2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY

2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY

I don't know what it is exactly, maybe its the joy ride around the universe in his seperate little star cruiser, or maybe its the fact that each level of terrain has its own gravity, or maybe its the girlie pic in that one guys dorm area, or maybe....... there is just so much going on here.

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Title : 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY

For those who will never make it to space.

Author : Wayne Young (AKA Slartybartfast)

Date : 2nd March 1999

Version : Version 1.0 - beta.

Filename : DM2001.zip

File contents : dmorbit.utx

: earth.utx

: realsky.utx

: DM2001.unr

: wdy_mods.u

: dm2001.txt (this file)

Email Address : [email protected]

Home Page : http://www.ganimede.demon.co.uk

Description : Unreal Death Match on a rotating space station similar to

the one featured in the film 2001 by Stanley Kubrik.

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Play Information

Single Player : No.

Deathmatch : Yes.

Recommended No. Bots : Up to 12 if you have a PII/266+ with 128MB of RAM and a V2 card.

8 or less if you have a less capable machine.

Any more than 12 bots and it gets pretty frantic !!

This map is big. It *will* run slowly in places. I know this. This map basically started

out as a proof-of-concept map and just grew. If I do it again, I will make the overall

size of the station half what it is at the moment (a quarter the volume). These are some

frame rate figures you can expect to see ....

* Pentium, 200MHz, 64MB, Voodoo Graphics (original Voodoo card), 512 x 384 x 16bit colour

Frame rates between 6 and 20 - *lots* of stalling - one second pauses

between areas and lots of disk thrashing. With more than 6 bots in the game,

these figures got even worse. Overall, it was more or less un-playable.

* Pentium II / 266MHz, 64MB, Voodoo Banshee, 800 x 600 x 16bit colour

Frame rates between 14 and 30. Much smoother play. Still lots of stalling,

and disk thrashing. Overall, playable, but with anoying pauses and breaks in

play, usually during heavy action.

* Pentium II / 266MHz, 128MB, Voodoo Banshee, 800 x 600 x 16bit colour

Frame rates between 14 and 30. Much smoother play. No stalling, no pausing

between levels. Overall, very playable even with 12 bots in the game.

* Pentium II / 450MHz, 192MB, Voodoo 3 - yes you read that right :-), 1024 x

768 x 16 bit colour

What can I say ? The frame rate never dropped below 50 and sat at 60

(refresh rate) most of the time. Overall - smooth as a baby's bottom with

images as crisp as a fresh lettuce :-)

Oh well, one lives and learns.

The good news is that this map looks *GORGEOUS* !!! Just play it - you'll see :-)

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Installation instructions

Put the following files in the folders indicated.

DM2001.unr ----> unreal/maps (or wherever you keep your new maps).

dmorbit.utx \

realsky.utx |---> unreal/textures

earth.utx /

wdy_mods.u ----> unreal/system

dm2001.txt ----> To wherever you like :-)

KNOWN BUG :

If, when you run the map, you get a message that says something like

"couldn't load blah..blah..dmorbit...blah..blah", try doing the following:

copy dmorbit.utx to your unreal/map directory and rename it dmorbit.unr

Yes, I know this sounds crazy, and I don't know why this helps, but it does.

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Construction

Editor used : UnrealEd (Unreal V2.20)

: PaintShop Pro V 4.14

: Corel Draw V 4.0

New textures : dmorbit.utx - Most of the new textures.

: realsky.utx - Star maps of the real sky -

Look out for the "Big Dipper" and Orion :-)

: earth.utx - Planet earth textures.

New classes : SequenceLight - Allows a light to blink on and off with a

precisely controlled sequence.

: ObjectPathRetrig - A retriggerable version of the existing

ObjectPath class (for the shuttle ride).

Known Bugs : There are some problems with some of the zone portals -

sometimes the fake backdrop shows through when it shouldn't.

This is much better than it used to be.

The bots seem to insist on "dithering" on zone boundaries. I

thought I had fixed this, but they still seem to get stuck

sometimes.

Build Time : 3 months worth of evenings

NOTE: This map is not finished. There are the occasional texture mis-alignments and

the item placement is not optimal. There is also a lack of detail in some of

the sections of the spacestation. However, I would like to think the areas that

*are* finished are pretty neat. You should be able to tell which ones they are :-)

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Other maps by Author

Tons of "experiments" to push the bounds of the Unreal engine - none published.

For example, I made a map with a moving mirrored door long before the Quake 3 demo

and Unreal "mirrormove" maps saw the light of day.

An un-released map of the 3Dfx Interactive Headquarters in San Jose -

with some "Men In Black" style changes to the interior :-)

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A message from the author...

I have to give a great big *THANK YOU* to all the people who have taken the time

to put up those useful tutorials on the web. Without some of the insights, I may

have given up map building long ago.

Thanks also to everyone who encouraged me to finally release this. Especially QAPete

and Lord MaSTeR over at Nali City, and Mike Chytracek at Unreal Action. Without the

exposure they gave my original screen shots, this map would probably still be

languishing on my hard drive. Keep up the good work guys!

Enjoy

Oh, and thanks to Tim Sweeney and all the people at Epic for being so damn clever :-)

===================================================================

(C) Copyright 1999 Wayne Young

You may distribute this map via electronic means, providing that it is done so free

of charge and that all files that constitute this map (listed above) are included

and that this text file is also included unchanged.

You may not include or distribute this map in any sort of commercial or non-comercial

product without permission from the author. You may not mass distribute this level

via any non-electronic means, including but not limited to compact disks, and floppy disks.

This map may not be used, in whole or in part, as the basis of another map, without the

author's permission.

All other trademarks acknowledged.