WIP in WIP, post your level screenshots!

[sn0wsh00 43]

On 12/24/2020 at 9:28 AM, blackdog said:

This is an interesting project, but I think you need to work on the central hub. This is basically gonna turn out as a TDM, since there are not gonna be clear fronts (two distinct sides) where players will come from, and running up and down a corridor is not fun.

So I think you need to build a central hub that is more than a corridor, you need an arena that allows people to clash together in a fluid manner. It would work out even better if you could add verticality, placing the different 1-on-1 rooms on different levels. Imagine a mall with a couple of galleries or look up the Panopticon concept (where your rooms would be the cells).

The map will have a radar, so that should make it easier to infer where friends and enemies will be coming from. Also, for one of the spinoff, I plan on having all surviving players teleport to a seventh arena, with Ts and CTs teleporting to distinct sides.

Nevertheless, taking your advice, I decided to overhaul the hallway on the original map so that it feels less hallway-ish. First, I widened the hallway to make it more like an atrium. I also transformed the corridor so that it'll look like three distinct sectors, with the two end sectors connecting to three arenas each. With this, I hope to visually nudge players into checking the two adjacent arenas first before moving across the map to check the other three arenas, hopefully reducing the amount of back and forth running.

Here's a comparison GIF of the changes (I did not record the coordinates for the original screenshot, so this comparison won't be perfect):
 

Spoiler

 

And here's another screenshot of the revamped connecting area:
 

Spoiler

 

 

Edited December 28, 2020 by sn0wsh00
spoilers

[blackdog 4,418]

Nice one @sn0wsh00. Just wanted to clarify my point about the TDM is not much about teamwork, players are used to play DM and is fine, my point was about the flow, as all good DM maps let you flow in circular paths (so you're never stopping).

Well done with the changes, it looks more structured already.

[Buddy 815]

That is too flat, other than that it does look like the retail game

[MadsenFK 580]

Acres (Wingman)

Gonna try and learn some more about custom assets and materials with this project 

Spoiler

 

 

 

Edited December 30, 2020 by MadsenFK

[D3ads 2,306]

On 12/29/2020 at 7:44 PM, Buddy said:

That is too flat, other than that it does look like the retail game

That's just the camera height making it look a bit like that:

In the retail maps, the terrain top is completely flat!
 

[That50'sGuy 505]

I'm still workin' on porting HLA content to Source 1. It's not much, but it's coming along!

It's not really challenging, it's just time consuming to do since it's quite a long process for even just 1 model. Though textures can be rather quick.

Car models have proven to be most challenging since they have different textures for both the inside and outside. And they aren't separate like the car models in CS:GOs Dust 2. So I have to manually select every polygon that makes up the interior, and temporarily make the interior it's own model to add the texture. Then I can combine the two together again. It can take hours to do this, but I'd say it's worth it.

Foliage hasn't proven challenging. The only thing I have to do is try to re-create how the S2 wind effects look with the S1 $treesway technology. Having a high scrumble setting usually recreates the look well.

Dynamic props are the only thing I'm not sure I'll be up for. I have no idea how to port over the animations for the model. But if by some miracle I figure it out, I'll be one happy fella!

I'll update y'all soon! I hope your new year has been great so far!

Edited January 5 by That50'sGuy

[blackdog 4,418]

Awesome stuff @That50'sGuy, you planning on releasing a pack for mappers?

Sure should be fine, but have you checked that Valve won't get mad for this?

[That50'sGuy 505]

1 hour ago, blackdog said:

Awesome stuff @That50'sGuy, you planning on releasing a pack for mappers?

Sure should be fine, but have you checked that Valve won't get mad for this?

Releasing a pack was indeed my intention! I was amazed at all the content in the game and thought to myself "CS:GO mappers would have a field day with all this!".

As for your second question, that's actually something I never thought of. I've heard in the past that Valve doesn't have issues with people using Valve assets in other Valve-Made games. But I'll probably see if there's a way to ask them.

Edited January 5 by That50'sGuy

[blackdog 4,418]

I was more thinking of the HL mapping community, being able to integrate more with the most recent game, remaster some maps/mods or just allow people that don’t have Alyx to play something in theme with that would be great.

You might accidentally become responsible for people recreating Alyx for the peasants that don’t own VR @That50'sGuy

Edited January 5 by blackdog

[JorisCeoen 244]

It's amazing to see how Valve has lately been using transparant textures as simple gradient overlays into displacements textures etc in CS:GO. Seeing that brick texture at the bottom edge of the brick wall, I'm wondering if it was a new texturing-modeling trick they simply ported to Dust 2's Kabash windows. Great work!

[That50'sGuy 505]

23 minutes ago, blackdog said:

I was more thinking of the HL mapping community, being able to integrate more with the most recent game, remaster some maps/mods or just allow people that don’t have Alyx to play something in theme with that would be great.

Gee, I didn't think of that! Seeing the HL2 maps remastered on the old engine with the new props/textures sounds like it would be nice to see!

23 minutes ago, blackdog said:

You might accidentally become responsible for people recreating Alyx for the peasants that don’t own VR @That50'sGuy

Well this just boosted my motivation by 105%! Knowing that my simple job of porting HD Half-Life stuff to the old engine could result in something big sure fills me with determination! (No, the Undertale reference was not intentional, heh )

12 minutes ago, JorisCeoen said:

It's amazing to see how Valve has lately been using transparant textures as simple gradient overlays into displacements textures etc in CS:GO. Seeing that brick texture at the bottom edge of the brick wall, I'm wondering if it was a new texturing-modeling trick they simply ported to Dust 2's Kabash windows. Great work!

It is indeed an interesting thing to take note of. I actually thought the same thing looking back at Dust 2 after playing HLA.

Fun-Fact: That very brick trim model was what actually motivated me to start this project in the first place. It's really high-quality and comes with a 4k texture. And all of the bricks really pop on the model. It was seeing that model while exploring chapter 6 that got me thinking about what could be made with all these assets.

Edited January 5 by That50'sGuy

[sn0wsh00 43]

Sure, it's been less than a week since I've released aim_six_arenas, but that doesn't mean I can't start working on the spinoff map.

The conceit of this spinoff map is still the same as the original: each round starts as a series of 1v1 matches before allowing all the surviving players to fight each other. The difference here is that, instead fighting it out in movie sets and hallways, the players now fight in separate arenas, with the surviving players teleporting to a seventh arena. From a gameplay perspective, this means no more searching up and down a corridor looking for enemies, something players generally dislike. From the design perspective, this means I can add a lot more details to the arenas, which can be seen below:

Aztec/Ancient arena (original arena for comparison)

Subzero/Monastery arena (original arena for comparison)

Swamp/Sugar Mill arena (original arena for comparison)

You'll notice that the skies in the screenshots are different, thanks to my use of skydomes. I wrote a tutorial on how I made these skydomes here.

Edited January 12 by sn0wsh00
wording

[StormCatcher.77 61]

First attempt in Prodeus map editor:

[Serialmapper 617]

That short film by 3DMike  in UE4 with de_survivor made me nostalgic, so, inspired by his maps de_survivor and de_recon, and being sick and tired of the urban landscapes that look like a warehouse full of crates,  i had started a small project of mine, a defuse map. For the start i am going to make it for the wingman mode with just one bomb site to see how it behaves and then i am really thinking of extending it to a fully fledged classical defuse map.

 

Edited January 18 by Serialmapper

[sn0wsh00 43]

I've been putting the finishing touches to my aim_six_arenas spinoff map (which I'm now calling Showdown Planet) and I though I could share some comparison GIFs between the original map and the spinoff map. As I mentioned earlier, while aim_six_arenas merely was a collection of six soundstage-like rooms connected by a hallway, Showdown Planet will consist of six separate arenas meant to represent different places around the world, which means the arenas in Showdown Planet will be far more detailed than their aim_six_arenas counterparts.

Dust/Mirage arena:

Aztec/Ancient arena:

Swamp/Mill arena:

Subzero/Monastery arena:

Hallway, made more AIM friendly in the Showdown Planet version:

I did not record camera positions when taking screenshots, hence why the GIFs aren't perfect comparisons.

 

Edited Sunday at 11:36 PM by sn0wsh00
wording