Date                    :8/29/2024
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Title                   :The Desolate Depot
Filename                :mxdm1
Author                  :mariteaux
E-Mail address          :mariteaux@somnolescent.net
Description             :A chilly base outside with hot action inside
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Map Information
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Singleplayer            :No
Cooperative             :No
Deathmatch              :Yes (21 spawns)
Difficulty settings     :No
New sound/music/graphics:No
Recommended engine      :QuakeWorld obviously

PC used                 :Windows 10, Quad-core i5 @3.20GHz, 8gb RAM
Editor used             :TrenchBroom
Build time              :A year to first draft + a few days for polish
BSP time                :3s
VIS time                :8s
LIGHT time (-extra4)    :64s

Description
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I'll go through periods of playing Half-Life 2: Deathmatch with bots, and
there's a specific (and apparently still fairly popular) custom map I always
liked called dm_lostvillage. It's this neat little two-level close quarters
layout, but it's built like garbage. You can tell this was the tail end of
custom levels being able to get away with abstract, blocky shit visuals that
don't really look like anything. There's many line-of-sight glitches and I'm
not sure it was even vis'ed. Thinking the layout would suit Quake, I got to
work rebuilding it with an idbase theme and hopefully more sensical
construction.

One of my biggest inspirations in how I build levels is Dimension of the Past,
which is one of the semi-official Machinegames Quake expansions. I especially
loved the way J.F. Gustafsson built these idbase levels with lots of supports
in the walls, everything broken up and not looking repetitive, the textures
all clean and aligned--slick, but not overdetailed. I've been trying to cop
that for years. Maybe this is the first time I actually sorta managed it,
maybe.

<p>I started this one prior to my first trip to Wales to see my girlfriend,
and didn't pick it back up until 2024 because of a bit of refactoring to
make the pieces fit together I had to do and was unwilling to do. (It took
about an hour when I stopped being a baby.) In the end, I wanted to add on
some secret areas and extra bits to the layout to maybe make it make more
sense as a place, even if it's still just a video game world. I still really
like the idea of mapping in inaccessible areas to make the level feel bigger,
like you're deathmatching in one corner of a base. Must do that more.

After this was built, for my birthday, I decided to stage the first
Somnolescent Quake deathmatch since building "Temple of the Strange" in 2017.
I (slowly and painfully) figured out nquakesv, gave everyone a customized
copy of nQuake so they could join right away, hopped on the eMachines Box with
a DOS-based QuakeWorld client of my own (because I'm picky about QuakeWorld
actually feeling like Quake), and we deathmatched 'til the cows came home.
Connor and Savannah dominated, I did surprisingly poorly (and didn't mind, I
was just happy to see people into my level), and even a few random folks we
didn't know joined in for a round or two at the end! Super fun.

Of course, such a test (and giving it out to some other non-group folks for
their expertise) found a bunch of bugs (stucks and dim lighting), laziness on
my part (one fucked up lift), and maybe some things that won't be to
everyone's taste. It was brought up to me that the walkway trim would probably
prevent folks from bunnyhopping, and the only way to solve that would be to
get rid of it. I wasn't willing to do that and have the ground be flat and
boring, so apologies if you're one of those super cool speedy bhop people (not
really). Amateurs, like the rest of us, play the map as I intended.

Anyway, this was fun! I really like how it came out visually and how it plays
too. I've definitely got some ideas in mind for future deathmatch levels of
various sizes and themes, possibly even Somnol-themed levels full of niche
references. Maybe once I have enough of them, I'll run a little server you can
join to play them with us.

http://mariteaux.somnolescent.net/modding/quake/deathmatch/
mariteaux