So, lalo's post in the "Background legends" thread made me think...
I wonder who is responsible for taking each scheme to the next level with their map designs.
I remember a lot of history when it comes to players and leagues, but not so much maps...
So i'll try tell the schemes I was most involved in and the most notable moments where things changed from my perspective, I may have made some mistakes so please correct anything you see that's wrong:
ROPER:I remember Roper receiving a drastic makeover, fabrousse took pro roping maps to what I consider an acceptable limit, making them slightly harder than the roper/warmer maps players used back in WACL, look at the difference here between 2 known early roper maps, and 2 roper maps i'd consider suitable, then 2 random evil maps that people play today:
1:
2:
3:
4:
5:
6:
Of course, the 1st 2 are too easy, the 2 last ones are just ridiculous lol, but the 2 in the middle are just right.
Then guys like Mablak, TheDoGG, franz and angus made the most recognisable roper maps that became the standard(maps which end up with a lot of crate rape).
BnG:So when I started playing League BnG people were playing on maps like this:
You simply load a random Team17 Cavern map, delete the top, fill the bottom, make sure you have 0 bridges and full objects, and voila!
Nowadays people play on maps like this:
I'm fairly responsible for the BnG League standard -forest maps with lots of good hides and raised edges at the edges, after a while it became clear the old Team17 style maps were too open and easy to attack, it wasn't just me who thought "oh, i'll change this and that", it was actually other players asking for more/better hides as I was becoming insanely accurate and consistent with a variety of shots so they were getting hit and pushed pretty much every turn without even getting a chance to shoot back, so that's kinda how evil hides were born...
All I done for 3-4 years was play BnG almost every day all day, with as many people as possible, people were learning how to shoot with low gravity, how to push worms around, do fancy shots, destroy land in advance(open/dig/destroy), BnG actually has strategy to it and maps cater to that better now, of course, not everyone likes this and gets bored easy lol.
I don't take credit alone as these maps were created while playing hundreds of games with b2b and other BnG enthusiasts, Ramone/wormf00d helped validate this style a lot, especially Ramone making the most insanely fun BnG map pack ever:
Other personal favourite BnG map designers would include, lacoste, KRD, Roperz(ArsGoetia), K1NG, madog, Chicken23, Jigsaw, Reso, dillifag, surgeon Jago and NiCo.
A special mention to Resonance, who sat with me for months practising and helping to create the future of BnG
Darts:With Darts, SiD created the classic map, where you had to time disabling the drill at the right moment to land on vertical targets:
Then Phanton decided to make a flat horizontal target which opened up so many possibilities:
Of course my initial Darts maps sucked in graphics but had fun playability:
Son of Sunshine:
Bank It!:
And with ridiculous amounts of testing with various dS guys we ended up with a standard sort of design and interesting ways to play which eventually led to a breakthrough in playabilty and map design:
Other maps that raised the bar:
Pepar - Muta:
Hurz - Deviation:
XanKriegor - Double Deviation:
Komito - Starfox:
Drumstick - Ride The Saw:
Hurz & Pepar - Walk The Plank:
tita - Worms At Work(Komito Remix):
Golf:Golf, not much so say on this as I haven't played it much but what IS weird to me is that I remember playing Golf in like 2002, before colour maps etc, it was just a Team17 map that we edited with gaps n obstacles and made a hole at one side in the water, something like this:
You only had bazooka and low gravity, shoot your worm through the course from S to F and into the water hole. I guess this went on to become Boom Race?
I was surprised(in a good way) to log on one day(many years later) and see someone hosting a Golf game with this map:
Warmer:Last but not least, Warmers
So I started WA in June 1999, I didn't start roping until later that year, and it wasn't until 2000 where I was involved in the Warmer scene and starting to get good, so yeah for the next few years these were the kind of maps the people I played with warmed on:
Gundam:dOgMa - Phat Ropa:
sikz - hookdam: (I don't know why there is a girder in the preview but it wasn't in the original map.)
Tflenker - Tflenker:
*unknown author* - Cheesy:
Vahagn - NR5:
I don't know if it was OutofOrder/Auto who started this style, but it was his style of maps I noticed popping up round about when Mablak/Anubis were at their peak:
The main switch I ever saw for Warmer maps was when someone decided to start using oversized WxW maps like these:
ExZo - Gym:
Ka1ser - Razer Warmer:
Personally that's when I feel like Warmers died, I don't mean they became crap all of a sudden, I just mean like, the spirit of Warmers just vanished, people just don't get it anymore. It's still an interesting story though and i'd love to hear more on Warmer maps from someone who knows way more than me.
Could anyone please share similar stories about the following schemes:
Bungee Race
Golf(more in depth than me)
Elite
Team17
Shopper
Big RR / Tower Race - What actually defines these maps? When hosting with hosting buddy it seems to load maps that aren't even Big RR...
Battle Race
Or anything else you can think of
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