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aaron_da_killa said:Shame that you lost your post
I lost my post
Anyway, its defiantly improved since last time. Here are some points:
-The map is still full bright! Not exactly sure why your doing that but its a good idea to do rough brush work first (which is finished), than add in basic prop placement and lighting so you can start to see the composition of the map and reiterate over that. Doing the brush work first, finalizing it, than doing prop placement, finalizing it, than doing lighting... that's not a real good idea.
-The map was fairly linear, it was pretty obvious there was one path to follow. Perhaps add some more rooms or spaces that aren't essential in the map, but give the player an opportunity to explore. Remember on occasion to reward the player for their exploration.
-The map still does not have a defanate consistent theme, it looks like a mixture of industrial and residential and that's not very appealing. Let's look at the Nova Prospekt interiors. You may notice that they use a very specific range of props and textures aswell as lighting and architecture and even sound design! The mixture of these 5 elements are used very consistently and it makes it a very strong theme.
The Nova Prospect interiors probably have a few sub themes such as:
-Jail Cells
-Control Room
-Kitchen/Cafeteria
-Laundry
These sub themes have similar properties such as lighting and texture choices which make them work well together, and it keeps it fresh when your running through the Nova Prospekt chapter, just running through the Jail cells would be boring as hell!
I'm not saying that you should copy the Nova Prospekt theme or a theme from Half-life 2, but you need to define a main theme for your map or a section of your map such as for example "Abandon casual industrial interior that has now been overrun with the combine", than your sub themes, like "Corridors, storage room, basement" or whatever. But remember, you need to be consistent in those 5 aspects and it needs to make sense.
Hopefully that all makes sense.
I always hate it when that happens. You just send it and then when it comes up "This webpage cannot be displayed" you realise that very moment that you have been caught out by that bug again. What I tend to do is copy my message before I posted it, I know it won't ease the frustation, though it is useful to get into the habit of.
Don't you ever get to the forums and see a new thread and think to yourself "Oh, that is new I'd better have a look at it" and then afterwards think "Hmmm, maybe not, I don't want to get involved in that right now" and then not get round to it?everything looks good in the screens except for that stairwell in pic 3, that is just wrong. If it absolutely must go there change the orientation of the surrounding walls so they line up, and create a bit more space around it for gameplay options.Thanks for taking the time to help me with my map. Yes-I knew something didn't look right with the stairs in that room. I think I was trying too hard with that room not to make it feel boxy. Originally I wasn't gonna have a staircase in that room, I think that is why it looks like it does. When I was building it, I knew it didn't look right but I couldn't line it up on the same angles as the room because it wouldn't snap to the grid. So basically it was a brush nightmare! I have made more room towards the left side by moving the wall brushes, but that is the best I can do in that department of the map. I guess it will just have to be accepted as one of the quirks of the map. Hopefully people will see it as a charmful feature
Also on your ramped surfaces change the texture to either plain concrete or something like the black textured train floor, looks odd with the continuation of tiles like that
I experimented with your suggestion of putting a normal concrete texture on there but it didn't look any good to me. I will use the same picture in my original post to compare to a picture where the slopes have been changed to concrete:
Flynn said:Yeah I do and I guess thats what prevents me from posting multiple times on a daily basis, but I do like running around in other peoples work and commenting and such, and I like to hang out on the pit
Anyway, aaron, how is it that you are so consistant with replying? Whatever the reason I am sincerely grateful smiley Don't you ever get to the forums and see a new thread and think to yourself "Oh, that is new I'd better have a look at it" and then afterwards think "Hmmm, maybe not, I don't want to get involved in that right now" and then not get round to it?
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Flynn said:Fair enough, I guess everybody has a different approach to mapping. I just think that its kind of better to see everything together so you get a good Idea of how everything is going to look right from the beginning. I mean, I tried once to do things in a specific order and I found that I was spending too much time trying to think how things would look if there was lighting, and if there was props and such, and I ended up changing it in the end anyway.
On your initial point, I said in the first post why the map is full bright, essentially because I would like to do the brush work, decal placement and prop placement before going into the lighting stage.
Flynn said:I'm not trying to say that your map is completely linear, but I think it could be less linear, and I'm talking in terms of layout, not architecture or gameplay, those are different types of things. Linerality isn't exactly frowned upon in maps, but non linearity is generally a good thing, you want to make the player think that they are choosing their own path through the world and there are many tricks you can deploy to make them feel like this as best as you can such as:
What you are saying about the map feeling fairly linear, I can't help but beg to differ with this. Near the begining after coming out of the maintainence rooms you can go into a room which has doors in it and a room with a collapsed roof and debry in it. In the hallway with the headcrabs coming out of the hole in the ground there is also a maintainence type room which has an electric conduit in it which hurts you if you go too near it. When you go into the maintainence corridors which has the Combine generator in it and then come out into the main room you can go through a short corridor to get to the hallway with the headcrabs coming out of the floor again. In the same room, there is also a broken lift which the player can use by pressing the button and the thing frying. Then, again, in the bit after the automatic stopping and starting fan there is yet another maintainence room which the player can go into. Since starting this post I have made a small corridor loop to add to the areas that the player can go to.
haymaker said:Actually I was going to mention this but I forgot. I don't think there is anything wrong with stairs being there, but the stairs are at an awkward angle, you have the hallway going at a 45 degree angle than you have stairs going at a 90 degree angle. I think if you rotate that whole stair setup 45 degrees counter clockwise it would be better.
everything looks good in the screens except for that stairwell in pic 3, that is just wrong. If it absolutely must go there change the orientation of the surrounding walls so they line up, and create a bit more space around it for gameplay options.
It just looks like it was added like an afterthought. The player can't even fit between that and the console. I would figure this problem is pretty obvious (besides it looking really bad)... aaron_da_killa said:I highlighted that last part because that's the part I highly agree with. Just because there is a button at the end to open a door, doesn't mean you've rewarded the player. Rewarding the player means giving them something they didn't need. So, don't forget about item pickups...
The map was fairly linear, it was pretty obvious there was one path to follow. Perhaps add some more rooms or spaces that aren't essential in the map, but give the player an opportunity to explore. Remember on occasion to reward the player for their exploration.
I can tell it by the C.P.U. fan spinning up because I have a laptop. It is a sickening realisation, to put it in a dramatised way 
aaron_da_killa said:Normally I do it the way you described in your previous post, but I found there were so many glitches just with the brushwork the first few times so I decided this time I would keep it simple. The problem is with this method I don't get the "feel" as I would if I had it all decaled up with props and lights etc. I will probably revert back to the old method after not too long.
Fair enough, I guess everybody has a different approach to mapping. I just think that its kind of better to see everything together so you get a good Idea of how everything is going to look right from the beginning. I mean, I tried once to do things in a specific order and I found that I was spending too much time trying to think how things would look if there was lighting, and if there was props and such, and I ended up changing it in the end anyway.
aaron_da_killa said:There is a blocked off hallway before the vent shaft with the stopping/starting fan in it
I'm not trying to say that your map is completely linear, but I think it could be less linear, and I'm talking in terms of layout, not architecture or gameplay, those are different types of things. Linerality isn't exactly frowned upon in maps, but non linearity is generally a good thing, you want to make the player think that they are choosing their own path through the world and there are many tricks you can deploy to make them feel like this as best as you can such as:
-Non playable spaces that the player can see but not get to, and you had a few of those. The more the better but don't let them come at the expense of actual playable areas.
-Paths that branch off from the main pathway through the map that offer players an opportunity to explore the world a bit more. And you had a few of these, but I think you need to work on this a bit more, up the scope and scale of these "alternate areas".
-Closed doors/blocked off or closed pathways, you don't want to be having plain/bare hallways and plain rooms, you want to be having doors and other pathways along the way that the player can't venture down aswell. Try to imagine that the environment your creating is real, how will people enter and exit, what will each place be used for and such.
And you mentioned the collapsed roof and the debris, you need to smooth out that displacement a bit, its very spiky, perhaps make the radius of the "displacement paint brush" larger when you work on it next time.
Including that there are a few places that the player can see but not reach.aaron_day_killa said:I cannot move those stairs without making major changes to the area before them and the room that they lead up into. Also rotating it that way would mean that I have to line up the vertices of the brushes to the grid which would change their shape slightly.
Actually I was going to mention this but I forgot. I don't think there is anything wrong with stairs being there, but the stairs are at an awkward angle, you have the hallway going at a 45 degree angle than you have stairs going at a 90 degree angle. I think if you rotate that whole stair setup 45 degrees counter clockwise it would be better.
Riven said:A cheap trick? That's strange, I felt that it was a really nice effect that made the map come alive so to speak. I personally think it looks really good.
Now that I have time during my break, I can sit down to type up some long crits now, yay!
Here we go...
I'll start from the beginning; never let the player get hurt in order to learn something. The steam coming from the floor as soon as you walk over it is a cheap trick that will only upset a player. They have no idea it's there and yet as soon as they pass over it (unknowingly) they get half their life taken away (or killed). These are grounds for a player to quit your map right then and there. Rule of Thumb, always present obstacles a player can foresee and plan for. If an obstacle can hurt a player never make the damage necessary. There should be a way to get around the obstacle without taking damage. If the player must take damage in order to pass the obstacle, make sure their well prepared for it.
Riven said:The reason you cannot destroy those crates is because they are mission critical crates. If they were destroyable and were destroyed it would be impossible to continue the game without cheating. I made metal crates out of brushes but they killed the player when stepped on, and besides, they didn't really look as good as the wooden ones.
-Why can't I destroy some of the early crates I come across in the map? You can't ignore the fact that most of your players will have already played Half-Life 2 and will be used to those game mechanics. If a crate cannot be destroyed (which they can in HL2) then make sure there is a reason why, or make it evident that these crates are different than regular crates.
Riven said:For every door which is locked I have chosen a sound which has the word "locked" in the name. Maybe they just sound like a door opening sound to you?
-For doors with a handle on them that are locked, make sure they have a 'locked' sound to them and not a unlock sound when a player goes to use them. This was kind of confusing for me at first, until I understood the problem.
Riven said:Okay
-Some of your doors are partially open, but unmovable. This will only confuse a player. Partially open doors imply entrance. Why would a door with a handle that was already partially opened not open all the way for a player wanting to use it? This doesn't make sense at all. Closed doors that a player cannot go through, should be closed. Believe me, if you're trying to add depth to the env. by having them partially open so you can see into them a little, it doesn't affect much. It's better off closing them all the way. This will keep the player from wasting time on something that adds nothing to the gameplay value but only deceives the player into thinking so.
I can understand that. I was just trying to find a middle ground between doors closed and doors open. I didn't want to have too much of the same thing. I guess I could have some doors open, some with just one open, and some partially open which can be then fully opened.
Riven said:I prefer the force field at a 45 degree angle. I can see it is not quite like that in the picture though so I will go back and fix that after building this post.
For your Combine gate:
[IMG]http://i158.photobucket.com/albums/t103/Riven_bucket/corr_riven1.jpg[/IMG]
Go ahead and move the gate stalls so that they line up on the 90 degree mark instead of on the diagonal like that; That just looks weird and not very well planned. Also, I saw the game before I noticed the button, and I had backed up into the button knocking it off (instead of grabbing it with use). Make it to where the player can't accidentally knock off the button in order to open the gate.
You can't get to the side of the force field with the plug without without deactivating the force field by shooting the plug from the other side or throwing a grenade. So the player knocking off the button is not a problem as since it will already have to be knocked off in order to get to that side.
Riven said:Riven, I have play tested this map loads of times and have always manag
The big pipe here:
[IMG]http://i158.photobucket.com/albums/t103/Riven_bucket/corr_riven2.jpg[/IMG]
-Is completely in the way of the console that the player HAS to press. Come on
-Also, I understand the monitor shows that the door will open if you press a button, but it would also help the player to know that the door will open. Add a red to green light above the door that switches when the player presses the button. That way the player will know instantly what they have just done.
Edit: Those stairs that you that said had steps which are too wide have been changed. They are now 8 unit tall and 8 units in. What's up with the forum it's not allowing me to edit my posts after half an hour
) there will be a text file with a story. So things that might not make sense in the map at the moment will when it has a story to go along with it. Unfortunately in the outside area the concrete in the skybox is lit differently from the concrete in the normal part of the map. Also I have set max audible distance for some ambient_generics and unchecked "play everywhere" but they are still playing all around the map Here are four screenshots to entice my fellow Snarkpit members: