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New custom submaps


flashman

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Wouldn't the submap directories also need a unique name then?

So they can be differentiated by the level design that is.

Otherwise if we both named our folders 'house' you might end up with my rubbish attempts at houses ruining your beautifully made levels :P

It would need to be something short, maybe just the creators name tagged on the end of the description so you know what you are looking for in the level creator.

I really think I should create a duplicate of my own house to use on one of the levels.

I don't think there are any props that show the right kind of damage that can be done by an annoyed cat though.

Better go feed him...

Edited by Gauddlike
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We need some damaged wall variants really.

I made a couple out of one of the industrial walls a few versions ago but lost them when I updated.

They made great buildings for placing around the crash site, especially if used with the divided submap method..

I did five variants :

Full height to half height from left and from right.

Half height.

Half down to destroyed from left and from right.

The ones going from full to half only had a thin section of full height so they could still be realistically classed as half height for cover and vaulting.

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I like the tile variant idea, however, I think we need to focus on supporting the main game before we get over excited about custom everything. Consistently good maps and a greater range of variation will make xenonauts so much better.

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OK version 4 of the sub pack is up.

This now contains multiple version of many buildings and props.

There are now 3/4 shops/stasi

5 version of basketball/park

5 versions of factory

between 7-10 versions of different cover props - barrels etc.

My aim is to flesh out what I have before I make any new designs.

Though I do have some exciting ideas :)

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These submaps are being rolled into the community map pack. As a result I have spent the afternoon doing three thngs.

1) renamed all submaps to new guidelines.

2) reworked many submaps to improve look and to create more unified tileset.

3) Combined matching size roles into submap folders, means more variation. Many submaps only have 1 variant but most have between 3 and 10.

Once the community map pack is released I will update with a new collage of submaps images and set it up as a standalone for anyone who wants to create soviet maps.

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I've just sat down and had a look at all of your buildings. I really like some of your ideas here, and some of the buildings are excellent given the tileset as a whole is mostly incomplete. I've added some general stuff below for you to work on, and commented on specific submaps too in order for you to know what to correct. I think several of these maps could quite easily make it into the final game.

General comments:

-Layering - I've noticed in a lot of your maps that you've included exterior ground tiles on them, such as pavement tiles around them or grass tiles between buildings. In most circumstances you shouldn't do this, as if there is an empty tile on the ground floor of a building sub-map it will load the tile from the "ground" layer below it. So if you only paint the interior tiles of a building and plonk the submap down on top of (say) a field, the field tiles will be displayed up to the walls and everything looks nice and natural. You can see this in the other tilesets.

-For the "flats" maps, I can see some of the tiles are a little misaligned or the tops of the window / door walls are different colours to the walls around them. Are you using the internal walls / doors for interior walls?

-Stairs - you've got freestanding stairs, which look very strange. Put them against NE / NW walls and they'll look a lot more natural.

-Wooden houses - we plan to split out this tileset into the Soviet Town (urbanised Soviet area) and the Tundra tileset, which will represent much of Siberia, Scandanavia and Canada etc. This will use the rural roads from the Soviet tileset and the trees and wooden houses, as we don't want the only "cold" tileset to literally be polar conditions. This means that the wooden houses will be present mostly in the Tundra tileset rather than the Soviet Town one, though you can use them if you really want to.

- Roofs / Floors - we've not had our artist draw up any carpet or roof tiles that we can apply to these buildings to stop them looking so ugly. We'll get that done ASAP, at which point you'll need to apply it to these maps. We might also spend some time generating some new options for roof edges on this tileset as at the moment they frequently look pretty ugly.

Specific sub-map comments (if I've not commented on a map, I don't think it works):

Sovietbungalowpair - these are really nice, and I can see us using them in the game once the floor / roof tiles are sorted.

sovietflatsLR - the stairs shouldn't be freestanding, put them up against a wall, probably the NW one.

sovietflatsUD - I'd put these in if you made the bed placement more sensible - no shared bedrooms with loads of beds, no beds in the hallway etc. That's not really how bedrooms work, they're usually small and self-contained and the living areas are the large open spaces.

sovietgarage - the one storey garage is good, but the pipes need to come off the roof. 2-storey one doesn't look right imo.

sovietgasstation - I like the idea of this. The shop and the workshop machines work really well, but for the roof you need to have the half-height factory walls around the edge otherwise it looks unnatural. Not a fan of the ground tiles, but I don't blame you since we've not got any painted ones done yet.

soviethospital - the roof ruins this. It might work as a 1-storey building, I like the ground floor layout and the garden at the front.

KGB office - this needs a better roof. I'm unsure whether it should be 2-storeys tall or 3, but I think the ground floor layout is excellent and I like how imposing it is. I don't think you should have a window every square though, it makes it look a bit overblown. With a little work I think this would easily make it into the game.

Soviet base - the whole sandbag thing is a really interesting idea. Not sure about the building as a whole, though - it might be too big, and I think it has too many windows. But it'd make a nice centrepiece for a terror map...or a smaller building with sandbags on the outer walls would. Very creative.

Propaganda office - this is nice, but I think the props are too industrial for it to look like a printer shop. Maybe use more office furniture?

Records office - nice ground floor look and layout, the upper level and roof don't really work though.

Rich house - I think this probably needs a carpet for a floor, and I'd divide it in two. It's a pretty big house and there's not much to fill the space. Having it a pair of two storey twin flats might make the building's internal layout make more sense (it'll need an extra door on the front).

Roadblock - I think this is an interesting idea. Maybe we should do some Soviet sandbags? The props look out of place because they're too saturated for the ground tile palette, and I think there's too much going on on the checkpoint (it probably only needs to be a few sandbags and one or two crates), but I like the military feel of it.

Stasi - the one with the cell at the end works quite well, but the building is too narrow to look realistic. We'll need to do something about the roof too, maybe we'll do some new tiles to top that wall type.

Wood office - this is fine, but see the Tundra tileset notes earlier in the post.

Wood outbuilding - as above, except this needs the wooden floor removed from it given it's an outbuilding.

Workshop - this works pretty well, except I'd take the car out and remove the white machines as they don't really fit in.

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Thanks Chris, I will work on the changes and I will upload a new version based on these designs for you to peruse.

I deliberately picked this tile set because it was in an unfinished state and just needed some love. I have a series of maps in another thread based on these designs.

If you get to try the maps I would love some feedback as well. Anything that didn't get commented on, I will move to a holding area until they can be debriefed.

I want to work on the Desert tileset next because i want an actual base. If you have a large prop F15 I could use I would love you for ever :D

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Ok are you ready for it?

I have attacked the Soviet submap list you left and created some stuff that I like and I hope you like.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/vfnl4ck6if75mk6/Soviet%20for%20Chris.rar?m

The only building I have not had a chance to fix yet is the military base and roadblocks because they are going to require thought.

The areas still to improve are the roves and floor tiles, however I have put most into flat roof mode to ease the eye and I have experimented with the top of the KGB building using a mix of industrial styles.

My notes

1) Soviet Bungalow Pair: Removed grass between them

2) Soviet FLastLR: Fixed all of them, wasn't sure which you were referring to. Fixed stairs and room layout.

3) Soviet_flatsUD: Fixed all - sorted room placement,made it much better

4) Soviet_garage: Removed pipes from roof

5) gas_station: Already had half height on roof, they just blend in quite straight not sure what to do instead as no floor yet.

6) KGB_Office: Reworked roof- tried a new flat roof -you will probably hate it - Completely redid 2nd and 3rd floors- added 2nd staircase.

Created a 2 storey version to compare.

7) Propaganda_office edited with new furniture - more office like

8) Records office - Temp Flat roof instead - not fond but limited choice

Now has 2 variants - 1 level flat roof and 2 level- flat roof - lost white for double brown walls.

9)Rich house :Reworked entire layout- created a 3 storey double flat. Changed floor tiles to experiment with carpets- currently default flat roof.

10) Stasi with cell : New temp- flat roof- made 8 wide – amended layout upstairs and downstairs due to size change.

Now has 2 versions 1 with stairs 1 without. 2nd version has additional prison cells and briefing room upstairs.

11) Workshop: Removed white machines- put in turquoise base lathe- moved a couple of props- lost car and roof pipes.

Looking forward to your feedback once you get time. I am going to work on the soviet maps using these buildings.

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I made a new submap for arctic maps: the outpost.

Xj80XPW.png

It has a checkpoint at the entrance, a work area, dorms, a storeroom, and four toliets. That's right: someone has to share. I'm betting it's not the guy with the access to a shotgun.

It's 20x20. If you want to see it in-game, I've made a scout/corvette map with it in map pack 2. I didn't include the roof layers: on top there's a few radar dishes. I'm think that for bigger maps, I'll make a bigger outpost.

There's no variants yet. I'm wondering whether I should make any, since the submap basically is the map. Thoughts?

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Have you tried using the military bed instead? Looks a bit like easy living in the arctic. I would have 2 stair access points for something so large if you put a 2nd floor. The military base shelving also looks better as I dont like those boxes. I have hated them since alpha :P

Think of a theme for the larger areas and place items for this. E>g a lab.

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They do look a bit too cozy, don't they? Not for long, though. Now there's more beds, one of the bedrooms has been converted into power generator storage.

I've put some more props in the monitoring station. I tried various others like the base terminals, but they didn't fit. What's driving me crazy is that there are these metallic terminal-desk type affairs somewhere that might fit, and I can't seem to find them right now. I could swear they were in base somewhere! Oh well. If I come across them again I'll come back.

There's a few cannisters in the corridors. I'd wanted to put Industrial piping along the walls, but it only seems to come in SE/SW flavours. I might have to bite the bullet and use custom spectres. That way I could do a hack job with the animated computer banks and make the monitoring station look better too. I did try using soviet piping, but it looked plain wrong.

Those base storage props really do knock the old ones out of the water. It looks much better in there.

The guard now watches TV on the sly. Well, it's not like anyone's gonna disturb some eggheads here in the middle of nowhere, right?

Z9FvFBQ.png

This updated version's in my pack 2 now.

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Okay, another update.

First, I tidied up the original outpost.

PvBwE8Y.png

I think what was bugging me about the corridors wasn't the fact that they were spartan, but that they weren't consistant in width. So I fixed that, and I think it looks better for it. I also found a more cohesive set of props for the monitoring room. What's not pictured is the radar array on the roof. I made the power generator room a bit more distinctive, too.

I did succeed in making the pipes, but they turned out to be too much clutter, regardless of corridor width.

Then I made a second outpost, Arctic_D_OutpostB_20x20_Stinky.

X3ULoRX.png

Rather than make this a variant of the first, I put it into its own map (ColdStink3). In addition to the rooms that the first one has, the outpost has a snowcat bay. The garage doors are all separate entities at the moment - I'll come back and turn it into a single 3x1 door later. With the Steam release looming, I'm guessing people are going to be wanting more maps, so I'll be cutting back on tinkering, and try to pump out more levels.

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  • 2 weeks later...
  • 2 weeks later...

A couple of industrial props. First, a StinkFactory. This is where the magic happens! It's 24x16 in size.

D93VVWP.png

And secondly, a storage unit. 22x17.

2p8mqtw.png

They're both in Stinky MP 2/CMP Review, if anyone wants a gander. And if you want to see them in-game, they're also used in my SmogStink 1 set of maps.

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  • 3 months later...

Not sure if it's the right place for requests, but I think we need more city buildings with identifiable function. I mean buildings we can relate to on a personal level, like schools, post offices or bars. We already have (in the game or mods) a supermarket, a gas station and a restaurant, these work great for player immersion (as long as they're not too prevalent over residential areas).

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i've had a chance to play one of your corevette levels that feature the:

storage unit. 22x17

StinkFactory 24x16

submaps and i have to say i really like the feel they give to the level. it almost feels like a terror mission in those buildings

Thanks! I wanted the industrial maps to have a close combat flavour to them, so I'm glad they're a bit distinct from the usual UFO maps.

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Not sure if it's the right place for requests, but I think we need more city buildings with identifiable function. I mean buildings we can relate to on a personal level, like schools, post offices or bars. We already have (in the game or mods) a supermarket, a gas station and a restaurant, these work great for player immersion (as long as they're not too prevalent over residential areas).

I'm fine with requests. Those are all good ideas. In particular, any ideas about what other industrial buildings you'd want to see are welcome; I can only think of what's already around (power plants, factories, offices), construction sites, and maybe a mine (quarries being too open for the type of industrial map I'd like). One of my projects was to try and create a rock block that I could use to make mines, but my art "skills" aren't up to the job, although I might have another crack at it.

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