de_malta

This is a little map I've been playing around with on and off for a few months. Its loosely based on my holiday to Malta last year. It still needs a lot of work, but I think its finally time to release some piccies and get some feedback, so I would much appreciate all your thoughts on it :biggrin:

This is the town centre/market area:


A back street leading off from the above area:


From here you can make your way inside the houses:



And then down into the cellar:



Note the hole in the wall, in the above picture? This leads to the 1st bomb site, which is a crypt:


From the crypt you can work your way upstairs to the churchyard which is the 2nd bomb site:

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Hello there.

Looks nice so far. I don't like the green lighting. It looks like it's just there for the sake of it and that's always a bad thing.

If however you want the green tinge, you can put a light entity over the room and set it to a very faint green lumen's.

I concur that the lights on the wall look bad in green but the crypt would look neeto remaining slightly green.

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The best things in life, aren't things.

That green light probably comes from the night goggles. :razz:

Overall, looks pretty decent to me. I've got a few grips, namely that the inside parts feel a bit small and too straight/uniform (everything 90-degree, even prop placement). The outside parts, the last two shots especially, feel pretty dusty which is a good thing I think, but they're close to looking monotome concerning colors used. And again, they feel a bit too uniform, too clean.

Other than that, it looks like a solid theme, keep it up! :smile:

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Create-ivity - a game development blog

Captain P said:
That green light probably comes from the night goggles. :razz:

Shows my f**king ignorance in all its glory doesn't it?

Seriously though, I thought the casket/crypt image looked very nice tinged in green.

The rest... was iffy.

Besides, who takes screens with their goggles on anyway? Pretty silly, but it might explain why I didn't catch on.

shrugs

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The best things in life, aren't things.

no the goggles are way green, like neon green.. thats not from the goggles.. so Orph your right on..

The lighting was meant to be more orangey than green to try and get a hot, dusky feel. No, I didnt use goggles :biggrin: Thanks for the feedback so far but can I have more non-lighting based critiques now please :wink:

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Hello there.

I was gonna say yesterday you were wrong Cap'n but if 'I' was wrong I'd look the fool so I hid. A nice looking map by the way.

The lighting was meant to be more orangey than green to try and get a hot, dusky feel. No, I didnt use goggles :biggrin: Thanks for the feedback so far but can I have more non-lighting based critiques now please :wink:

Alright, you asked for it! :biggrin:

[man, I could have sworn I already posted this answer, maybe it's floating around in another, totally different thread where I accidently posted?]

Anyway, I think what your map lacks is a center point, a highlight, a "trademark" if you want. The shots all look very well done but they could be from 4 different maps and not necessarily the most exciting parts of those maps. Right now this map looks "a bit like cs_italy". Add something that brings all the parts of the map together, a unique feature, a piece of architecture that stands out, that people can easily think of as the "Map with the .....". Maybe a church?

Heh, so I was wrong. Ok. :smile:

I believe reaper47 makes a good point too: there's no strong landmarks or unique things to see. I already said it looks monotone because of the limited colors used, but that also counts for other things. The streets and plaza's are fairly empty and flat and it does feel a bit 'standard'. Putting in some height difference (definitely don't make those roads so flat), perhaps up to the point that it becomes a hill village, could help, and placing high, outstanding buildings (like indeed a church) helps giving the map some unique points and they break up the low buildings. Higher stuff is usually also more impressive. :smile:

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Create-ivity - a game development blog

I think the only problem at this point is his presentation. Since there is no download link, you cannot really comment on its focal point. Who's to say that he took a true representation of his entire map with just those screens?

True, the majority of the screens show nothing but hallways but, one cannot really be so sure enough to say the map lacks something until they have been inside it. At least don't sound like thats a certainty.

/methinks it needs a download link, and a critique before it gets much closer to completion to ensure the feasibility of editing.

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The best things in life, aren't things.

That's true, Orph. But, I would assume you take screenshots of the most interesting parts of your map (well, I would). Either way, the shots provided do lack things I mentioned (in my point of view of course :wink: ). But yeah, the lack of focal points or landmarks is indeed discussable for the moment.

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Create-ivity - a game development blog

Thanks again for the feedback. In the past I have had the habit of releasing loads of betas of my maps so am adopting a image-focused approach this time. Dont underestimate how helpful judging a map based on in-game shots actually is, its given me something to think about/focus on without spending loads of time adding the iffy functionality required to play/release the map as a fully fledged beta. I've already made a siginificant restructue to the map which I would no doubt post pictures of soon :biggrin:

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Hello there.

Well, I still wouldn't underestimate the importance of a beta version - it's good for gameplay testing, and that's a thing you want to nail down pretty early since assets take so much longer to create these days. :smile:

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Create-ivity - a game development blog

The PM system works. You can govern who has the beta's.

You can also specify that they not be made public to keep them out of the servers.

Screens are nice, but I trust my own eyes, not yours.. Sorry. Thats not meant to be hateful.

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The best things in life, aren't things.

Yeah I agree with you both. I'd had a few drinks and made my point badly :wink: What I was getting at was I've actually recieved some quite useful stuff to work on based simply on those sets of pictures and I've saved myself the hassle of releasing a beta or 2 before making those changes, which previously I would have done. I'm trying new approaches with this map and 1 of those things is to not release 10 betas of something like I have done in the past. Whether that works out better or worse we will have to see but so far the mapping has been more enjoyable.

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Hello there.

I think betas for non-commercial work (like custom maps) do require much more polished and "finished" releases because they mostly go directly to public. Before using "orange rooms" Valve made lots of little sandbox levels just to illustrate the theme, lighting, texturing, modeling ect and only then started with the actual levels, using bits and pieces from the sandbox. If you release a beta to public you can't really "explain" what it should look and feel like later. You have to show it inside the map already. That means waiting with a beta release for a more fleshed out version of the map makes sense. Sometimes visuals have to be planned as early as the layout (which doesn't mean it's more important). I think (think) that's what SpiKeRs means and I'd agree with that.

I've playtested one of my maps when it was just out of the 'grey-orange' phase. Not a public playtest of course, only with a few friends. It was a helpfull thing indeed. A later playtest on the Snarkpit server gave me valuable feedback as well. The map had then less detail than this map, what I can see from the screenshots. Yet, it wasn't a bad idea at all.

I agree that releasing 10 beta's is probably overkill for us amateurs, though some companies seem to playtest much more extensively than that even before any real assets like models or textures are being made. I also agree visuals can (and for best results, should) be planned in beforehand.
Anyway, my point is: you'll need early playtesting to get the gameplay good from the start. Visuals can be judged by screenshots easier, but that's finally not the backbone of a good map (which doesn't mean it's not important, but what's cream without a cake underneath? :wink: ).

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Create-ivity - a game development blog

Based on the feedback I've gone and hacked up a few places. Was gonna release a beta but I'm going away so I'll put up a few shots of what I have worked on so far.

This is the churchyard again. I've made it larger and added the foliage in the middle. This hopefully goes someway to resolving the repetitiveness of the colours here and adds a bit of extra cover. The lighting and skybox is also different and much more fitting a mediterranean setting I hope.


This is the crypt. Again its slightly larger. Ive changed some of the textures and made the roof arched which should fit in with the setting better.



<br style="color: white;">The cellar again. Hopefully I've sorted out the "box with props" thing that was going on before<br style="color: white;">


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Hello there.

This is looking great :biggrin: The only thing I can criticise from your new
pics is the first one, it's only a small point but it could benefit
from a more 3d skybox, with some extra houses or mountains.

I'm looking at your shots and the only thing I can think of is pure beautiness. Then again there's something missing. But I think I know what it is now: floor detail

I once read about a guiding principle for architects that goes something like this: 1 millimeter on the floor is 1 decimeter on the walls and 1 meter on the ceiling. If you don't like meters it just means that floor detail is more important than wall detail and - obviously - much more important than ceiling detail.

Add some detail (it can be a flat border of another texture) to the floor. In all three shots the floor looks almost like an ocean of nothingness which you don't notice immediately because the walls and ceilings have excellent detail already.

My favourite maps intentionally have something surprisingly detailed on the ceilings. But ultimately, it's the attention to the floor that makes the looks. It gives the map consistency. It's not even about a million billion polygons. Giving enough attention to the floor can result in 5 more polygons - but them in exactly the right spot. Maybe you should try that.

Was gonna release a beta today but its taking longer than I thought and it was hogging the comp so it looks like being a leave-overnight job. Will just release some final pictures, this time to show how the outside area has changed (hopefully for the better :smile: )



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Hello there.

Sex on a plate tbh.

Here is ze dl linkie to beta 1:
http://www.mallosworld.co.uk/map/de_malta_b1.zip

It includes a nav file so you can run around with the bots :biggrin: Please give me as much feedback to work with as possible, ta!

(The pictures are more or less the same as in my last 2 posts so refer to them if you want a idea of how it looks)

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Hello there.

It looks good:), i didn't play it with bots or friends yet, but i'm sure it will play nicely!

Great job!

I don't really play CS:S so I didn't try this with bots or players, but I had a look around anyways.

The architecture and - especially - texturing work are really great. Indoors, everything feels very realistically dirty - trash on the floor, stains on the walls of varying sizes and shapes, wood splinters. The texturing choices indoors look absolutely great. Outdoors - same. Dirt, stains, streaks. Very good texturing out here as well, quite varied and realistic. I liked the architecture as well, quite detailed but not overdone.

I did notice a few things that you should keep in mind for your next map. One - I noticed two chairs outside floating almost a foot off the ground. Two - there were several places (pile of logs, wagon, hand railing) where I could jump on top of and see over the edge of the map, to a lot of nodrawed faces etc. Try to clip these areas off or raise the walls a bit next time. Three - I saw several radiators (heaters) sitting on the ground, which is rather unrealistic.. try raising them up half a foot and making them motion disabled/asleep.

Regardless of a few small visual problems that I doubt most players will even notice, the map looks great and I'd bet it plays quite well. Nice job!