Ryzom

Since I found about Ryzom, I've been thinking of making my own world with it. By creating a terrain, then placing models and characters around it with Ring (using existing assets). I looked into this earlier, but was disappointed to find that building terrain in NeL doesn't work as I expected. It seems you need 3D Studio Max for that, which I'm not planning to get either.

Initially, I thought Ryzom dynamically uses a heightmap and layermap for terrain, without any actual model. But it seems terrain is a set of 3D meshes, and the only way to create it is with a professional 3D app. I only have Blender (though I hate mapping with it) and it appears Ryzom has no other tool to do this, 3DS remaining the only option.

In my opinion, if Ryzom will be a full MMO toolkit with creation tools, it will need to be distributed with a terrain editor as well (Ring takes care of placing entities). I had three possible solutions in mind:

- Integrating a terraforming system in Ring. Although Ring is a scenario editor, so I don't know if such would fit there. Someone said it would mean re-writing it, and be very difficult too.

- Integrating a terraforming tool LIKE Ring in the client, usable the same way. In that case, it would be a sub-application or plugin. I'd find this best.

- Making a simple terrain tool for the NeL engine and including it with Ryzom (like WorldEditor). I'm thinking of something simple that would allow deforming a flat sheet with push / pull brushes, painting layers on it (indicating where each texture shows), and exporting it directly in NeL format. A good example would be EasyGen, a small terrain generator for Quake. Here is a screenshot:

I believe an integrated tool would be best, so one can use the client to create anything, without needing external applications for editing terrain. If not, a simple tool that comes with Ryzom by default would be good too in my opinion. But until such a tool is created (if one will be), I think a Blender export script would be excellent as at least a temporary solution. Since Blender is free, so the community doesn't have to buy 3DS to make terrains.

I'm eagerly looking forward for a solution, and would like to hear any ideas and plans. Especially if anyone thinks this could be done soon. Until then, I'll have to wait with making a Ryzom world, since I won't be able to do any land. I'm a newb coder, so sadly I'm not someone who can help much here. But if anyone can code such a thing, I (and likely anyone who plans on mapping) would greatly appreciate it :)

[EDIT] A quote from a discussion on IRC earlier:

<Taoki> BTW (pokes sfb as well about this). What if NeL engine could also support dynamic heightmap terrain? So if a mapper wishes to make a land without terraforming, they can use the method I initially thought is there. But of course without affecting the current terrain method, just an alternative :)
<Taoki> Would that be possible in any way, and anyone think it might be done?

[EDIT 2] I found some open source terrain editors around the web, and thought to post them here in case any could be forked and adapted to Ryzom.

Terraform - Looks good, though sadly seems to be available only for Linux (should be portable though): http://linux.softpedia.com/progDownload/Terraform-Download-34857.html - http://www.firedrake.org/terraform/ - http://gcmd.nasa.gov/records/TERRAFORM.html

Editable Terrain Manager - Ogre based terrain editor, only source available: http://www.ogre3d.org/tikiwiki/ETM - http://www.ogre3d.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=30955

MagicGearEditor3D - Another good looking terrain editor, but sadly no download: https://sourceforge.net/projects/mgeditor3d/

Height Map Editor - A basic heightmap editor, but could be adapted with an exporter I think: http://hme.sourceforge.net/

Wing - A seemingly realistic tool, but not ready yet, source only: http://wing-007.sourceforge.net/

RLP - Simple landscape tool, but sadly no download again: https://sourceforge.net/projects/real-landscape/

A list with some of the generators mentioned above (source): http://freegamer.blogspot.com/2009/03/open-source-3d-landscape-generators.html

Another list with more terrain tools, not mentioned above. Not all are open source, but some seem to be: http://www.vterrain.org/Packages/Artificial/