[WIP] 'Only A Test' UPDATE 1/09
Hober, filling in the gaps for my poorly thought out, often harassing posts since 10/13/07.
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Seeing as how you credited me for testing in the map, I figured I should probably actually test the map for you.
This is what I saw when I was playing:
first room needs celing speakers for central audio. You cannot hear the voice when moving to certain areas.
conveyor walls are portalable. inside and out.
if you pick up the additional ASHPD's fromt the conveyor, they dissapear. Suggest taking ASHPD's model and creating a new object that can be manipulated much like a camera can.
inside cube chute, end wall has nodraw texture. If you walk inside, you can see areas of the map that you should not be able to.
Monitor cables in gravity gun room look very unprofessional. - takes away from apature's "Clean" look and feel.
floor around the ASHPD pedistal is not portalable, despite floor of the same texture being portalable near by.
You can no longer re-acess the starting room in the second map, whereas you can in the first one.
Celing light above computer workstation by conveyor does not require the wire. Wire would be provided from directly above fixture and not seen by the player. Also, the wire doesn't go all the way to the wall. It just stops.
Metal door inside gravity gun room is portalable.
Where the concrete brakes, there is no sign of anything within the concrete. In reality, there would be rebar, and pipes containing water/gas/wires. Might be a bitch to add in for something so frivilous, but I just figured I'd mention it anyway.
Keep in mind that I was very picky, and noted the smallest of issues that I could find.
Okay, huge update. I added the maps I have up to beta testing. All of them are linked into one giant map with transitions. I think this will be about 1/3 the size of the entire pack.
Lorithad: Thanks for the tips. I hate to say it, but you're right about the wires. I spent a full hour getting the wires to react appropriately to pulling out the grate. Oh well.
first map no longer has audio track
While you can no longer enter the cube chute that the conveyor leads to, it is possible to drop a cube inside and not be able to retrieve it.
inside the first duct, there should be a grate of some kind protecting the fan. To prevent the willy wonka mishapps.
First button is not activated by sphere. Goes against established rules.
area with button that sphere is suppost to go on is very large. Very easy to have the sphere miss the button and have to restart the puzzle (or use the gravity gun I guess. Meh. Whatever.
Weighted companion cube does not activate 1st button. Again, goes against established rules.
The two doors that the 1st button opens, the second one in the series, you can see when the doors go past their frame. Also, the door leads to nowhere.
This second door also does not close fully when the first door is
The large device in the room with the combine shield tunnel(the one that has the blue motor looking thing attached to it). Not all of it is solid. You can walk through bits.
Forced to leave the WCC in map 2.
I'll do another run through of the third map when I get home from work today, and post all my picky observations here then.
However, I must say that now that I know the previous two maps are connected to the third map, which you released quite some time ago, I no longer have a problem with the whole "Why the hell do I have the gravity gun" thing.
Fixed. Forgot to use pakrat.
Those cubes aren't actually needed anywhere, they're remnants from the previous map.
Added to the todo list.
area with button that sphere is suppost to go on is very large. Very easy to have the sphere miss the button and have to restart the puzzle (or use the gravity gun I guess. Meh. Whatever.
I've thought up a better way to set up the puzzle. Soon to be fixed.
Now here is a problem. My intended solution to the puzzle is that
Oops, those second doors aren't supposed to open. My mistake.
That's going to be fixed as well.
That prop doesn't have collision data in places. I can't really fix that, unless I make a large number of invisible brushes.
It's going to be a WSC.
However, I must say that now that I know the previous two maps are connected to the third map, which you released quite some time ago, I no longer have a problem with the whole "Why the hell do I have the gravity gun" thing.
Lastly, thanks and a question. First, thanks again for testing. You've pointed out things I never even thought of. Second, the question: Is it fun?
As promised, I have picked apart your third map. There are lots of minor things here, but some are rather significant. I'm not sure if I got everything, so i'll be sure to test it again after you've updated this one.
But to answer your question, yes, these maps are most enjoyable.
3rd map:
Button that activates turrets and rocket launcher ("first button") can be activated by camera. Goes against established rules.
Button closest to window in turret chamber("second button") cannot be pressed by standing on it, or by cube. Goes against established rules.
I know that your intended solution is to have
Speaking of redundant, the door that opens partially is completly usless. Not sure why it's even there.
In the observation room by the first button, when looking up at the lighting while standing near the wall with the monitor, you can see that the metal does not come flush with the main surface. Light comes through where it should not.
The door that partially opens, there is a small corner at the side that you can see the next room through.
The supports that hold up the raised platforms should be (in my opinion) using pistons instead of the pillars.
When you walk along the very top of the angled platform, you hear the walking on glass sound.
Certain parts of the floor by the #1 dot are raised for no special reason. I know people that do floors, and they would never do that.
There appears to be some sort of issue with the rocket fizzling when going through a portal placed on the wall with the cracked door. unable to reproduce 100%.
Concrete walls inside the #1 dot room are non portalable.
Turrets inside broken piston room can see through windows. Will occasionally activate and you will hear them talking while preforming flings outside.
piston wall that breaks should use a piston instead of the current pillar.
In broken piston room, on the side oposite of the cube tube, the turret is broken. Laser flickers on and off, while other turret remains active and normal.
You can shoot portals through the broken pillar parts.
In the incinerator room, you can shoot through the incinerator, and the pipe fragments.
The incinerator appears to be higher than normal - I could be mistaken.
The ceiling of the incinerator room is a mirror'd surface. Looks very bad. Same with the walls in area used to get to the emancipated button.
You cannot fall into the incinerator.
You can portal to metalic sufraces within the incinerator.
There is no fire within the incinerator.
Somehow a cake survived the incineration process.
There is an unessesary orange visual barrier inside the cube tube that leads to the incinerator room.
There is a gap in the pipe where the orange visual barrier is.
You can push cubes through the incinerator's wall.
One of the doors inside the incinerator room is orange?
If you walk back from the incinerator room to the broken pillar room, and exit through the cube tube where you came in, the breaking metal sound plays again.
If you walk back from the incinerator room to the broken pillar room, you cannot return to the incinerator room. You are trapped and cannot complete the map.
But to answer your question, yes, these maps are most enjoyable.
3rd map:
Fixed.
I was hoping the lights on the floor would signify that. I don't know what else I can do to show that the button is "off".
Speaking of redundant, the door that opens partially is completly usless. Not sure why it's even there.
I'm trying to show that the labs were damaged from the explosion, and not everything works correctly. And the button gives the player a goal to distract them from the fact that they can
Fixed.
Yeah. I couldn't find the piston texture for the longest time. Apparently, there's no image in the texture preview.
That's due to the orange trim. I can't really fix that without editing the material itself.
Fixed.
Fixed. I noticed that long ago, and I finally figured out what it was. When you're on one side of the portal, every entity within a certan radius of the portal on the other side has a copy made of it. What happened is the rocket was being placed inside the turret because it was too close.
Fixed. Walls too low.
In broken piston room, on the side oposite of the cube tube, the turret is broken. Laser flickers on and off, while other turret remains active and normal.
Pistion: Fixed.
The turret is following the whole "Defective Lab" idea.
They're physboxes. I can't make them solid to the portal gun.
Fixing that.
It is. Will fix.
That's glass. That's on purpose.
Fixed. Invisible door was resetting itself.
Really? Weird.
It's off.
See above.
That was going to be a loading area, but I thought the better of it.
Fixed, kinda. Now the suction tube is penetrating the wall slightly.
Fixed.
Frankly, I have no idea what's causing that.
plays again.
I didn't know you could get back. Fixed.
Fixed.
Whew, that's a lot done. No wonder things take so long to get out of beta. I thought I was pretty close to done with this map.
A couple of things that Lorithad didn't mention:
In the room with the pedestal button that activates the rocket turret, there is a pre-existing orange portal that takes you directly to the second sentry gun room with the tube leading to the incinerator room, allowing you to bypass the next puzzle. Is that intentional?
Once inside the incinerator, is that the end of the map so far? I couldn't find anywhere to go from there.
If you hadn't mentioned the ceiling being made of glass, I wouldn't have ever thought to look up in the incinerator room. You might want to have something to draw the player's attention up there.
As for the broken button in the rocket turret room, one way to indicate to the player that it's nonfunctional would be to add sparks. Either to the button itself, or to the light path leading away from the button. If you choose the latter, I think the sparks should only go off when the player steps on the button. For the former, the sparks could be going the whole time.
Aside from this, and the things Lorithad mentioned, I think the map is quite fun and I enjoy the implementation of the gravity gun.
In the room with the pedestal button that activates the rocket turret, there is a pre-existing orange portal that takes you directly to the second sentry gun room with the tube leading to the incinerator room, allowing you to bypass the next puzzle. Is that intentional?
It's only there for testing purposes so I don't have to kill all the turrets to check anywhere else.
Yeah. That's what the cake means. It will be pushed back further and further until I finish the game, in which it will then be hidden as a secret.
I figure the upwards motion of the fizzler will be enough. It's hard to think of anything else that won't look forced.
That is a beautiful and elegent idea. Congratulations, Ralen, you're in the credits.
Ah, I had wondered why you did it that way instead of horizontally. Given enough time I might have figured it out, but it didn't occur to me to look up until after I read about the ceiling.
Maybe you could have the boxes be delivered from somewhere higher up? The way they're delivered now, from that opening in the wall, doesn't really seem to go with "established rules" as Lorithad might say. Just a thought.