Using console commands to find errors in your levels.

Lithtech Jupiter engine

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Using console commands to find errors in your levels.

Post by Spawn » Tue Dec 18, 2018 12:29 am

Wiky's Using console commands to find errors in your levels tutorial.

When setting up DEdit you have the option of using lithtech.exe or lithtechdev.exe under the run options.

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I happen to use lithtech.exe 90% of time since I use a nocd hack so that I don't have to wait for my CDROM to spin up to speed every time I want to check progress on my level.

When I want to optimize my level, I'll throw in my copy of NOLF or CJ and switch to lithtechdev.exe.

This allows me to enter in various console commands.

To run console commands make sure you have lithtechdev.exe as the executable in the DEdit run options.

Use the ~ (tilda) to bring the console down in game.


Here is a list of some useful console commands.

For a complete list of console commands, run a world in lithtechdev.exe and bring the console down (~) and press tab to cycle through all the commands.

Use 1 to turn on

Use 0 to turn off

Usage: hit ~ to bring down the console, type showframerate 1 to turn on the frame rate, press the ~ again to return to the game with your fps counter in the top left.

Use shift + ~ to scroll through the info once you've closed the console window so that you can see all the information.

Commands are NOT case sensitive.

Command Argument Function
DebugRBDrawOccluders 1,0 Draws the occluders in the level. When I tried this in CJ, I could only view the occluders when my sky was behind one, and even then it was a transparent blue. Therefore, use the command with the WireFrame 1 console command. When in WireFrame mode, you will be able to clearly see your occluders.
Drawflat 1,0 Turn off/on textures. I've had limited success with this one. Sometimes it works, sometimes not. Makes all your textures disappear and paints everything a flat solid shade.
DrawRenderBlocks 1,0 Shows the renderblock boundaries. Check the documentation for a description of renderblocks. Basically lithtech splits up the level in sections.
DrawSky 1,0 Turn your sky on or off.
DrawVolumeEffectVolumes 1,0 Shows the outline of your volume effect in game. Useful if you aren't seeing your volume effect effects in game.
FarZ Integer in DEdit Units By default the farz is the amount of distance in DEdit units that the engine draws from the player. The default is 10,000. This is way too far for most levels. Find the farthest distance your player can see in DEdit and set the farz distance to a few units beyond this in the World Properties. When testing your level, use this console command to test your distance in real time. Now there is no guessing in farz distance!
Lockpvs 1,0 LockPVS , tells the engine to continue drawing whatever is currently visible to it (the Potentially Visible Set ) and not to load any further brushes into the world until it’s un-frozen. Use this when you’re getting high counts in a particular view and want to see what’s being drawn in another room. Once you get the high counts on your screen, enter LockPVS 1 on the console. After that, you can walk the area and see what the engine’s drawing. Only objects that are visible from the point where you locked the PVS will be drawn.
ShowClassTicks 1,0 Displays game-specific performance information. Things like player spawn points, volume effects and other objects.
Showsplits 1,0 Shows where the processor has split a large polygon into smaller triangles or shows where the processor has split a polygon to fix a T junction.
Showfillinfo 1,0 Overdraw in a scene is measured using the ShowFillInfo console command. In the development of the game Shogo , for instance, values of 2-3 here were considered acceptable and values of 4-6 were danger signs. Once again, testing on your target platform to obtain figures for your own game would be wise.
ShowFrameRate 1,0 Displays the current framerate. Very helpful.
Showpolycount 1,0 Shows the current number of polygons that are visible. As a general guideline, the game designers for NOLF kept multiplayer levels to around 600 polygons/scene in general on multiplayer levels and 800 or so for single-player levels where frame rate was not as vital. It’s important to perform some tests of your own on your target platform to develop your own standards. NOTE: Use Use shift + ~ to scroll through the info once you've closed the console window so that you can see all the information.
Showtickcounts 1,0 Same as the ShowTicks command as far as I could tell.
Showtexturecounts 1,0 I'm not sure on this one, but taking it from the command I would say that it shows the visible texture count. I was unable to see if this worked or not.
Wireframe 1,0 The Wireframe mode is harder to work with but more flexible. It switches your view to a wireframe view of the level. Since all brushes are transparent in wireframe view, you can see right through a wall into rooms on the other side. This means you can also see what brushes are being drawn in rooms other than the one you are in. Though it takes some getting used to, this mode makes it possible to figure out exactly when and where the view of a room or object is cut off, making it extremely useful when you want to check your visibility blocks. This command should be used in conjunction with the ForceClear command if you get bad redraw effects when WireFrame is turned on. Some games do this automatically. You may also want to use the DrawFlat command to turn off textures, which makes it easier to see the wireframe lines. Lastly, you can use Debugrbdrawoccluders 1 command to view your occluders while in this mode.

(Reposed from Nicepurchase.com/nolf)
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