I decided I should write something about myself. My name is Ryan, I'm 21, live in Minnesota, do pizza delivery, and go to ITT tech for game design, though thoughts of switching to a different school offering photography ocasionally pop up.
I've been mapping since summer of 2002, when I first found a little (hehe) mod called Natural Selection. Hands down the best HL mod ever. At least at the time. It's gone down hill slightly since combat... sigh another story.
Back to focus, NS is what got me to start mapping in the first place. I used WorldCraft, later to become VHE, to make my map(s). Almost all my NS mapping was doodling. I doodled for about 1 year and a half before I released co_sift. Then I began fiddling with Radiant and Q3. Oooo.
My new love. <3 Radiant so much. If I could use GtkRadiant 1.4 to map for Source, I would. no questions about it. In fact, I wish the two would mate. It'd be stinkin awesome. Anyway, mapping for Q3 is a blast. I love it.
Doom3 engine mapping... well.. I love the D3 engine. It's just beautiful. But I have two gripes. 1) The hard shadows just.. yuk. They hurt my eyes. 2) I want to use more lights than the engine does! Not fair! I love to use tons and tons of lights in a given scene, and D3 engine doesn't really wing that way. I guess I'll adapt at some point, probably when I get a copy of Q4 that will actually WORK. CD2 always gets a CRC error. I have to return it and get a different copy.
For a short time I was also interested in mapping for AvP2. DEdit, the editor for Talon engine, is pretty good in my opinion. I liked it a lot. I felt very at home with it after using it for only a day or two, but very little came of that.
I have also learned to use Sandbox. That's a stinking awesome editor for a fricking sweet engine. That's all I'll say about that (OMG <3 FarCry)
And then there's UnrealEd. That editor, while very odd and buggy, is REALLY powerful. If you get the chance and have the inclination, try it out and get used to it. You can make stuff in seconds with that editor that would take hours in VHE or Radiant. Very powerful engine too.
And of course, Source, which has taken up residence in the SnarkPit. I really like mapping for Source. Lots of lights - ok! Pretty large areas - ok! Sweet indoor areas - ok! Sounds like we have an ok! engine! Heh. A couple quirkes, but overall I think it's the most rounded of the engines available today. And the most "real" of any available today (with the exception of HL). Out of all the engines listed above, I feel Source gives a person the most natural feeling, which is probably why I map for it most. Plus, it's fun making new texture themes with textures that really weren't meant to go together.
Jeeze. This was supposed to be about me. What a derailment. Ummmm... I like sleep food computers snowboarding SNOW cars Rally racing guns photography cameras music games movies wood aaaaaaaand...socks. My birthday is cool too.
