[CSGO] Engage

[catfood]

Hello all!

This post is a little late on Mapcore because I have been moving and working on other projects also but I still wanted to share the release of Engage with the Mapcorians for who missed the release on the workshop.

Two years ago BubkeZ and RZL came to me and asked if I wanted to work with them on a layout BubkeZ created in 2010 for CS 1.6 called de_engage and obviously I said yes.
The three of us then started to look at this old layout and discussed what needed to change to make it viable for CS:GO and improve on the original design.
RZL then made the first blockout with all the changes we discussed and handed the greybox level to me and I took it from there.

 

The result:

 

ENGAGE WORKSHOP PAGE

Edited August 3, 2020 by catfood

[Vaya]

amazing work. 

[Roald]

Stunningly beautiful 

[BubkeZ]

YEAH!  
The old 1.6 layout can be seen in this video and 10 years later RZL and catfood helped me to make it even better.

 

[JorisCeoen]

I've ran around it yesterday, and again today just as I woke up. The map is just insane. I swear you have to be some sort of architect to design maps this sophisticated and beautiful 

Though, as much as I was blown away by the map as a whole, I just have one overall concern (right now anyways), which would be that running in the map with or without bots feels very overloaded/overdesigned. It's hard to describe properly, but it feels that at every inch of the map so much is going on at the same time in terms of visual information, that it feels quite heavy on the brain. For me, at least. I'm sure other people have less of an issue with this. It's one of the reasons I never queue for Nuke, because as much as I love that map and see it as one of the biggest Valve masterpieces, it's just too much visuals and I lose focus.

However, compared to 98% of the workshop this map surpasses all boundaries, and equals only the best maps available right now. Congratulations!

[poLemin]

5 hours ago, catfood said:

1 hour ago, JorisCeoen said:

I've ran around it yesterday, and again today just as I woke up. The map is just insane. I swear you have to be some sort of architect to design maps this sophisticated and beautiful 

Though, as much as I was blown away by the map as a whole, I just have one overall concern (right now anyways), which would be that running in the map with or without bots feels very overloaded/overdesigned. It's hard to describe properly, but it feels that at every inch of the map so much is going on at the same time in terms of visual information, that it feels quite heavy on the brain. For me, at least. I'm sure other people have less of an issue with this. It's one of the reasons I never queue for Nuke, because as much as I love that map and see it as one of the biggest Valve masterpieces, it's just too much visuals and I lose focus.

However, compared to 98% of the workshop this map surpasses all boundaries, and equals only the best maps available right now. Congratulations!

 

I agree with what is being said here. The map looks stunning - in a positive and a negative way.
The particular shot shown above, is something I encountered when playing it as well. You get thrown into this area when leaving CT spawn, and it's unclear were the sections of gameplay relevance are. The connector to mid is hidden because of the U-Shape, The door is kinda hidden due to the orthogonal angle you are approaching it at and the stairs to your right are only in the corner of your eye. The bright light at the back of site draws attention, but only leads to a seamingly meaningless corner. I think the lighting overall looks beautiful, but it doesn't really support gameplay. It's hard to read which parts of the map are important and which are non-playable areas.

Again, this is criticism on a very very high level. The map is great, looks stunning and I had a lot of fun playing it (granted when it was a greybox, but only a few things changed since then). Congratulations to the team! It's definitely something to be very proud of

[Serialmapper]

[fewseb]

I really liked the use of the animated props to show the car assembly line, I cant think of another map that has done big animated set pieces like that before. The map really drives home the feeling of a modern car manufacturing plant. I also really like how you put a lot of detail into the ceilings and upper levels, its very nicely detailed especially since most players wont look up.

However I do agree the map starts to get confusing with its color coding choices. I also noticed the out of bounds area were bizarrely low detail, such here outside of ct spawn where the grass tiles way too often and most things seem to made out of basic blocks. I get that getting the map released was more important then spending time on area most players wont look at, but they do contrast harshly with the extreme level of detail in the playable areas.

 

This is also an extreme nit pick but I found the choice of factions for the player models to be really odd. So this map is set in Germany, but the British SAS are the cts for the map, when there are German GSG-9 models in the game. I think the GSG-9 might even improve visibility a bit since they are a way darker shade of blue then the SAS who almost match the shade of blue used most commonly around the map. The Anarchists also seem to be a bit odd of a choice for the Ts, obviously they have great visibility on the map, but some young Americans trying to bomb a German car factory seems a bit odd. To me it seems that the Professionals faction would have been better suited for the theme, they seem to match the workshop story much better then the Anarchists.

"As a last resort, the other manufacturers have contacted "experts" who will try to destroy the Mass Cars factory"

Im not sure how well visibility would be using the Professionals do to them use a lot of white in their color pallet, but I do think it would be worth looking into.

Overall though, its is definitely your best map yet and I like to see that you have continued to improve as an artist after all these years. Im excited to see your next project.

[Lizard]

32 minutes ago, fewseb said:

This is also an extreme nit pick but I found the choice of factions for the player models to be really odd. So this map is set in Germany, but the British SAS are the cts for the map, when there are German GSG-9 models in the game. I think the GSG-9 might even improve visibility a bit since they are a way darker shade of blue then the SAS who almost match the shade of blue used most commonly around the map. The Anarchists also seem to be a bit odd of a choice for the Ts, obviously they have great visibility on the map, but some young Americans trying to bomb a German car factory seems a bit odd. To me it seems that the Professionals faction would have been better suited for the theme, they seem to match the workshop story much better then the Anarchists.

Can you finally realise that foreign special forces do operate on foreign soil very often?

 

As for the map... Like I said to Rzl the other day it looks incredible. I love the animated assembly line and all the small details. I also left Rzl some feedback on lighting and  how to improve visibility of critical paths. I feel like the map is evenly lit from every direction causing the map to look flat without depth in most places. It creates the problem where you can't really tell whats playable area and whats not. Map having big elevation changes doesn't help with this issue. Other than that I tools incredible and I remember it plays well too.

Congratulations on the release guys! 

[fewseb]

2 minutes ago, Lizard said:

Can you finally realise that foreign special forces do operate on foreign soil very often?

My point is the GSG-9 fit better. Yeah the SAS probably have operated on German soil before, doesnt mean they fit the map better then the GSG-9. I also believe the GSG-9 would have better visibility on the map then the SAS.

[FMPONE]

My favorite map ever thus far by @catfood, and congrats to the rest of the crew as well! @BubkeZ and @'RZL

You guys should be proud, the map is really great.

[Interfearance]

I would enjoy this map, but as soon as I saw the enemy's playermodels the effect was ruined and I was no longer immersed in the hyper realistic world of csgo. Soon after I noticed that you failed to replicate a vehicular assembly line that would function efficiently in real life. Additionally, there were several violations of workplace safety regulation that I spotted throughout the factory that made it difficult to aim because my whole body was convulsing. I understand that you care about "gameplay" and all that other soft crap but I would like if you recreated a real car factory with local workers and special forces (preferably a night mission).

Good day

[El_Exodus]

15 hours ago, Interfearance said:

I would enjoy this map, but as soon as I saw the enemy's playermodels the effect was ruined and I was no longer immersed in the hyper realistic world of csgo. Soon after I noticed that you failed to replicate a vehicular assembly line that would function efficiently in real life. Additionally, there were several violations of workplace safety regulation that I spotted throughout the factory that made it difficult to aim because my whole body was convulsing. I understand that you care about "gameplay" and all that other soft crap but I would like if you recreated a real car factory with local workers and special forces (preferably a night mission).

Good day

You must be trolling.
Please tell me you are..

[Wintrius]

Great work! I forgot to give criticism when the map released, so here's some now:

[catfood]

On 8/3/2020 at 2:59 PM, JorisCeoen said:

I've ran around it yesterday, and again today just as I woke up. The map is just insane. I swear you have to be some sort of architect to design maps this sophisticated and beautiful 

Though, as much as I was blown away by the map as a whole, I just have one overall concern (right now anyways), which would be that running in the map with or without bots feels very overloaded/overdesigned. It's hard to describe properly, but it feels that at every inch of the map so much is going on at the same time in terms of visual information, that it feels quite heavy on the brain. For me, at least. I'm sure other people have less of an issue with this. It's one of the reasons I never queue for Nuke, because as much as I love that map and see it as one of the biggest Valve masterpieces, it's just too much visuals and I lose focus.

However, compared to 98% of the workshop this map surpasses all boundaries, and equals only the best maps available right now. Congratulations!

Thanks dude! I spend a lot of time getting the structure in place and making it look believable which was kind of a challenge due to its size.

 

@JorisCeoen@Lizard@Wintrius

About that the level is bright is entirely on purpose since adding contrast areas in the background of multiplayer levels especially for CS:GO can create issues with readability. Also car factories aswell as other modern factories are well lit. I turned off the lights of some areas to create a different vibe throughout the level but mainly it had to be well lit for those reasons.

@fewseb

I tried to keep the "3Dskybox" as simple as possible since most players wont notice flat grass in the background but do care for better FPS