Forum posts

If you can give me a full list of new entities, their models, and any other relevant info, I could probably slap one together eventually. I've played through it now, and all I can say is... nice. The maps are really hard, what with the lack of cover, but the new monsters and weapons are great. I didn't have a chance to see everything you coded, just what was in those levels, but what I did see is great. A few suggestions/notes/bugs, though;

Monster_human_assault (HWGrunt) doesn't have a spinup sound to warn you when he's about to start firing. I think HL shipped with one somewhere, but if not, svencoop should have one that can be used as a placeholder. He also holds on to his gun when he dies, but that's not as big a deal since the mod doesn't have a player-usable minigun.

monster_brother (assuming this is the one that uses the urban.mdl) doesn't have a submodel for not holding a gun, which would be problematic on death, as they would both drop a gun and still have one.

The knife is awesome, but not overly useful as a combat melee weapon. Please increase the damage or firerate to have roughly the same DPS as the other melee weapons, perhaps less damage but do slash damage instead of blunt (not sure if it already does) I think the op4 knife had a faster firerate but less damage than the crowbar.

On that note, could you maybe make it a bit easier to sneak up on enemies? Whenever you get within roughly melee range while sneaking they turn around, just like in vanilla.

The hornet grunt doesn't ever seem to run out of ammo, which makes him a lot tougher than he should be.

Opposing force weapons are awesomely detailed.
Does the glock start with the silencer, is it part of a spawnflag, or does impulse 101 just give you the silencer item too?

All in all, this is great code, and I hope something comes out of this. If a concrete plan gets set up in terms of team and storyline, I might be able to make a few maps/a chapter. (No promises, but I am interested)

Alright, got it. I'll have a go at the contents later.
EDIT: Cursory look at the contents shows that there are a few nice pieces in there. We'll have to get a FGD up and running, though.

Ah, never mind. I guess the Captcha didn't want me to use spaces or something.
How big is it? I'm not getting the filesize, just how much I've downloaded so far.

Out of curiosity, does this code use spirit as a base, or vanilla HL? Going to attempt a download now. Also, the LD arms is nothing that can't be remedied easily enough if you want to...

EDIT: Also, latest download doesn't work.

One person is Zelda, and everybody else are monsters with lower health/attack who have to try and kill him

Did you mean Link?

Looks very interesting. Can't wait until it's ready.

Called it. Sorta. Didn't occur to me that it would be for testing the games on different systems, with different cards and OSes.

Global shadow mapping sounds great, (And it's about time it was implemented, we should have had it back in L4D1 or sooner) But I'm unsure about the lack of CS_ maps. Rescuing hostages just seems a bit more engaging to me than defusal maps, and it's not like we can't have good pathfinding now. Looks great graphically though, and Valve have yet to disappoint in the gameplay department. (Well, except ricochet, but they know better now.)

You'll be okay. Good luck, not that you or the doctors will need it.

I've said this before, but I'm pretty sure it's just a small PC for carrying to conferences and demoing Source games on. That said, if they are making a console, I'll have to get it. And hope it's called "Pipe", as (I think it was) Daubster suggested.

It would probably result in a net loss if you turned all the geometry into a single model. I'm not sure, but I would probably do it. Maybe half the resolution of the textures used as well, because those would usually be scaled down a crapton in the skybox to fit the 1/16 scale.

Thanks.
Desert Wells, huh?I think perhaps this will lead to a new type of stronghold/dungeon complex. Temples or Crypts, maybe?

Just installed the patch about a minute ago and started a new world. The new door sounds are great! (And by great, I mean squeaktastic!)
Wonder what else has changed...

Sounds like it's time for me to patch it and start playing again!

...Someone needs to write documentation for some of Hammer's more obscure yet useful features.

Well yeah, you don't use clip to do everything. You wouldn't use a hammer to cut a board, or a screwdriver to put in a nail. But it does work perfectly for many things.

Yeah, I've never had any problems with the clip tool either. You just can't clip everything randomly and haphazardly.

I guess I'm doing something half-wrong. I don't have all that many experimental maps, only 3-7...

It's threads like these that make me think we should bundle all the latest tools, all the FGDs, vhe model support, compilator, etc, etc and make it available with perhaps a slight refit of Andy's "in the beginning" tutorial.

Oh my god yes. TWHL should definitely have a starter pack for Goldsource. That would be so useful for people just starting out.

Well, I'm not going to win any records for speed, but I will finish this.
Right after supper.
EDIT: I lied. Got it.

Bah, have to go to the other computer to access one of the steps.
Good, though.

Welcome to TWHL. Enjoy your stay.

You could make them using custom code and release the map as a small mod.
You could replace the pit drone with something that was in HL.

Other than that, you'd need to use Op4.

Awesome work guys. Hope to see more soon!

Soup: IIRC, the new VHLT includes func_detail. Though I'm not 100% sure on that, as I'm waiting for the new Compilator before I get them. (I'm sure it'll be out before I'm ready to make any final releases for GS.)

That is impressive. Is... is that hollow, too?
Holy crap.

noSICK, that looks awesome. I especially like the cell-shaded style textures, you don't see those very often, in either games or mods.
Urby, those are some nice models. I kind of want to complain about the vending machines though, because while the shape is a cut above the standard, they don't look functional at all.

The Source SDK Base programs are just content distribution packages for making mods. If you base a mod off of one of them, it will only require the content from it to run (but the player would still have to have a commercial source game to download it)

I feel so ashamed. I forgot about the Vort teleport sequence in the intro.

I didn't realize it was also a cheap joke until I finished typing it.

100%.
But that was just predisaster stuff.

After you put cubemaps in your map, you also have to run the console command buildcubemaps to get reflective/shiny things such as water, glass and many metal props rendering properly. You also need to do this separately for both LDR and HDR.

The new VM tool sucks, but you do need to use it, as you can't forget brush-based detailing just because you have props now.

Overlays are more configurable than decals, as you can spread them over multiple specific brushes and resize/rotate them, but they're also much more expensive to use. Any texture from the decals/ or overlays/ folder can safely be used as an overlay.

Thinking of that, get used to typing things based on their materials. if you type metal/, you get almost every metal texture in the game (there are a few in props/, which contrary to its name, is for brushwork textures) wood/ gets you wood, etc. There are exceptions, such as 'door', 'window' etc, but the folder system lets you find things much more easily than Goldsource's map-based naming system.

Not just any Black Mesa facility, I think. Looks like a Sector C Lobby remake. I can even see the vent you have to go through in Unforseen Consequences.

Hotdog, is that what I think it is? (Aside from awesome, I can tell that much for sure)

Source has func_conveyor, doesn't it? That could work for anything that's hit the ground.

You'd just need an animated skybox model simulating the countryside flying past. I've seen a similar thing in a UT2004 assault map. A touch of fog and you could do it without giving the track any curve.

I think you mean "homicidal". Being "homocidal" is a hate crime.

Well I hope you learned a valuable lesson about spouse-murdering. (IE, don't do it.)

Speaking of murdering NPCs, my current character killed a farmer, (The one who lives in Hollyfrost farm, if memory serves) stole everything from his house, and then had that farmer come back from the grave to hire thugs, not for revenge for his death, but for stealing from him. He didn't even tell them they had to kill me. (They tried anyway)

So, uh... Not exactly normal?

de_movingtrain? If nobody's made that, someone should.

That is beautiful. When can I book a flight? The lighting seems to be a bit different in the 3D skybox as opposed to the map, but that might just be because the treeline in the back has a lighter texture than the ones in front.

This thread just taught me about CTRL-I/CTRL-L. Someone should have written it down sooner!

~What made you start mapping in the first place?
When I was just a kid, I used to draw floorplans for levels in (mostly) FPS games. I must have designed tens of games, none of them really worth even salvaging the concept of. Then one day my brother got a burned copy of Starcraft. I watched him play through it, like I did every time he got a new game, and I started playing it. Sometime around when he bought the Battle Chest edition of Starcraft, I discovered the map editor and was hooked. As the years went by, I used different level editors with the games we had, Age of Empires (bleah, no customization), UT2004 (3D, but subtractive space, ugh), Warcraft III (Now here's a good RTS editor!), etc. One day he showed me a map he made in the Source SDK (a big empty room with dev textures, a platform, and some barrels) and I knew what I wanted to play with next. (He however, lost interest a few unfinished maps later) Unfortunately, he went off to university and took his steam password with him, but digging through the computer I found his old WON Half-life installation, which I happily played through, remembering how awesome it was from watching him years prior. And lookie here, the directory has an older version of the Hammer editor!
...With no Half-life FGD.

~What was your first map?
My first map was some crappy Starcraft map I can't remember and no longer exists. Moving on, my first compiled map in Hammer was another crappy map, but this time for The Specialists. I heard that there were roleplay servers, so I made a little office as a roleplay map. It had a hidden sawed-off shotgun, cubicles, invisible glass (I hadn't gotten the hang of texturemodes yet) and was complete crap. I've since deleted the BSP and destroyed the source files.
~Where did you get inspiration for your first map?
shrugs
~To who did you show it & how did they react?
Nobody. They reacted with disinterest.
~Your advace advice to future mappers/current mappers?
Don't give up, because you will improve with practice. It pays to learn to make custom textures and models (which I haven't fully grasped yet), and spelling is important too.

I used to get the same sort of crashes with my old Nvidia card, especially in HL2. (though not in newer source engine games, strangely) I'm fairly certain it was a temperature problem, as that card burned itself out. Haven't had a crash like that since I replaced it. Not sure what you could do without replacing the cards, though adding more cooling might help.

B) If the cars won't stop and the soldiers are pulling an HECU, (as I understand it) it's the best bet.

Speaking of which, one of the tweets mentioned giving the security guards the right pistol. Does this mean that the player will use a HD Glock in The Core, instead of the Beretta from the HL HD pack that comes with Ambient.Impact's security guards?

...Because smellycat said he was mapping for TFC?

You can't move func_illusionaries unless you're using spirit, though.

I think he has a cutting sequence, but it's not like he's going to post a gif of it or anything. (Although he can feel free to prove me wrong about that)

Don't forget that 4.x remembers the dimensions of the last brush you selected, which allows you to make things like matching walls and floors much faster than in 3.x, thus making the overall creation process much more efficient.