Monkey

[Mystic Monkey]

Hi! My name is Mystic Monkey. I only recently began map making yesturday so pretty new at it.

While inspired by the custom maps I seen on TF2 Official wiki, what inspired me to make maps was these dreams I had last year of playing TF2 in CtF maps I never seen before, oddly they all related to trains.

I found out about Hammer on SDK and thanks to the tutorial on VDC manage to pick up on it.

Yesturday I began work on "Terminal Station", the map I dreamt of and hope to show the WIP soon but as for now I hope to be credit to team.

 

[Nacimota]

Welcome

 

[Dragonstorm24]

Welcome, i see the Train Gods have chosen you

 

[Engineer]

Click the image to get more info about mapping!

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[Mystic Monkey]

Yep! The locomotive gods have choo choosed me.

Aw sweet thanks Engy!

I do have one problem with my map though, I dunno if it's leak or something else. I am sure I set a light source and everything and reset the starting spawn... it's just black. So dark can't even see the weapon. I prefer to preview my levles on GMod as the flashlight and noclip would be particularly useful but for some reason GMod won't reconise them. So this is the only preview I can provide.

I haven't made the subway maze yet, those bricked up tunnels are to prevent leak.

In my dream I dreamt I was playing for the RED team as demoman, the team were jumping and taunting around the station with a RED train waiting at the station, as the announcer begins the mission the doors of the train open and we all got on. There were 2 carrages and the actual train, the middle carrage is where we all got on, the rear carrage had the intel and the train had controls simular to the Freight Trams from HL1. It turns out that the whole map was a huge non-symetrical maze and that since the intel moved with the trains, you not only had to defend your train but also search for your opponents train.

This is all just a dream, I dunno yet if it's possible to have intel that "moves", but what I plan on adding to my map is a "reverse" function on the train, those train track switches from HL1 and those bricked up tunnels might still be in the final map as well as other reasons for trains to be slowed down.

 

[Dragonstorm24]

reminds me of that map in From Russia with Love

may give you some ideas, also the Bullet Crop's project pack has some new trains in it

 

[Mystic Monkey]

I rarely play 007. GoldenEye was probably my first FPS experiance though. Iremember my brothers teaching me to use strife for corners.

So I haven't made the subway maze yet nor probably will if I can't actually test my level to begin with.

 

[Nacimota]

Does your compile log say there's a leak?

 

[Mystic Monkey]

Thats when you run the map with no VIS or BSP right?

 

[Nacimota]

No, a leak is when VVIS fails to compile correctly because your map isn't sealed properly. If VVIS fails, VRAD won't run correctly (it will run but without radiosity).

Further reading:
http://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/Leak

 

[Mystic Monkey]

I know about leaks, I just dunno how ti pinpoint them, I try to Load Pointfile but it just shows an empty load screen.

 

[tyler]

What do you mean, an empty load screen? It should either ask you to load a pointfile from a list (in which case there is no leak) or ask you to load the default file (in which case you need to find the red line).

 

[Mystic Monkey]

This is what I mean, it's empty when I try to load pointfile.

 

[tyler]

Then you don't have a leak.

 

[Mystic Monkey]

Oh... so if it's empty that means no leak. Thats cool.

But if it isn't a leak and I am sure the spawn point is right as well as set the lighting, why is it only black when I test the level?

Well there was this one time I tested the level and even though it was black there was some light on my weapon, I looked up and turns out I spawned underneith the floor, I resetted the spawn point that day but still it's just all black no light.

 

[tyler]

Your light probably isn't functioning right. Can you post a screenshot or two of your light(s)? Just the properties panel that shows all its settings.

 

[Bockagon]

First make sure you have lights other then just a light_environment, as it doesn't look like you have any sky in there.

Then Make sure you have the right kind of spawnpoint. GMod uses "info_player_start" and tf2 uses "info_player_teamspawn."

Then try raising the spawn off the ground slightly, sometimes placing them directly on the ground can mess them up and cause them to spawn below the brush. Common practice is to raise them 8-16 units off the ground.

 

[Mystic Monkey]

So Environment light is only for places with sky? Perhaps thats the problem as the whole map will be played underground?

 

[tyler]

Yep, that's your problem. That light entity shines from the skybox, so inside buildings you won't see it.

Look in the Tutorial section for the light prefab pack and start with those. I'd link it but it's probably a good idea for you to go digging anyway, I think.

You may also want to use Snark's gametype library pack.

 

[Mystic Monkey]

OK, I'll switch it to regular light. I thought Environment light would just sorta light up the map equally or something to save having to put lightsources everywhere. Yeah there is light in subways but no one really pays much attention to it anyway.

I'll test map now. Is it possible to test maps in GMod?