BSP file extension

Several video games based on one of the Quake gaming engines (for example Quake, Quake 2, Quake 3, Half-Life, Half-Life 2, Team Fortress, Counter-Strike, Counter-Strike: Condition-Zero, Portal, Call of Duty: World at War and others) map file with the layout information, elements and resources for a level map. BSP means "Binary Space Partitioning" that is a method that breaks up intricate polygons into convex sets. This enables three-dimensional maps to be rendered faster. BSP maps are made up of "lumps" that are chunks of information specified in the file header. They include Entities, Nodes, Verticles, Planes, Leaves, Visibility, Faces and Textures. BSP files are compiled from MAP files into a binary format using such applications as Q3Map2 or Irrlicht. They also can be created with ID Software applications like GtkRadiant, ZeroRadiant and DarkRadiant. Quake-based engines that use BSP files include "ID Tech 1", "Quake Engine", "ID Tech 2", "ID Tech 3", "ID Tech 4" and originated from the Quake engine "Source Engine" developed by Valve Corporation.