Will Godot eventually get better tools for level design?

Audiobellum

I created so many pieces for my mesh library in Godot that, when I placed the mesh library in the gridmap 3d, the program slows down or become non-responsive whenever I right-click on the node.

The CSGmesh aren’t optimized enough and therefore is only good for making prototype levels. Sure, there is a work flow that involves using the csgmesh for blockouts/grayboxing. However, grayboxing seems to be for contemporary professional gaming studio.

I know that trenchbroom is an option and I do have it on my computer. However, bouncing between using Blender3d and Godot3d is difficult as it is; adding another 3d-related program to the mix would just make things burdensome.

I recently heard about this add-on for Godot take could help with level design; it’s name is ply. However, I only heard about it because I saw someone complained that it had flaws that made them go back to using trenchbroom.

Now a lot of the things I’m saying here, might be excuses but, a video by level designer Steve Lee has me feeling vindicated about the struggles I’ve faced with level design; the video is titled “Struggling to practice level design? This is why.” I’ll link the video right here:

Will Godot have better level editing tools in the future? If not, are their any better level editing tools for 3d in Godot that I haven’t heard about? If not, can anyone please share with me some resources that would help me to make an 3d level editor for Godot? I know I’m still a novice but, I’m passionate about this issue to make a solution myself( with a little bit off advice to point me in the right direction of course).

Please help.

cybereality

It would probably be up to the community. Godot already is missing stuff like a terrain editor, and have made clear they think of Godot as general purpose and not solely for certain type of games.

Gridmap is okay, and could work for simple designs, but most games these days use modular pieces that are not all the same size. Or dedicated tools like CSG that could be used in games, combined with custom models.

So I think it's possible, but someone would have to make it (maybe me, maybe you, or whoever).

Audiobellum

cybereality So I want to create my own level editor but, I don't know where to start. Could you point me in the direction of resources that could help? It probably doesn't exist but, do you know of any book that could teach me how to create my own level editor or something similar?

cybereality

I've read a lot of books, and this is the only one that attempts to teach this. It makes a whole first person shooter from scratch (in an old version of DirectX) but with the level editor and networking, and the engine interface.

Probably the only book I've seen that shows the whole process.

woopdeedoo

cybereality
Could you tell me what book that was? The link seems to be blocked or dead.

cybereality

I might need a level editor, but I'm still trying to figure out what I'm doing. I'm working on my own technology now for a long term project, but I plan to do a mobile game in Godot starting soon. I have a few ideas, I know that it's going to be similar to a runner or maybe something like Rez (it just constantly moves forward). So I may look into making a level editor, but it might be basic. Or I could do all procedural, which would be easier and probably okay for a running as the objects and stuff can be random. I also have a larger game in mind for maybe next year, but I want to see if Godot 4.0 stabilizes, cause I'm honestly having concerns with the state it's in. For the mobile game I might use Godot 3.x, I still have more tests to do but I would rather a stable game and not get bad reviews from bugs.

Audiobellum

cybereality Since I want to make a game right now, I'm just going to have to find some way to optimize the pieces for my meshlib but, I will also give that book a try.

Lethn

This might seem unlikely, but I highly recommend considering Blender for level design, what can be done now is you can link Blender projects directly to Godot as well and have them update as you make changes without the need for fresh importing.

gocat

This catches my interest! Blender is probably a decent option, even though I think it is too clunky for level editing. Don't take me wrong, it is excellent for making 3D models, houses, animations and what not, but level editing? However I know too less about Blender to judge.

About those CSG shapes, last time I tried them I found them too difficult to use. Changing it size was done from the center, so you continusly needed to move the shape after resize. I found it wierd that OP said that the level becomes laggy if you use too many of those. On the same time, now when thinking about it, they can perform realtime operations, so perhaps that would be buggy.

Soo... What's left? Making a level editing "game"? There is ways to save an scene inside the game, or at least the scene tree, so it should be possible. It is probably even possible to make some kind of editor tool, let a script run in the editor to make levels.

Audiobellum

" It is probably even possible to make some kind of editor tool, let a script run in the editor to make levels."

Oh that's what I want to do. I just need to acquire the skills first.

cybereality

This looks like a good algorithm to implement.

woopdeedoo

There is Cyclops in the making. I wouldn't say it's great as of yet. It's quite usable, but still very rough. I think it's has a lot of potential, though.

However... ultimately, unless people can do miracles in plugins, working inside Godot will remain terribly clunky and unwieldy. I'm not expecting Godot developers to ever make it much better, because level editing tooling is an entire field of expertise in itself, and also because, like Unity and UE and basically most engines in existence, it expects you to use external apps for everything related to assets. And that's the main reason why I'm not very hopeful that people can make miracles with plugins. People might make great things, but I presume they will always be fighting the editor's clunkiness. But hopefully I'm wrong.

The thing about Trenchbroom and similar editors, though, is that they can be excellent tools... if only you could move all of level editing workflow into them, and do little to no additional work in Godot. Otherwise you're of course going to be tediously jumping back and forth and doing work on both sides, constantly re-adjusting in Godot for the changes you've made in TB.

That potential is one of the advantages they can have over Blender. Although this depends on what kind of game you're making, and the type of geometry, etc. In cases where you need complex mesh editing, Blender will be the better option.

I'm currently experimenting with throwing all my level editing at TB (using TBLoader in Godot):

It's working. The only issues I'm having is that TB is very badly prepared for working with other engines. TB is made for Quake, first and foremost. TB also doesn't do complex geometry, among many other things. If you need an organic terrain, forget it. The process of getting 3D models into it and working with them is also not great... The UI is also quite clunky and crammed.

By far the most sophisticated level editor I've used (that isn't proprietary from Valve), is DarkRadiant. It still has it's limits, but you can go pretty wild with it, and you can rest assured it handles the workflow of huge maps no problem (it's very battle-tested with crazy-good Dark Mod missions). You can do some organic geometry with it, and the tooling is a whole lot more advanced than TB's. The problem is... again, it's not made to work with other engines other than The Dark Mod/Doom3. I've managed to get it to work with Godot, but the workflow is terribly tied to the way the Doom3 engine does things, where you need to write mtr files for it to even detect your textures, among other things.

I sincerely think someone ought to fork DarkRadiant and adapt it for general usage. If I was good enough at C++ I would. Meanwhile, we're stuck with Blender or TB (or NetRadiant-Custom, which is kind of ok as well).

I'm personally doing my baby steps in building an editor myself, but don't get your hopes up. It's probably a pipe dream. I've no idea what I'm doing. Took me quite a while to get something so basic as the UI viewports and clicking to select working.