For more general details, info on the story behind this and how this information works and how its made, go to:
leray.proboards.com/post/27943/thread
Items found:1 weapon each, excluding BFG, one more MG, lots of ammo for each one
small health, health and Large health packs, armor shards
backpack, MH, Quad damage
GA, 2x yA
Review:
Interesting realistic castle map. ''Cubish'' but effective brushwork, decent choice of well aligned textures, even though the ones used for trims and corners look a bit too ''cartoonish'' compared to the stone ones, mostly symmetrical in one axis layout, with several floors and types of rooms, lightning is OK due to the brushwork, but too dark in several places, darker than the MG room in q2dm1. Items are well placed overall in appropriate places, with some hidden good ones. Looks like that it could work for very ample number of players. No sounds seem to have been placed.
Liked the map overall, layout, theme, combat opportunities, variation in rooms, some details here and there, hidden places, It's very complete. What it is lacking is polishment (mainly in brushwork and lighting) and tweaking. I tend to like hidden places and this one has variety and quality, but couldn't find for now the way to reach the HB, will make another search later. The weapons aren't really where they are suited to the most but that's minor. The windpads were used well, and add a lot to the connectivity, but another texture would be better to make it clearer that those are what they are. The MH and Quad are well placed and liked even more the placement of the RG. What found weird is the way to the Quad, is a bit hard to reach on a bad way. Some improvements on brushwork efficiency would reduce your r_speeds a lot. Good idea on making not so easy to reach the windpads for the RL. Laughed a bit at the small health pack at the top of the crate, as usually can be seen better rewards on top of crates, but i know also that you did it on purpose, as it is the crate that is the easiest to reach. There is lots places where one get falling damage but there is always alternatives nearby, so there is no problem, except maybe from the HB and RG.
And finally, good idea with the texture about the contest and the sound at the beginning, those add a lot to the map.
Suggestions:- Darkness: The only area that is acceptable being so dark is the corridor where the GL is. In the rest one should know what is in front of him, so you need lots of work there.
- Believable sources of light: currently you depend on light that comes from no place and you need to show the player that it comes from somewhere: As there is no models that can be used with this theme, maybe some not noticiable light textures from those that were used by ID in Quake 2 (those sized 16x16) could go well with the theme. If not you'll probably need brushwork here, by making candles, lamps (even a wedge could work in this case), braziers, ... They don't need to be detailed, and you can place them higher so they can't be seen clearly, and you get a believable source of light.
- Make it so no one can touch the skybox. It is silly to hit an invisible wall. Currently you can get there with just normal jumps from the HB, RG and CG platforms.
- Change places between the HB and CG, and then put the HB in the place of the MG or SG, or put a RL were the CG was, and pass the HB to another place, maybe below the well or in the middle of the outdoor part, near the well. The HB is useless there, as that weapon works better in middle distances in the same floor, better if the target hasn't too much room to move. Also, add another ammo pack for the CG new placement. This is so the position up there is so good that people will try to get there to take you down, and that place isn't just a place to hid some weapons. Adding too a large health pack there would be probably overkill but fun. To make the RG position better, you could put a very good item on the middle of nowhere (RA or BFG), near the well, so the people will come out into the open.
- Work more on brushwork: add some supports to the floors that have not, add some curves and some details here and there. Nothing complicated, just what you would like to.
- Add some wood to the fire, and fix it a bit, it makes the sound of water for a reason i can't understand.
- Add some dim lighting on the teleporter to the Quad, as is hard to see it even when you have it nearby.
- Change the texture of the windpads, so its more noticeable what they are, or put an effect on them to show that they aren't just some planks on the ground. Something like the light you used on them but more noticeable.
- Give some meaning to the red lights (braziers maybe).
- you need to hide a bit those stairs with brushwork, by putting a ramp below them and a wedge on the side. The reason is that they create many splits on faces that affect even on long away faces, and thus increasing a lot vis time and r_speeds. you can see what i am talking about if you look at them after typing the gl_showtris 1 command on the console.
- The stairs on diagonal near the GL have some weird lighting on them, fix it.
- Needs more brushwork in the lower room, after getting rid of the darkness, the room feels a bit empty.
