Another one more, the original is a building that I like especially, maybe it's the roof top:
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i love that new one. do you have a pic from the movie to see where it came from?
There aren't good pictures of this one:
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I added a few changes, the original has no ladder, but has a resemblance I think. This building has a story, it was the original cantina from A fistful of dollars reconverted for the second movie. I talk as a spaghetti western freak, isn't it? 
you might want to dirty up the windows a bit. they seem to reflective
Yes, but that's a bug I think. Watch at the side picture, the same material is not so reflective, I'd like to know what happens there.
This week's building is the bath house:
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There were needed a custom white brick material, and several railing and support wood models. Each one with 3 lod levels (that's why FPS are higher in far view) 
Front windows material seems to be broken, it's more shinny than it should but don't know why.
Thx guys :wink: I plan to add several dirt decals, I'm going to make more for other buildings. I'd like to decrease sun reflection on lighted side, without touching the light values for the moment. There could be other improvements related to brush work, but don't want to increase the count, it's a simple building but there are a lot of faces because repetition. And finally, I should add some imperfections in the geometry so it doesn't look so perfect. If you pay attention to the original building, windows and main door seems to be intentionally misplaced. That's accounted by me, but other parts aren't.
Probably there will be a second version of this map with different game mode, bank assault and escape through train station. So I'll end making the bank indoors too.
Whats happning with that one? It looked awesum
Presidio was almost completed, maybe I'll replace some building textures.
you forgot the horsy thing in the front so the cowboys can rope up their horses
he he, I plan to add those later, once more building are up.
I think realism and complexity don't come together. The simpler the building is, the chances it looks credible are higher. Lighting also plays an important role here, HL2 radiosity can be awesome sometimes.
Here I'm again to show you the progress of a new map. This is going to be a long project, a complete western town with almost everything you can imagine. The buildings will be based on real movie sets created for the famous Sergio Leone spaghetti westerns. So this is about getting the feeling of those movies.
This is the first one, El Paso Bank from A few dollars more. I plan to create a building each week at least, including custom material and models made by me, as usually.
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Quote from ReNoHey man, you a member of the Empires dev team, or have they released the FGD and assets for custom maps? Looks like an interesting mod to have a play around with
They released it, comes with the package. Can be found under mapsrc\fgd
There is also a wiki with all the info needed to set resources, minimap, etc
http://empiresmod.info/index.php/Main_Page
I'm not part of the dev team, this is just my little contribution to the project. This mod deserves much more, hope it keeps improving because I like it a lot.
I have no inmediate plans for more maps of this kind. Probably I'll return to monument valley theme because I love that place, but don't know for what mod it will be.
My next one will be located in an old western city, you know, saloon, sheriff office, hotel, and such. I want to recreate some of the movie sets made in my country in the spaguetti western years, lot of time ago.
Performance was ok on my system, but I'm looking for any input about that matter. I can lower z clip distance if things go bad. This mod also uses bloom effect and it takes quite a lot performance (about 30%), so if someone cares about it, can be disabled with this command: pp_bloom 0
This is a map for Empires (HL2 RTS/FPS hybrid mod), all the custom models, sprites, skybox (just terragen) and some terrain textures are made by me. Due to its size (max grid+3dskybox) detail was lowered on terrain and the few present brushes.
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http://rapidshare.de/files/22228542/emp ... y.rar.html
If you don't know this mod, give it a try because it rocks 
I'm aware about the horizont, is off on purpose. Could be called "foggy skybox", it matches the map fog color to prevent some ugly effects when you have a giant map with z clip distance and 3dskybox. It works because they can't be seen
This is emp_mvalley, a large terrain map for Empires mod:
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It was made using an height map painted in photoshop, and then retouched in world machine to create erosion marks.
I use custom materials and 2 props made by me (radio telescope and rock butt). Slopes will be coupled with some rock overlays to enhace realism.
Size is 60000x60000, most part is in 3dskybox of course, but it's one single piece of terrain. View distance is 16000. Detail is low to mantain good framerates once is filled with players in masive battles with vehicles and buildings everywhere.
This map is not the best example, because I'm only using a very simple displacement+custom mountains model to simulate a big canyon. I can't spend much more resources, but it's starting to look credible.
There are lots of shortcomings, but none that can't stop large terrains with a decent amount of detail. The tools are also behind other editors, that means more effort for the mapper, Hammer is only for brave guys!
I'm actually designing a map for Empires, based on my mvalley scene (check portfolio). This terrain will use the full Hammer grid for playing area, and also a large 3dskybox to magnify open range sensation.
Here's an updated skin for the mountains
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i liked that you colored the skybox to match the ground texture as closely as you can, it's very important that there is not contrast between the two becuase it looks terrible if there is.
Yes, the objective was that, made smoothest possible transition between the two, it's going to be very present. It's strange, but looks better looking closely than from medium distance (angle), I'm also using a bigger texture scale outside to prevent excesive tiling
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One more update, maybe the last, or maybe not 
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I replaced the 3dskybox mountains with a far superior (for me) model, more real thanks to a high poly model erosionated. I used world machine for that. The texture also could be improved, I have some ideas.
That's playing area too, but you are right, 3dskybox took me some time.
Added a normal map from HL2, and voilá
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100 times better at least. Even I'd say that normal map didn't look so good in HL2
He he, more props, ok
I'm working on my bigscaled battlefield2 map and hl2's map's feels small/cramped and the terrain is not perfect.. Haha.. forget it it's just how i feel.
Yes I know, I like a lot big landscapes and engines that supports that, it's nice how BF2 or far cry rescales the geometry for example. I tried to make something similar, at least for low end systems. My main mountains are a model and has a second LOD with much lower poly count, so people that select low models will see it in game:
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Source wasn't created for such terrains, but we can push much more. If this map wasn't meant for multiplayer you could bet the 3dskybox would have x2 or x3 more detail.
About lighting, maybe my LCD monitor has not enought bright so it looks good to me, but I'll check that thx.
But still want colored lights in caves
I added some fake lights, but just white-boring color
The 3rd pic is this one
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Almost all roofs can be accesed, except the two big buildings around the church. The church's roof is accesible from two ways, inside the tower and the scaffolding at the back. Heights plays an important role, there are multiple levels with a clear hierarchy relationship.
I can add some small props at places with low visibility distance, and probably more physic props will be added because we have some kind of replacement for gravity gun (bare hands).
The terrain could be improved with decals I have made for rocks, but they could work on ground too.
The map is near to be completed, here is a overall view. Feel free to add whatever you consider necessary to make it better (without getting worse performance! :wink: )
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