New feature: Minimap with navigation means.

[krukhlis]

Hi All, just bringing new idea. :)
I think, we need Minimap functionality with support for navigation by click.
Minimap should show heights of terrain( probably by using some pallette to distinguish different heights). Also, it should show all the gameobjects as dots\circles\etc.
By clicking on some region of minimap, camera will be immediately relocated to the corresponding position on the corresponding terrain.

[codenigma]

Hi :)
Thats a good Idea for realy large maps. But I think this should not go directly into the editor. We will need some kind of plugin system, because some features are special and will not fit into every project. So it would be good to remove/deactivate some plugins for the sake of clarity in the UI.

So this Issue contains the tasks:

• creating a plugin system
• minimap plugin for navigation

We should collect these for now. When we got plenty of features we should prioritze them in a roadmap.

[mbrlabs]

This would be relatively easy to implement. The terrains are already backed by a pixmap containing the heights. But i'm not convinced that this should go into the editor..that's more like a feature for an actual game.

I already thought about a plugin system. We would have to define a stable api that plugins can use. We would also have to think about what plugins should be capable of. That's a big feature and should be the subject of a whole release iteration (more like 0.2.0 when we have more editor features and a stable api).

[krukhlis]

Yep. But i think plugins are separate task, really complicated in order to provide the balanced, easy and secure API.

Regarding minimap shouldn't be the part of editor -- sorry, but i disagree. It's really inconvenient to fly with camera around the map manually if you need to place gameobjects in distant areas. Sometimes such flights take more time 'n actual gameobjects placement. Also, it's really hard to understand on large maps which part of the terrain is currently visible in the frustum. And actual lack of functionality to see the overall picture with location of the gameobjects makes understanding of what is done/what should be done in terms of world/playfield configuration really complicated.
I do agree there should be means to turn minimap on and off. Also, I do agree the minimap component should be shared between runtime and editor -- so "design once and use everywhere" strategy will work.

P.S. I'm sharing my experience after design of the game similar to Jagged Alliance 2. :) So yes, this is position for strategical/tactical games. :)

[mbrlabs]

Hmm, well after all Mundus is a world editor, so this might be useful for real projects.

I could imagine implementing this in a native window using the lwjgl3/glfw features. You could drag the minimap window around + have the main editor window open. But this should be a editor only feature. I want to keep the runtime ui free.

[codenigma]

If this feature should only help on navigation. So the user don't have to zoom in and out like crazy if the map is that large I would suggest another, more universal solution which is used in many 3d tools:

• Saving camera positions with shortcuts for example ctrl + 1 until 10 and switching camera position
  For an Overview of the map the user could zoom out and save it on first slot (ctrl + 1), maybe he could save other important regions on other numbers
• by typing 1 until 10 (or if this numbers are reserved alt +1 or so) he can switch camera position to this points
  I think this solution will be even faster than a minimap in the editor, this would be the "power-user" approach

Edit:
And/Or we need a feature where we can zoom to a selected game object (maybe a shortcut and menu entry in the outline)