Is saw this level design article called Common Sense vs Level Design over @ Dave Johnston's personal site. Whose Dave Johnston I hear you cry: He is the guy who create De_Dust and its sequels for Counter-Strike, and is a very respected mapper from the Half-Life community.
Anyway its an interesting article and although it mainly centers around counter-strike I would recommend any mapper read it.
Level Design Article
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All very sound advice for mappers, experienced or not.
The section that MoH:AA mappers should adhere to the most, I feel, is this part:
I think the main problem with a lot of maps made for this game is the designer having this grand idea for a very realistic and detailed city or village and then just making it as if it were real.
What this leads to is a lot of huge maps with loads of identical buildings that all have interiors.
Whilst this may feel real and deep it makes for a very unplayable map which has no connectivity (player flow) and has a horrible FPS performance.
Any of these maps should be taken back to mohrad and have 75% of the buildings made not accesible, leaving those routes that Dave Johnston talks about.
It's very very important and is missed by many mappers. Awesome advice from Dave, there.
Advice that I have had to act upon in the design of both of my MoH:AA maps. Both had chunks deleted or editted to improve flow after feedback told me they weren't really used.
The other great one is Timing... A lot of maps spawn players so far apart that you are spending too long running and not enough time fighting.
Any budding new mapper should read this article, it's all good stuff. It won't teach you how to map but it will help you avoid the main mistakes that new mappers can make.
The section that MoH:AA mappers should adhere to the most, I feel, is this part:
- Only add routes that are needed - try not to duplicate routes unless necessary.
- Think to yourself - 'why would someone want to go to this part of the map?'
- Provide the player with landmarks by which they can orient themselves.
- If the map is too complex, remove routes that are useless and/or rarely used.
- Consider giving each major area of the map a specific purpose or advantage.
I think the main problem with a lot of maps made for this game is the designer having this grand idea for a very realistic and detailed city or village and then just making it as if it were real.
What this leads to is a lot of huge maps with loads of identical buildings that all have interiors.
Whilst this may feel real and deep it makes for a very unplayable map which has no connectivity (player flow) and has a horrible FPS performance.
Any of these maps should be taken back to mohrad and have 75% of the buildings made not accesible, leaving those routes that Dave Johnston talks about.
It's very very important and is missed by many mappers. Awesome advice from Dave, there.
Advice that I have had to act upon in the design of both of my MoH:AA maps. Both had chunks deleted or editted to improve flow after feedback told me they weren't really used.
The other great one is Timing... A lot of maps spawn players so far apart that you are spending too long running and not enough time fighting.
Any budding new mapper should read this article, it's all good stuff. It won't teach you how to map but it will help you avoid the main mistakes that new mappers can make.
