Beta 2 Release:
Code:
Change Log
Beta 1 => Beta 2 Change List:
* Added railings to the central point. (The Volcanic Core)
* Added playerclip to brushes to increase movement fluidity.
* Added Patch decals to areas with healthkits / ammokits.
* Adjusted the lighting around the center point to increase brightness.
* Added directional based signs to make pathways stand out more / make the layout more clear.
Please contact me if you have any complaints or questions about the map, and any criticism is always deeply appreciated. I will respond immediately!
CON: I can't tell you about the gameplay seeing as the right people weren't actually watching the TV2 server's thread, but I can tell you one thing right away. SNIPERS. I hate Snipers (being a consistent Medic), and the middle of this map just reeks of them. My only recommendation would be shielding the middle area.
As far as I know, snipers have a rather hard time in this map because of the multiple entrances / exits and the issue of having to deal with other snipers. In many ways, the map's layout is similar to mach4. I think I understand your point though, as for what I can do I am still thinking about it. I was, at one point, considering editing the windows and adding glass over one or two of them.
PRO: Now that I've got that off my chest, let me praise you for the obviously fine tuned detail here. It looks fantastic, and I was most impressed with how you had the lava set you on fire a split second before you died. May I also recommend you fill it with thin "invisible" brushes so that ragdolls appear to both sink slower and wiggle as the lava moves? While I'm at it, may I also ask how you set the player on fire?
Thanks, I am still trying to find a way to emulate falling through the lava. At one point, I was considering making it some sort of "water", but the ultimate result ended up making it so that the bodies would float on the lava... Which, really isn't a bad thing. IDK, I'll consider some changes to the lava mechanic.
CON: I hate to sound like another nagging voice, but the pixelated monitors do bug me, and not just because they're pixelated. If they were CRT screens with animated refreshing, that would be one thing, but the black on color flat screens look entirely out of place.
Some changes may be made on the monitors in future updates. I'll keep it in mind. I think one of my issues with the monitors right now is that they are not selfillum, which makes it looks too much like a flat texture on the display.
The reasoning for the pixelated text and the black background was because it seemed exaggerated and un-realistic, which I felt was perfect of the TF2 aesthetic. However, I think people would rather like to see the TF2 style font, which is a bit of a disappointment for me, since I really wanted to stress this map as being apart of the TF2 universe, but also very stylistic in my own ways (rather than following all of valves design philosophies for TF2)
PRO: Layout was extremely easy to learn. I wasn't exactly sure what the point of the fork in the vents was since they convened into the same room, but I'm sure they'd come in handy somehow.
The fork in the road in the vent allows spies to get around enemy players that may or may not be in the vents. I'm an avid spy player, so I designed the basic map layout and then tuned it for every class, and I was disappointed when I felt the class with the biggest issues was spy. After noticing that, I also added the lower pathways, with the railways going through them, which works very well for spies IMO. It also works well for scouts.
In the end, the fork in the road was a decision based on playing maps like Turbine, where the vents often caused players to run into enemies and they have no real way of avoiding enemies or getting around them in the vent.
CON: Lighting. There's a lot of contrast in lighting, and that kind of messes up the HDR. The middle area with the bright lava below and dark chains above makes it a bit harder to focus on the fight. As for indoors, when you're in a light area, you really can't see into a shadowy area. And being that there are plenty of shadowy areas, I'm afraid you're going to have to illuminate more.
I'm working on some lighting changes. The outside area's lighting was changed in the recent version to help players see other players. Indoor lighting may be changed in the future. I think I know the area in question too (the area under the walk way has always been kind of dark, but I always love a contrast in lighting so I kept it there. However, it's too strong of a contrast and caused gameplay related issues because of this. I'll work on this for beta 3
Yokai from Interlopers/HoldOut?
Yes, though I was never apart of the HoldOut Modification... As far as I know.
edit: Sorry, missed this post on page 2:
Hey, looking at your screenies I just realized I played this the other night on the cC servers, so here's some quick feedback based on what I remember.
I love the lighting effects on mid, but there is one area that I found too dark, the behind the barriers on either side of the point (first screenshot, below the RED logo). Players were still visible, but it became a bit hard to distinguish team colors.
Mid itself is very cool to look at, but unfortunately being so open it's rather prone to snipers. A better shot than I would've wrecked the other team as they came out of their vents. Add some more cover across the way for people to dart behind, and some on mid itself.
Right now venturing onto the middle point is a bit of a death trap. In the few matches I played both teams basically played chicken until one had lost enough players that they were forced back into their base, at which point the winning team would run in and hunt them down. Once again adding cover should help fix this a bit, and encourage people to step forward onto mid earlier.
More cover will be added. I'm unsure of how to prevent people from sniping mid, since right now there isn't enough room to add cover. I was thinking that I could add some more chains into the map, which conveniently block vision of the middle point from the sniping windows. I'll look into it and test some more things with cover. But there's definitely DEFINITELY going to be >more< cover between on the team specific ledges.
I increased the lighting to generally make it more light around that area. Hopefully it's better now, as it looked fine for me. However, I must consider all monitors and monitor types to make sure that it isn't dark for one person but not dark for another.
