New Maps From SplashDamage Later Maybe?

[NovaBurst]

I apologize if this has already been asked, but I have not noticed it anywhere.

Is there anyway SplashDamage may release more official maps for ET down the road?

By the way, I have read some of the ideas of some of the custom maps by individuals coming our way and they sound awesome! Can't wait!!


Thank you

[Locki]

Hi NovaBurst,

There're no additional add-ons or maps in production right now. However, as you may have seen from previous interviews/previews, we had a further four maps in progress that formed a Central Europe campaign and these were probably 50% complete. We lacked the time to complete them for Enemy Territory though.

Ultimately, whether we are able to complete these maps will depend on how much time we have alongside whatever project we do next.

Activision hopes to release the level editing tools soon though, and we're sure to see a large number of good quality maps being made by fans.

Paul/Locki.

[Auriel]

ohh the egyptian pyramid/dig map :)

[wudan]

Locki, any chance we'll see extra textures that might be used in community-made maps? If not, that's cool, I think the community can cook some good things up.

Congrats! This game rocks!

[CptnTriscuit]

Activision hopes to release the level editing tools soon though, and we're sure to see a large number of good quality maps being made by fans.
Paul/Locki.

I just hope soon means soon. I have been working on a bunch of textures; im anxious to use them. :D

A texture pack from Splash Damage sure would be :banana: as well : )

[NovaBurst]

Thank you Locki, I appreciate the reply!

:cool:

[NovaBurst]

Oh, and I also wanted to add that I hope we will see those maps one day when you guys get time!

Great job on the game guys, I LOVE IT!!

[hummer]

Just an idea...

But if you're unable to finish the maps, perhaps you could give them out to a few experienced mappers who already have mapped for RtCW... and have them finish them off... for free.

I know I would do it... I'm sure there are others who are up to it as well.

Anyway, the best way I suppose would be to have the people sign an NDA... then if they are "leaked," you know who to sue. Only give them to a small group of people? Five maybe? Maybe a few more.

They wouldn't be released until approved by SD / Activision, etc... but at least they would be released eventually... and prolong the life of the game.

[DACROW]

There're no additional add-ons or maps in production right now. However, as you may have seen from previous interviews/previews, we had a further four maps in progress that formed a Central Europe campaign and these were probably 50% complete. We lacked the time to complete them for Enemy Territory though.
Paul/Locki.

well why not let us fans (mappers) finish them off? :cool:

[=AiS=MrLee]

Yeah ... I like that idea ... maybe you can "give" us the maps which were developed for SP as a Beta so our mapping wizards/fans can try to finish them ... It would be sooo cool to play new maps :clap:

[Threshold]

Bump!

Any chance these maps can get out to very experienced Mapper's.. This game need's new maps or it will die like RTCW. Please consider it. I beg u.

The maps are getting over played as it is. If SD is not going to release them please consider another option :)

[MuffinMan]

there are quite a lot maps being released, imho problem in rtcw was not the support by mappers but by server admins who didn't offer the new customs and this way they never got popular...

besides of that I would of course love to see the 50% maps there are!

[thegnat]

The problem on making custom maps really popular is, that the downloads cause a massive traffic load. Most of the serveradmins do their job as a hobby and cant effort the costs that are connected with the huge traffic.

Additionally the problem with ET is, that there are too many players who load the maps directly from the server - that means they block a slot while downloading the map.
So on new maps sometimes the half of the players is downloading and the others are playing. Result: unbalanced games + no real fun. :/

If someone knows a webspaceprovider that offers unlimited traffic an at least 150 MB disk space, please feel free to share your knowledge.

[Threshold]

Yeah but I'm talking about maps that are for Competition. Allot of mapper's are geared toward "Shock and Awe" which is great. I am looking for maps for leagues. The fact that there is a campain that is almost done gives us players hope there is a slight chance for new maps. SD has moved onto another prodject which is fine but what is so hard to have a contest of map makers and give them a chance to finish these maps' Something. At least one map. It doesn't even have to be a whole campain.

[MuffinMan]

I guess this is not only sd's decision but probably id has to permit it...

[G0-Gerbil]

but what is so hard to have a contest of map makers and give them a chance to finish these maps' Annoyingly enough there is supposedly a competition in the works where part of the focus is towards competition / clan maps, but to be honest it appears to have gone into indefinite limbo while 'seeking' SD's stamp of approval. I do wish someone from SD would let us know the progress on this, and at least admit if it's not going to happen so that the people running the competition can get on with it and not be simply 'on hold' like for the past 4 or 5 months - must admit I don't think it's fair of SD to do this, and someone should pull their finger out, it can't be THAT bleeding hard to say 'yeah / no / we are still actively searching for permission'.

Also, thegnat's comments about the download in-game situation is 100% accurate, although he failed to mention the wonderful fact that makes it even worse, namely that since when a new map comes onto rotation, half the players are downloading it meaning those actually in it tend to finish the map stupidly quick. Moving to a new map will abort all the players trying to download the map (and usually kick them off the server) so that next time the map comes around, they don't have the damn maps still and will attempt to download them again from scratch (with ultimately the same result).

The ingame download was a nice idea, but it's just plain shite in practice. Would be nice if admins could limit in-game downloads to just the campaign files etc, but not maps (well, I suppose technically they can if they have the campaigns but not the maps set up somewhere online and configure the download options correctly, but how often do you see that?).

Anyway, don't expect to see these 'official' half-finished maps anytime soon, if ever.
ET has enough maps for it, and personally I only play servers that have at least some customs on them. The maps aren't the problem, it's getting people to download them in a non-intrusive way (for both that player and others).

[DG]

there are quite a lot maps being released, imho problem in rtcw was not the support by mappers but by server admins who didn't offer the new customs and this way they never got popular...

besides of that I would of course love to see the 50% maps there are!
I think it has more to do with the custom map servers sitting completely empty, and those that mixed officials & customs suddenly becoming empty when customs came onto rotation.

not to mention, sorry but probably >95% of rtcw custom maps really sucked. Regardless of often being buggy, looking or running like crap, they simply didnt play well. True, many maps are far beyond what I could evar come up with and take an impressive amount of knowledge, skill and time. Sadly that alone doesnt make people want to play them.

Certain maps did really really well, largely those that specifically did something radically different. bkforestb1 ran alone on a server I remember continually seeing (on that now-dead stats site) as the 3rd busiest rtcw server anywhere in the world, tux@tza. dzm_trickjump could be found on many servers, though largely running just occasionally on clan's servers for them doing praccy. ctfmultidemo was on loads of servers, again largely clanservers for praccy but also some publics setup for it were popular (esp at jolt) and it even had at least one very popular 2v2 tournament based around it plus another 1v1 where it was a major map. Marketgarden still has busy 50 player servers running it with diehard fans. Other maps to speak of... er, ufo and frostbite? both about the only two maps that really tried (or at least succeeded well enough) to cater for clans properly. Other "tournement edition" maps almost got there but just didnt take from the community - largely because the community didnt think they played well enough.

I cant even think of another rtcw map that I'd consider a success. That view is unlikely to make me popular, but 99% of rtcw'ers either agree with me or are far more harsh. And it wasnt because of the server admins. Hell few mappers ever bothered to pimp their map as far as making a simple webpage with info, screenshots and download links. If you want to blame server's for not running maps, you're highlighting one of the major reasons rtcw customs never took off, it's simply not that easy. You need to get players to want to play the damn map - the servers will follow.

[G0-Gerbil]

Agreed - custom maps may be a labour of love, but the end result is very often a pile of rubbish.
I do remember the tux server fondly I must admit, but apart from that probably the only custom I played was marketgarden, and that wasn't particularly 'custom' (coming as it did from SD).
I don't see ET maps as being much different. I think possibly supply depot comes closest to clan map playability-wise, but I still think it looks like a dog's dinner. Caen is ok-ish, again ugly as hell. Apart from that? Nope...
On the other hand we have maps like stargate, which look OK, but which have to be the crappest playability-wise I've ever come across.

There are some decent custom servers, and they tend to be popular (certainly in the evenings) - AZ Linux and southbunker both spring to mind, and I play on both of them, although they both suffer from the problem of the download issue (sadly southbunker more - sadly because it's currently my favourite server). ND80 also do a lovely range of servers that supply both your custom maps and custom playability needs.

Trouble is, pimping the good ones merely highlights the bad ones, which are empty most of the time. You need to offer DECENT customs to make it work, and this pretty much rules out most of the maps currently out.

In other words, I'd completely forgotten about the issues DG mentions above when I was talking about the problems with getting custom maps out there ;)

[Davros]

could be a good idea for have a "cliffyb ownage" style map site. only the better customs make it on the site

[DG]

Agreed, it's impossible to seperate good maps from bad, and for most people there's too many (and too bad a ratio) to go trying them all. Then there's the job of trying to keep up with the most recent/final/second final versions, and whatever version a server might actually be running...

[MindLink]

That situation won't become any better in the future. I can imagine that games like FarCry (where the editor is practically drag and drop, so even the most stupid person can use it) will be swarmed with thousands of really bad custom maps because everybody thinks he has to share his beautiful new stuff with everyone else.

[G0-Gerbil]

Yay, we need more first maps :D
I usually say to people who ask me about mapping:
'Never release your first map'
and I'd probably add these days:
'and have a serious thought about your second'

I know it seems like to fun have people playing on your maps, but they simply won't, and even assuming you don't then get a name for yourself as a crap mapper, you've still added another shite map to the pool, putting another straw (bad map) on the donkey's (ET) back (custom maps being played).

How's that for a laboured analogy? :)

[MuffinMan]

I definitely agree that the players don't easily accept a new map, you're right - a server taking a new map into rotation is empty the next moment, anyway there's a good way around it now with the campaigns, our public clan server (kingludwigsarmy.com) runs 2 campaigns, one 6 map official and one 3 map custom.
I (because I am the admin) created these to keep the people for at least the 6 maps as I hate being disconnected within a running campaign because of missing files as well - anyway people do play the customs as well now, it took quite a long time and I guess most admins don't wait that long but now the server is still full in the customs...

oh and another point - the customs are not as good as the officials in gameplay (most of them) because they can't test that thoroughly, you need a clan to test and not just once, which requires a friendly clan+server, not an easy find...

[G0-Gerbil]

I dunno - I'd say most mappers don't bother with testing - certainly not beyond obvious bugs, but even that's not true.
EG Was on 1944_forest final today - now the gameplay is bad, indicating that no real testing was done, but worse - there were simple mistakes like no bloody objective text, so no-one had a clue what to do.
It's stuff like this that gives customs a bad name, and when someone says 'I don't play customs, they are crap', I don't really have much of a convincing counter-arguement.

Wasn't someone on here though running a map rating site? Can't remember who - if you read this and it's you, pipe up and remind me, I was going to rate maps ;)

[NOP]

Wasn't someone on here though running a map rating site? Can't remember who
this (http://dynamic6.gamespy.com/~rf/) is the only site I'm aware of that has some reviews, but by the looks of it it hasn't been updated in a while. It would be nice to have a site with all the maps, where everyone can go and vote (kinda like the poll votes on the forums) on their favorite maps but i doubt anyone will want to go through the trouble of making and maintaining that.
I think the next best alternative would be to have some kind of sticky thread here in the forum with all the FINISHED maps, some screenshots, a small description and a link to a discussion thread for every map. In the discussion thread then we can just post our oppinion about the particular map...kinda like a rating.

[G0-Gerbil]

The problem with public votes is that it usually boils down to fanboys, not people voting properly.
I prefer the way the site you posted (which was indeed the one I was thinking of) works, but of course it's only as good as the people reviewing maps - IE do you trust their opinion?
Now I am thinking of writing reviews and I'm notoriously harsh, so am I a good choice?
Certainly I'd start by reviewing the maps I don't like since it's more fun to slate than compliment ;)

[MadJack]

I've never had anything against harsh judgements except if you don't do constructive commenting.

Anyone just saying "This map ain't worth shizz." is not a good reviewer.

If you do make reviews, I really hope you'll be making constructive criticisism. (sp?) This is nothing worse like a bad reviewer.

[G0-Gerbil]

I agree, but you'll soon find that people find it very hard to take any form of criticism against their creations, be it constructive or otherwise.
But since I don't really care what people think of me, I'm quite prepared to say what I think. But yes, I do try to frame it with at least pointers to how to improve it, even if my thoughts are particularly offensive :D

[MadJack]

If a mapper doesn't want or can't stand criticism... why the hell would he submit it to get reviewed!?! lol

Quick answer: To get their ego flattered I guess. Maybe a lot of mappers think they're the best... *shrugs*

[G0-Gerbil]

No, most maps aren't submitted to be reviewed, they are made public to become the next all-time favourite map.
Which as we all know, isn't going to happen.
Map reviews like the site above are an entirely independant effort to let people know what maps are crap, which to avoid and why etc.
Also, which maps are great and worth getting.

Call it harsh, but custom maps need to be drastically culled if they are ever to be taken seriously.

[MadJack]

I agree with that.

Now let's see some reviews Gerbil ;)

[=DaRk=CrAzY-NuTTeR]

yeah

:bash: critics :bash:

[Davros]

you dont have to write a whole page for a review, if ppl just wanna grab a bunch of good maps they wont want to read pages of reviews to find them. just a view paragraphs and screenshots would be cool. id happily provide webspace for this

[MadJack]

I agree with that Torchy. I think there's a quick and easy way to do that. First making a Pros/Cons without going into details. Just the basics and a more detailed review (for the mapper's and the mapping community benefit).

Something similar to PC Gamers or a magazine like that. There's an indepth review and a quick check...