15th November 2008 at 04:11 AM

[Contest] Map Remake/Improvement

Nexuiz Ninjaz - 1st Year Anniversary Celebration!



Repackage, Remake, Reinspire Mapping Contest


Introduction

November 15th marks the day I posted the first news post on Nexuiz Ninjaz. Optimistic and inspiring, it sent out a positive message to those receptive to its energy. Together we found each other and have built all of this out of love for Nexuiz and hope for the future of our games. Together we have helped each other understand. Looking at problems from different perspectives and collaborating ideas on ways to solve them, using various toolz, such as this forum, the map repository, image hosting, training classes and many other methods.

Today, in celebration of the Nexuiz Ninjaz' one year anniversary, we seek to build and improve another aspect of the game. Something divVerent's hard work is surely deserving of. Updated, properly packaged, improved or otherwise remade maps. The options are pretty limitless within the limits of being properly packaged. That is to say the minimum requirement is to repackage a map but you go as far to remaking an existing map from scratch. It doesn't even have to be from this game!

Rules and Regulations
Please read the following information carefully if you wish to yield the highest points possible per submission

To compensate fort the varying abilities of current and future mappers, participants are allowed to submit as many maps as they'd like, this contest will be point based. Players will get 3 points for a properly packaged maps and an additional 4 points in 5 respective categories for level of improvement. Textures, Sounds, Music, Item Placement, Flow. Participants are allowed to collaborate with other ninjaz, upon submission just tell us how to divide the points.

Packaging
Proper packaging consists of the structure linked above which participants will receive 1 point. An additional point is available for including bot waypoints. The final point is for generating a mini map radar (used in SVN). This can be done with an SVN client with the command sv_cmd radarmap. that should generate a .xpm file which you can convert to .tga using software such as GIMP. Put this file should be called put in a "gfx" folder inside your pk3 with the name MAPNAME_radar.tga. For examples, gfx/whizardv1r4_radar.tga.

Textures
Textures will be graded on overall quality, creativity and usage. As this is a map remake contest, judges may consider your textures against the quality of the previous textures. This means, if you've got some sweet textures with awesome usage... but they were this way prior to your remake, you may not get many more points. Adversely, if they were total crap and you've improved them drastically you may be rewarded the full 4 points.

Sounds
Sounds will be judged based on usage, creativity and quality. The same sort of rules apply here as they do in all dimensions of this contest, we're judging based on improvements. If the map had no sounds and you've added some, you are guaranteed at least 1 point.


Music
Err what? Isn't music sound? Yes... it's a sound technically but music is very different in consideration to the map. It's often overlooked as many players don't play with their music on. There are a lot of music-less maps that could benefit from this added dimension to further build the environment. This will be judged on creativity and quality. LICENSING IS VERY IMPORTANT HERE. Make sure you're VERY clear about this. If you're unsure, it's best to use something available under the Creative Commons.

Item Placement
Item placement and creativity goes together a bit with flow. You don't want to put 40 rocket launchers inside the bases... it will essentially break game play. SVN has brought in New weapons. Using these new weapons creatively will earn you more points.

Flow
Flow has to do with the shape of the map, the hallways, the varying altitudes, the trick jumps, portals, jump pads etc. It's hard to explain exactly what it is, for me at least. It's more something that you feel. This will be based on opinion/experience of the judges. Check out other maps and figure out "that feeling".


PRIZES will be given for first, second and third place.
All 3 top placing contestants will win a custom edition mapjutsu guru t-shirt. Only three of these shirts will EVER be printed.

1st Prize: Mapjutsu Guru t-shirt, a Razer Diamondback and a forum award
2nd Prize: Mapjutsu Guru t-shirt, a Nexuiz Ninjaz t-shirt and a forum award
3rd Prize: Mapjutsu Guru t-shirt and a forum award


All participants are eligible for a Nexuiz Ninjaz t-shirt at the discount price of $15 (down from $20). You can help Nexuiz and help the Ninjaz by purchasing a shirt. All profits are reinvested into this site and it's services (which costs ~$100 a month to run). These prizes are being paid for out of my pocket. Shirts are provided by my Bostonian friends, We Print Shirts 4 Less who are sponsoring this contest making the cost a little less painful. These guys are an open-source based company (all software, OSes, and philosophy). They do a damn good job too. Dex Ter, one of the guys from We Print Shirts 4 Less, was kind enough to make a run to the store to pick up some quality black t-shirts last order I made (cause he was out) and printed them with one days notice, THE DAY BEFORE I needed them! How awesome is that?!?

Resources

You can ask questions or otherwise chat about the mapping contest in the #nn.contest channel on QuakeNet. For more specific mapping questions, you may want to check out #nexuiz.editing

Need help mapping? Check out [How-to] Making Your First Nexuiz Map for a REALLY basic proof of concept on getting a map in the game, [How-to] Begin mapping like a ninja for some more advanced information and ai's Mapping video tutorials for so me advanced methods. Grasshopper has posted a nice collection of mapping resources which are helpful as well.

Check out Mapjutsu and the AlienTrap Nexuiz - Editing Forum for more help, tips, tricks and prefabs.

NetRadiant by divVerent is the most up to data Nexuiz mapping program!
You can download a Windows Build Here. Linux users, read the thread for directions on compiling.

You should use this over GtkRadiant. It's a new and improved version.


End of the Road

Judges will be Dokujisan, esteel, C. Brutail, pavlvs and myself. Judging will be done during the duration of the contest which will work to mapper's benefits by getting offered advice on how to further improve their maps. DO NOT ABUSE THIS WITH LAZINESS. If we feel you are simply not trying, we will limit the amount of (re)submissions on a per user basis. If you're taking your work seriously, don't let this note scare you. We just don't want to waste time :). Judges are ineligible for prizes but they can earn as many points as they want.

With the holidays coming up and perhaps some skills to be learned, we want to give people ample time to ask their questions, collaborate and build their ideas. This competition will last 3 months.

The official end date of the contest is 2/15/09, that is Feburary 15th of 2009! No points will be awarded for maps submitted after this date!
(13) comments »

24th October 2008 at 03:29 AM

QuakeC Stick Physics in Darkplace, pavlvs Octobre, toolbox montage, mikee slime

Tryin' to catch me reading nerdy? Cause it's time to get to the down and dirty. Urre posted a thread on Inside3D about stick physics based on an article written by Thomas Jakobsen, Advanced Character Physics. Some of you may remember this video below:



In the replies, you can see an old comment by Urre reading, "But it's sadly discontinued at the moment due to unforeseen bugs. I announced it too early."

His thread is about the trials and tribulations he and Lord Havoc of DarkPlaces went through to get to the place their at now. The physics are mind blowing but Urre's delivery is smooth.

It's a long read but really inspiring.

In Ninja News:

pavlvs made an amazing video for October (Octobre).

Amazing editing, it's a must download! right click save me!

Speaking of ninja videos, toolbox put together the montage below. He composed the music as well!


I've been doing some work on the Nexuiz Ninjaz SVN servers, you should see them improving more and more, less and less bugs as I get comfortable admining all of them. If you have any questions, comments or concerns, feel free to post them in the Nexuiz Ninjaz SVN servers thread.

mikeeusa did a revision of his giant slimepipectf6 map, slimepipesmallctf6 which is a bit more manageable. Out of all his maps, this is surely the most "Nexuiz" of them all. Screenshots below.

(0) comments »

19th October 2008 at 06:21 PM

New Map, New User Pages, Cool Video and OUNS!

I updated the links page today with some additional Nexuiz user pages, so check those out for some of the freshest Nexuiz related content. I've released a new version of my Halo Wizard/Warlock remake, Whizard, which you can find available for download on the sidebar of the front page. Also on that sidebar, there is a sweet video montage of air shots made by Agama. Lastly, OUNS Wiki is now hosted by the ninjaz.

For the latest in Nexuiz news, check out our chat or the forums.
(1) comments »

11th October 2008 at 08:11 PM

Dojo - The Nexuiz Dedicated Server

As some of you may have noticed, over the past few weeks, the Nexuiz Ninjaz game servers disappeared. Recently however, you might have also noticed them coming back stronger than ever before. Where'd they go you ask? Well... the server which was running Debian suffered from a bad update and failed to load our operating system properly, we ended up scrapping it in favor of Gentoo and now we're running a much more streamlined server.

I've been working on refining the scripts we use to run and maintain the game servers. They are in a beta stage right now while we tie up loose ends elsewhere, so expect them to improve and grow. These servers now communicate to IRC on irc.quakenet.org in #nn.servers. You can optionally check them out through chat.nn, our ajax IRC client that connects you to #nexuiz, #nexuiz.ninjaz and #nn.servers. You can learn more about the status of the Nexuiz Ninjaz servers and see who's playing at servers.nn (very beta).

Seven servers are running SVN and 3 remain on 2.4.2. The SVN includes MANY changes including a Client Side Quake C (CSQC) Scoreboard which is worlds beyond the 2.4.2 one and a fancy new radar system. You need the SVN client to play on these servers. You can download the client and read about the Nexuiz Ninjaz SVN servers here.

Over the course of the next few months, maps.nn will undergo some big changes. We'll be taking a step towards standardizing maps and we'll be delivering them through a newly databased archive of the maps. This will help keep standards strict and bring users better quality maps they can search through with ease. No more guesswork downloading random maps based solely on screenshots.

To find out more about Nexuiz Ninjaz development hang out on IRC. The developer's channel is #nn.dev. Speaking of development... I've now been officially recognized as a member of the Alien Trap Development Team.

As for Nexuiz and Nexuiz Ninjaz News, PCLizard has started a technique thread in Ninjutsu for tricking jumping. CanadianLinux has started a campaign / project to develop a new video for the Nexuiz Homepage.

I've updated the wickedz menu for SVN as well... it's still in progress but it's certainly improved. You can download it here. Save it in your data folder and load it by typing:

menu_skin wickedz_svn
menu_restart



As always, donations are welcome. Check the left hand side panel for button. It's been almost a year since we've started (11/15/2008). We wouldn't been able to make it this far is it wasn't for the hard working ninjaz that have donated to help keep our costs down, http://www.echoservers.com who graciously provided us with affordable hosting solutions or the many contributors. mkzelda, dokujisan, AceOfThumbs, nifrek, pavlvs, Moo, divVerent, Ronan, Tenshihan, esteel, mirio, shaggy and many many more who helped build this community's positive environment. Thanks guys.

I would especially like to thank mkzelda for helping me out with the dedicated server mess. It was by no means an easy process and there were bumps along the road but he held strong. Kudos to you sir.
(3) comments »

15th September 2008 at 05:34 AM

Phoenix Pro CTF - North American Competitive CTF server

Phoenix Pro CTF is a new public server that is intended to have more competitive gameplay and a more ideal map selection. It runs the latest SVN release and has adjusted scoring so a match is decided only by caps and not by kills.

More information will be posted later, such as the official maplist, the settings of the server, etc. Check this page frequently to find out more.

http://www.optimalclan.com/phoenix/

If you like the idea of this server, then PLEASE SUPPORT IT by playing on it whenever you can. If you don't like the settings or anything about the server, then please make suggestions. I'll tell you now though that maps like greatwall and mentalspace will be rejected ;-)

If you have any questions, send a PM to Dokujisan through nexuizninjaz.com.
(29) comments »

9th September 2008 at 09:13 PM

Nexuiz News - Warm off the presses

I'm two days late posting this, mostly because I've been preoccupied with managing things and getting my ass kicked in General Physics. But C. Brutail has posted the first (of what we hope to be many) issue of Nexuiz News. These articles will periodically detail what the Nexuiz development team and community are doing, have done and will do concerning Nexuiz development.
(7) comments »