DmCore

Did you mean to make this map for a different game?

... like ... *cough*JediKnight*cough*

Hell no!
HLDM forever!

First screenie don't work and the second is too large

Finally the map is done.

I hope you will enjoy it as much as i have doing it :wink: .

Thanks to my friends the result became way over my expectations.

It really feels good to show my map here at this forum and i hope I will continue to do so.

feel free to comment either here or in my profilethingy.

Enjoy :wink: .







Download the map here:

http://home.no/misterbister/maps/DmCore.zip

/me likes theme..

those textures look familiar too :smile:

i would check your profile pics.. 1 doesn't work 2 are the same shot.. and they are so long i have to look on the next page to see it all :biggrin:

800x600 works best.

very sweet looking though.

a word of advice, we love maps, we love maps in progress more than completed maps.. if the fanfare is not exactly what you were expecting, thats prolly it. a few of our members never learned that, and are continually disapointed in our responces.

good luck with your map.

and, welcome to the snarkpit.

Thanks for the info. Ill keep that in mind and ill change the pics on the profile.

Orpheus said:
a word of advice, we love maps, we love maps in progress more than completed maps.. if the fanfare is not exactly what you were expecting, thats prolly it. a few of our members never learned that, and are continually disapointed in our responces.

Aye, that sounds like me, I always get upset about that... someday I'll learn. :rolleyes:

nice idea to use the walllight01 texture for "lightbows". global architecture looks nice and varied, though could be improved a bit for matching with textures here and there (like the transitions between wall and door-openings). for my personal taste i lack contrasting shadows for atmosphere, but i can imagine bright rooms make for a better deathmatch experience

nice job

Very pretty architecture, but all except for the last shot, you're lighting is very flat. I'm not seeing any shadows in the first two pics at all!

Tracer Bullet said:
Very pretty architecture, but all except for the last shot, you're lighting is very flat. I'm not seeing any shadows in the first two pics at all!

might be asking a bit much TB, how could he have shadows, when every square foot of the room has illuminating textures

the outside area has a significant amount less light fixtures :smile:

I think TB's point is that some of the lights could be removed. At least that's how I feel about the map, they're freaking everywhere and don't really appear to light much up outside of the brush itself.

you need not remove any, just decrease the bounces to 1.. make harsher light/dark lines that way.

you can also, decrease the illumination of the light textures, and put light spots close to the floors to make light/dark lines..

So, I downloaded the map?
I was shocked and dismayed to see these w_poly readings; completely unacceptable in a HL1 map. The odd thing was that it didn?t impact performance very much compared to what I experienced in Armada?



I took this shot because it is your very best area in terms of lighting. You see how there is a nice contrast between the red and the white lights? The rest of the level is almost completely lacking on this front.


This is a nice touch that gives the impression of a blindingly bright light in the ceiling? to bad there isn?t a pool of light on the ground to match.


This shot illustrates two things. First, the very good layout you have going here, and second, the absolute flatness of most of the lighting.


I have three words for you: FIX THE LIGHTING!
This could be one of those levels that makes other mappers cry with the desire to create something equally good, but IMO the lighting spoils everything. You just have too many sources that aren?t bright enough. Cut the number of sources you have by half or two-thirds, double their brightness, and become good friends with the light_spot entity. Whether you fix this map, or not take home this lesson: flat lighting = dead disinteresting level.
Oh yes, and fix that r_speed peak!

Tracer Bullet said:
So, I downloaded the map?
I was shocked and dismayed to see these w_poly readings; completely unacceptable in a HL1 map. The odd thing was that it didn?t impact performance very much compared to what I experienced in Armada?

You do realise there are maps out there where the r_speeds sore into the 2500's, and there isn't one bit of lag? :razz: If performance isn't affected, I wouldn't screw around with it then :smile:

a) make something good (or close to)

b) you get comments like these

c) you improve your map

d) we happy

e)you happy

f) we worship thou mapping "skills"

g)you take over world domination

h) to find out that HL2 doesn't have inbuild multiplayer

i) suicide numbers world wide rise out of tha scale

G.Ballblue said:
You do realise there are maps out there where the r_speeds sore into the 2500's, and there isn't one bit of lag? :razz: If performance isn't affected, I wouldn't screw around with it then :smile:

must resist.. must...........resist.

some one else please take over, before i blow a circuit.

what's up doc?

oh well,

don't look at it as two-thousand-five-hundred...

look at it as a number

Ballblue, even I want to slap you for that comment :biggrin:

I concur. That's one of the stupidest things I've ever heard in a while. I would have thought you would know better. :dorky:

Anyone care to explain the problem with my theory?

G.Ballblue said:
Anyone care to explain the problem with my theory?

a) It's your theory.
b) The HL engine was not designed to handle WPolies over 800. It can handle around 1500 at best.

Quadruple post?! I have no clue how this happened... My connection timed out during the post, so bleh.

.

.

that info was so important, that i won't even complain about FOUR posts telling it.

I havn't posted for a while here, and yet I even want to point out how much I want to smack you right now.

It's official. if this wasn't an Internet forum GB would now be a bloody pulp lying on the floor...

... Anyhow I don't think we are going to rehash this subject just for you GB, so give the forums a search for "r_speeds" and I think you'll understand better the kind of land mine you just put your foot on.

irrelevant chemistry thought

Hey GB's initials are the designation for Sarin nerve gas!

Oh, how I love this community's inability to stay focused on the subject of a post, keep up the good work! :biggrin:

Even more important is that if you don't have r_speeds lower than 800 people using software won't be able to play your map. It's important to make maps that can appeal to the largest userbase possible in order to have the best chance of somebody actually playing it.

Completely unrelated: Did you know I can play CS:S with a 3 year old laptop using a geforce2? The wonders of the source engine!

tracer bullet:

That was the absolute best and most detailed critics (how does that spell?) Ive ever heard in my entire life!

Im deeply impressed, and thankful =), that you took your time to
download the map and take screenies and tell me what was wrong with it.

many of my friends says "the map is good but theres something missing" and nothing more.

Thanks to you , and all others who has commented it :wink: , i think that that "something" is the lightning.

I didnt think about it much before but as you said theres just too many lights and too little shadows.

As for the R_speeds i wanted to make something more detailed than i use to do and i know that 1800 is very high

But as you said the fpsdrop wasnt so bad and on my computer (which isnt
a nasa computer by any means) it worked just fine so i didnt care about
it.

But ill think i can tweak it down a little bit.

Thanks for all the comments. You inspired me to continue this work and actually make it even better.

Hugs and kisses.

/MisterBister

MisterBister said:
tracer bullet:

That was the absolute best and most detailed critics (how does that spell?) Ive ever heard in my entire life!
Im deeply impressed, and thankful =), that you took your time to download the map and take screenies and tell me what was wrong with it.

its confirmed TB, you are a success

Orpheus said:

MisterBister said:
tracer bullet:

That was the absolute best and most detailed critics (how does that spell?) Ive ever heard in my entire life!
Im deeply impressed, and thankful =), that you took your time to download the map and take screenies and tell me what was wrong with it.

its confirmed TB, you are a success

i agree, the Armada review was v good too

BlisTer said:
i agree, the Armada review was v good too

i was being slightly facetious.

TB's critiques are very well done..

I have ripped the lightning completely out of the map and started all over again.
Ive been compiling, changed the lights a bit, compiling, changes the lights a bit, in about 3-4 hours now =).
The result is actually very satisfying though far from complete.
at this state i actually dare to say that the lightning is about twice as good as it was before =).
I think I will have time post some screenies tomorrow about the progress.

The outdoor area is currently unchanged but i think ill start to work on that too.
Depends on how good it fits with the rest of the maps lightning.

Glad I could help. It's always an uncertain thing offering critcism because many people don't take it well. It's nice to see that you are not one of those people. The real master of crits around here is Orph, but I don't think he had HL installed anymore... Be that as it may, there are two material ways you can pay me back for my effort. The first you've already done by reacting so well, the second is to pass on the favor to someone else down the road. There are all too few of us who bother anymore, and judging by the general quality of your map, you ought to be well up to the task.

My point about the r_speeds is mostly this: it would be pretty simple to fix. You don't have to drop detail, all you have to do is put a kink in that corridor I was in and your peak should drop to ~12-1300, which is still high but quite accepatable by today's stnadards.

Tracer Bullet said:
, but I don't think he had HL installed anymore...

sadly, no.

i gave my gaming PC to my youngest son.. he is not as fond of HL as i am and uninstalled it while i was away for surgery (during my 3 month hiatus)

i could reinstall it i suppose, but HL2 is so close, and everyone else does a fantastic job at crits now.. shrugs

its about time i stepped down from HL1 critiques.

The first you've already done by reacting so well, the second is to
pass on the favor to someone else down the road. There are all too few
of us who bother anymore, and judging by the general quality of your
map, you ought to be well up to the task.

You don't have to drop detail, all you have to do is put a kink in
that corridor I was in and your peak should drop to ~12-1300, which is
still high but quite accepatable by today's stnadards.

I will do my best to contribute as much as i can to this site since it really rocks =).

The reason why i havent joined this site until now is because the
community i was hanging on called "www.leveldesign.nu" has gone down
due to lack of sponsors. But hopefully it will be up again some day..

I have to ask you this a bit embarrassing question, since in american
grades i have A in english, what the hell does "kink" mean?

MisterBister said:
I have to ask you this a bit embarrassing question, since in american grades i have A in english, what the hell does "kink" mean?

bend it around.. make it less straight.

any shots? i wanna see how this is progressing.

Orpheus said:

MisterBister said:
I have to ask you this a bit embarrassing question, since in american grades i have A in english, what the hell does "kink" mean?

bend it around.. make it less straight.

Well, your english is very good but that is sort of an uncommon word. Orph is perfectly correct, but here is a bit more depth on what I'm talking about:



The blue arrow illustrates the problem. You have a very long sight-line, practically all the way across the map. In order to fix this you need to change the layout in some way. Obviously that's up to you, but the one I have suggested seems easiest to me. By wrapping that hallway around as I have shown you eliminate the very long line of sight.

G.Ballblue said:
You do realise there are maps out there where the r_speeds sore into the 2500's, and there isn't one bit of lag? :razz: If performance isn't affected, I wouldn't screw around with it then :smile:

Truly ridiculous.

any shots? i wanna see how this is progressing.

Sorry i dont have had the time today. Ill throw up the pics tomorrow.

Stay tuned :wink: .

Finally i had time upload the images to my ftp. Well heres what i have done so far:

Note that the pictures are a bit darker than they really are ingame.

I thought that this room is one of the main areas and therefore making this room better would improve the overall impression of the map pretty much.
So i decided to remove lots of the white lights and strengthen the red lites seen to the right which i think made it look much more scary and not so "black and white" anymore.


In this corridor (seen to the left of the pic) I have removed a few lights making the small stair very dark and put some small lights at the sides just to break the darkness a little bit and creating a relly nice atmosphere.


Earlier today i had some time to improve the outdoor area. During the gametests i realized that this place was a bit too dark to be able to spot the enemy. So i increased the strength of the small lights and decreased the light_enviroment to create some nice shadows aswell. Im not really done with this part just yet.


This room gives me a real headache. The lightning just doesnt want to get right.
I have done some adjustments here and there which made it a little better but im still not happy... Suggestions are very appreciated.


Thanks to Tracer bullet who highlighted this problem i chose to make something cool with the holes in the ceiling by removing all the lights around it and putting a strong white light_spot do simulate the light from the hole. This makes it feel a little bit like a lighthouse in the darkness or something like that ^_^. I like the effect pretty much actually and i have done almost the same thing at the other place.


Heres another view of the "main" room. On the right you can see the other lightpool i mentioned above. Here you can see a signifiant differnece in the lightning of this area.
Ive removed almost all the lights in this "corridor" and let the lights from the main room light it up instead to make it look more scary and "atmospheric".


Finally i have taken a picture of the overview to show you the difference of the lightning compared to what i had before.


Other notes:
Because of the removal of so many lights, the compile time has cut down to half (from 1hour and 20 minutes to about 40 minutes). Which is a great thing.
I have also decreased the "bounce" option from 2 to 1 to make more sharp shadows.
Another great thing is that the map looks better than ever before ^_^.
I have uploaded the map to my ftp also so you can download it and take a look at it in its current state.
I have not yet started to fix the r_speeds problem but i have figured out a very simple and clean solution that will not affect the gameplay much at all and doesnt take much time to change either.

Download the map: http://home.no/misterbister/maps/DmCore.ziphttp://home.no/misterbister/maps/dmcore.zip

Comments on the current pictures are very much appreciated.

Some of these points may already have been covered and things, but I
didn't pay attention to other posts when I wrote these down.



These light fixtures are much too bright for the light level of the
area, looks odd. I suggest losing all (or at least most) of these trim
lights in favour of a trim texture around the whole level. That might
be overkill though, judge for yourself I guess.



Watch your texture alignment - nothing major but every little helps :wink:



Would be nice to put some blue output light from the screens - just put
a single blue light_spot, angled about -70 toward the floor, and play
around with its settings to make it look like its from the TV screens.



If you could be bothered, these are calling out for use of an overlay glow texture due to being so large.



HELLOOOOO texture alignment!



Considering the number of red lights, this area is distinctively un-red.



This stretched light texture on the side looks pretty awkward to me.



I like it :smile:



Another place that the blue lighting could look cool.



Very cool area, nice design.



Not keen on this rock texture, but its possibly just been scaled too high.



Lose the rock texture on the ground in favour of some sand or something

• variation is good. Plants look pretty awful sticking out of rock too.

Might wanna stick some subtle glow sprites around these light fixtures
as "halos", but don't make them too obvious (or cassius will eat you
for breakfast :wink: ).



I recommend you change this texture so that it looks unlit by default,
and goes lit on pressing. Also, you should stop it from moving into the
wall (there is a don't move flag in its properties).



I think these inset pipes could look better with a coloured light above
them. The light fixture being hidden by them but the light seeping past
them should look nice.



There is some dodgy clipping issue around this piece of architecture, I
got snagged a lot when quite a distance from any brushwork.

All in all its a nice map with an interesting layout and some good
visuals. A little bit repetitive perhaps (most corridors are very
similar, and the texture set is nice but unvaried) but still cool. Good
job, whether you take many of these comments on board or not :smile:

Oops, double post.

Watch your texture alignment - nothing major but every little helps :wink:

Fixed

Would be nice to put some blue output light from the screens - just put
a single blue light_spot, angled about -70 toward the floor, and play
around with its settings to make it look like its from the TV screens.

I have concidered using lights from the screens and tested it but i dont think it looks good at all..

Not keen on this rock texture, but its possibly just been scaled too high.

Me neither, if someone have a better rocktexture to use i would be happy if you gave it to me =).

Lose the rock texture on the ground in favour of some sand or something

• variation is good. Plants look pretty awful sticking out of rock too.

I wanted it to look like this "facility" ,or whatever it is, has been
blown in the rocks with dynamite, thats why i didnt use a sand texture.

Besides, wtf is wrong with plants on rock? There are rockliving plants you know ^_^.

Might wanna stick some subtle glow sprites around these light fixtures
as "halos", but don't make them too obvious (or cassius will eat you
for breakfast :wink: ).

Fixed (and it looks great too =))

I recommend you change this texture so that it looks unlit by default,
and goes lit on pressing. Also, you should stop it from moving into the
wall (there is a don't move flag in its properties).

I wanted it to be lit all the time so noone would miss it since it is a pretty dark area.

I have carved the wall so that the button slides in a little hole into the wall.

If i would let the button stay it would look truly ridicoulus
(spelling?) since the elevator would go straight through the button,
like a ghost elevator or something.

I think these inset pipes could look better with a coloured light above
them. The light fixture being hidden by them but the light seeping past
them should look nice.

Thanks for mentioning it. though i didnt do it as you wanted =). I put
small red lights at the sides of the pipes instead. And it looks great.

There is some dodgy clipping issue around this piece of architecture, I
got snagged a lot when quite a distance from any brushwork.

fixed thanks to ZHLT beta 3, and your help :wink: .

Thanks alot for highlighting some issues and commenting the map. I truly appreciate it.

And by the way.

I have now fixed the r_speeds issue with my "clean" solution, it took
about 5 minutes and it didnt affect the gameplay at all as I said ^_^.

The r_speedspeak is currently around 1200 instead of 1600.

I will present it later on when im able to take some screenies.

Thanks anyway Tracer Bullet for coming up with a solution, youre a really helpful guy and you deserve credits for that :wink: .

MisterBister said:

Beautiful. I'll definitely add this to my DM collection when you are finished. Everything is looking really good.

Hi again... The map is closing in to completion and currently im adding small details here and there.


Here are the red lights i was talking about, looks pretty good eh?


I have made the red lights in this room making more red light.
The reason why it looked very strange before, as reno mentioned, was because i had accidentaly created an entity light there with default settings ^_^.


Here are a pic on the blue light from the computer screens. Im not relly sure wether i will keep it like that in the final version. Im not relly sure if the blue fitts in the rest of the theme. Please tell me your opinion =P.


If you take a close look i you can see that i have created sprites which creates halos round all the lights. I think it looks pretty good, thanks to ReNo =P.


Ah and here is the major difference (which isnt actually that major :wink: ).
I made the Highlighted corridor about 100 units longer to block the players line of sight and therefore decrease the r_speeds in the problematic area down to about 1200.
I didnt want to change the map too much since i was very happy about the current layout and the "window" where you could kill your enemies before even entering the room.
Changing the map after Tracer bullets suggestion would create a too long boring corridor and I didnt want it like that..
But thanks again Tracer for mentioning it. I actually hadnt noticed it before you told me.

The red lights look ok but I think they are a bit weak - there is
barely any red light being emitted. Might wanna shove some glows on
those as well :wink:

I say the blue tint on the floor from the screens is good - its too
subtle to clash with any colour schemes you have going but adds a small
bit of a realism. I'm for keeping it, but your call.

Nice changes :smile: but don't ruin the utreactorecore thingy where the level is overly white lighted. I kinda liked seeing some of the areas with just the straight white light -- gave things a sense of "technology".

:0 and you actually blocked the line of sight thing? That's guts. When I build something, it STAYs like that -- like it or lump it. Very nice job :biggrin: