Doom Fever/Doom_Fever-1995_Maple_Media.iso/dmutil/verda011.zip/VERDA.DOC

Text File | 1994-02-07 | 8KB | 147 lines

              Viewer/Editor for Registered Doom Addicts
                      VERDA v0.11 -- 7 Feb 94

VERDA is an add-on utility to work with DOOM by id software.  It can
be used to view various pieces of map information on both the
shareware and the registered versions of the WAD file.  However, in
keeping with the wishes of id software, it will not modify a
shareware WAD file.

System Requirements
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
VERDA requires a VGA screen, a mouse(for graphic related things), and
enough memory to read in map info.  It has been compiled to run on a
80286 with no math co-processor.

What exactly does it do?
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
In short, VERDA can be used to examine and modify map information in
the WAD file.  There are two basic modes of operation supported.  One
is a dump and patch capability.  This lets you dump certain
information from the WAD file to an ascii file, modify it, then patch
the new info back into the WAD file.  This is handy for distributing
edited versions of the WAD file by only distributing changes you made.

The second mode of operation is a graphical map mode and requires a mouse.
You can move "things" around on the map and change them to whatever you
like.  i.e. you can take that barrel that justs sits there idly and
change it into a BFG-9000(more useful, if you also provide energy
cells!).  You can also edit other "thing" parameters to change the
direction it is pointing, or control which skill levels it appears
in and whether or not it shows up when playing a net game.  There are
some other features regarding lines, sides, sectors, etc.  They are
described later in this file.

Using VERDA
^^^^^^^^^^^
VERDA(with no command line arguments) looks for DOOM.WAD in the
directory it is run from.  A different WAD file can be specified with
the -w option.  VERDA -? gives a list of possible options.  From the
main menu use the <E> key to select the desired Episode(1-3) and the
<M> key to select the desired Map(1-9).  The current Episode/Map
level is shown at the bottom of the screen and all other commands
will only relate to that particular level.  The <D> key selects the
Dump option and the user is prompted for what kind of info to dump.
The options(not case sensitive) are:

  T - Things - Things are weapons, enemies, barrels, etc.
  L - Lines  - Lines connect the vertices, and draw the maps
  I - sIdes  - Sides are associated with lines provide images for them
  V - Verts  - Vertexes are the points where lines end
  G - seGs   - Not fully understood
  S - Ssects - Not fully understood
  N - Nodes  - Not fully understood
  C - seCts  - Defines an area with a specific height, floor & ceil image, etc.
  A - All    - Dumps all of the above into one file (for given Episode/Map)

The dump file is opened in append mode, so nothing is overwritten.
If you dump more than one copy of a certain type, when that file is
used to patch the WAD file, only the last instance of that type will be
used.  It is recommended that you dump "all" to a file for a particular map
before you edit anything.  This will let you patch the WAD file back to
its original configuration, without having to have a backup of the
whole WAD file.  Of course it is also comforting to know that you
have those original distribution diskettes around somewhere...  The
dump file contains information about what Episode/Map and type of
information was dumped.  Therefore, to patch in a file use the <P>
key and the only response required is the filename -- the correct
items will be patched.

Two other options from the main menu deal with "things".  The <L>
key gives a list of all things in the current map, while the <O> key
gives a sorted list of only the unique items in the map.  These
probably have limited utility and may go away in a future version,
but they were helpful in the development of VERDA.

The map mode of VERDA is entered by using the <V> key from the main
menu to view the map.  Hopefully the interface here is fairly intuitive.
You can use the <PageUp>/<PageDn> keys to zoom the map in and out --
centered on the mouse cursor.  The <left>/<right>/<up>/<down> arrow
keys are used to pan around in the map.

As you move the pointer over a "thing" the relevant information is
displayed in the lower right hand window: what it is, orientation,
skill level flags, etc.  To move a "thing", simply put the pointer
over it, hold down the left mouse button and drag the item to its new
location.  When you release the item, it is drawn at its new
position.  There are no checks for illegal options, such as putting
things in a wall, or on top of another thing -- so feel free to
experiment if you are curious.  You can rotate an item by pressing
<R> or <Shift-R> while the mouse pointer is over the item.  To change
thing characteristics other than position and orientation, move the
mouse pointer over the item and press the <SPACE> bar to bring up the
editing menu.  Use the mouse to select the desired action.  We
haven't figured out what the "Other Bit" in the skill level flags is,
so be sure to let us know if you figure it out.  Use Alt-S to save any
changes you make to the WAD file.

There are a few other display modes available when the map is
visible.  <L> toggles linemode and highlights a selected line number
- initially zero.  Use the keypad +/- keys to step up/down through
the lines.  The shift key can be used with the +/- to step in
increments of 0x10.  As you may have noticed, most numeric
information in VERDA is displayed in hex.  The relevant information
associated with the line is again displayed in the data window in the
lower right corner of the screen.  <I> can be used to toggle sidemode
and <C> to toggle sectormode.  These all work similarly.  Currently,
the only information in these modes that can be edited are numeric, such
as the ceiling and floor heights in sectormode.

Map Mode Command Summary
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
    <SPACE>       - Toggle edit mode for currently selected object
    <ESC>         - Exit whatever you are doing -- will prompt you
                    if you need to save changes
    <PGUP/PGDN>   - Zoom In/Out
    <Arrow Keys>  - Pan around
    <HOME>        - Return Map to original zoom, recentered
    <Keypad-5>    - Center Map with current zoom

    <R>           - Rotate a "thing" +45 degrees if mouse over thing
    <Shift-R>     - Rotate -45 degrees
    <L>           - Toggle linemode
    <I>           - Toggle sidemode
    <C>           - Toggle sectormode
    <Keypad +/->  - Step Up/Down through lines,sides, and sectors
    <Shift>       - with above to step through faster
    <Alt-S>       - Save changes to the WAD file

Future Versions
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Vaporware is never very popular to talk about.  There are some very
obvious enhancements to VERDA, some of these are in progress.  But we
thought that the program was useful enough in its current form to
benefit the net.  With this version of VERDA, you can neither add nor
delete items -- only change them.  We are planning to change that in
the future, though it is currently at a low priority.

Authors
^^^^^^^
VERDA is being developed as a team effort by Mike Carter, Robert
Fenske, and Bob Robison.  The WAD file format that we have figured
out so far, has been mostly on our own -- with some help from the
Unofficial specs and other doom utility programs that have been released.
We are very interested in feedback on this program.  Send comments,
complaints, suggestions, words of encouragement, etc. to the authors.
Our email address is [e-mail].