Most of you won't know me, I recently started getting back into modding for sc2. Some of the newer maps are really cool, a lot of them aren't. My hope from this post is to rejuvenate our community, share ideas and of course create some sick ass games.
Isn't it time we as a community evolved away from the standard "Blizzard assets" and start using our own? Create something original. Be creative! Make a game that you would want to play. Hell if one person loves your game isn't that the point? Isn't that why you started modding in the first place?
Anyone can create a game if they have a passion for learning or anyone who gets excited when creating work of their own. If you're reading this, then most likely you're exactly that type of person. The SCII Editor is a powerful tool. Let's start using it to it's full potential.
Note: This is not a guide to make your map unique or creative. Just some helpful tips to get you back in the right direction.
Skills you or your team need
Knowledge of game design
Coding experience
Level design (Not terrain, more like how smooth your game flows)
ART/Animations
In their own right, all of these are necessary and vital to your creation. So lets go over them breifly
Game Design
A Game Designers main objective is to create game mechanics. Most game designers have a very analytical mind, these are the guys that play games to learn/understand how it works. Watch/Learn how different people play your game. In most cases the game designer also fills the role of programming.
Design your levels to fit your game design. This is where you have endless possibilities to make your map
"Pop" and usually what makes the difference between a good and great map.
Note: Don't try to create you're whole layout at once. Create a small map and expand.
Art
If you're going to be working as a team make sure you find an Artist/Modeler who will stick with the project until the end. Or just do it yourself.
So where do you start?
Choose a project with potential
Make a list of games you want to make, games you want to play, games you've had experience in making.
Usually the best choice is a project that falls under all three categories.
Brainstorm
Go back to the basics you learned in elementary school-
Brainstorm ideas (Write them down)
Outline your story (if story based game)
Draw out story boards
Think of possible problems that may arrise with the map you're making
What type of game are you making? (Has it been done before)
If so- What makes your version unique?
Will it be better?
Are you sure??
Organize your work
Instead of having 500 files all over your desktop... ORGANIZE your folders. It will make your life/work much easier. This is probably one of my weakest skills and can be hard to learn.. just do it.
Make sure the core game is fun
Use core mechanics that are fun for the user, even the most basic mechanics should be fun or your game is already set up to fail. This will make it easier for you further on in development if you have to cut parts out of your game, you have your core to fall back on.
A well thought out post, but your stance on using all your own assets is pointless, the only real reason to use this editor is so you dont HAVE to gather your own assets :P that being said a few custom models and Textures never hurt haha.
as far as skill that will be needed :DD, I have none of those well atleast I didnt when I began :D.
if you have all of that its better to just move to unity (as a good portion of the community has.).
A well thought out post, but your stance on using all your own assets is pointless, the only real reason to use this editor is so you dont HAVE to gather your own assets :P that being said a few custom models and Textures never hurt haha.
Why is this? Blizzard was excited about the map marketplace. The reason it hasnt been released yet? Because no game is good enough. They want players to be inventive and creative. Hell blizzard started out with games like the Lost Vikings..
as far as skill that will be needed :DD, I have none of those well atleast I didnt when I began :D.
if you have all of that its better to just move to unity (as a good portion of the community has.).
Apart from that though great post :D.
Right, I understand people have moved on to other platforms. But the post was about making games for SC2. I want map creators to use the SC2 Editor to create games that are unique. The limitations of the Editor should be treated as obstacles instead of just saying "Oh thats just not possible".
Blizzards map marketplace was an idiotic idea passed down from Kotick(This has been stated), Its not the lack of good games that keeping it, its the lack of support, only about half of the community wants it, and of that half about half of those don't even understand what was planned.
Also your own assets? what? why... why work in SOMEONE ELSES GAMES IF YOUR NOT GOING TO USE THE FREE ASSETS GIVEN THATS PLAIN STUPIDITY... Also blizzards early games weren't inventive .... -_-, they might have been decent games, but they were pretty generic, or at least the ones I have played..
just dont get me started on this stupid idea of a marketplace, if you wanna make money go somewhere else...you will have better chances. go make Tf2 hats. -_-.
You know who you are. You've spent two months on a project making physics systems, a character creation screen, swappable weapons, inventory, etc. In other words, you've got a Ghost and a patch of grass. I'm not harping on you, I know that feel. The left brain is such a straightforward and manageable place. But stop it! TWO SOLUTIONS: 1) Get in the habit of creating a playable prototype as quickly as possible. The quicker you have a prototype with adversaries, level design and actual gameplay, the quicker you can discern whether your core design is worth a damn. 2) Find a team who needs a code monkey.
No core design whatsoever
Sort of similar, but worse. In this context, "core design" means "vision." It's sort of like when you put all your mental energy into a periphery feature and neglect everything else. An example would be creating a bunch of skill trees before even thinking about the levels or the enemies. Core design is the basis for everything, like a margin on notebook paper. How many enemies are you typically fighting at a time? How big are they? How big are the levels? What about bosses? At what frequencies? Your skill trees will have no connection to anything. SOLUTION: Slow your role. Then flip the script. Try to translate your enthusiasm for the periphery stuff into the core design. For example, perhaps you could tie exploration into the skill trees (kill 25 gnomes to get Gnome Stomp).
Released too early
Sometimes I'll try a map and the loading screen will start apologizing for it. Alpha and beta releases are fine, but don't release something if you don't think it's worth our time. I understand that feedback is critically important, and there's nothing wrong with wanting it early. The problem is that the cause of all the negative feedback is likely to stem from incompleteness and nothing else. The testers aren't going to fill in the blanks and give you "theoretical feedback," and if they did it wouldn't be worth anything either. SOLUTION: Make your time, like Goku with the Spirit Bomb. Gauge your map's readiness for public testing by the "demo" rule: one complete level (depending on the genre) with all the fixin's.
You can't play it
No one plays the map, so it's unplayable. SOLUTION: If the map is crap after all, cut your losses. But if you truly believe it's special then you owe it to yourself to make it playable with basic AI, "challenge mode," or whatever the genre calls for. You've already ran 20 miles, run 21 miles and immortalize your map, or else you wasted 20 miles. I can't tell you how many maps I've stumbled across that I wanted to investigate and appreciate but just...couldn't. Oh well.
Great post really, all true too :P, thats how people like me profit I find people like number 1. and have them help me on my project :P thats why Evo-Frenzy is awesome right now, because all of those mechanics that are being made, I see 1 I like and there we go :DD
It's hard to talk about this stuff without feeling like some kind of armchair general. Like, what the hell have I done lately. But I just love threads like these.
For what it's worth to the OP I'm sticking around. I'm not about to throw in the towel just yet, my pride won't allow it. I'll finish this one for sure.
EDIT: Your team looks like a real pack of winners. I guess The Masturbators was taken then. Sons of bitches. Also taken.
@wisp: nor content in your posts apparently.. but it is all good.. because you added caps and bitching around.
@ op: i totally agree that originality should be key.. the linchpin...
Too bad players don't try out stuff they don't know.. in my day "word of mouth" was all there was, you guys have the reverse issue "too many games". Life is weird like that, we always think the grass is greener somewhere else, yet we mostly all remain or retain a status quo.. humans are the only species this weird.
:^D
I agree with the notion that people should be making more original maps. I mostly play origonal type games and try to make them when i make a game. Given my preference for origonal games i havnt played custom games in SC2 very much at all, while i played them quite a bit in wc3. It all goes back to the same thing really, the popularity system which was out for like 2 years killed off the map making community to the point where it couldnt recover. And even this new arcade system is still shit, becuase even though their is a games list like in wc3 no one uses it becuase it is not the most convient option, players are lazy and will always go with whats convienent.
People get on and open up their booksmark list or just go to the top 10 and play the same games they have been playing for the past 2-3 years, never looking at the open games list (Even i do this). The way new origonal games where able to be played in wc3 was everyone was forced to look at the game list, so everyone saw these new interesting origonal games in teh list and could actrually make the decision to give them a try, giving the game an actual life. A game cant be played to any decent extent if no one ever sees it.
Sure there is problems with people not being origonal. Many people, including people on this site basically just want to make a cookie cutter tower defense or dota map, how many of these do we really need, come up with something original.
I really like the art assets and in some games i think they could make a huge difference. For example if you made a lotr game, sure you could use SC2 units but there would be no emersion at all and the game just wouldnt be all that playable, or Jurassic park for example. Both these games have been made for SC2 and wc3, plenty of people played them in wc3, but no one plays the very same games made for SC2 because they use SC2 models and assets, which is just ridiculous it doenst fit the theme at all.
Of course the problem with this is the amount of time making the art assets takes. The only real viable solution is as you said to have a team, where one guy works on art assets through the entire project while another guy does everything else. However there are few qualified map makers left and very few teams. Heck most teams i see these days are jsut a group of people that have no idea how to make maps, so they formed a team hoping someone else in that team could basically teach them or do the work for them.
So essentially i think the map community was just killed the point of no return by the popularity system, and the arcade system isnt much better. But i will also say im against the map market, these games should be free, and im saying that when my first i made was ranked #2 on battlenet overall during the peak of its popularity.
And i also do not understnad peoples problems with finishing maps, though i know its very common. If i put it abunch of time working on a map or on anything, i would never not finish it, or i would of wasted all that time. Put in teh rest of the time and you atleast get something out of it.
Most of you won't know me, I recently started getting back into modding for sc2. Some of the newer maps are really cool, a lot of them aren't. My hope from this post is to rejuvenate our community, share ideas and of course create some sick ass games.
Isn't it time we as a community evolved away from the standard "Blizzard assets" and start using our own? Create something original. Be creative! Make a game that you would want to play. Hell if one person loves your game isn't that the point? Isn't that why you started modding in the first place? Anyone can create a game if they have a passion for learning or anyone who gets excited when creating work of their own. If you're reading this, then most likely you're exactly that type of person. The SCII Editor is a powerful tool. Let's start using it to it's full potential.
Note: This is not a guide to make your map unique or creative. Just some helpful tips to get you back in the right direction.
Skills you or your team need
In their own right, all of these are necessary and vital to your creation. So lets go over them breifly
Game Design
A Game Designers main objective is to create game mechanics. Most game designers have a very analytical mind, these are the guys that play games to learn/understand how it works. Watch/Learn how different people play your game. In most cases the game designer also fills the role of programming.
Coding experience
Pretty obvious - LEARN TO CODE! Can't figure something out? Search for resources around the net. http://www.Sc2mapster.com http://www.hiveworkshop.com
Level Design
Design your levels to fit your game design. This is where you have endless possibilities to make your map "Pop" and usually what makes the difference between a good and great map.
Note: Don't try to create you're whole layout at once. Create a small map and expand.
Art
If you're going to be working as a team make sure you find an Artist/Modeler who will stick with the project until the end. Or just do it yourself.
So where do you start?
Choose a project with potential
Make a list of games you want to make, games you want to play, games you've had experience in making.
Usually the best choice is a project that falls under all three categories.
Brainstorm
Go back to the basics you learned in elementary school-
Brainstorm ideas (Write them down) Outline your story (if story based game) Draw out story boards Think of possible problems that may arrise with the map you're making What type of game are you making? (Has it been done before) If so- What makes your version unique? Will it be better? Are you sure??
Organize your work
Instead of having 500 files all over your desktop... ORGANIZE your folders. It will make your life/work much easier. This is probably one of my weakest skills and can be hard to learn.. just do it.
Make sure the core game is fun
Use core mechanics that are fun for the user, even the most basic mechanics should be fun or your game is already set up to fail. This will make it easier for you further on in development if you have to cut parts out of your game, you have your core to fall back on.
Make use of cameras/cutscenes
Finishing your game
Read this http://makegames.tumblr.com/post/1136623767/finishing-a-game
Everyone wants to make the "greatest game" ever created. But the fact is, you won't. "You have to walk before you run"
Although mostly overlooked when you start designing a game make sure you have the time needed to complete your project!
If you're feeling like you're getting ahead of yourself early on then you probably are; take a breath and go back to your basics.
@Tehwildcard: Go
A well thought out post, but your stance on using all your own assets is pointless, the only real reason to use this editor is so you dont HAVE to gather your own assets :P that being said a few custom models and Textures never hurt haha.
as far as skill that will be needed :DD, I have none of those well atleast I didnt when I began :D.
if you have all of that its better to just move to unity (as a good portion of the community has.).
Apart from that though great post :D.
How to make a custom game:
Have the drive and desire to do it.
How to make a good custom game:
Have the time and patience to polish it.
GOLDEN!
Why is this? Blizzard was excited about the map marketplace. The reason it hasnt been released yet? Because no game is good enough. They want players to be inventive and creative. Hell blizzard started out with games like the Lost Vikings..
Right, I understand people have moved on to other platforms. But the post was about making games for SC2. I want map creators to use the SC2 Editor to create games that are unique. The limitations of the Editor should be treated as obstacles instead of just saying "Oh thats just not possible".
@Tehwildcard: Go
Blizzards map marketplace was an idiotic idea passed down from Kotick(This has been stated), Its not the lack of good games that keeping it, its the lack of support, only about half of the community wants it, and of that half about half of those don't even understand what was planned.
Also your own assets? what? why... why work in SOMEONE ELSES GAMES IF YOUR NOT GOING TO USE THE FREE ASSETS GIVEN THATS PLAIN STUPIDITY... Also blizzards early games weren't inventive .... -_-, they might have been decent games, but they were pretty generic, or at least the ones I have played..
just dont get me started on this stupid idea of a marketplace, if you wanna make money go somewhere else...you will have better chances. go make Tf2 hats. -_-.
@Taintedwisp: Go
You mad?...
This was not a post to advocate a map market place. You're OK.
@Tehwildcard: Go
Another Taintedwisp thread hijacking:)
REASONS FOR MAP FAILURE:
Avoiding content creation like the plague
You know who you are. You've spent two months on a project making physics systems, a character creation screen, swappable weapons, inventory, etc. In other words, you've got a Ghost and a patch of grass. I'm not harping on you, I know that feel. The left brain is such a straightforward and manageable place. But stop it! TWO SOLUTIONS: 1) Get in the habit of creating a playable prototype as quickly as possible. The quicker you have a prototype with adversaries, level design and actual gameplay, the quicker you can discern whether your core design is worth a damn. 2) Find a team who needs a code monkey.
No core design whatsoever
Sort of similar, but worse. In this context, "core design" means "vision." It's sort of like when you put all your mental energy into a periphery feature and neglect everything else. An example would be creating a bunch of skill trees before even thinking about the levels or the enemies. Core design is the basis for everything, like a margin on notebook paper. How many enemies are you typically fighting at a time? How big are they? How big are the levels? What about bosses? At what frequencies? Your skill trees will have no connection to anything. SOLUTION: Slow your role. Then flip the script. Try to translate your enthusiasm for the periphery stuff into the core design. For example, perhaps you could tie exploration into the skill trees (kill 25 gnomes to get Gnome Stomp).
Released too early
Sometimes I'll try a map and the loading screen will start apologizing for it. Alpha and beta releases are fine, but don't release something if you don't think it's worth our time. I understand that feedback is critically important, and there's nothing wrong with wanting it early. The problem is that the cause of all the negative feedback is likely to stem from incompleteness and nothing else. The testers aren't going to fill in the blanks and give you "theoretical feedback," and if they did it wouldn't be worth anything either. SOLUTION: Make your time, like Goku with the Spirit Bomb. Gauge your map's readiness for public testing by the "demo" rule: one complete level (depending on the genre) with all the fixin's.
You can't play it
No one plays the map, so it's unplayable. SOLUTION: If the map is crap after all, cut your losses. But if you truly believe it's special then you owe it to yourself to make it playable with basic AI, "challenge mode," or whatever the genre calls for. You've already ran 20 miles, run 21 miles and immortalize your map, or else you wasted 20 miles. I can't tell you how many maps I've stumbled across that I wanted to investigate and appreciate but just...couldn't. Oh well.
@TheZizz: Go
Great post really, all true too :P, thats how people like me profit I find people like number 1. and have them help me on my project :P thats why Evo-Frenzy is awesome right now, because all of those mechanics that are being made, I see 1 I like and there we go :DD
It's hard to talk about this stuff without feeling like some kind of armchair general. Like, what the hell have I done lately. But I just love threads like these.
For what it's worth to the OP I'm sticking around. I'm not about to throw in the towel just yet, my pride won't allow it. I'll finish this one for sure.
EDIT: Your team looks like a real pack of winners. I guess The Masturbators was taken then. Sons of bitches. Also taken.
@TheZizz: Go
I am guessing my newly formed team haha, I just wanted this team name. haha, There is no ACTUAL mapping team.
@wisp: nor content in your posts apparently.. but it is all good.. because you added caps and bitching around.
@ op: i totally agree that originality should be key.. the linchpin... Too bad players don't try out stuff they don't know.. in my day "word of mouth" was all there was, you guys have the reverse issue "too many games". Life is weird like that, we always think the grass is greener somewhere else, yet we mostly all remain or retain a status quo.. humans are the only species this weird. :^D
I agree with the notion that people should be making more original maps. I mostly play origonal type games and try to make them when i make a game. Given my preference for origonal games i havnt played custom games in SC2 very much at all, while i played them quite a bit in wc3. It all goes back to the same thing really, the popularity system which was out for like 2 years killed off the map making community to the point where it couldnt recover. And even this new arcade system is still shit, becuase even though their is a games list like in wc3 no one uses it becuase it is not the most convient option, players are lazy and will always go with whats convienent.
People get on and open up their booksmark list or just go to the top 10 and play the same games they have been playing for the past 2-3 years, never looking at the open games list (Even i do this). The way new origonal games where able to be played in wc3 was everyone was forced to look at the game list, so everyone saw these new interesting origonal games in teh list and could actrually make the decision to give them a try, giving the game an actual life. A game cant be played to any decent extent if no one ever sees it.
Sure there is problems with people not being origonal. Many people, including people on this site basically just want to make a cookie cutter tower defense or dota map, how many of these do we really need, come up with something original.
I really like the art assets and in some games i think they could make a huge difference. For example if you made a lotr game, sure you could use SC2 units but there would be no emersion at all and the game just wouldnt be all that playable, or Jurassic park for example. Both these games have been made for SC2 and wc3, plenty of people played them in wc3, but no one plays the very same games made for SC2 because they use SC2 models and assets, which is just ridiculous it doenst fit the theme at all.
Of course the problem with this is the amount of time making the art assets takes. The only real viable solution is as you said to have a team, where one guy works on art assets through the entire project while another guy does everything else. However there are few qualified map makers left and very few teams. Heck most teams i see these days are jsut a group of people that have no idea how to make maps, so they formed a team hoping someone else in that team could basically teach them or do the work for them.
So essentially i think the map community was just killed the point of no return by the popularity system, and the arcade system isnt much better. But i will also say im against the map market, these games should be free, and im saying that when my first i made was ranked #2 on battlenet overall during the peak of its popularity.
And i also do not understnad peoples problems with finishing maps, though i know its very common. If i put it abunch of time working on a map or on anything, i would never not finish it, or i would of wasted all that time. Put in teh rest of the time and you atleast get something out of it.