Balloon Race

Geit

💜 I probably broke it 💜
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May 28, 2009
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1,161
Balloon Race is a custom map with a unique gameplay style; Balloon Race has BLU and RED racing against each other to a common goal - the finish - while trying to capture control points for Speed Boosts.

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Treasure island;
A lone island in the middle of a lake, surrounded by mound of earth to prevent unwanted intruders.

Rocky outpost;
A small but very secret facility based on the side of a mountain, originally intended as a refuelling outpost for small research crafts, this small station has been converted into a large-scale military outpost.

The Bird's Nest;
Hidden deep within the Chasm, this outpost was built for an unknown purpose.

Watchtowers
The watchtowers have long been abandoned but now serve as a perfect place to stop and refuel and rest.

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Balloon race was first released in October 2008, the gameplay was unique (Aside from wacky_races, on which Balloon Race is based) , and it was an instant hit with many servers, but the map was heavily unbalanced and turned into a sniper campfest fairly quickly, resulting in stalemates, ragequits and unofficial modifications of the map.

In late November of 2008 I was asked by one of my clan-leaders to make a few changes to the map, mainly minor aesthetical things to start with, but after a few days of mapping, I sought out Chuckstar's permission to expand on the changes further, he - Very Kindly - allowed me to continue on my changes, which resulted in most of the changes you see in v2 today.

While v2 was leaps and bounds ahead of v1, it was still unbalanced, bugged and unoptimized, and as such, Balloon Race was regarded as a map you play to practice, or warm-up. This is one of the things we wanted to change in v3, we wanted to create a map that wasn't considered to be a "Gimmicky" map, but instead a map you could enjoy for a few hours, rather than a few minutes.

Therefore, with the help of Gig and the guidance of Chuckstar, we are proud to deliver, V3 of Balloon Race.

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While it may not seem like a huge update, it shifts the way the whole of the map's playstyle.

Suggestions are appreciated!
P.S - Sorry for any typo's or formatting errors.
 
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Cerious

L420: High Member
Aug 10, 2008
455
133
Just dump that godawful 3rd stage, it favors the uphill team too much and just isn't fun.
 

Stormcaller3801

L5: Dapper Member
Jul 5, 2009
249
28
I'm impressed. I liked BR2 quite a bit- it's a very casual style of map that rewards teamwork and really felt like a welcome change from the more conventional rounds that typically featured me getting set on fire or blown up repeatedly. Even if we didn't win, I would enjoy playing it and just blazing away with the minigun or a sniper rifle.

Hopefully I can get the admins at my regular servers to check this one out. I don't know how it will play, but it certainly looks like you've put a good amount of time and effort into manipulating it.
 

zaratustra

L2: Junior Member
Feb 1, 2009
52
1
-Removed the starting music "Get Down - Nitori"

do-not-want.jpg
 

Penguin

Clinically Diagnosed with Small Mapper's Syndrome
aa
May 21, 2009
2,039
1,484
It was damn fine as it was, only it should feature a PLR HUD.
 

Geit

💜 I probably broke it 💜
aa
May 28, 2009
598
1,161
even though the execution could be very much more finetuned, the general idea of the walkways in the steep cave in that screenshot:
http://forums.tf2maps.net/geek/gars/images/4/1/9/4/balloon_race_v3_t30005.jpg
is something i totally like to adopt in a map project on my own :D
Go ahead, be warned though, the vertex editor will play nasty on the roofs. ;)

Heh, I might consider adding it back, the only reason it was removed is because of the decreased filesize from doing so.

I don't know if you can do a PLR HUD. If I remember correctly, the baloons path can change depending on how far ahead one team is from the other. It doesn't really work like a cart.
A Payload Race HUD works fine in balloon race, the HUD components are highly flexible. But, Sadly, the entities themselves are bugged, having payload entities in the map makes it impossible to stand on the balloon for any prolonged duration of time.


To everyone considering putting this on their server: The version provided in the download link is purely a playtest and is not the final version.
 
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Penguin

Clinically Diagnosed with Small Mapper's Syndrome
aa
May 21, 2009
2,039
1,484
Go ahead, be warned though, the vertex editor will play nasty on the roofs. ;)


A Payload Race HUD works fine in balloon race, the HUD components are highly flexible. But, Sadly, the entities themselves are bugged, having payload entities in the map makes it impossible to stand on the balloon for any prolonged duration of time.


This makes no sense to me. What causes that problem, exactly?
 

uma plata

L6: Sharp Member
Jan 20, 2009
294
93
Appreciate the extra work going into this. One of the earlier versions was always a reason for me to abandon server immediately, but I'll make sure to give the new version another shot
 

Penguin

Clinically Diagnosed with Small Mapper's Syndrome
aa
May 21, 2009
2,039
1,484
Question: Are you making the baloon itself the pl? There no need to do that, just make an invisible brush the cart and distance it from the balloon, prehaps hid eit in the actual balloon, so that the ship follows the cart but is not the cart.
 

Geit

💜 I probably broke it 💜
aa
May 28, 2009
598
1,161
Question: Are you making the baloon itself the pl? There no need to do that, just make an invisible brush the cart and distance it from the balloon, prehaps hid eit in the actual balloon, so that the ship follows the cart but is not the cart.

While that's an ingenious idea, it sadly, would break the capture points, and i've no desire to make custom CP's with no HUD warnings.
 

Penguin

Clinically Diagnosed with Small Mapper's Syndrome
aa
May 21, 2009
2,039
1,484
Not at all. You can have multiple game modes going at once.

As far as the HUD goes, I think Icarus might be able to help you. He did something really cool with Vector.
 

Geit

💜 I probably broke it 💜
aa
May 28, 2009
598
1,161
Playtest 4 is now up for grabs (See DL link in main release), we'll be putting it onto 81.19.212.48:27015 in a couple of hours for a large scale play test.