Level Editor, why?

[Storsorgen]

Hello. I'm unsure if this really counts as a tech support question, but hear me out.

What's the reason for using level editors? As I understand it, you design a map and save it as a file, and when the level loads it loads from that file.
But why is this better than manually placing the stuff? Doesn't it create longer loadtimes?

[ChrisBurrows]

Without using a level editor, if you want multiple levels in your game, you either need to use a different frame for each level, in which case if you make a change in the code to one of them, you manually have to make the same change in every other frame, OR you use a single frame and put your different levels "next" to the other levels but make them inaccessible to your player.

Also dragging thousands of objects around the level editor sucks.

[Storsorgen]

Noted, but isn't there a limit to how large the frame can be?

[ChrisBurrows]

Amongst other things, I'm working on a gta1 style driving game, it's 60000 by 60000.

[Storsorgen]

Ah. I'm kinda torn here, feels like it'd be complicated to have all levels created in this manner. Would you suggest using one?

[LB]

I strongly suggest creating a level editor for your game. Frames can be resized at runtime and the size limit is also higher at runtime than at edittime.

[Storsorgen]

Alright, guess I'll give it a try

[Storsorgen]

Oh man, these level editors sure seem complicated. Noone of those I found can add to different layers either :/

[Konidias]

You absolutely should make a level editor if your game is going to have a lot of levels. It would almost be stupid not to.

[Storsorgen]

But how do you make one that handles layers? From what I've seen, grid data is stored in a file, but only one value can be stored. Would you need something that goes through each layer and fills it up or what?