36 replies to this topic

[Erephine]

... making cool misc areas for BG2 like all the 'free' / nature areas you could go to in BG1?

It's really one of the most disturbing downsides of BG2 that theres no such things anymore. Exploring all the different areas without being 'forced' to the plot was always a lot of fun.

It probably wouldn't even be that difficult to do, compared to some of the projects that have been finished or are in work. Of course, that'd depend on the number of quests and events you work into the maps.

[Meira]

I too miss the 'empty' wilderness areas, but since I personally think that area editing is pain in the butt; I disagree that it would not be that difficult to do. Also it would request that ever so scare artistic skill (even if you were to cut-paste-edit from the old areas) to create the bitmaps for the areas.

It would be fun mod though.

[Erephine]

Creating area images is pretty easy. For me, the hard point is getting them to live in-game, i.e. scripting scripting scripting!.

Edited by Lightspeed, 21 July 2004 - 01:40 PM.

[Andyr]

If you can make areas and give them .WEDs and .AREs with IETME or similar then I can guarantee people will love you forever.

[Galactygon]

This is the #1 reason why I prefer BG1 over BG2, regarding playing the game rather than modding the game.

-Galactygon

[Feanor]

Yep, the missing of the wilderness areas is the single problem in BG2 in my opinion.

[dragon_lord]

It's really one of the most disturbing downsides of BG2 that theres no such things anymore. Exploring all the different areas without being 'forced' to the plot was always a lot of fun.

I loved the wilderness areas from BG1, I always felt I was really adventuring when exploring those areas. I remember stocking up on arrows heading out, clearing out an area full of ogres and then running out of arrows. Then heading back to town full of loot, selling the loot, buying new items, restocking and heading back out again

It probably wouldn't even be that difficult to do, compared to some of the projects that have been finished or are in work. Of course, that'd depend on the number of quests and events you work into the maps.

I dont think it would be that hard either, especially without having to create any towns. Scripting isnt much of an issue really, the only thing I dont know how to do is getting the areas to appear on the world map. But I'm sure someone knows how to do that. After I finish Julia I might seriously consider making something like this, otherwise its on to my next NPC idea.

Edited by dragon_lord, 02 August 2004 - 12:21 AM.

[Hendryk]

Actually, the wilderness areas all exist for BG2 if you've installed tutu. Once you have repopulated it according to your ideas for BG2, it's just a matter of getting the "Add Area to Worldmap" feature of IETME to work.

[SimDing0]

Creating area images is pretty easy. For me, the hard point is getting them to live in-game, i.e. scripting scripting scripting!.

If you've got decent area images and want a coder to work with, then I'm listening.

[SimDing0]

Actually, the wilderness areas all exist for BG2 if you've installed tutu. Once you have repopulated it according to your ideas for BG2, it's just a matter of getting the "Add Area to Worldmap" feature of IETME to work.

The style of the BG1 areas isn't appropriate to fit into BG2. And besides, area re-use sucks.

[Hendryk]

True. The task of building a decent area image from scratch also sucks, however.

[SimDing0]

Not really, no.

[dragon_lord]

Actually, the wilderness areas all exist for BG2 if you've installed tutu. Once you have repopulated it according to your ideas for BG2

Nah if you were going to the trouble of bringing back wilderness areas to BG2 you would at least create tilesets (probably a good idea to rope some people in from Sol Ek Sa)from the old BG1 areas, so you could make totally new areas. I'm not sure that there is enough variety in BG2 areas to create total new areas with tilesets without them looking repetitious.

[Hendryk]

Sure. Or you could cut and paste at the bitmap level and let IETME build the tilesets for you. That's really much simpler since the tiles themselves are pretty small and usually only make visual sense according the content of neighboring tiles.

Either way, though, you've got the challenge of creating a new area that looks like an integral whole and not like a bunch of bits and pieces all stuck together. And that - for me anyway - is even more difficult that creating the initial picture from scratch.

[Erephine]

I can make wilderness map images without any problems. I can't code them though (too much work for me ).

[dragon_lord]

I can make wilderness map images without any problems

Then what are you waiting for? Get creating. Coders arent hard to find. Hell I'd help if i had time.

[Hendryk]

I can make wilderness map images without any problems. I can't code them though (too much work for me ).

Sim indicated above that he might be available to help and from my own experience, area coding is one-tenth the work of BMP creation. Why don't you post a sample or two?

[SimDing0]

Yes indeed.

[Erephine]

Because I have none lying around

'kay kay - I'll cook one up for you when I have some free time.