting better at using the creation tools every day but as yet I'm not super skilled, which is why this is going to be such an undertaking for me. So what I'd like to hear is, how would other people go about this? Where would be a good place to start? What problems do you see me encountering doing something like this and how would you overcome them? Even tool tips and little tidbits of information you think might be useful for this project, I'd be really grateful for your input.
Thanks.
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If you're going to have a lot of houses, make each the fewest objects possible--a single sculpt would be ideal, thermo-wise. This means instead of having a thousand clones each with 300 pieces, making for 300,000 "things" on the gameplay thermo, you have a thousand clones each with 1 piece, making for 1,000 thungs on the gameplay thermo.
That might not be feasible long-term, but having that ideal in mind will help you not instantly blow the thermo ;D -
If I could go back and give myself advice, it would be to divide my starting goals by about 10, and then divide them again by about 5. Those are the bite sized things I should have started with to build my skillset. Everything I did early on as part of my larger long-term concept, I've had to redo because I did it all wrong the first time. Too detailed, too inefficient, too hideous, etc.
Large maps are hard to do well. You have to be very efficient with your resource usage. I would suggest starting out by making smaller things that are fun to work on and maybe even a little bit silly while you get used to the tools.
By embracing the idea of working on small throw-away things (just to start), you won't feel the frustration of having to constantly go back and clean up after yourself as you realize everything you were doing was wrong. -
Thanks for your input, both of you! This is exactly the kind of advice I was after.
AndymationB - I suspected this would be the case. The first thing I've made so far is a house with a small front garden and a section of pavement and road for duplicating - even by the time I'd finished that I realised how I'd done it wrong and ended up making it again. And funnily enough, where I went wrong was on precisely what TAPgiles is talking about - one thing taking up far too much thermo.
Thanks again guys. If you think of anything else or see any relevant tutorials (I can't seem to find) I'd love to hear it.
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