ellicott.zip

After playing to much and many aim maps, I realized that my flick shots were only accurate horizontally; so I tried making a map that made your opponent spawn on a different vertical level than you. This not only to increase vertical aim and muscle memory, but also to increase complexity with having to visually keep track of more potential angles from above/below as well has horizontally. However I think I made a shocking discover, most of which is anecdotal since I don't have enough time yet to make a numerical statistical comparative study. However after practicing on my map for comparatively similar amounts of time to another similarly sized standard aim map, I feel my aim is much more accurate. I will be starting to collect data on this, Ill publish it here soo. Anyways for mapping I then made it even a little more complex by having it spawn you on the same level as you opponent 25% of the time, to increase constant "looking up and down". Which should hypothetically increase even more vertical movements. I even added: ladders, stairs, cars, trains, colorful lighting and much more. In it's current development it's only good for 2v2, 3v3, 4v4...

I believe for this increase in uniform range of comfortability in all axes of shooting could influence more of a demand for vertically emphasized maps in the base game! Please let me know what you think and any improvements I should make!

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2094697085

Keeping with tradition, I'd say it's about time we took a look at what our community has achieved throughout the year. If last time I was saying how 2017 was a year of immense growth, then 2018 was surely one of significant change. And it hasn't been without its troubles and anxious moments. No change ever is, but I believe it to be for the best. We've seen some of our friends become parents, change work fields or get their first job in the industry. We've even seen a few pursue their dream projects. And for that, we have to applaud them. It takes courage to keep moving forward and to realise when it's time for something new. In the meantime, I hope this article inspires you and I wish everyone 

good luck!

2018: Mapcore's Year in Review

SteamVR - Gulping Goat Space Farm

by @Steve, @marnamai, @The Horse Strangler, @Sersch and others at Scraggy Rascal Studios

produced in collaboration with Valve

"Scraggy Rascal has been working with Valve to create all new SteamVR content, we've been given a lot of liberty to create these locations. Our goal was to create interesting and fun locations for the player to explore. These projects, over the last couple months, have been a crash course in Source 2,VR, project management, delivering within deadlines, working together as a team and personal growth. It has been an invaluable experience and great opportunity ... and we're just getting started!" - marnamai

Darksiders III - Art

by @The Horse Strangler and others at Gunfire Games

"Probably one of the biggest challenges the artists and designers faced on Darksiders 3 was working with both a platforming and fully connected streamed world. This meant that everything exists all the time. While we streamed levels in and out, areas couldn't intersect and we couldn't do the classic "Small exterior, big interior" swap. This was especially challenging because of how much verticality our design must support. We had a few "vistas", but for the most part every aspect of the level was accessible. If you can see it, you will likely be able to get there, jump on it, fight around it, etc. Fury, the main playable character can double jump, swing, float, glide and even rocket jump over 10 meters high. Personally for me it completely changed how I looked at art filling up a space. Every single mesh we placed impacted design. Art was design, and design was art." - The Horse Strangler

Europa

by @[HP]

"Europa is a relaxing narrative experience. The goal with this game is to offer just enough challenge that its rewarding to get from one area to the other for more than just the visuals by using environmental hazards, platforming sequences and light puzzles that you can beat by exploring.The game is split into linear sections and wider areas, that's at the core of the game and as you play, you keep improving your characters moving ability, which will further exploration and give you the ability to solve newer light puzzles. There's none of the typical character upgrading systems, rather, the levels will offer the incremental challenges and the sense of progression. Europa's main focus lies in environmental storytelling and immersing the player in it's universe with passive storytelling, evoking awe and bliss with colorful watercolor-like art and music." - Helder Pinto

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive - Turnpike

by @Squad

"For a while the "Highway Restaurant" theme has been sitting in my little Concepts.txt file. When the Wingman Contest was announced, it felt like the perfect opportunity to turn this idea into a map, as its relatively small size would be fitting for the Wingman gamemode. The casual nature of Wingman made me add some elements that I would not normally add to, let's say, a Defusal map, like the TF2-esque team color coding (albeit subtle), the moving vehicles and the silly bomb target. Additionally, since the playable space is (almost) completely indoors, making it nighttime felt right, as it both emphasizes the interiors and makes for an atmospheric blorange background." - Squad

Dying Light - A New Hope

by @will2k

"A full-fledged custom single player campaign that ties in to the original story of the main game. It will see the main protagonist, Kyle Crane,leaving the City for the countryside to search for a specific elusive medicinal herb and bring it back to Dr. Camden who believes it could be the cure to the Harran Virus. This campaign is a one man show as I’m doing everything myself: level design, environment art/detailing, story creation, scripting/quest creation, custom dialog, custom audio, custom materials/textures, custom foliage systems, custom brushes for terrain painting/sculpting, lighting, manual nav mesh tuning, scripted NPCs…" - will2k

Prodeus

by @General Vivi and Michael Voeller

"Prodeus is the first person shooter of old, re-imagined using modern rendering techniques. Oh, and tons of blood, gore, and secrets. Creating Prodeus has meant a lot to us over the last year. It feels great to finally be doing something for ourselves. It can be pretty ambitious at times since there are just two of us, but I’m confident we can pull it off. Keep an eye out for the end of February for a big announcement." - General Vivi

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive - Ruby

by @catfood

"When I was on vacation in Portugal years ago I was so impressed by the city Lisbon that I really wanted to build a map that has the same vibe. At the time I was already working on different projects so I decided whenever I got enough time to work on a map this size I would go back. So early 2017 the moment was finally there, I went back to Lisbon to shoot (~2000) reference photos then made a list of things that are iconic for Lisbon and started working on Ruby. Adding a lot of height differation, warm colors, tile patterns and ofcourse trams was essentiental to get the Lisbon vibe." - catfood

Subnautica

by @dux, @PogoP and others at Unknown Worlds Entertainment

"A mix of Survival, story, mystery, resource gathering, base building with some accidental horror and plenty of deep, deep water. We had not long finished up with Natural Selection 2 and were hungry to develop a different kind of game. During development we were (and still are) a small team but the game kept getting bigger and grew into something far larger in scope than originally planned. So we soon realised that what we had could be turned into something really unique if we put our heads down and just cranked on it." - dux

Unreal Tournament 4 - Chamber

by @Ubuska

"I used Halo and Warframe artstyle as a reference. The goal of this project was to make fun and cool looking map with 100% custom art that is 100 mb in file size. To achieve that I used several advanced techniques such as custom vertex normals, deferred mesh decals, no bake, tiling base materials and masks. There are basically 5 or so texture maps used in the entire map,  most of the filesize space was taken by lightmaps. I learned a lot doing this project in terms of composition, art direction and optimization. Hope you enjoy this map as much as I do!" - Ubuska

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive - Pitstop

by @Quotingmc and Quadratic

"It is not often that CS: GO receives a new game-mode, especially one as competitively focused as Wingman. I was understandably pleased at the announcement of the 2018 CSMapMakers contest for the mode. Pitstop was my entry where I set out to create a thematically bold centre piece for my portfolio. With the help of my teammate Quadratic and support from multiple Mapcore members, I learnt a lot about taking a level from a simple blockout to completion; I can say for certain I’m thrilled with the end result!" - Quoting

Black Mesa - Xen

by @JeanPaul, Adam Engels and others at Crowbar Collective

"While building Xen we had to design, iterate, and iterate (then iterate some more). We took what we thought we knew, and put it to the test. We learned how design and scope work together, and how to build momentum as a team. We are extremely proud of what we have accomplished over the year(s)! Despite the long and occasionally frustrating timeline, it has been a real testament to the commitment that this team and this community have for Half-Life." - Adam Engels

Unreal Engine 4 scene

by @Vorontsov

"So I decided I would step out of my comfort zone and create a small environment in an engine I've never used before, UE4. Although I think I did a fairly decent job at the time there were ultimately many nuances I could have done better, but that is the artist dilemma. This project taught me the value of properly blocking out your environment, gathering as many references as you can and to have patience and not rush through assets, when breaking any of these rules I was punished for it. Stay tuned for my next project which will be a giant mech, coming soon Valve time TM." - Vorontsov

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive - Opal

by @MikeGon

"My goal with this project was to make a fun and compact defuse map, with a simple level flow, ample verticality, and an overlapped layout! I wanted to have interior and exterior, and break the grid a lot, to avoid having that "90 degrees grid" feel in the layout. I needed to have a vista on one side of the map to help with orientation, so I decided to make it a coastal town, inspired by those found on the island of Skopelos, Greece. Expect more updates in the near future, as I'm not yet satisfied with it. Since this is my only CSGO map, I want to put all my time and effort into it, and focus on quality instead of quantity. Thank you everybody for your support and feedback! <3" - MikeGon

Insurgency: Sandstorm - Precinct

by @Xanthi, @Squad, @Jonny Phive, @LATTEH, @Steppenwolf and others at New World Interactive

"Precinct, was a fun and challenging map to work on. We decided early on to melt District and Contact two of our very nostalgic maps together into a single large-scale urban environment. The goal was to preserve the nostalgic feeling and at the same time create something unique and fresh not just a 1:1 copy. In the block-out stage we started playing with different terrain heights, which eventually was the key to accomplish our goal. Terrain height was a bit of a trial and error process; I remember driving up a hill and not having enough torque, oops!!" -Xanthi

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive - Killhouse

by @FMPONE

"Killhouse showcases brutal duels, player reaction times, and close-quarters combat. A highly vertical layout ensures the sort of unpredictability and replayability ideal for CS:GO’s 2vs.2 "Wingman" game-mode." - FMPONE

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive - Station

by @Roald and @untor

"All experiences contribute to where I am at this point. I am just a hobbiest but I think I learned alot about level design just by doing it and enjoying it. Overal my goal is to improve myself on level design, but also enviorment art. I think I archieved a goal on level design and it's now time to continue on enviorment art. This is where untor morozov comes in. I have met untor a while ago. He made this map 'Waterfall' which was pretty populair. I liked his designs and added him as a friend. When I had this wingman map going on with positive feedback I just contacted him again to work on it with me and since this moment we have had a incredible teamwork. I am gameplay orientated and he is art orientated so we were a great couple. We just enjoyed work on this project and respected eachother and had alot of fun." - Roald

The Gap

by @Yanzl and Sara Lukanc

"The Gap is a sci-fi thriller first person narrative exploration video game. You play as Joshua Hayes, a neuroscientist trying to figure out what happened, barely remembering anything about his past. It started as a project for our BA thesis and has now grown into a standalone game. It's also my first "real" indie game project, helping me learn a lot about Unreal Engine 4 and game development in general." - Yanzl

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive - Alexandra remake

by @Serialmapper

"My first successful map was born 10 years ago for CS1.6. It was done in just 4 days. Since then it has been ported/improved several times on CS:S then finally on CS:GO. It always had a "dust" theme. Initially i wanted to remake it with an "inferno" style but when the new dust2 came i switched the plan to use the new assets. The map was and is frequently played on public servers especially in Eastern Europe so i had plenty of feedback to improve it. For some it's just another "dust" map, but for me it's my dust2." - Serialmapper

Far Cry 5 - Wetland Turmoil

by @grapen

"I wanted to try working with location design in an (imaginary) open world game for the first time, so I made this backwater cabin neighborhood. At the time I also wanted to see what the limits were in Farcry Arcade and how far I could push it. The level has fixed spawns (a limitation of the editor), but I toyed with the idea of making it work regardless from which direction the player would have approached it. The pathing and player guidance is more or less shaped like the number eight, with the church acting as an outlook. Your task is to eliminate all the bad guys. In the end I wanted to do so much more, but couldn't due to technical limitations. All in all it was a fun experience to make it." - grapen

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive - Trailerpark

by @OrnateBaboon and @Skybex

"We wanted to make a map for CSGO, using a theme that had not been seen in any previous version of Counter-Strike.The map had to incorporate everyday plausibility, provide for enough variety so that things remained visually interesting,  but also be flexible enough to allow for the use of low geometry for easy grenade strategies. Being able to immediately recognize a theme in a map is always important, so with all this criteria in mind, A trailer park fitted the bill perfectly. There is still some way to go before a full release, but 2018 was a great year for progress on this project." - OrnateBaboon

Unreal Engine 4 scene

by @Corvus

"I was inspired by games like stalker and the last of us. The goal was to make something photoreal with a lot of foliage. It took a couple of iterations but I think I achieved the goal in the end. While making this project I've had to learn a lot about Speedtree to make all the foliage, it was a really cool experience. Right now I'm in the army so unfortunately I can't make any more scenes right now, but after I'll come back I'll try to make more scenes like that." - Corvus

Overwatch - Busan

by @Minos, @[HP], @PhilipK, @IxenonI, Phil Wang, Lucas Annunziata and others at Blizzard Entertainment

"Busan was a challenging map to make. Due to the game having 12 different heroes on screen we have a somewhat limited memory budget for maps, that includes all models, textures, effects, collision data, lighting information, etc... Fitting three radically different areas (Downtown, Sanctuary and MEKA Base) into one single map budget required us to find new ways to optimize our work. In the end, we were even squeezing kilobytes out of collision data to make it all fit, no kidding! But the result speaks for itself, the map was fun to work on and we are very proud of what we accomplished!" - Minos

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive - Highlands

by @ElectroSheep, @El Moroes and @'RZL

"We wanted to make a map in Scotland because, thanks to dishonored 2, we were browsing a lot of references froms this area and we really loved it. I also went myself here in holliday after that. We asked one of our close friends to make some special props, like the police van, the taxi, the phonebox and some others. Unfortunatly the hard development of Dishonored 2 put us in a difficult state where we weren't able to work on the map. So we lost motivation. Then RZL contacted us because he didn't want the project to die so we gave him the keys. And RZL became busy too ^^. Life sometime say NO I guess, hehe. Now Highlands Is my only advanced project I still didn't finished and I'm ready to give it a try, I hope." - ElectroSheep

"Highlands...is this map is a joke? Certainly no but we can say that the development is quite longer than what we expected. Perhaps we learn well how the famous "Valve time" works? :p No seriously I think we can explain that with the motivation. Of course we were motivated to create something cool with this map but with the time and, I think, with what we live in our life we never took the time to do it correctly...I mean we never had a constant rythm on the map. This (and other personal things) led to the current statut of the map; a still "work in progress" map started in 2014. But ElectroSheep came back and his goal is to finish it, and because he's right, I'll come back too to help him. Just, be patient (again) ;)" - El Moroes

Battlefield V - Fjell

by @Puddy, @Pampers and others at DICE

"Fjell was an explosive experiment which paired a new Battlefield dynamic, planes and infantry only, with an epic gosh darn mountain top. Tackling this design combination was like dealing with a bear after you've kicked it in the balls. It was a fun challenge and even though its extreme gameplay is quite polarizing when compared to more middle-of-the-road maps, I am happy that we went there!" - Puddy

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive - Iris

by @BubkeZ and @Oliver

"Iris was born out of a shared interest in the TV-show "Seinfeld", funnily enough. One day BubkeZ noticed I had changed my Steam profile picture to a photo of "George Costanza" and just like that the wheels were in motion! In the beginning, BubkeZ had the vision of an old city environment with lots of dirty alleyways and brick architecture. We didn't want to fall in the trap of making the map look too bleak, so we came up with the idea of making a mid-century town set in autumn. While the map certainly have visual elements from the 50's, I would say the overall theme of Iris is american auto-industry. Making the old cars was definitely my favorite part of making this map!" - Oliver

Unreal Engine 4 scene

by @Brightness

"I have always been a fan of retro and vintage, so this was like a dream to me. After watching the first season of True Detective, I immediately fell in love with the office set and the way the series was shot. I have definitely learned a lot from this project, mostly lighting techniques that can fill your scene with a story. The goal was to recreate their environment in my own style, and I'm pretty satisfied with how it turned out. I definitely wasn't expecting this much of positive feedback and I'm really thankful for this community. I want to do something with the environments, not just as a portfolio piece, but make a short film or make a small adventure game out of them." - Brightness

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive - Insertion 2

by @Oskmos

"Being the follow up to the first Insertion it will have the same overall concept with the spawning and open-world like layout. However this time it will be a more urban setting and overall higher quality art assets. I always love to make environments that feels real. And that are familiar. Its all made up. But the details and various elements in Insertion 2 is from my childhood basically. Friends that grew up in the same place I have recognizes it aswell." - Oskmos

_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

The Door Challenge

Submission thread

Articles

Designing Highly Replayable Stealth Levels for Payday 2

Level Design in Max Payne: Roscoe Street Station

Effect and Cause - Titanfall 2 Level Breakdown

2017: Mapcore's Year in Review

Hurg smiles upon you all!

(New logo by Yanzl)

I'm sure that by now most of us have our sleeves rolled up and are ready to tackle yet another year, but before we move forward let's take a moment to look back at what 2017 meant for our community. It was a time of immense growth for both professionals and amateurs alike. A time when everyone seemed to have surpassed their former selves. And without slowing down, some have even managed to land their first job in the industry. I don't know what this new year holds, what challenges to overcome will arise, but I know for certain that I'm excited to see everyone become even greater!

2017: Mapcore's Year in Review

Overwatch - Oasis

by Phillip K, Bram Eulaers, Helder Pinto and others

Dishonored 2: Death of the Outsider - Curator level

by electrosheep, kikette and others

Payday 2 - Brooklyn Bank level

by General Vivi

Sniper Elite 4 - Regilino Viaduct

by Beck Shaw and others

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive - Offtime

by Squad

Team Fortress 2 - Shoreleave

Art pass, props and sound by Freyja

Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus - Farmhouse

Modeled, textured and composed by BJA

Half-Life 2: Downfall

by marnamai

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive - Studio

by ZelZStorm, TanookiSuit3 and Hollandje

Portal 2 - Refraction

by Stract

Counter Strike: Global Offensive - Breach

by Yanzl and Puddy

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive - Berth

by grapen

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive - Kaizen

by Andre Valera and Jakuza

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive - Asylum

by Libertines

Half-Life 2: Episode 2 - FusionVille: The Shadow over Ravensmouth

by Klems

Unreal Engine 4 scene

by Dario Pinto

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive - Grind

by The Horse Strangler, `RZL and MaanMan

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive - Aurelia remake

by Serialmapper

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive - Tangerine

by Harry Poster

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive - Abbey

by Lizard and TheWhaleMan

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive - Apollo

by Vaya, CrTech, Vorontsov, JSadones

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive - Sirius

by El Exodus

Unreal Engine 4 scene

by Corvus

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive - Subzero

by FMPONE

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive - Biome

by jd40

(Art by Thurnip)

This overview proves how talented our community is. We share, give feedback and learn from one another. Lots of our members have made it into the game industry and continue to make their mark working for high-profile studios. Our articles were shared around the world and our collaborative CS:GO contest was a huge success. We can only conclude that 2015 was again a stellar year for the Core and we are looking forward to an even better 2016!   

2015: Mapcore's Year in Review

It was a banner year. Here’s a taste of what our community created:

Temple of Utu by Minos 

Corridor by JonnyPhive

Rails by Deh0lise

Cold Fusion by Rusk

Half-Life 2 Scene by Psy

Resort by 'RZL and Yanzl

Zoo by Squad and Yanzl

Santorini by FMPONE and Dimsane

Corridor by RaVaGe

Seat by penE

Half-Life 2 UE4 Corridor by PogoP

Tulip by catfood

Volcano by 2d-chris

Chilly UE4 Scene by TheOnlyDoubleF

Articles

High-quality original content:

Grand Prize Winner Announced

Hurg Smiles Upon You All!

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)

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

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

 

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

 

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.

Our members' success rate at having their content (gun skins, maps) added into Counter-Strike: Global Offensive also continued to be astronomical.

By Furyo

 

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

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.

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!

When a developer creates something that they feel proud of, it usually involves a large amount of time, energy and emotional investment. It is not uncommon for people to pour their heart and soul into something creative and then feel overly sensitive afterwards when confronted with a stranger's opinion.

Understanding what type of feedback is being offered can help you get past defensive feelings and realize that feedback is about helping to improve something, not hinder it.

Receiving compliments about something that you have worked on for a long period of time is great. Apart from the feel good factor, Candy feedback can also lead to other people being curious enough to want to try the game as well.

The best type of Candy feedback is when it is specific about something in the game and that is usually a good indication that the game is going in the right direction.

Questions are always good feedback because it is someone trying to understand why it works. This is the perfect opportunity for you to learn how to express your ideas in a way that others can easily understand. When someone initially asks a question they usually have further feedback, but they don't know how to express it yet and need more information.

Always remember there is no stupid question and answer politely because it will often lead to feedback that has been thought about over a long period of time.

Nobody wants to hear negative comments and it can be really easy to take this the wrong way. Feedback posted in anger is about frustration and lack of understanding. You need to put on your detective cap and find out why, be polite and ask simple questions. Why? What? How?

Remember to keep your replies free of emotions and to the point, if this is someone who genuinely does not understand it will often lead to good feedback because their problem was so frustrating that it drove them to comment!

Usually starts with a good compliment to break the ice, quickly moves onto the feedback and then sometimes a solution to fix it! The perfect feedback is when someone has logically thought through a problem, able to explain themselves and give a possible solution.

Thinker feedback is often referred to as constructive criticism and is the easiest type of feedback to understand because the thinker is direct and to the point, they want to improve the game.

There is nothing more frustrating than ‘no comment'; I would take a hundred angry people shouting feedback at me any day of the week than wondering why no one has made a comment.

Besides access problems (lack of login id, restrictive websites and foreign language) the lack of comments often stems from social convention that if you got nothing positive to say, then say nothing. At least a negative comment can lead to change, ‘no comment' leads to nothing.

If you are defensive and angry towards feedback eventually no one will comment and this is not where anyone wants to be. Try to engage people with questions, get people involved in the process of creation and most importantly accept all kinds of feedback without prejudice.

Fanatically feedback is ultimately positive because it can highlight really obvious problems that should be fixed. Passionate fans of games get a bad deal when compared to sports fans because they are so vocal.

Having someone engaged and wanting to be heard is the perfect starting point for a conversation and once all the feedback has been broken down into facts it can often highlight the most obvious problems that are overlooked because most developers don't think like new players.

Feedback is something that should be embraced because it can take a game in new directions and add features that were obvious to new players. Looking past the emotion of Internet feedback will stop you from getting upset when someone is not being subtle with their thoughts. Posting stuff on the internet is about asking for feedback and expecting only good comments all of the time is naive. The best kind of feedback is pointing out things that are wrong because then your game will improve rather than just be ‘no comment'.

109.123.124.138:27080 | MapCore - The Home of Hurg

We'll be enjoying de_icebourne (Psy) and cs_siege_go (3Dnj and moroes) tonight at 7pm GMT. Simply download the maps and turn up!

If you'd like to have your map tested on the server, get in touch with Psy or reply in the We'll also be introducing a special playtest forum soon, where people can arrange playtests for CS:GO and of course any other game.

There's a lot of interest in CS:GO mapping on MapCore, not too surprising considering that Counter-Strike mapping provided the foundation for the community in the first place. Why not get involved and enjoy having your maps playtested and criticised by MapCore's mighty crew?

Update: cs_siege_go will also be playtested tonight, download link above has been updated.

Almost exactly nine years after the MapCore forums opened on October 6th, 2003, they've been completely renovated for the first time. With new software and a focus on producing original content, an already wonderful community is going to become even better.

The most striking thing you'll notice is that MapCore is now using completely different forum software. Not only does it come with lots of useful features including some ideas borrowed from social networking sites such as the ability to 'like' posts and an in-depth notification system, but it also makes it a lot easier for us staff to extend the features of the site and make it more than just a forum.

With this in mind, a key focus going forward is going to be original content. With such a diverse and skilled range of members and staff, there's a huge amount of untapped potential for writing articles, interviews, reviews, and tutorials — and so all of those things can be expected over the coming months and beyond. There's not a lot to read right now, but work is currently underway to build a team of writers and also invite guests to contribute whatever they wish, and if it's suitable we'll be happy to feature it under your name.

Over the coming days and weeks the forums will continue to be refined as inevitable bugs and oversights crop up. Also, some new features will be added such as the promised community feed (have your blog's RSS feed appear in the MapCore sidebar), more in the way of challenges and spotlighted work, and more. With such easy-to-extend software, features we've wanted to introduce for years can now be implemented.

Be sure to leave a comment if you spot any bugs or quirks!