UT200X Tutorial Index

Intro

This page is an outline-form guide with links to tutorials mostly on external sites. The outline is arranged in an order best suited to helping beginning mappers grow to the advanced level. If you simply want an answer to a problem or a tutorial on a specific element, use the Sections area to find the appropriate topic or look at the Sources of Assistance section at the end of this page.

As of February 7, 2008, I have simplified the process for submitting tutorials: you can simply Click Here now instead of emailing me. You can submit either tutorials that others are hosting, or those that you've created but cannot host (I will host them for you). Of course, you can still submit a tutorial via email; direct your request to ice@icecreamyou.com.

If you have a comment or question, or if you spot a broken link, please email me at ice@icecreamyou.com and I will respond ASAP.

Notes

This page is not as organized as the UT3 Guide. For example, instead of the name of the site or mapper serving as the link to tutorials, there are only numbers. This state of affairs is unlikely to change anytime soon unless anyone volunteers to fix it. If you would like a page without these errors but without the same theme, you can visit the original page here. Keep in mind that the original page is not updated, but then again there's rarely a reason to update this page either.

Sections

Intro
Realism
Overview
        Theory
        Your First Level
        Getting Complicated (includes movers)
        Emitters
        Advanced Lighting
        Terrain
        Skyboxes
        Volumes and Zones
        Materials
        Triggers
        Advanced Brushes
Advanced Situations
Errors
Other Techniques and Ways to Improve Your Map
Gametype-specific
Development (includes Design Considerations, Coding, and Game/Mod Development)
External Program Analysis
Sources of Assistance
"It's Not Working"
Map Downloads
FAQ

Outline

1. Introduction: how to use these guides

a. Searching for Answers Online

b. Actor Icon Reference - Hazel.H's list of UEd icons and a description of each

2. A word about realism

3. Overview

a. Theory

b. Your first level - See also Architectonic, UDN, Hourences, Angel Mapper, and Wolf (WIP)

i. Navigation and the UnrealEd Interface (see also UDN - Interface - Keys - and Corsix's Basics)

ii. Subtracting

iii. Adding (see also Corsix's First Room - Second Room)

iv. Playerstarts, placing actors, moving actors

v. Basic pathnodes

vi. Basic Texturing

vii. Static Meshes - 1 2 3

viii. Basic lighting - 1 2

*SUPPLEMENT - BSP ERRORS*

c. Getting complicated

i. Actor properties

ii. Importing

1. Materials (Textures)

2. Static Meshes - File>>Import; must be in ASE or Lightwave format

3. Sounds

iii. Movers - 2 3 4 (with more than 8 keys)

1. Looping movers

2. Lifts (with doors that follow the lift)

3. Doors

a. Theory

b. Execution - 1 2 3

4. One-time movers

5. Other mover properties and Initialstates

6. Endlessly rotating movers

iv. More basic pathing and other play-affecting actors (comprehensive overview)

1. Lifts and lift-jumping

2. Doors

3. Shield jumps

4. Translocating

5. Wall jump

6. Jumping down

7. Jumppads - 1

8. Teleporters

v. Weapons, ammo, and health

d. Emitters 1 2

i. Types - (Most useful are ParticleEmitters)

ii. Properties

iii. Chains/multiple emitters

iv. Considerations (particle #)

v. Triggering, Untriggering, and Killing Emitters

vi. Sounds

e. Advanced lighting 1 (2 - UT1)

i. Theory

ii. Colors

iii. Other light types - spotlight, sunlight 1 2, triggerlight (technical) (informational)

iv. Other light properties

v. Ambient lighting

vi. Emitting light from actors (*NOTE*: To get a Static Mesh to emit light, you usually must set bShadowCast to False)

vii. Coronas

viii. Projectors 1 2

ix. BSP and LightMaps

x. Static Meshes and vertex lighting

f. Terrain 1 2 3 (optimization) (caves)

i. Theory

1. Heightmaps, texturing, limitations

2. Advantages/disadvantages of external terrain editors

ii. Importing a heightmap

iii. Creating your own heightmap

1. Prepping for terrain

2. Tools

iv. Texture layers

v. Deco layers (grass, underbrush, etc.)

vi. Visibility

vii. Placing objects on terrain - remove the terrain that won't be visible under/in them, make sure the surrounding terrain looks realistic

g. Skyboxes 1 2 3 4 (rotating) (multiple skyboxes - 1 2)

i. Considerations

1. Terrain

2. Lighting/time/sky textures

3. Objects in the skybox

4. % visible

5. The “awe” factor

6. Fogrings

h. Volumes and zones 1 2 3

i. Physicsvolumes (technical)

1. Velocity vs. Gravity

2. Other special properties

ii. Blockingvolumes

iii. Laddervolumes

iv. Watervolumes

1. FluidSurfaceInfos (2)

2. xProcMeshes

v. Lavavolumes

vi. Moving Volumes

vii. Zoning and zoneinfos

1. Theory

2. Implementation 1 2

i. Materials 1 2 3

i. Importing/Exporting

ii. Creation (general) (shaders) (environment maps)

iii. Property overview

iv. Material types and uses; using materials

v. Mipmaps

vi. External creation tips

vii. Surface Property Window

viii. Advanced texture theory and usage

1. Aligning

j. Trigger basics (overview) (technical) (types - triggers do a lot of things and not all of them will be covered here; see this page for some of the options)

i. ProximityTrigger and ShootTrigger - place a normal trigger and change the Object>>InitialState appropriately (see here for a list of InitialStates)

ii. MaterialTrigger

iii. Triggering volumes

iv. Triggering emitters

v. ScriptedTriggers 1 and Trigger Systems

k. Advanced Brushes (overview) (List of relevant pages) (working with brushes) (brush transformation)

i. More BSP Theory

ii. Creation

1. 2D shape editor 1 2 3

2. Intersect/Deintersect (just... don't use them)

3. Vertex editing 1 2 3

4. Face dragging 1 (2 - UT1), Brush clipping 1 2, Scaling 1 2

5. Freehand brush drawing - just don't use it, it almost always creates errors

6. Sinking 1 2

7. Solidity

8. Brush to Mesh (not recommended)

4. Advanced Situations

a. Nonstatic actors

c. Ground fog

d. Breaking walls/glass and other exploding objects (note: this page only shows one method. Best is to combine several: use an emitter for the explosion and original shattering effect, use movers to simulate pieces breaking off and laying around, and spawn objects around the area to simulate debris. You can also use one of the destroyable Decoration actors if you create a custom xEmitter to use for the effect.)

e. Importing custom characters and skins

f. Custom decoration

g. Vehicles

i. AS/ONS (ONS-Specific: 1)

ii. Other gametypes - VSOverride (installation) (download) (other 1 2)

iii. Custom vehicles

h. Karma Physics 1 2 3

i. ScriptedSequences

i. Actions

ii. NPCs

j. More Advanced lighting

i. Triggerlights (technical)

ii. Flickering lights - set up a scriptedtrigger with the actions WaitForTimer, IfRandomPct, TriggerEvent, EndSection, GoToEvent

k. “Instant bridges” - Angel Mapper's Reconstruct Effect (scroll down)

l. Spiral doors - just create each part of the door as a separate mover and make sure they're all triggered at the same time; only give one piece sounds

m. Reflections 1 2

i. Mirrors

n. Procedural textures: security cameras (2)

o. Multiple switches to open a door

i. All switches have same event (which is the door's tag)

ii. Multiple switches must be pressed before the door opens - make a scriptedtrigger with a WaitForEvent action for each "switch" and a TriggerEvent (and GoToAction if necessary) at the end

iii. IfConditions 1 2

p. Warpzones 1 2 3

*Restrictions: instant-hit weapons don't work through warpzones, can mess up skyboxes, warpzones malfunction if you can see another warpzone through one, "glitch" when moving through warpzones sideways, bots sometimes don't understand them

i. Playing on the ceiling

1. Player orientation theory - gravity can be inverted, but players are always "upright"

2. Faking it - duplicate the entire map (it's very important that everything is exactly the same) and place a warpzone on the ceiling of each part

3. The Escher Effect - Just like faking it, but doing it to walls and other surfaces as well

q. Complex Water and Waterfalls

i. Rising Water 1 2

ii. "Holes" in FluidSurfaces

iii. Waterfalls 1 2

r. Weather (with xWeatherEffects)

s. Scrolling Scoreboard

5. Errors

a. BSP

b. Rebuild/Map Check

6. Other Techniques and Ways to Make Your Map Better

* Bringing It All Together

* Words of Wisdom

* Taking a Level Screenshot 1 2

* Press F6 in UEd to view and edit Level Properties (description, author, etc.)

a. Ambiance

i. Sound

1. AmbientSound Actor

2. Sounds from Emitter Particles

ii. Looks

1. Walls

2. Ceiling/Sky

3. Floor

a. Height variation

iii. Space

b. Items

i. Puddles

ii. Obstructions

iii. Useless objects (hoses, fans, trim)

c. Giving things a source

d. Using groups

e. Optimization 1 2 3

i. Antiportals

7. Gametype-specific information (unlinked articles To Be Written (soon, by me))

a. AS 1 2 3

i. Matinee 1 2

b. JB

c. ONS 1 2 3

d. CTF/BR/DOM

i. CTF 1 (2 - UT1)

ii. BR

iii. DOM

e. DM/TDM

f. iG and DM variations

g. General

i. SinglePlayer

ii. Multiplayer

h. Other

iii. vCTF 1 2

8. Development

a. Multiplayer Design Considerations - most excellent and detailed article, written (of course) by me

b. Coding extras

i. Basic Coding

ii. UnrealWiki Coding Hub

iii. Coding and Actor Class Reference

c. Game/Mod Development

i. Recognizing a good idea

ii. How to start

iii. Follow-through

iv. Publication

9. External program analysis - Please Contribute!

a. Maya and 3DSMax vs. Blender, LightWave, and MilkShape

b. Photoshop vs. Paintshop vs. GIMP

i. Comparison 1

ii. Photoshop

iii. Paintshop

iv. GIMP

c. "Light" (free) versions

d. Terrain apps

10. Sources of assistance

a. BuF (BeyondUnreal Forums)

b. Epic Mapping Forum

c. UnrealPlayground Mapping Forum

d. 3DBuzz Mapping Forum - Video Tutorials - Excellent UEd Book

e. UDN (Unreal Developers' Network - extensive explanations of basic (and not-so-basic) functions of UEd - some pages for licensed developers only)

f. Wiki (The UnrealWiki, a good source of technical information)

g. Hourences' Tutorials

h. AngelMapper's Tutorials

i. Hazel.H's Tutorials

j. DGUnreal's Tutorials

k. DavidM's Tutorials (mostly lighting stuff, written for UT1 but still applies to UT2kx)

l. Corsix's Tutorials

m. Mr. Slackpants' Tutorials

n. Lode's Tutorials (UT1)

o. output.co.uk

o. Google

11. "It's Not Working"

*Crashing UnrealEd

*UnrealWiki Bug List

*Hazel's Random Bug List

*3DBuzz Bug List

12. Map Download Sites

a. Insite (Map Reviews and downloads - only reviewed maps are viewable, maps reviewed only if they will receive a minimum score of 3.5, user comments allowed)

b. Nalicity (Map Downloads and reviews - all completed maps allowed, some reviewed by user request, user comments allowed)

c. MapRaider (Map Downloads, user reviews, user comments allowed)

d. UnrealPlayground (Map Downloads - betas allowed, no user comments)

13. FAQ

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