Ustigua: Winter City

[rc1207sev]

First, here's a download of the "rough" version.

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https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B2xqTG ... sp=sharing

Ustigua: Winter City is a map based around a small village in a remote, snowy planet in the outer rim. The idea is that the droids have just landed on the planet, and have set up a base. The clones, are settled in a tunnel, which I hope to be a future complex tunnel system.


Work already done:

Hidden/Spoiler:

Galactic Marine and 501st Sides (could use improvement)
Basic map layout (could use expansion)
A playable CTF Mode
Basic Planning (no barriers or hintnodes)
Locals (Wampas spawning in every direction slaughtering everyone)
Water!
Snow effects

Things needing improvement:

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Yavin Sky!!!!
Expansion of map (like I said, tunnel system)
ARC trooper MSH for Fives (needs to be rigged)
Advanced planning (hintnodes, barriers, etc)
Lighting (duh)
Retexturing of some object meshes
CTF Mode (maybe an underground arena as part of the tunnel sysem, and in that case, new object meshes)
And a clean-up on the sides (some textures are real ugly)

Screenies!

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I don't know what other things it could improve on. Any ideas?

[jedimoose32]

Looks like a good start! I will download the rough version later, but for now based on the screenshots I have a few suggestions:
- Lighting: Looks dim and grey outside. Did you change/add any directional lights or change the top/bottom ambient lights in ZE? I know you haven't changed the sky yet so you may want to wait until after you know what that will look like, but I think it's still something that could be improved at some point.
- Map Layout: I see a lot of neat props from some of my favourite maps, and I see some terrain. But I don't see the glue that holds it all together... which is a solid map design. What I mean is that there should be plenty of objects/hills/cliffs/water that guide the player's movement and attention to help him/her focus on where he/she needs to go. To put it as simply as possible, it's very flat and open right now.

Those are the main things that stand out to me. I could be very wrong about both, because all I have right now is some screenshots. I will play it and get back to you.
Keep up the good work.

[Marth8880]

I tried out your current build, and it *looks* like a decent start but the gameplay leaves much to be desired. Your map name says "Winter City." I see a whole lot of "Winter" but not a whole lot of "City."

What's missing (Moose covered a lot of this pretty well already):
- Lighting. Easy temporary (at the very least) solution to this is to replace the contents of your map's main LGT file with the contents of Hoth's main LGT file. Then, load your map in ZE with Build Object Collision checked and burn your terrain: viewtopic.php?p=494706#
- A decent sky. The sky from Hoth, Mygeeto, or even Rhen Var should do fine in my opinion.
- Props! There's almost none of them, especially not enough to support the "city" theme, because right now it feels more like an outpost or a very small village than a city.
- An ambient sound stream, i.e., the sound of ambient, light wind in this map's case. These are super-easy to implement (especially if you use a stock one) and I can help you with it if you need.
- A decent map layout. Ditch the diamond-layout for your CP placements and get creative with it! (But hey, at least you didn't keep the perfect diamond-shape like many maps do, lol.)

Notes:
- Personally, I think you should either ditch the Wampas or severely decrease the amount of them, because right now they only really serve as an annoyance to the player.
- I recommend that you take a look at my level design checklist if you haven't already: http://www.gametoast.com/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=31078

[Sandtrooper956]

This might not be something you can control, but having the unofficial 1.3 patch installed makes the first Marine unit the Clone Commander from the patch. The second ones though is right, so maybe doing some little edits to the first one would fix that? And i'm pretty sure Tup only has one tear, not two. This is looking great so far though!

[jedimoose32]

Even so, it looks like he's doing custom sides, so the 1.3 patch will have no effect on the way his units look.

[Sandtrooper956]

Yeah, I know that. I'm saying he might wanna take into consideration some of us do. His mod though, so his choice.

[rc1207sev]

This might not be something you can control, but having the unofficial 1.3 patch installed makes the first Marine unit the Clone Commander from the patch.

I actually do have the 1.3 patch, but I have custom sides, "snowClones_inf_galmarine" and "snowClones_inf_galcommando"

And i'm pretty sure Tup only has one tear, not two

I can't really control that, because the UV mapping on the clone has the helmet and other textures mirrored, so I can't do much about that

- Lighting. Easy temporary (at the very least) solution to this is to replace the contents of your map's main LGT file with the contents of Hoth's main LGT file. Then, load your map in ZE with Build Object Collision checked and burn your terrain: viewtopic.php?p=494706#
- A decent sky. The sky from Hoth, Mygeeto, or even Rhen Var should do fine in my opinion.
- Props! There's almost none of them, especially not enough to support the "city" theme, because right now it feels more like an outpost or a very small village than a city.
- An ambient sound stream, i.e., the sound of ambient, light wind in this map's case. These are super-easy to implement (especially if you use a stock one) and I can help you with it if you need.
- A decent map layout. Ditch the diamond-layout for your CP placements and get creative with it! (But hey, at least you didn't keep the perfect diamond-shape like many maps do, lol.)

-Lighting: I'm planning to fix the lighting once I have a better map layout, and as well as the sky
-Props: I'm finding and retexturing some props from Cloud City so a team could obtain an aerial advantage.
-Sound Stream: I actually don't know how to do that, I can look up some tutorials or maybe someone could direct me to one(I'm terrible using search engines)

EDIT: Some other notes, I did ditch the wampas and replaced them with rebel retextures which are supposed to be Ustigua Resistance Fighters, with RogueKnight's DP-23 Tactical shotgun as the "Elites" main weapon.
Also, I realized my water is contrasting with the winter theme I'm going for, so I'll change the Kashyyyk water bumpmaps to fix that(which is what I used)

[Marth8880]

-Sound Stream: I actually don't know how to do that, I can look up some tutorials or maybe someone could direct me to one(I'm terrible using search engines)

http://www.gametoast.com/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=31166

[rc1207sev]

I think I'l just load the sound from hoth, but I'm running Windows 7, so I have to disable sound if I even want BF2 to work. I think I'll re-upload some of my progress and I hope someone can tell me if it works.

[THEWULFMAN]

Instead of disabling sound altogether to get SWBF2 working, try going into your settings and changing your audio quality to this.

Hidden/Spoiler:

[Noobasaurus]

Don't forget those opening satellite shots! They add just a little bit more flavor to your map.

[rc1207sev]

Don't forget those opening satellite shots!

You mean loadscreens?

Oh I've got the DL link so if anyone could please see if the Hoth music loaded.
Clicky

EDIT: Sorry Marth I didn't see your audio quality change. Hang on
EDIT2: 3 things:
Thanks Marth I can run BF2 with sound now (Yay!!!!)
the music didn't load (urgh)
and some sfx from clones/droids firing weren't playing (didn't notice that)

[Marth8880]

You mean loadscreens?

He means the opening satellite shots, i.e. the camera positions that are shown in-game in the faction selection and unit spawn screens.

http://www.gametoast.com/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=12742

[Sandtrooper956]

I didn't hear any music while playing. And it feels like the CIS has a big advantage being able to get most of the CPs from the start, but i'm sure you are working on that.

[rc1207sev]

For some reason, I have the disk in my drive, and it says insert CD 1, and then when I try it on my external drive, I get the same thing

[Noobasaurus]

Find the file "BattlefrontII.exe" in Gamedata. Run that. No need for a CD.

[rc1207sev]

No need for a CD.

I just used the "Safe Mode". Also, I meant that I couldn't run BF2_modtools.exe to get opening satellite shots

EDIT:Well, whoever said the patch would change the .msh for my galactic marine, they were right

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[Noobasaurus]

Are you still unable to run it? If so, check out question #4 from the FAQ.

[rc1207sev]

question #4 from the FAQ.

Uh, where exactly is the FAQ?

[Noobasaurus]

viewtopic.php?f=27&t=13806

SWBF2 Modding -> The FAQ / Everything You Need Thread Version 3.0 (about the 5th one down)