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Studio is back again with our every-other week update. The last two weeks, myself and the team have been hard at work on detailing A SITE as well as finalising CT and T's Art Work. From this point on-wards, every two weeks we will be now showing off different art-passes for each location as we draw closer to release / deadline. As expected, the areas shown in the images below are still being worked on and are not final. Images of the last two weeks progress: FULL IMGUR ALBUM (43 IMAGES): https://imgur.com/a/woeFt CT AND A SITE VIDEO SHOWCASE: A SITE: (WIP: A Site is still being detailed, so many of the props in "grey box" areas are not final. Additionally, the Site currently has an 'Inferno vibe' which will change with the addition of more studio related props. E.G. Replacing Wooden Crates / Fountain with Camera and Crane equipment.) T SPAWN: (WIP: Only a few more tweaks will be made to T spawn including minor editing to lighting, props and optimisation.) CT SPAWN: (WIP: Only a few more tweaks will be made to CT spawn including minor editing to lighting and optimisation.) Animated TV Screens: https://giant.gfycat.com/GleamingDarkAfricanclawedfrog.mp4 Finally, feedback is welcome and we hope to hear your opinions of the progress we have made so far!

hey guys look at my new csgo map- oh wait never mind it's still portal 2

Afther the last playtest I had a hard time to keep on working on this project. But hey I grabbed my balls together and finally put myself to it. Unfortenetly it's mostly still in greybox but hopefully the layout is about right! Check out the album over here, I have written the changes below the pictures: https://imgur.com/a/FCFqg I will make a radar soon, fix some lighting and build the cubemaps. Perhaps then another playtest to do or should it be time to go work on the Art? Steam workshop: [link coming when there is a radar]

Still working on this. Here's a little something I put together for the Skybox (spinning speed is WIP @grapen ).

Thanks for comments guys. VIOLATION - making things diverse is a challenge. Different colours will come in soon and more variety on the trailers, especially in areas that look too samey. Moved onto a new area, and thought I would show the development shots. Some horrid looking stuff in there! Last screen shows the entrances to the site which comes off the swimming pool screenshot.

After two and half years the game is finally out on Steam! Super proud of what we've managed to create. It's 10% off for the first week, and there's a new launch trailer as well. Hope you guys give it a shot http://store.steampowered.com/app/551770/ECHO/

@Fnugz dun a thing

A level for Brainbread 2 cancelled. It was supposed to be in the style of Chernobyl, though I stopped development and never continued.

I just come back from 2 days spent in the mountains ! It was amazing ! Now I'm tired ^^ A video I made on a peak (in french guys ).

First part of detailing is over (Fast compile) -B site took from previous version of the map -Added new window for CT's -Overview Quick showcase

Having lived that life for quite some time, it's really just like @[HP] and @Minos describe. If you live among the poor, the unwanted, the criminals, dealers and junkies, it's not really a choice. It's not that a life of crime or easy money is more appealing, for many that's all there is. People know who you are and who you associate with. They don't give you chances. The government doesn't give you chances. They keep you in that environment and out there, only the strong and ruthless survive. The weak and poor are always being fucked over by the rich. Always have, always will. I was lucky because I met a uptown girl who had a weak spot for bad boys. The girl wasn't that interesting, but her parents really fell in love with me. They took me in. Cleaned me up, arranged an education, job and what not. They gave me a chance to escape that life. Without them, I would have been another lost soul.

Hi =) I've been working on this greybox for a few weeks and it's now in a playable state. I've tried to convey some of the visuals I'm aiming for and already done some refining on timings and cover. The layout however is rather unusual and though I tried to make it fun and balanced it is really hard to judge that without the feedback of others. If any of you are interested in the map I'd love to hear and discuss your opinions on it. I am currently hosting the map here: 207.154.212.149 (host in europe). Add me on steam if you'd like to play it with me. Workshop Imgur Album Hope you enjoy.

Hello everyone, I've started a few classes on computer graphics and animation, from a scientific point of view. Since most people are either hobbyists or artists on this forum, I figured some of you might be interested in learning a few things (or rediscovering some things as I'm learning them as well. I can't post most of my learning materials since I'd get expelled otherwise, but I'll do my best anyway. One class will be about photorealistic rendering and the other one about physically based animations and effects. On the first one we'll program various effects starting from basic illumination to subsurface scattering, going through reflections and procedural generation of effects, geometry etc. Animation will go over rigid body then soft body simulation, with overviews of hair simulation and maybe machine learning techniques to have fast soft body simulation. If those subjects interests anyone, welcome here, I'll update this thread with new posts when I'll learn new things during my courses.

Another one from Iceland ^^

Gearbox Software is looking for a passionate senior level designer to join us in crafting upcoming first person shooters. This role involves working with the Lead Level Designer and Creative Director to pitch, build, polish, and ship levels using Unreal Engine 4. Senior Level Designers are responsible for owning the vision of their levels, and working with a variety of other departments to see that vision come to fruition. It involves close collaborative work with artists, mission designers, writers, coders, and a variety of other disciplines to ensure the level ships on time at a high standard of quality, while also being fun and memorable to players. Responsibilities: Develop single player and cooperative levels based on existing game design documents, direction from project leadership, and collaboration with peers. This involves taking a design all the way from a paper design to a shipping product, iterating over time based on feedback, creative goals, and project deadlines. Prototype, iterate, and polish moment-to-moment gameplay while working with narrative designers, enemy designers, artists, and other disciplines to ensure quality combats and mission experiences for the final customers Mentorship and sharing of expertise with junior level designers and other design staff. Ability to model a positive tone and work ethic to junior members of the team. Ability to provide and receive good feedback when iterating levels. Required Skills and Experience: Proven track record of building and shipping large level environments. Should include videos or screenshots of shipped levels, and any additional documentation showing design and iteration process. Understanding of modern level design practices, including layout, pacing, technical implementation, and above all else creating fun experiences for players. Strong eye towards aesthetics, with an ability to work hand-in-hand with art teams. Previous experience in a art role is a plus. Excellent documentation, communication, interpersonal, and organizational skills. Ability to maintain focus and self-motivation towards the current project goals. Live near or be able to relocate to Frisco, Texas Have shipped 2 or more AAA action titles, with a preference towards Unreal technology and first person shooters. Desired but not required: Shipped games using Unreal 4 technology Experience with the certification and shipping process on modern consoles Experience working with large inter-disciplinary teams Co-op and/or Online Multiplayer experience. Previous leadership experience Please apply here for consideration: https://gearboxsoftware.bamboohr.com/jobs/view.php?id=70

Loved this video! Here's an extra one, not related to video games directly, but the same lessons definitely apply here.

Hello guyz ! I did few screens of my work on the new Dishonored stand alone that I wanted to share with you If you want to know anything about these screens, as simple as it can be, feel free to ask, it would be a pleasure to answer Compared to art station, the following screens are in a much higher resolution (1920*3416 instead of 1920 * 1080) and I apologyze by advance if you get any trouble dowloading them. On the following screens, I only did the Buildings (Models and textures). The lighting, the composition and the smaller asset are made by my great colleagues I'll certainly update this topic with new pics when they'll be ready. Enjoy -_-_-_-_ Curator -_-_-_-_- Architecture design by Valentin "3dnj" Levilain -_-_-_- Ghost town -_-_-__-_- Architecture design by Christophe Lefaure

@El Moroes Sorry to hear that, your map was my favorite in this mapping contest. However i understand you perfectly. Today's standards for making high quality maps for CS:GO are higher and higher and much harder and time consuming to be accomplished. I miss the CS Source and cs1.6 mapping days.

Prof. Clem wrote a paper on the subject: http://www.clement-melendez.com/portfolio/articles/push-pull/introduction/

For koth_brazil, the main element of the map is the control point. The purpose was to lead the players to the control point as easily as possible, and also to make it looks like the main goal of the map. For the first version I've created a simple barn, I wasn't sure about the direction I wanted to take for the control point at that moment, I just knew I wanted to make a jungle map. After the playtests, and when I became happy with the layout ( Yyler helped me on that) I started to make a full artpass on the map. Here you can see the greybox on the spawn, the main goal to achieve here was to show to the players the 3 options they had to choose a path. After the artpass I tried to make a bright yellow lighting to try to catch the player's eyes, putting more details at the door spots helps to show the options. Below you can see the snipers deck, it's the main road on the map which is the fastest way to go to the control point. You can clearly see that it's hard to see where is the objective here. Here's the result after the artpass, I added a path to go to the snipers deck on the left, I added lamps to put some focus on the important areas, and more important, I changed the whole control point area. During the artpass, I wanted to create something that was standing out from the map, on a koth map, the control point is the main element, and you want to lead the players to it as naturally as possible. That's why I decided to work on a radar dish, like the one on tc_hydro, but instead of having a dish on the gameplay area, I decided to work on the pillar, which was fitting more on the current layout and design, and then put the dish on the background to create an awesome atmosphere. This site is shite, I can't upload more pictures :< After some texturing work I decided to put yellow stripes on the beams, it's making the tower even more standing out this way. The final result On the picture below, notice the lack of detailling on the left building, that way you put the emphasize on the tower. Sometimes adding details is not the best choice, instead, you just need to decrease the amount of details on the less usefull areas. Check these articles http://magnarj.net/article_funclight.html http://www.nodraw.net/2010/08/tf2-density-of-detailing/

This is another Halloween map that i have been working on for this year. Goal for BLU team is to sink a custom payload cart, that carries a big bottle of booze and a chemistry set into the enemys ghastly cauldron, causing an explosion. RED team should preent that from happening. But there is a catch - round doesnt end to either teams victory no matter how hard they try but they always end up the underworld. There, they have to have a bumper car race to their death or teans victory. Couldn't have done this without some help, and the people i worked with were awesome in helping me for making models and effects. Here's few screenshots belowand as always, it's in the Steam Workshop here! I usually don't say this but competition is hard, so vote it out at the workshop, either way is fine, like it or not. Thanks.

Found this on the web: http://csgo-mapstats.ga/ But I have no idea if this uses the correct data. Results seem a bit odd imo... Edit: (thanks @OrnateBaboon)

Simply Awsome! Maybe some plastic chairs or bench on those porches would do. Perhaps some empty beers and a beach ball or so ever. That would really make it trailerpark like

Agreed on the story stuff. It doesn't have the same layering that UC4 did. Maybe that's because Druckmann wasn't on the project, but also I think the choices for the characters are maybe a little strange for a small standalone. We just haven't spent enough time with Chloe or Nadine to really care about them, and the backstories that they tried to develop to get us more involved felt a little bit forced maybe? Those heartfelt moments that UC4 had like Nate and Elena having dinner on the couch just couldn't happen with these characters in such a short experience. In a longer game, they definitely could've fleshed it out more (similar to how they did with Sam in UC4). I think that was a key thing that made UC4 story work, we've lived with Nate, Sully and Elena for so long. Their relationships are complex and layered, just like relationships in real life. Naughty Dog took their time to explore those complexities. Would've been cool to see something with someone more familiar like Sam or Sully even, maybe getting to experience Sully's younger days. However I think the level design and combat encounters were the high points, especially towards the end. I think I was better at the game this time around, and knew how to break line of sight properly to go in and out of stealth. It also feels like they did a better job of designing the arenas around their "guerilla" stealth system better this time around. They basically took concepts from UC4 and pushed them just a little bit further. I loved the open world segment, felt like a great way to explore a Naughty Dog world. Hopefully they continue with that open-ended level design in TLoU part 2, super excited to see what they could come up with.

Cool! Hope you like it :D~ Also, some reviews are starting to come in. We got an 8 out of 10 on Gamespot plus Kotaku really seem to dig it!

I'm really looking forward to his remake:

Correct. Most, if not all, of the characters are based on real people: relatives, people working in the same building, etc.

Watched this last night. It's so inspiring to see what a small group of people can accomplish together when all the pieces fall in the right place, everyone on the team on the same page. It's one of those cases where the whole is much greater than the sum of its parts. It's also a lesson on how you can get away with cheap solutions, ex the devs using themselves and their relatives as characters in the game. This stuff adds authenticity and a unique feel. I feel like these days we tend to complicate things too much, always trying to match AAA standards, when in fact, things in a game just need to be consistent to be immersive. No need to have the same actors as in every other game too, use people you know with no acting experience, that will make things more interesting I could be wrong but if I remember correctly Valve did the same for Half-Life 2 characters.

That's almost that ; Architects implements the modular assets they did in the editor first before giving it to Env art. Everything should works fine first to avoid bad surprise. Sometimes, since our engine as it own constraint, It happens that we suggest few change in the layout, to get dirt gradient on a huge surface, etc. 2) It's not a benefit, we just do not had the right tools to work with Bsp as smoothly as in Hammer =) 3) The gameplay changes only impacts the "In editor" composition. If someone wants a broken wall somewhere, he just need to swap a generic wall with a broken one and it's over. No more works on the Env art side (Except if someone needs something REALLY specific but we are already aware of.) 4) It isn't the case since each building is already mount in the engine before the "final" art pass About the Content Lock down, you just have to make your request before it. If not, too bad ahah ! 5) Cannot tell the production time of a level (I guess everybody works on there own level from start to end), but for a building like the curator, It tooks me 1 month to do it, and for the whole Ghost town (Interior + Exterior) around 1 mounth and half. Vertex paint is included in the delay and can takes around 2 weeks to paint each modules in Maya.. since we were not able to do it Inengine :'( :'( :'(

@El Moroes Can you elaborate a little on the workflow? Blockout in Maya => passed onto environment artists => architects implement gameplay events in editor while artists work on modular assets => env artists bring modular art pieces into the editor to dress up the level? 1) Howdo the architects start implementing the gameplay, is the blockout imported into the editor? (gotta have geo to implement gameplay) 2) What are the benefits of blocking out in an external 3D tool vs in-editor? 3) Since implementing the gameplay and playtesting inevitably leads to iteration, do the architects change the blockout in Maya or in-editor? If Maya, doesn't that create a lot of "unnecessary" back & forwarding between Maya and the editor? 4) The art is modular but does it ever impede iteration? I don't think this is the case, since additional assets can be created when required. But I guess compromises have to be made at some point (content lockdown?) 5) How many architects worked on Death of the Outsider and what's the estimated average production time on a level (mission) from start to end?

Happy to see our map here now ! I want to share and i will keep update this theme with our new props and textures. Some of our own props atm

Yeah, pretty much the same story for me. It made me want to be a level designer, then it rolled off to environment art. Kind of crazy how a video game could change my life this much, for the better. I remember playing MP1 over, and over and over again, one day I was so bored I started reading the game's manual, in the very last page there was a little section called "Modding", I remember like it was yesterday, reading that little paragraph saying if I wanted more Max Payne I could hop online and get other people's content and even make my own. I got on a bus to the nearest cyber-cafe, carrying with me an old CD-RW that was rewritten a hundred times already, I couldn't afford internet at home so that turned into my routine for the months to come, we take it for granted now but man having the chance to socialize with people with the same passion for a game and mods was extremly liberating and enabling for me. Which btw, eventually in the search for more games I could mod, I found Mapcore. Max Payne still has one of the best ambiance work I've ever seen in a video game, the balance between the story, design, art and music was nailed to perfection. It made me realize a video game can be way more than just running in boring corridors killing mindless mean dudes on the screen, they can immerse you and help better your life, I've been trying to recreate that with my art, ever since.

Functional Lighting - Magnar Jenssen

This video but you might have seen it already :x

you should post more pictures in here. people will be more likely to check it out.

Released RC12 today Worked on a bunch of little things here and there, some which I don't remember. CT side is still the same layout as I have not been able to do a 5v5 play test on the map yet. I had tried making a mulitlevel radar today but got too frustrated and went back to just the plain 1 level radar for now. I took some new screenshots as well. (mostly T side) I'm not a big fan of the CT layout at the moment but maybe it isn't that bad. Close to 4,000 downloads on the workshop and I still haven't played a full match on it yet. I also find some of the lighting models on the ceiling a bit ugly. I will be paying more attention to the ceiling when I start detailing both sides more. The bottom floor you can access via the elevator shaft will be raised 1 floor too for next release.

Cool pics @2d-chris, i've been there too it's great Some pics from Brazil. Sorry, i don't have a good camera it's just from a phone, I hope it's still interesting to look at.

Interesting question... So if they remove the old maps, the map pool would consist of Mapcore maps only in a few years? (and dust2)

This brought a lot of memories!

Sup peeps. Just finished another csgo map with buds @'RZL and @MaanMan. We've been working on this one for a good while now, maybe since December of last year. It was challenging at times, but we're finally happy to put it out there. WORKSHOP LINK Do you hate it, do you love it? Not enough sand? Let us know.

In some ways we stagnated a bit, in others, there was actually a lot of progress in this field:

Well...thanks @kikette for the answers ^^ Just a point about your last question : there was 1 "owner" by level. The other architects helped the "owners" by making a pass of details, optimization, lighting,... From the beginning to the end, I think we worked 8 months on this project (from prototyping to the finished levels).

I've been living in a favela in Rio de Janeiro for the last 2 weeks. Damn guys we are lucky to be where we are. As much as i love seeing the country for its landscapes and the great sunny weather, I feel so lucky to live where i live. It's not really about terror and gangs that the media might speak about, it's more about the way people live here and are used to it. You know it when you see their habbits, how they built houses without much plans, how they get themselves into debt to buy stuff that i wouldn't even buy (upgrading from a Galaxy S7 to an S8, taking a credit for months, taking another huge TV ...), how they drive (seatbelt is optional, there's no clear rule and everyone is just trying to overtake anyone else), how they let the old persons sick at home until they absolutely must go to the hospital, how they eat/drink, how they leave school very early and parents don't even care (people even ask you "but why do you still continue school ? Don't you want to work ?") ... I love the people and I hope the best for all of them. But damn it hurts and i don't know how stuff are going to change/get better ... Just an important note : the favelas represent "only" 25% of the population in Rio, I do not have an overall look over the city. I'll get back home by the end of the week, i'll have some pictures to show you.

Well, he's finally here. My son Jayce was born on Tuesday. It's been a long and difficult road, both for him and my wife. But he's a fighter and he's here to stay. Both are still recovering and I hope they get well soon. It's been tough and tiresome, but nothing says love more than holding both your son and daughter in your hands. Now, if I just could find a moment to catch some sleep. Anyway, heres him enjoying the view: Oh, and if you are wondering about the name. I couldn't get Jason (my wife refused), so this is the closest I could get. Nothing wrong with Jayce though, because.....

Looks Global to me! I'll see myself out...

Guys...bad news here. Well how will I explain that I think this project show me that I've enough with mapping ? Mmmh during the last couple of days (and after two busy summer months) I tried to find someone who could help me to art this level. I honestly though that this map will be something that I'm proud and perhaps the last level for me...but these last days I was also thinking a lot about myself and my priorities and unfortunately, making levels is not on my top priorities. Of course I still like that but now, and since few years, it's my job and I honestly don't want to spend time on that when I'm at home. I think I should stop lying on myself and make what I really want to do. Of course I'll continue to follow what you're doing guys (because you're making great levels!) but, yeah, about me I'm done with that. Perhaps some of you would like to continue this level ? If it's the case, you'll find all the needed files here : DOWNLOAD ARIZONA FILES Well, I think it's clear and I'm sorry if I disappoint some of you but I think I take the right decision for me.

Damn, son!