Workshop map compression

Suggestions
1

Hi,

This is part question, part suggestion.

When you upload a custom map of any type you can see its size on the Steam workshop page. This is less than the file size for map and textures that is shown by windows. For example on my map the map file is 14,993 kb while the textures are 2.65 mb (transparent png’s take a stupid amount of space :disappointed: ) .

It is a detailed map, but I confess I am not entirely sure why the map file is so large. Size wise the file is large for mini golf, but not compared to other games, such as ball race or some of the highly detailed SDNL maps.

While the total shown on Steam is 15.352mb, which is quite a bit less than the 17.3(ish) mb the files take up, it is still a sizeable file set. I suspect that it causes folk with a slow internet issues when they come to join a game for the 1st time. I also suspect that they give up if the map does not load quickly enough as a result.

However running 7 zip over the map file compresses it to 394kb, though the textures hardly reduce at all to 2.62 mb.

So question and suggestion. Do you run any compression over the map files and if not would it be possible to implement?

Thanks in advance.

2

I’ve talked about doing it a few times but we’ve often been focused on other more important things, but I’d like us to get around to it at some point cause yeah the compression ratios are insane.

5 Likes
3

Thanks for suck a quiick reply. It would be great if this could be bumped up the stack a bit. :smiley:

4

If you want to understand more about the file format and why it compresses so well, I suggest you check out the community made json converter.