Map Expectations

(EterneX) #21

Thank you guys for all you comments and help, i have one qestion thyough.

how do you tell how much fps there is in one area?

(carnage) #22

in the console

/cg_drawfps 1

(EterneX) #23

thanks ill have to do that

(Sauron|EFG) #24

I wasn’t saying that big maps can’t become popular, but Venice (which I love) did empty servers that I played on (and was removed from some of them because to that). Not compromising on the map quality is one thing, but making sure it’s as small as possible (by e.g. not including stock textures in the pk3, not using large tga textures, you name it) is still a good thing.

I don’t think Caen would be as popular as it is if it had been 20 MB. It certainly isn’t better than Venice.

That’s a bit harsh. A lot of people still have 512 kbps and may prefer to download them “offline” instead of when they want to play.

The “customs servers” are usually full of regulars (at least the ones I play on), which makes it easier to have big downloads (most people will have all maps). The same can’t be said of less popular servers trying to introduce big custom maps in their rotation.

(carnage) #25

i have no probelms with a 20mb map download noramly, however its not unusualy to find a 4kb a second download offerd by a server… if your going to offer map downloads your going to have to offer a good speed or you will find ur server is emptied

there is a lot of talk about this however if your map is good people will play it, it might have more of a chance with a small download but if you make your map something truly special it will find its way around

i think the problem is the low quality of the majority of custom ET maps, the expectations from players is probably very low and so are less willing to download custom maps

oh yeah, and dont give your map one of these big stand out names or put colour in it, imo it makes it look like it need to the name to stand out to make up for the map… also might not be too good to make ur maps seem in like a set… take 1944 beach after playing that i dont want to play any more 1944 maps. no awfence to ppl involved in making it it just seemd like they were more concerned with getting something to realse fast rather than make something quality

yeah, take you time^^

(P4nth3r) #26
  1. playablity
  2. originality
  3. visuality
(]UBC[ McNite) #27

Just to pay respect to loffys hurt feelings i m posting a link in here to a thread i opened on optimizing pk3 filesize. I didn’t think I d really add to the discussion on here, that s why I opened a new thread quoting loffy’s statement on the filesize for a discussion on some technical aspects on filesize.

You can read that thread here.

Here s my thoughts on

the final pk3 must be under 10 Mb. 3-4 is perfect.

Staying under 10 mb is possible if u don’t do complex brushwork or dont use lots of badly compressed custom texes/ tga. A map like stalingrad with 30 mb is major bug by itself tbh.
However 3-4 mb is ridiculous. Only way to do that is: no custom textures, no custom models, and no custom voice objectives. Those 3 eat the most part of a pk3. This would result in: same looks as we already know it (eg. El Kef looks like another part of the goldrush town… not really what u d call originality). And especially you ll either need objectives that are pretty much the same as in the original maps so u can use those VO, or don’t put VO into the map. The first is boring, the second is very likely to result in ppl not knowing what to do (cuz there are barely players that ever look at he CM or have a look at the limbo-menue objectives list where there are even objective cams).

Ok, and just to add my 2 ct: this is sorta kindergartenish. For real.

(Loffy) #28

Well, you lost some of my respect in the process.

(]UBC[ McNite) #29

Well no need to get personal right? As i posted… my topic doesnt fit in this thread, so i made a new one. As there wasn’t ANY personal attack from my side, i start wondering why its a big deal for you. But i think only u can answer that question to yoruself, and i m not interested in the answer. 'nuff said.

(.Chris.) #30

My last map i did i managed to get at 4.2mb and i been told is fairly decent map maybe not the greatest but still i dont think a map at certain size means its of a certain quality, braundorth is only 3.65mb reactor 3.95mb and them have done fairly nice things using mainly stock textures and such. Even using customs textures dont make for huge pk3s when used sparingly like in dubrovnik which is only pk3 size of 6.75mb. I think with carefully selected custom textures and decent layout a mapper could keep pk3 size down and still have a map that stands out from the rest that server admins would want on their servers.

(Sauron|EFG) #31

That’s true chr1s. There are enough quality 4MB maps around to show that it’s not “ridiculous” or necessarily leads to unoriginal maps.