News posts

Valve have just announced the winners of their HL2DM mapping contest via their newest steam news update, so restart steam to get the latest. While unfortunately none of the locals snagged a prize (indeed not many ended up entering), it looks like there is some nice work on display in the chosen entries. The maps haven't been released as of yet, though if you are a real eager beaver you can probably dig around the net and find old beta releases and screenshots :wink: The winning maps are...

1st - dm_underpass
2nd - dm_resistance
3rd - dm_powerhouse
Special Mention - dm_avalon

I'm afraid I forget a few of the authors, so for fear of showing favouritism I won't mention any names :biggrin: Many congratulations to all the winners and, if they are reading this, spend your prize funds wisely :wink:

EDIT: Here is a link to the steam update news, for your viewing pleasure...

http://www.steampowered.com/Steam/Marketing/Mar18.2005/

The most recent beta of Ferrets construction site based map, "Rebar", has been added to the server rotation.

You can get it here.

Check out the news post below to see the rest of the maps being played on the server.

Also, a bug seems to be appearing more and more frequently where the prop_physics items seem to "bounce" and float, and take no damage. I know this bug is there and how to sort it, but if you see it happening, be sure to come tell me or another admin on our IRC channel, #snarkpit, on the Quakenet network.

Just a quick news post to say that the map rotation on the server has been tweaked.

dm_np_refinery - keved
dm_steamlab - (Has been removed - due to physics/server crashing bugs - Gwil)
dm_torque - Yak_Fighter
dm_lockdown - VALVe
dm_island17 - mazemaster
dm_overwatch - VALVe
dm_morbid - KornyBizkit

In case you've forgotten (and can't be bothered looking down), the IP is 195.20.108.12:27025. If you have any suggestions for other maps or "themed" events, then please let us know.

Thanks to Gwil, we now have our own server! It's mainly the stock HL2DM maps right now, with Island17 thrown in. The server IP is 195.20.108.12:27025, or on sever lists as 4u-servers.co.uk- Snarkpit - if it asks for a password, you can get it from the IRC room (#snarkpit on Quakenet). We'll be putting on the best custom deathmatch maps featured here on the Snarkpit, and host the occasional map playtest. We took it for a test drive this morning- call me juvenile, but the highlight was probably the aerial battles (and of course pwn1ng everyone else :biggrin: )

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Some of the custom maps on the server are:

[*] Island17
[*] Morbid
[*] Torque
If you want to make a map request, or have your own quality HL2DM map you want to see played, check out this forum thread.

Screenshot uploading has been temporarily disabled while we wait for the server we're hosted on to have the relevant modules and whatnot installed (apparently we were moved to another machine but I'm not sure what's going on!) But for the time being you can still list URLs of screenshots for your maps. Sorry about this...

Update 2nd March: They're working again now.

Here's a quick list of the best of the week's HL2DM map releases here on the SnarkPit; I'll hopefully be making this into a weekly feature if a lot of good new maps start getting released!

DM Industrial http://www.snarkpit.com/maps.php?map=1760

DM Olphro http://www.snarkpit.com/maps.php?map=1647

DM Pinnacles http://www.snarkpit.com/maps.php?map=1781

DM Rust http://www.snarkpit.com/maps.php?map=1796

Right, we are open for business once again! Apologies for the huge delay, here's the story:

• Our hosts Oktagone apparently didn't pay their bills and so the whole network was shutdown a couple of weeks ago. I found out about this through a forum post at Webhostingtalk after being sent an e-mail from Oktagone telling me that there "had been a power cut." If it hadn't been for this forum post, I wouldn't have found out that I could still get into my site via an alternate IP address and download a backup (which I usually do every 2 months and was due to do when this happened).
• After several days of joining in the screaming on said forums, there was at last some action: an e-mail was to be sent out offering us new hosting options, asking if we wanted to stay with Oktagone, or Ezzi (the company that owns and maintains their servers) or move to another host. I chose to stay with the current hosts until this site was back up and running, and would then consider moving (also due to the fact that the new packages wouldn't be as good as they used to be).
• A few days later nothing was heard, and so some IRC camping was required. It was discovered that Oktagone were building their own datacenter, and our websites would be worked on after they finished putting in the carpet and building their own website. E-mails were sent to their support centre and people were bugged on IRC.
• Wednesday morning, I got an e-mail saying my account was ready to be set up, and it took until Saturday morning until it was all configured correctly.
• And finally, although the DNS has been propagating for the last 24 hours some crazy PHP bug reared up its ugly head, which basically logged you in as other people, which I have now fixed.

So as you can see, I've been having loads of fun these last few days, and I hope you have all spent the time off to work and map! I apologise if the site seems a bit slow- it is now hosted in Australia. Also if you had a pit that needs putting back up, let me know. Thanks!

Update: Big thanks to everyone who's sent me a PM about finding a new host, we've found one and should hopefully be moving in the next few days.

Check out some Valve HL2DM contest maps that a few of our members are working on:

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Merry Christmas from all the staff, happy Half-Life 2 if you got it as a present - and happy mapping!

:beerchug:

For anyone who's interested there's now an RSS feed of all the news posted on this site- both mine and mappers'- which can be viewed here. Please let me know if there are any problems with it.