 
 PLEASE NOTE:  This is a demo, a proof of concept that one can use warpzones
               to create a level in which one can walk across the floor, 
               up the walls and across the ceiling.  That is all it is.
               No claim as to playability or polish is made.
               In compressed downloadable form, it is less than 70K in size,
               so you are not out significant time, cost or inconvenience.
               If it sounds interesting, try it.  If not, delete it.

================================================================
Title                   : DEMO - Walk On The Walls (And Ceiling)
                          CAUTION:  WARPZONE AREA
                          (To avoid snags, look up as step onto walls.
                           If snagged, back up.)
Author                  : Michael Harris (AKA Springfield)

Date                    : Feb 11, 1999
Version                 : Version 0.2.

Filename                : DM-DEMO-Walk-On-Walls.zip  (compressed)
File contents           : DM-DEMO-Walk-On-Walls.unr
                        : DM-DEMO-Walk-On-Walls.txt  (this file)

Email Address           : mharris@fgi.net
Home Page		: www.fgi.net/~mharris/mike  (up soon)
Description             : Walk on floor, WALLS and CEILING
                          interior surfaces of a hollow cube,
                          upright, on your side and upside down,
                          such that you are at right angles to,
                          or upside-down from, players/bots
                          located on other surfaces.
                         
================================================================
Special Thanks To:	Wayne Young, creator of the superb DM2001_v2
                        Unreal level (Unreal Death Match in a rotating 
                        wheel shaped space station similar to the one 
                        featured in the film "2001: A Space Odyssey"
                        by Stanley Kubrik), for his advice
                        regarding the use of warpzones.
                        Note that the DM2001_v2 Unreal level
                        works well in Unreal Tournament
                        if installed into the appropriate
                        Unreal Tournament directories
                        corresponding to the Unreal directories
                        discussed in the level's documentation
                        and subsequently "recompiled"
                        (i.e. loaded into the editor and re-F8ed).
                        Lots to be studied there, if you are interested
                        in curving space in Unreal and Unreal Tournament
                        and/or excellent level design.
                        NaliCity on www.planetunreal.com gave it a 10 out of 10.
                         
================================================================

Accomplishments:

* 0.1.  Warpzoneing six pyramidal volumes of space together,
        tip-to-tip, to create the effect of a single hollow cube,
        in which players/bots can walk across the "floor", up "walls"
        and across the "ceiling".  Players/bots re-orient as they step
        onto each surface, so as to be perpendicular to that surface, 
        with the result that they often wind up at right angles to
        or upside-down from players/bots on other surfaces.
        Note that warpzoneing is used to accomplish this,
        as regular zone's variably oriented gravity vector
        can be used to pull a player/bot to a wall or ceiling
        but fails to result in the player/bot being appropriately
        reoriented/able to walk on the wall/ceiling.
* 0.2.  Used Unreal Tournament's experimental "PATHS BUILD" 
        (and "PATHS DEFINE) to automatically generate numerous paths,
        facilitating bot movement on and between surfaces.

Problems/Issues:

* Bots don't see or react to players/bots on other surfaces
  (I assume that players will see other players in multiplayer).
  They do cross onto other surfaces for a variety of reasons,
  including chasing a player/bot who has crossed their surface,
  but they don't see you when you are on other surfaces, 
  even if you place yourself on the "wall"
  directly in front of them.
* Players/bots on other surfaces intermittently vanish,
  except for the shadow under their feet.  Might be due to
  distance, angle or the extreme (45 degree) tilt of the warpzones.
* It is possible to get snagged in the warpzones.  Looking up as one
  approaches a "wall" helps.  If snagged, one can back up to get free.
  This seems to be due to the extreme tilt of the warpzones.
* Some weapons work through the warpzones, some don't.  This could
  be considered a problem or a feature.  It introduces some weapons
  selection/restrictions/placement strategy.
* Warpzone sheets apparently must intersect physical boundaries,
  at least where non-rectangular warps (triangular in this case) are
  desired, which results in at least thin warpzone "frames" appearing.
  In this particular case, they appear as thin triangular/pyramidal
  framework rising from each corner of the cube, to meet in the middle.
  It would be nice if one could avoid this, so as to produce a completely
  empty cube interior.  Worst case, one can "thin" the frame as much
  as possible or else beef it up and consider it a feature
  (rationalize it as a frame necessary for generating a warp
   and give it interesting textures/animation/lighting).
* What architecture does one fill such a "multi-gravity"\curved space
  with?  Walls/fortifications?  Central or multiple tower(s) to
  provide closeness to other surfaces?  Diagonal walkways running
  up from one surface to another?  
* What size volumes of open space best lend themselves to this kind
  of exercise?  Probably smaller than the cube interior in this
  level, for aesthetic reasons (performance doesn't seem to be
  an issue).
* How practical would it be to further curve/smooth space, via
  larger numbers of warpzones laid out in more complex ways?
  How practical would it be to write a program that could
  automatically grind out some of the geometry and warps required to
  accomplish this?
* Per Wayne Young, at least in Unreal, a maximum of 64 zones can exist 
  per level, with each surface/volume of space such as dealt with here
  requiring multiple zones, and one can only see through
  a maximum of 4 warps. 

A Note About Tilting/Rotating WarpZone Sheets:

* Per Wayne Young, tilting of warpzone sheets must be accomplished
  via manual selection and dragging of sheet corners (vertices),
  rather than rotation of the sheets.  Rotation of the sheets
  around a horizonal axis apparently results in distorted views 
  through the warpzones.
* It is sometimes necessary to spin warpzone sheets 180 degrees
  around their vertical axis, in order to get the proper view through them.
* See warpzone tutorials elsewhere for general information.
  
Advice:

* Per Wayne Young, and my own painful experience, avoid leaping
  into major projects.  Instead, proceed via numerous small
  proof of concept experiments.  By focusing on only one or a few
  problems/issues at a time, using small levels, one can rapidly
  modify/recompile(F8)/test over and over again.

Help Wanted:

* Suggestions as to solutions for above problems/issues would be appreciated
  and will be credited in any subsequent update or spin-off.

================================================================

Play Information	

* Want no or only a few bots in the level when playing/testing it from the
  editor?  Before starting the editor, start Unreal Tournament
  and set the number and intelligence of bots.  This will apply later,
  when playing/testing from the editor.

* This level was developed on a Pentium 166, with 80MB of RAM
  and a Voodoo 3 2000 PCI card.



=================================================================

Installation instructions

* Put DM-DEMO-Walk-On-Walls.unr in unrealtournament/maps. 



===================================================================
(C) Copyright 2000 Michael E. Harris

You may distribute this map via electronic means, providing that it is done so free
of charge and that all files that constitute this map (listed above) are included
and that this text file is also included unchanged.

You may not include or distribute this map in any sort of commercial or non-comercial
product without permission from the author.  You may not mass distribute this level
via any non-electronic means, including but not limited to compact disks, and floppy disks.
This map may not be used, in whole or in part, as the basis of another map, without the
author's permission.

All other trademarks acknowledged.
