Stage 3 and the Future

The Friday evening playtest went without a hitch. I havn't posted anything about it because... I got a temporary job that has thrown me off my daily rhythm. At any rate I'll be showcasing the 3rd and final stage of my level in this post. I'll save any comments, plans, and other thoughts for the next post.


The design of the 3rd stage of payload races tend to be an equal affair. Both carts run on parallel tracks, generally up 1 or two major hills, and it is usually a battle to get the high ground first. I wanted to keep the same principles alive but I also wanted to change the formula slightly.




This is the basic layout of the map. As you can see both of the bases are rather close to one another. This makes the entire map a pretty hardcore "meatgrinder" as all the players meet in the center of the map. The carts start at the bottom and the team is to work their way up the map. Also for the majority of the map your teams cart is closer to the enemy.



This is the first major floor which sees alot of combat at the start of the round. The hill also provides for the first milestone for a team to accomplish in trying as it is a rollback hill.




This is where I divert from the common formula. Usually where the tracks turn away from each other is where the final control point is. I wanted the tracks to double back at least slightly. It brings an interesting perspective to the game. In other PLR maps the further away from spawn/closer it gets to the control point the harder it is to defend. So the ideal solution is to either keep the enemy closer to your base, or to control the far end. By doubling back there is a bellcurve of sorts in terms of the difficulty of defending. It starts off really easy, becomes difficult, and then gets slightly easier. I say slightly because there is no simply and quick path to get from your spawn to the flag. They all take approximately 14 seconds.



This is the final cap room. It was a difficult design decision to make, but I chose to make it at least slightly defendable by an engineer. That being said, its not the best place to build a gun at. You are basically limited to the upper catwalk next to the control point, and the lower catwalk. Depending on the location of a sentry a team can easily use the cart as a shield and push it on the cap. The area also has limited ammo, so it takes much longer for an engineer to build. Furthermore the windows allow for players to identify any threats. A back door, access is very near the bottom of the screen, gives players another entry opporunity.

Thats it for now. Tune in next time when I discuss...... the future!

Map Face lift: Stage 2

Stage 2's facelift has been completed. The majority of work was spent on the middle area dividing the two main bases and changing the layout the track takes in the actual bases.

Before

After


The middle area is a crucial part of gameplay as it is where the majority of in game combat is to take place. In my redesign I decided to tighten the area up and make it not seem so flat. I also adjusted the length of the first section of the track before the center control point.

Before

After


From the opposite corner you can see how the addition of the building. This building servers multiple purposes. It gives spies and other classes good visual cover from the rest of the area as they try to sneak in from the back door. It also has a dominant physical presence which helps in the appearance of the area being smaller than it actually is.
Before

After


In creating this room I basically knocked out the wall and extended it out to the right of the top screenshot. Also in an effort to make this area major chockpoint I have designated the long ramp as a rollback hill. Meaning that anytime a player stops touching their teams cart while it is on the ramp it will roll back to the bottom. By expanding the room and making it a rollback hill I am hoping this building will play as an effective chockpoint.

Before

After


The biggest problem with the base was how the cart path went directly by the spawn, the path itself was too long, and the defenders had a clear advantage throughout the area. The changes made should fix most of these problems. The track path is now more direct and overall further away from the enemy spawn. I moved the spawn location to the back corner of the space, by doing so players are nearly equidistant from most of the track.

Before

After


Stage 3 is next up for the screenshot updates. Until then, cheers.

Map Face lift: Stage 1

I don't know why but I always like to think of making structural changes to something in 3d as a "face lift" or re constructional surgery. I think it started when I had to remodel a character's face, and I literally cut off the nose, made a new one in its place, and welded the vertices back in. Anyways back on topic. My goal is to release alpha 5 by friday. The first 3 days of the week will be spent rebuilding each stage back to the needed quality for playtesting. With the rest of the time spent checking the map for any glitches, lighting issues, or whatever I can find that isn't major. If all goes to plan I will post a short series of screenshots of what is different or new from the previous version. Today, my focus is on stage 1.

The Problems

Player navigation was confusing and the space between the upper and lower area's didn't flow well from one to the other. Also players we unsure of where their cart was at the start of the round.

Before


After


This image best illustrates the change made. The entire area is now in the open. In the first screenshot the tunnel at the lower left hand part of the screen was the only path (other than via spawn) to get from the bottom to the top. Also players who jumped down from the upper area to the lower area took fall damage upon landing. The middle building breaking up the openness of the area effectively contains an elevator for the cart. This allows me to place track in the lower area, hopefully giving players an extra visual cue that their cart is in that area. An elevator also provides a logical method to get the cart from the lower level to the upper level.

Before


After


The entire geometry of the area is now different. I removed the entire building in the area and replaced it with open space. Needless to say the "skyline" of the area is completely different and new now.

Before


After


From a distance you can see the track for your teams cart and that there is more to that area than the original design.

Before

After


This is in the shared middle area. The old design was more or less a place holder that hid the gate as it opened at the start of the round. The new one is mostly the same size, it now looks a little less awkward.

Thats it for today. Stage 2 progress should be up tomorrow. :D

Download Available. and screens

This week saw stage two evolve into a working level. It is amazing how the level comes to life with a little lighting and proper construction.

First off an overhead look at stage two.



The design prinicle of this map was to have a larger common and shared middle area. In contrast the middle of stage 1 is divided into several smaller and distinct areas.



The carts start at the top of the small cliff face along the edges of the walls. They are pushed downhill until they meet in the center. This area needs alot of work. I added the trees in fairly late simply because I needed something in the middle to break up the openness of the space.



Each team base is built as a simple courtyard with accessory buildings lining the area. The buildings on the northern end are built into the rock walls. The extruded part of the building in the center of the screenshot provides for an excellent spot to place a sentry gun to defend the final control point of the stage in the foreground.



The building in the background is one of the major chokepoints that exists in the level.

If you have Team Fortress 2 and would like to play the level. You can get the download link here

The Monday Update: Always Evolving

While working towards my goal of a multiplayer capable level, I finally hit that point where you can no longer look at something without having to fix it. Chief among the fixes required was an overhaul of the Stage 1 bases and the much needed consideration of how my level is to be themed. The geometry making up parts of the Stage 1 bases was hastily assembled and build more as a visual "This is what I want it to look like" reference to the level design. Part of this reconstruction was a full design change made to key areas of the level. The area where the "back" entrance to each base, the raised path in the 2nd screen shot of my previous post, received the brunt of the changes. Initially a staircase on the interior of a 2 level building was the access point to that upper section. The problem with it was the size of the building limited the width of the stairwell. Thus this has been changed so the stairs are a single stairway on the exterior of the building. Other changes to the perimeter walls were made to expand the size of the platforms.

Other changes were made to help apply the very crucial theme element of the level. I realized I had forgotten to give a reason to "where the cart came from." Most payload levels simply don't have a stopping point for the carts tracks, they continue or start from a location extended "through" the level. While you never see the cart on these track pieces you can assume that's where the cart would go from there. I've also decided to focus on creating the feel that the first stage is in a rocky canyon with man-made construction being build on and inside of the canyon walls.

On Sunday I finally got the inspiration to construct one of my 3rd (and final) stage ideas out. Throughout this process I've been conflicted on the design of this stage. Do I do it like Valve did it by focusing the fighting over two massive hills? Do I tie the design in with my other two stages? Do I try something completely different?

My current design solution is kinda a mix of all 3 depending on how you look at it. It features
-Two smaller hills that equal the same size of the last larger hill.
-First small hill is skip if a team wins the first 2 stages.
-Tracks run parallel and are mirrored in the entire stage.
-For the vast majority of the time your teams cart will be on the opposite side of center from your base.
-Out and Back Design. The carts start at one end and work their way toward the other and then turn around and head back toward the center of the map.
-To simplify the amount of track in the area a small section of track will be shared when traveling "out" and "back".
-At the far end is a turnaround section for the cart to head back towards center.
-At the center of the map is the final hill.
-A raised platform connects the top of the hill and the two bases. The carts will be pushed toward each teams respective enemies base (Red toward Blu, Blu toward Red) where the final CP of the game will be located at.
-Upon victory the cart will roll into the enemy base and explode.

This design affords me a great deal of flexibly and accomplishes an overall goal from the start of design. By having the cart explode in the enemy base I bring a degree of reasoning that is missing in Valve's official Payload Race level where the cart simply explodes at the same spot regardless of the victor. The flexibility is achieved through the track design. If it is discovered that the match pace is too slow or its too difficult to win changes can easily be made to fix this problem. Furthermore I can easily add a middle control point that governs a gameplay variable thus keeping a design feature of the first two stages intact in the 3rd.

This concludes a rather lengthy post. I'm hoping to get into a regular schedule of posting on this blog with screenshots posted around midweek and a post (I'll try to keep it not as lengthy) at the start of the week.

Cheers.

Stage 1 Powerplay Screenshots

Finally I've uploaded some screenshots of the level at its current state of WIP. These are of the first stage.
Blu base backdoor over look area. Allows players to quick access to the control point from the middle area of the map. Although they will take fall damage when jumping down and are immediately exposed.

Middle Control Point Area. Both teams carts come down the white ramp in a race to reach the middle Control Point first. By reaching the CP first their teams cart will automatically roll down their respective steep hill and will have a 25% slower rollback speed.

Overall layout of Stage 1. Both teams cart starts at the top and work their way toward the middle control point. From there the cart paths cross and head toward their respective enemies base.

Progress Update

My goal of this next week is to have a fully functional stage from my level capable of basic multiplayer playtesting. At this point I have plenty on my "to-do" list to accomplish this goal.

This last week saw vast changes and improvements made to the level. Frankly I got a little sick of working on the first stage and I felt the need to design the 2nd and 3rd stages of the level. Most of this last week was spent building the 2nd stage and troubleshooting some unforeseen technical limitations of the source engine. The biggest problem I was encountering was that my level was "crashing on load" meaning every single time I attempted to open it, the level crashed TF2. Apparently you are limited to 8 physical control points. The way my map is designed and in order to achieve ideal results I need 10 control points to govern the gameplay. After some creative testing and the help of other TF2 mappers I figured out how to use a single control point more than once allowing me to remain within the 8 control point limit.

The other major accomplishment of this week of work has been the succesful creation of game logic to allow for "powerplay situations". It has been my intent throughout development to give an advantage to whichever team reaches the middle control point first. The current system works like this...

The first team to push the payload over the middle control point will give them a powerplay advantage of x time. (3-8 minutes) This advantage will be directly applied to the cart. On large hills it will roll down automatically, become easier to push, or effected less when being pushed up a hill. Once time runs out and a team hasn't won a round the advantage will be given to other team and leveling the playing field.

Screenshots and a download link on tf2maps.net should be up sometime in this next week.