If you’re going to do that, might as well show everyone my latest bit of progress to show I really am serious about this.
Remember this is the product of 4 day’s work. I started this on Monday. I have been making leaps and strides, I think. Mapping wise this is the fastest I’ve ever worked. Compare this to the other day and you’ll see it all looks much better. I’ve worked hard to try and bring the themes more in line with the rest of BM’s Surface Tension.
Another idea for the missing Surface Tension maps. Perhaps you could find some place to add an assassin encounter. Since there are only 2 times you encounter them in the whole game (plus in HL1 as well). Just a suggestion.
There’s something else I’m wondering. Is it possible to set up the Marines to use the TOW? (I assume this would be needed if you are going to extend on a rail).
Hah, I know that feeling, I’ve been designing and programming a different game of late, the thing is a pain in the ass.
A suggestion about having the Garg entering, if you can, put a breakable wall infront of it and just have it burst through while it sends a few SUVs flying with the debris and have that crush the marines. That will still keep the “holy shit” feel when you get shot out of the vent in the original BM.
That ain’t a bad idea at all. Though not too sure about the SUVs crushing the marines.
One of the things I actually loved about the original Garg scene from HL1 was how casually he crushed those two marines against the walls with the car. He could have easily flung one at them or kicked it, but he really calmly sorta pushed it into them, gibbing them into pieces like it was something he did every morning (though it probably is!). Then he turns to you and loses his shit, and decides he wants you as his next target. To me, that made him seem really fearsome and added a lot to the scene. I’d like to reproduce that, if possible!
The real point of that scene was to show that the Garg was a critter with A LOT of strength. The idea I’m really presenting is a similar circumstance but it also keeps the feeling of the player wanting to run like hell after witnessing it come out.
A few additional thoughts
You can go the rout of HL2 and have cameras and a screen in a security office and you can watch another firefight with some aliens and grunts, after the firefight’s up you hear a thud, the camera screen shakes, and then the camera goes blank.
When you get to the garage area in particular you hear a fire fight going on, a squad of marines enter through an emergency door, then like the Antlion Guard in Nova Prospekt in HL2, you see Big Blue and Ugly burst through a wall, and all hell breaks loose starting with the Garg casually frying some marines then turning on you like in Power Up. It shows the strength of the SoB while still retaining the awe of the scene.
shrugs Just an idea, but it’s really up to you on how you want to do it. I still want the feeling of “HOLY SHIT! RUN!” when I first see it. Maybe a mix of the two after it bursts through the wall a couple of marines get crushed between some SUVs when it decides to push a few of them out of the way. Just remember that the Garg is a living thinking, and intelligent entity, it will want to kill the marines in the worst way possible before turning on you (it’s still pissed).
I have no plans to extend On a Rail as of yet. I feel the missing chapter of Surface Tension hurts the story the most, whereas the missing chapter for On a Rail was more of a gameplay experience lost. As I said, my reasoning is that it is C2A5F where you see the marines getting pounded by the aliens repeatedly. It’s right before they decide to pull out - it just…makes sense that you’d see them getting beat right beforehand.
I’m not sure quite what you’re trying to say here, but I know the part of HL2EP1 that you’re talking about. It’s very different thematically from what I’m trying to do here though.
Yeah, I reckon the compromise is the best idea. I like the idea of having both - the throwing SUVs everywhere to show of its strength and the crushing to show its “badassery” and brutality. Bear in mind though we are talking about stuff I’ll be doing a long time from now. I’m not close to the stage where I can start worrying too much about how to program the Garg yet. I need to finish the level, first and foremost! But, it’s good to have the idea on the plate, I guess.
Heh, good luck with it all the same. I do hope the the Devs include the stuff in the end when you’re done. So far from your progress screens it looks awesome, keep up the good work.
Thank you for your kind words my good sir. I’m progressing further and further. I’m getting to the stage now where I need start thinking about working on the lighting and VIS calculations, two things which I’m fairly good at. NPC and enemy encounters will wait till the end, I think, seeing as that’s by far my weakest point.
I’ve already since I posted my last screenshots added a lot of detail to the map. My next big task is the 3D skybox, which I have big plans for. Expect my next screenshots to be fully lit and beautiful! Funnily enough the worst areas of the map are now the garage’s emergency stairway and car ramps. This is because I freaking suck at texture alignment along verticals, so all the textures are horribly aligned and look bad. Not sure what I can do about that.
I think the you should add more displacements to the gravely areas, and add the sand texture from ST, and FBF to give it more of a “desert” feel. This place IS built upon a desert.
If you are doing lighting calculation things, I’d suggest increasing the luxel count for more cinematic scenes, like the devs did for Blast Pit, and Surface Tension.
Looking great so far, hopefully we can get one of the Devs in here to give you a few pointers and some critiques. Good to see you are expanding on this section, I was also a bit dissapointed that it was cut, even though it was one of the weakest parts of that chapter in the original.
This is actually looking pretty cool. I am most interested to see how you will do the whole “satchel in the pipe scene” with the fiery blast rushing down the tunnel.
Bear in mind, the harrier jet sequence might not be doable. The jets aren’t NPCs, they’re animated props, and their flight paths are entirely pre canned. The Manta Rays, however, are NPCs. I don’t know if they still have chest beams. You should probably do a test map to work out what kind of entity work you’re in for. If you can do it, AWESOME. More power to you. But this sounds like a nightmare in the SDK.
Also, loading soldiers into the Ospreys also might not be doable. I guess you could have the soldiers run behind the Osprey on the tarmac, use Kill inputs to get rid of the soldier NPCs, then have the osprey take off as if it had loaded the soldiers?
I disagree. It had a good amount of “oh shit” moments, like the soldiers shooting you through the vent, or the satchel charge in the pipe. It kind of gave the impression that they were starting to get wise to some of your tricks. Also it had a lot of soldiers fighting the aliens, which is something that BM currently lacks somewhat.
I really, really hope this works out. I would love to see Surface Tension extended to its original length.
I’ve sort of worked it out to a degree. You can have both the Mantas and the Harriers as animated props which seems preferable to me. I will parent fires and smokestacks to the harrier as it flies overhead. One Manta will be in direct pursuit, the other will break off as it flies overhead and attack the Osprey.
Env_Beam coupled with some timed particle effects -should- do the trick. I have used env_beams before to a sort of similar effect. I just parent it to the base of the manta. Granted, it will require a tricky entity setup - sound, effects, destruction, as the beam won’t actually do anything, I’ll just have to time the effects so it appears as such.
As for the Osprey loading up? I don’t know. I’ll find out once I get to that bridge. I know that there’s no specific load-up sequence so it’d have to be cleverly scripted to appear as such, but if I can’t shrugs. The scene’d still be alright without.
I had a blindingly good day yesterday in terms of progress. Sometime this afternoon/evening I should be able to post fully lit/3d Skybox’d screenshots. And it’s looking rather lovely, I promise you. I do think the chapter I’m reproducing was the weaker part of ST, but I’m hoping to change that.
I’ll admit, I’m a little worried this won’t ever be finished, but that’s just because I’m a massive pessimist who is used to seeing projects like this fall through. The fact that you’re making a lot of progress gives me hope.
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.
