On A Rail Uncut - Re-Adding Cut Areas/Scenes (Expansion Project)

General Development Source 1
#1521

I’m not doing the car one anyway, was having too much trouble getting the guard to work properly, and as others have said, it’s a bit over the top.

The flare bit is good but I’m suffering from lack of good flare effects, really. I tried copying the ones I used on B1, but they look horrible when they’re increased in size and blown up, so I’ll need to find an alternative in some form.

I’ve moved the 50 Cal from the underground segment to underneath where the Sniper used to live. I took a little bit of inspiration from Episode 2 here actually. I’ve doubled up on the 50 Cals like people asked, and there are 2 dudes manning them now. It gave me an idea for how I can make the outdoor area a lot more interesting and tense, without it being “action packed”. The 50 Cals, while being extremely inaccurate, can range you all the way over by the trainyard shelter. This creates a situation kinda like the autogun in Ep2 where this difficult to kill emplacement (remember you have no effective ranged weapons at this point) is keeping you pinned down and causing you problems. It shouldn’t be frustratingly OP, it’s not like you die within seconds of running into the open - the 50 Cal is damn inaccurate and only does 10 damage per shot to the player.

This gives the large outdoor area a bit of a gameplay purpose, as well as opening up some room for player tactics. A bolder player might switch the rails, and then charge the emplacement ducking behind the tram, and finish them with a well placed MP5 nade/frag grenade. Slightly more conservative players might use either large side area to flank and sneak up on the emplacement for a slow but silent kill. This gives the large outdoor area more of a gameplay purpose as it now becomes a means of outmaneuvering this emplacement.

I really like this idea, what do you guys think? I think it’s the perfect way to give the outdoor area more of a gameplay purpose, and make it feel more tense and “alive,” without having vast amounts of action and scripts.

I’ve also swapped the edited song for the full version, which works well.

Now I’m going to work on the optimization. I’m actually fairly on track for a release within the next few days - it really depends on how much trouble I have with optimization. If the worst comes to the worst, I might just release it without it being brilliantly optimized. It can be addressed in the future, there are more pressing concerns with the map I’d like players to have a chance to evaluate.

This is a good idea which would certainly make more of the outdoor area have a purpose - but the “switch the power on” trick at this point has been used a lot throughout OaR and OaR Uncut. There’s a power puzzle on A, A1, and B1 already.

#1522

Your idea for the .50 cal emplacement sounds pretty good. That couldn’t be considered some heavy fight like the turntable ambush, but using advantage of the yard to take cover and get closer to the emplacement would be quite close to the idea behind the original map, and in fact make it way better.

I understand the power puzzles have been already used over the past maps, but concerning the sniper, why not having him trying to finish you off once the .50 cal soldiers have been dealt with? That would be sneaky enough for this bastard! >.<

#1523

Had a simple idea on how to make the map feel less like decoration for a rail switch. :slight_smile: Reflect the rail switch room so that it’s on the other side of the rail, and then put it further back, so that it’s at the end of the loop, rather than the start of it. Maybe put something on the track so that you can only go through it forwards, too. That way, you will absolutely have to go around the loop at least once in order to proceed.

#1524

Love all your ideas text, on what you said ^. But I just had a random thought. I know you wanted this outdoor segment to feel vastly huge, but I get the feeling that it might be to large. NOT saying you need to redo it, it’s just that perhaps there are some areas you should fence off to the player. specifically some of the areas on the “outside” of the loop. Like when the player exits the area right outside the warehouse with the tram, that section to the left, that army tent and road behind it seemed very bare and had no interest for the player. By fencing it off and keeping the player on the tracks, you give the illusion that the rail yard looks open. it will also feel less bare because the player wont have to explore those areas(which some may think could be a bad thing but I don’t think so). However from a design perspective it would make total sense, at any rail shipping company they cordon off the tracks from the road for safety purposes. Just some food for thought, However ill go with whatever you decide with in the end. As I said before love your ideas ^ about spicing up the yard.

PS. cant you use the flare from HL2, the ones that Civil Protection use to launch into the air whenever they spotted Gordon

#1525

Okay, removing the electric fence around the outer perimeter got rid of nearly 200 entities, giving me a fair bit of room for detailing some areas. HOWEVER - I’ve just done the first optimization pass and the performance has gone up by about 10FPS average, but it still isn’t good. People with lower spec rigs are going to suffer, sadly, and I don’t think there’s much I can do about it without fundamentally overhauling the layout - something I’m not willing to do.

We’ll see!

This wouldn’t work. 2 things - firstly - how do you fence across a railway line? Secondly - what benefit is there to leaving it fenced off, really? The fence just hurts performance more, and the idea of that area in particular is to feel open, as it’s a trainyard. It’s there to make it feel vast and connected to other parts of Black Mesa. It’s in an area where the player would be disinclined to explore anyway, as the actual goal is off to the right. It doesn’t really hurt to leave it open, especially now there’s a tram running in from that area.

As for your other idea, this was covered during B1’s development. That entity doesn’t work on Black Mesa’s engine, sadly - if it did I’d use it in a flash. In a flash, get it? Man I’m good.

#1526

Excellent work as always.

I thought the railyard was almost perfect - it has a great quality of quiet and tranquility that I can imagine Valve putting in. In this regard, from the player’s point of view they are pretty much under the radar at this point and I would say focus on making it a rest for the player rather than putting in more conflict.

The flyover is a brilliant example of this, and is a rare opportunity to show off the helicopters and Osprey models. It hints at the battle that is raging elsewhere and shows the power of the HECU.

My suggestions:

  • It does feel slightly empty, so just a scattering of dead bodies, debris and other signs of life would help to make it feel more occupied.

  • Sounds of vehicles, helicopters and military movement in the distance to help reinforce the idea that the player is safe but surrounded by unseen enemies.

  • Further combat shouldn’t be necessary, but perhaps some intriguing puzzles. You’ve got a few in there but maybe make them more difficult to solve as with those in HL2, rather than ones you just stumble upon.

  • With this in mind, when you climbed the crane I expected to be able to control it as you did in HL2 - perhaps you could make the area into a puzzle, where you have to remove obstacles from the tram’s path? That could also coincide with the HECU ambush at the security office that already exists.

#1527

How do you block off the access now? Or am I missing something?

Also a random thought - how about (switchable on/off) alarm sirens around the perimeter? It is a former military base after all. But as any random thoughts - I am not really sure how you can implement this. Maybe have a marines hauling his ass towards the switch and having to kill him before he sounds the alarm, otherwise spawning/drawing more HECUs from other parts of the map?

As for the flare - who would launch them? Doesn’t make much sense for HECU’s to send flares. A group of scientists and guards, however?

#1528

Possible to add some fork lift trucks and flat bed trainwagons now u have place?

#1529

Okay, moving the 50 Cal has worked out fantastically, it’s really improved the outdoor area without making it action packed. Doltman’s suggestion has really significantly improved it already, even though it may seem small.

For now, I’ve removed the electrical “puzzle,” which isn’t really a puzzle so much as it is “duck under the beams”. It’s a shame to see it gone - but it actually hurt performance in the outdoor area a lot - I now average 45FPS generally outdoors - I’ve been optimizing it a lot today. It’s mostly the dynamic lights which accompanied the beams, it did a number on the framerate, it really did. If anyone can suggest some kind of alternate obstacle for that but which doesn’t involve electrical arcs, I’m all for it.

I numbered your suggestions to make them easier to respond to.

  1. Am doing that now. Since removing the electrical fence I have a bit of leeway to do stuff like that, especially since the outdoor area is now much better optimized.

  2. I’m already using the very limited pool available to me. There aren’t very many sounds for this.

  3. There isn’t really anywhere for these to go. The only one I can think of right off the bat is to have the box in the warehouse actually blocking the track which you have to move with the crane controls, pretty much the same as A1. But it’s already been done, and I’m not sure it’s worth repeating. Anyone have any thoughts on this?

  4. This won’t happen. The crane entity doesn’t exist in Black Mesa, and even if it did it’s a tonne of work and entity setup for relatively little reward.

Thanks for the suggestions.

The electric fence setup I used was an emulation of the one found on the C map from WGH. It features a barbed wire fence with electrical wires attached to the front of it. I’ve simply removed the electrical wires, but kept the fence. It’s removed an absolute tonne of entities, with little visual cost. I’m a bit sad to see it go, but it’s the best place to save on entities, allowing me to make other parts of the map have better detail.

The alarm thing actually sounds like a really neat idea, but the problem is there’s no real way to orient the player to this quickly enough. It would be very unintuitive and frustrating to a player who doesn’t make the connections quickly enough. I’m not sure there’s a good way to make this intuitive, which is a shame cuz it’s a cool idea.

As for the flares, maybe I’m missing something, but why doesn’t it make sense for the HECU to fire flares? If they’re getting fucked up by something and urgently need air support/evac in the middle of the night, would it not make sense for them to fire out a flare? Bear in mind this isn’t over B2, this is in the distance in the skybox. Either way, you never actually see who’s firing it and why, so it’s kinda left up to the player’s imagination.

#1530

What about a switch (override system or something, cause eveything is in lockdown mode) in the indoor area where u meet the Vorts, so u need to open the door leading to those broken tram elevator (just at those sniper spot)? (or activate a power switch)

Cause u can just skip the ride and move on foot…

#1531

That makes no sense though. Why would the power switch for the door be all the way in the cave tunnel? It just doesn’t work. I agree with you it could be better like that, but it really makes no sense and isn’t intuitive.

If the player wants to skip the ride and run on foot, they can do that. It’s an option. It’s kinda difficult to make it any different with such a large, open outdoor area. I can’t really shoehorn the player into going down one particular route.

#1532

It’s just a shame u do alot of effort and use alot of entities and some just gonna skip those part

I just thought about the part with ST Uncut. U had to use the switch to have power in the garage with the first big battle, so…

#1533

That’s kinda the curse of creating more open games though, some effort is always going to be wasted because players will just skip those parts. It’s why games are so damn linear nowadays, devs want to make sure that every single bit of their work is enjoyed by the player - which I can kinda understand.

The way I see it - if the player is so eager to just cruise to the end of the level that they don’t want to take a look around and explore the landscape they’re put in, then they probably wouldn’t have enjoyed the additional areas anyway. So in a way I guess everybody wins? Maybe a flawed way of looking at it but I do think that having non-linear elements in a linear story is a great way to go about doing things.

#1534

Not sure if the alarms should be easily/intuitively avoidable - why not challenge the player to figure it out on a subsequent playthrough. It would be one of those ‘Oh, so you could cancel the alarm by simply killing that cunt over there fast enough - didn’t know that’ things.

That’s the thing - I expressed the same opinion before in this thread - it’s unlikely they would be fucked up by anything yet - correct me if I’m wrong, but the impression was that they were in control of the area?
However, you can have an osprey or an apache crash in the distance (pilot going full retard - accidents do happen) - and then a couple minutes later, the pilot would fire the flares off.

#1535

The map looks amazing. I watched the video last night and again just now. I do agree with others that it’s just a tad too scenic with not a lot to really do or see game play wise on the outdoor section. The two 50 cals outside sounds like it’s going to make it much more interesting and originally it was in a odd position where you really had too much cover inside that room to easily take it out.

The cave part is simply brilliant. It looks amazing. You may want to put a small flickering light above the ladder to make it a bit more apparent so people don’t think they are supposed to jump down somehow. It looked a little dark and hard to spot. Also I really dig the construction workers I think they work well. Extending the music track to the full version sounds like a good idea too because it really seems too quiet outside as others have pointed out. With all of the dead bodies laying around and no aliens in sight and the dead tank it’s almost like Gordon was late to the party and missed out.

I would really like to see some type of physics puzzle or maybe a bit more exciting scripted sequence of some sort. Trucks driving by in the distance is okay, but honestly just more visuals and a bit boring in my opinion. Maybe have a marine up on one of the guard towers and have a houndeye teleport in and charge blowing him and whatever he’s standing on, or next to an explosive barrel away so his body goes flying off the tower.

I guess it’s just a shame to see the source engine and not see the physic aspect of it really being put to use. I think that’s why so many people have mentioned the operational crane thing. Think on HL2 where you would blow up barrels to release a large pendulum hook thing which would swing and bust down gate doors, or scenes where the resistance were running across wooden planks between buildings and the combine would blow the whole thing to pieces with a rocket sending debris and bodies falling. Obviously it doesn’t have to be that over the top, but at least a little more use of physics in any fashion be it puzzles or sequences would be nice to see as the visuals shouldn’t be the only perk of going from hl1 to hl2.

#1536

I, for one, wouldn’t miss it at all - duplication of the stuff already used, looks out of place and isn’t really doing anything.

#1537

Wow. I’m glad my one idea had some value after all.

I’ve been thinking about the transition between B2 and C. It seems a little obtuse that the tram, which is presumably on level with the launchpad on the trainyard, has to then dive far underground only to pop right back up another turntable lift like 3 minutes later. I know this is the only way to match up with C, but I fear that this could cause confusion for players who see the destroyed track and just think “okay, must be some other track I missed then”.

I was thinking you could alleviate this with a sign either in the guardhouse or in the destroyed turntable room with some sort of signage, like “Launch Pad Access through Tram Sublevel ONLY”. Something to give the player a hint that down is the correct move here (contrasted to the general desire to go up in the chapter as a whole) and provide a little plausible explanation.

The only other thing I can think is what if there aren’t like alot of HECU guarding the trainyard, but they’re all in really advantageous places. I’m thinking like a mini-recreation of the courtyard assault on Nova Prospect from HL2. You have one up in the gaurdhouse, maybe one up on the crane and one or two others about. It might give a semblace of the sniper feeling now that he’s been removed (or just moved?) and give player the opportunity to use part of the trainyard for tactical cover (which I know you’re already doing with the .50 cals but without seeing the map I don’t know how the fields of fire really line up).

#1538

Edit: Accidental double post.

#1539

Gotta say, the maps look amazing! I’ve read every post so I know the changes afterward. I’m just gonna throw down by cents on the outdoor area, some simple things, but it could help?

  1. I was going to suggest maybe move the Sniper to the Guard Tower. Dealing with him might be difficult though, but you have the entire outdoors. This was before you moved the Machine Gun outdoors, so I’m sort of thinking it might be too much even having the Sniper at all.

  2. Flare? Sounds cool. It’d be amazing if a flare was fired off in the distance, and shortly after an Apache glides over the area and begins unloading it’s autocannon at the unseen enemy on the ground (In response to the above, just because AG’s haven’t arrived doesn’t mean there can’t be trouble. We’re dealing with teleporting enemies, and even in Text’s maps, the Xenians fuck the HECU up hardcore long before Surface Tension).

  3. To liven up the area (if still necessary, 'though it doesn’t seem like it may be) ‘pest’ enemies like sentry guns and headcrabs could be used in the ‘side’ areas of the map. Heacrabs could dig out of the ground (which is why the military didn’t get them) and sentries are military. Maybe you can have a zombie bust out of one of the shipping containers if you go near it?

  4. Crane quips, I’d still prefer tower cranes although it’s not necessary. Also that power tower looks like a serious hazard to crane operations, and it doesn’t seem to serve any purpose anyway. Lastly, could it be possible to use a ‘hooks and ropes’ setup for the lifted containers? A magnetic crane like that could be hazardous to electrical equipment in containers.

  5. Outside of the warehouse by the crane, maybe remove that entire platform and just have all the crates stacked in a line toward that wall. Not urgent, but it looks like a real tight squeeze for such large trucks.

  6. If ‘pawning off’ some of B2 onto C will help with performance, then I’m all for it, although it seems like a lot of work.

This is all I can think of for now. Cheers!

#1540

Some other ideas:

Maybe introduce some HECU which are scripted to run into a bunker in which a metal door closes behind him. They would not provoke as they are trying to retreat unless attacked.

I cannot state enough the flare. That will be the highlight of the game. Seriously, find a way to do it.

Remember how the first vort you meet bursts out of a door? Maybe try to do that with a train car. That would be pretty great.

Don’t jam pack everything in here though. It still serves as a tranquil place.

Also, if you may, update the parent post.

Founded in 2004, Leakfree.org became one of the first online communities dedicated to Valve’s Source engine development. It is more famously known for the formation of Black Mesa: Source under the 'Leakfree Modification Team' handle in September 2004.