Publishing and Cooking UT3 Community Maps

[jpaul1985]

Yes your right and sorry for getting off topic man . . . .

[firefly]

Ok, so I've made a map in the editor and its ready for some in-game testing so I figured I'd cook the map and test it, however when I press the 'Publsih/Cook' button I end up getting this:

Init: Version: 3487
Init: Epic Internal: 0
Init: Compiled: Oct 21 2007 03:17:32
Init: Command line: -platform=PC CTF-Test -AlwaysRecookMaps -UpdateInisAuto
Init: Base directory: D:\Spel\Program\Unreal Tournament 3\Binaries\
Init: Character set: Unicode
Log: Executing Class Editor.CookPackagesCommandlet
Log: GConfig::Find has loaded file: ..\Engine\Localization\int\Editor.int
UserModeType: <0>
..\UTGame\Published\CookedPC\GlobalPersistentCooke rData.upk is out of date. Forcing a full recook.
Error, Failed to load base level CTF-Test

Warning/Error Summary
----------------------
Error, Failed to load base level CTF-Test

Commandlet->Main return this error code: 1
With 1 error<s>, warning<s>

Execution of commandlet took: 1.38

I have no clue of what I'm supposed to do here, it also deleted the maps I allready had in the Published/CookedPC/CustomMaps folder.

I was having this problem too but moving the map file to the homedir allowed it to cook with no errors.

[DGUnreal]

You require a system with at least a 17" monitor set to 1280x1024.
Anything less than that is too small.

Your other option is to use the Unreal Frontend to cook.

[gilarin]

So, I have a fairly major problem... My UT3 Editor doesn't have (or isn't showing) the Cook icon at all. My toolbar ends at the "No Propagation" box. I thought it might be a resolution problem, but when I un-maximized the window, I couldn't pull the right side of the window any further to uncover any "hidden" icons. I patched up to 1.3, and still nothing. Please help... what's the use of a level editor if you can't actually cook your mods? =(

[DGUnreal]

Hi,
You should start a new thread for this question in the Level Editing, Modeling & Skinning forum area.

[jpaul1985]

excuse me

i dont mean to get this thread off topic but can you give me some quick pointers on how to get a, actor(player/bot) to spawn with shield belt? Please~!

in kismet when i open the "give inventory properties" i see everything in weapons and powerups except for Thigh pads, helmet, body armor and shield belt. I assume it has something to do with "UTpickupinventory" am i correct

this is how i do it. . .

open kismet, right click go to -new event - player - player spawned
then right click go to "new action - pawn - give inventory

in the properties window click the green plus on right side of inventorylist "boldletters"
choose what you want to be spawned with

select a player start in ya map, then in kismet right click, new object var using player start "?" "the one without the arrow

drag link out of "player spawned" into "give inventory" out -----> in

instigator(from "playerspawned") shall be dragged to player start, and target(from "give inventory")shall be dragged to player start as well and there you have it

you spawn with whatever is added in the give inventories properties via kismet

but i dont see "Shieldbelt" in the menu of "give invemtory? can ya help me please???

[Rob313]

Thanks,

I use Paint.net, but will try photopaint now and see if that works.
Thanks for the other info and the hundreds of posts through out the forum. I had trouble with admin rights (vista) and creating a maps folder. But things are finally working out.

[DGUnreal]

... but when i look at the map to makes sure its there it says 32.5KB!

You must be looking in the wrong place.
You were prompted for where you want to put the PS3 file, there will be a USERDATA.JAM file in the subfolder of where you told it to save.
See this.

I came across a very frustrating issue last night that I thought I'd share.

What's happening is correct. You can either use the -unpublished switch or make sure that the packages and scripts used by the map are in the proper folders.
IMHO the method that they are using for file management is not my favorite, but is most likely due to console file management.

But I would really like to cook it. Did I miss anything?

Most crashes during build are caused by bad assets imported by the mapper, or by incorrect use of actors and existing content.

Which issues are you referring to with lightmaps and occlusion?

That was an old post of mine you quoted.

Many mappers do not understand the various intricacies of geometry lightmaps. I see many maps that are still using per-vertex lighting on staticmeshes, incorrect lightmap sizes, or other such issues.
See the various lightmap tips here. FYI, I still have more tips to put on that page, plus more UDN tutorials to complete.

Occlusion is automatic in UE3, but it requires that geometry occlusion be taken into consideration when designing the map layout. Otherwise specific frustum/camera views will impact performance. A large complaint on many community maps is that their framerate varies wildly from location to location in the map. This is because the mapper didn't consider occlusion when they designed the layout.

I'm guessing it was the custom textures.

However, after cooking an ini file was not created, but I can make one those....

i couldn't make the map loc file.

Custom textures can kill builds. I've never personally had any issue, but I always use standard Windows uncompressed .bmp files for 24-bit and uncompressed .tga for 32-bit. I also use PhotoPaint to edit them, which always produces properly compatible format files with the importer.
Paint software like Windows Paint and other free software can sometimes create files that are not properly compatible.

Ini files will many times not be auto-created after an initial build has been done, forcing you to create it yourself. I just copy a previous map ini and modify it.

Loc files are language localization and are usually not required to run a map.

[Rob313]

After reading about 53,000 posts about cook errors I finally broke down and unistalled everything and it seems to be working. I'm guessing it was the custom textures. However, after cooking an ini file was not created, but I can make one those.... i couldn't make the map loc file.

So thanks to all the forum posts and DGUnreal and everyone else here.

[r2tincan]

Cooking shouldn't hurt the textures.
There is a known issue with Texture settings below 5 not streaming the higher LODs, but that is fixed by either setting the game to Texture of 5 or hack-fixing by setting bForceMipStreaming on all StaticMeshes. Using bForceMipStreaming on a map with a large amount of textures may cause pool issues though, especially on consoles. I would expect a proper fix on a future patch.

The PS3 only has 256MB of main and 256MB of video memory, so there are limits on what it can run when compared to the average PC.

Part of the overall issue with community maps is that most mappers do not understand the issues with lightmaps and with occlusion. This is no different than UT2004 though in which most mappers never could grasp the simplified collision system, etc.

Which issues are you referring to with lightmaps and occlusion?

Thanks

[Rob313]

Running: UT3.exe CookPackages -platform=PC DM-LostReligion -alwaysRecookmaps -alwaysRecookScript -user -installed -updateInisAuto
[COMMANDLET STARTED]

Init: Version: 3487
Init: Epic Internal: 0
Init: Compiled: Oct 21 2007 03:17:32
Init: Command line: -platform=PC DM-LostReligion -alwaysRecookmaps -alwaysRecookScript -user -installed -updateInisAuto
Init: Base directory: C:\Program Files\Unreal Tournament 3\Binaries\
Init: Character set: Unicode
Log: Executing Class Editor.CookPackagesCommandlet
Log: GConfig::Find has loaded file: ..\Engine\Localization\int\Editor.int
UserModType: (0)
Loading base level ..\UTGame\CookedPC\CustomMaps\DM-LostReligion.ut3
Skipping shader cache ..\UTGame\CookedPC\LocalShaderCache-PC-D3D-SM2.upk
Skipping shader cache ..\UTGame\CookedPC\LocalShaderCache-PC-D3D-SM3.upk
Skipping shader cache ..\UTGame\CookedPC\LocalShaderCache-PC-D3D-SM4.upk
Skipping shader cache ..\UTGame\CookedPC\RefShaderCache-PC-D3D-SM2.upk
Skipping shader cache ..\UTGame\CookedPC\RefShaderCache-PC-D3D-SM3.upk
Skipping shader cache ..\UTGame\CookedPC\RefShaderCache-PC-D3D-SM4.upk
Cooking MyPackage

[COMMANDLET FINISHED]


I know everyone has seen some of this before. I'm running Vista. When this gets to "Cooking MyPackage" - the UT3.exe crashes and must be closed. I can run the level fine in the editor and if I copy the file into the C: UT3 maps file and make a ini for it myself, it shows up. But I would really like to cook it. Did I miss anything?

[CaptainSnarf]

I came across a very frustrating issue last night that I thought I'd share.

I have a map 'WAR-TestMap' in my unpublished\cookedpc\custommaps folder. It uses a vehicle I've been working on, with it's content located in unpublished\CookedPC\VH_MyNewVehicleContent.upk and script in unpublished\CookedPC\Script\VH_MyNewVehicle.u, both default locations.

When I cook the map, I get zero errors. When I try to play the map after cooking, it always crashes UT3. The cooked map is corrupted somehow.

If I first copy the 'unpublished\CookedPC\VH_MyNewVehicleContent.upk' to the published folder, then cook, the map works ok.

Why does the VH_MyNewVehicleContent.upk need to be in the published folder *before* publishing a map that uses it? If the cooking process needs those files in the published folder, shouldn't I get an error during cooking if they only exist in unpublished?

[TheAgent]

i can cook for you if you want if you have aim send it to joel791e9 if not then send me a email at joel791e@verizon.net

[hantaruu]

(cooking for PS3 reduces size?!)
I neeed help when i Cook my map for the PS3 everything is fine i save it to the disk so i can transfer it to the ps3, but when i look at the map to makes sure its there it says 32.5KB! i dont get it My maps size is originally 72.5mb i dont get it anyone know wha ti did wrong?

[DGUnreal]

If the scripts contain code that relates to client-server actions then, yes, they will have to be on the Server since it is the authorative controller.
In other words, if your scripts are doing anything that changes or expands game play, the Server must control that, the client cannot, that is how anti-cheats are managed.
Anything that runs locally on the client only should be able to be embedded, such as non-relevant effects, NPCs (eg. circling birds), etc.

This is why using Kismet or stock actors such as Triggers and Volumes are preferable to resorting to custom scripts. Not all Servers admins are going to want to install custom scripts.
Mutators are often a better choice than custom scripts.