Portal 2 - Different doors?
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
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)
useful tools and stuff here on TWP 
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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. 
Thanks for both your replies.
@FelixGriffin: Is there a way you can quickly summarize the method to me, or is it too complicated?
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.
As I told you earlier, each model has a texture stored in the pakdir_01.vpk package file. Check how it looks:
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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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
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 
.
I have an instance of a destroyed exit door packed into my Impulse Laser Intro map.
Aperture Science: We do our science asbestos we can!
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.
Other Portal 2 maps: Medusa Glare
Portal 1 maps: Try Anything Twice | Manic Mechanic