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A request to all Snarkpit mappers!
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 Re: A request to all Snarkpit mappers!
Posted by Flynn on Fri Jan 26th at 6:05pm 2007

Please direct your talents towards singleplayer. Besides, you'll get noticed more! There are literally millions of H-L 2 D.M. and C-S:S maps out there. It would be so much more exciting to see singleplayer maps being produced by the Pit. Then we would have something to relate to. Sorry but I have to get this off my back

Love, Flynn XXX




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 Re: A request to all Snarkpit mappers!
Posted by reaper47 on Fri Jan 26th at 7:06pm 2007

I agree with the lack of SP projects. Maybe the upcoming competition could serve as a motivation boost towards SP mapping. If we come up with an appropriate theme.

There are many good reasons, however, for why most mappers prefer multiplayer. It's generally easier and you can watch hundreds of people play your map live on servers - which simply is more fun than reading a few reviews on websites.


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 Re: A request to all Snarkpit mappers!
Posted by AlexW on Sat Jan 27th at 12:52am 2007

The one small (actually, it's a pretty big :P) problem with creating a single player game is that, well... you need to create a storyline. Anybody can think up of a story for a game. But not all can conjure up a good story that's worth playing the game for.

Although single player projects are a large undertaking for an individual, you don't have to worry about the balance issues that one encounters with a multi-player map. (and you can also skimp on the optimization just a tad if you're feeling lazy :P)

I'd try creating a single player story... but I have enough trouble thinking up themes for multi-player maps. I'm sort of stuck right now, so I just map some small unrelated things just for the sake of mapping.



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 Re: A request to all Snarkpit mappers!
Posted by Naklajat on Sat Jan 27th at 12:56am 2007

I've actually been thinking of starting a SP project. Source multiplayer has always had lag issues, but it's a great engine for single player games.


=o



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 Re: A request to all Snarkpit mappers!
Posted by Orpheus on Sat Jan 27th at 1:02am 2007

? quoting Baron von Snickers
Source multiplayer has always had lag issues, .

*whispers*

Spoken like a spoiled LPB. <img src=" SRC="images/smiles/heee.gif">





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 Re: A request to all Snarkpit mappers!
Posted by Flynn on Sat Jan 27th at 6:17pm 2007

? quoting AlexW
The one small (actually, it's a pretty big ) problem with creating a single player game is that, well... you need to create a storyline. Anybody can think up of a story for a game. But not all can conjure up a good story that's worth playing the game for.

Sorry but I completely disagree. Gameplay is what matters. People love playing H-L 2, so if there is new content available people are going to lap it up like hot cakes. I see no reason why a story is necessary to make a good singleplayer map. Gameplay is what matters. If you give people good quality gameplay then they won't mind. And what do you mean by it's quite a large project for one person!? It's as large or as small as you want it to be.




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 Re: A request to all Snarkpit mappers!
Posted by reaper47 on Sat Jan 27th at 8:15pm 2007

This all reminded me of how storylines where handled back in the good old days of Half-Life 1.

HL1 had dozens of short, fun little SP missions. This is how I was introduced to HL1 community mapping. They usually started where HL1 ended, had some random Gman encounters and a simple background story, mostly told in a few paragraphs of screen-text. And they were fun, people appreciated them.

Minerva, actually, is a modern example for this approach. All you have is a higher being with an impressive vocabulary, telling you to invade a combine base on an island - via text-messages. Then you go and... well, invade a combine base on an island.

Minerva, the much-hailed Mod phenomenon, getting into the Top-5 Mod of the Year charts doesn't have such a unique theme or idea. Minerva has a very simple premise. While explaining too little to the player to actually need a concrete background story it explains enough to keep him playing. Which isn't all that much.

Ok, it's done very smartly and with skill, I won't deny that. But it didn't need any new characters, cut-scenes or voice-acting. The best part of the story, although cleverly hidden from being too obvious, is the idea for an interesting piece of technology the Combine built. A pretty ordinary idea. So far, we don't even know what it is, it just looks cool and mysterious, and the powerful lady writes us emails in which she suggests it's powerful.

I don't believe it's that hard to come up with an interesting story for a HL2 SP map. I think it's not much harder than thinking of themes for multiplayer maps and, as AlexW said, there are many things that are actually easier in singleplayer. It just feels as if a SP idea is less appreciated than a MP idea. There is no room for medicority, for improvement especially. Everything gets compared to Minerva. At the moment Minerva is both the maximum (best mod evarr!!!1) and minimum (no new content!) of HL2 SP mapping. There aren't many popular examples around it, except for full-blown mods. I can only think of maybe 5 or 6 proper HL2 SP missions coming out since HL2 was released. There should be more room for good ideas, even small ones.

It's a shame there's not more support for manageable SP projects by individuals. I know I'm as responsible for this as the majority of the community. When I read threads like this I feel a bit ashamed for the MP mapping dominance everywhere.

We really need more support for fun, small SP maps.
And I agree with Flynn. Maybe I wouldn't dismiss the importance of a storyline so categorically. But story alone isn't an excuse for avoiding SP mapping.

...

Anyway, I'll go back working on my MP map... image


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 Re: A request to all Snarkpit mappers!
Posted by Orpheus on Sat Jan 27th at 8:45pm 2007

? quoting Flynn
Sorry but I completely disagree. be.

The good thing about Snarkpit is, you're perfectly welcome to do so. You will however find that doing so in no way means you are correct.

Believe me, I disagree 90% of the time I am here and less than 10% of the people think I was correct.





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 Re: A request to all Snarkpit mappers!
Posted by Naklajat on Sat Jan 27th at 9:36pm 2007

Orph, I may be a LPB, but I can play a multiplayer game based on GoldSource, Quake 1 and 2 (and any of their GNU derivatives), Unreal Engine 1 and 2, and they're all pretty much lag-free. Every multiplayer game I've played that's based on the Source engine has had the infamous and ever-present hitbox lag, plus general inconsistency from players changing several network-related cvars to whatever they want, since the defaults are so bad.


=o



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 Re: A request to all Snarkpit mappers!
Posted by Orpheus on Sat Jan 27th at 9:54pm 2007

Oh, so you're not bitching about your connection then?

Oops, my bad. I get so tired of people bitching with connections less then 100. I thought perhaps that was your point.

As for the hitbox error, that happens on LAN too, so.. I sympathize.

For the record, I consider connection gripes LPB, not hitbox ones. <img src=" SRC="images/smiles/sad.gif">





The best things in life, aren't things.



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 Re: A request to all Snarkpit mappers!
Posted by Captain P on Sat Jan 27th at 10:45pm 2007

Flynn has a point: SP maps can be great things to play - and to create. I had a lot of fun creating a HL SP map, lots of idea's are available that you just can't do in a multiplayer map.

And I agree it's not about the story. Think of Portal: it looks more like a casual puzzle game put into a FPS skin than a story-driven AAA title to me. And it sounds very promising to me exactly because of that. Story's are just an ingredient, and can add spice to a map, but it's not a necessary thing.

Oh well. <img src=" SRC="images/smiles/icon_wink.gif">


Create-ivity - a game development blog



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 Re: A request to all Snarkpit mappers!
Posted by Kasperg_JM on Sun Jan 28th at 2:48am 2007

My main issue with SP maps is that a map the size of a DM map takes the same (or more) time to make and the player spends about 5 minutes playing through. Yes, that's less than a normal DM round! (unless you put insanely hard puzzles that is).

DM maps have different themes, and you can do something completely different after finishing one. SP makes you stay within a theme and style for a much longer time, and it can sometimes be tiresome.
Anyway. I've done some SP maps in the past (Testlab16, Vilcabamba and Sandscroll), and I'm currently working in another one for HL1. SP mapping for Source is a different matter. My three attempts have failed so far (last one), and I think it's hard to be motivated. Custom content isn't as easy to make as it was before, and deviating from the HL2 standard (which Minerva or Rock24 don't do) isn't easy.





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 Re: A request to all Snarkpit mappers!
Posted by Orpheus on Sun Jan 28th at 2:59am 2007

I know it sounds absurd, but I'd like to see someone map a series of singleplayer maps, that can be easily converted to DM. When you consider a map like Bounce was part of the intro for HL1, but it was played a s**tload of times, it seems remotely possible to make a singleplayer champaign out of MP maps.

Then again, perhaps not.





The best things in life, aren't things.



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 Re: A request to all Snarkpit mappers!
Posted by G.Ballblue on Sun Jan 28th at 4:43am 2007

Well, yes and no. I suppose it really just depends on how DMish the singleplayer map is made to begin with.

A good example would probably be the Doom1 maps -- if you play Zdaemon, chances are, you'll probably be running around the first chapter of doom in deathmatch mode. Despite that the first chapter of doom was a whipass single player campaign, only a handful of maps were actually worth the while for DM -- E1M9 and E1M3, for instance. Trying to create singleplayer map that is also DM'able is possible, but it's probably a major pain in the ass.

The way I see it is this: Make a singleplayer map, and if you want to convert it to DM, do NOT just do a basic archtecture and entity swap. Convert the basic architecture into your DM map, but then modify it for more circular flow and better speed. Naturally, go by whatever DM laws you have in the process, and always throw more weapons and ammo in image


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 Re: A request to all Snarkpit mappers!
Posted by omegaslayer on Sun Jan 28th at 6:46am 2007

? quote:
Sorry but I completely disagree. Gameplay is what matters. People love playing H-L 2, so if there is new content available people are going to lap it up like hot cakes. I see no reason why a story is necessary to make a good singleplayer map. Gameplay is what matters. If you give people good quality gameplay then they won't mind. And what do you mean by it's quite a large project for one person!? It's as large or as small as you want it to be.

To completely dismiss the story-line of an SP game is wrong. While gameplay is a major aspect of all maps, so is story and background; You wouldn't bother playing Half Life 2 if you had nto played the first HL1 game. It was that drive to come back and play as freeman that hyped HL2 to players such as myself. Its not one or the other, but a well weaved web of the two.

Half Life 2 single player project:
http://files.filefront.com/smc%20chapter1zip/;3846160;/fileinfo.html



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 Re: A request to all Snarkpit mappers!
Posted by Campaignjunkie on Sun Jan 28th at 11:04am 2007

I'm trying to start a "quarterly" of short-form HL2 singleplayer maps - think of it as the level design equivalent of a short story - but it's not going too well, mainly because I can't get most of my prototypes to work for a potential pilot issue. There's always some random problem that totally kills my idea: for example, it's impossible to get the player to fight Dog, because Dog will only throw things when the player is looking in his direction as part of the catch & throw behavior. I suppose I could get some custom code done, but that kind of defeats the purpose of doing small-investment singleplayer maps. :

As for the lack of smaller SP releases... I think that's more of a symptom of the monolithic mod project complex - release media, rinse, repeat.



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 Re: A request to all Snarkpit mappers!
Posted by reaper47 on Sun Jan 28th at 3:06pm 2007

Obviously, it's wrong to ignore the importance of an interesting storyline for Singleplayer maps.

But you could think of a story that specifically avoids all major custom content issues. That sounds like an awful limitation but it isn't. No-one expects the clever writing of Minerva. But for example, I've been thinking of a HL2 SP storyline for a while now which would work at a zero-effort of custom-content. And it wasn't too hard either.

"Monolithic mod project complex" indeed... Many mappers are intimidated by huge mod-projects that haven't released anything playable in 2 or 3 years. That's not the right competition.


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 Re: A request to all Snarkpit mappers!
Posted by Captain P on Sun Jan 28th at 10:25pm 2007

Yes, storylines, small arcs or large arcs, but how about puzzle-oriented maps? Maps that lean more towards being different games than maps? That's probably what I would create, if I'd start it anyway...


Create-ivity - a game development blog



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 Re: A request to all Snarkpit mappers!
Posted by Nickelplate on Mon Jan 29th at 3:15pm 2007

it's all the scripting that keeps me from SP mapping...


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 Re: A request to all Snarkpit mappers!
Posted by Flynn on Mon Jan 29th at 8:18pm 2007

I dunno it's not that hard unless your trying to do the bit from the final scene. In a game where even shooting the submachine gun is a joy in itself, I don't see why all the concerns are valid.


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