Lesson 1

By: Deathbliss

Deathbliss

Your first room:

Well go ahead and open up UnrealED. In this tutorial you will learn how to create your very first room. Throughout the series of these tutorials you will learn various things from me that I have learned, a few tips and tricks, and by the end of these lessons you will be well on you way to becoming an excellent Unreal Mapper. Unfortunately Unreal is getting misplaced more and more by Unreal Tournament (which I will eventually cover) but you should still find what you need here and a few other places. I'll place some links to what few places I know of soon. For these tutorials I will also provide printer friendly versions along with the maps that go with the lesson all in a convenient download. Keep in mind things may move slowly, and I will still be learning as I teach you. You can e-mail me here.

Back to work...

Okay, so you are faced with a screen that has three squares in the middle that look like little graphs, a square displaying a black void, a column of little buttons on the left side, and a bunch of pictures or words on the right. Here's a breakdown of what everything is:

Note this, as I will be referring to the editor's functions as shown above frequently. RIGHT CLICK on the little square icon. You should see the following box, set everything to what you see below:
Once you've set it CLICK on BUILD. Now you should have a cube sketched out in red lines in the bottom leftmost box - floating in a black void, and in the other boxes you'll the same thing on the gray grid. The top leftmost is the TOP VIEW, as if you were flying over the level. The one right next to it on the right is a view from the side of your level - the SIDE VIEW, the last grid box on the bottom is the view from in front - the FRONT VIEW, and the final area that is a black void is the 3-D VIEW. Unreal's grid default is from what I understand divisible anywhere from units of 1 to units to 256, with the default set at 16. Hence the weird numbers for the box. You can RE-SIZE THE GRID at any time by RIGHT CLICKING on any of the views with the grid in it and selecting GRID, then the size you desire. You'll RE-SIZE THE GRID usually for fine tuning the placement of the various pieces of geometry that you add. This should make it easier to align your level upon the gray lines in your top, side, and front views. What's the final box for? You'll see in a sec. Remember!!! The grid runs in units of 16 by default, but this can be changed as I have stated above.

Okay, another thing you need to know at this time that what you see below, the red brush, this is your "carving tool". Unlike Quake style games and levels that add into the void, Unreal style games and levels subtract from the void. In UnrealED, you are a carpenter designing something from a block of wood. The RED BRUSH is your carving tool.

Well now this RED BRUSH still hasn't become a cube. It's shaped like a cube and ready to carve it, so look over to the right of your screen. See those pictures? If not go up to the word CLASSES and CLICK on the ARROW next to it. Select TEXTURES. Here is where you'll find textures from which you can decorate the various pieces of geometry in your level. However there really isn't anything you can use here yet. Look near the bottom of the texture window and find the LOAD link. You'll be faced with a bunch of .UTX files. The files ending in this extension (UTX) are texture files - also known as TEXTURE PACKAGES. You can use what's provided, make your own, or download someone else's. For now we will use what's here. The files with FX in the filename are not useable for wall texturing. Well, they could be but these files are for things like lens flares, lasers, etc. I'm choosing ANCIENT.UTX. You may choose whatever you desire. Find a texture that you'd want for your walls, and click on it's picture. It should now be surrounded by a greenish box. Go up to the top of the screen, and CLICK TWICE on BRUSH. Go down the list until SUBTRACT is highlighted. CLICK ONCE to subtract the RED BRUSH from the world.

Congratulations! You've just made your very first Unreal level! However, you can't explore it yet, and you may want to do some internal decorating. So go ahead and in the 3-D VIEW select the surfaces you wish to change by LEFT CLICKING on them. You can select multiple surfaces by PRESSING DOWN and HOLDING the CTRL button while LEFT CLICKING with the mouse. I used BASICROK 2 for my walls, ACEILIN 1 for my ceiling, and AZ FLOOR for the floor. If you'll look next to the word ANCIENT in the TEXTURE BROWSER you'll notice 2 arrows pointing away from each other. Click these arrows to select the different texture (UTX) packages you've loaded. You can load as many as you like, and use whatever you want among them. The next lowest set of arrows will take you through the various types of textures in the texture pack currently shown. You can select a wall texture from WALL, a ceiling texture from CEILING, etc. Or you can use a wall texture for the floor. Everything is easily reached and well organized in the TEXTURE BROWSER.

Well, does everything look the way you want? Once it does, go up to the word TEXTURE and then CLICK on the arrow next to it. Highlight the word CLASSES and CLICK ONCE. The TEXTURE BROWSER is located in the same area as the CLASSES BROWSER, and here is where we find something we need, a PLAYER START. In the list, CLICK on the MINUS next to NAVIGATION POINT to expose yet another list. In there you'll see the words PLAYER START. CLICK on them, if a weird box comes up with a bunch of gobbledygook in it (stuff you may not understand) just CLICK on the X at the TOP RIGHT to remove it. Once PLAYER START is highlighted move your cursor inside the texture view. Moving the mouse while CLICKING and HOLDING the left mouse button will move you forward, and the same applies for moving backward. CLICKING and HOLDING the RIGHT mouse button lets you look up and down. CLICKING and HOLDING both mouse buttons elevates your position up or down. These are the basic movements in the 3-D VIEW. Anyhow, look down at the floor where you wish to put the PLAYER START. It must be inside the level you have created. RIGHT CLICK on that point above the floor, select and highlight ADD PLAYER START HERE from the list, CLICK once and a little joystick should have materialized into your level. Zoom in on it in the TOP VIEW by CLICKING and HOLDING the LEFT mouse button, then CLICKING and HOLDING on the RIGHT mouse button. In the TOP, SIDE, and FRONT views this is how you zoom in and out, by following these instructions and DRAGGING the mouse forward or backward. Once you've zoomed in let go of the mouse buttons, click on the joystick to highlight it, and then PRESS and HOLD CTRL. Now CLICK and HOLD the RIGHT mouse button and DRAG your mouse to point the RED ARROW in the direction you wish to face when entering your level.

Almost done! You'll need a light, right? Well in that list you saw when placing the ADD PLAYER START HERE you may have noticed the words ADD LIGHT HERE. Again in the 3-D VIEW follow the same instructions for adding a PLAYER START, only highlight and CLICK on ADD LIGHT HERE. Put up to 4 in your level, and try not to get them too near the walls. I would RIGHT CLICK just away from the corners of your ceiling and place the lights there. Ready? Well here is where you need to do next - REBUILD your level. Do this by PRESSING F8 or going up to the top of the screen clicking on OPTIONS, then selecting and CLICKING on REBUILD. Here's what the REBUILD box looks like, and don't change any values:

| This is what my level looks like.

CLICK on REBUILD GEOMETRY, and once it's done rebuilding go up to FILE, click on SAVE, and name your level EXP1. SAVE your level, the click on FILE, select PLAY LEVEL, and CLICK ONCE. Now you'll be transported into the level you just made. Sure, there's nothing much there now but we'll work on that in the next tutorial. You have just gotten further than most people have ever will, and you have just created something of your very own. For me this is my main reason for continuing, and I hope I will be able to get you even further than this. With UnrealED and the Unreal Engine there really aren't any limits at this point in our mapping explorations. The sky's the limit, and we have a helluva lot more we can do. Take a break and come back later for Lesson 2.

Final notes on REBUILDING:

Thanks Tim for pointing this out. Remember that view that started as a black void? Well that view (the 3-D VIEW) does not always show you what you're doing in a level. If you delete a lot of brushes, or add a lot of things and move them around, they may appear to be the same as before you changed them in the 3-D VIEW, so you may feel like it's not working. THIS IS NOT THE CASE!!! The 3-D VIEW only updates after you REBUILD, so remember to RE-BUILD after any big change in your level, and the SAVE accordingly. Once you RE-BUILD your level, everything should look the way it supposed to. This is not a flaw in UnrealED, it's merely the way UnrealED works.