SD: Hire custom mappers from ET and RTCW

#1

SD: Hire custom mappers from ET and RTCW

Most played in W:ET http://et.splatterladder.com/?mod=maplist

You can see there both “public clan maps” there as well as “public large fun maps”.

I’d give the best custom mappers from ET and RTCW A++ rating, and DB maps D.

Not trying to be rude or similar. And I dont want to hurt current SD/DB mappers.
But this is how I feel.

Also, even though the textures / graphics in RTCW and ET were less good, most of their maps are much more interesting to look at, and immersive.

Sorry for all the negative feedback.

(stealth6) #2

SD could just communicate more with the competitve players that are leaving feedback in the right place:
http://forums.warchest.com/forumdisplay.php/66-DB-Maps-and-Objectives

So few dev posts and is there even a single post by a LD? I think most of their balancing is based on internal testing & ECHO which doesn’t seem to be working very well.

#3

When ETQW was released I felt that SD had completely ignored, or were ignorant why W:ET had survived so long. Its because the over 300 custom maps, where many of them are truly amazingly fun to play. I felt SD had not followed up on what had happend to W:ET.
I felt SD ignored all that, and just went with what they wanted, and not what had worked for 3 full years.
I felt SD somehow pretended that their vanilla W:ET with 6 maps was the reason it has been so successfull for so long
I felt the custom mappers, is a gold mine of good ideas and pure talent, was ignored.

I rarely touched servers who only had the default maps.
The whole commuity was built around custom servers, joining a community with nice people and admins who changed the maprotation every week, with maybe 50% changed maps, which made the game fresh every week.
I’ve had sooo much fun in W:ET thanks to community maps.
W:ET at xmas, are one of my nicest gamermoments.

(Glottis-3D) #4

[QUOTE=stealth6;510328]SD could just communicate more with the competitve players that are leaving feedback in the right place:
http://forums.warchest.com/forumdisplay.php/66-DB-Maps-and-Objectives

So few dev posts and is there even a single post by a LD? I think most of their balancing is based on internal testing & ECHO which doesn’t seem to be working very well.[/QUOTE]

map designers should speak directly to testers in that forum. lots of lots of ideas, some being realy promising and helpfull.

#5

Echo feels like such a strange approach.

Why make a program for learning good map design, when you can hire the pure talent who made superb custom maps.

It feels like SD lack the experience why those maps were good, and why they worked so good.

Players who played those maps extensivly, and their creators know whats good or fun about them.

I dont know the other side of the coin / whats up with SD.

But, I do know the situation was wierd in 2007, and stil seems to be.
Hire the friggin talents! Dont try to renvent the wheels, when they had alredy made the wheels for you over 7 years ago. They got the insider / experienced knowledge. Why not use it?

Again, sorry for negative feedback.

(tokamak) #6

Venice and Caen are crap. Everything above that is mediocre at best.

I do agree that the map style doesn’t need to be reinvented. SD are genius at this, they’ve shown that much both with interior, hybrid and large scale terrain.

Things started to get weaker with Brink but console orientation can be blamed for that. It’s just that DB seemed to have inherited Brink’s style a bit too much while not having to cater to consoles any longer.

(potty200) #7

Import raste and wezelkrozum’s maps!

Would love to see community designs make the release.

(prophett) #8

Day 1 community created content is a must.

(BomBaKlaK) #9

And maybe the solution !

(tokamak) #10

People look at custom maps through rose-coloured goggles due to the prestige. It’s impressive to see a hobbyist being able to achieve something that otherwise takes a full professional team even if it’s just remotely.

It doesn’t make a map more enjoyable to play in though.

#11

If not hire:

Then special invite custom mappers from ET and RTCW they can start make something now, so its ready for game release.

(tokamak) #12

They already can. UnrealED is available and the standard measurements are known.

(potty200) #13

[QUOTE=tokamak;510349]People look at custom maps through rose-coloured goggles due to the prestige. It’s impressive to see a hobbyist being able to achieve something that otherwise takes a full professional team even if it’s just remotely.

It doesn’t make a map more enjoyable to play in though.[/QUOTE]

Which is why the competitive map list features 1 out of 6 developer made maps in ET (after a few map scripts to make it work)

User created content has always been fantastic, some more so than others. Whilst most developers do it for a living the people who do it for fun tend to know the player base of the community a lot better. Sometimes technical statistics are not as good as a talk with a few teams on teamspeak!

(tokamak) #14

Leagues being fought in smaller numbers is why the stock isn’t used.

(Anti) #15

[QUOTE=JBRAA;510332]Echo feels like such a strange approach.

Why make a program for learning good map design, when you can hire the pure talent who made superb custom maps.
[/QUOTE]

This is not at all what Echo does. It’s primary use is actually balancing of mechanics rather than spaces, and as stated before Echo is only one of 6-7 different tools and methods of feedback we use to balance stuff.

As for the current maps versus modder maps from past games the issue is very little to do with the Level Designers or any lack of understanding, it has a lot to do with the development process.

A lot of DB’s maps had art work started on them prior to gameplay mechanics like speed, abilities and weapons being fully locked down or the Merc roster being filled out, meaning flow and spaces in some places no longer match the gameplay as well as they should and they can’t be changed very quickly. It’s frustrating that this has happened so much with DB so far, and it’s something we’re looking to address, but it is a problem that does impact all FPS games to some extent. To get the art done in time you have to start some of it before you’re certain on your gameplay.

Maps for games like CS (the ones that didn’t get cut over the years), and those made by modders for other games have the advantage here because they are always made well after gameplay is locked down. Base maps with examples of good and bad spaces, mechanics and techniques are there to be looked at and learnt from. The plane isn’t going to be rebuilt mid-flight on those guys :wink:

We could have thrown the best ET or ETQW mappers at DB, a different game, before its mechanics and balance were locked down enough and they would have experienced the same sort of issues. It’s just the nature of the beast.

The nice thing is that every new map should be much better than the previous ones the longer we keep adding to the game :slight_smile:

(spookify) #16

[QUOTE=Anti;510363]This is not at all what Echo does. It’s primary use is actually balancing of mechanics rather than spaces, and as stated before Echo is only one of 6-7 different tools and methods of feedback we use to balance stuff.

As for the current maps versus modder maps from past games the issue is very little to do with the Level Designers or any lack of understanding, it has a lot to do with the development process.

A lot of DB’s maps had art work started on them prior to gameplay mechanics like speed, abilities and weapons being fully locked down or the Merc roster being filled out, meaning flow and spaces in some places no longer match the gameplay as well as they should and they can’t be changed very quickly. It’s frustrating that this has happened so much with DB so far, and it’s something we’re looking to address, but it is a problem that does impact all FPS games to some extent. To get the art done in time you have to start some of it before you’re certain on your gameplay.

Maps for games like CS (the ones that didn’t get cut over the years), and those made by modders for other games have the advantage here because they are always made well after gameplay is locked down. Base maps with examples of good and bad spaces, mechanics and techniques are there to be looked at and learnt from. The plane isn’t going to be rebuilt mid-flight on those guys :wink:

We could have thrown the best ET or ETQW mappers at DB, a different game, before its mechanics and balance were locked down enough and they would have experienced the same sort of issues. It’s just the nature of the beast.

The nice thing is that every new map should be much better than the previous ones the longer we keep adding to the game :)[/QUOTE]

I bet echo is amazing at show my camp area’s HAHA!!
Where’s the echo report from yesterday when spook played? Why is there red around the spawn hallways and Corners HAHA!!

(tokamak) #17

W:ET survived for so long because the original maps were infinitely replayable. It survived despite all the custom tripe that still managed to suffocate it in the end.

(PixelTwitch) #18

Removed the rage!!!

(ailmanki) #19

Its still breathing and alive.

I would love to see pure blockout maps. And I don’t mean see it now, and on next patch its already had its art pass. Nope I mean experiment with that blockout for 6monthes.

For et and its custom maps, usually only pub servers have those custom maps, in pro environment most aren’t good enough. There is only supply coming to my mind which is a custom map played in pro. The other ones had been ported from rtcw. And for the maps by SD, lets just say 50% is really excellent. Yet that is a better quota then the custom maps, as there are over 4000 maps. And only a hundred or so are played, even less are played regularly.

(warbie) #20

Completely agree. This was what most frustrated me early on in the beta - maps that obviously weren’t working being given art pass after art pass. Testers were leaving in droves at this point and the vast majority didn’t come back. It’s doubly frustrating that gameplay since has been built around these maps that haven’t ever worked - it’s all arse about face. 12 months of blockout maps so we could get spread, speed, acceleration, basic gameplay elements etc sorted would have made a world of difference. It’s never felt like I could make valid suggestions in this process as everything has been built on flaky, seemingly arbitrary foundations.