Well, the ThinkingWithPortals.com 2010 Mapping Contest has come and passed. I hope we all had a lot of fun, but now comes the best part. Judgement. Here is a full listing of the maps from the contest, for easy downloading:

• (No Name) by spare8ball
• Afterburn by Amran
• Dyad by Mevious
• MotanumsTest by Motanum
• Aperture Rockets by Crabby
• Aperture Facility Delta by Soga
• temprising by Jthm
• 19 by elpieo

Maps will be rated on a scale of one-to-five based on four main factors.

** - Adherence to your chosen theme.** Did you follow the guidelines for the theme you chose? Was your Reveal, well, revealing enough? Did you have your three difficulty chambers?

** - Visual and technical design.** Is your map well put together? Does your budget go crazy? Does the environment pop out and wow the player? Do brushes overlap, are faces missing, and does lighting leak?

** - Judge appeal.** An overall score of how one of our four judges rates your map.

• And lastly, Community appeal. The score on your map's Download page means something! The rating on this page will be a part of your map's final score as well. Post your map around the internet and get people to play and rate it!

As for our four judges, let's go ahead and meet them:

** - Duffers, two-time TWP Community Spotlight holder.
** - MrTwoVideoCards, long time Source mapper and member of Gear Dev.
- Relative TWP newcomer wstrika, a personal friend of mine and artist/web designer for several sites we have worked on together.
- And obviously, myself, another veteran Source mapper and Alpha and Omega here at TWP.

Questions about the judging process, or want to discuss the contest overall? Post it here!

The people have spoken, and we will be extending our mapping contest until December 7, 2010 at 11:59pm (EST)! Hurry up and use your last week full wisely!

If you have been living under a rock, you can view the full contest rules here, and a full list of the $150+ in prizes here.

Good luck to all of our entrants!

Portal 2 has been delayed until the middle of April, as announced yesterday:

Quote:
Valve today announced that Portal 2? the sequel to the ground-breaking title that won over 30 game of the year awards, despite missing its original ship date?will now be available the week of April 18th, 2011. This two month slip not only marks the shortest delay in Valve's proud tradition of delays, it represents the approaching convergence of Valve Time and Real Time. Though this convergence spells doom for humanity, it will not affect the new Portal 2 release date.

Just in time for my birthday!

We are a little more than 2 weeks away from the October 2010 Mapping Contest deadline. A few of our contest entrants have posted up some screenshots of their work, and things are looking good!

Check out all of the screenshots in this thread. Are you mapping for the contest as well? Go ahead and post your own!

Speaking of the contest deadline, there has been a few request for an extension. Contest mappers: please vote in this poll and let us know if you really do need an extension. I told you that two months would go by fast!

Happy Halloween from ThinkingWithPortals!