DE_Theos By Vinneri

    Hello partners! I'm fairly new here, so I must introduce myself. I have been playing CS, from early Source. Competitive scene is familiar me, because I've played CS:S in various semi-competitive teams and I have been competing in few LAN-tournaments around Finland. When CS:GO was released I started to get familiar with it, but I never really started to play competitive. I have watched CS streams from the time Twitch was released and I still love watching high-talented teams play against each other. After all these years I'm pretty sure I know mostly how the CS plays.
    I started using hammer about 4 years ago. First I made some easy CS:S maps and L4D survival maps. It took few years to get known with Hammer and those projects were actually not so bad Then suddenly I lost my interest in making maps. It took over a year to finally found back, just to start from beginning. I was so pumpped, that I wanted to make the best map I could ever do. I took one of my old CS:S projects, because I liked it a lot and started to convert it to CS:GO. After many long nights and days I'm here to show you what I got.
    I know that here are some of the most talented mappers, so I'm waiting for responses how to make this map even better I have playtested this map few times with my friends and you maybe have noticed that you are going to get one too! (I'm so excited!) If you could give me things I could do to make this look better that would be awesome. I have promised to myself that this will be released, when it's perfect. And I'm aiming to that.


    So...

    I'm presenting for you, DE_Theos (beta)

    It's a semi-modern map taking place in drug dealers homefarm in unknown location. Police have found the secret hideout and are trying to prevent terrorists from hiding trails. Terrorists are trying to destroy the drugfacility and/or the mansion to cover all the trails from drug manufacture. Map is build to be competitive 5v5 and have various opportunities for tactics. With good smokes, flashes and teamplay any team can win.

    [Blocked Image: http://puu.sh/7Q1wB.jpg]

    [Blocked Image: http://puu.sh/7Q1Bp.jpg][Blocked Image: http://puu.sh/7Q1F1.jpg][Blocked Image: http://puu.sh/7Q1GT.jpg][Blocked Image: http://puu.sh/7Q1HM.jpg][Blocked Image: http://puu.sh/7Q1Je.jpg][Blocked Image: http://puu.sh/7Q1K5.jpg][Blocked Image: http://puu.sh/7Q1Lh.jpg][Blocked Image: http://puu.sh/7Q1Mi.jpg][Blocked Image: http://puu.sh/7Q1Dp.jpg][Blocked Image: http://puu.sh/7PZKv]


    I'm not giving mapfile yet, so spot as many awful looking place from pictures as you can and give me feedpack if you want.

    Thank you!

    Feedback from images: Detail/adjustment for eye detail ("NOT GAMEPLAY")


    1st image

    The new addition to the concrete is a nice addition giving it a more realistic feel compared to the solid "Tile texture" used before. The white building with the big heart one it. The roof texture could use some adjustment in terms of moving the texture down to match where the edge ends. Plus maybe add a little more overhang to the roof to give more detail.


    2nd image

    The roof with all the foliage on it seems a little repetitive.


    3rd image

    This is by far the best looking part of the map as of right now. Not much to see change excluding the addition of decals on the floor and or around the broken in concrete area.


    4th image

    Where the gravel connects to the concrete area, it seems to be black from the image. The concrete texture choice also seems a little plain, maybe change the texture to dirt or something "Again from image view, not sure what's behind the camera".


    5th image

    The floor could use some missing planks and decals. The roof above seems it could use some more detail or variation to keep it repetitive. ("Or an addition of a more room under construction feel i.e. de_vertigo").


    6th image

    The skylight could use a beam detailing the parameter of the edges of the skylight. The rooms feels a little to flat, add some more variant detail to the walls. ("Bumps, pillars, arches")


    7th image

    Seems alright from what I can see, just adjust the texture's by the stairs so they align properly.


    8th image

    roof texture on both buildings need some adjusting. Plus the foliage on the building with the flag decal could use more variation .


    9th image

    The displacement could use some more grass around the edges. Some props ("Crates, garbage") on the sides.


    10th image

    Additional detailing to stairs leading into building ("Rails added to sides or middle") as well as the roof needing additional work.


    11th image

    N/A


    Again these are just things that I would personally improve at the moment. Really nice work on the level, giving it a unique feel. Keep up the progress and hope to see some more additions to this level truly making it a masterpiece.

    Thank you so much! You may know the feeling when something in map is not good, but you can't find it. I'll start working with things you pointed. Also good to know that everything isn't bad

    Great job on the new additions to the map. The detail given in the first image really helps define the space and give it a little more personality. In the third image, I love the choice of color for the bright yellow colored overpass, it really helps catch the players eye. Although the ground could use some more randomness in terms of more grass around the edges. The fourth image has really nice and excellent detail and much personality to. They choice and design of the white tower is really interesting as well as the 2 tall metal towers in the back.


    In all, the map seems to have come along way since you showed it. Thank you for taking some of my feedback in to account. Good luck on your future endeavors.

    Looks like an interesting theme


    but there's something weird going on with the lighting, did you mess with postprocessing?


    and avoid using decals from overpass, it's just too specific to that map.


    I think you should focus more on lighting, better sun angle, more brightness and hard shadows etc.

    I agree, it looks very flat, maybe you could look at your shadow controller and change the shadows to be a bit darker.


    I would also use displacements for most exterior grounds, just allows you to make them look better. Use a bit more alpha on the pebble road too


    Finally there seems to be a mix of quite noisy textures and unnoisy textures, this looks odd, try to replace some of the noisy wooden textures with less noisy ones. Also that grass texture, find a better one, I'm not sure what is up with that one, but it looks very low res.

    Alright, I take a look. I'm using basic 16 lightmap scale everywhere atm, so I have to reduce it in some places. With sun angle I was mimicing de_cobblestone, but I'll try something else Thanks!

    I don't think you have to worry about lightmap scale yet(actually I almost never change that)


    Try setting light_environment's SunSpreadAngle and light_directional SpreadAngle property to something small, 1-5

    Hey Vinneri looks like a good map The biggest thing that stands out to me is the heavy contrast in images 5, 7 and 10 where a lot of the surfaces are near black. I would maybe lighten a few of the textures as my eye is being drawn straight to those dark areas. the underground tunnel lights also look to have the same problem making the ceiling very dark , I think a fill light at a lower intensity would help out a lot there.


    http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/comm…ent_Hallway.jpg


    I think the macro detailing is great around the map


    And i much prefer the shadows on the first image as i feel it gives the area more weight the second image looks as if it is a very cloudy day and the light is being diffused by the cloud cover, which contradicts the skybox atm.


    Hope this helps !

    Thanks Cruckz! I'll look at those. Some problems seems to be in images, but I guess little lighter couldn't be bad idea I'm really anticipating the feedback from next tuesdays playtest!

    I had yesterday pro's playtest. It went pretty well and got a lot of feedback. It ended 16-14 with sides 9-6 7-8 and higher rounds as CT. So I made some fixes to make it more balanced.

    Most of the guys liked the map, but as you know the scene (specially in Finland) you get also ton of shit without any real feedback. Well anyways it was nice to see how it works when two good teams play first time the map in competitive.

    The general layout felt great! I think A could have cleaner cover (as both CT and T taking A site, it was a bit difficult to lock onto enemies) but the sites had nice unique feel. Maybe B could use more room but that's forgivable IMO.


    I'm not sure if these positions were intentional but I'll list some really hard angles:

    -Ct spawn to heaven/sniper nest at A (you have to check both left and above)

    -As CT pushing A tunnels, when you go up the ramp, you are exposed from a lot of angles (above and left and right and from outside A tun).

    -As CT at A (above bomb site), you can see the passage with the rugs (you see T's feet and legs before they see you)

    -The dark staircase next to T window needs to be clipped more in my opinion. It's misleading and I also managed to catch a couple of CT's off guard by hiding there >


    I have 2 main criticisms: Cleaning up a bit and more cohesive environment art.


    1. Cleaning up: I'm not sure if this map is optimized but I had FPS drops. There were quite a lot of props scattered around the map and some of them felt unnecessary i.e. the haystack area would drop my fps.


    2. Cohesive environment: a lot of props and textures varied a lot. There would be old-village "stone/wood" areas but the doors would be modern and new and there would be industrial objects. Just as an idea, you could try making the residential areas something like this:

    [Blocked Image: https://encrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTBpnx8Y0CTuzr19nbanEPihfZ60FS-hS4y4TcATQF7_70CRBAp][Blocked Image: https://encrypted-tbn3.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSICjc8Ee7GINCd4NNXk9OWTjcIMgns9rupYZNuUTX1EyPrf4NT]


    Another examplke is that instead of pine trees, you could use palm trees instead to help build that sub-tropical cuban atmosphere.

    I've thought today and yesterday many of the things you said. I'm going to clip that t window stair and fixing the theme. A tunnel route you pointed out was intentional. I don't want ct's to rush from there. It's a path where ct's have big risk but also big reward if they get through unspotted. Passage with rugs have same idea, you can see feets, but you are spottable from haystacks. What did you mean with the ct nest problem? Only in few casea t's are allowed to get to the nest, so in retake you rarely have to check it. If that was what you ment

    theme is a real problem for me. I want to keep the modern houses and most likely pines. Also I'm using a lot of wood everywhere which isn't popular in that part of the world. So I'm thinking of changing the location to somewhere like norway. Funny thing is that there are no drugcartels etc so this thing is really pain in my .. So I have to think more.

    last thing you said was cleaning unnecessary props. I will do so, but how I do it without making map look less detailed? Thanks for the feedback!

    Quote from Vinneri

    last thing you said was cleaning unnecessary props. I will do so, but how I do it without making map look less detailed? Thanks for the feedback!


    Only put props where they're actually needed from a gameplay standpoint. Then you can put more props to make it prettier(but don't overdo it) less is more.

    Loved all but the one for the whole place.

    The details are incredible.


    Better?

    Well, no, this is great.


    But is there anyway to make this either a browser (where say, websites would automatically be filed into physical locations, even to where some things are just left out?)

    Or, a file system for a PC? Regular 'ol PC game arrows and spacebar and whatnot. Avatars that hold info and tell you things, and they should probably be able to fight and whatnot.

    But if there was some novel and applicable AI, the avatars could do things for you like figure stuff out and retreive things from the web, even outside of the browser aspect copacity. Naturally communicating avatars, so long as the output didn't use too much space and time, or could be trained when the event arises, they could naturally anticipate and maximize their usage and potential, interact. However, there is a real thing called video game addiction. Apparently the game Flappy Bird went down for this.

    Thanks.

    Plus, if you make this a reality, I wont sue you for any of it. However, if you do happen to not only make this, but profit by insane margins, a gratuity would be appreciated.

    It'd be the best thing to happen to the computer since the invention/discovery/creation of the internet.

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