Massive Scale PCZSM

theMouse

13-05-2011 18:17:24

Hello,

We are making a game (RPG) and are planning a massive scale map.
Small Continent sized or like the UK.

The general plan is to create a world map height map with the basic mountains, large rivers etc. (using GIMP)
Then take that height map scale and size it, clean up the image.
Then in code, split that image up into the various pages for the landscape. "tiles" each as a zone.
Add some noise so the terrain is a little more realistic.
Save each of those.
Write a tool to do that and define all the general generic stuff.

Then take all of those (multiple developers) one "tile"
fine tune texturing, add trees , rocks , grass etc whatever
and add game content, cities towns/ruins with prefabs as child zones

My guess even with the portals and zones some kind of loading/unloading would have
to be done. i.e only load into memory portals\zones reachable by current zone, normal game movement.
For things like fast travel unload them all load the target and then all of its connecting zones/portals

I probably did not explain this correctly but hopefully you get the idea.
Has any one tried this? Have any ideas , pointers, thoughts?

Everything but the content would be shared. Tools, code etc.

thank you,
theMouse