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CTF DM Lakeside BETA (first map)
Soldat Forums - Soldat Maps & Map Making - Quality Maps
SakAttak
January 20, 2006, 8:32 am
UPDATE

The final version has been posted and can be found HERE

bolhy
January 20, 2006, 8:38 am
Uhhhh nice map man i'll d/l it right away

DeMonIc
January 20, 2006, 8:59 am
That's your first map? God, the youth of today! Back in my age, first maps had to suck.

The looks are A+, although you might want to use less of support.bmp next time ( I am quite surprised that you used it so well that it doesn't look like vomit ), the moshy water looks grand. The gameplay also looks pretty promising, I'll have some of the folks playtest it today and I'll edit my reply with further comments.

Gameplay: 'tis truly awesome. The top route seems to be the fastest, with the middle part being the alternative route, and the lowest way is done in such a daring and unique way, that it is an actually usefull half route. Only negative is that the walls are pretty narrow, therefore nades sometimes go through them. The map is pretty huge, 4v4+ quality games I'd say.

Deleted User
January 20, 2006, 9:09 am
Ah the good old days were to begin mapping your first map had to be totaly crap house and you had to be flamed to hell about how crap it was :P. It does appear like those days are gone.

Great first map and i look forward to more.

Soulsnipa
January 20, 2006, 9:39 am
I really like your style....I'm trying to nit pick to help you out on your future maps. It is very hard but lets see what I can come up with.

Work on some background scenery. Ie. For support.bmp you should have more 3d like...have some in the background with less transparency..etc.

In the overview I dont like how the bottom is so dark, it just doesnt seem to match with the top which is almost perfect contrast. I really like the shading.

In one of the screenshots you have a polygon that is totally black...try to avoid those, they often look ugly. Try to touch at least one vertice with something a little lighter.

The floating platforms may be a little to edgy, I suggest making some of them a little more smooth.

Hmm what else, well there really isnt too much else really keep em coming.

Eagles_Arrows
January 20, 2006, 10:57 am
Oh geez oh boy...

Lovin' the looks.
/download

Avarax
January 20, 2006, 12:25 pm
a map that deserves default status. this map perfectly combines the old soldat look with modern shading and texture stretching. good use of the the lights. the layout is very tricky an extraordinary, but still playable and balanced with enough routes for good tactics. i like your kind of grass placement. i like the support.bmp, u managed to make it look good, and even if you used 10+, it still does.
10/10
i think this is the first 10/10 i've ever given. be proud :D

EDIT:

plz pm leo, he seems to be the only server hoster actually hosting good new custom maps, so he may host yours as well.

<3 leo

person
January 20, 2006, 2:22 pm
Looks awesome. The only thing I can say is that it looks like there should be some bugs reflections in the lights.

Flying_Dutchman
January 20, 2006, 2:56 pm
Great map! Both the looks and gameplay are awesome. Avarax is right, this map really deserves default status.

OutofOrder
January 20, 2006, 5:12 pm
I think more or less everyone above this post.
And i want to know, what font is that you used on those pics? thanks

John O
January 20, 2006, 6:23 pm
jeez, im still working on my first map, but between you and xtender(japanheights?), im going to have to put a [CENSORED] load of finishing touches on it. and ill need a lot more custom scenery. very nice look, and the gameplay looks cool. i love bottomless pits.

Michal
January 20, 2006, 7:08 pm
This is a really great map.
Visuals are perfect and I love the use of buildings.

SakAttak
January 20, 2006, 8:05 pm
Wow. I didn't expect to get such a great response. Thanks to everyone who responded.

DeMonIc: Thanks. I never wanted to use that much support.bmp, but when I finished the map I realized I had used 893/500 scenery files. Originally the floating platforms at the bottom were held up by ropes that looked amazing but I had to make cutbacks somewhere. Oh well. I'm tempted to use some thin "doesn't collide" polys instead of the supports. Nothing so big that people could hide behind them. In fact, my original version made use of about 3 or 4 supports. I want to have SOMETHING there (I guess I have a visual pet peeve about floating islands). Any ideas for other sceneries that I could use? Come to think of it, I could make a custom scenery that looks like a natural rock support... hmmmmmm...

Soulsnipa: Thanks. The scenery problem I mentioned above kind of screwed me up. I'll play around with alternatives to support, and I think I can make it look better. I wasn't worrying too much about the bottom, as it's really only seen in that moment before your soldat bursts into bloody chunks, but I'll consider prettying it up a little. It used to be scattered with rubble, like in the deathmatch version, but that proved too costly. I'm not sure which polygon you're talking about, but if you could somehow point it out, I'll fix it. As far as the platforms go, you're right. I probably should make them a little less edgy. I was trying to conserve polygons until I knew just how many I was going to use.

Avarax: I'm flattered. I've seen some of your maps and I definitely respect you as a mapmaker.

OutOfOrder: The font is called "Dekka Dense JL". I must have downloaded it from a free fonts site years ago. In fact, a quick googling gives you this site: [URL]

Thanks again to everyone who posted. I'm not sure how productive I can be with mapmaking in the immediate future, but I will definitely take your suggestions into consideration and tweak this the next chance I get.


Keron Cyst
January 20, 2006, 8:27 pm
Hm...

I may consider waypointing it once it's rolling into Final and out of Beta.

Raptor
January 20, 2006, 10:13 pm
OMG! This is completely awesome to be your 1st map! =D

I like the lights scenery better! Well, I like the whole map lol

*Downloads*

vash763
January 21, 2006, 1:55 am
I <3 Leo

This is great man. Keep it up. Bases could be a tad bigger.

SakAttak
January 21, 2006, 4:16 am
I think I may agree with you, vash. Does anyone else think the bases should be a little bigger? Also, due to the somewhat thin walls of the bases I find grenades occasionally find their way through them. I tried to fix this by adding a second set of walls hidden inside, and it seems to have cut down a little on the bug, but does anyone have any suggestions on a way to fix it completely?

.Rabble.
January 21, 2006, 5:25 am
And yet another first time map that blows away all of ours, im gunna test it now see what i think ^_^

Soulsnipa
January 21, 2006, 6:54 am
[IMAGE]

perhaps also thinking about making bit more of a transition from black to white shading rather then an immediate WHOA its light here. (see picture)

and the blue boxed part is to show where i believe there to be an all black polygon. I may be wrong?

John O
January 21, 2006, 8:42 am
naw, the hash contrasts are good in this one. its too swampy to not have black against white...

DeMonIc
January 21, 2006, 9:16 am
The bases are already big enough, although the hanging structure could be a bit bigger, so it's a bit easier to get through.

About the nades-go-through walls: a bit barbaric, but effective solution would be adding small colliders inside the walls. The feedback is that grenades would sometimes insta-explode in the wall, but atleast the hiding flag carrier would be safe from the massive grenade spam.

John O
January 21, 2006, 10:43 pm
alright, i jsut got to play 3 matches on this map and it rules. rs on leos with a 5v5 was simply badass. good layout, good visuals, good map. for a beta?

oh, and s.snipa, i totally misssed what you were trying to point out in your post. i guess ur right.

SakAttak
January 26, 2006, 7:55 pm
So I've tweaked a few visual elements and still have a few left to change, but are there any further suggestions as to modifications to affect gameplay? The final version (which shouldn't be very different at all from this one) will be uploaded soon but I just wanted to make sure there weren't any glaring issues gameplay-wise (I still haven't played a large game on it :) )
Thanks guys.