introduction | entities | environment | gameplay | performance | publishing

As was said before, no matter how well a map plays, no one's going to want it if it looks ugly. Well, the reverse is also true. Good maps need the perfect mix of both good looks and good play. There are many factors to consider in Quake 3 maps that the mappers of the Quake 1 and Quake 2 days never really had to worry about. As you read through these gameplay hints, keep in mind that crazy maps never hurt - in a normal deathmatch map these tips are important, but you may want to purposely avoid some of them if you want to build an oddity. It won't make it to a CPL tournament anytime soon, but a crazy map always has its place in the entertainment department. Anyway, here ya go:

Avoid mirrors. Do not, under any circumstances, put mirrors in a serious deathmatch map. They may be fun to play with, but they decrease the game's frame rate severely. Since performance is very important, you don't want to use anything that will hinder it, especially when it's just eye candy. This is one of those things that hurts the gameplay / environment balance... too much environment, not enough gameplay. You will only find two mirrors in any id Software maps - one of those mirrors is on the first Single Player map, and the other is in the ceiling in the megahealth hall of Q3DM8.

Fog is good, but not in excess. Fog can add a lot to a map's atmosphere, and should be used. However, you need remember two very important things: never put fog in a very large room with a lot of textures or shaders, as this will slow systems down way too much. If you are going to fill your entire level or an entire room with fog, don't use many shaders or other visual effects in that area - and keep the texture count to a minimum (they don't show up much anyway). Thicker fog is best kept on the floor, but a really thin fog can add a lot to a level, as in H2SO4. Q3TOURNEY5 is a good example of a foggy map - no shaders, no visual effects, just a few well-placed textures and curves.

Don't use too many jump pads. Jump pads are fun, but they are also very tempting - and too many of them will hurt the gameplay on your map. Don't place any weapons directly above them, either, or players will be too tempted to stay on the jump pad. This will frustrate others - you don't want to encourage cheap gameplay of any kind in any of your maps. When you arrange your jump pads, do it in such a way that they won't stop a battle, but simply give players a way to move around. Just take a look at Q3DM17... there are quite a few jump pads on that map, but you can have a battle on just about every one of them, so they don't have any bad effects on the gameplay.

Teleporters are another thing that people often overuse. If you put an excessive amount of teleporters in your map, none of the players will ever know where they're going or ever be able to find each other - which doesn't make for a very exciting game. Use them in places such as the dead end of a hall or the corner of a room, and make sure the destination is far enough away to make them worth using. A lot of times, mappers will place good items at teleport destinations in order to give players a reason to use them.

Don't lock good weapons and items into separate rooms, tiny corners, or other closed-in areas. This will encourage camping, which is generally a thing you want to avoid. Often times you will hear players say that the only reason they don't like a map is because of the "BFG room" or something along those lines. That being said, don't put a BFG on your map, period. There is no reason to have one on any standard map, and it will almost immediately turn people away.

Don't make long hallways with no exits. No one wants to spend half of their game walking down a hall with no way out except the ends. Keep the halls short enough so that the players won't have to spend more than a few seconds running through them without finding some way out. Actually, long halls are a good thing to avoid altogether, regardless of how many exits they have - they disrupt the flow of the map. This isn't a hotel, ya know.

Place ammo and health against walls, and weapons and items in the middle of rooms. This has always been a very common style in Quake games, and with good reason. You want your weapons to be easily accessible, but you don't want your ammo right out there in the middle. Because of explosive weapons like the rocket launcher, being near a wall is risky. Players will endanger themselves filling up, and this makes the game more exciting. You don't, however, want to make it too hard to get weapons - they are important in keeping things moving.

Make your maps make sense. Don't place computer consoles in the ceiling or windows in the floor. Such a strange map leaves little to be desired in the environmental aspect, and a good environment is important if you want to make your map sell. What does this have to do with gameplay? Well, the map should be beautiful, but invisible to the player. A player distracted by a goofy console is going to be killed by someone who is actually paying attention. Can you really stop people from being spaced out? Certainly not - but you can help them along a little.

Don't use shaders in excess. Shaders should be used, but remember to keep the amount down. Having too many shaders will impact the performance of your map, leading to poor gameplay.

Don't overuse (there's that word again) doors. These are great for surprise attacks in single player games, but not for deathmatching. Doors close off the map too much and make it easy to follow players. That's not to say you should avoid them altogether, but use them carefully and sparingly. That being said, if you do use doors, don't make players press buttons to open them. Buttons should be reserved for activating parts of the map itself, doors should open automatically. The same is true for elevator platforms - which, by the way, should also be avoided, as Quake 3 provides you with jump pads instead.

Trains are another thing you need to watch out for. Try not to use them over pits of death - this isn't an aerobics class, it's Quake. You don't want your players to have to squeeze and jump their way through your map unless there is a very important item at the other end - and only if it really is an end. Don't ever place traps in main flow areas, or you'll pretty much lose the flow. And, when you do use them, keep trains moving all the time - don't give players control over them.

page 4 of 6
next page: performance
previous page: environment