Grate Tutorial W A V E L E N G T H
by Hellbringer December 21, 1998
Foreword:
This tutorial assumes that you have both Half-Life and Worldcraft 2.0, and are fairly proficient in the use of Worldcraft, in that you have completed the previous tutorials in this series.

Remember to start small and build up in complexity; it will save you a lot of frustration in the end! If you have any questions or problems as a result of this thing, definitely email me and I'll try to help clear the confusion.

This article covers how to use:
- The "solid" Render mode for partial-texture transparency

Welcome to the Grates tutorial - this one's gonna be pretty brief and assume a lot about what you already know; but its scope is pretty limited. As always, feel free to email me (link at the bottom of the page) with any questions or comments. Don't be shy if something confuses you or raises any questions you want answered right away. Blue statements are the functions I want you to perform.

  NOTE: I AM going to assume that by now you've mastered how to perform the functions we've done in previous tutorials here at Wavelength.

  You came here for this tutorial -so without further ado, why don't you load up Worldcraft now.  All tutorials are going to assume you have the latest version, and use the default setup with a 2-button mouse - you should also have all of the proper directories and tools configured before using this tutorial.  Refer to the documentation, my WC Setup Doc, and my Compile FAQ for details.

    Once Worldcraft has been loaded, go up to the "File" menu item and click on "new". 

  Okay, first on the list is to create a room for our grate to exist in. So, pick a texture in the texture browser for our room and create a brush that is 256 units on all sides (make it a perfect cube). Now, select it and hollow it with a wall width of 16. Switch your grid spacing to 8, and zoom in a bit on your room. Switch to the brush creation tool and create a new brush with "{grate" in the texture name. Make it in the middle of the room - and have it be 8 units thick (north to south), 64 units wide, and 64 units tall. Once the brush is created, select it and press the "To Entity" button. When the dialog box comes up; switch the entity type to "func_wall". Then, change the "rendermode" key to "solid" - this will make all of the BLUE AREAS of the texture transparent. You also need to set the "FX amount" ("renderamt" if you are NOT in SmartEdit mode) to "255". Also, switch to entity mode and add a player start point. Voila! Compile and test, and you should be handsomely rewarded with some grate sitting in the middle of your room. This can be done with any teture with the pure blue "background" or blue "holes" - usually the texture begins with the "{" character as well. Note that you can only see one side at a time; so for realism's sake; its best if you keep any brush like this thin. Enjoy!!

Here are some screenshots to help you understand things:

This is the room with the brush.

This is the grate as a func_wall.

Here it is in the game.

  As always, feel free to email me any comments, questions, or problems!

HellBringer's E-mail address is: noelwade@hotmail.com
Half-Life, and the Half-Life logo are trademarks of Valve Software and Sierra Online, used with permission. All screenshots and drawings of Half-Life are (c) copyright Valve Software, 1998. All rights reserved. All original content (text and art) are (c) copyright Wavelength, 1998, and may not be reproduced without permission.