An alternative to Valve Hammer Editor

[Prof_Orribilus]

http://sledge-editor.com/

:p

[ErikKiller]

No.

[[KIRBY]]

gonna check it out, might be fun to make maps for goldsrc again, but until full Source support is included I doubt it will be useful.

[LordDz]

Considering every update Valve releases, the hammer editor is broken a bit more.. This might be worth looking into.

[Armageddon]

This is really cool, I'll have to give it a try when I make a GoldSrc mod.

[Knights]

Considering every update Valve releases, the hammer editor is broken a bit more.. This might be worth looking into.

I'm pretty sure after a quick browse of the site it's just hl1 mapping... Valve hasn't touched that editor in years... Looks cool though for an open source editor!

[LordDz]

Yeah, it looks like they're focusing on Hl1, however..
"Sledge is a completely free and open source replacement for Valve's Hammer Editor, with a focus on compatibility with both Goldsource and Source engines."

Also, might be something for the guys making The Core?

[ScarT]

Pretty cool I guess but the Hammer-like interface is an absolute shit idea. One of the biggest problems with Hammer is really the shitty UI.

[Dr Evil]

I wonder if I could map for HL2:DM with this...

[ScarT]

If you don't have any displacements, and know what your models are called. Know which way to rotate them and pretty much everything else, then yes you could.

[pk_hunter]

Yeah, it looks like they're focusing on Hl1, however..
"Sledge is a completely free and open source replacement for Valve's Hammer Editor, with a focus on compatibility with both Goldsource and Source engines."

Also, might be something for the guys making The Core?

Sledge is being developed by Penguinboy, the current top dog at TWHL which is the site where The Core originated. We're definitely keeping a close eye on it, and I've already used it a couple of times to convert some of my unfinished Source maps to HL1 RMF files. At its current stage, Sledge is designed to work with the .vmf format for both Source and Goldsource allowing for unparalleled compatibility between the two engines and although the vast majority of Source tools are currently missing, it's certainly a good taste of things to come.

There are particularly exciting features for Goldsource mappers. For instance, the displacements tool will work with Goldsource (by changing displacements to tetrahedrons during compile) and tool textures and alpha textures will display with transparency in-editor.

There are also a whole bunch of usability upgrades that will benefit all mappers alike. The current version of the texture browser, for example, is already miles ahead of any version of Hammer.

It's certainly not at a stage where you should jump ship just yet, but definitely keep an eye on it because the chances are this will be finished long before a properly stable version of Hammer is.

[Penguinboy]

Pretty cool I guess but the Hammer-like interface is an absolute shit idea. One of the biggest problems with Hammer is really the shitty UI.

Can you please elaborate on how the UI could be improved? It is extremely relevant to my interests.

[Armageddon]

I'd ignore ScarT. I wouldn't use the tool if it had completely different UI to Hammer.

[Penguinboy]

Well, I'm open to suggestions. I have future plans for nice-to-have things (e.g. extra viewports in floating windows, blender-like context-sensitive sidebar, file browser tree view for drag-and-drop models, other stuff like that) and I think that this type of stuff makes it nicer for both new and experienced users, while not affecting people who are familiar with Hammer. If any big changes were made, they would be an option in the settings. I'd love to hear suggestions from everybody, though of course I wont just blindly add everything without considering the impact on the users

[ScarT]

Well, I'm open to suggestions. I have future plans for nice-to-have things (e.g. extra viewports in floating windows, blender-like context-sensitive sidebar, file browser tree view for drag-and-drop models, other stuff like that) and I think that this type of stuff makes it nicer for both new and experienced users, while not affecting people who are familiar with Hammer. If any big changes were made, they would be an option in the settings. I'd love to hear suggestions from everybody, though of course I wont just blindly add everything without considering the impact on the users

Here's a guy I like. Listening to people instead of just following the tracks someone already made for them.

I made a concept of how I imagined the perfect editor for Source a couple of years back.



Basically you'd be able to edit entities in the Properties dialog found in the right side by default. The individual views can be detached and put on a second monitor for better viewing. Opening and closing dialog windows takes time away from production, especially the properties dialog in Hammer.

The compile window would be in a separate tab, and there'd be a window extracting invidiual compile errors, highlighting them and offer help on how to fix them (e.g. explain what a leak is, and how to fix it).

(There'd be a tab called Map Compile showing everything, instead of separate tabs like show above)

I actually downloaded the source for the project and looked a bit into porting it to WPF since it offers a better UI (imo) but integrating OpenGL in WPF seems to be a no-go.

I could probably come up with a billion other things that'd help make mapping easier for both GoldSrc and Source but these are my overall ideas for now.

Feel free to add me on Steam if you want more pointers and help