[CS:GO] Exotic Places Contest TOP 4 WINNERS

[Vaya]

son...junction is a mapcore map...

 

[Roald]

13 minutes ago, Vaya said:

son...junction is a mapcore map...

 

Made by TheHorseStrangler and some other dudes.
He also contributed to Studio which made it in the game and BlackGold if I am not wrong?
Anyway it doesnt matter if a map has been part of the mapping contest or not or if it is made by a 'known' mapper. 
If it is a high quality map, Valve will look into it and when they enjoy it and see potentiol in it they will throw it out there in the wild for the community to give it a go.

I think its cool to try out new ideas, but it just takes alot more time, playtests & itterations to make it work and be acknowledged by the players.
Not really a smart thing for a contest where you always run out short on time no matter what you do. 
And also, this game has been developed over many years and there are LD aspects to it you need to keep in mind, if you differ from those guidelines, you probally get in trouble with your design. 
This doesn't mean you can't be creative or do crazy stuff, just dont go overboard I would say... 

Just like Nikio is saying.. dont design a horror game for a playerbase expecting a fluffy kids game..
 

[Radix]

2 hours ago, Passerby97 said:

Junction was awesome map and there's no good reason why it wasn't added to the game. But please also realize that Valve doesn't decide the maps accepted to the game anymore like they used to. Now they seem to purely accept Mapcore contest winners or maps from famous mappers.

I think they didn't add it to the game because de_junction was never finished. Can't talk about gameplay, because I never really played it.

But yes, the visuals are awesome at some spots, but some areas need a lot of additional work imo.

I don't know why, but it seems like the creators abandoned this map (?)

 

The fact that Valve only picks Mapcore maps is because pretty much every good CS:GO mapper is at Mapcore.

Valve also tests every candidate internally, that's why some awesome looking maps sometimes don't get added (because they are not fun, completely imbalanced, exploitable, not optimized (low fps) or whatever).

[Passerby97]

2 hours ago, Radix said:

The fact that Valve only picks Mapcore maps is because pretty much every good CS:GO mapper is at Mapcore.

Valve also tests every candidate internally, that's why some awesome looking maps sometimes don't get added (because they are not fun, completely imbalanced, exploitable, not optimized (low fps) or whatever).

I respect that you took time to write this, but this is not really a response to anything I said.

Yes, maps that are sent to Mapcore get accepted because most maps get sent to mapcore. But maps that Mapcore doesn't acknowledge aren't accepted to CS.

Anubis has 50-100 fps lag spikes on medium rigs. Ruby and Breach got completely remade midway through their in-game rotations. Not every map can be perfect when first accepted into the game, and that clearly does not stop them from being accepted.

What clearly does, is if Mapcore is the one who acknowledges the maps. There's nothing wrong with that. My point this entire time has been that if you want to change what competitive maps get accepted into the game, you want to get a top position in mapcore and get to be a judge in a competition, there's no reason to ruffle Valve's feathers about that.
 

Edited April 3, 2020 by Passerby97

[Radix]

4 hours ago, Passerby97 said:

I respect that you took time to write this, but this is not really a response to anything I said.

Oh, then I probably just got you wrong. Sorry.

Quote

But maps that Mapcore doesn't acknowledge aren't accepted to CS.

Which maps do you think of particularly that were good but not added because of not being "acknowledged" by Mapcore?

Yes, there are a couple of maps that looked interesting but never got added (Grind, Import, Sanchez, Waterfall, Iris, ...). (Just talking about the visuals, not layout, because that's obviously Valve's first exclusion criterion)

But maybe there are different reasons. As I already said, they might just have failed when tested by Valve...

Or maybe there were just other maps that were better at the same time.

After all there are only a few mappers that reach the high requirements for the visuals. And these guys try to finish their maps by the end of a contest. Because of the fame/extra money I guess. So it's natural that most "good" maps are contest winners in the end.

Quote

Anubis has 50-100 fps lag spikes on medium rigs

I agree. Anubis looks awesome, but it's not well optimized yet. (Of course not! Because that's one of the last things you do when you make a map)

At it's current state it should not have been added to the game yet imo. It will surely run a lot better in a few weeks...

Quote

Ruby and Breach got completely remade midway through their in-game rotations. Not every map can be perfect when first accepted into the game, and that clearly does not stop them from being accepted.

Yes. But mostly gameplay changes. These maps looked very polished and played well already when they were added. The authors just wanted to improve gameplay based on player feedback imo.

What I said about Junction was that it's currently way to unpolished to be added. (Flickering props, nodraw surfaces, temporary assets, ...). Don't get me wrong. I like the map. But 80% finished is not enough.

 

After all you remind me of a guy called "Tynnyri". Just more polite.

Edited April 4, 2020 by Radix

[Vaya]

yes valve give feedback once you are on their radar. I know horse strangler has spoken to valve about junction too. He's not working on it anymore (or cs for that matter I'm pretty sure)

[JimWood]

I think the main thing you are misunderstanding Passerby is that maps are not "sent to MapCore", but instead most of the dedicated csgo mappers are a part of MapCore's community. And obviously the people handing the Twitter account like to help people get exposure.

The MapCore FaceIt hubs were originally setup solely by mappers in the community, which has helped get eyes on maps.

Lots of MapCore member's maps have not made it into the game, however yes, a large amount have because there are so many dedicated mappers in MapCore, but this is more down to the hard work of the mappers than the fact that they are "MapCore maps". 

Edited April 4, 2020 by JimWood

[Lizard]

15 hours ago, Passerby97 said:

My point this entire time has been that if you want to change what competitive maps get accepted into the game, you want to get a top position in mapcore and get to be a judge in a competition, there's no reason to ruffle Valve's feathers about that.

Read is as "You really want to make a good quality map that plays well" Case closed.

[Guest kubickmk]

Congrats!

[Interfearance]

Wow I really started something. I didn't communicate well that I was vindictive of valve for never changing active duty. Well, unless its one of their stinking maps

Edit: why does everyone always botch my simple arguments by tacking on some strange anti-mapcore manifesto

Edited April 4, 2020 by Interfearance

[blackdog]

Congratulations to those thay already made it into the game! I only found out thanks to Kliksphillip latest video.

On 4/3/2020 at 5:19 PM, Passerby97 said:

You are exactly right. Junction was awesome map and there's no good reason why it wasn't added to the game. But please also realize that Valve doesn't decide the maps accepted to the game anymore like they used to. Now they seem to purely accept Mapcore contest winners or maps from famous mappers.

The only way you can get maps like Junction into the game is to focus on getting them at the top spot in the next Mapcore contest, or get huge community reaction likes of a "new map from the maker of [popular map here]".

Sadly only few hand-picked judges in this third-party website decide what maps get the fabled top spot. This means nobody but them control what maps get accepted to the game. Effectively nobody else in the playerbase has any power to even slightly influence what maps get accepted to the game.

So no, if a map you like doesn't get accepted, it really is not the fault of Valve.

Man I don't Reddit, but apart from one Wingman contest last year, I don't remember hearing of any other contest for CSGO mappers. So where is Valve supposed to get their tips from? Untested random submissions to the Workshop? (first they would have to get through get-knivez111 spambots anyway).

Speaking of looking around, when is the last time you have seen a major game developer supporting a community-led event and accepting content in the game? Cos I can't think of any. Hell, I struggle counting more than a handful games that allow for custom content at all in recent years!

I'm very thankful we have connected admins that can get contests up with serious prizes. I'm sure if anyone else was able to do this elsewhere Valve would take it into consideration and Mapcore would cross-promote because if the community wins, we all win.

[Interfearance]

Aren't most of the maps at least a decade old? I don't know what kind of beating around the bush you guys are doing, but csgo makes $200m+ a year and even managed to get away with putting their own horrible map in the game. There is no excuse for them not to introduce fresh maps. Half the map updates they just made were corrections to fix player model visibility. The most memorable updates in recent history have been cosmetic additions.

2 hours ago, blackdog said:

Speaking of looking around, when is the last time you have seen a major game developer supporting a community-led event and accepting content in the game?

Insurgency. Yes a while ago, but I still play regularly in full servers. Also damn good maps.

IIRC bohemia interactive had a huge modding contest too, giving out like half a milly

It is easy (and also correct) to chalk up valve as being lazy.

 

 

 

[fewseb]

1 hour ago, Interfearance said:

There is no excuse for them not to introduce fresh maps.

No one plays them. Thats the big problem, not that valve isnt introducing any, but that people wont and do not want to play them. New custom maps used to be the selling points of operations, but around bloodhound-ish and getting worse from there, there has developed a pretty common complaint that players dont want to play the community maps. They didnt want do it for missions then and they dont even want to try them now.

Its why the que times for chlorine and anubis maps that have been in for just 1 week have already gone to 5 minutes.

Why is this? Because the playerbase thats still left playing csgo 7 years in arnt the ones who made unboxing videos and showed off their flashy skins on ever account they own. The people still left are the ones who like to play competitively.  Since Valve updates the map pool about once a century and usual the map being added is a known one. Being good at the game is no longer just having good aim and reaction time, its knowing ever hyper specific grenade throw and every weird trick for each of the 7 pro pool maps. Thats all people want to play, those 7 maps, usually less.

As if people not wanting to play maps taking up valuable server space wasnt bad enough. Prior to scrimmage, rank skimmers who used to inhabit the likes of old Vertigo and militia back when they were in comp play exclusively community made maps since people are less likely to know them and that allows for those ranks skimmers to rank up quickly since they have the home field advantage. Even now, scrimmage maps still fall victim to these types.

So really, Valve see no return on Community maps, and its essentially a money sink for them. Now you can say that Valve could do more to encourage people trying new maps and I would agree with you, but if they were going to do that, they would have done it by now. The obvious solution would be to punish people who play the same map over and over again and to reward people for trying unfamiliar maps. Getting more elo for winning a new map, while losing less for losing a new map. Meanwhile if you lose on a map that you play all the time your elo takes a bigger hit while winning adds very little elo. Of course valve would never do this because that would cause a large (and somewhat fair) backlash from the community. The most we might hope for is xp boosts and reductions instead of elo.

[Interfearance]

@fewseb I was going to make an argument that the long que was due to the maps being in scrimmage, but then I checked my csgo. Anubis, now moved to "competitive maps", has a significantly shorter que time. Better than 3 active duty maps in fact. It seems that valve has given this map some limelight and it has spoken for itself. However, with the way valve has operated, and coming back to my original point, the map will probably be cycled out like workout and such. They need to make it active duty; its outperforming vertigo, train, and nuke in que time. If only they gave all maps this chance, moving to the map pool based on performance, the active pool would be dialed in with awesome maps.

 

[fewseb]

48 minutes ago, Interfearance said:

@fewseb I was going to make an argument that the long que was due to the maps being in scrimmage, but then I checked my csgo. Anubis, now moved to "competitive maps", has a significantly shorter que time. Better than 3 active duty maps in fact. It seems that valve has given this map some limelight and it has spoken for itself. However, with the way valve has operated, and coming back to my original point, the map will probably be cycled out like workout and such. They need to make it active duty; its outperforming vertigo, train, and nuke in que time. If only they gave all maps this chance, moving to the map pool based on performance, the active pool would be dialed in with awesome maps.

 

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.

Edited April 12, 2020 by fewseb