Marine Infiltration Eminent

PRIMER · April 2003

<div class="IPBDescription">Tell me I am wrong for doing this.</div> I doesn't say anything against this, but I think I am going to make a map, that has a natural look to it. As if marines are breaking into some alien environment. Meaning, there is more of an alien presence.

The only room that will have a marine aura to it, will be the ship, which is at the edge of a cave. Or maybe an open map, with a sky, and marines have to leave a ground base.

Personally, it scares the **** out of me when there aren't man made structures around.

The one thought that really tickles my fancy is this: ns_pluto or ns_<something cold>
There is a base, and marines can run outside, or go down into the caverns. Outside it is frosty. Underneath, it is wall to wall alien infestation.
The lights for the ground or ceiling will be similar to those alien lights from HL that if you touch them, they cripple up; some cripple some don't. Now, I would have ceiling lights so that is it not completely, but I think I might include some of those lights that cripple and turn off in long hallways...where it is not critical to siege.

Once I go into production, I might need some serious help. I do not want all the stress to be serverside. I am hoping to have very few entities client/server side. The base will look marinish, but basic...like most would. Snow is very simple. And I would probably stick to a select few alien textures. Would it be best if I just made my own wad file? How would this work for performance?

- Open for comments, suggestions, and such -

PS: SS's late into May hopefully.

PRIMER · April 2003

RE: Base/dropship
There will be an elevator of some sort. As you go down, snow turns into alien walls. Expect something very cool with the elevator.
RE: Ice
yes, I hope to have ice and breakable walls. I am thinking I might protect the tops of the hives with some 200 HP spikes. That way JPers just can go taking control so easily.
Frigid water...fear the water and the caverns

wrongwaygoback · April 2003

</span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> I think I am going to make a map, that has a natural look to it. As if marines are breaking into some alien environment. Meaning, there is more of an alien presence.</td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'>

Fair enough, but to get the organic feel you're probably going to end up with big poly counts and you'll need new textures. Also, I'd be worried about highly repetative environments, but that shouldn't be a problem if you've got a big enough imagination.

</span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> The only room that will have a marine aura to it, will be the ship, which is at the edge of a cave. Or maybe an open map, with a sky, and marines have to leave a ground base.</td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'>

That first idea is okay, but the open sky isn't so good - it's been discussed to death here, so do a search in the archives for those -however the basic gist is 1. the Half-Life engine is not meant for open spaces, and 2. Lerks and jetpackers hitting the skybox is way lame.

</span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'>Now, I would have ceiling lights so that is it not completely, but I think I might include some of those lights that cripple and turn off in long hallways...where it is not critical to siege.</td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'>

Turning lights on-off on presence might be interesting (I'm considering a couple of things like that on my map), but consistency of gameplay has to be considered. How would you make them "cripple up", btw - would you be using a model? If so lighting would probably be entity based bound to a presence entity, which is adverse to your statement....

</span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> I am hoping to have very few entities client/server side</td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'>

Just some thoughts. Good luck.

PRIMER · April 2003

</span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'>Fair enough, but to get the organic feel you're probably going to end up with big poly counts and you'll need new textures. Also, I'd be worried about highly repetative environments, but that shouldn't be a problem if you've got a big enough imagination.</td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'>
I think the most present texture will be the snow (low poly). For underground, I will use an alien-mask. One that gives you that feel like that alien moss on the walls. So it won't be a full texture. You think that is still high-poly?

</span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'>Turning lights on-off on presence might be interesting (I'm considering a couple of things like that on my map), but consistency of gameplay has to be considered. How would you make them "cripple up", btw - would you be using a model? If so lighting would probably be entity based bound to a presence entity, which is adverse to your statement....</td></tr></table><span class='postcolor'>
2 types of lights. 1) model based with a "presensce entity" 2) texture based normal lighting effects

RPGreg2600 · April 2003

HL can do open spaces just fine. Go play dod_bleakhill, dod_hill, para_hedgerow, dod_shwetz, or hell even my map, dod_heckeniveau, You just have to know what you're doing. and yes, those are all day of defeat maps.

Wither · April 2003

How about making the ceiling, instead of a wall, a trigger_hurt that just makes your hp decrease 5 hp a second cause the air is to thin? Start this a few feet from under your skybox and nobody'll be hitting the box..plus it'll be pretty realistic.

I'm no mapper..that's the only thing I can come up with <img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/wink.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wink.gif'> sorry

digz · April 2003

Hey, Idea of where the lighting comes from, you could make the plot of the map that the marines are there because miners mysteriously disapeared while mining into whatever planet/asteroid/whatever. Heck, you can even have what the miners where looking for be the NS node vents. So pretty much they mined into an alien habitat. That way you can have those heavy duty construction lights going through certain tunnels. Hell, you can even put them on a generator triger.. if the aliens kill the gen, the lights go out. Kinda forces you to use your flashlight. Hey, if you want the marines to start on the surface, just stick them in a little crator or canyon to box them in, and have a cave entrance right there. Im not much of a mapper, but theres just a few ideas (that probably have already been said) just thrown out there. I really do want to see a map like this though <img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin.gif'> .

Marine Infiltration Eminent

Comments