scale for video game enviroment...

Rockley Bonner

for example in; reference to a 6ft person? is this something I should watch for and if so, where would I change the reference or scale that 3ds max uses. Or should I just go and do it. its going to be for my portfolio.

Scruples

Since it is for your portfolio the size doesn't really matter, it can always be scaled later and max does have a utility for such a thing, under Utilities>More...>Rescale World units

It worked fine on an animated biped for me without issue, so it seems pretty reliable.

If you are using Vray or a physical light setup they are affected by the size of your models,
and I don't recommend modelling in very small sizes because you will lose precision and most of the modeling tools (especially graphite tools) work best on something in the tens to hundreds of units range.

Froyok

It can depends of your target engine.

Most of the time, the scale of your environment is based on the player scale. It's the view of the player which guide your scale reference. So most of the time you adapt the scale of your 3D Software to your target engine/game. If you stick to you 3D app only, you are free to use whatever grid/scale/reference that you want.

The UDK for example can be used to any given scale of the player, however, if you use very big object you might encounter some problems (like fucked physics or lightmaps problems).

Rockley Bonner

thank you, im working in feet in reference to a 6ft tall block.