Resources, Everything you should know before getting started Options

[Whiffen]

Main resources and communities:

Valve developer community: http://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/Main_Page

This is a great resource filled with everything you can think of and more.

Interlopers: http://www.interlopers.net/

Helpful community if you have any questions, or want to show off your work.

FPSBANANA: http://www.fpsbanana.com/

This site holds a huge portion of community submitted content. Whether your looking for new maps, skins, scripts, you name it, its there.

Tutorials:

SDK Nuts: http://sdknuts.net/

Editlife: http://www.editlife.net/tutorial.php

Halfwit-2: http://www.halfwit-2.com/?page=tutorials&category=5

Valve developer community: http://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/Category:Tutorials

Interlopers: http://www.interlopers.net/tutorials/

Snarkpit: http://www.snarkpit.net/index.php?s=articles

Beginner:

Setting up hammer: http://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/Ha...l_Configuration

How to set up hammer editor for the first time. (Quick way to do this is when prompted to configure the settings close hammer and Source SDK then reload it again and everything should be filled out for you.)

Getting familiar with hammer: http://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/Category:Hammer

All about the editor

Valve developer community: http://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/SDK_Docs

Your link to Level Design, Material System, Sound System, etc.

Useful and Quick links:

Hammer:

Hot keys: http://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/Ha...otkey_Reference

Console commands: http://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/Console_Command_List

Optimizing:

Half-Life 2 Map Editing Optimization Guide: http://www.student.ru.nl/rvanhoorn/optimiz...77f9c0a58dfb8b2

Valve developer community: http://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/Op..._(level_design)

General mapping:

Skybox List: http://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/Sky_list

Dimensions: http://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/Dimensions

Modeling:

XSI Mod Tool: http://www.softimage.com/products/modtool/

Custom content:

Textures: http://www.cgtextures.com/

Reference content:

Google: http://google.com/

Search engine. The somewhat new street view feature in Google maps is perfect for city scape reference.

Synergy:

Synergy Home: http://synergymod.net/

Synergy Forums: http://synergymod.net/forums/

Synergy Maps: http://6igmile.ifrance.com/

SynergyOB Maps: http://files.matt-russell.com/synergy/

SynergyOB Mappack: http://cfsyn.matt-russell.com/

Synergy Head Quarters: http://hq.synergymod.net/news.php

Synergy Wiki: http://wiki.synmod.org/wiki/Main_Page

Synergy Docs: http://synergymod.net/Documents

This post has been edited by ultradude25: May 19 2010, 09:11 AM

Reason for edit: Updated links

[4-Legged Tumor]

I might call it "communities" instead of "community's"

[Flobulon]

Great list, but maybe you should include the Snark Pit (http://www.snarkpit.net/index.php?s=articles) ? I find they have some great tutorials. Assuming they haven't been taken from another site or something.

[Panzerhandschuh]

http://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/Dimensions - Player model heights, speeds, and other useful references.

[Whiffen]

Updated, shes getting pretty thick (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

Any more reference sites you guys know? I basically just use Google.

[Littlejohny]

Is there a Map Pack with all Maps ? with one Link ?

[Panzerhandschuh]

You can't get "all maps" since not all maps get released. Anyway, here's a link to a website with a lot of maps.. http://6igmile.ifrance.com/ Sorry it's not a map pack though.

Edit: I found a synergy map pack but I'm not sure what maps are in it. Download here: http://games.on.net/file/13858/BIG_Synergy_Map_Pack

[Littlejohny]

Ok, i will Download all Maps from http://6igmile.ifrance.com/ and i put it in to a Pack, and i post it here =)

- LJ

[CMaster]

Anyone know any good physics tutorials? Preferably one that covers see saws?
Because all I can find is pretty generic stuff about things made of physboxes that fall apart.

[Whiffen]

Make a prop_dynamic with the seesaw stand model. Name it (Seesaw) Stand.

Then make a prop_physics with the seesaw seat model. Name it (Seesaw) Seat.

You don't really need the "(Seesaw)" but I find, for me, that it keeps everything much more organized. It helps you find stuff faster, you know all the entity's being used for the seesaw. I do that with every group of entity's that effect one thing. (Helicopter) Up, (Car) Up, (Boat) Up. Easier to find the right entity than Up_1, Up_2, Up_3.

Place the seat on the stand so that it fits on top.

Make a phys_hinge in between the seat and stand in the center, make sure the origin of the phys_hinge isn't inside either of the models.

Go into the phys_hinge's property's and make Entity1:(Seesaw) Seat, Entity2:(Seesaw) Stand.

Last thing to do is set the Hinge axis property. Look at your seesaw in the Top(x,y) view. The horizontal of that view is the X axis. Vertical is the Y axis. If the seat is lengthwise with the Y axis you want it to rotate on the X axis. If the seat is lengthwise with the X axis you want it to rotate on the Y axis.

(IMG:http://img300.imageshack.us/img300/5610/30293899xd6.jpg)

The Hinge axis has 3 values, default 0 0 20, or Xaxis Yaxis Zaxis.

So lets say like in my example I want the hinge to be on the X axis, and I don't want it to rotate on any other axis. So I would put 90 0 0 as the value. Why 90? 0 is pointing upward but we don't want that, we want the hinge to be parallel with the X axis. So how do we go from | to - ? Rotate it 90 degrees.

If you wanted the hinge on the Y axis put 0 90 0.

Should be good to go.

[CMaster]

Yeah, I made something rather like that (although with brush entities rather than models),
The problem isn't that it doesn't work, just that its frankly very, very difficult to stay stood on and has a tendency to catapult people around the room.

[Whiffen]

Not much you can do about that I'm afraid. This one might not sling you around as much because brush entity's have a tendency to do that :/

[gez]

@moderator: pls make a copy of this list and sticky it. this is the most useful thread in mapping forums.

(copy it, so that we can keep it uptodate. the orginal poster isnt active anymore)

[ultradude25]

Don't need to copy it, we can just edit his post. I agree on the sticky though.

I also have a kind-of mappack, it has all the maps currently on the CustomFactor Server. However the edits may not be up-to-date so you'll need to download them separately from my Synergy folder.