Sketching...

Do you people sketch or plan out your map before you make it or do you just use your imagination and do it off the spot?

I never draw anything unless it's a complicated structure that I can't focuse on. Usually I plan 5 mins ahead before mapping what I want or I just put random stuff in and modify it to my taste.

I rough sketch

I don't sketch often but when I do, it helps a lot in designing. I plan on doing it more often once I get some of my current stuff finished.

I made a sketch once, but I never took the time to turn it into a Doom map. Maybe I'll go find that sketchone day and see what the map looks like. Usually I just play around in the editor until I like something.

Each room is mapped out in my head first. The whole level is not.

I do everything mentally. Except the actual mapping that is. :P

I usually sketch the level out on paper (whole Waste Site was sketched first) later it was mapped, but sometimes I just slap together cool rooms and outdoors. Sketching is good because You can loose some good ideas sometimes.

I used to sketch out maps once. I really had no choice since I had no computer, a copy of Doom(2), or an editor. This was over four years ago by the way.

I still have a binder full of those map sketches. There are nearly 40 of them in total...all rather crude, and the layout is as linear as you can get. A couple of them I have successfully converted to actual levels, one of them being incomplete. I haven't touched it in almost a year now. I wouldn't mind sharing what I have on it so far if I could just find the thing...

Anyway, I don't sketch anymore. I just make them out on the editor sector by sector and await ideas and inspiration now.

Occasionally I do draw out what my maps' basic layout might look like, but most of the time I go on mental images of what i want it to look like and try to recreate that to the best of my ability.

On a similar topic, I print out copies of my maps and keep them in a folder no matter how shitty they are. I've got some 100 or so map printouts of partial or whole levels, many of them which are 5-6 years old. Sometimes they prove to be helpful in bringing to life retired ideas that at the time were not possible to recreate.

I sketch a lot, like a hog. Why still there is no directory for them at the idgames archive? Feel the power of sketches - they're port-independent, fast in production, no editors needed, helluva of feats (you can draw almost anything within a pair of minutes). Megawads weekly, yea... Just an idea :)

I've developed myself into sketching out every map. This allows for me to get a feel for how the map will flow before I start making it. I use very complicated sketches with all the monsters and things and the like labeled and insterted into the appropriate places. The only thing I don't really sketch out are the ceiling and floor heights, the lighting, and the textures. I use grid paper where I consider the grid 64*64. I also add in little bits of detail after mapping the whole thing of course.

All the bloody time, both 2d and 3d perspectives.

I couldn't map by sketching. What if I came up with a really cool structural plan halfway through mapping which totally messes up the original plans? Often I have no idea how the level will turn out until it turns out, and that makes it much more enjoyable to me.

I don't sketch. I tried it once and I hated it. What I do is just make up as I go along, make a "room", add details, and move along, planning ahead a bit at times.

Many of my old maps are drawn out, I was able to score huge sheets of graph paper from a friend of mine years ago.

Yeah I rough out a series of vistas and plan out how I want the gameplay to progress ie:

3d Sketch of entry area
1) Show player the objective of the map, make it unreachable.
2) Force player to make a decision between two routes, close routes once chosen.
3) Spring a surprise on player by tempting them with a goodie.
4) Once beaten open a path to the next area.

3d Sketch of area 2

etc...

Many of my ideas come from dreams I've had that take place in doom :P

No. Thought about it. But I do everything carefully in my head. I focus my brain power on main layout, then add deatials all at once. It works for me.

While none of mine come from drafting, my next map will. The reason in doing so is it causes no block and gives you time to decide where you want detail and such. If you got a good layout and design drawn on that paper, you could map that out in probably two days. Then add in more to the map to make it even better. Plus your nodebuilders won't mess up on you!

insertwackynamehere said:

Many of my ideas come from dreams I've had that take place in doom :P

I wish I dreamed about Doom!

insertwackynamehere said:

Many of my ideas come from dreams I've had that take place in doom :P

Lutrov71 said:

I wish I dreamed about Doom!

Heh. Been there...

It's actually quite interesting because most of the time they're about maps that you, or more accurately nobody, has seen before. Consider yourself lucky if you happen to remember enough to start building parts of it. It's kind of scary...

I get an idea from somewhere then I build as I go. I rarely sketch

Hm. I'm a partially non-linear creator in pretty much everything I work with, and I don't plan ahead much. The only map I've sketched out on paper is the shinamori mansion in my first novel in progress, though ... I'll probably use it for a 3d game at some point. (It's huge, and has a convienent undeground spaceport -- actually, it might make a good first hub in my current idea; it would also make for a more resident-evil flavor of doom.)

I do like having maps of things; in writing, they're likely to come in the middle rather than beforehand though, and in mapping, er, it's the whole point ;).

I dream about doom very often ... I play it every day, so I guess I have the full right to dream about it at night.

Sadly, the levels I dream of are room-over-room, heavy-scripting genius pieces, with architechture that mentions Deus Vult.

Sadly, my programming skills BLOUE.

And, on-topic - I never sketch ... ever.