The visual overhaul is still in progress and I'm hoping you'll be able to see some fairly major improvements in Factory this week (which I'm using to test the new art style). I would love to hear what anyone thinks, it really does help home in on a good look. Thanks to everyone who's been providing feedback so far, by the way.
From my testing so far, it looks like there shouldn't be much, if any, FPS loss from last week on low end systems. This can vary per system though, so again, do please let me know if Factory is performing badly for you after this update. I'm still hoping to mitigate the slight FPS drop that was incurred with last weeks update to Factory. For various reasons, it makes more sense to optimize once I've settled on the look though, so I may leave this until towards the end of the process.
Anyway, I think I might begin work on the character model shortly, since it's arguably the most important element of the visuals, and could help dictate the direction for much of the remaining level art. If you have any thoughts on how the current character model could be improved, it would help a lot.
Lastly, on an relatively unimportant note, I'm thinking about having a couple of days off this week, so I may be less responsive than usual for part of the week.
COMMUNITY MADE MAPS:
- Another new map from Max Graw (Ex3mx): "Elevators". He's using more and more of his own 3d models (which I can now confirm is an option for map makers), although he made highly inventive use of the stock geometry in previous maps. You can see the benefits of this on this latest map, which is recognisable as being in Ex3mx's emerging visual style, but is also inspired by a certain visually striking game. I wonder if anyone will be able to guess what it is?
- Max Graw (Ex3mx) has also used some of his new 3d models to art up the visuals on his first map, Labor. It always played great, but until now was the only one of Ex3mx's maps not to have a strong visual style. Now the walls are broken up by colourful pipes, which just looks great, and I particularly like the huge lights, protected by a kind of perforated metal grill.
ADDITIONS:
- Art overhaul progress:
These are the things I've added to or changed in Factory this week:
- I've interspersed the small wall panels with larger ones of various sizes. So far I think this looks way better than the sea of 1x1m panels, and I know several people agree. As a convenient side effect, it also uses fewer polygons.
- I've made a completely new short cover model. I'm yet to make versions for the other shapes of cover, but the short version is the only one used in Factory. Do let me know if you think there should be any improvements to the design, so I can make them before I do the other versions, since I'll be adapting the same design for all the other shapes.
- There are now edge panels for the walls, so you can no longer see behind them.
- I've also added green wires throughout the map, which trail from gaps in the wall edge panels. The idea is to add some detail, and also I personally think the yellow green colour complements the general colour scheme. Would love to hear what anyone else thinks though. I'm not 100% pleased with the wires yet, I think possibly they don't look enough like wires.
CHANGES:
- Changed run acceleration to 3000cms^-2 from 4000cms^-2, just as an experiment. I think the movement definitely feels smoother with it lower, and it will also place more emphasis on jumping and floating for dodging, but let me know if you preferred it before and I can always change it back.
- I've moved many of the weapon pickups on most of the maps. This is due to a change in design philosophy that I want to try out. Ages ago, I think I looked up weapon placement for general map design and saw somewhere that someone thought you should place each weapon in an area of the map that it's strong. On reflection, I really can't see the reasoning behind this, so I've changed the locations of many of the weapons to areas of the map that they're weak. The advantages of this that I can think are:
- This will discourage camping. If the sniper, for instance, was placed in a good sniping spot, surely it's in someone's interest to just camp there and be constantly supplied with ammo? With the sniper in an enclosed area where it's weak, you'll have to go too and from that area to restock on ammo (and if someone's OP with the sniper, the other players will more easily be able to prevent them from getting it, which will make for a more interesting game for all).
- This will also encourage movement around the map in general, since you'll generally want to be picking up weapons then moving on quickly.
- Mac users should now have the same default avatar colour as windows users. Previously I was unable to set a default for mac users, so it was black on black.
- You now cannot use health pickups if you have full health already. Previously the pickup would be consumed but wouldn't do anything.
BUGFIXES:
- Fixed a hole in the floor in the tutorial level. Well spotted by DarkGuy