6 replies to this topic

[Azkyroth]

I have, today, come to the unfortunate realization that I am absolutely clueless about how the game handles the day/night changes in the appearance of a given area. Can anyone point me to a good tutorial or explanation for that?

[Miloch]

http://www.simpilot..../main.htm#night

[Azkyroth]

http://www.simpilot..../main.htm#night

So, the AR####N tilesets are for night areas, as I suspected...which is confusing because, at least in BG2, several areas that look different at night (such as AR1600) don't have matching AR####N tilesets, at least, that DLTCEP can find. Are the tiles for that somehow embedded in the "normal" tileset, or is it done with color filters somehow, or...?

[Mike1072]

http://www.simpilot..../main.htm#night

So, the AR####N tilesets are for night areas, as I suspected...which is confusing because, at least in BG2, several areas that look different at night (such as AR1600) don't have matching AR####N tilesets, at least, that DLTCEP can find. Are the tiles for that somehow embedded in the "normal" tileset, or is it done with color filters somehow, or...?

If the flag 'extended night' is set in the .are file, then in addition to the WED specified in the .are at offset 0x08, there will be a <wedname>n.wed file (which will in turn specify the tileset) and in addition to the <arename>lm.bmp, there will be an <arename>ln.bmp. If the extended night flag is set and those files are missing, you're likely to get a crash in-game.

I don't know what the deal is with Brynnlaw - it doesn't use the extended night method and does just look like it's had a dark purple filter stuck on it.

[Azkyroth]

http://www.simpilot..../main.htm#night

So, the AR####N tilesets are for night areas, as I suspected...which is confusing because, at least in BG2, several areas that look different at night (such as AR1600) don't have matching AR####N tilesets, at least, that DLTCEP can find. Are the tiles for that somehow embedded in the "normal" tileset, or is it done with color filters somehow, or...?

If the flag 'extended night' is set in the .are file, then in addition to the WED specified in the .are at offset 0x08, there will be a <wedname>n.wed file (which will in turn specify the tileset) and in addition to the <arename>lm.bmp, there will be an <arename>ln.bmp. If the extended night flag is set and those files are missing, you're likely to get a crash in-game.

I don't know what the deal is with Brynnlaw - it doesn't use the extended night method and does just look like it's had a dark purple filter stuck on it.

Hmm. Brynnlaw has the Day/Night flag, but not the Extended Night flag, no *n tileset, no night map, no night WED, and I note that it seems to have four color patterns, Day, Night, and also Sunset and Sunrise, and as far as my probing indicates it does not display the "Sunup/sundown" movies that most of, say, the Athkatla areas do. I'll need to take a look at a few more areas with day/night versions but it seems as though the "extended night" function refers to the use of a separate WED and tileset (with the "sundown" and "sunup" movies obscuring the transition), whereas the Day/Night flag may just use a color filter that's applied at specified clock times by the exe...does this sound like a plausible interpretation?

(With some probing I've determined that AR300 also does the color-shift thing at sunrise and sundown, but that AR1600 indeed does not display the movie).

[Yovaneth]

I don't know what the deal is with Brynnlaw - it doesn't use the extended night method and does just look like it's had a dark purple filter stuck on it.

Any area that does not have an extended night gets the lightmap overlaid with a single blue/purple colour after the change to night. During the sunrise/sunset periods, a rose-tinted colour is blended onto the existing day lightmap. Both are hard-coded - at least, I'm pretty sure that's what happens. The day lightmap is not replaced; remember the frustration of trying to keep track of everyone in the rotting forest on your way to the temple north of the Umar Hills? Your party kept vanishing into the lightmap shadows and behind dithered wallgroups.

You may find that without specific use of extended night that the night period may actually be too light to be convincing. As it happens, the latest version of my DLTCEP tutorial describes a quick and dirty way of adding extended night if you suddenly find that you need it. I did...

-Y-

[Azkyroth]

Any area that does not have an extended night gets the lightmap overlaid with a single blue/purple colour after the change to night. During the sunrise/sunset periods, a rose-tinted colour is blended onto the existing day lightmap. Both are hard-coded - at least, I'm pretty sure that's what happens.

That's what I'd concluded as well, though I'm guessing it's the "Day/Night" flag that controls that behavivor since dungeons don't do it (you probably intended that but just skipped over it). I'll have to look at the area scripting to see whether the sunup/sundown movies are run from it or whether that's hard-coded as well.

The day lightmap is not replaced; remember the frustration of trying to keep track of everyone in the rotting forest on your way to the temple north of the Umar Hills? Your party kept vanishing into the lightmap shadows and behind dithered wallgroups.

I don't, but that's consistent with what I've concluded.

You may find that without specific use of extended night that the night period may actually be too light to be convincing. As it happens, the latest version of my DLTCEP tutorial describes a quick and dirty way of adding extended night if you suddenly find that you need it. I did...

Ah, that's the link I wanted. Awesome, thanks.