cp_scythe

Shadow Scythe

L2: Junior Member
Aug 8, 2008
51
0
Well, oxygencube directed me to this here forum to have you guys rip and tear away at how terrible my map is since he's probably too nice to do it himself. So here I am! Ready to have my map ripped apart!

...yeah, that was a joke. I'm sure at least most of you guys are probably nice.

This is my first serious attempt at making a map using Hammer at all ever. I had no idea it would be this much work. But that hasn't stopped me before! Now, I'm not exactly sure what I should do here... like, I know I need to give out screenshots. But should I offer up a .bsp of the file as well?

I guess a description is something I could do. Well, uh... it's a control point map alright. It's got... control points... oh, it's a two-story map. The bottom level has the end points, and the top level has the middle point. There's also a metalic basement level that's there for no reason except to be the road less traveled, hide teleporters in there and whatnot. Essentially, there's a bunch of routes for you to get lost in, although I intend to ammend this by cutting off certain routes.

Here's some fancy pics that I totally didn't take five minutes ago!:unsure:

cp_scythe_b30000.jpg

When you leave the first floor respawn, you end up here. You can head down to the watery basement area or continue towards the home control point.

cp_scythe_b30001.jpg

Head up that ramp towards the middle point. I forgot to take a screenshot, but there's a small passageway that sort of snakes around to the other team's home point sort of parallel to the ramp.

cp_scythe_b30002.jpg

Another passageway goes under the ramp, sort of to the enemy's underground area. I think I'm getting rid of it though.

cp_scythe_b30003.jpg

Anyways, going up the ramp, you sort of get to the intermediary room. Curve around here into disputed territory.

cp_scythe_b30004.jpg

Up ahead is the middle control point. The gun is sort of blocking it, but there's a small passagething into a huge glass room. To the right, offscreen, is the second floor of the reds' spawn. See, there's an elevator in the spawn rooms where you can go between floors...

cp_scythe_b30007.jpg

That rectangular tunnel going upwards? That's the elevator...

cp_scythe_b30005.jpg

Up on top of the roof is a sniping point. For sniping. Also here's a better show of what the middle point looks like.

cp_scythe_b30006

This is the top-level spawn. There's an exit to the roof, as well as a normal one. No doors on those.

And... that is all the shots I took. Ding!
 
Last edited:

cornontheCoD

L420: High Member
Mar 25, 2008
437
70
ummm.. will look good if you use TF2 textures. I hope those ones from portal arent permanent :unsure:

anyways, type in "tf" under keywords to find the tf2 textures
 

Shadow Scythe

L2: Junior Member
Aug 8, 2008
51
0
ummm.. will look good if you use TF2 textures. I hope those ones from portal arent permanent :unsure:

anyways, type in "tf" under keywords to find the tf2 textures

Naw, they aren't. Actually all of these screenshots are somewhat dated as a cp_scythe_b4 is about half-way done. I just didn't want to give you guys half-baked crap. Most of the portal wall textures are already replaced with the computerwall ones. The floor I have will probably stay, however. I can't find a good replacement.
 

Nineaxis

Quack Doctor
aa
May 19, 2008
1,767
2,820
It's illegal to pack the portal floor in a TF2 map, you'd be distributing copyrighted content to people for free.
 

Shadow Scythe

L2: Junior Member
Aug 8, 2008
51
0
It's illegal to pack the portal floor in a TF2 map, you'd be distributing copyrighted content to people for free.

I think that the floor is actually from Half-Life 2 and not Portal itself. In any case, I only have Team Fortress 2 installed right now (due to unfortunate circumstances where I had to re-download everything steam-related) and the textures is still... around. Don't the Half-Life 2 textures come with Team Fortress 2 anyway?
 

MangyCarface

Mapper
aa
Feb 26, 2008
1,626
1,325
HL2 content is packed with TF2 but still... avoid using it at all costs, it's a terrible eye sore. There are definitely good floor textures among the TF2 ones, just experiment. Your lighting relies too heavily upon point lights instead of light_spots and more evenly spread lighting. Change all of your lights to a dark grey color with a high brightness attribute (the last value in brightness) such as 600.
 

Chilly

L6: Sharp Member
May 3, 2008
326
127
The harsh point lighting can look good in certain places, too. MangyCarface is correct, though... you're relying on it too much across the entire map.

For example, in screenshots 5 and 6 it adds a little bit, but you'd need to put light fixtures for each light point to make it look right. I think the trick is properly using both methods. For a good example of lighting done right on a custom map, get any of vilepickle's maps. He's done an excellent job with the lighting and it really adds a great feel on each map.
 

Ida

deer
aa
Jan 6, 2008
2,289
1,372
I really don't know what to say about this map, since right now it looks more like a Portal map, even if all of those textures aren't from Portal. :S
 

Shadow Scythe

L2: Junior Member
Aug 8, 2008
51
0
HL2 content is packed with TF2 but still... avoid using it at all costs, it's a terrible eye sore. There are definitely good floor textures among the TF2 ones, just experiment. Your lighting relies too heavily upon point lights instead of light_spots and more evenly spread lighting. Change all of your lights to a dark grey color with a high brightness attribute (the last value in brightness) such as 600.

Huh, thanks. I didn't know how to do that before. How handy. Guess it's time to do a bit of a lighting overhaul to accompany the texture overhaul.