using max Xref

romi

i'd like to get feedback from folks who have used max xref functionality extensively for game production (specifically for level/environment creation & editing). does it work? where does it break? pitfalls?

any advice is much appreciated. thanks in advance!

cheers,
Rom
snowblindstudios.com

Mark Dygert

I haven't tried it out in Max2008 yet but in 9 and previous versions it was a good idea but broken. I had issues with imported elements losing their links when the referenced object was re-saved. Most of the time I would have to re-link the object and then everything would be fine, but that gets to be a pain in the ass when you have hundreds of objects and a bunch of people working on things. It seemed to mostly be set up to only import from a library of finished objects. At that point the only neat feature of Xref's are the proxy meshes... woopie... I That functionality is in a handful of modifiers already.

It seemed to be more stable when we used Scene Xref's but I think that doesn't let you move the imported object, which Object Xref's do. So if you Scene Xref'ed a box and wanted to copy it a bunch of time in different places you couldn't use a Scene Xref, it had to be an Object Xref, which would lose its link often... The good news was that if you 'instanced' each copy you would only have to update the link on one of them. Still a pain tho.

Supposedly they added a bunch of functionality and stabilized Xref's in Max2008 but honestly it was such a waste of time before I don't think I want to try using them again. And they always break 4 things when they "fix or improve" 1 thing. I think there are some specific project management software out there that do a better job and they plug into max. But I've never tried any of it out.

danr

depending on how extensively you need to use it, it can be a total cocking nightmare. developers often have proprietary tools to help get around its problems, if they need to use quite a few references

Sage

Well what Vig said essentially. It works, but sucks sometimes. One thing I noticed that works just as badly due to pitfalls, is that you can make say a prop make a reference or instance place it where ever you want and have it placed however you want. You edit the master one and all the duplicates update. Seem to work fine for the environment stuff I was doing.

Here is the workflow.

1. make master.
2. duplicate and place where you want.
3. Make new object if master doesn't suit your needs.
4. select master attach the new object you want the master to be, delete the old master object while in element subobject mode or before attaching while in subobject, whatever you prefer.
5. All clones update and no need to do xref crap.

Rinse repeat as needed. Essentially this master object is a container, just make sure you don't screw up.

Alex

romi

thanks guys for the insight! much appreciated. looks like we should look into creating our own internal referencing tool and bypass xref altogether.

cheers,
Rom
snowblindstudios.com

Eric Chadwick

That's what we did. Too buggy, even though Xrefs have been around for several releases.