Map editor sounds nice.
I just found out I’m an extremely good modeler…building with legos in blender. Go figure. Those lego space marines on blendswap.com inspired me lol. Somehow I don’t think that will be of much use to you though.
Did I really just scare everyone away?
No… I was holding out on mentioning this because I figured maybe I could solve the problem, but my Blender machine, in which all of my files were on, has just fried its motherboard -_- Luckily I backed up my files not even a week before this happened. However my desktop is pretty old and can’t run Blender too smoothly. I’ll do what I can on it for now until I get a new PC. Still trying to clean this one up and see how it will hold out. I’ll update you soon.
EDIT:
I restored my older desktop to factory defaults and optimized it as best I could, and it seems to work fine in Blender and most other programs (surprisingly), and I have all of my most recent files on here so close call, but I am ok for now until I am able to afford a new PC.
If you want to be REALLY awesome, make a map-editor like that
or maybe that…
Nah, I know, that’s not very helpful xP but maybe you can grasp a feature or two you might want to consider^^
(I’m aware that the focus isn’t that much on the sandbox but rather on the visuals in both but you can at least see SOME things^^)
Btw, WolfireGames, the YT-channel of the designers of the game in the first vid, are using, amongst others, Blender in their work and also document all the changes to their currently developed game on a weekly basis. You should check out their channel to simply get an idea of detail. It’s not quite a similar game to yours but I guess it’s still great for opening up ones mind 
http://www.youtube.com/wolfiregames
Btw, AFAIK, Emptys aren’t quite Empty meshes. they’re objects which lack any Mesh data. Subtle difference but it’s like the empty set {} as opposed to a set, containing the empty set {{}} ^^
Yeah, thanks Kram. I’ve actually seen both those vids before. I can safely say I’m not shooting for something that impressive 0_0 Although they are absolutely beautiful.
We are mostly aiming at a very mathematical, geometrical, symmetrical style of arena-based maps. It’s hard to explain the goal really. I’ll just have to finish the editor and show you 
As far as empties, I abandoned them. I decided to build the different parts of the map in layers, and then only export certain layers. So now the grid is composed of just vertices on a layer that will NOT be exported. So the snap-to-grid idea still works and I don’t have to worry about extra tris. Maybe later on when our programmer(s) are done with the game we can focus on a map editor and have more flexibility, but for now I am keeping it purposely simplistic. Our goal is to utilize our players to create maps for the game, both for the reason of giving them something to do while they wait, and for having maps to play when the game launches. Another reason is that later on, if we do end up creating a full-blown editor, they will already be familiar with the one I am doing now.
Darned motherboards are always giving out…
As for the map editor, have you ever heard of the cube engine? Real time map editing =) You can even do it online with other players, and the project is open source. I really know nothing of programming though lol.
maybe it’s possible to combine the snapping tool with no snap in z-direction (possibly unless you press some additional button or something) but instead auto-snap to the lowest object in height, based on the given object’s bounding box…
That’s exactly how I plan to do it actually. My biggest challenge was not necessarily snapping objects to the grid, but to each other to stack etc. I have a jury rigged setup atm but I need to look further into how to do bounding boxes. Some things in Blender I just really haven’t touched, as simple as they are heheh. If you can snap to bounding boxes instead of meshes, that would be extremely ideal. Definitely going to look into that, thanks Kram. You have anything you are working on now btw?
New computer on the way soon with way better specs. Working on this machine from 2002 with its on-board video is horrible, even optimized and overclocked. I didn’t realize Blender had any kind of real demand when it comes to video cards. But I keep crashing, so a new computer it shall be! More progress soon. Until then, I started work on a UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle) that will unfold from a cylindrical-ish shape, considering all weapons will be fired from the tanks gun barrel. It’s very slow progress on this PC with all the ‘not respondings’ and driver crashes, but this is what I have so far:
Still debating on whether I should have propellers unfold from those side chunks or just place some kind of small engine in them. By the way, this is just the rear. It will have more length to it. This idea was inspired by blenderlogic’s attack drone concept. Our players picked it apart until they came up with a way it could be used. So kudos to you BL
Some more progress on the UAV:
Main concept is for this thing to be launched from a gun barrel. The thing on top will most likely launch flares. Camera will be on the bottom, makes sense. More info in video details on YouTube. Might finish tomorrow if time. Aware of all errors in video, but critiquing welcome.
You are a very talented animator! 'Nough said.
ya what he said
Ha thanks guys. Animating is tough for me because the only compatible type of animation for our game is specifically a single mesh with parented armatures using weight paint. Over time I came up with a nice system. I basically build the mesh each moveable part at a time, keeping it separate in edit mode, then assemble it in pose mode using the armatures. Then I animate it like you see above. I’m glad you like it so far.
But just the imagination and the ability to translate that into blender is awesome! It’s so complicated.
Thanks man. I pretty much build as I go. Almost no planning. Whatever works.
I managed to borrow my sisters computer for a day and I immediately installed Blender and sent myself some files to work on, one of which was the UAV. So I had a decent amount of progress today and was able to record rather than using rendered frames.
I know it has alot of animations -_- I’m starting to think that this thing would be too small once unfolded if it came from a tank turret. If it was, it would almost look like a micro plane and all that detail is wasted. I guess we might save this thing to be launched from a structure a tank docks into somehow (probably from base or a recon station). Either that or I will have to do some very sneaky scaling so it grows in size subtly while unfolding without anyone noticing. I’m not too happy about the front, but my recent insight into how small this thing might end up being made me not care as much
More to come.
Looks very cool. Unfortunately cannot watch the video. 
I actually prefer version 2 over version 3… the last one seems nearly cluttered to me^^
By the way, I’d guess that it should be fairly easy to get the bounding box data of any mesh…
If you keep stackable objects flat on top, it should be fairly easy to do a stacking mechanism.
If you use more believable snapping parts, it would be harder and might end up being a lookup-table for each part to be stacked correctly…
Jezuz, this is ridiculously amazing!
Love the UAV! But yeah probably as you sait this will happen too fast/too small for anyone to really appreciate the animations.
SpiritOfOnyx, thanks man. I will create a gif just for you then I keep forgetting Youtube vids don’t play for you. Is it the load time or some kind of flash problem maybe? Some of those vids are very small file sizes and load immediately, you should give it a try if you haven’t already.
Wow DDD that means alot coming from you. I always did have a boner for your work Thanks I really appreciate it, I’m glad you like it. Have anything new you are working on lately? I have too much downtime Need inspiration!
Kram, I agree. I’ll be honest, for the last chunk of building it, I realized how off my planning was and how small it would be and I lost some of my drive. I wasn’t very motivated at that point but I figured I should at least get it to the point of presentable. I’ll probably redo this eventually with less animations and better planning. As for that bounding box idea, I love it. It will work better than anything I’ve thought of so far. The only question I have is: Is there a way to use the bounding box to snap objects together while still seeing the entire mesh on-screen? Even if it requires both to be on screen at once, that’d be awesome. Even better if the bounding box were hidden I guess, but I’ll take anything at this point. Even if that isn’t an option, I’d still like to explore the option of setting up meshes so they only snap or get-snapped-to by the verts/faces/edges I designate. That would also be ideal.
Thanks guys for feedback. Just when I think I’m talking to myself my blender buddies show up
Haha np mate, i just never really got into animation so that looked impressive to me, you know all those parts moving.
With school going on i havent been working in blender too much but yes i have been creating stuff, just have not been posting alot, now with school over i am going to be working in blender more. Still cant devote myself full time cuz of work.
I have been experimenting with cycles, i posted a few renders in here, did you not see them?
Just when I think I’m talking to myself my blender buddies show up
Well i have to say, sometime i just like to watch the progress of projects and dont have anything to comment on, as i am sure is the same with most of the people here. So even if no new replies are coming up, if the view counter is going up, people are watching. This goes for any thread for any person.