He needs bodyguards!!! :meh:
Well, that escalated quickly. But seriously, everyone just needs to chill out, we can still have a civil discussion without resorting to personal attacks. You don’t want me to ban you over a petty argument, do you? 
Put them all in your Broken Fridge 
no way? no way! no way? no way!
Everyone climb in, there’s room for all! Alright back on topic forumeers!
Hey text! I love the map as is. I love the lighting, the gaps in the floor helps with an overall bigger sense and atmosphere, I like the unique fights you get with the mixtures of aliens and I love the cafeteria. I love the hole mood you created. Like I said: just tone down the colors of the cafeteria, make it a little more dull. But please don’t change it TOO much from the version I saw in the video.
AND I cannot wait to see the outdoor maps with your night time vista.
When I originally played BM I really wished it had a longer mission at night because I loved the stars and the full moon and the weird peaceful atmosphere it created amongst the chaos around you!
Totally agree!
Can’t remember if it was proposed or not (probably was) - but here goes:
To populate the space once (I assume) you remove some tables from the cafeteria - try looking for some household crap in the assets (i.e. wet floor signs, buckets of paint) and just stash some away there. Maybe even fence it in with those metallic fence (durr) fragmets present in HL2 assets (either the stashed stuff only or the whole area - would work both ways)
-It fills space so that you can keep that bootyful curve.
-It gives the impression that this place has not been in use for quite a while.
Should be a simple way out.
P.S. About plants
Plants do not require direct sunlight (albeit it is preferable) for photosynthesis. With correct room temperature (and correct lamp type, although it’s not as crucial) - they’ll be just fine
Even with no lights at all they’ll survive. They’ll consume the oxygen in the air as we do so… too bad for whoever works down there :fffuuu:
^exactly
Get rid of the plants, and dim the lights.
I’m pretty sure the plants ARE cheap plastic plants. For God’s sake, it’s an office complex!
Weird, cause plants do photosynthesis, so when there is no sun on them, they give oxigen
Right, I’m moving on to mapping the B sections for a little bit, so I figured I’d ask everyone a few questions.
My rationale for starting on the B sections is as follows - my uni workload has really started to ramp up now, and I don’t really have the free time just yet to make the push to get the A maps testing release ready. The nature of the adjustments that have to be made to A require a large “block” of free time, so that I can blast all the changes out at once. The reason for this being mapping small changes sporadically is a VERY bad thing - it’s easy to forget what you haven’t fixed and what you have as well as what needs to be done. Blocking out segments of a map is much more suited to sporadic work than fine adjustments, hence it would probably be better to start blocking out the layout for the B maps.
I will work on finishing up the A maps at weekends. I actually have a busy weekend lined up so this probably means you won’t get to play on the A maps until the end of next weekend - but certainly no later than that. Sorry guys, but as I’m sure you know - real life comes first.
So, onto the questions:
-
I’m planning on using blueish, cold lighting (as has been requested) for the indoor B segments of the map, to bring them closer in line to HL1’s style. This will however make them contrast with Black Mesa’s rust reddish lighting style - which may not necessarily be a bad thing. Thematically the B maps are already going to be fairly distinct regardless of lighting (no more offices), so having a further distinction may help to improve the diversity and mood of the chapter as a whole. What’s everybody’s stance on this? Keep the rust red lighting and use it throughout the chapter, or stick with my current idea and make it more like HL1?
-
I’ve created a very rough schematic of how the B maps are going to be laid out, and if I mirror and rotate a few of the HL1 elements (as well as cutting some of them down a bit), it fits into the existing B/C structure without much difficulty at all. If anyone has layout/design ideas to contribute to the B sections, now would be a good time to add them, before I block out the basic layout. My current plan is to follow the HL1 designs somewhat closely. E and G will see the most changes, but this mostly involves altering tunnel layouts to make it fit into the current structure a bit better (and cut out a few of the pointlessly long sections). My current plan is to basically 1:1 the F section as it’s a well designed loop, though there will be some additions made to add a bit of extra content and retain interest.
Here are the schematics I made to showcase the HL1 layouts and how I’m planning on incorporating them into Black Mesa. Firstly there are 3 overhead images straight from the HL1 maps with basic annotations and some notes on areas where I might add stuff. Then there’s a composite of these 3 HL1 overheads laid onto the hammer grid of the B/C maps from BM. Note that the HL1 schematics themselves are replicas of HL1’s layout. Only on the composite have I outlined my new layout and the adjustments.
HL1 E Map
HL1 F Map
HL1 G Map
Black Mesa Composite - The B maps start from “B Exit” and end at “C Entry”. Rectangles represent new tunnels, lines represent blockages.
- Is there anything missing BOTH from HL1 and BM OaR that you guys would like to see? “New” features, so to speak? BE REALISTIC here. I’m obviously not going to add stupid or really contrasting ideas. The only one I’m currently planning so far is to add some kind of new element to one of the bare straights on the F map (possibly another crane like that on A1, to reinforce the element which isn’t seen anywhere else).
Maybe collapsing walls behind u, so u cannot backtrack
I’d say keep it like HL1 with the colder lighting. I don’t think it will create any inconsistencies, but help it stand out. If the whole chapter uses the warm lighting, it all kind of blends together. If you’re planning to have any horror elements in this map, don’t forget to test out the “Abrupt Awakening” music that I posted earlier.
@ TEXT
Is BMS’C map on image 3 and connecting to HL’s G?
Edit:
-
Also, are you roughly going to follow my E schematic as it looks like you are gonna merge the dynamite/C4 tunnel w/the functional one
-
What’s w/the tunnel blocked area in E?
Can I just quickly ask what is everyones’ deal with backtracking?
A lot of the suggestions i’ve read on preventing it aren’t all that great either.
(Randomly closing doors despite you killing EVERYTHING in the previous area, randomly collapsing tunnels etc…)
I DO want to see collapsing tunnels… but I want to see them to the player’s side to enforce a sense of scale, with the cause being HECU explosives to reinforce the HECU’s presence in the tram system, not behind the player to prevent backtracking with no justification. Mindless, contrived attempts to prevent backtracking are one of BM’s biggest developmental flaws.
And on the whole transition to a cooler lighting scheme thing for the B maps; you’ll have to be pretty careful about how you do it.
It’ll look REALLY weird if you just have a sudden and clear transition from the red/orange to blue lighting.
You would have to find a way to blend the two in at a few points before transitioning to the blue lighting completely.
Or what you could do is make the section in the B maps visually distinct from the A maps. Make it clear that you’re entering into a completely different section of the Mat. Trans. system for the B maps and give the section it’s own distinct look from A so that the change in lighting makes some bit of sense.
In fact, I think this happened in Half-Life too for a short stretch of tunnel you go through just before you reach the surface and get outside.
(The look of the tunnels transitioned from an old, decrepit, cramped solid concrete tube in the beginning to a newer looking, more open, just all around more modern looking tunnel in the final couple of minutes before you reach the outside and get to the area with the sniper)