I see this with a TON of new maps that come out. They come out unfinished. I mean, not just unpolished, even though they should be polished as well, but just plain unfinished. Sure, the basic functionality is there, the mechanics are all in place, but that's really it. Bugs littered throughout, some of them game-breaking. Visuals extremely lacking/non-existent. Units with mismatched sounds and models. Tooltips completely missing or otherwise worded poorly or just wrong. Completely unbalanced. Weak terrain, etc.
It just drives me nuts when people can't even take the time to finish the game. I mean, we're lucky in that unlike regular game developers, we don't have a time frame or budget to abide by. That means we can take all the time we need on the map without having people breathing down our necks. I guess what I'm trying to say is that it would be nice to see some higher quality maps in general. Some maps are of very high quality. Most are not.
It seems to me that people release their maps when they are about 75% done, and then months and dozens of patches later it starts to resemble something like a working, complete game. Why? Why do people do this? Personally, if I join your game and it looks like you made it in about 2 days or if it looks carelessly thrown together, I don't play it again. And I think this is the case for a lot of people. This might be a contributing factor to why some maps fail. The first time someone plays your game is the most important one. It's your one shot to make an impression and reel them back in for another, or to tell their friends about the cool game they just played.
The only reason I can think of for doing this would be for testing purposes. They say, oh hey, my map is "done" but now I need to test it so I'll just release it to the community and have people tell me of all the bugs. In my opinion, public release should be for finished maps, and beta testing should be done internally. It's not like you don't have any help at your disposal. Get your friends to play with you. Get some of the many people on sc2mapster willing to test it. I really don't see any reason for anyone to release a game in an unfinished state. How do you guys feel about the overall quality in terms of completeness of the average custom map?
Most are not worth playing even when finished. It will be several years before we see some really good rpgs emerge. Still not having complete terrain is an insult to players. Worst is when you cant win the map because of bad triggers.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Contribute to the wiki (Wiki button at top of page) Considered easy altering of the unit textures?
I kind of feel this way too. But you say they look 75% done, I'd say many times they look 50% or even 25% done. And we know many of them will never get "finished", because their authors don't even feel there's need to work on them anymore. I am perfectionist and I always think aobut some things you said (tooltips, icons, visuals and so on). In my opinion its not the end of the world if one map isn't finished, but it can't be that early in development.
And now I give the reasons I released my own map before it could be finished. In my case it was clear I couldn't come with all the ideas I needed to finish it. Also I couldn't balance it and balance only comes from players' feedback. So I worked on everything I could by the moment, released it, got a few players giving me feedback and gathering more players. But the main difference is that I'm still working on it non-stop, so players really feel their gaming experience is going to be improved. It grew to be a lot better than if I had kept it for myself.
My conclusion from the maps I've played and from my own map is that maps can be unfinished upon release, but they still have to stick to some standards and most map-makers and many players don't care about it. That's why you see "fastest map possible" and other ridiculous maps high-ranked in that popularity system.
I say release something that's playable so that you can get lots of feedback on how to improve the game. Something that closely resembles the gameplay of the finished version is fine by me.
The popularity system combined with the bnet custom community causes low standards to propagate, so map makers will think it's sufficient to release an unfinished product without investing too much time on the map.
Keep in mind people are making maps on their free time w/ little reward as incentive. If maps were a commercial product, I would have higher standards and expect the map to be a finished product.
No map will ever be completed privately. Period. No map can be relased 100% bugfree, or even worse with gamemechanics that just dont fit your audience or the plattform. Some things you cant anticipate. So, if your goal is to truly make a great map, start testing as soon as the map is playable. It's also way more fun, it gives you motivation.
BUT the idea is to use that input for improvement. So I somewhat agree with the op, most maps out there dont really seem to use the feedback. They just end up unfinished. Also agreed, the testing for improvement should never be public. The pop system only gives you one chance... ;-)
I agree. Part of the reason I'd wager people don't venture past page 1 is because 99% (statistically proven) of the maps beyond that point are unfinished messes.
It seems to me that people release their maps when they are about 75% done, and then months and dozens of patches later it starts to resemble something like a working, complete game. Why? Why do people do this?
Welcome to the wonderful world of "Hey, I have no affiliation with any sort of mapping community, but I randomly discovered the editor and released some half-assed map! Incidentally, I also own half of the popularity list!".
Basically you just threw good pie back into the face of the person who cooked it and served it to you.
Personally I release unfinished "garbage" prior to it having any polish is because if the core functions of the game are there you can then test it with others and get feed back.
Chances are nobody even ever runs across most of my demo test maps. Its just easier to release it public and have a few select people play it on their own time for feed back.
That fact that it may have caused you to rage at some point gives me great satisfaction.
I know theres a lot of unplayable stuff out there. But honestly pick up the editor and make something. It is incredibly time consuming work.
Hes an asshole because hes complaining about free stuff.....
On the other hand im an asshole for pointing out his being an asshole....
By the way Id love to hear your complaints regarding "Infinite TD" Id be happy to work on whatever you feel is needed to achieve your standards with in my map.
Just because it's free doesn't mean we should be thankful. I see garbage on the courseways but that doesn't mean I want it there, or that I should be grateful to the person who dropped it.
You can directly compare 99% of bnet maps to that same garbage. It's just trash that clutters up the space for real maps.
It'd be great if there was some kind of quality control for maps before they appeared on the popsys, though I appreciate that it'd be low on Blizzard's priority list. Maybe they could appoint "Map QA" volunteers in the same way that they have the forum MVPs.
Maybe some kind of 'featured map' function could work. Not like we have it right now, but with a function where, say, 30+ maps could be featured at any time. This still leaves plenty of space for the garbage, but ensures you don't get to see if until you start looking for it actively.
Or well, that's the idea, but that is also the idea of the current pop system, and we all know how that worked out :D
Hes an asshole because hes complaining about free stuff.....
On the other hand im an asshole for pointing out his being an asshole....
It's not free, it costs TIME. Precious, precious time...and when I play a map I want to know that the author thinks it's worth my investment.
I suppose everyone has different reasons for shoveling out unfinished maps. To me it seems obvious that the overwhelming majority simply got ants in their pants...they can't sit on their work, they're just too impatient. It sort of ties in with the issue of motivation, but at some point you just got to learn to motivate yourself and hold shit down. Then, unleash your Spirit Bomb.
Compared to W3 there is much less unfinished/unpolished map, but you can access all maps on bnet and you dont have to dl it from others or from sites. I dont see any surprise or strange in that.
I think main reason is when people get nice idea but it just requires too much time to make it good / finished. And ofcourse it is very easy to publish. "Why not?" and publish it... unfinished.
I'm working single player content so I can't pusblish it good way in battle.net. Here in sc2mapster we have lot of "useless" maps that are meant just testing or just uploaded that people can inspect its data / triggers / terrain even if it is unfinished.
So after all are we talking about stuff released on battle.net in this thread?
I see this with a TON of new maps that come out. They come out unfinished. I mean, not just unpolished, even though they should be polished as well, but just plain unfinished. Sure, the basic functionality is there, the mechanics are all in place, but that's really it. Bugs littered throughout, some of them game-breaking. Visuals extremely lacking/non-existent. Units with mismatched sounds and models. Tooltips completely missing or otherwise worded poorly or just wrong. Completely unbalanced. Weak terrain, etc.
It just drives me nuts when people can't even take the time to finish the game. I mean, we're lucky in that unlike regular game developers, we don't have a time frame or budget to abide by. That means we can take all the time we need on the map without having people breathing down our necks. I guess what I'm trying to say is that it would be nice to see some higher quality maps in general. Some maps are of very high quality. Most are not.
It seems to me that people release their maps when they are about 75% done, and then months and dozens of patches later it starts to resemble something like a working, complete game. Why? Why do people do this? Personally, if I join your game and it looks like you made it in about 2 days or if it looks carelessly thrown together, I don't play it again. And I think this is the case for a lot of people. This might be a contributing factor to why some maps fail. The first time someone plays your game is the most important one. It's your one shot to make an impression and reel them back in for another, or to tell their friends about the cool game they just played.
The only reason I can think of for doing this would be for testing purposes. They say, oh hey, my map is "done" but now I need to test it so I'll just release it to the community and have people tell me of all the bugs. In my opinion, public release should be for finished maps, and beta testing should be done internally. It's not like you don't have any help at your disposal. Get your friends to play with you. Get some of the many people on sc2mapster willing to test it. I really don't see any reason for anyone to release a game in an unfinished state. How do you guys feel about the overall quality in terms of completeness of the average custom map?
-
View User Profile
-
View Posts
-
Send Message
ModeratorsMost are not worth playing even when finished. It will be several years before we see some really good rpgs emerge. Still not having complete terrain is an insult to players. Worst is when you cant win the map because of bad triggers.
Contribute to the wiki (Wiki button at top of page) Considered easy altering of the unit textures?
https://www.sc2mapster.com/forums/resources/tutorials/179654-data-actor-events-message-texture-select-by-id
https://media.forgecdn.net/attachments/187/40/Screenshot2011-04-17_09_16_21.jpg
I kind of feel this way too. But you say they look 75% done, I'd say many times they look 50% or even 25% done. And we know many of them will never get "finished", because their authors don't even feel there's need to work on them anymore. I am perfectionist and I always think aobut some things you said (tooltips, icons, visuals and so on). In my opinion its not the end of the world if one map isn't finished, but it can't be that early in development.
And now I give the reasons I released my own map before it could be finished. In my case it was clear I couldn't come with all the ideas I needed to finish it. Also I couldn't balance it and balance only comes from players' feedback. So I worked on everything I could by the moment, released it, got a few players giving me feedback and gathering more players. But the main difference is that I'm still working on it non-stop, so players really feel their gaming experience is going to be improved. It grew to be a lot better than if I had kept it for myself.
My conclusion from the maps I've played and from my own map is that maps can be unfinished upon release, but they still have to stick to some standards and most map-makers and many players don't care about it. That's why you see "fastest map possible" and other ridiculous maps high-ranked in that popularity system.
I say release something that's playable so that you can get lots of feedback on how to improve the game. Something that closely resembles the gameplay of the finished version is fine by me.
The popularity system combined with the bnet custom community causes low standards to propagate, so map makers will think it's sufficient to release an unfinished product without investing too much time on the map.
Keep in mind people are making maps on their free time w/ little reward as incentive. If maps were a commercial product, I would have higher standards and expect the map to be a finished product.
No map will ever be completed privately. Period. No map can be relased 100% bugfree, or even worse with gamemechanics that just dont fit your audience or the plattform. Some things you cant anticipate. So, if your goal is to truly make a great map, start testing as soon as the map is playable. It's also way more fun, it gives you motivation.
BUT the idea is to use that input for improvement. So I somewhat agree with the op, most maps out there dont really seem to use the feedback. They just end up unfinished. Also agreed, the testing for improvement should never be public. The pop system only gives you one chance... ;-)
I agree. Part of the reason I'd wager people don't venture past page 1 is because 99% (statistically proven) of the maps beyond that point are unfinished messes.
100% agree. The biggest problem is people THINKING that they have a finished map when they don't. I know that there are a lot of that going on...
Great to be back and part of the community again!
Welcome to the wonderful world of "Hey, I have no affiliation with any sort of mapping community, but I randomly discovered the editor and released some half-assed map! Incidentally, I also own half of the popularity list!".
What Mozared means is:
Nexus Wars
Desert Strike
Marine Arena
Squadron TD
@peranzormal: Go
You sir are an asshole.
Basically you just threw good pie back into the face of the person who cooked it and served it to you.
Personally I release unfinished "garbage" prior to it having any polish is because if the core functions of the game are there you can then test it with others and get feed back.
Chances are nobody even ever runs across most of my demo test maps. Its just easier to release it public and have a few select people play it on their own time for feed back.
That fact that it may have caused you to rage at some point gives me great satisfaction.
I know theres a lot of unplayable stuff out there. But honestly pick up the editor and make something. It is incredibly time consuming work.
He's an asshole because he doesn't want to play unfinished/broken maps?
@Eiviyn: Go
Hes an asshole because hes complaining about free stuff.....
On the other hand im an asshole for pointing out his being an asshole....
By the way Id love to hear your complaints regarding "Infinite TD" Id be happy to work on whatever you feel is needed to achieve your standards with in my map.
Just because it's free doesn't mean we should be thankful. I see garbage on the courseways but that doesn't mean I want it there, or that I should be grateful to the person who dropped it.
You can directly compare 99% of bnet maps to that same garbage. It's just trash that clutters up the space for real maps.
It'd be great if there was some kind of quality control for maps before they appeared on the popsys, though I appreciate that it'd be low on Blizzard's priority list. Maybe they could appoint "Map QA" volunteers in the same way that they have the forum MVPs.
@Eiviyn: Go
Maybe some kind of 'featured map' function could work. Not like we have it right now, but with a function where, say, 30+ maps could be featured at any time. This still leaves plenty of space for the garbage, but ensures you don't get to see if until you start looking for it actively.
Or well, that's the idea, but that is also the idea of the current pop system, and we all know how that worked out :D
It's not free, it costs TIME. Precious, precious time...and when I play a map I want to know that the author thinks it's worth my investment.
I suppose everyone has different reasons for shoveling out unfinished maps. To me it seems obvious that the overwhelming majority simply got ants in their pants...they can't sit on their work, they're just too impatient. It sort of ties in with the issue of motivation, but at some point you just got to learn to motivate yourself and hold shit down. Then, unleash your Spirit Bomb.
Compared to W3 there is much less unfinished/unpolished map, but you can access all maps on bnet and you dont have to dl it from others or from sites. I dont see any surprise or strange in that.
I think main reason is when people get nice idea but it just requires too much time to make it good / finished. And ofcourse it is very easy to publish. "Why not?" and publish it... unfinished.
I'm working single player content so I can't pusblish it good way in battle.net. Here in sc2mapster we have lot of "useless" maps that are meant just testing or just uploaded that people can inspect its data / triggers / terrain even if it is unfinished.
So after all are we talking about stuff released on battle.net in this thread?