Well, after looking at it again... I do see your point about the textures. I definitely over-used a couple. The idea was to make it feel like the inside of a ship, very metallic... but that one texture does get a little monotonous.

Good suggestion, thanks.

Obviously that skybox was taken from Unreal Tournament. :)

And I obviously don't play Unreal.

Well look at that you totally got meh :\
Apologies U_U

Actually, I took staffy's skybox as a starting point. Then I found a picture of the earth via Google's image search. Finally, I sized it to fit the bottom of the skybox and there you have it, earth orbit skybox.

I figured you did something like that. Thnx for clearing that up....

Thanks for all the good feedback. I appreciate you taking the time to write all that. And I'm glad you can actually tell what everything is supposed to be. (By the way, the room you don't know what to call I've been thinking of as the Observation Deck).

Phoenix: I especially like the skybox. Did you make it?
Well, it definitely wasn't made from scratch. I just pasted an image of the earth into staffy's skybox. But I think it's a pretty cool effect myself.

Item Placement
I totally agree that this needs some work. That is always the very last thing I do when making a map. Also, I am actually a big instagib fan so I didn't put as much effort into this as was needed. I like your suggestions in this regard. The next release (which I will be posting, perhaps tonight if I have enough time) will have better balanced item placement.

Landing Bay
Funny that you should mention putting a ship in there... that's what I had in mind from the beginning. I was actually originally thinking of creating a ship mapmodel. But that will be way too time consuming... and I think Sauer's editing features are flexible enough that I can probably make a pretty convincing ship without needing a mapmodel.

The Roof
Your probably right about having more ways to get down... maybe some more asteroids on the other side of the ship. (I don't know if you've discovered it yet but there is an asteroid above the door that will allow you to jump into the bay. Some of the lower ones will work too, but you'd have to do a rocket jump.)

The Quad
Well I agree that the quad is a little tricky. (Although, if you choose the right booster to jump from you can make it every time.) I feel like you should really have to earn an advantage like that. But maybe I made it a little too challenging... I'll have to think about that one.

Well, again, thanks for all the good feedback and stay tuned for updates.

After reading the feedback so far and looking at the map with fresh eyes, I think a 3 is fair. I have pretty high standards for my own work.

I've already started working on better detailing and texture composition. And I'm definitely going to incorporate a lot of phoenix's advice.

I won't be satisfied until it's truly 5 quality.

We're stuck with 3. My php skills suck, and we're using a standard module for Drupal to provide teh stars called "propstar" and propstar isn't very configurable. Plus, even if I did hack out an upgrade for 5 stars, I'd have to make a script to run through the DB and update the old ratings.

teh suck.

So make do with 5.

-- Single player is masturbation --

Hey! I've downloaded the new version and is really better. I like the changes you've made, especially the ships. Still, there are textures that I feel out of place. The stairs could use some more detail, they're simple steps, try varying the shape and adding lights to it or something :P
The room that has the chairs is better, but I still don't like the chairs.

Keep up the good work!

Well, I agree that the stairs are a little too plain. I've changed the texture and added a slanted border on either side. Here are a couple of screenshots:
Looking from below
On the stairs

I'm going to respectfully disagree on changing the shape. Personally, I think the horseshoe shaped stairs have been over-used in a lot of maps.

What is it about the chairs that you don't like? The texture? shape? both?

I've been experimenting with changing them to a black texture. I think I might like that better.

I agree that shape of stair is overused (I've used it on every map of mine) but you could invent some other type of shape. But what you show me on those screens is great already, a lot less repetitive.

For the chiars, I just don't buy them as chairs, they don't look real enough. =\

Once again, thanks for the feedback. I'm really pleased that there has been this much interest so far.

The new ships are cool, but I think the texturing on them needs to be changed. I feel that they should have more of a smooth polished metal look to them.
Agreed. I wasn't totally sold on those textures myself. Looks a little too rusty for a spaceship.

About the bridge: what I had intended earlier is that there should be an obstacle that reaches to (or close to) the ceiling...
Yes, I thought that's what you had in mind. My only concern with that is that it could make the bridge feel very cramped and make movement in there kind of difficult... but maybe not, I'll experiment with some ideas.

...the earth is inverted...
Ha. Never even noticed that.

...a cool thing that you could add to the skybox: the sun and the moon
Hmmmmm.... interesting... could be cool. I'm leaning toward just the moon. Maybe even see if I can set it up so the main light source outside the ship looks like it's coming from the moon.

Item placement
You've put a lot of thought into this. I like all of your suggestions.

...I think you still need a few more asteroids around the transport...
Really? Even with the new asteroids on the opposite side of the ship?

Ok, well I've got plenty of ideas to get started on. Thanks again, and stay tuned for more updates.

But I think it can still need some detailing.
Especially the corridors are rather bland. How about some additional small lights there, maybe some structures supporting the walls ?
Also, the floors are a bit uniform. Those dark panels work very good with the dented metal floor, maybe use some of them to break it up a little?
You could also have some pipes here and there on the walls.

I like the ships. :)

Thanks, I think you're right about the corridors and the floors. I'll spice them up a bit.

I messed around last night with what I could do about creating objects to hide behind on the bridge. I liked an idea (that I believe you [phoenix] suggested originally) about perhaps putting in a couple of computer terminals. I liked how the little railing I added turned out so I decided to keep it and just put the terminals behind it on either side of the stairs. Here are a couple of screenshots:

Looking back from the front of the bridge
Looking toward the stairs from the left side

I may still tweak the textures a bit and maybe add some cables coming down from the ceiling.

Let me know what you think.

Yes, I think those will work nicely. I'm glad you like my idea. Can't wait to try it out.

\,,/

True. But then, I've taken a whole lot of creative license with the laws of physics for this map. Even more un-scientific is the fact that you're running around in space. :)

That said, I actually have considered having a major light source coming from below to simulate light reflected from the earth. I guess I could see how that looks...

Thanks, I've actually been toying with the idea of having two versions of the map: One like it is now and one with additional rooms like you suggested.

That way if you only have 2-4 guys playing you could choose the smaller version and not spend all of your time running around trying to find each other.

Thought you might like the item placement this time :)
I will look at putting more health and ammo on the roof.

hallway: put clip material over those holes. Rhinos can fall through (really annoying in dmsp).
Ha. I hadn't tried playing it on DMSP yet. I had to try that out. I actually kind of got a kick out of watching them fall in and then tossing grenades down on them... but this is not exactly what I had in mind for the gameplay. I've added the clip material like you suggested.

bridge: I don't believe there is a player start here. I do believe there should be.
I originally had one there. I must have removed it during one of times I remodelled the bridge. I've put one back in now.

roof: make the starts above the doors face inside. See, because players tend to run foreward when they respawn....
Done.

I know you're sick of hearing this...
(uh oh)
...and I'm sick of saying it, and you might not agree with me...
(here it comes)
...and I'm not sure I agree with me...
(he's going to ask for more asteroids)
...and this is going to hurt me more than it is going to hurt you...
(i just know it)
...and I apologize in advance for saying this...
(yep, he's about to do it)
...but I'm going to throw this out there anyway...
(this is it)
...one more asteroid by the port side door
I KNEW IT!

Ok, you got it... one more round of asteroids on the house.

Thanks again for the comments, man. I'll hopefully have another update tomorrow with all of these changes plus some additional detailing and texturing work.

I 'preciate you putting up with me and my suggestions this whole time. I'm hard to please, but please me you did :) It must have taken a lot of willpower not to tell me to "BUILD THE F**KING MAP YOURSELF IF YOU KNOW HOW TO MAKE IT BETTER."

Again, great work, and don't forget to flip the Earth.

\,,/

I forgot to mention that I went ahead and flipped the earth... and added the moon.

This has been a lot of fun. It's hard to be totally objective with your own work and I think a lot of people miss out on a good opportunity to improve their maps by getting their feelings hurt at the first sign of negative criticism.

Once I get done I plan to post some before and after screenshots.

Glad you like it! Yes, I did play the original homeworld a few times... several years ago.

Yeah, I'd like to see your version of the skybox. I guess the easiest way would be to zip it up and email it to me: dwbox@hotmail.com.

I only changed the top panel of the skybox.

http://www.geocities.com/crash3519/space1_up.jpg

If you like it, I would be honored to see it used in your map :)

\,,/

I like it. I've updated the latest version with your sunburst.

Also, just let me say I'm glad you've taken such an interest in this map and I appreciate the contribution you've made to it in terms of feedback and suggestions.

Now it's your turn to post a new map and my turn to critique :)

I started working on a map a little while ago. It's coming along... slowly, but it's coming. I'll post it as soon as it's ready, of course.

I'm glad you liked my sun, it was my pleasure to contribute.

\,,/

Thanks Passa, glad you like it!

Good catch on the brick texture, I totally missed that.

As you can tell from the release comments above I updated your skybox mod, but I went back to my original plain moon as the default. Your version is included as space1_up_phoenix.jpg.

When I look at the version you created as an image I think it looks awesome, and I think it is way more interesting than my plain moon version. But when I view it in the game it looks really jpeg-y. The gradient looks very rough, not nearly as smooth of a transition as when you just look at the image outside of the game. I don't know what's causing this. Anybody have any ideas? Perhaps all of the skybox images need to be saved with the same color pallete?

I'm looking forward to reviewing your new map. As you can tell from my long absence, I've been too slammed with work to do much Sauerbratening lately.

Once again, thanks for the heads up on the texture problem and if you (or anybody else) has any ideas on the skybox issue please let me know.

I really can´t see that roughness in phoenix´s picture that you´re seeing.

The only explanation is that maybe you run in 16-bit colour depth?

But even there I don´t really see something looking really bad, imho it looks fine. Just the 16-bit causes the hues close to grey get some red/green tints. But still it looks fine to me.
Even if I change the overall image quality to low (in my nvidia driver) it still looks fine.

And as far as I know, you can´t palletize a jpg.

I made the corona around the sun more translucent for just that reason. It looks a little better now, but I don't blame you for reverting back to your original skybox. I guess Sauer just renders images slightly differently than most image editing/viewing programs...

\,,/

Mmmh. This node is one and a half years old ..