Kasperg Projects! Created 18 years ago2006-04-25 18:24:30 UTC by Kasperg

This weekend, hopefully. I'm having trouble deciding where to place the T spawns and the hostages.
The house has a lower floor, second floor (cramped) and a third floor (tiny).
Counter-terrorists start in the outside near the bridge. The hostages are in the lower (entrance) floor. Terrorists start on the second floor, and have to either get down to the living room internally or attack the CTs from the multiple terraces and balconies (or just go outside and fight there).

Terrorist bots seem to have trouble getting to the lower floor...
It won't be a proble with human players, but I don't know if I should make changes. I like what I have played so far. The many entrances to the house allow very different approaches and strategies.

I just played the map with some bots, and I had a great time.

However, I do have some suggestions about the gameplay.

In its current layout, the third level is underutilized. In fact, I can't imagine any player would ever get up there at all. It takes some time to traverse to the third level, and by the time any terrorist makes his way up there, the hosties would have been rescued.

In addition, it's too easy for the terrorists to spawn-kill the CT's from their current T Spawn points. From the second level balcony area, they can pick off the CT's like target practice.

What I recommend is the following:

1. Move the T Spawn points to the back area here:

2. Instead of having all the hostages grouped in the living room on the first floor, move them to two separate areas. The first area being the second level master bedroom:

And the second area on the third level deck:

This arrangement encourages the players on both team to traverse most of the map. Otherwise, the third level and the second level would not be involved in the gameplay very much.

As for the bots, you can ask my friend Peter "Barndoor" to manually tune the nav mesh for you. He's a real expert at tuning meshes.

Finally, here is the scoreboard for my brief round with the bots. I had so much fun playing this map. It gets very exciting when the bullets are flying around inside the living room, with hostages falling left and right and glass shards splattering everywhere. It reminds me of the original "Die Hard".

Great job, Kasperg!

I also posted an article at GamingParents about cs_fallingwater.

It's a wonderful building, and Kasperg transformed it into a wonderful map.

I think Valve (and TRS) has improved the navigatibility of the hosties quite well. I blieve they'll be able to negotiate that stairs quite nicely. If not, they'll just jump down.

For most players, there is an incentive to be indoor. It provides a lot more cover than the outside openness. I found myself getting shot a lot whenever I remain in the outdoor area for too long. Furthermore, the hostages are held inside. It's easier for the T's to guard the hosties from inside.

I didn't have too much problem with performance. The worst it got (with four bots) was around 35 fps, which isn't too horrible.

I think the trees look decent enough. I don't think many players would mind. We mappers tend to be more critical of the aesthetics of the maps.

How much of a performance hit does converting the water to expensive reflective water? The water is such an essential part of this map that it's a huge loss when it had to be tuned down.

great review, satchmo!

Although i must ask:
Why do you run in such a high resolution, but without high texture detail or shaders?
The game would look far better on a lower resolution with texture detail set to high, and shaders on full.

I like to run all my games on the native resolution of my LCD. I sometimes run maps on high texture resolution if the map isn't so performance-demanding.

Medium texture resolution doesn't bother me as much as low resolution, and when I did try lowering the resolution, the performance increase was negligible.

ello kasperg,you said dm_suspended would be released with cs_ fallingwater...what happened dude??

Well, now I can say that it has been released almost at the same time. I can't upload 10 MB maps just like that, you know...
I also needed to do a final dm_suspended compile to get rid of some env_steam entities and build the LDR and HDR lights.
Now you have both beta versions, enjoy them!

My concrete mansion is next on the list. After that, it's singleplayer time. I have a very nice idea for the Funny map compo, and some experiments I wish to do with HL2 NPCs.

nice one kasperg cheers,this will be joining most of your other maps on 22g server 1.

Top mapping fella

I updated dm_suspended and fixed (hopefully) all the issues.

When can we expect an update for cs_fallingwater?

This weekend, maybe. I fixed most of the issues and changed the spawn points like you suggested. Unfortunately, the CT bots almost never get to the second or third floor. Human oponents will play differently, I hope.
In the visual part of the map, I still need to change some lightmaps and add some trims to the terraces.
I will also try to convert some furniture into props with Xyos121's help.

Oh goodies!

Okay, I have this huge dilemma with the cs_fallingwater map.

Until today, I hadn't properly decided which brushes would be world brushes and which would be func_detailed. Which means I never ran a full VIS of the map (not even the HL2 version) because it took many hours.
Today I turned basically ALL of the brushes in the house to func_detail. VIS only takes 59 seconds now, but a normal RAD can be somewhere between an hour or two. If you add HDR, it takes more than twice.
Bad optimization = long VIS
Good optimization = full VIS = long RAD.

By turning everything to func_detail, several lighting problems have shown up, mainly sunlight affecting parts of brushes that should be in shadow. Solving this is possible and I have worked on it.

However, performance is still far from optimal. I have placed several occluders throughout the map, which hide only some models. Trees, for example, are never hidden by the occluders!!! I have checked the budget with r_occlussion 1 and 0, but there seems to be hardly any change in the fps. On top of that, the occluders that seem to work stop doing so when you get too close to them. For example, if you are on the first floor directly below the hostages in the 2nd floor, they suddenly appear in the wireframe even with the occluder and a world brush between them and the player.

I don't know exactly how the performance compares with the beta, but my guess is that even turning the furniture into props won't help much. I really don't know what to do.

Any ideas on why the occluders don't want to hide certain types of models?

Aren't occluders one-directional? They only block models in one direction, correct?

What's the visibility radius for the models?

You can adjust the lighting setting for func_detail brushes, turning shadow either on or off.

Using an unfinished section that never made it into the Sandscroll SP maps, I've been working on a DM this weekend. Brushwork is almost finished, so maybe the map can be ready next Friday. I think the size and layout might provide a fun fraggin time in Muzz's server, who knows!The name of the map is "Molten Gold". Liquid gold was initially going to be present in the Sandscroll maps. I don't know exactly how to explain it, but this map is sort of "bleeding" gold from a series of ceiling fractures, and creating small puddles and falls of gold. It will not hurt the player, because hldm players have enough with worrying about other opponents!

looks rather nice..

Before you mentioned the liquid gold, i was gonna point out that it looks far more like gold than sand, but it turns out that those were your intentions.

The well-oiled mapping machine that is Kasperg is running on time and approaching the station.

I dont quite see how molten gold wouldn't hurt a player, HEV suit or not, but hey, your map

Looks rather nice.

The last shot is kinda lacking tho, I dunno, it's missing something.
Also, the floor texture could get a bit of difference in it.

I enjoyed the sandscroll setting, and i'm hoping this map turns out great so i can play it on Muzz's or.. wherever. The ripple effect in the second shot is really nice. You're developing quite a gift for making Goldsource still appeal to me.

I agree the last shot is a little lacking, at risk of overdoing this maps theme, i recommend 'gold pools' EVERYWHERE.

I would love to play that map on my server, Kasp. You better get that finished!

This is off topic, but since it also concerns one of my maps, it will be fine to post it here.
A while ago, I read a comment somewhere of a Gmod user loading the Fallingwater map and trying different fog combinations. I finally decided (and learnt how) to see it for myself, and I took this screenshot.
http://img152.imageshack.us/img152/4497/creepyeo4.jpg
In my opinion, it looks quite creepy!

The interesting part came when I decided to noclip and fly around. Since fog also works in the Z-axis, there was a very interesting visual effect of creepy HL2 trees emerging from the fog, while the ground stayed invisible. I think it might look nice in horror style maps. A scene of a narrow railway over this foggy forest sprang to my mind... I think people should experiment more with fog in custom maps. At least, that's what I plan to do in the future!

If used correctly i think fog could make for some interesting gameplay in that it sort of forces players to stick with close-ranged weaponry (i.e. shotguns and that heavy machinegun in CS:S).

A scene of a narrow railway over this foggy forest sprang to my mind

I could imagine if you could travel between the clear upper areas (the railway) and the foggy forest it would make need for different tactics. Below you can't see shit beyond 10-20 feet, but you're hidden yourself, and above you have a long-range advantage but at the cost of being highly visible.

I decided to remake some of the original Sandscroll textures, which means this map will look a bit better. I've added some more trims in floors and walls, as well as more puddles of gold. I am in the process of placing weapons and ammo, with the help of bots.

cs_fallingwater will now be called cs_fallingliquid, and the paintings inside the house will be replaced by some of my own work.
That way, there will be nothing in the map belonging to the caretakers of the real house in Pennsylvania. Valve made the trees and textures, I made my own textures and my own brushwork.

What's Calhoun doing in moltengold?

I accidentally put the pak2.pak file in the valve folder a while ago and didn't bother to fix it !

It won't be long until Christmas holidays begin, so I've decided to make a big Source map, just the way I made Kaufmann House almost a year ago.
This time, the project will be of a much, much bigger scale, and the amount of custom materials I will have to create will be significantly larger.
The place in question will be Saint Mark's Square in Venice.
I will build the map for normal HL2, and I might include an option to fight some combine troops or Striders. The place is very open so I'll have to think of something.

I started with everything yesterday night, and so far I've done most of one building and set the basic shapes on top of a floor plan I found and scaled.
The hardest part of the whole thing is that most of the buildings have non-perpendicular angles while having details like arches in their facades...
I will also make St. Mark's Cathedral, but just the outside. Mine won't have as many polygons as the one seen in Painkiller. The Source engine pales in comparison with the geometric power of the Painkiller engine...

Some images:
Aerial view with the Campanile

Arches in the Procuratie Vecchie The arches are made with custom materials with alpha channels, saving a lot of rendering power and dramatically reducing compile times.

The 3d skybox will include some of the real islands in Venice and the famous buildings I've had to study @ uni.
And unlike Fallingwater, this time I've actually been to the place in question!

Looks nice so far.

I so want to start Source mapping. How long does the compile take for this so far? Will there be big interior portions as well?

The longest compile time is now about 28 minutes, which is reduced if I disable the expensive water.
Another problem with this map will be the file size. I have a lot of custom materials already even though the map is still very emtpy...

http://img408.imageshack.us/img408/19/sanmarcos4tq8.jpg

I liked Molten Gold. Very neat-looking with the gold flowing around everywhere, t'was a very neat effect. Textures were cool too, although the lighting was a bit dull at places.

Molten gold looks good!

Your color scheme is obviously blue and yellow, cool and warm. I agree with the lighting, but a nice way of dealing with it is to go with warm and cool lights to see how it changes how things looks. I'm not saying use realy heavy blues and such, just tone the lights a little.

Other than that, the mapping look exquisitely awsome.

Molten gold looks good!

Hell yes it does. I love the intricate little layout on it too.

@Kasperg: Now I know why you're mapping Saint Mark's... I just saw the movie! ('twas awsome!!1)

I want to map Mr. White's house at the end

How hard is it going to be to optimise that whole area, Kasperg? Looks like it'll be an absolute bitch! :>

@Rowleybob: It is true I saw the movie recently, but the thought occurred to me while I was looking at my photos from our high school trip to Venice, Florence and Rome >>Ever since I saw "Attack of Clones" I've been wanting to map something similar to Lake Como. I saw a tutorial on how to make realistic terrain for Source, so who knows...

@Strider:For optimization, I am using some of the methods described above, like making a lot of the detail with masked textures. Some of the main textures will also be 256x256 @ 0.5X and 0.5Y. I know it won't look as good as normal texturing scaled at 0.25, but if include the water plane (the map takes place in a period of acqua alta), I really need the performance. Any extra fps I can get means I can add more pigeons, which is one of the trademarks of this place! (I put a couple of striders in the map. It was fun seeing how they tried to shoot me down but ended up killing every pigeon :D)

Lol weird conicidence then

And yeah, Lake Como is beautiful

Today I've done some work with the Palazzo Ducale, combining brushwork, masked textures and decals. I made some of the materials using photographs, and others entirely from scratch.My version looks too colorful. I might have to give the materials an older look.

Yeah, I agree. Both ways, though, will look killer.

It will be interesting to see Striders fight in the water during acqua alta. I wonder if they'll function properly (it may be a foot of water, but hey, you never know )

This is looking quite incredible.

Any extra fps I can get means I can add more pigeons, which is one of the trademarks of this place! (I put a couple of striders in the map. It was fun seeing how they tried to shoot me down but ended up killing every pigeon

Haha, you better leave that in for laughs. =P

Your "Real life -to-> 3D " projects are always very interesting

Here's an example of the work needed for this type of project. Based on pictures of the base of the Campanile building, I drew the outline for a texture with AutoCAD.
Afterwards, it was just a matter of Photoshop and imagination. If there weren't so many materials going into this map, I would even go as far as making a normal map for each. Since it's not the case, little adjustments in the texture itself will have to do in order to give them a little depth.And a screenie of how it looks in the game:
http://img261.imageshack.us/img261/250/campalo0.jpg

Ever since I saw "Attack of Clones" I've been wanting to map something similar to Lake Como.

During our honeymoon, we went to the very same villa that Anakin and Padme stayed for their honeymoon. You can check out the pics yourself.

Note the same villa was featured in the recent "Casino Royale" film.

And your virtual Piazza S. Marco looks fabulous! I can't wait for the final product.

I really haven't made any progress in St Mark's Square these past two weeks. I have plenty of time until classes start again so I'm not worried.
Besides finishing that abstract hldm map, I've worked a bit on the Antimatter Star Trek minimod. I'm having trouble with the scripted_sentences, so I decided to work on other things and shaping the story a bit. I know that my maps won't look as detailed as anything you have seen in Natural Selection, Quake4, Unreal II or the dozens of space-themed games out there. I'll try to add "something" to make it unique or fun...

I don't always care about detail in a level but that picture seems fine to me considering this is the HL engine. I'm assuming the picture is not based inside the ship since there is water?

A big space station. The water is the effect of a "coolant leak". It's the typical excuse used in sci-fi to explain huge amounts of water inside a ship.

Antimatter progress:
With each attempt, the main bridge looks more like the one from the Enterprise-E!
This time I used a bridge floorplan texture and built on top of it.I still need to retexture things and adjust the texlight values a bit.

As a reminder, the other three versions:
2006
2004
2002

Looks extremely sexy!!1

It's vbery bright, but that's the theme. You can still discern shadows pretty easily, so it's an excellent fine line you're walking, well done.

More progress. I made some textures specifically for the brushes I was going to use. The light effects under the carpet are done with a func_illusionary with additive properties. Texture lights just can't make the blue glow as defined as I want it

http://img183.imageshack.us/img183/5223/commandck5.jpg

And here's the proof that this room is the hardest thing I've ever done in Hammer. It looks really messy because of the crazy VM, but the brushwork is actually efficient in terms of compile time and ingame performance. Or so I want to think...

http://img122.imageshack.us/img122/9560/command2lm4.jpg

It's a major improvement over the previous screen shots. I haven't seen that much of StarTrek, so I don't know if this is a look you'd think would fit, but I think that effect would look great if it lined the edges of the floor that meet the wall. It would add some horrizontal and coloring interest to the walls, as well as a sharp transition from floor to wall.

Yeah, all the bright textures (including the panels) are texlights. The bridge takes 3 minutes to compile with cordon bounds, so it'll be even less in the future. (I turned the gamma up for the screenshot. It's darker ingame)