Those are beauty screens, the light fixtures bring it together nicely. What a difference a few hours makes! ( jk, I saw yr other post about 70 hours. Thanks for the credit there btw ) Also I wouldn't belittle your "physical setback" so, but kudos for making sure the show goes on.
Love that first shot especially, I can see the player movement in that area clearly. I agree with most of Aaron's points, though I like the way the basement floor turned out. You could probably get away with a few vent decals or a strip of that metalwall texture withe vent on it, here and there, without killing the fps. Especially in the basement, where it was the strongest on that runaround the other day. Maybe your posts could use a texture experiment too.
Aaron, that unreal shot is pure cinema, love that guy's work. dm_tobor remains one of the most fascinating maps I've come across. Although that LOD is way too advanced for hl2dm (98887 triangles!!!) it's cool to see the artistic approach.
Looking good Juim. To be honest, I can't really think of much else to say going off screenshots since your not aiming for any sort of defined environment it seems and as you said.
I think that some of those interior/sheltered spaces are too dark and need to be brighter. Also, there is too much concrete and orange in there for me to handle, I think you need to add a bit of contrast in there such as metal or wood textures (anything but more concrete) and some textures on the green/blue side of the spectrum, it seems overly orange/yellow/red to me at the moment.
You could probably get away with leaving the light environment colour as it is and making those interior lights whiteish/light green/light blue.
And ofcourse you need to have background surroundings, you can't just have the level floating in a skybox like this.
Just a bump. I replaced most of the pics in the first post (scroll back up to the top please). They represent the map as it is today. Thanks to a small physical setback, I managed to get in about 70 hours of mapping in the last ten days or so, and the map is starting to really take shape. I am not releasing any of the betas (yet), but you can PM me for a link to beta 3 if you like.I could use some feedback. I will have it posted first thing tomorrow morning(wednesday 03/04).
Thanks for having a look.
(Gwil, could you delete the last two pic links in the first post please?. Apparently I cant edit any posts after 30 minutes in any forum here, hehehe).
Lookin good Juim. I like that last screen, reminds me of the LD control room a bit.
One thing with the long glass hallways, they may become a discouraging way to go because of the distance/dynamic ratio...what I mean is, if you introduced a little "popout" like a wider, higher zone in the middle, it would give incentive to get halfway and then decide, kinda. I'd also be concerned about how the tools are gonna cut up the leafs around the solid curves, but that's controllable with hints as you know.
I don't know what you have in mind for a texture theme but remember that the less number of textures you have the better it will run. Looking at your brushwork I can see all kinds of possibilities for detailing with just your awesome lighting skills, so many shadow lines and pockets here and there. Lighting is the cheapest way to detail and here I think you've got some real opportunities.
Not mapping as much as I'd like, but I still poke away at this one when I can. Also taking my time as little inspirations seem farther apart on this, probably due to the haphaxard nature of the layout. Anywho, here's a few more screenies:
some no clip shots. I added some glass hallways around the sides (partly to keep people within the structure).
More from the other side. I also moved the glass tunnel outside and up top. Seemed a bit more conducive to appearance up there.
And finally a current shot from down below. I am almost to the texturing stage.Lets hope I can keep moving on this one.
Looks good Juim, are those railings just placeholders? Replacing them with func_detail solves a couple weapon issues and may let you have more freedom with your texture aesthetic, ie not so grimy-hl2.
Also I know you have a monster machine there ( judging by your screens of striker ), watch your visblocking for the little guys like me!
