Texture choices

tovilovan

L6: Sharp Member
Jul 23, 2008
391
104
Right now fiddling with detail on my map, and I'm running into some problems. There's a lot of textures to choose from in the theme I'm working with (sawmill-ish), and I really feel an urge to make the most of it and use every single one. However I'm afraid the map might get too messy with all these different wood textures. Maps like Sawmill make use of about two or three, but maps like doublecross and thunder mountain use a lot more. How do you you guys think I should make the texture choices - stick with a few throughout the map, or use a wide range of textures?
 

Mr.Blob

L8: Fancy Shmancy Member
Jun 12, 2009
573
249
Just tweak it until it looks good, I guess. Look at other maps such as Sawmill for inspiration.
 
Apr 13, 2009
728
309
Double cross has like 2 outer wall textures and one for inner walls (not counting detail beams) for the RED base, that's quite consistent. Thunder mountain is a bit of a mess and not much of an example in detailing (or rather it's more of an example of what you can get away with and still call Valve quality than what you should strive to achieve :p)
I guess it depends on the type of the map and the size of it. Assuming this is for snakewater, you might want to use three "clusters" of textures : one set for BLU, one set for RED, and one for the middle ground that could either be neutral in tone or a bit of mixup of BLU and RED. I guess 2 or 3 different wall textures for each area are good. Probably not a good idea to mixup different wood textures in a single building block.

You can also rotate a wood texture 90° in places to break uniformity without creating a patchwork of colors.
 

Huckle

L3: Member
May 31, 2010
149
101
In general, I'd say just to start with a single texture and then switch to another when you feel that it's necessary. Having too many different textures is also a problem and the lighting in-game will make a lot of things that look uniform in hammer stand out more.

If you have flat geometry, stay with a low number of textures either way and save the texture variation for more varied areas. Other types of details such as props, func_details and poster overlays will help break up monotony as well.
 

REEJ

L420: High Member
Aug 26, 2010
437
176
Imo:
Use as many as you like, just chop your map's design into sections in which you focus on particular style. The tricky thing in that, probably, will be making the transitions between sections look logic and not too sudden.
 

tovilovan

L6: Sharp Member
Jul 23, 2008
391
104
I suppose this is logical. Right now I think I've come up with a rather good solution where I have one basic neutral texture for each team (grey/brownish) which is the base of most buildings, and then I add team coloured textured on smaller buildings. Like you say, working with overlays and props to make sure the player realizes where he is seems to be working.