Level management in max (2009)

vahl

hey guys, so I've been trying to set up some kind of workflow for a side project of mine and I'm more or less hitting a wall regarding level meshes management.

here's the deal :

I want to first create the layout of my levels using modular tiles, obviouslt, named following a specific convention.

then once the levels gameplay is validated I want to be able to "swap" the meshes with the final graphics meshes.


So my theory was : I can create 2 max files, one has all the dev/layout/graybox meshes for layout building, testing, etc, one has the final graphics meshes.

then I create the level scene, my theory is that I should be able to do like I would in a level editor, means I have my dev laout meshes and I just change the "package" or referenced scene for the graphics one, since they both follow the exact same naming conventions, all dev meshes get replaced, etc.

but it seems much more complex than that, so any of you ever dealt with that in the past ? mostly with iterative design (which is the whole point here). Any max plugin allows you to do this ?

r_fletch_r

Containers might also be another thing to look at they were introduced in 2010, aparently they are a step up from XRef. havent tested them myself much. It seems you save each object into a container file and load instances of it into the scene, saving over the container updates every instance of it.

Mark Dygert

I would stay away from xrefs, I've had nothing but trouble with them. The most common issue I ran into was that they would lose the link and stop updating if I made changes to the original. I would then have to click on each one and load each xref. The problem with that was that I had hundreds, and when the link broke the mesh turned to a little X. This seemed to happen when I would update a xref as long as I didn't make any changes, they where fine...

I was on the verge of writing a script that would re-link all the xrefs when I decided to use instanced meshes and Niel Blevins Object Replacer script and just keep it all in one scene. Oh also the "open xref from menu" command would often crash max, forcing me to open up xref originals the manual way by browsing.

I've experimented with containers, the idea behind them is great, but they can be a little laggy if you have too many open at once or if multiple people are working on containers in your scene and they save often while working... For those cases I suggest that they save to iteration or save over a "working file" and when they want to "publish", save over the file that is being referenced.

The container scene explore can be a bit laggy just like the normal scene explore when you have a bunch of objects, only it seems to be gathering more info and takes a bit longer to build.

Alternatively there are a few object library scripts available on script spot that might be worth taking a look at.
http://www.scriptspot.com/3ds-max/scripts/hcg-asset-browser-pro
http://www.scriptspot.com/3ds-max/scripts/object-library-v1-10

Autocon

We use xrefs at work. Although they have been custom done into our UI/Tools so it gives us a ton more options then standaered xrefs like lightmap rez, sound info, collision and so forth. Have hered some negitive feedback like Vig said about xrefs, havent had it myself though.