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Counter-Strike 2 >  Workshop > Yanzl's Workshop > Castle > Discussions
Castle
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GamingRevenant (YT) 29 Dec, 2013 @ 3:41pm
Review - Castle
So, because I'm a mapper as well, I decided to write a review about the map before I go to sleep, because I think it deserves it.

First of all great work, it's a juwel all-together and when I first saw the picture I though this was another spam-submission, just to discover at my complete surprise that this really is a map, able to be played in all its glory.


Going into some details, I'm gonna adress what's good and what could be better/bad at each aspect of the map.

  • The map's lighting is amazing. It's really good, makes the caves look into place and also gives a somewhat scary-like forest. Lights themselves are well-placed and light the inside very well. The castle wall lighting is especially nice, and is something I haven't seen quite yet.

    It's however also a downside for the gameplay, because the outside environments are simply not suited for competitive gameplay. Dark places are hard to deal with and delay the tactical play, and puts players from the inside at great disadvantage as they can be spotted head-on while the inside player barely sees anything.

    I should say that the only way to fix this is to set it at another lighting time, day I would say? You can keep this version and try a new one for competitive mode with daylight scenery.

  • The props and brushwork are probably what I think one of the strongest points of this map. It has a lot of custom content in it, with good textures, normal maps, props in combination with nice brushwork and good placement. Also displacements are very well done, especially the cave part, and the river that flows through the forest.

    The stalagmites/stalagtites are nice details and aren't overdone so it doesn't become one load of eye candy, which is in itself a good balance for gameplay. The trees are very nice, although some of them just have flat planes without all-too-much depth in them, but they have very well textures so I think that's alright. I couldn't really tell yet if they are actually the pine trees from de_cobblestone but I thought they did not as they had more depth so far I remember. You seem to have been using a lot of de_cobblestone content, but definitly in the good way :)

    The downside, again, and I see it coming more and more, with this is obviously that the filesize is rather large. You should try to recycle your textures a bit more for custom content, or lower the sizes of either your texture resolutions or your lightmaps. High lightmaps are ok, but they add immensivly to the BSP and high lightmaps should only be used at specific parts of the map just to make the shadows stand out a bit more where necessary.

    One notice as well: Some of the props are having textures with a bumpmap on them. This is bad for vertexlighting because it disables it by default. Try to recompile them with a different vmt name so that you can tag out the bumpmap.

  • The 3D Skybox is very well done and there's not much I can add here. It align very well with the actual environment and seamlessly flows with the map.

  • One of the problems I think this map could face is that it's relativly large and has some confusing crosses at the caves, but nothing really major I think. I mean the map is large, but at least with bots the fight came by fast actually. Although on public play, it's definitly going to be a difficult map for people who cannot stand campers, hiders and snipers, as it offers a lot of large environments and ths will confuse players. Anyway, that's something that can be fixed and as you are the mapper, you have the creative freedom to change some things to get that right :) It's also a choice, as if you don't want it to be competitive, then most of the above points are just to be ignored.

  • The final thing is that the loading screen and the Radar are very finy, and the way Valve likes them, so I think that's also a good + point.

In the end I believe this map is a little juwel on its own and offers many things I haven't seen yet in CS:GO or Source multiplayer games. It's the result of hard work and well-done coördination/planning. With some tweaks where necessary the map is definitly worth being official I think!


Great work!
Last edited by GamingRevenant (YT); 29 Dec, 2013 @ 3:42pm
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Showing 1-15 of 24 comments
Rabbit 30 Dec, 2013 @ 6:43am 
i agree
#1
ThePointlessBox_ 30 Dec, 2013 @ 8:02am 
this castle is actually real,google predjama castle,its in slovenia.a castle is built inside the cave behind it
Last edited by ThePointlessBox_; 30 Dec, 2013 @ 8:02am
#2
🤖Divided States Of America 30 Dec, 2013 @ 9:39am 
I disagree with the review on some points. The lightning are actualy perfect, even if it dark the ambient look answome for a competitive map, the map might look big but it actualy simple and smart! The paths are perfect, CTs and Ts spawn look balanced, I love the back path you open up to give the oportinity for the CTs to take a site back instead of jumping into the site and wait.
The middle path is just amazing for both side.

The only thing I found that might be a problem, is there no invisible wall to block the cliff in Ts spawn where (untested) would be possible with a teamate to boost outside of the map. It is very clean and I really think that is a map worth playing in league, I just can't wait to play it 5v5 to see the actually gameplay. Incredible job buddy, well done, you have absoluty NOTHING to change except for the "maybe glitch" which is not even confirmed.

Thx Bai, __int128
Last edited by 🤖Divided States Of America; 30 Dec, 2013 @ 9:43am
#3
Buddy 30 Dec, 2013 @ 11:25am 
I agree! That map looks awesome :)
#4
Manill 30 Dec, 2013 @ 12:06pm 
This map is so awesome.
#5
Müs Lee 30 Dec, 2013 @ 1:46pm 
Looks awesome!
#6
タイタンキラー 30 Dec, 2013 @ 2:45pm 
My only problem with this review was *jewel*. Grammar nazi out!
#7
maribor 31 Dec, 2013 @ 3:02am 
postojna castle :D
#8
guski 31 Dec, 2013 @ 5:37am 
+1
#9
smilzo 31 Dec, 2013 @ 8:54am 
nice
#10
WaSSabi 31 Dec, 2013 @ 5:18pm 
+1
#11
beiVollmond 31 Dec, 2013 @ 8:08pm 
nice
#12
+++DIABLO+++ 31 Dec, 2013 @ 11:32pm 
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#13
Ане4ка Черных 1 Jan, 2014 @ 5:36am 
gj
#14
kAA 1 Jan, 2014 @ 11:18am 
Nice
#15
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