Looking good!

You added point on the top of the building, glass and the text on the last pic.

My last update for today:



I think I'm going to drop the car park idea and continue developing this map as a4 keeping all progress from a3 backed up in case I change my mind. You guys played a1 so there are still some big-ish differences. I want to tidy up the outside area as it's just a bit messy. I'm dropping the car park area in favour of some other thing...

Wow, this map is looking really good atm! Why the change of textures tho Aaron? Surely it would still look the part even tho it looked "HL2ish"?

Very balanced by play terms aswell? I can't wait to see the final one... I'm gueesing the Super Computer idea has creeped back into it....

At the moment, the map is looking really good. But I am worried that there are too many ways for people getting in to the building to have an advantage over the people in the building... I've expanded the building because of this, and I'm going to add a few more hiding places, and pillars in front of the large windows to support the new ceiling. Also, I want the textures to be really clean looking, so it looks like an office you would like to work in, similar to how de_morningstar looked liked a hotel you actually wanted to jump in to... Screenshot after the break...



There you go

So, now youve dropped the carpark, where are the spawn points going to lie? O.o

Seems you've lost a large area that could of been ideal for a CT spawn site.

I removed it so that I could spend more time focusing on the gameplay inside the building. I found that the map got a little bit messy after adding and expanding the car park... It will be coming back but it will look quite different. I intend to have the car park underneath the office and have the entrance off the side of the office. There will also be a street but obviously closed off sensibly so players know that the area is out of bounds but also to cut down development time!

I want to add more outdoor space because otherwise the people that start out in the building will most likely get butchered without getting even half a chance.

Wow, it's certainly changed a lot! Looking good!

Have you noticed the little border running around each floor? You can hop on to this from the fire escape or from one of the main windows.

I like adding little tweaks like this but will it put the game off balance? Most probably...

Why woould the border affect gameplay?! O.o

I'm going to have a stab at saying you're making a multi story next to it? That would be for more compact and more economical and fitting with the office block look...

Nope, he means you can run around this border to the windows, which would drastically affect gameplay (more points of approach).

I actually think that one of the worst parts of the map is... and wait for it...

The staircase that is in the centre of every floor! Perhaps it could be moved to the side of the building. I just think that when people are playing seriously, this stairwell is going to be a hotspot and a bloodbath. If the staircase were against a side wall then at least i'm cutting off 90 degrees of attack potential... What are your thoughts? Shall we keep it centre? It is kind of nice and fitting with that modern office look.

DHR, I actually like the sound of adding a second office block to the side. It would massively increase development time though, but it would be fun. It would give the people in the building somewhere to escape to if things get too heated.

I think that the border running around the building allowing you to access all areas is going to be overkill for anybody inside that building. I'm going to keep them, but I am going to block them off at the corners to give the building a reinforced look, that will also function as a block to stop people from running around the corners of the building.

Hmm, that stairwell is a bit central, and is likely to cause a bloodbath, yes. Maybe move it to the back, but in the middle, cut off 1/4 of the attack.

Good idea, I am going to work on that later

Anybody want to play?

This is cs_tchs_office_a6:

Ooooh, textures! Does it have buy areas and objectives?

Well, since my last post, it jumped from a6 to a7. a7 was a slight re-texture job (cleanup) and also added buy zones and hostage rescue zone (as there are now hostage), but the hostages did not know where to go. In a8 I added some more cubemaps, built the navigation mesh, and added some more yellowy lights to the car park.

I've dropped the little loop-around area at the back of the office (sorry, no more climbing to the roof to snipe people in that area!) and some of the cubemaps are not in the right locations - you'll notice this as you run through the car park and your gun switches to a light reflection very quickly, then switches back. It's because the reflection is being grabbed from a cubemap above you - as it is closer to you. I need to unify the cubemaps in the car park in exactly the same way as I have done for the rest of the map and this issue can be resolved in under 5 minutes.

So yes, this is now a complete cs_ mission. The areas that are still textured with developer textures indicate the areas I would like to change or expand upon. The dev stairs, basically... They all need changing. The middle stairs will be circular or curved, with banisters, and less rectangular so they will generally just take up more space per-floor. Also, they all need banisters - hostages fall to their doom then run back up only to follow you for a few seconds and fall again.

a9 introduced NPC clipping on the stairs which failed miserably. The NPC's seem to want to jump through the clip and on to the stairs. I am assuming this is a bug as the NPC clip brush has been used correctly.

a9 also introduced the funny glass roof which eats grenades (especially loves smoke grenade). I think this is because the unbreakable glass is a breakable object set to infinite health. I will remove this the next time I build the map.

a9 also introduced the elevator shaft and the maintenance shaft. This needs tidying up a lot. I'm just not happy with the positioning of the walls and it doesn't follow my convention, if you get my drift. I like to have a wall per level, not for the whole building as it helps with texturing should I decide to change it per floor. It makes it easier to measure etc. Floors not so bad. I like the walls to be sandwiched by the floors and this isn't strictly true of the elevator shaft and maintenance shaft (well, the elevator shaft is fine but the maintenance shaft is bad).

I'll fix that next time around. Oh, I'll also add support for 40 players instead of 12.

And I think I'm going to make it a de_ mission, definitely. The NPC hostages really are just too stupid.

Update at 10:20:

Nice work! If you fix the roof you should definitely have another peice of glass somewhere else that does it, and Easter Egg, lol.

de_ ftw. Hostages - fail.

I would like to say that the roof issue is definitely fixed a10 is a good build with lots of improvements. Unfortunately, I don't know where to put the bomb sites. The map needs some more horizontal space and also a few more shortcuts... Too much of the map is played on the fire escape and I never wanted that! I've completely redesigned the roof. It's quite nice

Hey guys, I released a10 last night but I didn't get a chance to stick around for some feedback...
Any suggestions?

The corridors need to be wide enough for atleast two people. Otherwise it looked good.

You're referring to the little crouch hole beneath the stairs, beside the car park right? Or the maintenance shaft and elevator area?

There was atleast one corridor in the basement that could only fit 1 player in. The doorways don't matter too much, but corridors do.

Ah yes, I think this is the small staircase beside the car park. I'll make sure I expand it when I change all of the stairs and release the beta. The same is also true of the small staircase beside the elevator shaft and also the entire fire escape.

What do you think of the fire escape? Shall I just ladder it?

The fire escape is interesting, but maybe you should make it more like fire escapes you see in America on apart buildings, where all the stairs go in the same directions, and the bottom layer is still a (releasable) ladder.