Posts by NikiOo

  • [CS:GO] Erect (wingman hostage)

    watch out! below lies a contextual joke, building up the suspense for the below screenshot. you might feel uncomfortable..

    Spoiler

    If you thought that was crazy, wait till you see this. I ordered this old MetaPolys subdivision box and plugged it into my blender drivers:

    [Blocked Image: https://i.imgur.com/cBK7Zec.jpg]

    What it does is, it reads the geometry of your 3d mesh through that input cable, then based on some hidden algorithm it dials up the frequency of your topology, and voila! I've more than quadrupled the polygons of my mesh. Here's what it looks like now:


    [Blocked Image: https://i.imgur.com/f0l5T2R.png]

    and now...a series of tasteless jokes with some facts sprinkled here and there:

    Spoiler

    The original mesh was based on real topological data, so let's see if you guys can guess the place. Here, I'll give you a hint - it's somewhere in Israel. And another hint - Jesus stood on it. So I'll leave it there. If you are struggling to guess, revise your bibles.

    As a moodboard for the colors I used Kim Kardashian's Skims collection. Particularly, the design goal is to have a map with colors inspired by the human body, so it can be more relatable. When you boot up the game to play this map, it's like calling up a friend. If you like your friends naked that is. I might expand the gradient spectrum to be more inclusive, but this is just a test, so hold your horses.

    On second glance, though, geometry seems like it might get quite repetitive. This old remesh box does a good job, but its age shows when I slap on some Unreal 5 textures. And since I am aiming for some uncanny valley type shit where you can't recognize the map from a human, I might redo the model with some more inspiration from human anatomy. Good night! May this rock visit you in your dreams!

  • [CS:GO] Erect (wingman hostage)

    Quote from Interfearance

    On 5/14/2020 at 8:24 PM, Interfearance said: Those rock textures are making me ERECT

    off topic joke alert!

    Spoiler

    I've just hand-painted these beautiful rock sculpts in Zbrush. I'm glad you like them!

    If you like that texture, you'd be happy to hear I have some merch in the works. Here's a quick preview:


    Spoiler [Blocked Image: https://i.imgur.com/dWSlAAv.png]


    Quote from DMU222

    On 5/14/2020 at 4:02 PM, DMU222 said: Maybe needs a bit more FARM and SCARECROW? Looking pretty epic.

    I've added a barn in the new version. Scarecrows are a must!

  • [CS:GO] Erect (wingman hostage)

    Erect is a wingman map set around a secluded church inside a desert cliff, ran by a murderous cult leader. The cops have been informed that yet another religious sacrifice is about to go down and so they've rolled down the desert in their heavy swat vehicle and jammed it straight through the main entrance. The occultists at the back have been alerted by the loud crash. The guns are out and the hunt is on!

    [Blocked Image: https://i.imgur.com/eOwGdWX.jpg]

    More screenshots:

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    Radar:

    Spoiler [Blocked Image: https://i.imgur.com/tuz6V3L.png]

    I saw the announcement for the Wingman contest and I put together this map in a couple of hours. I've always wanted to make a map with a church and this seems like a perfect occasion to do so. Yes, it is a hostage map. I don't even know if Valve supports hostage maps for Wingman, but the rules of the contest allowed it so I thought, why not. I've never made a hostage map. One thing I've noticed about Wingman maps is that the objective is rarely fulfilled, because either the fights happen way too quickly, or players would much rather lurk to get the jump on their opponent, than give away their position by trying to plant a bomb. So I thought why not give the attacking team, the CTs in the case of hostage, a headstart by putting them at arms reach from the hostages. This way the winning strategy is not so evident. You can either make a run and get the hostage quickly, or you can hold the breaks and wait for your opponents to make a mistake and frag them out. Either way, I've only had time to playtest this with bots so I can't tell how it's gonna play.

    The CTs spawn inside the church, at the main entrance, from where they have two options. They can either walk out and wrap around the church through Long where they can take a long range engagement, or flank the Ts, or they can push forward towards the hostage, where they'll be vulnerable from three attacking points. The Ts have one entrance from beneath the hostage, one side entrance, and a roof area, with one window opening to the church hall. The roof on the left side of the church is accessible through a ladder.

    It's not meant to be a very competitive map. I just want to make a fun map with lots of cool things that you can do. Most of the areas that seem accessible are. I've just uploaded it to the workshop so it should be accessible in a couple of hours, as soon as it gets approved. Here's the link: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/fi…/?id=2095685385 Let me know what you think!

    Visuals inspired by Dusk.

  • [CS:GO] Exotic Places Contest TOP 4 WINNERS

    Quote from Radix

    On 4/12/2020 at 3:22 PM, Radix said: If players know that a map will be removed after such a short time, they will not want to learn it and keep playing Mirage or whatever.

    That was my original concern with the Operations model. Good point!

    I do agree with the popularity idea, but here's lies the transparency issue. Players need to know that this map is being trialed out and could potentially move up to Active Duty.

    The way Valve does things with the map pool reminds me of how I make maps, with zero transparency. I design a layout, I test it, I put aside the feedback, then I take the tings I like and start from scratch. And then when the next playtest comes along and people be like, what happened to this map? I can't recognize it? It was fine before, I just say, ahem, this is how it is now. I like it better.

    Quote from Passerby97

    On 4/13/2020 at 2:20 AM, Passerby97 said: It's not Valve's fault the most efficient way to get high quality maps is by following mapcore and it's competitions.

    That's like saying it's not my fault for watching a Captain Crunch commercial and deciding it's the best breakfast for me.

    Maybe if they had a long term plan about these gorgeous community maps (like seeing them on the big screen, cause that's what I want), then it wouldn't seem like they're so lazy about curating them.

  • Valorant

    I remember in a QNA video the devs were asked whether they plan on having a map editor and their response was that they wanted to focus on making the game as good as it can be, and not get distracted with extraneous stuff like that. I personally don't see them ever coming out with a level editor. They're too proud of their visual artistry to ever let a community member influence the look of their game. Riot is a bunch of artists who steal game mechanics from other games. They won't even let you upload your own custom profile icon - instead they have these incredibly generic profile banners, which look like they straight up took the concept art for the weapons and agents off the shelf, along with some product designs for the Valorant brand. Sprays - same thing. And then there are those name tags, which are also similarly generic and corny. And to me this ties back to what yall have said about the abilities that they take away the freedom of exploring the game and discovering cool things and expressing your personality in a unique way. Instead they take these modes of personal expression and bottle them up in an ability - you like to hold off angles? We've got just the right agent for you - Jett. You like to throw strategic smokes while setting up a site execute? Well, you're in the right hands, buddy! We've got Brimstone for ya. You like making info plays and being aware of the movement and positioning of the enemy teams? Here's Cypher! You like chipping away from your enemies'' health with smart nade usage? Raze is just for you. Riot is like a morbidly insecure, overprotective, narcissistic parent (they won't even admit they're trying to compete with CSGO) who scolds his children for watching porn and going to concerts and then gives them placebo pills and cough syrup every night after curfew, trying to make sure they don't get into trouble. Cause trouble is bad. And god forbid you fail at trying to have a personality. That would be too much to swallow. And what will we do with you if you try to line up a smoke and it lands one meter off, then you die because of it and you feel annoyed? No, here's a tablet screen where you can point exactly where you want your smoke to land. Cause heaven forbid, you go play another game! And don't say those nasty words! God always listens!

    And if I was on Riot's PR team, I would say add an option to disable that anti-cheat and go public about it, saying "We know that many of you have previously experienced the exploits of intrusive anti cheat (implying ESEA), but we are here to fix that! Our anti-cheat can be disabled at any time you want because we care about you!". Here it's very important to ponder on this trust thing because Riot are very deceptive and they don't want their players developing trust issues, otherwise they might discover that they're full of shit. "So come here, my children! This is a safe haven! You shall lay here in my harem where you can lick your wounds." That's how you draw members into your fucked up cult. You tap into their insecurity and you give an answer to their anxiety.

    Also, really smart marketing. The beta release? The twitch streams? The random drops? I was already invested way before I had the chance to try the game and get shit on.

  • [CS:GO] Exotic Places Contest TOP 4 WINNERS

    Quote from fewseb

    5 hours ago, fewseb said: You have to remember the pro scene threw a fit when they added vertigo into the pro pool, A map which at the time was constantly being updated based on feedback and still had 7 months before the next major. Pros are the same type who look at community maps and think they are all about looks with no thought into layout or grenade throws. Id like it if another community map could earn a permanent spot in the game like Agency or Cache, but I dont think well see a new community map ever end up in the pro pool.

    Vertigo's always been known for being a very casual map, hasn't it?

    I played Anubis yesterday and it was the map with the shortest queue time. I read some of the feedback people were giving on Reddit and I have to wonder, have the CS community ever agreed on a community map being *competitively viable*? There's always some areas that *feel* right and some that *feel* wrong. The map's always either too big or too small. It's almost like CS is such a diverse game that everyone judges the maps from the perspective of their own unique playstyle ?.

    I also think that this new way Valve have been introducing maps for the past 2 or so years, unlike in Operations, predisposes players to treat them like they could stay in forever. There's no such thing as, "here's the deadline, here's when things go back to normal". I doubt most players care whether a map is made by Valve or not, as long as it plays well. So in my eyes it just comes down to whether Valve would want a community map to represent their game in tournaments. It would no doubt spice up the viewing experience if a gorgeous new map like Anubis replaced a generic construction site.

  • [WIP] Torga

    Thanks to @CommonCrayon for reminding me of this map's existence. Now that I'm quarantined at home, and now that my exams are postponed, I thought I might have some free time to work on some old maps.

    I stopped working on this map back in July last year because I was beginning my first year in college and didn't have much free time. I might have also hit a creative block cause I found myself constantly switching themes and looking for new gimmicks to inspire me to continue with it. Now I am certain this is the theme I am going to stick with. And by this I mean a Chinese mountain village with rise fields surrounding it. I think I'm onto something with this dark atmosphere, cause I'm really digging it!

    Anyways I thought I'd share some screenshots. Purely for documentation purposes, if anything. Here goes:

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    [Blocked Image: https://i.imgur.com/lCgSLSQ.jpg]

    [Blocked Image: https://i.imgur.com/4DDxjsf.jpg]

    The story is that Riot games, terrified by death threats coming from the CSGO developers, have moved the development team of Valorant to a secret location in the Chinese mountains. The CSGO devs however managed to track them down with their very special computers, which have internet access, and they've now sent a terrorist team to bomb the location, along with the entire studio (which is hidden inside these conveniently shaped 72x72 crates), to halt development. This is only one location, however, I have 3 more maps coming with the backup servers.

  • [CS:GO] Exotic Places Contest TOP 4 WINNERS

    Quote from Interfearance

    On 3/24/2020 at 4:51 PM, Interfearance said: That's a good point. It is also sad, because they are much more interesting than what does survive today, and they obviously work.

    The Bible also works, doesn't it? Far better than it would have if it was released today. It was released in the peak of interest and when there wasn't much competition. That's not to say the literary and social theory of religion hasn't evolved since then.

    Back in the day there were no dating apps and no social media, so you just had to date people in your local community. There was far less choice, but that doesn't mean people were less happy.

    I feel like there's always going to be a misalignment between the interests of mappers and the interests of players. You gotta think about this like a drug dealer - you must know your audience, know what they're currently on and what kind of nerve it's scratching. You need to make them feel comfortable and safe in changing over to the new drug and convince them that it is a sufficient substitute. If you're a biochemist making designer drugs, you might take pride in making the *best* drug (some drug that stimulates your brain and makes you smarter, or some drug that turns you into a warewolf), but if you want to make big buck off of that drug, you gotta streamline it - you gotta make it easy to consume, make it scentless so police dogs can't track it, etc. That's why maps that stick to standard 4 square layout (flat map with few paths) are more accessible. Mappers think like mappers, players think like players. That drug which turns you into a werewolf might get a lot of praise from your fellow mappers, but it's not gonna be the new tobacco.

    Here's another analogy: There are games that liked by many - like Super Mario, and there are games that are loved by few, like Prison Architect for example. Imagine booting up Flappy Bird on your computer (Don't know why you would play flappy bird on your computer, but what do I know. You're the weird one, not me), and then you see a small button below Play that says "New Mode", so you press it and suddenly it boots up Dark Souls! You're not in the mood for Dark Souls, you're in the mood for Flappy Bird. It's 2 AM and you're lying in bed with your laptop. Hell, you don't even have a mouse.

    I'm probably overthinking this and layouts may well be a minor factor in getting players to play new maps. It may be the way the areas are designed, or the way the art is put together that makes something tick in peoples brains so they think to themselves, "ah this feels familiar, this feel like those other 5 maps I've played for hundreds of hours".

    I personally like making maps with crazy layout constrains like De_Graveyard, driven by some grand concept, because I know other mappers will appreciate the effort it takes to make such a layout work, and because some people are just gonna be fascinated by the all-round coolness of having a map set on a ship, or in a radio tower, or a large open train-yard, or around a giant fucking statue.

  • [CS:GO] Exotic Places Contest TOP 4 WINNERS

    Getting Valve to add a community map to the tournament pool is like asking your wife to have a kid after you've been married for 30 years. That ship has already sailed long ago. By this point even adoption isn't an option. If anyone was interested in playing new maps, they're either on Mapcore, or they're already playing other games. I bet for most people CSGO is just that old game which you can boot up at any time, always expecting the same thing, and always getting the same thing. The most recent update with the operators skins and the battle royale mode tells me that this game is just a cash cow for Valve. It's about time that cow get slaughtered. And not like in a nice and ethical farm, but in one of those farms from those vegan documentaries. The game is entering menopause already and this is our last bitch effort to give birth to something new.

    Also, Imagine all 6 tournament maps getting replaced by community maps. It wouldn't be a Valve game anymore. Why do you think they stopped adding maps in operations? Cause they don't want their profits going to some random community members. Remember what happened to that doctor who tried to introduce new treating methods to the hospital? He got fired! And then he died! In a car accident. So don't be him. Don't waste your talents. No one will remember you.


    Or I'm probably just butthurt because I suck at the game and dont play it anymore ... anyways, yeah Mutiny is really awesome. I remember playing it almost a year ago in it's earlier stages when it was still a greybox and I just now recognized where I remember it from. It's changed (shrinked) quite a lot.

  • Mustang (formerly Everest)

    Quote from fewseb

    12 hours ago, fewseb said: [Blocked Image: https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/772866286594481316/2454D1B3B10824BC651CE0919D7285256F0DE8F2/?imw=637&imh=358&ima=fit&impolicy=Letterbox&imcolor=%23000000&letterbox=true]

    What I really want to know is why, in the year 2020, are map makers still using that T-Logo on their overviews. That one was in the CSGO beta for all of 5 minutes before they replaced it with the current one. They made that change about 8 years ago so you would think this wouldnt keep happening.

    I always use that one cause it's the same resolution as the CT logo (when you download it from the source wiki) and it's so much easier to just slap it onto the radar in Photoshop, knowing that they're both the exact same size.

  • [CS:GO] Gust II

    I did some more testing on the map and I came to the conclusion that bombsite A was a bit too exposed to the upper entrances so I redesigned the layout of the site. It's now an arctic convoy:

    Spoiler [Blocked Image: https://i.imgur.com/IQ5BB2E.jpg]

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    [Blocked Image: https://i.imgur.com/chv4xQ3.jpg]

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    There is now a lot more cover to play around and several places to defend from around the outskirts of the bombsite. The way it was previously the only spot Ts could defend from in an after-plant was from CT spawn, unless they had someone covering them from upper.

    I checked the size of the map and right now the playable area takes up roughly as much as Nuke does. I don't know if it might still be a bit too small.

    I'll update the workshop asap.

  • [CS:GO] Gust II

    Here's a quick update with some changes...

    I've added a second pathway for Ts to go towards B, which connects to the other side of the main one, so they don't have to expose themselves to the long sightline through the two bomb sites if they don't want to:

    Spoiler [Blocked Image: https://i.imgur.com/QgTL4Mt.jpg]

    The height difference in bombsite A has been decreased to 320 (as much as nuke upper rafters on A). Also one of the entries from CT spawn has been raised to give the CTs a higher vantage point towards upper T entrance, and at the same time provide more cover in the site for afterplant:

    Spoiler [Blocked Image: https://i.imgur.com/8y4h1Al.jpg]

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    I've also added a flying sign in both spawns spelling "Breakable Ice!" to indicate to players that the ice is breakable. There is also a floating block of ice beneath the sign, but it is...well broken:

    Spoiler [Blocked Image: https://i.imgur.com/eQnADD8.jpg]

    Don't mind the darkness, this is another one of the unique features of the map. Both teams have equal access to it so it's fair. If you've noticed the new crate I've added in the screenshot above then congratulations! You really are quite perceptive. You are set to succeed in this map. Not everyone is. This map is not for the faint-hearted.

    Some people expressed disconcern with the bombsites being so close:

    Spoiler [Blocked Image: https://i.imgur.com/2Ghhro0.jpg]

    I don't think there's anything fundamentally wrong with that. It just isn't seen very often. I believe that if done correctly, it can make for an interesting fast-paced map with a lot of flanking and wide range of possible strategies.

    Another big change is the closing of the T entrance to middle, which was previously open to CT spawn:

    Spoiler [Blocked Image: https://i.imgur.com/05k8tc6.jpg]

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    I realized that I couldn't make it work the way I wanted it to as it was before, so I just closed it off. I also added a crate so it can remind people of playing Cashe's A main as a T, which will inevitably make them feel comfortable and 'safe'. This is very much necessary since the rest of the map is ridiculously stupid. I am planning on having cracks in the ice floor in T spawn (like the ones in de_survivor) where you can fall and die if you are not perceptive enough (but you found that crate in the dark screenshot so you don't have to worry about that).

    Now onto B site... Did I say quick update? Forget it. I just like to write, okay! Here's the new B site:

    Spoiler [Blocked Image: https://i.imgur.com/00Wwd5B.jpg]

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    I didn't really like the T entrance to B the way it was before so I completely reworked the angles. This time around I've flattened the ground across the entire bomb site so players can feel safe and secure and confident that they won't have to move their lazy arm vertically. Or at least they can rest the muscles required for vertical aiming so they'll be more prepared for the extreme height variations around A. See this is what I call good map design. You need to have balance. If you are taking risks with one area of the map, you need to make the other one play like a generic aim map. You can't suddenly introduce height variation in all areas of your map. That would be like taking a dog out of it's natural habitat and putting it out in the streets expecting it won't get lime disease. Or like taking a hunter gatherer and sitting him down on a computer to make CS:GO maps while you deliver him the same food he'd otherwise go hunting for, and expect him not to get fat. Of course he will get fat. The CS:GO player's wrist is the product of decades of evolution through random mutation and natural selection. You need to respect that process of evolution and treat your patients with caution.

    Speaking of caution, I've elevated the pathway to the ladder and given it a nice tall wall to protect it from CT sightline from B site:

    Spoiler [Blocked Image: https://i.imgur.com/ZeeFMcR.jpg]

    The map is gonna be set in a glacier by the way, next to some rock hills perhaps.

    I'll update the workshop link tomorrow.