Tips for making a 480x480 map playable

[azurespecter]

Hey everyone!

I'm playing around with a NewGen Map that is 480x480 and is a near exact replica for George R. R. Martin's Song of Ice and Fire world (Well, Westeros at least, if you're a fan)

I actually made the entire terrain in regular world editor before I discovered I could have bigger maps with Jass Newgen, haha. Good thing I like terraining. Although it's more of a personal creativity project, I'd like to turn it into a playable game. I'm pretty good at terraining so it looks awesome, and I'd like to share it.

So I'm looking for advice on how to keep the map from lagging too much or taking too long to load.

What's going to cause the biggest problem? terrain, doodads, triggers, or imports?

 

[PurgeandFire]

Some general tips:
- Don't calculate shadows until you are done with the map, trust me.
- Work on things in a separate map. A lot of times the 480x480 maps take a while to load, so I usually make my systems and spells in a small 64x64 map that is separate so that I can do everything quicker.
- As far as lag goes, it will mostly be from rendering terrain and destructibles. Just try not to overload an area with them and you should be fine.
- You may want to try something like this once you've finished your map:
http://www.hiveworkshop.com/forums/jass-resources-412/system-destructablehider-219569/
- Create back ups. This really goes for any map, but it would be very painful to lose an entire 480x480 map that you've terrained.

That is it for now, I might update this post later if I have any other tips.

 

[Adiktuz]

For load time, well it depends largely on how many things you do on map init (library/modules/struct inits, triggers running on the event Map Initialization, etc)...

 

[azurespecter]

Thank you PurgeandFire, I'll definitely try out that trigger you linked. Looks like it will help a ton.

For load time, well it depends largely on how many things you do on map init (library/modules/struct inits, triggers running on the event Map Initialization, etc)...

I've seen some maps that have a delayed initialization, so the map loads certain things sequentially as the game is starting. Would triggers like this help? or any other suggestions to curb that initial startup?

 

[Adiktuz]

well doing it in-game is fine as long as you don't load too much at a time because that will cause lag... I think the widgetizer helps you hasten up loading time by "widgetizing" things...