Cubemaps issue

ics

http://ics-base.net
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Jun 17, 2010
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I have rather odd problem right now. Let me say first that i am no amateur of building cubemaps and i do know how they are supposed to be built with hdr and without hdr and in tf2 regarding specular being off while building.

Thing is, whenever i build the cubemaps hdr on or hdr off, the map filesize or date doesn't change, aka the cubemaps won't save into the bsp. However, whenever i load my game, it looks like that the cubemaps are built and i see no checkerboard or glowing shiny models while HDR is on. It's like the cubemaps are saved to somewhere, but not in bsp. If i give the map out to someone else (i did give it to 2 people) and tell them to see if they see checker or sginy models, they do.

I made a friend of mine to try to build cubemaps (exactly same steps as i did) and then he gave the map to me and the 2 people who we tested with. Result, worked as intended and should have worked like if i had build them. So the problem isn't the map either, it's my pc. I used this same pc not too long ago to build cubemaps for CSS maps and they worked ok.

So could TF2 have some sort of issue regarding cubemaps or is it just my pc? Any clues how to fix this, other than using another pc to build the maps.
 

tyler

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Sep 11, 2013
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You're using the file from your tf/maps folder and not the file Hammer puts in some other folder, right?
 

ics

http://ics-base.net
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Jun 17, 2010
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Just some more info to share on this. Problem seems to be TF2 related only. I tried cubemaps for my old CS Source maps that i updated last fall and built cubemaps on them today again, worked like a glove. Filesize and date changes on it, at TF2, nope. Any ideas are welcome.
 

ics

http://ics-base.net
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Jun 17, 2010
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Even more info on this.

It appears that once cubemaps are built, they go to tf/materials/maps/mapname/ temprarely and once done, they should get added into the .bsp in /tf/maps/ but for some reason, this never happens. Windows file permissions are correct. This explains why cubemaps work fine when i watch them but fails for others.
 

A Boojum Snark

Toraipoddodezain Mazahabado
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Nov 2, 2007
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I can't think of what might cause it, but if all else fails, it is entirely possible to manually embed the cubemaps in the same as custom content.
 

ics

http://ics-base.net
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Jun 17, 2010
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I actually tried pakratting the cubemaps in. Not only it increased filesize ~1-2MB, it also gave out error in the console. Cubemaps do work but the error didn't go away about them. I still have no idea how to fix this, i tried building them with tf2 beta with no luck either.

I'll just have to put TF2 into another machine and transfer the map into that one to build cubemaps :|
 

ics

http://ics-base.net
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Jun 17, 2010
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I dug into this some more. It seems that my game cannot load bsppack.dll. The file is there, it even gets "updated" (date changes) while i build cubemaps but it won't do it's job. I've tried verifying game files, verifying sdk files, resetting it's configs, let it recopy it's files with no success. Still no cubemaps save into map bsp.
 

grazr

Old Man Mutant Ninja Turtle
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Mar 4, 2008
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Are they physically not present in the bsp? Opening the map in pakrat (like you've seen in my screenshot in my map thread) will show you whether the files are there or not.
 

ics

http://ics-base.net
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Jun 17, 2010
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Nope, like i said the file doesn't change during cubemapbuilding. There are no cubemaps within the bsp. For some reason, bsppack.dll fails to deliver.