Dm_valley by MisterBister

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Map Info

Map Description

This map is originally based on a map called "halo" made for HLDM. It was supposed to be a half-life variant of the map "blood gulch" from the game halo. Half-life?s graphics engine didnt manage to render a landscape similar to bloodgulch and forced me to make the map into an "L" shape.Since i had played blood gulch with my friends with "rocket launchers only" and had a damn good time with them the night before i started with "halo", i thought it would be fun to see if it was as fun to play with "rocket launchers only" in my HLDM map.The map looked like hell and had alot of visual flaws, though it was not meant to be beautiful since I mainly made it to improve my skills in how to make realistic terrain.

Despite its ugglyness, the map turned out to be a huge success during "LD-LAN #1", a LAN for swedish mappers held in Gothemburg a few times a year. Everyone loved the idea of running around with rocket launchers.

When HL2DM was released i thought it would be fun to make a follow-up on the old "halo" map.

And so it begun, the creation of Dm_valley.

Originally, the map was meant to be very similar to its predecessor, although many of my friends thought it would be more fun, and challenging, if I made it straight, instead of the old "L" shape. After that, things has evolved quite a bit. At first, the map was intended to have to exactly the same bases with only one route between them. However during some gametests one way turned out to be insignificant, so I made two more around the main route, creating a chocke-point in the middle aswell as sideways for the sneaky bastards. I made a unique base for each team to make the map feel more alive and not so dull.

I took alot inspiration from dm_island17 when creating the rebelbase, as you easily can see if you compare the maps.

After seeing a great nasty cool bridge on the map dm_lake i got very dissapointed when you couldnt run up on it, and I thought that I would add a bridge on Dm_valley from where you could get a great advantage over your oponents to make it more unique and fun to play, aswell as adding some eyecandy.

The gameplay of the map is extremely fast paced since everyone respawns with a rocket launcher in addition to the original kit. The map has great support for teamplay but works just as fine with the good old deathmatch mode.

The map is now released and below is the readme, although the personal comments in the thanks to list has been removed to save some space:
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Dm_valley V 1.0
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Release date: August 5 2005, Gothenburg, Sweden
Half-Life 2 Deathmatch (HL2DM)

Title: Dm_valley v 1.0
Name: Dm_valley.bsp
Author: Filip "MisterBister" Coulianos
Email address: f_misterbister@hotmail.com
URL: none specific.
Description:

A fast paced deathmatch map where all the players respawn into the mayhem with rocket launchers in a big valley.
The map is originally created with teamplay in mind as each team respawns in a separate base,
but the map works just as fine in Deathmatch.

Play information

Deathmatch: Yes (4-12+)
Team deathmatch: Yes (6-16+)
New sounds: no
New graphics: yes
New music: no

Construction:

Base: none
Editor: Hammer World Editor V4
Other progs: Batchcompiler
Known bugs: Texture problems may appear with Nvidia cards.
Build time: 6 months

Thanks to:

My mom and dad, My girlfriend Karin, Satchmo, Frissi, Habboi, BlisTer, Orpheus, Myrk-, Addicted to Morphine ,Spartan, Hugh, MoneyShot, ReNo, Crono, Dark_Kilauea, Pureferret, mazemaster, CrazySteve, Underdog, dragonfliet, Grim Reaper, wiggle987, IZaNaGI, seppe, Dead-Inside, Spas12, Vash., Blink, habboi, YokaI, vasko, Yoshi, cur_sed,Athlete{UK}, mabufo, Lonedog, Xlator, Wolf/Sky, Olleman, Coldblooded, Westberg, Lingon geisha, Bladebitch, Alucard, NotueRn, Kobi the leopard, Fenix, Twiggy, Teddybear, Ace, RatFace, Namron, Toor-, Skunken, Ank4, Frank_Desembler, Synthetiq, Clawfinger, Klasse, Skumtomten, Surfer, XPerience, Nilesh and Juim

Additional thanks to:
The Snarkpit community.
The Leveldesign community.
The Interlopers community.
The Halflife.nu community.
The Valve company.

Special thanks to YOU for reading this document and for downloading this map.

Other notes:

If you have a server with this map, you may notice that people cannot download the map directly from the server
via steam. This problem appears since this maps file size is bigger than the maximum file size that Valve has allowed
a HL2DM server to upload. This problem can be solved by entering this command in the console:
"net_maxfilesize 30"

If you have suggestions, feedback or anything you want to tell me, please don't hesitate to send me an email:
f_misterbister@hotmail.com

? 2005 Filip "MisterBister" Coulianos

Discussion

Posted by Myrk- on Tue May 31st 2005 at 1:10pm

I think the 2 thumpers is good, and the way they go in time with each other- however, all the thumpers are going in time. They should only go in time as pairs, not all at the same time. There may be too many too.

By the Barracks I mean that outside combine building. The access isn't very good and it seems a little unconnected- maybe use the teleport system with it.
Posted by keved on Tue May 31st 2005 at 12:03pm

Some feedback from me...

The 5 screenshots here on Snarkpit don't work (for me, anyway).

In some places you have 2 thumpers side-by-side. Overkill? One in each position will suffice.

Also the positioning of the thumpers seems weird - on rocky peaks and flat man-made surfaces. Surely they should be on sand?

The majority of the texturing is misaligned and needs sorting out, along with all the cubemapping on the combine materials too (I was getting an ugly-looking purple and white effect).

The exterior feels very empty at the moment and filling it sufficiently with detailing is likely to hammer framerates into the ground. :sad:

In terms of the deathmatch layout, Blood Gulch may have worked ok on the Xbox in which levels have to be one-tier due to the limitations of the controller, but on PC surely we expect some multi-tier action going on? (i.e. enemies potentially above and below you too). Also, this level is RPG only? Maybe it's just me not "getting it" but this isn't the type of level I'd find to be any fun, sorry. :sad:
Posted by MisterBister on Tue May 31st 2005 at 8:05am
[Author]

Myrk- said:
Firstly noted that the map has some serious design issues- random houses with some combine fortress? Nah... NAH! Take them out, they aren't that great anyway and they have alot of the problems in texturing and design etc.
yes, the rebel houses is out of place, no doubt about that.
I wanted to create a rebel-looking base when i created them.
If anyone has alternative suggestions to rebel-looking bases that fits the enviroment better, then please tell me.
Myrk- said:
When you go out of the combine fortress bit to the thumpers and look back when at the thumpers there is a big white glare- I'm thinking you probably tried to make a glare effect for when looking outside, but it seems to have reversed...
Yes, i made a mistake and been lazy enough to not delete the entity =P.
Don't like the barracks much, they seem kinda lazy and un-thoughtfull.
What barracks?
Myrk- said:
Alot of the edge texturing needs redoing or aligning, by edges I mean trims, sides, everything- in most cases its misaligned. On that note the barrier on the bridge thingy is too low at the stair point, needs extending more.

The swamp areas swamp gassy thing sprites need to be placed better, currently they are in a grid, and its easy to tell.
Yes, yes, all of that will be fixed at a later stage. Good that you mentioned it though, i havent thought of the "swamp grassy thing sprites".
Myrk- said:
Another thing I just thought of but I'm not sure about... The bridge ends with damage and rubble, but I can't remember if there was any actual rubble on the ground, or on the other side where it was going to connect to.
Youre not the first one to mention this part. i have not created any rubble there (YET) since i didnt want to block the path that goes under the bridge. But if placed properly, the rubble can work as great cover from enemy fire.
Myrk- said:
Lastly, you need a 3D skybox...
Yes i most certainly do. I have a few great plans for it. Although there are a few things that have kept me from starting with it. First off, im not sure how its going to work together with the fog on the map. Will the fog affect the skybox aswell?
Secondly, im not sure how the "max viewable distance" includes skyboxes aswell..
Myrk- said:
As I said I'm not 100% sure if this is the latest version, but I'm pretty sure it is. If you wanna create a server some time I can show you in game all the flaws.
You mentioned thumpers. They are only present in the latest official version.
Yes, that would be great. Ill be in touch.
Posted by Myrk- on Mon May 30th 2005 at 9:32pm

Ok not sure how old the beta is that I played, pretty sure its the latest. I would take pics, but I'm very, very lazy. Anyways-

Firstly noted that the map has some serious design issues- random houses with some combine fortress? Nah... NAH! Take them out, they aren't that great anyway and they have alot of the problems in texturing and design etc.

When you go out of the combine fortress bit to the thumpers and look back when at the thumpers there is a big white glare- I'm thinking you probably tried to make a glare effect for when looking outside, but it seems to have reversed...

Don't like the barracks much, they seem kinda lazy and un-thoughtfull.

Alot of the edge texturing needs redoing or aligning, by edges I mean trims, sides, everything- in most cases its misaligned. On that note the barrier on the bridge thingy is too low at the stair point, needs extending more.

The swamp areas swamp gassy thing sprites need to be placed better, currently they are in a grid, and its easy to tell.

Another thing I just thought of but I'm not sure about... The bridge ends with damage and rubble, but I can't remember if there was any actual rubble on the ground, or on the other side where it was going to connect to.

Lastly, you need a 3D skybox...

As I said I'm not 100% sure if this is the latest version, but I'm pretty sure it is. If you wanna create a server some time I can show you in game all the flaws.
Posted by Orpheus on Mon May 30th 2005 at 2:55pm

MisterBister said:
Besides, in what way is it stunning?
The attention to detail.. I do however have several screens where you have holes in your map. I suspect you used sky to seal this thing. If so, fix the leaks and recompile, I bet your FPS will go up and allow you room to increase the distance.

User posted image

User posted image
Posted by MisterBister on Mon May 30th 2005 at 2:29pm
[Author]

Visually, it is stunning, I recommend you increase the visual
lengths as it is disconcerting to see the map being drawn as you walk
about.
Well, thats a problem that I really do not know how to solve. If I
let the engine draw any further, that will cause serius FPS-drops when
playing against many players. I would love to remove the fog
completely, but im afraid I cannot do that.

If you have alternative solutions, please tell me =).

Besides, in what way is it stunning?
Posted by Orpheus on Mon May 30th 2005 at 2:04pm

I am Dloading now. I must say, you have the speediest downloads I have seen in quite some time. I am holding at a solid 8.1k :/

Anywho's, I will post some sort of a comment in a bit. I am curious to see if this much praise is warranted.

[EDIT]

This map has potential, but it is not ready for my comments yet. It is to empty to judge gameplay and such at this point.

Visually, it is stunning, I recommend you increase the visual lengths as it is disconcerting to see the map being drawn as you walk about.

Keep me posted for when you get at least a few items placed. enough to frag anyways.

My only concern is the magnitude of scope. This map is freaking huge and IMO will turn into a sniper fest rapidly cause no one is going to want to run 4 miles to the other side. Place any/all sniper weapons carefully.

/me awaits next version.
Posted by MisterBister on Mon May 30th 2005 at 10:52am
[Author]

Spartan said:
Pimp this map out over at Interlopers as well. I'm sure there are some people over there that would like to see a good DM map.
Thanks for the tip, ill do that when I get home from school.
Posted by Spartan on Mon May 30th 2005 at 2:54am

Pimp this map out over at Interlopers as well. I'm sure there are some people over there that would like to see a good DM map.
Posted by Orpheus on Mon May 30th 2005 at 1:16am

Frissi said:
WOW a great map indeed im going to rape this map when i upgrade my computer on lans :sailor:
WAY to much info there Fris.. :wtf: