the Veldt
technical notes
1 INTRO • 2 ENV_BUBBLES • 3 FOLIAGE • 4 LIMITS • 5 MAPS
The Veldt is a tiny Half-Life mod that deals with the creation of randomized foliage. These are a few pages that explain how it works on the coding and mapping fronts.
Grass is randomly generated and placed in random positions within the map. Foliage automatically conforms to the shape of the terrain, making rolling hills of grass a possibility.
Trees are also randomly generated. In addition, the leaf formations of trees are randomly generated, making each tree a completely unique product. This leaf-randomization is a resource hog and admittedly has no gameplay benefit, but its sheer good looks and novelty value makes it worth looking at.
This is all done with very little work on the mapper's side. Just mark the regions you wish to have trees and grass, and The Veldt will do the rest of the work.
The goal was to make mod that randomly generates new playing fields upon re-loading the map. Find a map you like, and restart the map over and over again. You will find that you will never get the same tree and grass formations, allowing for a respectable replay value.
Enemies are clad in camoflauged gillie suits, blending invisibly with the dried grass. Welcome to The Veldt!
Enjoy
-Brendon Chung