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[ut] [RELEASED] The Man from A.H.R.G.

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User avatar Jet v4.3.5
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Subject: Re: [ut] [RELEASED] The Man from A.H.R.G.

Post Posted: 21 Mar 2011, 00:51

I want to note that I've been looking through this level's geometry in the editor for about ten minutes and I'm already surprised at how similar my own practice attempts are to this. I'm also inclined to say that I've gotten a lot of pointers from it, and I'm seeing a lot of great workflow ideas in this that are, of course, very transferable to other types of environments. I'm going to have to try some of this neat stuff some time, because this gauge of level design is top-notch and, as far as I can tell, very simple from a technical standpoint. I can definitely work with this. Haven't even looked beyond the first section of the map, so I'm very interested in how you pulled off some of the later sections too. Great stuff, man.
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User avatar ividyon
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Subject: Re: [ut] [RELEASED] The Man from A.H.R.G.

Post Posted: 21 Mar 2011, 01:08

Fond play-testing memories. I love your architectural style, Carthage, and the plot idea was pretty, er, interesting as well! :D Need to check the final version out! Did you ever get these scripts you needed?

Also, news posted. Sorry for the tardiness!
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Subject: Re: [ut] [RELEASED] The Man from A.H.R.G.

Post Posted: 21 Mar 2011, 11:31

Welcome back GTD!
There's been so much new content the last year that I had forgotten about The Man from A.H.R.G.
But having just read through this topic, it's all coming back and I am just raving to have a go at this new version. Architecture and surroundings were already incredible and the sniper area was absolutely thrilling. At first the gameplay style wasn't my favourite, but I got caught in the flow and you managed to keep me captivated.

I'll be downloading this evening and pushing aside some labourous tasks to make space and time for some serious AHRGing this week. \o/

User avatar StalwartUK
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Subject: Re: [ut] [RELEASED] The Man from A.H.R.G.

Post Posted: 21 Mar 2011, 15:00

I apologise if I sound a bit dumb by posting this but how do you actually run this? I've tried playing it through the OldSkool menus, but stuff didn't work properly. Then I tried it using the open command and everything now seems fine... except now my allies have no weapons. Strange given they had them before.

Your release post mentions olextras.u but there isn't one included with the download.
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Subject: Re: [ut] [RELEASED] The Man from A.H.R.G.

Post Posted: 21 Mar 2011, 16:44

olextras.u comes from Operation Na Pali which, along with UT Bonus Pack 4, you'll need to have installed to play.

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Subject: Re: [ut] [RELEASED] The Man from A.H.R.G.

Post Posted: 21 Mar 2011, 18:53

Glad to see that you're still around man, and still producing kickass content :D

I gave it a quick try, codes and friendly marines didn't work properly so I guess that I chose the wrong way of opening the map (I think that I did that with the oldskool custom SP map menu) but I solved that ghosting through the door where you're supposed to enter the codes.

[spoiler]At first I was a little concerned when I saw that you were using bots as enemies, I am not a fan of those in SP (especially when welding hitscan weapons) but I have to say that you managed to balance it nicely (at least in the first segment before the codes door) and produce a fun gameplay.

The second part of the map was kind of hard without the help of those fellow marines, especially in the part right after the codes door where you're in some cramped rooms and there are a bunch of enemy soldiers with quadshots that can slice your health into pieces but I solved that summoning a couple of health packs for myself, the rest of the map was playable even without the allies (I was playing on Medium). Ammo was plentiful and so were Armors, I like the change of pace from the usual Unreal SP maps where you get one armor every half hour.

The two "bosses" and the section afterwards were pretty easy, I made it on the first try without dying. I think that you could try something a little more grand for the last room specifically, like triggering enemy guards coming from opening doors only when the player is in the middle of the zone and assigning them orders so that they are a little more aggressive.[/spoiler]

I don't have words to describe the visuals, I have high expectations for a map of yours but you surpassed them and lapped them twice... amazing stuff, some of the best UT mappage that I've seen to date. Loved the larger rooms, loved the smaller rooms and corridors you connected those rooms with, loved about everything :P (and you know that I'm "quite" picky about stuff ;))

The story was pretty interesting but I think that you could have condensed the translator messages a bit, the translator borders were pretty much raped by your long messages.


Great work overall, I'm eagerly awaiting a finished version with a little more polish and the continuation of the story :)

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Subject: Re: [ut] [RELEASED] The Man from A.H.R.G.

Post Posted: 22 Mar 2011, 02:10

The bot-centric style worked pretty well here (although I'm glad I played on medium as I could see it getting a bit frustrating on higher settings), and, while the opposition doesn't change much, the map does a good job mixing in a lot of different styles of combat arena and settings (open areas followed by confined battles and similar), along with decent amounts of non-linearity and exploration. The allies also worked better than I thought they would, although they caused some friendly fire issues; it was okay after I got used to staying out their way though. The sniper part at the end seemed tougher than intended, as the last couple took me ages to find (compared to similar sequences in Mister Prophet's packs where I did it easily), maybe there could have been more clues in some way. The story works for what's there and does a good job introducing the world you are in, along with some humour. Too bad it's apparently not going to be concluded.

The visuals are really nice, as well as quite unique, and varied as well, with the mix of clean living areas and the more grimy maintenance sections. Plus there's some cool details like the Mirror's Edge type skybox and the usage of meshes like statues. I can't really recall any notable visual flaws at all. I thought the Shogo menu music used for the majority of the level got a little repetitive though as the song is so short. The weapon selection also seemed a bit bugged (the Quadshot and CAR showed up as using DP ammo, and didn't even appear on the selection bar a lot of the time).
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Subject: Re: [ut] [RELEASED] The Man from A.H.R.G.

Post Posted: 22 Mar 2011, 03:01

I found the sniper section to be pretty easy myself. I got killed once when I lunged for the health before the sniper rifle and learned that there were snipers around by dying.
I got killed again by missing a single sniper and waltzing out into the open.
The next time I owned everyone.
Maybe my eyesight is just good. :P
I really liked the music choice too.
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User avatar GTD-Carthage
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Subject: Re: [ut] [RELEASED] The Man from A.H.R.G.

Post Posted: 23 Mar 2011, 17:20

Jet v4.3.5 wrote:Great stuff, man.

Thanks for the compliment and taking a look. :D In all actuality, there a lot of design concepts in AHRG that pretty much offset from my usual method - for one, I did try simplifying architecture and instead, focused more on texturing and lighting. I must say for one however the part I worked the most for would be the lighting itself - I tried going for a more realistic modern 'cold air-conditioned' look which permeates throughout the entire map. As for texture alignment - I've picked up a lot of strange techniques that solved a whole slew of alignment issues in short order during my time away building this back then. (Good I still somehow remember them now - I can make a tutorial just in case. :P )

sana wrote:Fond play-testing memories.

It's all in good time. :P Unfortunately, nope, the scripts I needed never got addressed. :B A few fixes were done since then however but nothing significant either.

StalwartUK wrote:I apologise if I sound a bit dumb by posting this but how do you actually run this?

As a last resort, I would suggest double-clicking the map file. :P I have not yet encountered problems with bots being unequipped - but indeed, I will be uploading my own version of olextras.u shortly (being it's part of other mods and not OldSkool itself, I should have added it to begin with.)

XYZ8000 wrote:Glad to see that you're still around man

I must say I am astonished and a little surprised that you like it. :P When you said you were concerned about my use of bots - so was I. :lol: My largest fear having my gameplay associated with the still-infamous Unreality: Episode One. I tried to balance the amount of carnage by offering enough supply for the player as well as allies to actually take away fire from the player, given the hitscan nature of most weapons I've used so far. I'll have to make a trophy out of your praise now. :P

Mman wrote:Too bad it's apparently not going to be concluded.

[spoiler]The sniper section occasionally had problems with disappearing snipers but a tight look around will eventually reveal all their locations - the optimum spot to look for snipers is actually right behind the box, to the side on the right of where the rifle is initially found. As for the humor, I actually wanted to include some more 'sensible-outrageous' plot devices there but I apparently got too fixated on simply making the world more believable - in the end, it didn't really turn out to be the laugh-out-loud 'parody' project of sorts intended but I think it has so far been all in good effect.[/spoiler] And lastly - concluding the map is still an option, motivation being the only key factor for me so all is not lost yet... well, I hope.

[EDIT]
For those who may be experiencing problems like compatibility issues with olextras.u - http://giantpupae.chibits.co.uk/olextras_ahrg_compat.7z
Last edited by GTD-Carthage on 23 Mar 2011, 17:58, edited 2 times in total.

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Subject: Re: [ut] [RELEASED] The Man from A.H.R.G.

Post Posted: 23 Mar 2011, 17:34

Double post - it feels kind of weird to include project information and responses in one post so I'll keep this separate for organization.

Due to popular demand ('popular' read in Unreal community terms as at least three people), I have decided to 'try' building the second map - but as for right now, mostly for experimentation as it doesn't have a strict plan yet whatsoever (going "impromptu" at the moment). Some amounts of plot progression will be offered by second map aside from more dynamic cutscenes and interactive areas (those areas being limited to the cinematic and bomb things in map one which made it feel a little too static for me). Certain aspects of gameplay are to be more refined in this map with closer attention to fight sequences I'd be staging.

Whatever I'm doing right now is solely founded on newfound motivation as I haven't actually worked this much in the editor for some amounts of time so I have you guys to thank for it. :D I must say, I've been recently reminded of why I've went on a hiatus to begin with - conversely, why I shouldn't have gone on said hiatus. This isn't an official announcement for map 2 however. :P

---

For the heck of it, here are shots of a random section I've made in the second map:

In an attempt to further hi-jack the aesthetic style of Mirror's Edge, I tried doing the exaggerated radiosity/bleed lighting commonly found in Mirror's Edge maps. If there's one thing I really liked about ME lighting, it was the equal footing between fantasy artsy lighting and realism. :P
Image

Here is another shot of the same area from another angle - in this case, my attempt at making the sunny effect fancier is visible in the distance on the right which is actually composed of a two-color fog.
Image

I really like how this is turning out but as usual, fixing the lighting is now officially taking more time than anything else. :P Real Life is a bug as usual - got a job to mind now (two in fact). :P

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Subject: Re: [ut] [RELEASED] The Man from A.H.R.G.

Post Posted: 23 Mar 2011, 19:26

GTD-Carthage wrote:I must say I am astonished and a little surprised that you like it. :P When you said you were concerned about my use of bots - so was I. :lol: My largest fear having my gameplay associated with the still-infamous Unreality: Episode One. I tried to balance the amount of carnage by offering enough supply for the player as well as allies to actually take away fire from the player, given the hitscan nature of most weapons I've used so far. I'll have to make a trophy out of your praise now. :P


I was pretty surprised too when you came out of the blue and dropped here this SP map ;)
I'm not really the number one fan of those bots with hitscan weapons but the gameplay was refreshing and enjoyable, sometimes it's nice to have something else to shoot aside from Skaarjs and Mercenaries and Kralls and Kralls and Kralls and Kralls and Kralls and Kralls and Kralls and Kralls and Kralls. The map does need a little more polish (especially in the "make sure that the map can be opened without f*$%!^ up some vital gameplay functions" department) but I am sure that you will take care of that :)


Those new shots look nice, I always found UE1 lighting to be a PITA to do properly but it looks like you have it under control :)
Be careful of greenings when working with such bright lights though, near the lamps above the advertising signs there are some little traces of it although it's not really noticeable when taking in account the whole picture.

Keep up the good work :tup:

User avatar Jet v4.3.5
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Subject: Re: [ut] [RELEASED] The Man from A.H.R.G.

Post Posted: 23 Mar 2011, 20:49

Great to hear you're up for some more mapping, even if you still have RL to deal with. You're certainly one of the mappers that achieve good, aesthetic visuals in your maps to fantastic effect. Those shots being evidence to that alone. I'd love to see more stuff from you.
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Subject: Re: [ut] [RELEASED] The Man from A.H.R.G.

Post Posted: 23 Mar 2011, 23:32

Finished it just now. In the end I just summoned the weapons that the two guys needed. Very impressive stuff so far.
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Subject: Re: [ut] [RELEASED] The Man from A.H.R.G.

Post Posted: 23 Mar 2011, 23:57

These shots are just... beautiful O.o'
You're my idol Carthage.

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Subject: Re: [ut] [RELEASED] The Man from A.H.R.G.

Post Posted: 24 Mar 2011, 13:55

UPDATE! I was barely able to do much today - mostly because I've slowly ran out of things to experiment with for the time being aside from lack of time (Real Life dumpage). :lol:

I have decided to upgrade my Mirror's Edge style skybox to version two: [cue Still Alive song]
Image
It is now a Bullet's Edge skybox! :lol: Or is it Mirrorstorm... (note the FORCED widescreen! It actually makes everything better! All screenshots will now be in forced widescreen but without black bounding boxes! YAY FOR FORCED WIDESCREEN! IT IS SUPER-CONSOLIZED!)

On the other hand, here is a closer shot of the happy sunny part of the shot I showed yesterday - I refused to take a closer shot because it wasn't 'finished' yet that time. :P The two color-fog here actually has a superbright white core, and a not-so-equally bright orange 'skirt'.
Image

---

XYZ8000 wrote:I am sure that you will take care of that

I was really planning to publish the map one way or the other - I was just looking for the right time (read as getting off one's own ass to actually look for dependency packages and create a valid archive out of them). Other than that, indeed, I am still thinking of refining a lot of parts in map 1, beginning with the gametype problem.

As for the fugly dark white thing in undersatured lights, I've nerfed it down a little. It's only now I realize the color blending used by the old engine that has lead to this kind of crappy lighting effect.

Jet v4.3.5 wrote:Great to hear you're up for some more mapping

Thanks again - as of right now, any mapping I'm doing is solely for enjoyment so there's some doubt cast on whether I can keep this up until a time this second map actually gets more serious (and map 1 gets the needed refinements).

StalwartUK wrote:Finished it just now.
Thanks for playing - but I am still not sure how to fix the weaponlessness problem but perhaps the map renaming thing might fix it... but in all honesty, maybe I'm one of few people who feel bad about adding the prefix "ONP" to my map file name? :lol: I'll do it still anyway. :P

Qtit wrote:These shots

Thanks - but this is pretty much the only thing I can do. :lol: Most of your projects are pretty much dynamic feature and programming-heavy - something I'd wish to have the ability to similarly execute. :P

[Edit]
I have edited the skybox once more to make it more color-puked. :D I think it's sort of way too much now though.
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