Editor Interface

Introduction

The editor user interface

This page details all the interface elements and actions in the Overgrowth level editor. It can be accessed by pressing the Editor button on the main menu, selecting one of the levels and then pressing escape when in the game.

Camera Movement

Action	Control	Behavior
Forward	W	Moves camera forward.
Backward	S	Moves camera backward.
Left	A	Moves camera left.
Right	D	Moves camera right.
Up	Shift + W	Moves camera up.
Down	Shift + S	Moves camera down.

Ribbon User Interface

The tabs of the ribbon user interface

The horizontal bar across the top of the window is called the ribbon. Many editor functions can be found here, but some functions can only be reached via hotkeys for now.

'Cmd' refers to the '⌘' key on Macs, and the 'ctrl' key on PCs.

Home

Contains the most common tools.

Button	Hotkey	Effect
Rabbot	8	Enter play mode.
Paste	cmd+v	Pastes the clipboard on the cursor position.
Cut	cmd+x	Puts the selection into the clipboard and removes the selected objects.
Copy	cmd+c	Puts the selection into the clipboard.
Undo	cmd+z	Undo the most recent action.
Redo	cmd+shift+z	Redo the most recent action.
Load Item	cmd+l	Opens the item browser.
Save Item	cmd+shift+s	Opens a save dialog to save selected objects.
Load Level	-	Opens a file browser where you can pick what level to load.
Save Level	cmd+s	Overwrites the current level with any changes.
New Level	-	Opens the nothing.xml level, which is an empty level by default.
Parameters	-	Opens the parameter editor for the loaded level.
Group	cmd+g	Groups the selected objects.
Ungroup	cmd+shift+g	Ungroups any selected groups.
Rigging tool	-	-
Delete	delete	Removes any selected objects.
Exit	alt+f4	Closes the application.

Edit

Contains tools more directly related to level editing.

Button	Hotkey	Effect
Calculate shadows	-	Starts baking shadows.
Calculate GI 2nd pass	-	Renders second pass of light probes.
Update global illumination	-	Re-renders all light probes in the level.
Edit static meshes	cmd+1	Toggle ability to select objects.
Edit gameplay objects	cmd+3	Toggle ability to select hotspots.
Edit decals	cmd+2	Toggle ability to select decals.
Edit lighting	-	Toggle ability to select lights.
Set Level Script	-	Select what script to use for this level.

Pathfinding

Tools for nav mesh generation, loading, saving and viewing.

Button	Hotkey	Effect
Create Nav Mesh	-	Generates a new navigation mesh.
Load Nav Mesh	-	Load a previously saved nav mesh from disk.
Save Nav Mesh	-	Save the current nav mesh to disk.
View Hints	-	Render navmesh_hint objects.
View Nav Mesh	-	Render the nav mesh.
View Region	-	Render navmesh_region objects.
View Nav-Collision Mesh	-	Render the model the nav mesh is generated on.
View Jump Nodes	-	Render navmesh_connection objects.

Dialogue

Tools for dialogue editing.

Button	Hotkey	Effect
Edit Selected	-	Start editing the selected dialogue.
Load Pose	-	Load a pose to use in the scene.
Stop Editing	-	Stop editing the dialogue that is being edited.
Preview Dialogue	-	Test-play the dialogue.
Save Dialogue	-	Save the active dialogue to disk.
Toggle Recording	-	Allows for placing the camera and actors.
Load Dialogue	-	Load a previously saved dialogue.
New Dialogue	-	Create a new dialogue.

Lighting

Tools for editing global illumination.

Button	Hotkey	Effect
Bake second pass	-	Renders second pass for light probes to give a better result.
Show probes	-	Render light probes.
Rebake first pass	-	Re-render all light probes in the level.
Show probes through walls	-	Render light probes through walls.
Show tet mesh	-	Render tetrahedral mesh generated by light probes to see how they are connected.
Probe lighting enabled	-	Enable probe lighting.

Functions Without Buttons

Some functions are only reachable via hotkeys, here are a list of those.

Action	Control	Behavior
Make player-controlled	Shift+Cmd+P	Toggles whether a character is controlled by a human or by AI. A human-controlled character's spawn box has a green outline, an AI-controlled character's box has white outlines. If two characters are set to be human-controlled Overgrowth will start in split-screen mode the next time game-play is resumed from editor mode. The second player will be controllable via a USB controller.
Parameter Editor	U (with object selected)	Opens the parameter editor to modify parameters of the selected object.
Palette Editor	Cmd+P (with character selected)	Brings up a dialog to modify colors of different parts of the character.
Color Picker	Cmd+P (with object that is not a character selected)	Brings up a dialog that can be used to tint the color of any selected objects.
Spawn Dead	Cmd+K or Ctrl+K (with character spawn selected)	Makes selected characters spawn dead. It will spawn at the point it went into ragdoll mode (which may cause it to spawn "dead" while standing up). If you want to update the pose for the dead body then move the body, select the spawn point, and hit the hotkey again to save its new position.
Spawn Alive	K (with character spawn selected)	Makes selected characters spawn alive.

Parameter Editor

Object parameter editor

You can bring up the parameter editor for an object by selecting it and pressing U, or for the level itself by clicking the "Parameters" button in the home tab of the ribbon. It allows you to change different parameters depending on what object you have selected. For instance if you use it on a regular static object you can precisely adjust its position, scale and rotation. If you use it on a character you can adjust a large number of parameters, including its field of view.

Note: You can visualize the field of view of a character by going to ../Overgrowth/Data/Scripts and opening up aschar.as and changing the row saying "const bool _draw_stealth_debug = false;" to "const bool _draw_stealth_debug = true;". Then open up enemycontrol.as and change the line saying "float fov_opac_mult = 0.0;" to "float fov_opac_mult = 1.0;". Save both files and tab back into the game and you should see a visualization of every character's field of view.

Level Parameters

Open up the parameter editor for the current level by clicking the the "Parameters" button in the home tab of the ribbon. Here is a description of what each parameter does.

Parameter	Description
Achievements	Decide which challenges you can complete on the level, they appear on the level end screen.
Fog amount	Sets the thicknoess of the atmosphere and thus how far you can see.
HDR Black point	Sets what brightness should be regarded as black.
HDR Bloom multiplier	Decides how much light pixels bleed.
HDR White point	Sets what brightness should be regarded as white.
Level Boundaries	If this is checked characters will be pushed back into the level when they try to go past a certain point.
Objectives	Set the goal of the level.
Sky Brightness	Adjust how bright the sky should be.
Sky Rotation	Move the sky around.
Sky Tint	Makes the sky have a specified color.

Object Selection

Here are the different ways you can select objects.

Action	Control	Behavior
Select single object	double-left-click on object	Selects clicked on object and deselects all other objects. If the object is part of a group, the whole group is selected. A box around the object indicates that it is selected.
Toggle-select objects	shift + double-left-click on objects	Toggles selection of clicked on object. Preserves existing selections.
Box select objects	left-click + right-click + drag, or left-click + 'b' + drag	Selects all objects whose centers lie within box drawn on screen. Deselects all other objects.
Box add to selection	shift + left-click + right-click + drag, or shift + left-click + 'b' + drag	Adds all objects whose centers lie within the drawn box to the selection. Preserves existing selection.
Select decal or object that is under another decal	mouse wheel up/down	When you have 2 or more objects or decals on top of each other, you can select at least 1 decal or object, put your mouse cursor on top of the one you want to select, then use the scroll wheel to switch your selection between the objects.
Select all	cmd-a	Selects all objects.
Deselect all	double-left-click away from all objects	Deselects all objects.

Object information

When you select an object some useful information will appear on the left hand side. It'll show you what xml file it is created from, its unique object ID and what type of object it is.

Transformations

For all transformations:

• In order to transform an object you must first select it.
• Hold ctrl to make movements snap to half-meter increments.
• Hold alt to clone and transform the selected objects, leaving the original objects behind.
• Left-click transforms objects on all axis. Right-click transforms on the two axis that are perpendicular to the side of the bounding box you click on. Holding shift and right click locks the transformation to the axis parallel to the bounding box face you click on.
• Groups are transformed around the group center. Ungrouped objects, even if multiple are selected and transformed at once, are transformed around their own individual centers.

Translation

Set tool to 'translation', or set tool to 'omni tool' and hover mouse over central region of a bounding box face, or set tool to 'omni tool' and hold 't'.

Action	Control	Behavior
Camera relative	left-click + drag	Translates clicked on object along plane parallel to the screen.
Locked to plane	right-click + drag	Translates clicked on object along plane of clicked on face.
Locked to line	shift + right-click + drag	Translates clicked on object along normal of clicked on face.
force decal(s) to map only one object/group	hold i	selected decal will only map with that object that is directly underneath your mouse
force decal(s) to project only on selected objects	press o	selected decal will only map with that object that is directly underneath your mouse
projection box/angle	press p	to make projection box for decal

Scale

Set tool to 'scale', or set tool to 'omni tool' and hover mouse near bounding box vertices, or set tool to 'omni tool' and hold 'e'.

Action	Control	Behavior
All dimensions	left-click + drag	Scales clicked on object in all dimensions (x, y, and z) at once.
Locked to plane	right-click + drag	Extends clicked on object along plane of clicked on face.
Locked to line	shift + right-click + drag	Extrudes clicked on object along normal of clicked on face.

Mirror

Just use the right-click scale tool, and scale down the object until it flips and its mirror image begins scaling up!

Rotation

Set tool to 'rotation', or set tool to 'omni tool' and hover mouse near bounding box edges, or set tool to 'omni tool' and hold 'r'.

Action	Control	Behavior
Free	left-click + drag	Rotates clicked on object as if you are pushing the surface of a ball.
Locked to axis	right-click + drag	Rotates clicked on object about normal of clicked on face.

Warnings

Just below the ribbon on the left side is a space for warnings. These warnings will tell you if the nav mesh, ambient occlusion or baked shadows needs to be updated.

Item Browser

The item browser

The item browser is used to browse for items that can be spawned in the levels. It is brought up by pressing the Load Item button under the Home tab. To spawn an item, click it and then click in the world to create the item on that location.

This list does not necessarily contain all the objects that can be spawned as all objects need to be manually added to the list. A file browser can be brought up by pressing the folder icon just under the tabs at the top. That file browser can be used to try loading any xml file, which is useful if you're trying to load a custom object that has not been added to the item browser for instance. The types of items that can be spawned are objects (static models), characters, weapons, hotspots, decals and spawn points.

Along the top of the window there are tabs for different categories of items. In the bottom right there is a slider to change the size of the thumbnail images as well as a grip that can be clicked and dragged to resize the window. A search field that searches in the currently open tab is located under the tabs to the right.

Hovering your mouse cursor over a thumbnail image causes a heart icon to appear on the thumbnail. If that heart icon is pressed the object is added as a favorite. To sort out any object that is not a favorite from the view, press the heart button right under the tabs at the top of the window. The favorites do not persist between closing and opening the item browser.

Color Picker

Two crete blocks. The left is the original, the right has had it's color altered by the color picker.

The Color Picker is used to tint the color of selected objects. It is opened by pressing CTRL+P (For Mac users: Command+P). The color picker consists of a color-gradient box, a rainbow slider, two boxes of different sizes showing the basic chosen color, RGB values, a hex value, and an overbrightness slider. Increasing overbrightness makes the color brighter.

Save Selected Objects

Once you have created something you wish to use elsewhere, press Ctrl+Shift+S (On Windows) or Command+Shift+S (on Mac) to open an object saving dialog. This way, you can save buildings, trees or obstacle courses made from many parts as a single XML object, ready to be imported back to Overgrowth.

Sun Editor

To edit the sun, find it in the sky and double-click it. Now you can click and drag on the circle to change the intensity of the sun, click and drag on the dot to change the color and click and drag on the sun itself to move it around the sky.

Dialogue Editor

The dialogue editor is used to create scenes with different camera angles, text and poses. It is commonly used to give context and progress the story in a level.

Getting Started

Write the dialogue

Create a text file in your mods Dialogues folder (../Overgrowth/Data/Dialogues) and write the dialogue in it like this.

#name "Mirage"
#participants 1
say 1 "Thorn" "You there!"
say 1 "Thorn" "Do you have any..[wait 0.4] water?"

• The #name "Mirage" is the name of the scene. This is given to a dialogue hotspot on so it knows which dialogue to activate.
• The #participants 1 is how many characters there are in the scene. The numbered boxes above the dialogue object are connected to spawn points to decide which character is which in this scene.
• say at the beginning of a line is used to make someone say something.
• The 1 is the ID of the participant that should say the dialogue, this decides who moves their mouth when the dialogue appears.
• "Thorn" is which name should appear for the dialogue
• The text within the quotes at the end of the line is the dialogue itself.
• The [wait 0.4] will make the dialogue text pause for 0.4 seconds before continuing to display the next text.

Save and close the file.

Set up the scene

Open up your level in the game, go to the Dialogue tab in the ribbon and click Load Dialogue. Select the dialogue file you created and click in your level to spawn it there.

There is a small box above the dialogue object that you just created. Select this object and alt-click on a character to tell the game that the participant with ID 1 is that character.

Select the box and press Edit Selected, bringing up the text of the dialogue on the screen. Use the arrow up and down keys to select what line in the scene you want to edit. Now press Toggle Recording, which creates a few more useful objects in our scene:

• Camera (with accompanying preview window)
• Torso control
• Head control
• Eye control

Move the camera to choose where the camera will be when the dialogue reaches the selected line, scale it to zoom in or out. Move the torso, head and eye controls to choose where the character's torso, head and eye should be pointing at that point. You need to scale up the torso and head controls for them to have any effect.

Press Load Pose and find the files with names that start with r_dialogue, find one that you think might fit and load it to make the character take that pose when the scene loads.

Press Preview Dialogue to test the scene. When you're happy, click Toggle Recording again to turn it off and press Save Dialogue to save your changes to the scene.

Trigger the scene

Now we have the scene set up, but we don't have anything that triggers it yet. We can use a dialogue hotspot to make that happen. So go to the Home tab and press Load Item, go to the Hotspots tab, click the Start Dialogue hotspot and click on the ground in your level. This should spawn a wireframe cube with a green sign icon in.

The dialogue will trigger when the player enters this hotspot, so place it where it will trigger when you want it to. Just make sure the player spawn is not inside of the hotspot, as that won't work when the level is restarted.

Press U with the hotspot selected and change the Dialogue property to be the same as the #name setting in the dialogue you want to trigger. If you've followed this example, that would be Mirage. If you don't want the dialogue to automatically trigger when you enter the hotspot, uncheck the "Automatic" checkbox.

Now save your level, start playing, enter the hotspot, and the dialogue should trigger!

Spawn Corpse

To make a character spawn as a corpse, select it and press ctrl+K (or cmd+K) to turn on corpse mode. Its spawn box will turn red and the character will now be a corpse when it spawns. If you want to place the corpse in a specific location, drag the corpse to where you want it, then hit ctrl + K to save its resting position as its new corpse spawn position.

If you want to make a character spawn normally instead of as a corpse, select its spawn point, and press K.

Web browser

Web browser in Phoenix.

There is a web browser that can be brought up by pressing f1.