SP-District

[evilmrfrank]

Name: SP-District
Game: Gears of War PC

Description:
This was a small level I designed as part of a design test for Epic as part of their hiring process. They gave me permission to release it to the public so here it is :) The level is pretty small only about 5-10 minutes worth of gameplay. Read the readme included with the map on how to install it.

Screenshots:
http://evilmrfrank.com/images/SP-District1.JPG

http://evilmrfrank.com/images/SP-District2.JPG

http://evilmrfrank.com/images/SP-District3.JPG

http://evilmrfrank.com/images/SP-District4.JPG

Download:

http://evilmrfrank.com/Files/SP-District.zip

[darksin]

thx!!, feedback later, ....

[evilmrfrank]

Just fixed it. My webhost is a bit picky and just cause the F in files wasnt capital it didnt work :B It's fixed now :P

[darksin]

Played it, a very short sp ,finished within 2 minutes, shoot the troika gunner dead, then kick the door, game ends.

The map optimized very well, good framerate, detailed object. Lack some cover spot on some entrance pillars,
also need more lighting, the whole map looks very dark, there're also some collision bug, like we can penetrate walls.
Finally i found the map seems too brown, is that the right color theme ?

Overall a good level design, almost official quality, looks very natural, less man made trail, beautiful buildings...
i enjoy the gameplay although it's very short,if you can make some horde map like this, our gears game life will be awesome...

[evilmrfrank]

I had a lot of issues with cover spots and AI using them when it was obvious they shouldn't have been. I'm sure there are tricks to get around this but I couldn't figure them out so I had to end up removing them :( The whole brown look is what I was going for but I kind of over did it, could have used a lot more contrast in shaded areas. Sadly I don't think I'll be making any more gears maps. Perhaps after the Make Something Unreal Contest is over and I get bored I'll pick up Gears and make some more maps for it :)

Thanks for the feedback :)

[Taffer]

Wow, you're in the hiring process?!

It looks very nice, you seem to have the "destroyed beauty" look down very well.

[evilmrfrank]

It was a part of the hiring process but I wasn't quite good enough I suppose, just gotta try harder next time :)

[NewPCGamer]

this map looks great. awesome work.
are you all self taught? or did you go to any sort of schooling?
either way awesome work

[Taffer]

It was a part of the hiring process but I wasn't quite good enough I suppose, just gotta try harder next time :)

That's honestly still really ****ing cool.

[evilmrfrank]

this map looks great. awesome work.
are you all self taught? or did you go to any sort of schooling?
either way awesome work

Self taught mapper for previous versions of the UE, although I did learn a lot of what I know about UE3 from working at Gearbox Software :D

[JUGGERNUT]

I liked this map, reminded me of another map, SP_Square.

[snake85027]

I saw that you worked on damnation, why didn't they have a cover system, I couldn't play the game for 5 minutes, it looked great and had a cool story from what Ive read but I am so use to cover and believe the game would have been better with it.

[Taffer]

I played it, it was quite good.

Visually it's really well-done. There's minor gripes in the lighting but it's mostly very solid.

Gameplay-wise, you played around with loops FAR more than Epic has ever done. I'm actually a fan of loops and I liked it quite a bit. It's very cool being able to see yourself progress thru the environment.

I would say that the biggest downfall is the encounters. You mentioned that the AI do not work and do not attempt to flank the player, but I can't seem to remember instances where you gave AI the opportunity to flank. Almost all of the encounters were head-on, and as a result were somewhat static. Fun, but multiple playthru's yield similar results.

I've also noticed something interesting. Epic typically sets up encounters the same way that someone like Bungie does (studio behind the Halo games). Each encounter is treated separately. You move into this room, you fight these enemies. You walk thru a hallway, and when you approach the next room you get the next set of enemies, etc. The way you've set it up here is that the entire level is treated as ONE giant encounter. Opponents are trickled in and spawned close to the player as you move thru the environment, and it was often one or two enemies at a time.

Overall it was a very solid map. Sure, it was short, but you showcased quite a bit of scripting, and I had fun. Keep it up.

[evilmrfrank]

I saw that you worked on damnation, why didn't they have a cover system, I couldn't play the game for 5 minutes, it looked great and had a cool story from what Ive read but I am so use to cover and believe the game would have been better with it.

I came in only in the last 6 months of development on that project so I can't tell you why things turned out for the most part like they did. I agree it probably would have been a bit better with a cover system of sorts but it wasn't my job to make those decisions :)

Thanks for the feedback Taffer. I really didn't get a hang of how their AI works or how to set them up correctly so the gameplay probably is pretty crappy in a lot of ways. I basically had to script the heck out of them to force the AI to just sit still in most of the combats cause they were always doing stupid stuff I didn't want them to :B I agree about it being one big combat, it was a bit of a mistake setting things up that way :)

Thanks :)