BeigeAlertTexasJoin Date: 2013-08-08Member: 186657Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Diamond, Reinforced - Shadow, Subnautica Playtester, Pistachionauts
Sorry to say it guys, but no new version of Temple this week... or the next week... or the next week... but after that we should be good to go!
A great work opportunity came up yesterday, and so my mapping time will be pretty much zero for the next few weeks. But don't worry, your ole' pal Beige didn't just up and disappear on you! (or "pull a Remedy" as it is popularly described )
BeigeAlertTexasJoin Date: 2013-08-08Member: 186657Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Diamond, Reinforced - Shadow, Subnautica Playtester, Pistachionauts
edited August 2014
Hey guys! That "work opportunity" from the previous post didn't end up using me for the entire duration of the project, so I'm back home and had some time to eek out a new build of Temple! The biggest highlights of this release are: 1) Laser Drill is gone, and in its place, please welcome Crew Quarters, a room whose existence actually makes sense with this map. 2) Map has been reduced in size slightly. 3) Throne Room should be a bit more alien friendly now. 4) Royal Quarters RT has been moved to Great Hall South.
Changelog:
v0.4.5
-Laser Drill remade from scratch. Room is now called Crew Quarters.
-Moved Royal Quarters RT to Great Hall South.
-Moved Worship slightly to the west by squeezing Royal Quarters.
-Moved the River Mouth RT to the northeast corner of the room.
-Reworked the path from River Mouth to Worship. Shouldn't be such a big line of sight issue now.
-Shifted Mausoleum slightly to the East.
-Shifted Colony slightly to the East.
-Added lots of cover to Throne Room, so it shoudln't be so much of a jetpacker haven now.
-Added a (temporary) throne to Throne Room, and moved the RT back to the room's center.
Overview:
EDIT: Oops! It would help a lot if I actually hit "publish".
Yup, that's our good friend the texture lock doing what the texture lock does best. It seems that it only ever works if the faces are exactly planar. I'll need to go through and manually re-align ALL of those faces.
BeigeAlertTexasJoin Date: 2013-08-08Member: 186657Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Diamond, Reinforced - Shadow, Subnautica Playtester, Pistachionauts
Just released a quick bug-fix update.
Changelog:
v0.4.6 (bug fix)
-Fixed a stuck spot between Mausoleum and Colony.
-Fixed a stuck spot between Colony and Crew Quarters.
-RT in River Mouth moved slightly so it can't be sniped from Aerodome's approach.
-Adjusted the nav mesh in Aerodome for easier observatory placement.
Yup, that's our good friend the texture lock doing what the texture lock does best. It seems that it only ever works if the faces are exactly planar. I'll need to go through and manually re-align ALL of those faces.
Happens on face that aren't at a 0/90° etc...
Anything that is round will suffer.
Yup, that's our good friend the texture lock doing what the texture lock does best. It seems that it only ever works if the faces are exactly planar. I'll need to go through and manually re-align ALL of those faces.
Happens on face that aren't at a 0/90° etc...
Anything that is round will suffer.
This is true, but it's most noticeable on non-planar faces... which my map has in spades.
BeigeAlertTexasJoin Date: 2013-08-08Member: 186657Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Diamond, Reinforced - Shadow, Subnautica Playtester, Pistachionauts
Just released a new build! That pesky Crew Quarters -> GHN vent is gone.
Full changelog:
v0.5.0
-Added vents in the Mausoleum-Colony and Aerodome-River Mouth hallways. Should be less of an alien death trap now.
-Added a bit of cover on the ceiling between Aerodome and Crew Quarters.
-Added a vent going from the Tomb-side of Mausoleum to the entrance of Waterfall. Mausoleum should be tougher for Marines to hold now.
-Removed the vent between Crew Quarters and Great Hall North. This should be interesting...
-Replaced cliff geometry with prop for better performance. (Draw calls are slightly increased in most areas (<5%), in exchange for falling nearly 35% in certain areas. Worth.
PelargirJoin Date: 2013-07-02Member: 185857Members, Forum Moderators, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Supporter, Reinforced - Silver, WC 2013 - Silver, Forum staff
I do not care of any overview changes if you don't remove that statue in the main room.
Just like that, it looks better but I need to take a real look ingame though.
I do not care of any overview changes if you don't remove that statue in the main room.
Just like that, it looks better but I need to take a real look ingame though.
What would you have me put there instead? Without that statue, that's a massive line of sight straight to the rez node.
BeigeAlertTexasJoin Date: 2013-08-08Member: 186657Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Diamond, Reinforced - Shadow, Subnautica Playtester, Pistachionauts
edited August 2014
Update published. Mostly bug fixes... that and I lowered the force field in Aerodome so you can't go up and over the ship anymore.
v0.5.1
-Fixed a stuck spot in Cavern.
-Lowered the dome in Aerodome so you cannot fly over the top of the ship anymore.
-Added some collision geo to the stairs in tomb to smooth things out a bit.
-Fixed a stuck spot in Colony.
A skulk can still move under the base. Open the area with a door on a wall and move the vessel in the middle of it. Then the force field of this pseudo door would cut in half the vessel. That would eventually rule out many issues.
Find a way to block big heights in the Great Hall + Throne. The lag issues of the game and distance view won't allow this map to work unless it's ruled out. Rubbles, statue head on the ground etc... i'm sure you have enough imagination to make that happen.
That's fine, there's precisely zero cover underneath the ship. I don't have a problem with skulks being able to run around a base; every map has that. What I had a problem with is how easy it was in this base for one skulk to waste so much time with marines. Now, skulks should have much less freedom in Aerodome.
Find a way to block big heights in the Great Hall + Throne. The lag issues of the game and distance view won't allow this map to work unless it's ruled out. Rubbles, statue head on the ground etc... i'm sure you have enough imagination to make that happen.
I have yet to see the dramatic height of the Great Hall areas have any negative impact on gameplay -- not to say that it won't, but if I sat around fixing every single thing that *might/maybe/someday-perhaps* be a problem, the map would never get done.
That was mainly due to imbalanced teams, though. Three very good shots on the marine team held the whole alien team down.
I don't know if that was the main reason. We were locked down in our main hive, and when we tried to get out and see the world and met marines, it was quite hard to engage them, because of the large line of sigh they had in all rooms, and the lack of props (which is normal at this stage). Sure they had three good shots, but my ass was kicked by not so good players because I couldn't dodge bullets easily, stay hidden, ambush, etc ...
That was mainly due to imbalanced teams, though. Three very good shots on the marine team held the whole alien team down.
I don't know if that was the main reason. We were locked down in our main hive, and when we tried to get out and see the world and met marines, it was quite hard to engage them, because of the large line of sigh they had in all rooms, and the lack of props (which is normal at this stage). Sure they had three good shots, but my ass was kicked by not so good players because I couldn't dodge bullets easily, stay hidden, ambush, etc ...
I'll make an effort to add more cover to these rooms... though I'm not entirely sure where it is needed. Gone are the days where I could spend 7-8 hours a day on this map... most of the work gets done on the weekends now. If you could point out specifically which rooms need more cover, it would make my job a lot easier.
Also, the next update will feature a route from Crew Quarters to Great Hall North... and I'm thinking of adding that 11th RT back to Crew Quarters, just to see how it works out.
BeigeAlertTexasJoin Date: 2013-08-08Member: 186657Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Diamond, Reinforced - Shadow, Subnautica Playtester, Pistachionauts
edited August 2014
Alright guys, new release, this one is a big change. I've added a route from Crew Quarters to Great Hall North, as well as added the 11th (!) RT back in. We'll see how this goes... but I'm thinking I'll probably have to remove one to get it back down to 10. We'll see...
v0.6.0
-Added a route between Great Hall North and Crew Quarters.
-Added RT to Crew Quarters.
-Added a vent route to Aerodome from the south.
-Tweaked the lighting a little bit to light up routes, and darken some rooms.
BeigeAlertTexasJoin Date: 2013-08-08Member: 186657Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Diamond, Reinforced - Shadow, Subnautica Playtester, Pistachionauts
edited August 2014
I think I'm done with map making for a while... or at LEAST until ns2 figures out what kind of game it wants to be.
I'm tired of the game being fun ONLY until marines get jetpacks, taking down hives with much greater ease than aliens require to successfully defend.
I'm tired of getting stuck on random marine buildings and being unable to escape because lag keeps dragging me back.
I'm tired of the only solution offered to obnoxiously long loading times being "dude, just spend hundreds of dollars on an SSD for this game and this game alone."
And most of all, I'm tired of the community that seems content with exclusively playing the same 5-6 damn maps to death, and running into the dirt any new maps.
So I'm done with ns2 mapping for a while. I'm not going to invest any more time in a map for a game whose future is shaky at best.
I think I'm done with map making for a while... or at LEAST until ns2 figures out what kind of game it wants to be.
I'm tired of the game being fun ONLY until marines get jetpacks, taking down hives with much greater ease than aliens require to successfully defend.
I'm tired of getting stuck on random marine buildings and being unable to escape because lag keeps dragging me back.
I'm tired of the only solution offered to obnoxiously long loading times being "dude, just spend hundreds of dollars on an SSD for this game and this game alone."
And most of all, I'm tired of the community that seems content with exclusively playing the same 5-6 damn maps to death, and running into the dirt any new maps.
So I'm done with ns2 mapping for a while. I'm not going to invest any more time in a map for a game whose future is shaky at best.
When did you got this bad feeling? Our last game on Yo Clan server?
Actually, even if I truly understand your point of view, I felt the same when I stopped NSL maptesting... a bit different but it's even relative to mappers & all that stuff, I do have to disagree with your statement.
Getting stuck into a structure or something else isn't too rare but, is this really an issue? You were not able to escape 'cause of the map, structures positions, etc, + your ping. You're coming from US, that makes sense to have a bad ping on EU servers, so --> blame the ping.
About the loading times, build after build, they're improved. Okay, maybe not, depending of your computer & performances. B267 & b268 made my computers a tiny bit slower than before regarding of loading times. That's bad, 'cause the first loading can reach 10minutes for me (i'm not joking). Then, mapchange, or server or even if I attempt to play again later, that's getting better (fortunately). CDT is working on this & that makes me happy. Do you really suffer because of loading times?
The community? You're right. They only like to play Tram/Veil/Summit. Boring, boring & boring. No, really, I love these maps, seriously, but, personally I have more than 2.000 hours of playtime & guess what, around probably 80% on these maps. I like them, balanced, fun, etc, but yeah, playing the same maps is just annoying. Sadly, there's a bunch (the most part) of people that only enjoy to play on these maps, the others are, hum, unbalanced, shit or something. Doesn't make sense to me, but whatever.
The example is, not sure if that guy was joking or serious, the Yo Clan admin (dunno who) that blamed MeatMachine for installing Kodiak5 & Derelict on the server, wtf? Server was full, & games were funny. I learned a lot about these maps & i was so glad to be lost between all those corridors, fu. Did he call these maps 'shit'? But it's the main community's reaction and that's a shame.
But you know what? Why are you doing a map? To make it played? Make it famous & popular, because you want people enjoy to discover it & play on it? Isn't right? Dude, seriously, that's your job. I mean, you're working on a """" good & huge map. Temple is the one, with Fusion that make me impatient. You did a lot of layout changes lately & that's awesome, you still need a lot of work before releasing it but what, that's thrilling. This is hard, to convince people your map is fine, well designed, balanced, etc. It's a part of your work, you have to design it, to make it, and to bring people to play it. By different ways, but you have to do it. As I said, there's a bunch of custom maps that are currently work in progress but half of them do not me feel impatient & happy when I have some news about them.
I won't try out to convince you to keep working on your map. But yeah, honestly, you just did an awesome work, I want to see your map on public servers (and why not in competitive). Yes, the community is crappy regarding of the maps, and yes it's hard work to make a map popular enough & appreciated. Yes, the game isn't perfect and will never be perfect one day, but god dammit, this is NS2 dude! You have around 1.500 hours, what did you learn?
I think I'm done with map making for a while... or at LEAST until ns2 figures out what kind of game it wants to be.
And most of all, I'm tired of the community that seems content with exclusively playing the same 5-6 damn maps to death, and running into the dirt any new maps.
I'm not going to invest any more time in a map for a game whose future is shaky at best.
I do know what you mean. It would be nice if the game would just stay what it is now, with detail changes. I know the CDT has great visions and all, but really, it's too late to re-invent everything. And the playerbase keeps declining. Why make the huge effort of creating a map if theres only 300 people left to play it?
I think I'm done with map making for a while... or at LEAST until ns2 figures out what kind of game it wants to be.
I'm tired of the game being fun ONLY until marines get jetpacks, taking down hives with much greater ease than aliens require to successfully defend.
I'm tired of getting stuck on random marine buildings and being unable to escape because lag keeps dragging me back.
I'm tired of the only solution offered to obnoxiously long loading times being "dude, just spend hundreds of dollars on an SSD for this game and this game alone."
And most of all, I'm tired of the community that seems content with exclusively playing the same 5-6 damn maps to death, and running into the dirt any new maps.
So I'm done with ns2 mapping for a while. I'm not going to invest any more time in a map for a game whose future is shaky at best.
I think I'm done with map making for a while... or at LEAST until ns2 figures out what kind of game it wants to be.
I'm tired of the game being fun ONLY until marines get jetpacks, taking down hives with much greater ease than aliens require to successfully defend.
I'm tired of getting stuck on random marine buildings and being unable to escape because lag keeps dragging me back.
I'm tired of the only solution offered to obnoxiously long loading times being "dude, just spend hundreds of dollars on an SSD for this game and this game alone."
And most of all, I'm tired of the community that seems content with exclusively playing the same 5-6 damn maps to death, and running into the dirt any new maps.
So I'm done with ns2 mapping for a while. I'm not going to invest any more time in a map for a game whose future is shaky at best.
When did you got this bad feeling? Our last game on Yo Clan server?
Actually, even if I truly understand your point of view, I felt the same when I stopped NSL maptesting... a bit different but it's even relative to mappers & all that stuff, I do have to disagree with your statement.
Getting stuck into a structure or something else isn't too rare but, is this really an issue? You were not able to escape 'cause of the map, structures positions, etc, + your ping. You're coming from US, that makes sense to have a bad ping on EU servers, so --> blame the ping.
About the loading times, build after build, they're improved. Okay, maybe not, depending of your computer & performances. B267 & b268 made my computers a tiny bit slower than before regarding of loading times. That's bad, 'cause the first loading can reach 10minutes for me (i'm not joking). Then, mapchange, or server or even if I attempt to play again later, that's getting better (fortunately). CDT is working on this & that makes me happy. Do you really suffer because of loading times?
The community? You're right. They only like to play Tram/Veil/Summit. Boring, boring & boring. No, really, I love these maps, seriously, but, personally I have more than 2.000 hours of playtime & guess what, around probably 80% on these maps. I like them, balanced, fun, etc, but yeah, playing the same maps is just annoying. Sadly, there's a bunch (the most part) of people that only enjoy to play on these maps, the others are, hum, unbalanced, shit or something. Doesn't make sense to me, but whatever.
The example is, not sure if that guy was joking or serious, the Yo Clan admin (dunno who) that blamed MeatMachine for installing Kodiak5 & Derelict on the server, wtf? Server was full, & games were funny. I learned a lot about these maps & i was so glad to be lost between all those corridors, fu. Did he call these maps 'shit'? But it's the main community's reaction and that's a shame.
But you know what? Why are you doing a map? To make it played? Make it famous & popular, because you want people enjoy to discover it & play on it? Isn't right? Dude, seriously, that's your job. I mean, you're working on a """" good & huge map. Temple is the one, with Fusion that make me impatient. You did a lot of layout changes lately & that's awesome, you still need a lot of work before releasing it but what, that's thrilling. This is hard, to convince people your map is fine, well designed, balanced, etc. It's a part of your work, you have to design it, to make it, and to bring people to play it. By different ways, but you have to do it. As I said, there's a bunch of custom maps that are currently work in progress but half of them do not me feel impatient & happy when I have some news about them.
I won't try out to convince you to keep working on your map. But yeah, honestly, you just did an awesome work, I want to see your map on public servers (and why not in competitive). Yes, the community is crappy regarding of the maps, and yes it's hard work to make a map popular enough & appreciated. Yes, the game isn't perfect and will never be perfect one day, but god dammit, this is NS2 dude! You have around 1.500 hours, what did you learn?
No, it wasn't because of today. I've been feeling this way for a long time. I've sunk an unbelievable amount of time into map making for this game (including ns2_hotdogs... anyone remember that one?), and I'm afraid that when the time comes that I actually do have something really good to show for it... who is going to be left? We're down to... what... ~5-600 average? Yea, some may come back from holidays... I think that's what you were implying Crunch, but that's not going to help much. Just LOOK at the chart! ( http://steamcharts.com/app/4920 ). That's NOT an upward trend, or even a FLAT trend! We have NEVER been this low before. I'm just so frustrated that instead of focusing on THE BIGGEST PROBLEM ns2 has faced since day 1: steep learning curve killing player retention, we instead get updates that regularly break the game and/or completely change how you have to play it. We NEED a good tutorial for this game, and no, not that idiotic tutorial that ships with the game. That has little to no significance with what ACTUALLY happens in a game. There's nothing in that tutorial you couldn't have figured out after a few minutes in a real game. ("Build buildings with e? BRILLIANT! Now WHY do we build certain buildings? What's a 'forward armory' and why is it important? Why is everyone yelling at you for finishing a power node in an empty room? Don't stand inside phase gates if they're under attack, you'll almost surely die and get your teammates killed as well", etc etc.) I've often thought about putting together a comprehensive tutorial of my own, until I remember -- oh wait! That's actually one of the FEW things in this game that CANNOT be modded. Why? Because people new to the game wouldn't know about it! It would have to be integrated in officially.
Okay, regardless of my own feelings towards what the CDT has done with the game -- I love 99% of what you guys have done... just... make sure the critical stuff WORKS before releasing! --that still doesn't change the reality that we are hemorrhaging players. Even if I did a complete 180 right now and resumed work on the map, it'd be at least 6 months before it was finished. We had DOUBLE the playerbase 6 months ago. If we don't do something FAST, this game will be way down in the 300's by February next year. I don't want that to happen, but that's the way we're headed right now.
I hate that it's come to this. I am extremely grateful to everyone that has helped me test my maps, and I'm really sorry that this *might* be the end of it. (Though if you recall, this was never meant to be a solo project of mine... everybody else just disappeared). If anybody wants to take over development of it, I can pass along all the files.
To answer your question about collision: it's not ping, it's not 268. Collision in this game has always been really wonky. For as long as I can remember, two skulks heading the same direction will always lose all momentum at the slightest little graze, (again... SAME DAMN DIRECTION), a ~3 ton onos will come to a screeching halt because of a 200 pound marine rather than the other way around, I can fumble around, trying to climb a stupid little wall and keep falling as a skulk because the roof has a weird angle in it, and aliens can fly right through the damned smelting buckets like they're not even there! That last one really irks me and is extremely telling of the kind of thought process involved in making this game. ("Oh the smelting buckets don't work right at all? Better leave them exactly as-is for no damned good reason!" Seriously... swap em out with static props and it'd work beautifully.)
TLDR: I was making this map because I wanted it to be played. The rate at which the player base is declining suggests there won't be much of anybody left to play it once it's finished. There is absolutely no indication of any initiative to fix this... and it would need to happen NOW if this game is to be saved.
Damn I wish I had gotten into this game a year... year and a half earlier than I did... I just didn't know about it. Wonder what I would've made by now... I'll never know.
Soul_RiderMod BeanJoin Date: 2004-06-19Member: 29388Members, Constellation, Squad Five Blue
I share your pain, and that is why I stopped modding for NS2. I am offline so not able to do anything properly, but I am working on new projects with different tools. I wouls whole heartedly recommend that you not look on this time as time wasted, but as time spent learning many new things.
I did the same as you with NS1. I got into mapping too late, and while I got into NS2 mapping early, I switched it up to modding instead, and now I am off working with other stuff, but I will be ready to come back and work with spark 2.0 if the opportunity arrives.
You need to find something else to divert these energies into for a while, to further expand your skillset, and you may also end up coming back for Spark 2.0, fresh and hungry
Comments
A great work opportunity came up yesterday, and so my mapping time will be pretty much zero for the next few weeks. But don't worry, your ole' pal Beige didn't just up and disappear on you! (or "pull a Remedy" as it is popularly described
Changelog:
-Laser Drill remade from scratch. Room is now called Crew Quarters.
-Moved Royal Quarters RT to Great Hall South.
-Moved Worship slightly to the west by squeezing Royal Quarters.
-Moved the River Mouth RT to the northeast corner of the room.
-Reworked the path from River Mouth to Worship. Shouldn't be such a big line of sight issue now.
-Shifted Mausoleum slightly to the East.
-Shifted Colony slightly to the East.
-Added lots of cover to Throne Room, so it shoudln't be so much of a jetpacker haven now.
-Added a (temporary) throne to Throne Room, and moved the RT back to the room's center.
Overview:
EDIT: Oops! It would help a lot if I actually hit "publish".
Yup, that's our good friend the texture lock doing what the texture lock does best. It seems that it only ever works if the faces are exactly planar. I'll need to go through and manually re-align ALL of those faces.
Changelog:
-Fixed a stuck spot between Mausoleum and Colony.
-Fixed a stuck spot between Colony and Crew Quarters.
-RT in River Mouth moved slightly so it can't be sniped from Aerodome's approach.
-Adjusted the nav mesh in Aerodome for easier observatory placement.
Happens on face that aren't at a 0/90° etc...
Anything that is round will suffer.
But i found a even better bug.
This is true, but it's most noticeable on non-planar faces... which my map has in spades.
Can you... elaborate on that?
Full changelog:
-Added vents in the Mausoleum-Colony and Aerodome-River Mouth hallways. Should be less of an alien death trap now.
-Added a bit of cover on the ceiling between Aerodome and Crew Quarters.
-Added a vent going from the Tomb-side of Mausoleum to the entrance of Waterfall. Mausoleum should be tougher for Marines to hold now.
-Removed the vent between Crew Quarters and Great Hall North. This should be interesting...
-Replaced cliff geometry with prop for better performance. (Draw calls are slightly increased in most areas (<5%), in exchange for falling nearly 35% in certain areas. Worth.
New overview:
Just like that, it looks better but I need to take a real look ingame though.
I have no idea what that is, but thanks!
What would you have me put there instead? Without that statue, that's a massive line of sight straight to the rez node.
-Fixed a stuck spot in Cavern.
-Lowered the dome in Aerodome so you cannot fly over the top of the ship anymore.
-Added some collision geo to the stairs in tomb to smooth things out a bit.
-Fixed a stuck spot in Colony.
Wait, what?!
A skulk can still move under the base. Open the area with a door on a wall and move the vessel in the middle of it. Then the force field of this pseudo door would cut in half the vessel. That would eventually rule out many issues.
Find a way to block big heights in the Great Hall + Throne. The lag issues of the game and distance view won't allow this map to work unless it's ruled out. Rubbles, statue head on the ground etc... i'm sure you have enough imagination to make that happen.
That's fine, there's precisely zero cover underneath the ship. I don't have a problem with skulks being able to run around a base; every map has that. What I had a problem with is how easy it was in this base for one skulk to waste so much time with marines. Now, skulks should have much less freedom in Aerodome.
I have yet to see the dramatic height of the Great Hall areas have any negative impact on gameplay -- not to say that it won't, but if I sat around fixing every single thing that *might/maybe/someday-perhaps* be a problem, the map would never get done.
Couldn't stand a single chance
I'll make an effort to add more cover to these rooms... though I'm not entirely sure where it is needed. Gone are the days where I could spend 7-8 hours a day on this map... most of the work gets done on the weekends now. If you could point out specifically which rooms need more cover, it would make my job a lot easier.
Also, the next update will feature a route from Crew Quarters to Great Hall North... and I'm thinking of adding that 11th RT back to Crew Quarters, just to see how it works out.
-Added a route between Great Hall North and Crew Quarters.
-Added RT to Crew Quarters.
-Added a vent route to Aerodome from the south.
-Tweaked the lighting a little bit to light up routes, and darken some rooms.
New overview:
I'm tired of the game being fun ONLY until marines get jetpacks, taking down hives with much greater ease than aliens require to successfully defend.
I'm tired of getting stuck on random marine buildings and being unable to escape because lag keeps dragging me back.
I'm tired of the only solution offered to obnoxiously long loading times being "dude, just spend hundreds of dollars on an SSD for this game and this game alone."
And most of all, I'm tired of the community that seems content with exclusively playing the same 5-6 damn maps to death, and running into the dirt any new maps.
So I'm done with ns2 mapping for a while. I'm not going to invest any more time in a map for a game whose future is shaky at best.
When did you got this bad feeling? Our last game on Yo Clan server?
Actually, even if I truly understand your point of view, I felt the same when I stopped NSL maptesting... a bit different but it's even relative to mappers & all that stuff, I do have to disagree with your statement.
Getting stuck into a structure or something else isn't too rare but, is this really an issue? You were not able to escape 'cause of the map, structures positions, etc, + your ping. You're coming from US, that makes sense to have a bad ping on EU servers, so --> blame the ping.
About the loading times, build after build, they're improved. Okay, maybe not, depending of your computer & performances. B267 & b268 made my computers a tiny bit slower than before regarding of loading times. That's bad, 'cause the first loading can reach 10minutes for me (i'm not joking). Then, mapchange, or server or even if I attempt to play again later, that's getting better (fortunately). CDT is working on this & that makes me happy. Do you really suffer because of loading times?
The community? You're right. They only like to play Tram/Veil/Summit. Boring, boring & boring. No, really, I love these maps, seriously, but, personally I have more than 2.000 hours of playtime & guess what, around probably 80% on these maps. I like them, balanced, fun, etc, but yeah, playing the same maps is just annoying. Sadly, there's a bunch (the most part) of people that only enjoy to play on these maps, the others are, hum, unbalanced, shit or something. Doesn't make sense to me, but whatever.
The example is, not sure if that guy was joking or serious, the Yo Clan admin (dunno who) that blamed MeatMachine for installing Kodiak5 & Derelict on the server, wtf? Server was full, & games were funny. I learned a lot about these maps & i was so glad to be lost between all those corridors, fu. Did he call these maps 'shit'? But it's the main community's reaction and that's a shame.
But you know what? Why are you doing a map? To make it played? Make it famous & popular, because you want people enjoy to discover it & play on it? Isn't right? Dude, seriously, that's your job. I mean, you're working on a """" good & huge map. Temple is the one, with Fusion that make me impatient. You did a lot of layout changes lately & that's awesome, you still need a lot of work before releasing it but what, that's thrilling. This is hard, to convince people your map is fine, well designed, balanced, etc. It's a part of your work, you have to design it, to make it, and to bring people to play it. By different ways, but you have to do it. As I said, there's a bunch of custom maps that are currently work in progress but half of them do not me feel impatient & happy when I have some news about them.
I won't try out to convince you to keep working on your map. But yeah, honestly, you just did an awesome work, I want to see your map on public servers (and why not in competitive). Yes, the community is crappy regarding of the maps, and yes it's hard work to make a map popular enough & appreciated. Yes, the game isn't perfect and will never be perfect one day, but god dammit, this is NS2 dude! You have around 1.500 hours, what did you learn?
I do know what you mean. It would be nice if the game would just stay what it is now, with detail changes. I know the CDT has great visions and all, but really, it's too late to re-invent everything. And the playerbase keeps declining. Why make the huge effort of creating a map if theres only 300 people left to play it?
relax.
No, it wasn't because of today. I've been feeling this way for a long time. I've sunk an unbelievable amount of time into map making for this game (including ns2_hotdogs... anyone remember that one?), and I'm afraid that when the time comes that I actually do have something really good to show for it... who is going to be left? We're down to... what... ~5-600 average? Yea, some may come back from holidays... I think that's what you were implying Crunch, but that's not going to help much. Just LOOK at the chart! ( http://steamcharts.com/app/4920 ). That's NOT an upward trend, or even a FLAT trend! We have NEVER been this low before. I'm just so frustrated that instead of focusing on THE BIGGEST PROBLEM ns2 has faced since day 1: steep learning curve killing player retention, we instead get updates that regularly break the game and/or completely change how you have to play it. We NEED a good tutorial for this game, and no, not that idiotic tutorial that ships with the game. That has little to no significance with what ACTUALLY happens in a game. There's nothing in that tutorial you couldn't have figured out after a few minutes in a real game. ("Build buildings with e? BRILLIANT! Now WHY do we build certain buildings? What's a 'forward armory' and why is it important? Why is everyone yelling at you for finishing a power node in an empty room? Don't stand inside phase gates if they're under attack, you'll almost surely die and get your teammates killed as well", etc etc.) I've often thought about putting together a comprehensive tutorial of my own, until I remember -- oh wait! That's actually one of the FEW things in this game that CANNOT be modded. Why? Because people new to the game wouldn't know about it! It would have to be integrated in officially.
Okay, regardless of my own feelings towards what the CDT has done with the game -- I love 99% of what you guys have done... just... make sure the critical stuff WORKS before releasing! --that still doesn't change the reality that we are hemorrhaging players. Even if I did a complete 180 right now and resumed work on the map, it'd be at least 6 months before it was finished. We had DOUBLE the playerbase 6 months ago. If we don't do something FAST, this game will be way down in the 300's by February next year.
I hate that it's come to this. I am extremely grateful to everyone that has helped me test my maps, and I'm really sorry that this *might* be the end of it. (Though if you recall, this was never meant to be a solo project of mine... everybody else just disappeared). If anybody wants to take over development of it, I can pass along all the files.
To answer your question about collision: it's not ping, it's not 268. Collision in this game has always been really wonky. For as long as I can remember, two skulks heading the same direction will always lose all momentum at the slightest little graze, (again... SAME DAMN DIRECTION), a ~3 ton onos will come to a screeching halt because of a 200 pound marine rather than the other way around, I can fumble around, trying to climb a stupid little wall and keep falling as a skulk because the roof has a weird angle in it, and aliens can fly right through the damned smelting buckets like they're not even there! That last one really irks me and is extremely telling of the kind of thought process involved in making this game. ("Oh the smelting buckets don't work right at all? Better leave them exactly as-is for no damned good reason!" Seriously... swap em out with static props and it'd work beautifully.)
TLDR: I was making this map because I wanted it to be played. The rate at which the player base is declining suggests there won't be much of anybody left to play it once it's finished. There is absolutely no indication of any initiative to fix this... and it would need to happen NOW if this game is to be saved.
Damn I wish I had gotten into this game a year... year and a half earlier than I did... I just didn't know about it.
I did the same as you with NS1. I got into mapping too late, and while I got into NS2 mapping early, I switched it up to modding instead, and now I am off working with other stuff, but I will be ready to come back and work with spark 2.0 if the opportunity arrives.
You need to find something else to divert these energies into for a while, to further expand your skillset, and you may also end up coming back for Spark 2.0, fresh and hungry