Ah, memories...

The server these images are hosted on will be disappearing within a few days, so none of these images will work around October 25th. Sorry.

Lots of images in this post. Beware.

Anyways, here's my mapping career in chronological order:



The computer I started mapping on DID NOT have 3D Textured View in Worldcraft 3.3; t'was evil, as I had an ATI video card (which did not like Open GL). Anyways, I made do with what I had and learned some mapping basics, trying to do some simple Sven Co-Op stuff (which didn't turn out too well, without textured view)



Finally I got textured view working in-editor, and my abilities instantly improved drastically. I began doing some more complex things, even though they were never really that good. Still in love with Sven Co-Op though for some reason.



Then I went through a sort of "Counter-Strike" phase, trying to make some CS maps for my friends to play. That obviously never turned out well. This was my first fairly-large map, but I could never get this thing to compile very well.



More Sven Co-Op stuff with that desert/martian theme I love so much. This map looked a little more decent than the others I suppose, but still not really what I would have preferred. I still didn't really show any of my maps to anyone yet.



I briefly experimented with a "comic-book" style of mapping, similar to Buzzy Bots, with simple architecture. Most of the textures in this shot were based off of a Sega Dreamcast game called "Jet Set Radio", which was one of the first cel-shaded games and was a true pioneer.



An experimental Paroxysm map (same modification ReNo's px_selfless is being made for), but this was obviously done more than a year or so ago. It was a jungle theme, taken from de_predator (I loved that map). Unfortunately... Yes, it didn't work out. :smile:



I began working on scale and proportion in my maps (as they were obviously lacking). This was one of my first projects that had a good-feeling scale, with a tall majestic cathedral (even if it was simple looking). I liked it. Textures from the Mike-Zilla pack over at Countermap.



Tried my hand at an NS map when it was getting popular. My attempts were rather bland though... But at least I was improving, which was what really mattered. Some notes to mention is that crater-thing in the floor at the bottom (which I was really proud of at the time). I don't believe I ever got the compile to work on this one...

I did some more Paroxysm stuff (which I unfortunately don't have screenshots of) and got on the ill-fated DarkTruths project. Here's some early screenshots of Epicentre (which you can find in my profile! </shamelesspimpage> :biggrin: )









Half-Life textures didn't suit it. I retextured the cliff with some hacked up textures I made myself:







(The beginning of that screenshot in my profile)

And the rest is, erm, "history".

I'm sure a lot of people could care less about my "mapping" career, but I just found it fairly interesting about how I improved over the years. Also I'm sure that lots of other mappers have plenty of RMF's that never really quite cut it or got released / finished.

But I kept on going! And never gave up, despite all my unreleased and crappy maps! Woohoo!

Ahhh good stuff there. I remember the oldy days. My first attempt at a map was a room with a CT start and a whole in a wall which i'd carved out. Good times. :biggrin:

I don't remember at what stage though i finally started thinking in a proper way and wasn't just making crummy rooms but was able to start creating levels.

My first real attempt at mapping was when i made a pql2 map which was sooo funny though strangely rather good. I had this cool glass corridor going by one room and grunts underneath you and as you ran along the glass was smashing like something out of a film. Good stuff.

I had various other little things like that including a large room with pillars and a reflective floor room and i know now why i couldn't compile it. My chair legs were soooo invalid :biggrin:

I didn't waste any time at all jumping on the DT bandwagoon were i kept improving and found myself in this locked cycle of improvement causing me to constantly have to rework the same map to bring it up to standard(I made a page on my site once which was my DT work through the ages, was rather funny :biggrin: ). DT was were i really started to understand more about the game and things in general like: how vis works, a better understanding of entities, effects and the glory that is custum textures.

I then jumped on the NW bandwagoon were i've truely learnt the most ever and i'm now able to create maps with actual gameplay! OMG WOW. Along with all sorts of things which you learn from being surrounded by uber level designers of doom!

And now i'm trying my hand at MP too with my very own NS map. Booyah!

Meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeemories.

Awsome stuff there

Wow CJ, you only started after 3.3 was out? I assumed you had been doing it for longer. You learnt the way of the rockwork very early in your career it seems, you seem to slot it in even more than I do :biggrin:

I'd love to do a thing like this but unfortunately the oldest RMFs I have are of obsolete. I had some older projects that were much too grand for the HL engine - think boot_camp style layout (lots of ledges etc....) but with non-box buildings :smile: I'll have a dig and see if I can find anything old but I doubt I'll have much success :sad: