The Lost City

Drakon

L1: Registered
Jul 18, 2010
3
0
This is a medium-large sized CTF map taking place in an underground city. The usual themes found in TF2 are not so prevalent here; it is more stone and rocks, and a bit darker than most maps.
 

Mr. P. Kiwi

L5: Dapper Member
Nov 22, 2009
244
95
First of all, welcome to the forums.
Secondly, the map itself looks nice, but I hope you played tested it.
There are long sighlines everywhere.
I hope to see how it plays!
 

nik

L12: Fabulous Member
Aug 14, 2009
987
564
You've got a really interesting twist on the Egypt theme, but alas...I do think darkness will be an issue in some spots. There also seem to be some nasty sightlines, but those could be a non-issue.

I like how your water wasn't just thrown in as some random water texture, and it actually looks like it's supposed to be underground.
 

DJive

Cake or Death?
aa
Dec 20, 2007
1,465
741
Lighting is an issue and I think your use of the textures could be much better. I like the geometry however massive walls with the same texture or detail on those walls with the same texture is rough.

Mix it up a bit, get some theme in there. Add some lights and i think this could be really cool.
 

Drakon

L1: Registered
Jul 18, 2010
3
0
I will probably enhance the lighting a bit in the near future. I'm not sure if I happen to play with a high gamma or what, but my screenshots always seem much darker than actual gameplay. I know I've checked it before and never found anything bizarre with my gamma settings, though...

As for the sightlines, there are two fairly large main areas (one per base, the two furthest points are probably approaching 2fort battlements separation distance)
There is also a long hallway (alleyway, if you will) in the "back entrance", which I may add onto to allow more cover. The rest of the map is fairly open; not a lot of close quarters aside from the main interchange between the two bases

Furthermore, if you're going only by screenshots, I took those at FOV(field of view angle) set to 100/110 to capture more of the scene(most people play with 70 to 90); everything looks a lot further apart in these screenshots than they really are.

As for textures, I do agree that it *could* be mixed up a bit and to good effect; however, I am purposely blanding the texturing somewhat as something of an experiment with lighting. Personally I'm rather pleased with how the effect turned out... I'm hoping making the level a bit brighter won't detract though.
 

Melt

L1: Registered
Jul 20, 2010
13
1
The brush work looks really interesting. I can get behind having some areas dark, but maybe you can balance it out by having some areas bright and flooded with light - maybe from a sinkhole in the cave's roof and let in some views of the skybox... could use a volume light prop to really get the beam of light feel.

Another way of getting more light in is having it come up out of the water
 

Drakon

L1: Registered
Jul 18, 2010
3
0
There is a sink hole (though since we're already in the hole, I call it a ventilation shaft), but its not so much of a light source (Its storming on the surface, so its raining through the shaft instead). There are lights under the water, but its not much of a light source in itself.

A second possibility I've been considering is to have archaelogical artifacts, and with that, floodlights for the diggers. (Though why would there be archaeological artifact in a place that appears to already use electric lighting? *shrug*, could work anyhow)
Honestly, this might be done regardless for "adherance to TF2 style" if I end up submitting this for the art pass contest.

I think the first thing I need to try is to just brighten the lights I have, and increase the ambient light_environment.