Big List of Mapping Crimes
A list of those things you hate but keep popping up in maps and mods. I thought it would make a good reference for mappers of what NOT to do. This is mainly focused on single-player and HL2 mapping. Post what you hate in maps. Here?s mine:
Too many baddies
This ruined Coastline to Atmosphere for me, as well as a ton of Russian-developed HL1 and Return to Castle Wolf mods. In games like Serious Sam and Painkiller it works fine, but HL?s baddies aren?t meant to be used that way, and for those who play on Hard it can lead to the premature death of mice/monitors and loud swearing.
Four baddies, well placed can be much more fun to fight than 20 spawning outside a door and pouring in for five minutes. Unless you?ve got the super gravity gun and access to those Combine energy balls?.
The Damn HL2 Helicopter
The HL2 helicopter is great?.it just takes about a million hits to kill with an RPG. So why don?t people do the simple thing and use the Entity I/O to set it to die/retreat after taking a few hits? If not replace it with a gunship or two. Anything that takes more than six RPG rockets to take down becomes boring, fast. Especially if the guy who put it there doesn't even give it a path and it just hovers there....
A total lack of scripted sequences
I miss those incidental moments that made HL and HL2 feel so alive ? npc?s doing and saying things, seeing stuff going on beyond a window. In most HL2 mods, it?s just baddies standing around waiting to be shot, and if you?re lucky they charge in though a door.
Squeaky-Clean War Zones
I was playing an HL2 mod the other day, and there was a street war going on. A pretty unconvincing one. Some buildings were damaged, there were some fires but it was all wrong. A building with it?s front destroyed would leave a huge load of rubble. There was nothing. It was like the cleaners had come in ? no burn decals, no nothing. The fires were messed up too ? they were just flames on the (concrete) floor. Concrete doesn?t burn.
S-S-S-Slowdow-w-w-w-n-n-n
Too many HL2 maps I?ve played have slowed to a crawl on my (admittedly ancient) PC (from 2002). What ever happed to r-speeds (or whatever the HL2 equivalent is)? HL2 has areaportals, occulenders, hint brushes and people need to use them!
That?s all I can think of right now. Anything Else?