New map: Crazy spiral missile silo

[noobenstein]

Hi everyone,

So I made a cool new map: http://freeism.org/games/spiral_missile

I need to get it playtested, and also hosted. Does anyone want to host such a nice map?

Apart from the pictures, I'll try to describe it.

A CTF map. The intel is hidden underground, with three entrances but only two exits. All are a little hidden but not hard to find once you know where they are. One underwater entrance is clearly marked.

The action is meant to focus around the spiral staircases, giving the enemy a bit of an advantage in getting down the staircase into your base! This makes more action occur. However, its not one of those linear-deadlocked maps where two teams clash endlessly, because there are two side lifts and, and two upward side-coridoors, to make for FOUR routes to get up the spiral around the main action.

The center of the map is a "computer room". But again, there are two side routes around the "computer room", so the teams dont become "deadlocked". The side routes launch you through the air, across and to the exit "super fun zone" with fun diversions. You can ignore the exit and go back into that room, to use the bouncy castle or the air bouncer.

There are fun stuff in the map! Like walls that punch you (automated defences), exploding barrels, death pits, secret passages, launchers, and that "super fun zone" in the middle. Once you win the round, the rocket launches into the sky! It looks very nice.

Actually, the "super fun zone"... needs work, I did put a bouncy castle, a crazy air bouncer and a maze, but ideally I would like other creative people to add fun random stuff to that "zone". I'd put the .vmf file up so people can download and add stuff.

If anyone wants to host this map, let me know. I really would like for a lot of people to play this map. Also, I'll be updating the map a little, as it hasn't been playtested yet.

Download link here: http://freeism.org/games/spiral_missile ... issile.bsp

I really hope I can get this map hosted... of course I'd become a paying supporter of your servers... that is if I could find a link to such a thing. I guess the furrypound don't have a paypal supporter system set up yet?

[miniskunk]

Looks very nice. Especially the cave areas. I love maps that have a more detailed realistic touch to them.

[Purplecat]

I hope I don't come across as too harsh since I'm just trying to help! But I see a quite few things that should probably be fixed with this map. I'm personally not fond of too "fun" maps (ala MarioKart/Cyberpunk), so keep that in mind while reading my comments.

HL2 textures are a big no. It dosen't fit to the TF2 artstyle. Using explosive barrels from HL2 is also a rather bad idea, as they're using a fire effect that is bugged in TF2 (not to say, the realistic style dosen't fit at all in the TF2 universe). There is TF2 rock textures, you should probably replace the HL2 ones with the TF2 rocks. Also I see that there is no cubemaps, leading to purple checkerboard reflections, you should probably look up on how to generate those! And then there is the absurd use of container textures, which is bit of an eyesore to be honest.

My suggestion is to keep the TF2 theme in mind, avoid using the base HL2 textures, avoid using gimmicks unless they actually add to the map.

"Cubic" look rooms are ok if indoors, but it looks kind of off if they're really large areas. Consider cutting the roof off on the area with the castle, and probably make the castle a bit "TF2'ish" in look (maybe change it to a bunker of some kind?). Don't be afraid of scrapping areas to replace with something else, such as the maze which is probably too gimmicky for TF2 and dosen't really add to the TF2 gameplay (it's team vs team, not team vs environment!).

Also at the moment, we aren't interested in receiving monetary donations.

[Sekh765]

I am not a map commentator kinda guy, but I'd just like to state for those that might be confused. TFP doesn't have a donation system, and won't be implementing one any time soon, as we host everything ourselves and thus do not need one. Thanks.

[noobenstein]

[Mr. Munchlax]

Well there'd be nothing wrong with custom textures, it's just that you used base HL2 textures, which don't fit in TF2 at all.

[noobenstein]

Thats not the way I see it.

The way I see it, is that I looked through all the textures, and I chose the textures that fit the best.

I didn't think "oh, that's HL2, thats TF2".

I just thought "does it look good".

I had no concept of HL2 or TF2.

If I had a much larger choice of textures I might have chosen different ones.

I did listen to this advice before, and they told me how to serach for TF2 textures. I tried it, and it looked worse. The textures I chose, fit my map better than the TF2 textures.

It's a shame to spend so much effort on a map, trying to get it all tactically nice, put loads of fun things in, putting lots of creativity in, solving technical issues such as making a nice spiral, and then I just get told "the textures are from HL2, change them".

Especially when I don't see it that way. I don't care about HL2/TF2. I never even played HL2. All I see is that I chose the textures that fit the best out of the textures I was given. It also feels like I'm being mislead, because the textures really look worse when i used the TF2 textures.

All I want is a chance to see how real players who enjoy fun maps such as zombie/mario maps, (as opposed to serious map makers), enjoy this map or not. But I don't feel like I'm being given a chance.