Alien Swarm > The Detailing Contest

[Flame]

In my opinion, ok this contest is great practice for your detailing skills sure, but you could get the same practice by offering to help someone else detail their map which is still in alpha or by attempting to make your own map and detaling that.

This contest is going to be very disappointing for a lot of people and more of a waste of time than anything else imo. Obviously this is not true for all and if you feel you have a shot at winning the whole thing I heavily encourage you to finish it out and I'll be more than happy to give feedback on screenshots or help you with ideas/what not.

I do think however Alien Swarms release last night was a huge success and a LOT of people I've talked to are just begging for more since you can only play the same 5 maps so many times, cough l4d cough 2fort.

I'm more than interested in this game and think the community here is more than qualified and capable of putting out a really good campaign. I feel like one map per person or distributing the workload between people would be the easiest since mapping for this game seems just about as difficult if not a little more difficult than mapping for l4d.

You could do payload in AS as well as maybe a ctf mode by going to the map grabbing something and getting out, add control points with slow cap times that trigger swarms for a linear survival mode or do a L4D gas can escort sort of thing where you need to bring something somewhere.

Idk I'm depressed at how bad this contest is for the community, how much of a clusterfck the chat room is with random people and how little people are playing during impromptus as they stare down their dev textured walls saying what now.

Love flame.

 

[ANova]

This Contest is bad it shouldn't even be a contest because all you have to do is Detail a dev map

I Vote redo contest #5 and turn it into a Cp contest

 

[Flame]

I think theres more to be won with Alien Swarm. Valve didn't really hype this game much and EVERYONE loved it... its hard, aim based, requires teamwork, and has really nice graphics while being very simple to handle at the same time aka everything tf2 pubs arent.

if valve bought your AS campaign you'd be a hero, not a custom map in a 32 player server rotation that'll rtv your maps ass all day.

 

[DJive]

This Contest is bad it shouldn't even be a contest because all you have to do is Detail a dev map

well that's useless feedback. that IS the contest. If you don't like it, don't do it.


While i think Alien swarm is over shadowing the Contest atm.. I think everyone will come back when they beat that game in 2 nights =)

 

[Flame]

not really feedback djive its just fact.

tell 100+ people to work on the same map separately with no collabs for 2 and a half months with no freedom other than props textures and maybe small brushes for a 1 in 100 chance to go official, btw when your map loses, itll get thrown out or maybe added to a screenshot thread on our blog.

dumbdumbdumbdumb. i want more customs and more testing and more bros on the server.

 

[grazr]

TBH, I don't really like AS.

I expected an entertaining DOOM style shooter, instead we get a game with so many unintuitive features it's bothersome to play.

The ammo system is awkward, my entire team manages to run out of ammo half way through a level, the most efficient way of playing is to just speed run it, which is exactly what you expect not to do. Unwelded welded doors stay locked and require yet more ammo expenditure to open and FF is just frustrating when you're running through corridors and multi-level rooms.

Admittedly the AI made things that much more bothersome and co-op play is probably infinitely more entertaining, but the HUD is too much info at once, not to mention displayed inefficiently; plus the item system is awkward on the go too.

I'll probably stick with Killing Floor for gunning down masses of generic organic enemies.

 

[lana]

Grazr's arguments are really more quantity than quality. Alien Swarm is pretty intuitive, especially since we've been playing with friends and having a good time. Regardless, we need some work put into documentation and resources before we can start with super complex things.

 

[J4CK8]

In my opinion, ok this contest is great practice for your detailing skills sure, but you could get the same practice by offering to help someone else detail their map which is still in alpha or by attempting to make your own map and detaling that.

Making your own map and detailing would more than likely result in the same outcome for most people as most entries for the artpass contest. To create a map that doesn't just get ignored after one day of being released you need to spend time working on it, not just the detailing but the gameplay. How long on average does it take to create a good, well balanced map for TF2? At least 2 months, then you do the detailing.

tell 100+ people to work on the same map separately with no collabs for 2 and a half months with no freedom other than props textures and maybe small brushes for a 1 in 100 chance to go official, btw when your map loses, itll get thrown out or maybe added to a screenshot thread on our blog.

I would feel like I'd achieved something if I managed to get a mention on the blog let alone win.

Whilst I am enjoying AS, it's one of those games that's only fun with friends to me, and with only a couple of friends currently online who play the game, I tend to have a lot of spare time in which I use to detail the contest map and continue with my own map.

 

[DJive]

not really feedback djive its just fact.

My first response was to ANova's statement which was more or less "This store is stupid all it does is sell item is don't want!!"
anywho..

tell 100+ people to work on the same map separately with no collabs for 2 and a half months with no freedom other than props textures and maybe small brushes for a 1 in 100 chance to go official, btw when your map loses, itll get thrown out or maybe added to a screenshot thread on our blog.

I think the odds are way more off then 1 to 100 imo. but anyways

People aren't FORCED into this contest. they choose to do it. May as well complain that people are at work and not home playing games with ya =p

 

[Retroid]

I think the odds are way more off then 1 to 100 imo. but anyways

:O

I'm going on Holiday as well for 2 weeks...

Feasably there's no way I'm going to win this - my lack of experience detailing will slow me down as well, I'm not bad at creating textures (for models usually) but I dunno...

 

[Flame]

i just think spending 2 and a half months on 100+ maps that wont be played kind of blows

 

[Retroid]

i just think spending 2 and a half months on 100+ maps that wont be played kind of blows

I kind of agree, god - imagine if you could harness that creative tallent...

 

[DJive]

i just think spending 2 and a half months on 100+ maps that wont be played kind of blows

Err. Spending 2 months or less detailing a map you hope many will play and you will get $$ for and recognition if you plan to make a career out of. this sort of stuff looks great on a resume if this is the field you are looking to get in.

 

[Prestige]

Err. Spending 2 months or less detailing a map you hope many will play and you will get $$ for and recognition if you plan to make a career out of. this sort of stuff looks great on a resume if this is the field you are looking to get in.

well see anyone can enter, and their really isn't much distinguishing a good entry that took some time versus a 100% orange devtexture entry.

it would be nice for valve or anyone to judge them (i know theres 100+), and to rank at least the top 10 so you can say "#8 place in artpass detailing contest," rather than "I lost the artpass detailing contest"

 

[DJive]

...and their really isn't much distinguishing a good entry that took some time versus a 100% orange devtexture entry.

Huh?

it would be nice for valve or anyone to judge them (i know theres 100+), and to rank at least the top 10 so you can say "#8 place in artpass detailing contest," rather than "I lost the artpass detailing contest"

I agree completely. Hopefully they will list say the 10 closest runners up.

 

[cyked]

Err. Spending 2 months or less detailing a map you hope many will play and you will get $$ for and recognition if you plan to make a career out of. this sort of stuff looks great on a resume if this is the field you are looking to get in.

I would rather spend 4-6 months creating a map that I hope many will play and have a longshot chance at getting $$ and recognition if I plan to make a career out of it. if you want to become a level designer would game companies rather see a portfolio of a TF2m Detail contest entry or "this map that i made all by myself" and then when asked about it you can go into detail about why the layout is the way it is where with the valve detail entry all you can say is "idunnovalvedidit"

To me, when it comes to mapping, I do things for the experience and/or enjoyment. All this contest would give me is detailing experience which I could get from detailing my own maps. With Alien Swarm I would be able to learn about tileset mapping and how to tell a story with non-multiplayer maps. Not only that but I would be able to look underneath the hood and see how the game works, and modifying it with whatever ideas I have. Creating maps for tf2/ASW and a mod for ASW would look a hell of a lot better than just about anything other than 1st place in the competition.

tl;dr The contest would be a waste of my time

 

[DJive]

tl;dr The contest would be a waste of my time

EXACTLY.

that is what I'm trying to get at. Applying for a human resource job with Microsoft would be a waste of my time HOWEVER I'm not going to complain about it or if the position doesn't suit my needs or expectations. I don't say that its terrible.

 

[Psy]

Don't worry Flame. Come September the forums, chat room and servers will be back to normal hopefully. Just hold tight like I am.

 

[Fraz]

tbh, I'm impartial to this contest and to AS. Since I have a crappy graphics card AS plays fine sometimes and others it just kills fps, which is fine, really I don't mind it too much. What I really dislike about AS is the god damn screen shake when you get hit. It totally throws me off and I can't see anything so am shooting/meleeing randomly until it stops. The contest I was never gonna enter, just not down my alley as it were. I dont know if I'll really ever enter a contest unless its a contest for a gamemode/idea I was planning to do anyway.

I do want more impromptus and proper maps being played/developed as well though. It's something I'm starting to miss more and more.

 

[Bermuda Cake]

Some people do enjoy detailing... Even if their map doesn't get chosen for many this is a really helpful experience, both into maps in development stages as well as art passes.