I'm looking for any information that will help a beginner learn about loading 3d map formats. For example, bsp files. Are there any web sites that teach you want is in the file and how to support the map file.

Thanks

www.wotsit.org has the specs for LOADS of file formats from ZIP files to Quake PAK files, from 3DS (3D Studio) files to VRML

If you want to know how to load a BSP I suggest you look at the recently released Quake 1 source which has BSP loading in it (obviously :)

Steven Vallis