I remember when this thing hit the scene, and made our lives at the cybercafe both easier and harder.

Got inspired after visiting the MFABoston.

The Cohost Mapping Potluck inspired me to see what's changed in the last three decades with both the software and how I think about constructing things in Quake. It's been a hot minute since I've done anything specifically with Quake and mapping.

Over the course of about a week and a half, a few hours a day, I constructed a little map from scratch. My main goal was to apply things as I learned about them. And most importantly, conclude the project. Finishing projects is a tough skill to improve.

FlowBase01

Map Info

• Single Player (it has no deathmatch spawns)
• Short (5 mins give or take)
• Supports Easy/Hard very mildly.
• A handful of dumb secrets, the first one being my favorite.
• Untextured beyond Prototype.wad.

You can find the map here: https://shysaursoft.itch.io/flowbase01

_{(vkQuake recommended just because it's awesome and fast.)}

Some thoughts on the tools, lessons learned and advice below the cut.

From https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wLHXn8IlAiA, which is a great explainer.

Just about done. Was worried I'd lose interest before finishing it.

Misadventures.

Whenever I'm doing layouts, I always feel like I'm excising some demons placed there by Circus Charlie when I was a kid.

Supposed to be concentrating on working (level design) but all I can think of is this finishing this Quake map side-project, and its (why did I think it was a good idea) stupid spiral.

Lightmaps are so beautiful. I know precalc fell out of favour when the 90s brought all the coloured lighting, but there's something to be said about a hard-baked (with modern light tools) lightmap.

Get the whole pride out

There's something magical about when you get your first patroller set up.

Discovered surface for a light tag. This is going to work out much better. (Entire level lit using only surfaces, rather than spamming light entities everywhere).

If you do any kind of creative work (drawing, level design, etc) and there is wrist action involved (where the wrist rests on a surface), get an Artist Drawing Glove. You'll thank yourself. They last a good while, are cheap, and saves you from callouses.

Some Excite Bike shapes.

gator joes slopshack (2018)

Some more doodling in Trenchbroom today. Wanted to answer some questions about monster teathering using geometry, ended up practicing massing instead.

I always enjoy the difference in the forced-perspective geometry between Hyrule Field's entrance to the castle in the N64 version of Ocarina vs the 3DS 'remaster'. Talk about going above and beyond for an area you only see through a small frame before teleporting.

a level

Today's experiments and practice.