[Aleks]

Love these shots, Maarten! These rural/camping areas give me such a strong GTA: San Andreas vibe, pretty cool. Also it looks freakin' huge (once again...).

[Mister Sinister]

OH NO

[Maarten]

Aleks, on 23 May 2021 - 09:39 AM, said:

Love these shots, Maarten! These rural/camping areas give me such a strong GTA: San Andreas vibe, pretty cool. Also it looks freakin' huge (once again...).

Thanks! Funny, AAP1 also got GTA reference I wasn't even aiming for it..I just keep on mapping what I like haha.

Finishing the very last stuf, making choices with wall limit as well. Also going to add a little story. And yes, it's even more huge compared to AAP1!

[ck3D]

That's a great combo of news, music and shots, Maarten. I don't know if you noticed but in my WIP project thread, recently I wrote a big tutorial thingy on how to build large scale maps more easily than with the default/traditional method of carving things piece by piece into always more of the available Mapster grid. You may be interested in that, and of course if you've been developing your own techniques for such results (which it obviously looks like you did) then I'm all ears when it comes to comparison in efficiency (in fact just reading my tutorial again, I'm already seeing some things in it that could be optimized). Best of luck wrapping this up, can't wait to play. Have fun!

Also and again, looking forward to Mister Sinister's work. Even more so than just the other day I found out about Sludge Plunge https://msdn.duke4.n...ludgeplunge.php which I don't think I've played yet (or maybe I did a while back? It did feel sort of familiar after all), but looked magnificent from the screens I saw.

[Sangman]

One screenshot in that video stands tall above all, you know the one

[Maarten]

@ck3D: Thanks man! IC you're really active mapping as well - looking really great. Haven't seen your tutorial yet. In fact, I didn't think too much about the big grid/size... I just keep on mapping & see what's happening haha. Still, this time around, a little bit more "white walls"..but then again, this is is bigger compared to AAP1 (not going to spoil too much about it yet - the map is nearly finished. Just added a little story right now).

@Sangman: my my, I wonder which one

[Sangman]

I kinda wanna remake Supa to redeem it's meme status, but the problem with that is that it pretty much has to be one of the greatest maps of all time for that kind of arc to work out

oh forgot to mention, the map looks great, but you know this

[ck3D]

Sangman, on 27 May 2021 - 02:26 PM, said:

I kinda wanna remake Supa to redeem it's meme status, but the problem with that is that it pretty much has to be one of the greatest maps of all time for that kind of arc to work out

To be fair though, just not retconning "BLOW THE SHIT" in itself would already be worth a solid 95 points. People would salute your fueling of the fire, modern enhancement even, of the mystique. You may be realizing only now, but twenty years ago it was your destiny that you really wrote on the wall.

And now I kind of feel like replaying the Battlefield maps.

[Merlijn]

Sangman, on 27 May 2021 - 02:26 PM, said:

I kinda wanna remake Supa to redeem it's meme status, but the problem with that is that it pretty much has to be one of the greatest maps of all time for that kind of arc to work out

Look at it this way: almost every author starts with maps that are just bad and forgettable, at least your first maps were bad in a very memorable way
The gag with the empty armory room is still pretty funny (for those that can read Dutch).

I'm nearly done with Shaky Grounds Pt. 4, I actually got closer to the wall limit than I expected but I got in what I wanted and still have about 600 left.
So that's good. This was a very fun map to make, it's different than the others but it's also the logical next step for the series.

Also has some of my most complicated sector-over-sector work to date, here's a 2D screenshot from mapster:

[ck3D]

Yo, that's wild. Great to hear the map is nearing completion already, can't wait! Always a big fan of crazy 2D map art too, I don't even know what's so fascinating about it, perhaps how it's like a rather explicit glimpse into someone else's synaptic connections, or something. Did you work on all the SOS layers in situation? Respect if you did. The more I've been mapping lately, the more I've built them separately resorting to some cheap copy pasting tricks to always keep the layout and then moving the bunch where it's supposed to be when I'm done. But in some instances you can't really do that and that's way more hardcore!

[Merlijn]

Thanks! Yes I had to build without resorting to copy-paste in this case. So it did require some careful planning, I had to completely finish the top floor before moving on to the 2nd to make sure I didn't mess up.
But once you get into the flow it's not that bad, it was actually a fun challenge.

[Sangman]

That screenshot reminds me of something that has been bothering me about Mapster for a while, now that TROR also means I'm doing more sector over sector work.. I really wish we had more options for hiding irrelevant walls/sprites. There is the grey-out thing but it doesn't work correctly all the time and I still find it somewhat distracting.. Props for working with it to Merlijn of course, but we kinda shouldn't have to

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The more I've been mapping lately, the more I've built them separately resorting to some cheap copy pasting tricks to always keep the layout and then moving the bunch where it's supposed to be when I'm done

Yeah that's what I do, and I keep the original "blueprint" around in case I need to do major fixing

[ck3D]

^ I actually just learned that a few days ago, I think either on the Infosuite or the eDuke32 Wiki but there is an alternative to the sectors greying out thing where you can just hide the undesired sectors altogether with just a key press, can't remember which one though so you'll have to look that up, the version of Mapster I prefer to use these days myself is so old it doesn't even have the feature with the sectors greying out. Trying to look it up now, I can't seem to find that information anywhere again and so maybe the source was less official than that and/or incorrect.

Side note, there also is the option of working on different floors of a building by editing the same layout template in separate map files. And then once you merge the sections into one map, everything will naturally perfectly overlap (and in fact you might have to watch for the vertices accidentally connecting).

[quakis]

I too would love a feature in mapster to manually assign sectors into named groups that I can show/hide on a whim (from a list? & info stored like maptags?) when working with SOS or TROR. The auto-greyout feature for TROR works great so long as sector heights are parallel to the TROR bunches, but doing anything more complex where that isn't possible is a recipe for headaches to bother attempting. Had to scrap some ideas because I spent more time fighting with the editor than doing anything else. :'D

[Merlijn]

That's a wrap for Shaky Grounds 4, the map is done with about 300 walls left (in case I need them).

Next stop: boss map! At this point I'm considering adding a secret map as well, although it depends on how smooth the boss map goes.
If I add a secret map, it would nicely mirror LA Meltdown (5 regular maps and 1 secret)

Some final shots of SG4, I'll probably won't share any of the boss map.
1. Another sneak peak of The Kompleks, slightly different angle
2. The red room I posted before, now finished
3. Part of Froyd Eenakee's secret base

[ck3D]

Amazing news and stellar shots. Between that and Maarten's new map (which I beta tested last night and I can only tease by saying it's really amazing), and Aleks and William's respective comebacks to the scene, right now is such exciting times!

[Ninety-Six]

ck3D, on 01 June 2021 - 12:58 PM, said:

right now is such exciting times!

It really is, though. And of course, humble as you are, you neglected to mention your own Blast Radius. It might not be as close to completion, but currently we are living in one of the busiest eras we've had for Duke mapping.

Add on top of that the increase in cross-posting that's been going on showing us things like Michael Hunt's series and Downtown Journey, and TCs like the newest release of Alien Armageddon, Demon Throne's full release back in October, and altogether what we have is from about the second half of 2020 to now and the forseeable future, there is a lot more activity than we've seen in years.


It's a good time to be a fan of Duke 3D. Gearbox might have let its birthday come and go but either by miraculous coincidence or the aforementioned neglect prompting a rise, you guys have really picked up the slack they left behind and are giving Duke a really good year so far.


EDIT: Forgot to mention Mister Sinister's project as well. There's so much to be hype about right now.

[ToiletDuck64]

Ninety-Six, on 01 June 2021 - 01:58 PM, said:

There's so much to be hype about right now.

I know, right? I think that, any time now, there's going to just be a huge fucking explosion of awesome content from all these people all at once. (Seriously. By the time I reached the end of SG3, my mind was just blown away even more than the damn buildings. I'm struggling to even imagine what SG4 would have to be like for it to be awesome enough to belong with what's already been released.)

[Merlijn]

Thanks guys!

And yes, the community is really on fire at the moment! So much cool stuff is being worked on right now. We even notice it with Alien Armageddon, more mappers are joining in to create content.
It's probably a combo of the lockdowns (more time to spend at home), Duke being 25 years old and Gearbox dropping the ball.

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By the time I reached the end of SG3, my mind was just blown away even more than the damn buildings.

That's always cool to hear, thanks

[jimbob]

working on a bazooka, not happy with the perspective so im going to re-do it tomorow but you get the idea. atleast it goes floomp and blows stuff up

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[Seb Luca]

Little walk on a sunny day

[taivo30]

Merlijn, on 01 June 2021 - 11:44 AM, said:

That's a wrap for Shaky Grounds 4, the map is done with about 300 walls left (in case I need them).

Next stop: boss map! At this point I'm considering adding a secret map as well, although it depends on how smooth the boss map goes.
If I add a secret map, it would nicely mirror LA Meltdown (5 regular maps and 1 secret)

Some final shots of SG4, I'll probably won't share any of the boss map.
1. Another sneak peak of The Kompleks, slightly different angle
2. The red room I posted before, now finished
3. Part of Froyd Eenakee's secret base

duke0201.png
duke0202.png
duke0203.png

Great looking screens! Looking forward to playing the maps

[jimbob]

putting the finishing touches on the WW2 mod Operation Mallard's episode 1, and begun production of episode 2.. snow! norway? forget about norway! kenya, oooh kenya, kenya believe it.

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[Aleks]

jimbob, on 09 June 2021 - 01:03 PM, said:

putting the finishing touches on the WW2 mod Operation Mallard's episode 1, and begun production of episode 2.. snow! norway? forget about norway! kenya, oooh kenya, kenya believe it.

Don't remember now, are you planning to replace all the original Duke textures in this mod or gonna keep some? I dig the combo of red sky with snowy mountains, not something I've seen done before too often, but might work giving it quite a fresh look. Also the snowman in the middle of WW2 reminds me of "Midnight Clear", not sure if that was the idea!

[jimbob]

Aleks, on 09 June 2021 - 01:26 PM, said:

Don't remember now, are you planning to replace all the original Duke textures in this mod or gonna keep some? I dig the combo of red sky with snowy mountains, not something I've seen done before too often, but might work giving it quite a fresh look. Also the snowman in the middle of WW2 reminds me of "Midnight Clear", not sure if that was the idea!

im going to keep those i like, and add new ones as i see fit. the red sky is a placeholder until i get a decent skybox for a snowy mountain area, i have a few neat skyboxes but those are taken from too close to the ground to make for a believable mountain area, i do like the red sky though, its a nice contrast from the white snow. i might implement that into the skybox somehow


[edit]
i did find a few usable skyboxes, forgot i only searched for desert and city areas before
threw this together quite quickly, might swap it out later if it doesnt feel right but you get the idea

i have a few neat ideas, but right now im doing everything by myself, i could really use a few people to help lighten the workload

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[Mark]

Try this for the snow. It looks great close up but I'm not sure about far away like in your screenshots.

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[jimbob]

Mark, on 09 June 2021 - 03:05 PM, said:

Try this for the snow. It looks great close up but I'm not sure about far away like in your screenshots.

thanks, i'll add that, and a credit.

[Mark]

No credit. I didn't make it. I don't remember the name of the royalty free site I found it at.

As far as helping with your project. I'm always busy with my solo stuff and helping others but I think I can devote a small amount of time to help you. I know what its like to get overwhelmed working alone. I've been doing it for years when I'm not on a team. Contact me in PM and we can discuss details.

[jimbob]

Mark, on 09 June 2021 - 03:14 PM, said:

No credit. I didn't make it. I don't remember the name of the royalty free site I found it at.

As far as helping with your project. I'm always busy with my solo stuff and helping others but I think I can devote a small amount of time to help you. I know what its like to get overwhelmed working alone. I've been doing it for years when I'm not on a team. Contact me in PM and we can discuss details.

will do tomorow, right now its time for bed

[Mark]

ok