StormCatcher.77

Not so long ago, I returned to the active mapping and am trying to finish my ex-Nova III map. I think I'm almost at the finish. It remains to complete some final touches and test. If everything goes according to plan, then it will be possible to play this month, but for now I want to share screenshots of completed locations:

My thanks to all! :3 Someday I will finish it all the same ... Hmm ... I do not remember that I deliberately somehow manipulated the lighting of the textures in this place. I think this is due to the classic dynamic lighting in this room. And yes, in UDMF you can change the brightness of any surfaces, regardless of the sector brightness.

And one more reason to recall my old abandoned map ...

The project is not abandoned in any way, I'm just pretty busy and can't find enough time to work on it. I did not updating the megawad for an unforgivably long time. There are already a lot of bug reports and fixes waiting for assembling... @dylux By the way, on map 29 number of bugs is much more :D I just already know about this, but thanks anyway for mentioning. It's nice that the project is remembered. It will definitely be completed. Hope this year. By the way, we still have no INTERPIC and title screen ... I don’t even know how they could look.

Congratulations on the release!! I did not expect to be able to try these maps so soon. Judging by the screenshots, this mapset will be one of the key this year. I hope to get acquainted with the project in the near future.

That nasty feeling ... when you get paid in cash and live in the middle of the taiga, without the possibility of somehow manipulating the means online ... Sorry, at the moment I can not help, but I think I can solve this problem in the coming months (if I can catch a good moment for ride to the nearest big city) and support you. You give a lot of creative energy to the community and make wonderful stuff. In a sense, it is very difficult to imagine community without your creativity, how much it permeates all. I hope many people will support you.

Looks superb! I was waiting to see the realization of something similar on the GZDoom engine, and here it is this moment. I'm interested, did you are planning to ever make sun lens-flares effect similar to effects presented in Serious Sam Classic: For a gloomy atmosphere, it is not very suitable and, maybe hard in terms of realisation ... but if suddenly ... In any case, really looking forward to this project. Impressed by that demos.

Oh, I completely forgot about this event. Sorry, but maybe someone see on Joel stream my map (file named "The Burial Vault.wad")? I did not notice it on the videos, available on YouTube. I have not seen this map in the list of files shown before the end of the contest and I am afraid that it was either missed or rejected. If so, why? Or maybe I was badly search it ...

+1 for Verdant Citadel. Gorgerous map!

You on the right way with GZDB :D I can not say that I have full knowledge of all the UDMF and GZDoom capabilities, especially with scripts, however, I think I can help with some questions regarding slopes, 3D floors, polyobjects, lighting and the most basic ACS-scripts. If you are interested in ZScript, then I definitely can not help. I do not know coding well, and there it is all serious. And, maybe I will finally have the motivation to dig into someone's maps, if we cannot understand how some things are work. If it is convenient for you, I can make sample maps for relevant questions.

Hurt - Giand map with outstanding atchitecture, created by Elend.

@elend VladGuardian, after seeing screenshots of your map under my small review on Doom Power, said: "This is the 'Doom' from our dreams." And this is 100% true. Making big maps means taking some risk, because players have different tastes and may react negatively to the most characteristic features of such map: linearity, entanglement, excessive or uneven difficult, etc. But here I see a map where there are no such flaws and I am sure it will be liked by many. The map is designed so that nothing interferes with the classic gameplay. All its locations are voluminous and roomy, allow player to move as quickly as possible, competently use space and heights. Here is perfectly conveys the feeling of monumentality and volume, both through the rich architecture and the detailed layout. Moving through the level, the player's gaze almost always rushes into some kind of bottomless space, inviting to explore itself. I liked the local arena battles with scripted waves. They are very solidly made, without the excesses of difficulty, giving the player freedom of choice of tactics. At first, the player’s disarmlessness makes one expect big problems, but everything turns out to be simple. In general, if player do not do stupid things, then the map is not quite complicated, except for the last boss. I didn’t observe any problems with balance, in any case. Despite the amazing scale of the map, the objects associated with the keys are highlighted, and their location is bumped into memory due to the almost complete uniqueness of the architectural techniques encountered. I found an indicator of excellence that all this is done only with standard textures that look completely new here, thanks to how Elend works with lighting. This is the real magic of saturated dynamic and sector light. The only significant drawback of the map is the noticeable FPS subsidence towards the end, but this does not spoil the overall impression. At the very finale, approaching the bridge, which ends in the abyss, there is a feeling of some incompleteness. Having spent on fights inside the grand hellish den for almost an hour, I looked back, checked the automap and was surprised at how much I missed. I did not find a single secret on the first try ... they are perfectly hidden. After the fall of the last beast in the final battle, finding yourself in the middle of a field from demon corpses and the bits of their leader, comes the feeling that this place was conquered by you and now is too early ro leave until it gave to you everything it can. This is some forgotten feeling of excitement. Elend, you gave us a great example of how to make big and great maps. You are a true master. I am sure this map has all the chances to get Cacoward this year! Looking forward to your next projects!! First Demo Attempt - about 1 hour, UV, GZDoom 4.0.0

Apparently, I played the very first version of the map, because I faced the fact that I could not get into the area with the blue skullkey, after which I went further with the cheats ... There were quite a lot of bugs, but since I see progress in updating the map, I think they have already been fixed. Simultaneously with the passage, I began to record demo, but it does not make sense to publish it because of the difference in versions... To be honest, due to the strong non-obviousness, the passage of this map is a rather exhausting experience. I spent about 1 h 10 min on it. The reason why I leave the map in my collection is an interesting point with a portal maze. I would like this use of portals to come across more often. When you find yourself in this labyrinth, a second wind appears: "Oh, yes, something interesting happens now!". But, alas, it is only one such moment. The moments when there are obstacles in front of the player, forcing him to look for a workaround, knock the pace and the desire to pass it further, because suggests painful jogging along narrow corridors. The idea itself is good, but its implementation on a map with such a structure does not work. A few more gameplay remarks. When a berserk falls into a player's hands, gameplay becomes too easy. By the way, remembering the moment with BFG, the path to which lies over a pit of acid ... I could not jump back over it ... Generally, as I noted, the portals are used on the map quite abundantly, and this is commendable, as well as the desire to make the map long and add microdetails. It is important that the latter does not work on the visual component of the map, although it can be seen that considerable effort has been put into the detailing. Alas, after passing the map architecture was remembered on a very classic level, and small details are only once forcing to pay attention to themselves. I remember that on my first map I also tried to pay attention to small objects, but from my own experience, this did not justify itself. Players simply do not attach importance to them, while running around and firing ... The main thing in the following project is not to confuse the player too much and give him more guidance. Good luck to you in the future!

The script looks quite working... I can assume that the script is not executed due to incorrect linedef settings of the stop switch. Please check the "When player press use" and "Repeatable action" properties are on, and the action "80, ACS_Execute" is present and activates script 12.

My map for "1000 Line Project" (vanilla)

Rummaging today in my projects archive, I remembered again the old abandoned map "Complex 502 - Descend". More precisely, about the interesting application of the bug (maybe feature?), allowing to make transparent areas in the image of the camtextures, rendered on midtextures. I found this effect at the end of 2015, doing all sorts of experiments, not quite understanding what I was doing (i.e., by chance). I remember, I felt then a pioneer, and in general it was great. Given that I did not know how to create 3D models and voxels, I immediately began to use the discovery to simulate complex and moving 3D objects. It turned out "puff pie" from the camtextures, pretty good looking from afar. I want to show you the results of my labors: Probably, if I did not pursue ambitions, but released this map in the middle of 2016, this could have a “wow effect”. Now it does not look so impressive on the background of full-fledged 3D-models support. In addition, the latest version of GZDoom, which allows to get this effect - 3.2.5. In the newest versions, the camtextures no longer have transparent areas (or maybe this is done differently now?) I think, if sometime it comes to release, I will have to replace all this stuff with suitable 3D models ... Here’s what it looks like in the editor: And finally, one small control room:

Recorded in PrBoom+. Category 1, UV. Duration is above 2 hours (2:21 maybe). Demo ends at map 11 (killed by Cyberdemon). IEDarkCovenant_StormCathcher77.zip

Can't stop to listening this: