Because if you add up all the time they must surely waste writing .QCs and going from .max/.maya to .SMD to .MDL and from .TGA to .VTF and back and forth for model and material updates and instead put that time towards doing something useful you would probably be having fun playing episode 3 right now.
No kidding. QCs are a bullshit waste of time. All the settings you put into a QC file could and should be in a single popup with some dropdown menus and checkboxes. What it spits out should be a single file containing all relevant information regarding animations, collision, material type, animation framerate and all the rest, and it should be goddamn editable, updateable and exportable.
VMTs and VTFs are also stupid. The Source engine is smart enough to convert a 32-bit TGA to a VTF with transparency while a game is running, so it should be smart enough to just have native TGA support and then let you set flags for material type in-game.
But fuck it. I'm whining about things that could be solved by going to another, easier engine like Unreal or Crysis, so I'll just shut up and keep plugging away in Hammer while saying "I don't like this! Why are you forcing this on me?!" like a typical bitchy fanboy.
They do have their own qc compiling tools, but they're not very good at all!
Cannonfodders compiler was a good one. But it doesn't work anymore for whatever reasons..
Duct-tape has a similar process to cannon fodders all done through the gui but it is quite bloated in the fact that it has a lot of functionality that probably most people won't use.
I still write mine by hand just because I have always done that.
edit: Also I don't think anyone hates valve here, I mean I sure don't it is just that the model/mapping work flow in their engine gets tiresome quite quickly.
I remember MilkShape3D also had a "write basic QC file" as well as it writing a QC file when it decompiled models so I don't think its too hard of a thing to do. I don't think it works anymore... Luckily CannonFodders decompiler works, with some tweaking...
Also writing VMT files by hand is tedious and they probably have it automated in some way. It would be nice to have a viewport shader that reads or writes them. I know VTFEdit can write VMT files but its pretty generic and its easier for me to edit an exsisting one rather than start from scratch.
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No kidding. QCs are a bullshit waste of time. All the settings you put into a QC file could and should be in a single popup with some dropdown menus and checkboxes. What it spits out should be a single file containing all relevant information regarding animations, collision, material type, animation framerate and all the rest, and it should be goddamn editable, updateable and exportable.
VMTs and VTFs are also stupid. The Source engine is smart enough to convert a 32-bit TGA to a VTF with transparency while a game is running, so it should be smart enough to just have native TGA support and then let you set flags for material type in-game.
But fuck it. I'm whining about things that could be solved by going to another, easier engine like Unreal or Crysis, so I'll just shut up and keep plugging away in Hammer while saying "I don't like this! Why are you forcing this on me?!" like a typical bitchy fanboy.
"Or what?"
"I won't use them anymore!"
"Okay."
Cannonfodders compiler was a good one. But it doesn't work anymore for whatever reasons..
I still write mine by hand just because I have always done that.
edit: Also I don't think anyone hates valve here, I mean I sure don't it is just that the model/mapping work flow in their engine gets tiresome quite quickly.
Also writing VMT files by hand is tedious and they probably have it automated in some way. It would be nice to have a viewport shader that reads or writes them. I know VTFEdit can write VMT files but its pretty generic and its easier for me to edit an exsisting one rather than start from scratch.