Ever notice this???????

[A_Huge_Sweaty_Baboon]

In each and every level where there is a sky, if you ghost yourself and fly out of the level, in the distance you should see a little room.
This room (or sometimes 2 aka.ArcaneTemple) is a scale model of the sky in the rest of the level, is this the sky itself which is projected into the level??

If so, the why is there 2 sometimes.

Anyhow, its pretty neat when you think about it.

[[Ci]Morgan]

The Unreal engine works with a 'Skybox'. This is indeed a hollow box, outside the play-map. In here, a camera is placed that renders the sky and other elements (clouds, halo's, smoke) if needed. A play-map is placed inside a hollow cube itself. The faces of this cube are given the "project fake backdrop" parameter and thereby project the view seen from the camera in the skybox. In a way, this causes the Engine rasterizer to render 2 images, but this gives a more realistic and better skybox / distance effect than using one huge brush outside the play-map for a skybox.

But for me, the coolest skybox was in Thief. Those who played (that great game) Thief 1 / Gold and remember (that great mission) in "Constatines Mansion" might remember that little room where all the walls were given the fake backdrop, making it look like you're floating in space :)