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Commented 8 months ago2023-08-18 04:04:24 UTC in journal: Bringing a 20 year old map back to life Comment #105485
Gosh it's a little hard to remember what maps I made that actually saw release. I feel like back in those days a 'release' consisted of a forum post and a link to the map on a file sharing website (I think fileplanet was one?). It was difficult to get people to play new maps. Servers weren't interested in running them because downloads from the game server were excruciatingly slow, especially on 56k with maps having a lot of custom assets, so most people would drop out once a new map started loading. This is before in-game systems for voting on the next map or anything like that.

Anyhow, I think the most popular map I released in terms of hours played was actually a re-texture and re-model of cs_militia. The author of that map released the .rmf file at some point, so a lot of people made their own versions of it. I made new textures for it, re-did all the rocks, and added some other niceties here and there. It was called cs_militia_qe and I think it made it onto some servers for a while.
cs_militia_qecs_militia_qe
I also did a de_dust retexture, as was the style at the time. The .wad for de_dust was unbelievably popular in those days. This is because they were some of the best textures available, and aesthetically quite apart from the industrial/lab stuff that most people had access to. As I mentioned, this is also probably because the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were very central in the public consciousness. A lot of movies, games, and popular media spoke to this as well, and our maps inevitably reflect the spirit of their times. Anyhow, a good way to get your name out there as a texture artist was to make alternate versions of the de_dust.wad, because mappers who've already made their map using that wad can plug in yours instead, and instantly have a more distinctive product.
de_dust re-texturede_dust re-texture
Another map I remember getting some play was a super rough experiment I made when drivable vehicles were first introduced into Counter-Strike (I think maybe Beta 7?) I made a giant track that was pretty close to the limits of the engine, and a drivable two-storey 'building'. One team had control of the drivable building, the other team only had a little cart to chase them. The object was to invade the building as it was driving. The physics were really bizarre but I remember it somewhat working and being a lot of fun. I think the map was called raceomatic, or something like that. It is out there somewhere but I've lost track of a playable version.
I forgot what this one was calledI forgot what this one was called
Finally, I think I released a dustbowl-style map called snowbowl for TFC. I don't have the source material any more and I can't seem to find it online, so very little information remains.
snowbowlsnowbowl
Just going through my files and trying to dredge up memories, it seems like I spent more of my time trying to make maps and textures for Counter-Strike. But I spent more of my gaming time playing TFC. This is probably why there are more CS maps here.