Tilesets are a fickle thing.
There doesn't appear to be a tutorial for them anywhere, so I figured it was
high time to make one!
In this tutorial, We are going to be discussing
how to make a tileset. We are going to assume that you know how to make a model
and export and convert it to g3d. If you don't know how to do this, you should
download blender, check out my glest help compilation, and learn model
making!
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We
are going to split this tutorial into several parts:
~The first part will
detail how to properly make surfaces, ensure they are tileable, and ready to
use. Click here to go to that
page.
~The second part will tell you how to get the models ready. Click
here to go to that page.
~The third
part will detail audio, including formating and recording. Click here to go to that page.
~The next part
is about the XML, which is what links everything together. Click here to go to that page.
~And finally, the
last page, the closing, will sum everything up. Click here to go to that
page.
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This
will be the layout of our tutorial. Please make sure that you open this page in
MS Internet Explorer, for it is the only browser that I guarentee this formats
properly on. I've tested it on Safari as well, and noticed that it formats a bit
off. Not sure about Firefox and Mozilla, but you may want to just us IE to be
safe.
Lastly, before you get started, I want to make sure people are
aware of a few tips for tileset making:
~The trees are one of the most
important things. Try to get new trees for your tileset to ensure it looks
original.
~Make sure all surfaces are tileable, or the seems will pop out and
make the surface look bad.
~Don't make a tileset if there is already one very
simular to that. A evergreen tileset is fine, but don't make it very simular to
the existing one.
~Copying and pasting does NOT pay off! Don't just copy
everyone's models. Feel free to copy the surfaces then darken them up, add some
contrast and stuff, but don't go copying all the models.
People aren't big fans of merely recoloured textures, and other simple stuff.
Have at least a few new models. It is not expected that you use all original
models, but don't copy all the models from the forest, dark forest, winter
tilesets.
And here is some ideas that I think would look great for
tilesets. Try using some of them to get a great tileset. (100%
original)
~Tundra tileset. A winter biased tileset with tundra style trees
and such.
~Modern tileset. A tileset biased on modern artitecture. More
modern objects and such.
~Lava tileset. A tileset with burnt, dead trees.
Lava would coat the map, and some objects would be lava and volcano themed.
Water would be lava coloured and have very little alpha. Very cool!
~Future
Tileset. A tileset with futuristic objects.
~Stone Tileset. A stony tileset
that is very rock themed, with most surfaces being rocks and such. (cavemen
style)
~Japanese/Chinese Tileset. An ancient japanese/chinese tileset with
matching themes.
~Jurasic Tileset. A dinosaur style tileset with meteors,
dinosaur nests, jungle style trees, and ferns.
~Haunted Tileset. Very spooky
tileset with graves, ghosts, etc;
~Fantasy Tileset. A fantasy style tileset.
Fantasy objects of course!
Once you've chosen an idea, either from the
list above or one of your own, go read the pages to learn how to make that
tileset happen!