Galaxy and solar system creation

[DamoclesX]

okay I spent the last bit searching this forum and the old ss forums and I cant find any info, can anybody link me to info/tutorials and examples of how to do either of these, I want to get a basic galaxy setup and a few planets down and done.

[DamoclesX]

I got it, pheagey has a great tut on his site

Right now this is the info we have, I will be working on a full blow tutorial soon. for now thought Emjoy.

1) Create a directory in your Mods folder called Galaxy.

2) Inside the Galaxy folder.

2i) You will create one sub-folder for each star system.

3) In the main Galaxy folder, you will need a def file listing all of the systems in your mod. You can call it anything you like. The format of the Galaxy file is:

GALAXY

system: { loc: (52.0, 51.0, 1.0), class: G, iff: 1, name: Earth }
star: { loc: (56.0, 56.0, 1.0), class: M, name: "A" }
star: { loc: (43.5, 55.0, 1.0), class: M, name: "B" }

4) In the galaxy.def file, systems are places you can visit and stars are background stars that show up on the galaxy map, but that you can't actually go to.

5) The class parameter is the main-sequence stellar class of the star or system. Values can be: O B A F G K M (from blue-white super giant to red dwarf). You can also use R W and Z for red giant, white dwarf, and black hole.

6) The loc vector is the location of the system on the galactic map. The x and y elements of the vector must be greater than +10 or less than -10 so that they don't interfere with the main game galaxy.

7) The name parameter is the name of the system or star on the map. For systems, this is also the name of the folder that contains all of the planetary data for the system.

8) Each star system folder must contain a system def file with the same name as the system. The Earth system must contain a file with this path: \Mods\Galaxy\Earth\Earth.def

8i) STARSYSTEM

name: Athenar
/*************************************/
sky: {
nebula: "Nebula6.mag",
poly_stars: "stars.mag"
}

stars:500
dust:300

/*************************************/

ambient:(16, 17, 26)


star:{
name: Athenar,
image: "Suns/G3.pcx",
tscale: 6,
radius: 16e8,
mass: 2e30,
light: 1.6e11,
color: (255, 250, 230),// - standard yellow
back: ( 50, 50, 90) // - nebula6
}

planet:{
name: Athenar,
image: "Athenar/athenar_lo.pcx",
high_res:"Athenar/athenar_hi.pcx",
radius: 5.72e6,
mass: 3.53e24,
atmosphere: (80,100,150),
orbit: 1.95e11,
}

region:{
name: Athenar,
radius: 480e3,
grid: 20e3,
orbit: 18e6,
inclination: 0.4
}

moon:{
name: Nike,
image: "Jarnell/lanos_lo.pcx",
high_res:"Jarnell/lanos_hi.pcx",
radius: 0.72e6,
mass: 4.1e22,
orbit: 81e6
}

planet:{
name: Pallas,
image: "Athenar/pallas_lo.pcx",
high_res:"Athenar/pallas_hi.pcx",
radius: 3.35e6,
mass: 2.52e24,
atmosphere: (80,120,150),
orbit: 4.25e11,
}

region:{
name: Pallas,
radius: 480e3,
grid: 20e3,
orbit: 19e6,
inclination: 0.2,
link: Navara, // Janus
link: Dawn, // Jarnell
}


8ii) Regions orbit the item they follow in the file. You can place regions around stars, planets, or moons.

8iii) Low-res surface images should be 256x256. High-res can be whatever you want, I use 1024x512. The game engine will stretch the image to the proper size.

8iv) Planets and moons can have a rotation paremeter that defines how long a local day is in hours.

8v) Inclination refers to orbital inclination, and controls how high in the sky the sun will appear when you are in orbit. I usually use higher values for inner planets and lower values for outer planets, for psycho-perceptual reasons.

8vi) There is also a tilt parameter that controls the deflection of the planetary axis from the orbital plane. I usually use values between 0 and 0.2.

8vii) The glow and glow_high_res parameters define overlay bitmaps that can be used for city lights, or other glow-in-the-dark effects.

8ix) Asteroids are a single parameter of the region structure, asteroids: 100, that sets the number of asteroids in the region. The parameter defaults to zero (obviously). Asteroids are randomly placed throughout the region by the game engine.

9) Rings:
ring: "Giants/Ring2.pcx",
minrad: 1.2,
maxrad: 1.9,

The minrad and maxrad params define the inner and outer radius of the ring system, relative to the planet's own radius.
NOTE: Oh, and in case it wasn't clear, all texture bitmaps are given relative to the Mods\Galaxy folder. Most moons and gas giants look about the same, so I have folders that just hold reusable textures for them. Saves room in the .dat file not to repeat them for each star system.

got one question tho

what do the stars and nebula .mag files do, I dont have them/know how to make them so I have to // them out, how do you create them?

[John DiCamillo]

The stars and nebula mags are just hollow shells, centered on the origin, with all polys facing the origin. The stars object is a skybox with just white stars on a black background. Actually, I use an eight-sided hollow barrel shape instead of a cube to reduce distortion at the edges. The nebula is alpha blended and designed to fit inside the stars skybox.

I use two objects instead of a single skybox with combined nebula and stars bitmaps to allow the player to turn off the nebula graphics for a more realistic look (or a Star Wars or Star Trek mod). There is no requirement that says you have to do the same thing. You could create a single combined skybox if you don't want to give the player the option. However, if you don't provide a nebula mag (or if the user turns off the nebula option) you will also lose the colored backlight effect on all the ships and planets. The backlight will still be there, but it will be a shade of white instead of being colored to match the nebula.

[TheDeadlyShoe]

Check Mehrune's site as well.

[DamoclesX]

awsome thanks

I got everything done and built except one thing, pluto orbits at orbit:250.9165e10, from the sun(I halved all the distances, made it look better, well so far anyways)

but, it orbits so fast you can see it REALLY moving in the game, how do I slow down its orbit? I dont mean rotating, I mean its orbit around the sun

[DamoclesX]

Okay

I"m at a loss with these backgrounds, I know what you are trying to get at, but I cant get them to map property, I can get them to show up right in max, but when I export it to the game, it distortes a lot, basically its like its to "close" the textured is blurred like your face is 2mm in front of it, just like if you get really close to a planet, and I dont know how to either expand the background sphere, or set it up different.

did you map your backgrounds in magic? just wondering, I tryed that at first, and well, lol, it was a massive failure!



a few pics