Cafu Engine documentation

Cafu is an all-purpose, modern 3D graphics engine and game development kit, feature complete to get you started quickly.

Contents

User Documentation

• Quick Start
• Installation
  • Minimum System Requirements
  • Installing Cafu
  • Upgrading
  • De-Installation
• Running Cafu
  • The Main Menu
  • Keyboard Layout
  • The Command Console

General

• User FAQ
  • Why does my Personal Firewall report Cafu.exe?
  • Cafu reports an “Initialization Error”, what can I do?
  • Why do you use OpenGL? I think that DirectX is better.
  • Why is the image quality low? How can I improve it?
  • Why is the frame-rate (FPS) low? How can I improve it?
• Developer FAQ
  • Is Cafu right for our game of genre “…”?
  • Where are the Visual Studio project files?
  • What is the maximum number of network players?
  • How can I clone the Cafu source code repository?
  • How do I start a new game (MOD) project?
  • How do I dynamically reload the map script in-game?
  • Where can I learn more about 3D programming or game engines?

The Map Editor

• Installation, Initial Configuration and De-Installation
  • Installation
  • First-Time Configuration
  • De-Installation
• Getting Started
  • Introduction to Editing
  • The Main Window User Interface
  • 2D and 3D Views
  • The Material Browser
  • Your First Map
• Map Editing Tools
  • The Selection Tool
  • The Camera Tool
  • The New Brush Tool
  • The New Entity Tool
  • The New Bezier Patch Tool
  • The New Terrain Tool
  • The New Light Tool
  • The New Decal Tool
  • The Edit Surface Properties Tool
  • The Edit Terrain Tool
  • The Clipping Tool
  • The Edit Vertices (Morph) Tool
• Selected Topics
  • Groups
  • Dealing with Leaks
  • Creating Teleporter Stations
  • About Lights and Shadows
  • Importing Maps from other Games/Editors
  • Method One: Creating a skybox
  • Placing Water
• Menu Reference
  • The File Menu
  • The Edit Menu
  • The Map Menu
  • The View Menu
  • The Tools Menu
  • The Compile Menu
  • The Window Menu
  • The Help Menu
• Dialog Reference
  • The Configure CaWE Options Dialog
  • The Replace Materials Dialog
  • The Paste Special Dialog
  • The Find Entities Dialog
  • The Object Properties Dialog
  • The Goto Brush/Entity Dialog
  • The Entity Report Dialog
  • The Map Error Report Dialog
  • The Transform Type-In Dialog
  • The Surface Properties Dialog
  • The Entity Inspector Dialog
• Entity Guide
  • Brush-Based Entities
  • Point Entities
• Compiling Maps for Cafu
  • Step 1: The compile steps
  • Step 2: Starting the compile process
  • Tips, Tricks and Trouble-shooting
• Compiling Maps at the Command-Line
  • Compiling step 1: CaBSP
  • Compiling step 2: CaPVS
  • Compiling step 3: CaLight
  • Done: Running the world with Cafu
• Creating Height-Maps for your Terrains
  • Programs for Creating and Editing Height-Maps
  • Summary

The GUI Editor

• The Font Wizard: Creating new fonts
  • Creating fonts at the command prompt
  • Using the newly created font
• GUI Files Explained
  • One directory per GUI
  • cgui GUI definition files
  • cmat material definition files
  • Texture images

The Model Editor

• The Model Editor: Introduction
  • “How do I get my models into Cafu?”
• The Main Window
  • Starting the Model Editor
  • Main Window Elements
• How-Tos
  • How do I …
• Model Elements
  • Skeleton
  • Meshes
  • Skins
  • GUI Fixtures
  • Animations
  • Channels
• Program Dialogs
  • Scene Setup
  • Submodels
  • Level-of-Detail Models
  • Transforms: translate, rotate and scale
• Menu and Toolbar Reference
  • The Toolbar
  • The File menu
  • The Edit menu
  • The View menu
  • The Model menu
  • The Window menu
  • The Help menu
• Model Files Explained
  • One directory per model
  • cmdl model files
  • cmat material definition files
  • Texture images
• Dependencies among Models
  • Human player models
  • Weapons
  • Applicability to your own game

Textures

• Supported file formats
• Texture types
• Skybox creation (Environmental Map, Cubemap)
  • How to integrate a skybox into Cafu
  • How to create a skybox with Terragen
  • How to create a skybox with SkyGen
  • How to create a skybox out of photos
  • How to create a skybox out of panoramic images
• Using own textures
  • Part 1: Map textures
  • Part 2: Model textures
  • Part 3: Skybox textures
• Making “perfect” Detail-Maps
  • The Problem
  • The Idea
  • The Solution
  • Discussion and Results
  • High-Pass Filters in PhotoShop

The Material System

• What is it? An Introduction
  • Purpose, Goals and Features
  • Renderers
  • Materials
  • Shaders
  • Summary
• The Materialviewer
  • The command-line
  • The Materialviewer Window
  • Keyboard and Mouse Controls
• The Materials (cmat files) Manual
  • Overview
  • Texture Map Specifications
  • Shader Specifications
  • Expressions and Tables
  • Keyword Reference

The Cafu Source Code

• Getting Started with the Cafu Source Code
  • Getting the Source Code
  • Python and SCons
  • Linux Packages
  • Compiler Setup
  • Compiling the Source Code
  • Adding Binary Assets
  • Running the new Programs
  • What next?
• How to Submit Patches
  • Changing Cafu
  • Final Considerations
• Coding Conventions
  • Control Structures
  • Classes
  • Methods and Functions
  • Whitespace
  • Indentation
  • Vertical Alignment
  • Parentheses
  • Comments
  • Conclusions
  • References
• Selected Topics
  • Game Development Overview
  • Starting your own Game
  • Loading game worlds
  • Using the Autodesk FBX SDK