81 replies to this topic

[Athom83]

I mean... we got a new map a few months ago, and Solaris will be adding a few more maps... and they have another 2 full-size maps in the pipeline... so...

Khalcruth, on 22 February 2018 - 09:23 AM, said:

Yeah, I don't buy the whole "$250000 to make a single map" figure. That adds up to 5 people at $50000 spending an entire year doing that and nothing else. I don't believe that for a second.

Keeping mind PGI has a team of about 50 people IIRC, so that rather makes it 5k per person if they all have something to with making the map. Of course that doesn't include bills, taxes, and other expenses.

[Valdarion Silarius]

This is why I wished PGI would openly allow community map contributions. Not only would it save them money, but it would help prolong the life of the game and help save them time for other things that need to be addressed in MW:O.

[JediPanther]

Bombast, on 22 February 2018 - 10:05 AM, said:

I think think kind of highlights the issue mentioned earlier - map voting has really messed up the way we think about maps, to the point where asking for more of them faster is pointless. You completely forgot a map you actually liked existed simply because no one ever plays on it.

But you sure as **** remembered Grim Plexus and it's history, because we've all got summer homes in that good forsaken **** hole.

That made me laugh because its so true. I can just set my mech speed to half and go make a sandwitch on grim because 98% of the fighting is at F6. Pgi has an obsession with F 6 on a few other maps. And with the heard mentality of pugs in qp you know exactly where the fighting is going to happen on so many maps all you need is auto pilot your mech to the grid then go do whatever and come back when the shooting starts.

The only time I feel like I have to be-a-scout and wish I had full sensors is on polar lrm lands but even then it's still going to be pretty much H-9 most of the time. Alpine has its K-L hole of death for one side. Canyon has Pride Rock on d3-d4 that every one nascars around.

The one time I lead the pugs on Terra we went into the old terra firma's ring of death in the H area and won because so many people don't know how to play that ring any more. Makes me kind of miss the days of ramps and door fighting trying not to art strike the herd so that they move through the ramp or off it.

[HGAK47]

I just wish that for the love of god PGI would chop up some of the larger maps and make 2 or 3 unique maps out of the collosal ones that have so much area that is barely ever used.

A good example in my mind would be the sort of tucked away outpost area on Alpine peaks. That small area could be an interesting map all in itself.

How about those faction play maps? Could they not be utilised with a little adjustment too? For the record I actually quite like Ruby Oasis (the newest map to date that came out recently)

[Captain Caveman DE]

so.. concerning new maps:
I srsly want those, too.

also different map within the same "landscape set" would be easy and GOOD for the game, while costing a lot less (as everything is already finished, you just have to rearrange paths etc); take the canyon-set, do a new map with that; "job's done".

otoh, and striking a blow here for PGI (and speaking of QP only):
we can have all the maps in the world - the number 1 reason that makes them so repetitive is the people playing on them;
Rive city could be 2 quadrants big (those 2 around the citadel) and 19 out of 20 here wouldn't see the difference.
cause all they do is to run around that thing.
crim plex is very big, yet we always fight in the same spot.. and so on.
maybe people should try something new - like teamplay, tactics and new paths.. but yeah.. who am I kidding..

[Bud Crue]

A discussion on maps and the lack thereof was not at all what I was expecting from the thread title.
I must say, I am a bit disappointed.

[Exilyth]

Most modern game engines

• have a terrain generator that can give you a basic elevation model within a few seconds to minutes, also generating texture coordinates along the way.
  
• contain functions to map texture layers to the terrain by conditions, e.g. "slopes steeper than 70° get a rock texture".
  
• provide the ability to define regions and fill them with scatter terrain like trees, plants, rocks and rubble in a pseudorandom manner (e.g. via poison disk sampling).
  
• require the user to play around with a bunch of parameters in each step
  
• require the user to place large structures by hand
  
• allow the user to touch up any part of the map after the random part of map generation is complete

By looking at the above list and trying out cry-sdk (cryengine map editor), we can trivially conclude that cryengine is not a modern game engine.

Let's just hope that MW:O will be ported to UE some time after MW5 is released - maybe some MW5 maps could be reused then.


And talking about maps which don't show up often enough: anyone remember canyon network?

Thermoluminescence, on 22 February 2018 - 06:59 AM, said:

Some thread said it costs $250,000 to make a new map, but that is illogical.

I just hope PGI isn't using the 'lumberyard' version of cryengine. THAT would be highly illogical, but would explain the high map creation cost.

Edited by Exilyth, 22 February 2018 - 12:38 PM.

[Zigmund Freud]

Want more maps, but have no time or money to make them?
Want to please your player base and deliver more diverse gameplay?
Click inside for one weird trick!

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Step 1: add old Terra, old River City, old Forest Colony (I love you, PGI, just please bring back old Forest Colony), and that old Frost Winter Something City maps, both of them.

Step 2: disable map voting.

Here ya go! With this one simple trick you added 5 maps that that old whales will **** their pants for, and increased probability of getting a rarely used map in your games. And most important, you spent like 10 minutes on this!

[Bombast]

Exilyth, on 22 February 2018 - 12:36 PM, said:

Most modern game engines[list]
I just hope PGI isn't using the 'lumberyard' version of cryengine. THAT would be highly illogical, but would explain the high map creation cost.

Lumberyard would probably be an improvement over what MWO uses (Some butchered variant of CE 2.something). At least Lumberyard is standardized.

[Bombast]

Exilyth, on 22 February 2018 - 12:36 PM, said:

And talking about maps which don't show up often enough: anyone remember canyon network?

Canyon. Anyone here remember when Canyon was what Grim Plexus is now?

I actually like Canyon now that it's rare, but I hated it prior to Incursion/Escort when the game was basically 'HPG/Canyon Warrior Online.'

Edited by Bombast, 22 February 2018 - 12:55 PM.

[Exilyth]

Bombast, on 22 February 2018 - 12:47 PM, said:

Lumberyard would probably be an improvement over what MWO uses (Some butchered variant of CE 2.something). At least Lumberyard is standardized.

Lumberyard uses amazon web services to do the compiling steps of turning editor maps into game maps - which costs money to use. it also uses amazon web services for the servers - which costs money to use.
Software as a service...

[Grus]

On the maps subject.



we need bigger maps but not just that. a new mode. lets call it "Wargrounds" im taking inspiration from the way MWLL plays. so you'll need to actually get good rewards for capturing and holding bases and F.O.B's. at said locations repair and reloads are available. NO RE-SPAWNS! This will make your choices oh how you A; load out your mech B; play your mech and C; coordinate movements and positioning with the rest of your team.

THIS is what i want out of my Mechwarrior.

[Yosharian]

The maps should be entirely randomly generated

[Thermoluminescence]

Bud Crue, on 22 February 2018 - 12:09 PM, said:

A discussion on maps and the lack thereof was not at all what I was expecting from the thread title.
I must say, I am a bit disappointed.

It is best to focus on one thing at a time.

If you pile it all on at once it will get glazed over and probably the thread will be locked...

Or to be more specific, my other complaints require changes to the engine or netcode and that seems out of grasp.

[BumbleBee]

A good short term stop gap measure would be to take an existing map, say Alpine Peaks and move the spawn points and call it "Alpine Peaks B", do that again and call it "Alpine Peaks C". Even if the new spawn points were in the bottom right and bottom left, it is currently completely unused terrain and would help freshen the experience a little.

But seriously, voting needs to go. It doesn't matter how many maps there are, it will still be 4-5 maps making up 90% of the drops. You may even start seeing some variation in setups, and therefore tactics, if there is a decent chance that a warm brawling map may come up instead of almost being guaranteed to be on a cool long range map like it is now

[Spare Parts Bin]

We need a map that looks like the city in Expendibles lll(you know the movie with Stallone,Swartzneger,Jet Lee,etc.). All bombed out large lanes but rubble and fires everywhere. Weather or other conditions like radiation levels could reduce ECM,Stealth Armour effectiveness. Chemical clouds could reduce visibility outside but not inside damaged structures. That's my $.02.

[jjm1]

Alcom Isst, on 22 February 2018 - 07:08 AM, said:

Between conceptualization, greyboxing, testing, redesigning, creating new model and art assets, structuring and painting terrain, testing, redesigning, constructing the map with finished assets, testing, redesigning, testing, release, handling bug reports, and testing... $250,000 sounds like a fair number to me for a low estimate. People need to get payed, yo.

Take a good look at MWO map assets and they are really basic. Rubellite with its recycled assets and simple UVW work should be doable in weeks. Send to community to find the holes, and done.

[Jackal Noble]

^
That guy knows what he is talking about, pay heed.

[Roughneck45]

Its more the voting than the maps. There are 22 maps across the various modes.

They just need to take another pass at the ones people never vote for, add a few more lanes of attack and cover options to make them more dynamic.

[Wil McCullough]

Alcom Isst, on 22 February 2018 - 07:08 AM, said:

Between conceptualization, greyboxing, testing, redesigning, creating new model and art assets, structuring and painting terrain, testing, redesigning, constructing the map with finished assets, testing, redesigning, testing, release, handling bug reports, and testing... $250,000 sounds like a fair number to me for a low estimate. People need to get payed, yo.

I don't see evidence of a lot of those processes in mwo.

Invisible walls, random terrain glitches on grim plexus/tourmaline that can catapult a mech literally kilometers up in the air and shatter both legs upon landing, potholes that mechs can walk into on forest colony but can't get out of.

All those have been around for years.

Most of the maps are also recolored assets. So more than half of the processes you mentioned aren't even done. If they are, then the people doing it are useless and should be fired.