Jump to content

Thurnip

Mapcore Staff
  • Posts

    539
  • Joined

  • Last visited

  • Days Won

    1

Reputation Activity

  1. Like
    Thurnip reacted to Mapcore for an article, Day of Infamy Mapping Contest   
    Participants have from the 15th of September 2016 until Midnight (GMT) on the 22nd of December 2016 to create, test and upload an original or Day of Defeat inspired map for Day of Infamy (www.dayofinfamy.com)
     
     
     

     
    Prize Structure
     
    1st place
     
    $3,000 cash
    Map included officially in game
    Corsair Hardware
    Void Surround Sound Headphones
    Strafe Keyboard
    Katar Mouse
    M330 Mouse Pad
    All Wall Worm Source Modelling Tools
     
     
     
    2nd place
     
    $1,500 cash
    Corsair Hardware
    Strafe Keyboard
    Katar Mouse
    M330 Mouse Pad
    All Wall Worm Source Modelling Tools
     
    3rd place
     
    $1,000 cash
    Corsair Hardware
    Katar Mouse
    M330 Mouse Pad
    All Wall Worm Source Modelling Tools
     
    4th place
     
    $500 cash
    Corsair Hardware
    Katar Mouse
    M330 Mouse Pad
    All Wall Worm Source Modelling Tools
     
    (*All prizes are subject to participant eligibility. No cash value. The contest Organizers and Sponsors reserve the right to change or remove the prize structure at any point with or without reason.)
     
     
     

     
    Sub-Prizes
    In addition to the prizes stated above, GameBanana will also be offering a sub-prize for the best development blog, work in progress or tutorial created throughout the process. 
    This is an entirely optional part of the contest and is open to members of all communities.
    To enter simply create either a development blog / work in progress page OR a level design tutorial / guide for Day of Infamy on either GameBanana, MapCore or the Insurgency Forums.
    Entries must be uploaded on or before Midnight (GMT) on the 22nd of December 2016, and include “[DoI Contest]” in the title. Entries will be judged by members of the GameBanana team, as they appeared at the deadline.. No changes or updates are permitted during the judging phase.
     
    Rules and Frequently asks Questions
     
    The submission must be a playable map for the PC version of Day of Infamy.
    Remakes of existing maps are not allowed, however maps inspired by classic DoD maps are encouraged.
    Entries must be submitted to the Day of Infamy mapping contest section of BOTH GameBanana.com and the Steam Workshop before the deadline.
    Multiple entries are permitted, however submissions will be judged on individual quality rather than quantity.
    Team based entries are permitted, however the entrants will have to agree how to split any prizes awarded, prior to prize claim and dispatch.
    It is essential to thoroughly test your submission before the deadline as entries cannot be modified during the judging phase.
    Exceptions: Changes to the submission profile are permitted after the deadline, provided they are purely aesthetic and that the map file does not change. (E.g. Editing the description / screenshots)
    Maps that were under creation prior to the announcement of this contest can be entered, provided a completed version has not been released for public Download.
    All custom textures, models or code must be contained within the download file or embedded into the .bsp.
    Authors are free to share their content on any other websites or services they wish, however the file must remain free to download and play, without requiring membership or payment.
    If the submission is distributed on an external website or service, it must clearly state that the submission was created for the "GameBanana / MapCore Day of Infamy Mapping Contest 2016”.
    Authors must be able to accept cash payments via paypal and will be required to fill in a prize claim form prior to payment. Winners of hardware and physical products will also be required to provide a valid shipping address.
    Judges and individuals associated with organising this contest cannot enter or assist entrants.
    Entries must clearly state which game mode the level is designed for.

     
    Eligibility
     
    Participant eligibility: The “GameBanana / MapCore Day of Infamy Mapping Contest 2016” is open to any individual, or teams of individuals, provided they comply with the following:
    Participants may not be an employee of the “Organiser” or “Sponsors”.
    Participants may not have taken part in the preparation or announcement of this
    Contest.
    Participants may not be a direct relative, spouse, direct employee, or long term
    partner of any of the above definitions (a - c).
    Legal Age: This contest is open to any individual who meet the above “participant eligibility” criteria. In the event of participant who has not reached the legal age in his/her state winning one or more prizes defined below, he/she must provide contact details for the legal guardian who will claim the prize(s).
     
     
    Submitting
     
    TWO (2) copies of the map are required for this contest, and must be uploaded on or before the deadline. The primary version (used for judging) must be submitted to GameBanana.com and placed in the “Day of Infamy > Mapping Contest 2016” category.
     
    http://gamebanana.com/maps/cats/8989
     
    The second version must be uploaded to the Day of Infamy Steam Workshop
     
    http://steamcommunity.com/app/447820/workshop/
     
    No changes to the downloadable file can be made during the judging phase. Please remember to ensure that all relevant custom content is included, and that your map is thoroughly tested.
     
     
     

     
    Judging Criteria
     
    Maps will be judged by the developers at New World along with the staff at MapCore and GameBanana. Each map will be scored on the following categories, and given a total score out of 100.
    Gameplay (40 marks)
    Visuals (30 marks)
    Originality (15 marks)
    Performance / Optimization (15 marks)
  2. Like
    Thurnip reacted to FMPONE for an article, Reddit + Mapcore CS:GO Mapping Contest Finalists Announced!   
    (Art by Thurnip)
     
    Contest finalists have been chosen!
    Before announcing our finalists, we want to thank everyone for participating and giving your feedback: with over 150 entries, this event has thus far exceeded expectations in every way.
    We strongly considered adding an “honorable mentions” addendum to this announcement, but realized there were simply too many maps which came extremely close to becoming finalists, lacking only one of our “big three” judging criteria components.
     
     
    Now, without futher ado…
     
    THE FINALISTS:
    (in no particular order)
     
    DE_ROYAL
    By Jakuza

    Workshop Link
     
    DE_EMPIRE
    By Andre Valera

    Workshop Link
     
    DE_BOURG
    by Klems

    Workshop Link
     
    DE_COAST
    By Ornate Baboon

    Workshop Link
     
    These exciting levels exhibit competitive potential, excellent visual presentation, AND a satisfying level of polish, making them truly strong representatives for our talented community. As finalists competing for the grand prize, the authors of these levels will be able to update their work based on your feedback, including fine-tuning their competitive layouts using public playtesting over on Reddit. Let's support them on their journey!
    To check out the excellent prizes awaiting our finalists (including money prizes + official Valve merchandise), click here.
     
     
     
    Congratulations, finalists!
    ...but who will be the Grand Prize Winner? Find out September 30th.
     
     
     
     
    P.S. – To all our wonderful participants: don't despair. Level design is an art to be pursued for its own sake, and brilliant work should always be celebrated and studied. Additionally, Valve has consistently supported CS:GO community mapping, and Valve Operations remain a lucrative and thrilling opportunity for community mappers such as yourself. Valve’s criteria for Operations can be found here.
     
    "Never give up." - Hurg

  3. Like
    Thurnip reacted to leplubodeslapin for an article, Source Lighting Technical Analysis: Part One   
    After the announcement of the Reddit + Mapcore mapping contest, the website has welcomed many newcomers. A proof that, even if it is a twelve year old game engine, Source engine attracts map makers, and there are lots of reasons for that. It is common knowledge that technology has moved forward since 2003, and many new game engines have found various techniques and methods to improve their renderings, making the Source Engine older and older. Nevertheless, it still has its very specific visual aspect that makes it appealing. The lighting system in Source is most definitely one of the key aspects to that, and at the end of this article you will know why.
     
    About the reality...
    Light in the real world is still a subject with a lot of pending questions, we do not know exactly what it is, but we have a good idea of how it behaves. The most common physic model of light element is the photon, symbolized as a single-point particle moving in space. The more photons there are, the more powerful light is. But light is in the same time a wave, depending on the wavelengths light can have all kind of color properties (monochrome or combined colors). Light travels through space without especially needing matter to travel (the space is the best example; even without matter the sun can still light the earth). And when it encounters matter, different kind of things can happen:
    Light can bounce and continue its travel to another direction Light can be absorbed by the matter (and the energy can be transformed to heat) Light can go through the matter, for example with air or water, some properties might change but it goes through it And all these things can be combined or happen individually. If you can see any object outside, it is only because a massive amount of photons traveled into space, through the earth’s atmosphere, bounced on all the surfaces of the object you are looking at, and finally came into your eyes.
    How can such a complex physical behavior from nature be simulated and integrated into virtual 3D renderings?
    One of the oldest method is still used today because of its accuracy: the ray-tracing method. Just to be clear, it is NOT used in game engines because it is incredibly expensive, but I believe it is important to know how and why it has been made the way it is, since it probably influenced the way lighting is handled in Source and most videogame engines. Instead of simulating enormous amount of photons traveling from the lights to the eye/camera, it does the exact opposite. If you want a picture with a 1000x1000 resolution, you will only need to simulate the travel of 1 000 000 photons (or “rays”), 1 for each pixel. Each ray is calculated individually until it reaches the light origins, and at the end the result is 1 pixel color integrated in the full picture. 
    By using the laws of physics we discovered centuries ago, we can obtain a physically-accurate rendering that looks incredibly realistic. This method is used almost everywhere, from architectural renderings to movies. As an example, you can watch The Third & The Seventh by Alex Roman, one of the most famous CGI videos of all time. And because it is an efficient way to render 3D virtual elements with great lighting, it will influence other methods, such as the lightmap baking method.
     
    Lightmap baking
    OKAY LET’S FINALLY TALK ABOUT THE SOURCE ENGINE, ALRIGHT!
    A “lightmap” is a grid that is added on every single brush face you have on your map. The squares defined by the grid are called Luxels (they are kind of “lighting pixels”). Each luxel get its 2 own properties: a color and a brightness. You can see the lightmap grids in hammer by switching your 3D preview to 3D lightmap grid mode.

    You can also see them in-game with the console command mat_luxels 1 (without and with).
    During the compilation process, a program named VRAD.exe is used. Its role is to find the color and brightness to apply for every single luxel in your map. Light starts from the light entities and from the sky (from the tools/toolsskybox texture actually, using the parameter values that has been filled in the light_environment entity), travels through space and when it meets a brush face:
    It is partially absorbed in the lightmap grid A less bright ray bounces from the face Here is an animated picture to show how a lightmap grid can be filled with a single light entity:

    When you compile your map, at first the lightmaps are all full black, but progressively VRAD will compute the lightmaps with all the light entities (one by one) and combine them all at the end. Finally, the lightmaps obtained are applied to the corresponding brush faces, as an additive layer to the texture used on that face. Let us take a look at a wall texture for example.

    On the left, you have the texture as you can see it in hammer. When you compile your map, it generates the lightmaps and at the end you obtain the result on the right in-game. Unfortunately, luxels are much rougher, with a lower resolution, more like this.

    On the left you have a lightmap grid with the default luxel size of 16 units generated my VRAD, a blur filter is applied and you obtain something close to the result on the right in the game.
    In case you did not know, you can change the lightmap grid scale with the “Lightmap Scale” value with the texture tool. It is better to use values that are squares of 2, such as 16, 8, 4 or even 2. Do not go below 2, it might cause issues (with decals for example). Only use lower values than the default 16 if you think it's really useful, because you will drastically increase your map file size and compilation time with precise lightmap grids. Of course, you can also use greater values in order to optimize your map, with values such as 32, 64 or even 128 on very flat areas or surfaces that are far away from the playable areas. You can get more infos about lightmaps on Valve’s Wiki page.

    But as we said before, light also bounces from the surface until it meets another brush, using radiosity algorithms. Because of that, even if a room does not have any light entity in it, rays can bounce on the floor and light the walls/ceiling, therefore it is not full black. 
    Here’s an example:

    The maximum amount of bounces can be fixed with the VRAD command -bounce X (with X being the maximum amount of bounces allowed). The 100 default value should be more than enough.
    Another thing taken into account by VRAD is the normal direction of each luxel: if the light comes directly against the luxel or brushes against it, it will not behave in the same way. This is what we call the angle of incidence of light.

    Let us take the example of a light_spot lighting a cylinder, the light will bright gradually the surface - from fully bright at the bottom to slightly visible at the top.

    In-hammer view on the left, in-game view on the right
     
    Light Falloff laws
    One of the things that made the Source Engine lighting much more realistic than any others in 2004 is the light falloff system. Alright, we saw that light can travel through space until it meets something, but how does it travel through space? At the same brightness, whatever the distance is between the light origin and destination? Maybe sometimes yes… but most of the time no.

     
    Imagine a simple situation of a room with 1 single point light inside. The light is turned on, it produces photons that are going in all the directions around it. As you might imagine, photons are all going in their own direction and have absolutely no reason to deviate from their trajectory.
     
     
     
    At one time, let’s picture billions of photons going in all the directions possible around the light, the moment after, they are all a bit further in their own trajectory, and all the photons are still there, in this “wave”. But, as each photon follows its own trajectory, they will all spread apart, making the photon density lower and lower.
    As we said before, the more photons there are, the more powerful light is. And the highest the density, the more intense light is. Intensity of light can be expressed like this:

     
    You have to keep in mind that all of this happens in 3D, therefore the “waves” of photons aren’t circles but spheres. And the area of a sphere is its surface, expressed like this:

    (R is the radius of the sphere)
     
    If we integrate that surface area in the previous equation:

    With ♥ being a constant number. We can see the Intensity is therefore proportional to the reverse of the square of the distance between the photons and their light origin. 
    So, the further light travels, the lower is its intensity. And the falloff is proportional to the inverse of the square of the distance.
    Consequently, the corners of our room will get darker, because they are farther away from the light (plus they don’t directly face the light, the angle of incidence is lower than the walls/floor/ceiling).

    This is what we call the Inverse-Square law, it’s a very well-known behavior of the light in the field of photography and cinema. People have to deal with it to make sure to get the best exposure they can get.
    This law is true when light spreads in all possible directions, but you can also focus light in one direction and reduce the spread, with lenses for example. This is why, when Valve decided to integrate a lighting falloff law in their engine, they decided to use a method not only following the inverse-square law but also giving to mapmakers the opportunity to alter the law for each light entity.
     
    Constant, Linear, Quadratic... Wait, what?
    In math, there is a very frequent type of functions, named polynomial functions. The concept is simple, it’s a sum of several terms, like this:

    Every time, there is a constant factor (the “a” thing, a0 being the first one, a1 the second one, a2 the third one...), multiplied with the variable x at a certain degree:
    x^0 = 1 : degree 0 x^1 = x : degree 1 x^2 : degree 2 x^3 : degree 3 ... And
    a0 is the constant named “constant coefficient” (associated to degree 0) a1 is the constant named “linear coefficient” (associated to degree 1) a2 is the constant named “quadratic coefficient” (associated to degree 2) Usually, the function has an end, and we call it by the highest degree of x it uses. For example, a “polynomial of the second degree” is written:

    Then, if we take the expression from the inverse-square law, which was:

    With a2 = 1 and D being the variable of distance from the light origin.
    In Source, the constant ♥ is actually the brightness (the value you configure here).
    It is simply an inverse polynomial of the second degree, with a0 and a1 equal to zero. And we could write it like this:

    Or...

    And here you have it! This is approximately the equation used by VRAD to determine the intensity of light for each luxel during the compilation. And you can alter it by changing the values of the 3 variables constant, linear and quadratic, for any of your light / light_spot entity in your level.
    Actually you set proportions of each variable against the other two, and only a percentage for each variable is saved. For example:

    Another example:

    By default, constant and linear are set to 0 and quadratic to 1, which means a 100%quadratic lighting attenuation. Therefore, by default lights in Source Engine follows the classic Inverse-Square law.
    If you look at the page dedicated to the constant-linear-quadratic falloff system on Valve’s Wiki, it’s explained that the intensity of light is boosted by 100 for the linear part of equation and 10 000 for the quadratic part of equation. This is due to the fact that inverse formulas in equations always drop drastically at the beginning, and therefore a light with a brightness of 200 would only be efficient in a distance of 5 units and therefore completely pointless.

    You would have to boost your brightness a lot in hammer to make the light visible, that's what Valve decided to make automatically.
    The following equation is a personal guess of what could be the one used by VRAD:

    With constant, linear and quadratic being percentage values. The blue part is here to determine the brightness to apply, allowing to boost the value set in hammer if it is as least partially using linear or quadratic falloff. The orange part is the falloff part of equation, making the brightness attenuation depending of the distance the point studied is from the light origin. 
    The best way to see how this equation works is to visualize it in a 2D graph: 
    https://www.desmos.com/calculator/1oboly7cl0
    This website provides a great way to see 2D graphics associated to functions. On the left, you can find all the elements needed with at first the inputs (in a folder named “INPUTS”), which are:
    a0 is the Constant coefficient that you enter in hammer  a1 is the Linear coefficient a2 is the Quadratic coefficient B is the Brightness coefficient In another folder are the 3 coefficients constant, linear and quadratic, automatically transformed into a percentage form. And finally, the function I(D) is the Intensity function depending on the distance D. The drawing of the function is visible in the rest of the webpage. 
    Try to interact with it!
    This concludes the first part, the second part will come in about two weeks. We will see some examples of application of this Constant-Linear-Quadratic Falloff system, and a simpler alternative. We will also see how lighting works on models and dynamic lighting systems integrated in source games.Thank you for reading!
     
    Part Two : link
  4. Like
    Thurnip reacted to FMPONE for an article, 2014: MapCore's Year in Review   
    Overview of 2014's articles We published a ton of high-quality, original content in 2014. Take a look — you might spot something you missed!
     

    By KNJ
     
    Interview with Mateusz 'seir' Piaskiewicz, Techland Senior Level Artist
    4,100+ reads
    Interview with Rosin 'kikette' Geoffrey, Arkane Studios Environment Artist
    6,700+ reads
    Deus Ex: Human Revolution scene interview with KNJ
    6,800+ reads
    Virtual Reality: The Final Platform
    5,300+ reads
    Interview with Francois 'Furyo' Roughol, BioShock Infinite Level Designer
    6,200+ reads
    Interview with Thibault 'dkm' Courbet, Wolfenstein: The New Order Level Designer
    6,600+ reads
    Interview with Lenz 'penE' Monath, Environment and Lighting/VFX Artist
    3,900+ reads
    Interview with Thiago 'Minos' Klafke, Blizzard Environment Artist
    7,600+ reads
    Interview with Paul 'PaulH' Haynes, Homefront: The Revolution Senior Level Designer
    5,000+ reads
    Korath: The Witcher Saga scene interview? with Krzysztof 'Tepcio' Teper
    3,700+ reads
    Level Design in The Last of Us: Part One, Part Two, Part Three
    13,500+ reads (all parts)
      Contests and challenges Even better, MapCore continues to thrive as a close-knit community. We collaborated, playtested one another's work, and inspired eachother. Thanks to RZL for his great work organizing Counter-Strike: Global Offensive playtests. SpronyvanJohnson also did a great job organizing MapCore contests, where users pushed themselves to improve their skill set.
    We had a fantastic contest and two thrilling challenges, all of which received unprecedented levels of support and engagement. You can relive the action here:
    Quake 3 15th Anniversary Contest
    CS:GO Sticks Mini Texturing Challenge
    By Min0s
    New logo and branding For the first time since the forums were established in 2003, 2014 saw the introduction of professional-grade branding, which was brought to life by our very own Arthur de Padua (AKA Thurnip), including a wonderful new logo! We also set up a small store for those wishing to spread the wonder of MapCore throughout the world, complete with Arthur's beautiful new designs, and we'll be updating the store with even more new products based on your feedback very soon!
     
    New logo and branding by Thurnip
     
    Babies! MapCore kids were also born in 2014! ...God help us all. A huge congratulations to Skjalg and SpronyvanJohnson for their ultimate creative projects: bringing new life into the world. If we missed anyone, let us know in the comments so we can add you!
     
    By 2-D Chris
     
    Employment As a community, MapCore has always been a mixture of veteran game developers, aspiring amateurs, and plain ol' gamers. One of the best parts about that mixture of experience-levels is when one of our members gets an awesome new job within the industry. In 2014, we got a LOT of great news on that front.
     
    Martin "Sentura" Colith - Level Designer at IO Interactive (Copenhagen, Denmark)
    Al "Intelect0" Anselmo - QA Tester at Top Free Games (Sao Paulo, Brazil)
    Lenz "penE" Monath - Environment Artist at Yager (Berlin, Germany)
    Oskmos - FX Artist at DICE (Stockholm, Sweden)
    Morten "Mazy"Hedegren - Game Designer at Brain+ (Copenhagen, Denmark)
    Skjalg "Skjalg" Sturlasson Maehre - Programmer at Megapop Games (Drammen, Norway)
    mr.P - Senior World Designer at Avalanche Studios (NYC, NY, USA)
    Pete_H - Game Designer at Gameloft (Barcelona, Spain)
    Jobye-Kyle "deceiver" Karmaker - Level Artist at Ubisoft Toronto (Canada)
    Alex "AlexM" McGilvray - Build/Tools Engineer at United Front Games (Vancouver, Canada)
    Alexander "Taylor" Taylor - Game Designer at Space Ape (London, England)
    Kacper "knj" Niepokólczycki - Environment Artist at CD Projekt Red (Krakow, Poland)
    John "Ginger Lord" Crewe - Senior Technical Designer at Cloud Imperium Games (Manchester, England)
    Paul "PaulH" Haynes - Senior Level Designer at Deep Silver Dambuster Studios (Nottingham, England)
    Toni "SotaPoika" Seppänen - Junior Level designer at Next Games (Helsinki, Finland)
    Austin "Setin" House - Designer at Escalation Studios (Dallas, Tx, USA)
    Richard "KoKo5oVaR" Malinar - Environment Artist at Krysalide (Lyon, France)
    Mateusz "seir" Piaskiewicz - Designer at Treyarch (Santa Monica, California, USA)
    Jason "General Vivi" Mojica - Senior Level Designer at Overkill Software (Stockholm, Sweden)
    Will "Vilham" Josephy - Senior Level Designer at Cloud Imperium Games/Foundry 42 (Manchester, England)
    Chris "2d-chris" Kay - Senior Level Designer at Epic Games (Cary, NC, USA)
    Liam "PogoP" Tart - Environment Artist at The Creative Assembly (Horsham, England)
    Matthew "bawwwcas" Barcas - Level Designer at Pure F.P.S. (Los Angeles, California, USA)
    Francois "Furyo" Roughol - Senior Mission Designer at Sucker Punch Productions (Bellevue, Wa, USA
    Friedrich "FrieChamp" Bode - Level Designer at Goodgame Studios (Hamburg, Germany)
     
    Our members' success rate at having their content (gun skins, maps) added into Counter-Strike: Global Offensive also continued to be astronomical.
     
    By Furyo
     
    Wrap-up At the end of the day though, MapCore has always been about one thing: sharing work in progress, receiving feedback, and learning from one another. In 2014, MapCore's WIP threads buzzed with life and activity, and our 2D and 3D forums were a goldmine of beautiful work, interesting ideas and fun experimentation.
    Our community is working better than ever, and 2015 should mark even further progress in the growth of this awesome forum.
     
    By Kikette
     
    SpronyvanJohnson's map given feedback in the form of an overpaint by Seir
     
    By penE
  5. Like
    Thurnip reacted to Thrik for an article, Introducing MapCore's new logo and store   
    Designed by professional designer Arthur de Padua (AKA Thurnip), the new logo was developed over a period of many months and incorporates some of the successful themes that came up during the logo design contest we had some time ago. Unlike the existing logo which only existed as a low-resolution render, this one is perfectly crisp and comes in numerous formats suitable for print — allowing us to finally offer high-quality merchandise.

    So, head over to the MapCore store if you want to show your MapCorian allegiance in public! All items come as a 'Regular Edition' (no profit for MapCore) and 'Donation Edition' (£5 profit that goes towards MapCore hosting/development costs).

    We're currently offering a small but carefully designed selection of products. Once we make sure everything's running OK and we don't need to change vendor for whatever reason, more products will be added. We'll also soon be adding a way for you to donate while receiving a small token of appreciation (e.g. a sticker that can be bought for £5, £10, or £20) for those who want to support us but don't necessarily need or want a T-shirt, etc.

    If you buy anything, be sure to post some photos for us to look at! I have some orders on the way, so will create a thread for such snaps if nobody else beats me to it. If you'd love to buy something but the item you want isn't available, don't hesitate to leave a comment or get in touch with me — I'm happy to build up the products based upon what people want.
  6. Like
    Thurnip reacted to FMPONE for an article, Operation: Payback, First Hand   
    The first map-pack for Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (CS:GO) was launched by Valve in the Spring of 2013. It was called Operation: Payback, and consisted exclusively of community-created maps. I'm often asked about my experience as a map-maker whose work was featured in the promotion. And just recently the sequel to Operation: Payback was launched — Operation: Bravo.
    What's the objective of these "Operations"? I would describe them as Valve’s way of supporting custom mappers. If you've ever purchased a map-pack DLC for games like Call of Duty, you sort of know the drill... but the crucial difference between a typical commercial DLC and what Valve is doing, is monetary proceeds from each Operation go to community members. And community members are making some serious coin: well over $180,000 dollars was raised throughout Operation: Payback’s five-month season. That's a HUGE reward for mappers, which is having a real impact on our lives. Any fan of gaming and game development done the right way should not miss their chance to support Operation: Bravo.
     

     
    But what if you don’t play CS:GO?
    First, I would suggest you give the game a shot, since that’s the only way you’ll get a chance to check out my newest maps, which (full disclosure!) were included in Bravo. CS:GO is typical Counter-Strike: it's really addicting... in a good way! Secondly, Operation: Bravo means more than just eight brand-new maps for people to play. Historically, Valve has always tried to provide a financial incentive for artists and designers to make custom content for their games (we saw this in Team Fortress 2 for instance, where some folks were taking home as much as $100,000 yearly just from making hats). At this point, it’s clear that you can earn money by making stuff for Valve titles. What might not be obvious is how bold Operation: Bravo actually is, even compared to what we've seen before.
    Bravo is intimately connected to the case-drop system recently unveiled for CS:GO. What that means is that by buying a Bravo pass, you increase your likelihood of obtaining cases which can be opened to obtain rare items, or simply sold on the marketplace for a profit. At initial launch, Bravo cases were going for as much as thirty dollars. It sounds ridiculous, but it seems likely that for most players, Bravo will tend to pay for itself. Welcome to Steam-land!
     

     
    Valve's unprecedented support for custom content is a big reason why I wanted to get heavily involved with mapping for the new Counter-Strike, even before I knew much about the game. I was confident that big things were on the way. But Valve — and the community — delivered beyond my expectations. So, why should you join thousands of others in supporting Operation: Bravo? I think there are three key reasons:
     
    1) As graphics get exponentially better, custom content becomes that much more challenging to create. More knowledge, experience, and personal sacrifices are required of designers and artists.
     
    2) In the past, innovators have created some of your favorite maps and games.
     
    3) Valve is paying close attention. Send them the unambiguous signal that you will support their newest effort to reward content creators.
     
    As for myself, I'm in law school. At my school, students should budget for a debt load in the area of $60,000. So far, thanks to Valve and the community’s generosity, I have received almost $18,000, putting a serious dent in my debt. By the end of this year, thanks to Bravo, that figure is likely to grow substantially...
    From a designer's point of view, from the moment that my map was included in Operation: Payback back in April, it instantly attained a higher public profile than ever before and received more play than ever before (including substantial play from CS:GO's developers -- which is pretty special). It's difficult to describe the stress, fascination, and thrill you experience watching a crowd of gamers running around a level you created. Basically, it made me prouder than ever to do what I do.
    I was also incredibly grateful that Operation: Payback enabled me to reward the artists (3Dnj and penE) that I had collaborated with. Because of the well-known Counter-Strike brand name, as well as the money I earned, I was also able to include my friends and family in my creative endeavors more than ever before. All the kindness shown by Valve, the community, and folks sending me Steam messages of congratulations and enthusiasm (and yes, questions about how much I earned) was both touching and invigorating. Now I'm dreaming about levels more than even I'm accustomed to.
     

     
    So, that's my perspective... but keep in mind I'm just one of the people this promotion uplifted. I hope you agree that Operation: Bravo empowers the community and provides serious income (not to mention resume pedigree) for map-makers. In closing, please consider supporting Operation: Bravo!
×
×
  • Create New...