Tileset Variations

[mhd995]

In order to reduce the repetitiveness of how maps are experienced, the individual and unique segments that make up existing tilesets could be duplicated and altered to varying degrees to make new ones. For example, there is this locker room with lots of lockers and an access terminal (your spawn there occasionally) that could be rearranged so that it's still a lockerroom, but just not the same one. Or its contents could be completely different, so that now you may have to retrieve the artifact/capture the crewman there. The shape and size of the room(s) would not be modified, so its architecture would not need to be reworked. Just the contents are re-arranged or replaced altogether. This way you can create more diversity in a simple yet effective way, especially for smaller segments.

 

I imagine this is less time and resource intensive than creating new tilesets or segments altogether and will help with making maps feel more fresh. Right now you could encounter the exact same segment two or three times on a mission, but if each one is a little different it would already feel much less like a deja vu. New variations could also open up options of making these areas serve a different purpose (artifact/hostage/capture/consoles/etc). Additionally, it may make maps less confusing to new players who do not understand the concept of the randomized maps yet.

 

 

Edited April 22, 2013 by mhd995

[calgon]

Some nice points there...

 

What about to add to it the possibilty to mirror some of those tilesets? That could help the immersion and would feel "much less like a deja vu", too .. + maybe easy implementable? ( No idea... but cmon.. the same thing, just mirrored? should be easy)

Edited April 19, 2013 by calgon

[shukudai]

I can't imagine it would be too difficult to create mirror tiles...

 

Didn't they just vertically mirror the entire game when they ported Zelda to the Wii so Link would be right-handed for wiimote users? ;)

[mhd995]

I haven't even thought of mirroring, but yes that would seem like a viable option also.

[Ced23Ric]

DE churns out new tilesets and new tiles for those at an insane rate. You have been with us for ... what, three weeks now? Beginning of the year, we had one tileset - Corpus Ship. With half the tiles it has now. With all due respect, but DE is going pretty fast at creating new tilesets and tiles. No worries on my part.

[mhd995]

You're missing the point. I'm not suggesting new tilesets from scratch, I am suggesting alternatives of existing tilesets by copy-pasting them and modifying them a little (or more) so as to stop maps from being repetitive. Assuming they have the tools to do so, this should be relatively simple.

[Ced23Ric]

You are missing the point. Why invest time in copy & paste and integration, when you can just have new maps/tilesets?

[mhd995]

You are missing the point. Why invest time in copy & paste and integration, when you can just have new maps/tilesets?

 

You don't "just have" a new tileset. It takes a long time to construct, finetune and test it. It is much easier to duplicate an existing tile set and alter its contents. It won't be as awesome as having a new tileset, but it will help break the repetition of coming across the same tilesets every time.

[Venarge]

 It is much easier to duplicate an existing tile set and alter its contents.

 

Actually, its not....

 

You just cant change how big or small a room is and add new stuff. Texture must be redone, pathing must be redone, almost everything you would do in a new map must be done in a duplicated tile set. so why changing existing rooms if new rooms give more variety with almost the same work?

Edited April 21, 2013 by Venarge

[Ced23Ric]

You don't "just have" a new tileset. It takes a long time to construct, finetune and test it.

 

You don't understand me. DE has produced two new tilesets since Update 5 - December 2012. In less than 5 months, we got the Grineer asteroid base in Update 6, followed by the Corpus Outpost in Update 7. Now, Update 8 is around the corner. In between, we just received expansions to all tilesets, which is the second expansion to the tilesets since Grineer Asteroid was released.

 

I much rather have DE go on with their usual schedule of new tilesets and then, tileset additions, then just copy&pasting existing tiles. They're doing a good job. You may just not understand/see it, because you joined after all this happened - except for the last expansion wave.

Edited April 21, 2013 by Ced23Ric

[mhd995]

Actually, its not....

You just cant change how big or small a room is and add new stuff. Texture must be redone, pathing must be redone, almost everything you would do in a new map must be done in a duplicated tile set. so why changing existing rooms if new rooms give more variety with almost the same work?

 

 

The shape and size of the room would not be modified, so its architecture would not need to be reworked. Just the contents are re-arranged or replaced altogether. This way you can create more diversity in a simple yet effective way, especially for smaller rooms.

 

 

As long as the architecture doesn't change, no textures need to be redone, no lights have to be moved, no occlusion optimizations need to be put in place, etc. Just the pathfinding which (I assume) is done by placing down pathnodes. Maybe I am oversimplying this in which case this suggestion is useless, because it's supposed to save time.

Let me clarify: I am not suggesting new maps/tilesets altogether or copy pasting an entire map and making modifications to that. The "problem" we face now is that we have only a limited amount of segments that make up a map. From my understanding, these are put together at random to make such a map. Because each segment is unique each container, each explosive barrel, each console, each locker in the exact same place if you encounter the same segment again later. This makes each spaceship/outpost look exactly the same and the environments get boring/repetitive because of it. By taking these individual segments and shuffling their contents to create a new one you break this pattern somewhat. Hence why I used the term variations. They're essentially duplicates of the original segment, but with its contents re-arranged. The more variations of a segment, the less you feel like you've been there before.

Edited April 22, 2013 by mhd995

[Ced23Ric]

Because each segment is unique each container, each explosive barrel, each console, each locker in the exact same place if you encounter the same segment again later. This makes each spaceship/outpost look exactly the same and the environments get boring/repetitive because of it. By taking these individual segments and shuffling their contents to create a new one you break this pattern somewhat. Hence why I used the term variations. They're essentially duplicates of the original segment, but with its contents re-arranged. The more variations of a segment, the less you feel like you've been there before.

 

Now I got you.

 

This is actually a good idea. +1 :)

[mhd995]

Now I got you.

 

This is actually a good idea. +1 :)

 

My bad for not making a proper distinction between the tilesets themselves (the themes essentially) and the segments they are created from. I've also edited the first post. But you were right, copying an entire tileset and changing them for the sake of variety would be ludicrous and incredibly counter-productive :P