Welcome to Gaia! ::

I'd like to get a mapping subforum, but before we go all out to set it up, I need to see how much interest the guild as a whole has in making maps and sharing them in general. You don't need to be a map maker to help out either. I'm constantly looking for playtesters to get opinions on my maps, as well as to get some feedback on how balanced the level is in general. VS mode is hard to balance with 2 player infected VS 4 bots and vice versa.

For those of you who are into mapping, this can be a place to get suggestions on how to tweak stuff, or help if you hit a roadblock. It can be a place to recruit playtesters, or even recruit someone to help split up the load, five full L4D maps can be quite a project.

To whet your appetites, and get things rolling, I'll pop up some pictures of maps I've made for discussion. Only one of them is in open release at the moment, but I could be convinced to release another if people really like it.

UNHAPPY HOUR
This was a much longer term project than cs_cabin (Which I probably spent all of two weeks on honestly). I was learning a lot about the development process as I was making this map, and having learned the basics during cabin, I was able to spend a lot more time working on the finer aspects. I've managed to keep a lot of stored up pictures documenting the development of this map, so I'll post those as well.

WORK IN PROGRESS PIX!







As you can see, I tend to start with very generic textures that only have things like measurements on them. I do development in 3 phases really, I do geometry first, which includes walls and any sort of gameplay centric props, then I do texturing and populating, which is applying the textures (duh) and making the world look more lived in with things like lights, desks, and that sort of thing. The last step is detailing, where I do stuff like go around and add doorframes, molding, and any kinds of decals or writing on the walls. Getting closer to completion, maps start to look like this:









Then we just add zombies. (Or pyros.)





Finally, you get something like this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JaAhaq2pTFY

(Download available at www.landminelabs.com)

I'd more into mapping if I had any skills to start it off with, but I have absolutely no idea where to begin. If there is enough interest, I'm hoping you guys can show me how to do some stuff.

If the subforum never gets made you can start a thread in the respective subforums about the maps you've made, and your mods can go into the source mods subforum.


EDIT: IDEA TIMES

I'll just made the source mods subforum into Source Mods/Modding/Mapping with approval from the captain.

Unless there is enough interest for a stand alone subforum.

Mostly CS:S, TF2, and maybe a little HL2 biggrin M. Actually I'd probably start off with HL2 biggrin M because it seems to be the easiest, and people don't really care how the levels look in that game.

I'm actually working on a couple of TF2 maps based off of other video games. One is Fourside and the others are a coupe of areas from Tooie.

The deed is done. You may now post your maps and stuff in the subforum.