Portal 2 - Different doors?

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BL5965
8 Posts
Posted Jun 20, 2012
Hi everyone,

I'm quite new to Hammer editing, only started watching tutorials yesterday.

Anyway, I've reached the "advanced beginner" stage where I'm inserting doors and creating basic puzzles. I've noticed there's only one door design for Portal 2, which is the "slightly dirty green person exit door" (unless I'm mistaken). In a map with multiple doors, having all of them as exit doors would look confusing.

I tried an alternative through a download here: (post79172.html), but it wasn't as efficient as prop_testchamberdoor with managing outputs, and also when I rotated it 90 degrees, the doors opened forward/backwards instead of sideways. Being a beginner, I have no idea how to solve this.

Does anyone have any suggestions or things they did to get different types of doors?

Thanks in advance for your help.
BL

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josepezdj
2,386 Posts
Posted Jun 20, 2012
Replied 34 minutes later
OK, the model of the door, as all rest of models, has an image type file with its texture into the pak01_dir.vpk file you have into your portal2/portal2 folder. You could edit it and save under different names in order to reskin the door model, but since you're new to hammer and this would require some scripting as well, I'd suggest you to wait by now and identify each door with signage.

Anyway, check in the model browser if the prop_testchamber door has different skins, I can't check it myself right now and I can't remember clearly. I think there's another one with that "exit person" in black/grey colours (usually used for the prop_linked_door in Portal2)

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FelixGriffin
2,680 Posts
Posted Jun 20, 2012
Replied 1 minutes later
Hello, BL5965!

Have you tried using the varius instances in /maps/instances/door/ yet? Those have a few different options, and by examining them in Hammer you can see that they actually used textured brushes. You can copy one and change the textures yourself to make your own custom door. :smile:

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BL5965
8 Posts
Posted Jun 20, 2012
Replied 4 minutes later
Thanks for both your replies.

@FelixGriffin: Is there a way you can quickly summarize the method to me, or is it too complicated?

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FelixGriffin
2,680 Posts
Posted Jun 20, 2012
Replied 11 minutes later
Oh, certainly. It's actually pretty easy if you know a bit about Hammer.

EDIT: I'm sorry, I was COMPLETELY wrong. The doors don't use brushes at all, they use prop_testchamber_door entities. Sorry about that. You would need to use model hexing to get your own model in there, which is pretty advanced. For now, try using the func_door entity, with a nice texture on it.

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josepezdj
2,386 Posts
Posted Jun 20, 2012
Replied 22 minutes later
As I told you earlier, each model has a texture stored in the pakdir_01.vpk package file. Check how it looks:

img
That texture image's name is portal_door_02.vtf. It's very possible to edit that image how you like and save it for example with a different name, BUT unless you are making a mod (where things get much more easy) you'll have to use a script to change the model in-game because the engine gives preference to the model textures into that .vpk file.

Check this thread where we were discussing essentially the same but regarding reskining cubes instead.

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ChickenMobile
2,460 Posts
Posted Jun 20, 2012
Replied 1 hour later
There's always the prop_linked_portal_door entity which uses a black door instead of a green one. But you know... world portals :S
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Lpfreaky90
2,842 Posts
Posted Jun 20, 2012
Replied 1 hour later
Personally I don't think you should worry about that stuff right now.
In the PTI there's only one door which is always the exit door, but in a hell of a lot custom maps here on thinkingwithportals there are multiple doors.

A very easy solution is just to add the exit signage to the door and have it visible at the map start, or very soon. This is a lot easier than getting a custom model and it works just as fine :wink:.
img

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CamBen
973 Posts
Posted Jun 20, 2012
Replied 1 minutes later
I have an instance of a destroyed exit door packed into my Impulse Laser Intro map.
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HMW
806 Posts
Posted Jun 20, 2012
Replied 3 hours later
The best thing to do IMO is to have only two of those round doors per test chamber: entrance and exit. Any other door-like barriers can be either moving panels or some other kind of obstacle suitable for the situation. (Fizzler, laser field, vertical light bridge etc.)
This is not a hard rule of course, but it usually works best.

There's a nice template that comes with the authoring tools: instances/gameplay/door_4_panels.vmf
It is a 128x128 hole, covered by 4 panels that open and close in response to inputs. It works very well as an intra-chamber door.

The point of doing it like this, is so that the final exit is easy to recognise for the player, because it's the only other round door besides the one you enter from. (Labelling it with the exit icon, as lpfreaky suggests, also helps with this.)
Using another type of barrier (preferably a transparent one) indicates that the area beyond is still part of the same test.

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FelixGriffin
2,680 Posts
Posted Jun 20, 2012
Replied 7 minutes later
I think Fourthreaper also had some sort of force field specifically designed to be an everything-clip, so that it would be a transparent door for splitting sections of a test chamber. Or, if you want to be harsher, LP's death-fizzlers work the same way.
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BL5965
8 Posts
Posted Jun 21, 2012
Replied 19 hours later
Thanks for all your help.

For now, I've bypassed this by having two telescopic glass panels back-to-back, to fold into the ground, like a drawbridge. It works, I guess.

Once I build up some more experience, I'll start foraging into those more technical solutions.

BL

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RubyCarbuncIe
303 Posts
Posted Jun 21, 2012
Replied 3 hours later
You also could've used the Portal 1 doors. It takes a longer time to set up but it's what I've been using as entry/in chamber doors, and then I've been using the regular Portal 2 doors only for the exit.
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josepezdj
2,386 Posts
Posted Jun 21, 2012
Replied 31 minutes later
(Justin, the OP already knew about that, check that link he's posting... :wink:)
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RubyCarbuncIe
303 Posts
Posted Jun 21, 2012
Replied 1 hour later

josepezdj wrote:
(Justin, the OP already knew about that, check that link he's posting... :wink:)

Whoops, my bad. :razz: I read it I just never clicked the link. :lol:

To the OP though changing the direction the door moves is change by changing the move position when you double click the nodraw texture inside the door model and scroll down until you see Movement position. All you have to do for the I/O is set the Open and Close relays to trigger, the same way you'd make the prop_testchamberdoor to open/close with I/O.

Sorry for not reading your post thoroughly.