Lux

[NikiOo]

The steam condenser had to be enlarged so it was moved from bombsite A to bombsite B, because B required a rework and the condenser theme was more mendable.

Bombsite A is now the thermal storage tanks.

The reworked B site is right under the steam condenser. It has that rock-paper-scissors dynamic of every spot that counters entrance 1 being exposed to entrance 2 and vice versa.

Here's yard (yard means mid but placed elsewhere but in-between the sites) --

Notice the lack of whitespace between B site and yard. That's right! I don't fuck with white space. Whitespace is for pretentious ivory tower designers. White space, get off my lawn!

[wslysnps]

White space?

[NikiOo]

Or negative space, it's the same thing.

[NikiOo]

I'm going to Stage 2, in fact I am winning this contest. The map will be on the Faceit hubs from the 4th of October to the 18th of October.

I didn't like A site, both structurally and thematically, so I reworked it. It is now set between 2 molten salt storage tanks, and the bomb target is a heat exchanger. This is more interesting visually and it's more flexible so I can move things around without worrying so much if the change I want to make will cohere with the theme or not. Here's some screenshots --

I want this to be a map where you have to keep track of what's happening around you and coordinate with your teammates in order to win, instead of just focusing on your duel and marching forward.

[NikiOo]

I'm doubling down on the vibe is too surreal. This month's vibe is inspired by this white-Ferrari-in-a-sunflower-field poster, from my vibes folder --

To make a modern power plant that looks remarkably un-Nuke-esque, I'm adding flowers where one would expect to find grass, reflective textures where one would expect unreflective textures, and brick where one would expect to find concrete (the sky will also be remarkably less blue than Nuke).

Now it looks like we're in one of those western-European countries that use a lot of brick for some reason, which irks me a bit. Now it just looks like middle-brow modern architecture. I'm hoping it will come into place when I add ventilation and pipes all over the place, or else I'm going back to webcore.

P.S. If you're making maps, don't play on 120% brightness and 4:3 res, your map will end up with stretched doors and very saturated.

[NikiOo]

I made a custom skybox texture. I think it's cool.

It's inspired by Heaven. I want the colors to be bright and uplifting.

[NikiOo]

I did not expect everyone else to be this good at environment art. The maps that are going to the finals are looking sick. I would have had to fully lock in and wreck my sanity in order to even have a chance of getting into the top 10. Anyway, I learned a lot throughout the way. I spent a lot of time exploring ideas that were ultimately a dead end, like the giant silos. I still want to finish the map because I think I have a really cool vision for it, but I don't have time right now so it'll have to wait. I'll be cheering for Jura and Grail. I'm glad that one very boring and formulaic map by a mapcore thought leader did not make it through ikyk.