As mentioned in previous blogs we have a unique opportunity right now to just get rid of the legacy baggage the Source Engine comes with - namely all the base entities that the engine is stuck with since the Gold Source days. They contain a lot of features that are simply obsolete with the newer versions of the engine. So this is what I have been working on lately.
It starts the the 4 ways you could create doors in Source - func_door, func_door_rotating for 'brush' based doors you make entirely in Hammer, and prop_door_rotating and prop_dynamic for model based doors.
In S&box we just have one door entity - ent_door. It can handle both dedicated models and 'brushes', it can work as both rotating door and a linearly moving one. It can be animated via an Animation Graph if rotating and linear movement is not enough.
The same philosophy has been applied to a few other entities so far:
- func_button and func_rot_button were merged into ent_button
- func_rotating and func_movelinear were merged into ent_platform
- func_tracktrain, func_train, path_node and related entities used in creation of elevator and train-like objects are superseded by ent_path_platform
If you have ideas or criticisms of this approach to base entities, please do not hesitate to let us know. This is the perfect time to let them known while things are still in flux.
