First ever Xenophobia screenshts!

Hey all,

I know I've been talking alot about it but never gave you any reason to listion. I reamimber an old Vash qote "I havent even seen this so called great mod!" Well now thanks to years of research by the Black Mesa scientists we have extracted some behind the senes screenshots of the first intro level!!

BEHOLD!

This is the first room you see after you get out of the train.



This is entering the hallway (I havent put the door in yet.)



And up the stairs we go, notice the hanging light incorperated into the pipe supports. :smile:



And here is my yet to be finished reception room, you will comeback here lots of times.



And finally this is what the Barneys at the Xen ficility look like.



So what do you think? Please respond Reno!

<DIV class=quote>
<DIV class=quotetitle>? quoting half-dude</DIV>
<DIV class=quotetext>Please respond Reno!</DIV></DIV>

Well, I'm certainly no Reno, but here's my response:
It's actually looking pretty nice, half-dude, though perhaps this would be better suited to the Maps forum.

Agreed! Moved :smile:

LOL, how can I deny you of a response when you asked so nicely :biggrin:

Anyway, as Cass said, this is looking really pretty good. Without
meaning to put you down, its a damn sight better than I had expected,
and it goes to show just how far you've come on.

The first room shows some nice architecture and you've got a decent
spread of lighting colours and brightness. My main concern about that
room is the exceedingly dark horizontal band between the first and
second wall segments all around the room - what number of light bounces
are you running in RAD?

Second shot is a little plain but good enough for what it is - could I
suggest tweaking the lighting a little, so that the yellow spotlight is
a light_spot that leaves a definable circle on the ground? Could also
benefit from either a larger plant, or perhaps more than one of them,
as it seems like a grand planter for such a small plant.

I like the style you've got going in the stairwell shot and it looks to
have quite a bit of overhead detail, but I can't quite make out what
I'm looking at from the angle. At any rate, there is nothing to really
criticise here, though you might wanna try adding some accent lighting
up at the ceiling to see how it looks.

The reception room is probably my favourite area, though the overly
simple roof sorta detracts from it. The architecture in here looks
solid and meaningful, and the texture on the second wall level, though
looking rather blurry and stretched, actually works quite nicely in
this setting. It could be improved by making the lighting more sourced
(it currently feels like its just "there" as opposed to coming out from
your sources), improving the ceiling, and adding in some functional
details (benches, reception desk, planters, etc...), but even as is its
a nice looking room.

Last shot, well its not really worth commenting on really now mate :biggrin:

All in all though, it really looks like your doing a good job on this,
so congratulations :smile: I don't think you need to have any paranoia about
not being able to handle the extra detail of the source engine, as by
the looks of things you'll get by admirably. Keep it up.

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Sorry Gwil for putting it in the wrong spot, I was gona put it in maps but I guess I forgot lol.

Thank you for the nice comments, I've actually havent been mapping for a while becouse I thought I sucked. But now I feel refreashed and ready to go. Whats better is that all the things that you said to change were things that I was planing on changing anyway so woot! I can see how you coud wonder why the lighting is that way without being able to move around its hard to tell, I posted a picture showing you what going on there.

Since this is supposed to me an underwater lad I was planing to put up some big windows on the roof over the stairs. The reason the light in the reception is as you say "just there" is becouse it is indeed just that, I had to put four light entitys in there becouse I didnt have enough light sources yet, hopefullly after I make the below revisions it will have more light.

Nice diagrams. Seems to be a section and a plan showing light rays. As Reno said use light spots and sprites on the lights.

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OK reno, I've worked on the reception and this is what I have so far.

Too much contrast, work it back a little so that you can actually SEE
some more of the room. Its good to have the floor being brighter than
the rest but at the moment, most of the room isn't getting any lighting
at all. Which leads me to ask - are you running your compiles
correctly? Could you post your compile log here, as it looks like you
aren't getting any light bounces.

you know what? i have ignored this thread in the hopes that someone, ANYONE would mention the screen shots, but god dammit, 1/2 a f**king meg for one is just to much.

if you guys are not going to say a damned thing, AND YOU BOTH ARE ADMIN!!!!!

the nearly 300k ones slid right past you and now 500K and not a damned word. shame on you both.

you two, most of all are the ones making me look like an asshole.

You know Orph, for a minute there I thought you were going to mention
the name wasn't appropriate, which is what I've been thinking since it
was posted. You might want to look up the word xenophobia in the
dictionary half-dude before you settle on the name, as it might offend
some and give others the wrong impression. It could be interpreted as
being some kind of racist game. Just a suggestion, as I suppose it also
refers to things that are "alien", that being a fear of. You might want
to make that clear though.

Map isn't not looking too bad either :smile: .

Orph, I've got 2mb ADSL, the pictures loaded quick enough that I
thought they were an ok filesize. I don't just look at filesizes for
s**ts.

Strangely enough, some of us really don't give a toss. I'm on 56k now and don't really mind- I, like many other people, will just do something else or read the text while they load.

both of you think real hard on what you typed. real hard.

i am so ashamed. both of you kicked me right in the face. and blew it off with the most pathetic excuses i have ever seen. under any other circumstances, one or both would have at least said "oops"

i have taken a lot of s**t for believing in weird things, but file sizes is not weird. the fixation on it may be, but the subject is not.

all i can say is, now i know exactly where i stand around here.

till all the admin "give a toss" do not ask anything of me again.

Er, I don't think we ever did. All I would ever ask is that you critique what's IN people screenshots, and leave pointing our their filesizes as a small aside, rather than making it into a crusade. Sure, half a mb is too big and half-dude hasn't really shown himself to be master of screenshots, but the only map comments I read from you these days are links to your screenshot-reducing tutorial.

Lep walks in with his halo on, and wants to believe that no one sees it perched on a set of horns

Why do you want to play the stupid games? Lets see how big a hole we can dig a popular event in the UK?

Now I have to ask, do you admin not communicate with each other at all? I was specifically ask to please stop complaining about file sizes, and simple post a link to my tutorial and leave quietly. I will not state which admin told me this, he can i hope speak up for himself, but the point is, you guys have this annoying habit of putting me in a position of "a rock and a hard place"

I am so tired of looking like the asshole, when all it boils down to is a lack of support from those in charge. it doesn't matter if any of them feel its important to them, what is important is the fact that it is important to someone so must be addressed. I doubt for a second that it has even dawned on any of you that if i detected a bit of effort in controlling this issue, that i would shut up about it completely. I accept the fact that no one asked me to crusade around here and point this out. I accept that no one asks me to create images that are the best they can be when i write my critiques. but the fact is, setting an example must be done by somebody.

I get the distinct impression that the only reason its not a priority is because its me, not that its unimportant an issue, but because i take it to a level that no one else would care to. As sad as that sounds.

yes, you will ask me to do something, either "play nice" or "shut up" but yeah, you will ask. the answer will "NO"

now go back to your hole and dig on i some more, but i am done with the topic. in fact, i think i will deliberately post 1 meg screens until its important enough to address. perhaps i won't but i am considering it. :/

I try not to take sides in arguments like this, but I'm going to back
Orph in this one - even if it is just for trying to keep him at the
SnarkPit, since I reckon he's worth having as a member of the community.

File sizes don't normally matter and shouldn't, but for us
56k-ers who still have pay-as-you-go for internet costs, we won't
really want to have to download that sort of thing whilst also clawing
away desperately at the latest Windows update in the background. I
can't say I'm quite as extreme as Orph in this, but I share his view
that screenies should really be down-sized. I use the GIMP, and that
can cut file sizes considerably even on 85% quality.

On a side note, I come from the "can't we all just get along" clan.
Fine, people disagree, and it's unrealistic to think that no one will
disagree with what somebody says, but perhaps we should try to be
slightly more diplomatic. For example, somebody here recently expressed
a political view that I strongly disagreed with, and I was ready to
absolutely nail them with points about how their party would abolish
mandatory life sentences for murder and would abolish local church
schools etc, but he was entitled to his opinion, and for all I know his
family might have voted for that party for hundreds of years - it
wasn't up to me to decide.

/2cents

/loveandpeaceorelse

Anyway, back to the map, the screenies do reveal one main point, which
is the textures on the windows in the latest screen are repetitive. Try
scaling up the textures. (Heh, look at this point compared to the rest of my post - not strictly relevant is it!)

2000+ members, and I don't get on well with only one of them. Obviously I'm a power mad crazy man who likes to pick on people. sighs And Loco, it takes a lot more than whinging over file sizes to make me want to ban someone

Half-dude, sorry for dragging this off-topic. Your crazy round light looks quite cool (I can't comment otherwise, HL1 makes my eyes burn!)

Lep, don't apologize to half dude like you are doing something noble. you are being an asshole and if you don't know it, everyone else still does.

this attitude you have "its my sandbox and I'll tell you if and when you can make a castle in it " is bulls**t.

no one, most especially me will begrudge you the rights you have as owner. hell i would defend you to my dying breath AND be honored to do it, but you have this horrible habit to chose the wrong side of things. most especially when i am on the other side.

this image topic, consider,... if the screens are optimized, EVERYONE WINS. if they are not, some lose. why the f**k would you ever consider defending it, even if its with an air of total indifference?

i appreciate loco's defense, but have to wonder, by the way he typed, would he have said anything if he had a connection as great as mine? BTW, i am still on 1.5 Mbps DSL.. so every f**king time i see the load status bar appear, i KNOW SOMETHING IS WRONG .. i do not go looking for over sized screens. and am insulted if anyone would think otherwise.

I would have you consider this however, i would be willing to push this till you had to ban me, just to win. i consider this a topic worthy enough to do exactly that. so consider your next move. continue to pawn this off as my fixation and we will see how long it takes for my departure.

i am not threatening you, i have no powers to do so, but i can reduce this forum to misery before i leave.

i am not the enemy, stop making it sound as if you are going out of your way allowing me to stay :/

And Loco, it takes a lot more than whinging over file sizes to make me want to ban someone

I know, it's just that in the same way that members arrive, some
members leave. I seem to remember something about people leaving the
Pit before. And Orph, I would kill for a connection like yours! :biggrin:

Anyway, enough said. Let's just leave this and get on with commenting
on the map. This is my last post on the topic - I don't really want to
get dragged into anything (despite, I will admit, having tried to put
myself into the "discussion" in the first place - i r teh muppet).

btw, there seems to be a large white block in the top corner of that
screen, but it doesn't seem to be lighting much. Might want to (re)move
it.

/2cents

/loveandpeaceorigetshot

The last screenshot with the large windows looks strange. Did you
sharpen it or something? If so, don't in the future; it's not an
accurate representation of what players will see in-game and only
complicates commenting/critique-ing.

I agree with Reno in that you should brighten up the rest of the room.
There's almost no use for walls if the player can't see them! :smile: Think
about what lighting would be practical in a lab setting! Also, make it
feel more populated - chairs, more monitors, equipment carts, whatever.
Right now it's a relatively empty, illogically lit room... But
definately a good start! :wink:

Ok, Im not going to get in your argument Orph sence it seems that you and Lep have been at this for some time. But please don't ruin my topic becouse of it. I apologize for the huge I didnt even check the size. I'm using Irfan View and I do a batch conversion on them to *jpg. If you know how I can get a smaller size I change my evil ways.

I personally like Lep as an Admin. I mean think of what he gives us, our own profiles with all our own control panels. He also cares about what you want, he even lets you send him e-mails for complaints. He's also always upgrading to make it easier for its users. KEEP UP THE GOOD WORK LEP.

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Some images in this post have been automatically down-sized, click on them to view the full sized versions:

Ok reno,

I've ran VIS for the first time on this map. Now that black line you hated is GONE!



I've also added some new lights in the reception I like it.

OMFG...

Wow! Really like the second screenshot there. Only criticism of it is
that you might want to rethink that white light texture - it looks
fairly incongruous there. I really like the circular "halo" light.
Again, you might want to scale up the texture on the windows, as it
looks a bit repetitive. The only danger is scaling it up too far so
that it looks "pixelly", but that shouldn't be a problem unless the
windows are truly enormous.

And after the brief debate above, you might want to reduce the size of
the first one. I just put the same screenie through irfanview, and
reduced the jpeg quality to 85%. That reduced it to about 80k - a fifth
of the size of the original. Anyway, it's just a case of personal
preference. If you want to do that on "batch conversion" on irfan view,
click on "options" next to where you select jpeg as what you're
converting to, and change the quality to 80-85. There shouldn't be too
much difference.

Anyway, as I said, it's just personal preference and a bit of advice for next time. I won't go
ballistic if you don't do it in future, it's just so you know for
reference. I really should stop commenting on this sort of thing...

Really half-dude, you'd think you would have checked the file size this time around!

Also, ALWAYS run VIS. All the compile tools serve a purpose and should
always be run. Even if you just want to do a quick test compile, run
VIS and RAD regardless but turn them onto their fast modes.

Personally I really really like what you have done with the reception
room. If the facility is meant to be ultra high tech, then a cool
effect you might consider is adding some sort of additive rendered
column between the circle on the ceiling and the circle in the centre
of the room. If they are aligned vertically I think it could make a
really neat looking effect :smile:

Well, I was trying to get a reinforced glass. This ficility is suposed to be underwater (I will change the skybox) do you guys know how to make it look more like its underwater?

"Really half-dude, you'd think you would have checked the file size this time around!"
I am sorry! But I still didnt know how, and I was in a hurry to post it.

fog has been the way most game creators simulate water.

I think if you just make things outside that look like they are bobbing
around in water that that will let the player know they are underwater.