dm_powersurge

I hope you guys like my map. Here is a few pictures of it but they are old, Give it a test.

http://stu.aii.edu/~crw152/dm_powersurgebeta50000.jpg

http://stu.aii.edu/~crw152/dm_powersurgebeta50001.jpg

atrocity.vertexninjas.com

Read More link isn't working.

http://www.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=196638
this is the right link
Good job, by the way

Lighting is really bland, and its hard to pick out the brushwork cause everything blends together, there is no contrast. I also believe that this might be a little to open. And we would be better for a different gameplay style.

3- points to remember while doing a DM map.

-Layout

-weapon layout

-and Z-axis action

Looks pretty good, try adding some subtle lighting outside to give it some contrast. Give us some closer screenies too:)

Ohhhhhh perty, hehe, very nice!

Indeed it is very open, but it also has its closed spots too. I'm sick of all Dm maps being all closed in and small. Like I sad those screenshots are old, and that version of the map on my site had some problems, but alot of people on the steam forums seem to like it.

Thanks, I'm compiling again now, so I will have updated screenshots. Probably better looking pics tonight.

The reason people on Steam forums like it is because they don't know
the first thing about a good map. We, on the other hand are far more
critical of people's work.

I do like your map, but I can't see much, it's far too dark. Either a)
Increase the light_environment brightness or b) add some lights
outside. Adding lights outside could also be good to direct people to
important places.

Overall I like the map though, but I do agree with Crackerjack as the lighting is very bland.

I think the trouble is all the textures tend to blend together especially using that light too, brown walls, brown roofing and orange light:/ Tends to make it a bit wishy washy. The map looks good, just try work on some lighting:) oh and more pics please;)

That gigantic danger sign in the first pic looks odd.

Looks not bad so far. Obviously as others said the lighting needs some
serious work, and it would help if you modified the outside cliffs to
stop them being, essentially, the sides of a box. Vary their height in
particular.

I've been compiling this map for a while, it takes a while to get to the final stages of vis its been on 9... fir a while, I still see flucuation or what ever word im looking for,in my cpu useage, did it freeze or is it taking forever?

Fluctuation?

It's just taking a while. To quicken your VIS time, use some hint brushes, areaportals, occluders, or even just func_detail some things to reduce splitting and leaf creation.

yeah I didn't now what word I was going for..... sorry. But I'll need to read up on how occluders, and area portals work unless some oen has somethign they can copy paste into here.

<DIV class=quote style="WIDTH: 87.51%; HEIGHT: 131px">
<DIV class=quotetitle>? quoting RabidMonkey777</DIV>
<DIV class=quotetext>Fluctuation?

It's just taking a while. To quicken your VIS time, use some hint brushes, areaportals, occluders, or even just func_detail some things to reduce splitting and leaf creation.</DIV></DIV>
Monkey can you explain What all of these do and how to use them. Would appreciate it:)

Go to the official SDK and read up on them. Its not the best documentation in the world but it covers the basics.

http://www.valve-erc.com/srcsdk/Levels/performance_and_visibility.html

i think i get it now, cs map = better if open for snipers n realism n sutch, dm maps = need to be close so u can run into someone around the corner and blow head off!!!!!

atrocity.vertexninjas.com/pictars/dm_powersurge_preview.rar

Well it's finished and submitted. Here are 2 pictures of the final version.

http://atrocity.vertexninjas.com/mappics/dm_powersurgefinal0001.gif
http://atrocity.vertexninjas.com/mappics/dm_powersurgefinal0005.gif

Hope you guys like it, before you rip it apart =/

Over 300kb per image? Thats why you never use gif's for screenshots :razz:
Also, use either [*url] or [*image] (without the asterisks) to post links
or images respectively - figured you'd know all of these things by now
to be honest!

Screenshots don't look bad, but I really dislike the fog. In my opinion
it just makes everything look really washed out. The spotlights in the
second shot don't look to originate from the actual lights either.

The fog was corrected so it doesn't wash everything out, I don't have the final map to update the pics. I should know the link thing but I forget things from time to time. Sorry for size didn't realize they were that huge.

here's what to do, change the skybrush to a darker, nighttime picture. This is about power, and what better way to imply electricity than LIGHTS! Also if it is dark outside, no one will notice the REALLLY blocky cliffs (i am not insulting, I am saying that you can keep the cheaper cliffs and cut down on the lag in your map[lag that would happen if you made the cliffs really elaborate])

Powersurge is just the name. It takes place at a more or less decaying Dam. I did make the cliffs lower displacement because of the issues with FPS. I would also try nightime but it seems a lot of people are making nighttime maps.

It's to late to change things now. Thanks for the comments though.

Doesn't look finished. Theres a lot of tweaks that could be done.

When you have a really huge open map Details and tweaking can be a problem.

What do you think needs to be tweaked?

It's a nice looking level but imo far too big, open and empty.

I appreciate that you can't add much more to it for players to use as cover as it'll further decrease performance, but atm this is heaven for crossbow & magnum snipers and I imagine not much fun for the rest. If an opponent has a crossbow or magnum all you can do is jump & strafe around like a madman and hope he runs out of ammo - the sheer potential distance between opponents means that even the MGs aren't much use outside.

Also, you really do need to limit visibility between the two main open areas. Performance is really poor. My PC (P4 2.4, 512mb, FX5600) was chugging along at 10fps running around by myself - I wouldn't be able to even play this online at all. You can still keep the nice feature of being on the dividing dam-type structure and look into either of the open areas, but rather than direct visibility you can require players to run the other side of a vis-blocking wall to change to the other open area.

Sorry for all these negative sounding comments. Like I say, it looks nice and the ambience is good, but it's enormous size is a major problem imo.

Nah thanks for the comments. I'm not sure why it ran so bad. I play online with a p4 1.6 Ghz 512 ram and have no problems. Who knows. I guess I tried but failed horribly. I got some ideas on how to improve the FPS a lot but haven't had the chance to impliment them cause I don't know, if we are susposed to mess with our maps after we submit them or not.

I ran into some similar problems with my contest map. Not knowing the limits of hl2 yet, and my natural tendancy to push more towards the grandiose, my map ended up being far too big, bloated, and hungry for the ole fps.

I'm currently in the process of chopping off my favorite portion of the map, and making a smaller map centered around that area. The result should be something much more playable, size and performance wise.

Screw the contest. If your map has obvious problems (like mine did), the chances of you winning are fairly slim anyway. Go to town on that sucker. Rip it apart, until you have something really solid that plays well and looks great. All the heartache this map has given you, after dozens of revisions and major renovations, will only make your next map that much stronger. I see lots of people give up on maps and just start over...while this is not a bad thing, it is also good to have a couple of real nightmare projects that you have to beat into submission, and you are determined to do right, even if it means tearing apart what you thought was a final map.

Very motivating my friend.