№11 | July 2017
SourceSTUFF Light
Featuring: JPRAS, VLEK, The Ronin, Chaofanatic, Logan Mc Cloud and Tim «YM» Johnson
Contents
06 Interview JPRAS is talking about everything related to the recent updates
12 Workshop Numerous items have to come from somewhere, right? We’ve gathered some opinions about how to go about creating a beautiful item which fits well into the games’ artstyle
24 Maps It’s a little bit hard to play without some maps, that’s why we’ve also obtained the views of some mapmakers!
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Contents
42 Showcase For dessert, we’ve left a sweet piece of cake. Our editors go through the workshop and place a spotlight on all the promising items and unusual effects.
34 Unusuals You can’t make an update without unusuals. Here we discuss all the unique Jungle/Myann style unusuals which have surfaced in light of the update.
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SourceSTUFF
Editor-In-Chief Evil Witch Co-Editors Victory, Enigmus Proof-Readers MysticTheMeem, Sundownsyndrome, GotchaBakin Illustrators p0nystark, Shadowenza, Scurvyorange, Cpt-Sourcebird Correspondent DarthBodan Authors Logan McCloud, Chaofanatic, JPRAS, VLEK, MechaFourth, The Winglet, The Ronin, Tim YM Johnson,
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Translators OPyshkin, BRBS, Nessy Cyrodiil, Black Harrier, Chiara, SchizoFrankie Special thanks Facepunch, SFM_RU, TF2 vk group, Menaria, DA SFM group, Zacharian Scott, TF2RU Links vk.com, Facepunch thread, Steam group
Letter from the Editor
It’s been a long time since our last release but we didn’t for a moment forget about the magazine! Now, despite encountering many different problems, we present you a new issue dedicated to the Mayann update. We hope you’ll enjoy reading it as much as we enjoyed working on it, studying the materials of this interesting topic and compiling them into this issue. Enjoy your reading!
Evil Wicth, Editor-In-Chief 5
Interview
From idea to project JPRAS on mayann update. How it all started and what was accomplished.
Introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about your work please. Hi. My name is Joaquim Silva, I’m from Lisbon, Portugal, and I’m a 3D artist and TF2 item maker. When and how did you discover TF2? I discovered TF2 back in December 2007, after my brother had gotten The Orange Box for his Steam account. I decided to buy TF2 for my own Steam account later on March 2008. Did you have anybody with you when you started? Did they stick around or did you find new friends? I started 3D modelling and getting into making items in 2011, in which point I started alone. I learned how to model by watching YouTube tutorials, and experimenting things by myself. However, I had a weak spot, texturing the items I modeled. I looked for someone willing to texture my items, and thats when I met Texman. He soon started texturing my items, and we’ve been workshop partners ever since 2011. We got our first TF2 item in-game in December 2012, the 6
Tough Stuff Muffs. Has your attitude towards TF2 changed in the time you’ve spent in it? I’ve always loved TF2. I’ve had my ups and downs in terms of playing the game, but ever since I got it in 2008, I’ve always kept up with it. It’s updates with new maps, bug fixes, and eventually, weapons and items. TF2 has always been a fun game, although, I’ve been playing less over the years, and spending more time making items. How did you get the idea to create this project? I’ve always wanted to create my own TF2 project, but never had a defined theme. I always had the idea of having a video where RED and BLU had to search and fight for a lost buried hidden pirate treasure, but it never had a proper plot, so I never went forward with it. It wasn’t until one of the main developers of the TF2 Invasion! Community Update and I had talked about community projects that I finally decided to go forward with my own project. It looked like a fun thing
Interview
to do, specially in my free time, and with the possiblity of rewarding the work. So, the jungle / mayan theme came to me, and it felt just right, because it was a fresh take on TF2’s universe, an unexplored theme. Who was in the team that worked on the project? The team started with just me, back in August 2015. I had written a script for the SFM movie, and started organizing and planning what content the project should aim to create: an Indiana Jones styled SFM adventure; a deep, wild jungle, exotic map, and of course, themed cosmetics. I had a pretty good
idea on who I wanted for my team, and fortunatly, I was able to get everyone I wanted. Winglet was one of the people I knew had to be on my team: he produced quality animation in short amounts of time, as well as having the patience and persistance to create “longer than usual” SFM videos. With the help of MechaFourth, another TF2 Youtuber, I had the chance of meeting The Winglet and getting him onboard, along with MechaFourth, to animate the project’s SFM. For the main map(s) part, I knew YM was the right person, he had worked on EOTL and several other maps picked up by Valve (cp_manor, pl_hoodoo): he had both the experience and professionalism.
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Interview
I was lucky enough to grab Svdl, BANG!, Sparkwire, VLEK, Evil_ Knevil, NassimO, Gadget and Texman. Later on, The Ronin also joined the team, and helped in plenty of ways. He created the whole SFM storyboard, aswell as plenty of advice for running the project, seeing he had led the Invasion! update. Without him, the project probably wouldn’t have come this far. ‘R’DoubleTap was the one responsible for all SFM related things (except animation, of course), such as lighting, scene building, camera animation, etc. He and I had worked alot together on SFM posters for my workshop items, so I knew he would be able to produce quality results. I was also happy to get Chaofanatic on the team, seeing as he is unmatchable when it comes to particle effects creation. What was the process of creating the project? I started by having the idea, then organizing the content the project should produce and get the people I knew would be fit for the “jobs”. From then on, it was mostly a matter of keeping the project alive, and organizing the content that was being created by the whole team. Have you had to collaborate with people other then your team? Yes, a few people, such as Maxxy and IJCT, were kind enough to help out through some problems that appeared with the project. Were there any funny moments during the making of your project? I feel like there were “fun” moments, rather than “funny”.. During the production of the SFM video, we had tons of fun watching the results we were getting. Pyro and his pet monkey were just priceless. What makes this project unique in comparison to the other ones? I feel the project’s theme is a whole new take on TF2’s universe. It takes the mercenaries away to a never seen before environment, a complete change. Were there any people/things that inspired you? Older community projects were a great source of inspiration, as well as Valve’s SFM videos. 8
Interview
Several excellent items created for «Mayann Project» by JPRAS, ‘R’ DoubleTap, Texman, Sparkwire.
Some of those items comes with additional skins. Clicking on images will redirect you to the corresponding workshop page.
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Interview
How does it feel to compete with many others on this front? I don’t feel like there is competition between community projects. I think they can all co-exist and get potentially added to TF2. Are you planning to work on more content like this in future? Probably not. If/once the Mayann Update is accepted by Valve I will probably go back to making items, and dedicating a whole lot more time into my professional career as a 3D artist. Please, give some advice to the beginners who are looking forward to create something like this project. I started out this project for fun, with some friends. Anyone can do this. You just have to be sure what you’re getting into. Keep things organized, clean, and straight to the point. This has helped me alot since the beggining of the project, back in September 2015. If you’re looking to create a project like this, find a theme, get some friends and discuss ideas. Then plan the content you aim to create and start creating it. Never do a project like this for the money. Not only are these projects not garunteed to pay off, money can also bring good friends apart, and create confusion where there is none. Say a few words to our readers. It means alot when people like your work and recognize your effort. For that, I’d like to thank SourceStuff for their interest in the Mayann Project, and for making this edition dedicated to it. I’d also like to thank the great team behind the Mayann Project, they were there for me since the beggining, and the community for their continued support and contributions, for none of this would have happened without you. Thank you for the interview! Steam — link FP thread — link 10
Interview
“I’d also like to thank the great team behind the Mayann Project, they were there for me since the beggining, and the community for their continued support and contributions, for none of this would have happened without you�
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Workshop
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Workshop
Mayann Cosmetics No update can be considered completed without hats. Unsurprisingly, enormous amount of cosmetics items was submitted for “Mayann Project”. We invited VLEK and The Ronin to talk about their work and contribution.
My name is Vladislav, I’m known as VLEK on Steam. I’ve been modeling since 2004. I created and sent off my first TF hat in 2010. The main reason why I like TF2 is its cartoonish style. It’s awesome that every class has its own unique nature and each one of them has some special advantages over the others. This makes the game a real one-of-a-kind gem. I grew to like TF2 even more after having watched a preview of the gameplay. When Valve finally allowed me to create items for the game, I immediately began creating hats. The Workshop wasn’t even there at that time. The amount of time I spend on creating a model grows exponentially with the complexity of the mentioned model. Some items can take a day or two to model and to add textures to them. As for others - it can take up to two months
to create them (for example, the shotgun named “Maxim”). There are various ways to create an item. Here you can see the one I’ve chosen to work with: I got the offer to work at Mayann project from one of the coolest TF2 workshopers – JPRAS. Of course, I have accepted the offer without any hesitation. I have been modeling and working with the textures for both: the video and the map. I have been working on that since December. It’s hard for me to pinpoint one exact source of inspiration. Ideas just happen to come to me every now and then. That’s probably good. I will continue to entertain you with new items, I promise. Also, I have a little piece of advice for the newcomers – if you’ve decided to create in-game items, take it seriously. Welcome to the Workshop! 13
How the Conaghers’ Utility Idol was made VLEK is talking about making this amazing idol.
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First, we weigh an idea. In my case it’s a whip and a statuette. Since the subject allows us to create Indiana Jones style items, we can try to recreate the stolen statuette from the everfamous scene. But instead of a woman we will make an engi atop his wrench. Do not forget that for quality work, you always need a reference or a sketch.
Workshop
The second step is the creation of a high-poly Zbrush model. This step can be skipped in some cases, since TF2 uses a simplified normal_map but in our case it’s crucial to the creation of the model.
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After the sculpture, we wrap the model in «3D Coat» and do a retopo. A retopology is needed to create a low-poly model since TF models support a maximum of 1400 triangles. For comparison, high-poly models usually have between 500 000 and several million triangles.
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At this stage, you need to do a sweep of the model. This is needed to create a texture. In game we usually see symmetrical textures (when one half of a texture is mirrored). To achieve this we only need to map (unwrap) half of the statuette. 3D Coat, Maya, 3D Max and Blender are all suitable for this.
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Workshop
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Drawing on the 3D model. In "3D Coat" again (the best utility for this stage of work).
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Once the model and textures are ready you need to attach it to the model bone. I created my own bone for the statuette itself.
Now it’s time to make a jigglebone, so the object will swing from impact. You can check the result of this in hmlv.
Workshop
Following this we will have an authentic-feeling model which is akin to those found on the set of Indiana Jones. After you have tested your item and are satisfied with the result, upload the item to SFM and make a poster. This poster will become your workshop thumbnail so make sure it properly showcases the model. After doing this you can upload your model, poster and any other resources onto the workshop.
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Workshop
Hello, I’m Ronin. I’m 36 years old and i live in an always sunny island called Aruba. I’m a full time store manager in a big Dutch Supermarket Chain in the caribbean and I have a wife and 2 kids. That’s what i am currently now as a brief glimpse of my personal life that only a few know. But enough of my boring personal life. Until i’m approached by a publisher to write about my interesting as dust-on-the-4thshelf-library life, i doubt that you’d be interested of what i have to say there. Fortunately, we’re here to talk about art, professionalism and video games; 3 things that only a few viewed, a couple of decades ago, as something that would fit each other. So bare with me and all these massive blocks of text that you’re average teen would adamantly avoid like the zombie apocalipse of novelization. (well maybe some of you would like that) I started my professional career in a small studio in chicago called Starstruck studios. I briefly published these samurai comics and ran a group of comics duels. The highlight of my comic book career would probably be being auditioning for Marvel and DC comics.Of course i wasnt accepted by the talent scouts citing that my style does not fit their house style and needs some geometry and anatomy work. But these setbacks helped me a lot down the road. Professionally i took this to heart even though my grand dreams of being a true professional comic book writer/artist were effectively crossed out, filed somewhere for archivists to ignore for the next few years. It took a while to get out of that disappointment but later if found another outlet to devote my art and aspirations on, TF2. I was playing TF2 with my internet buddies and its actually one of the few games that my old PC can afford to run. Soon i was trying to look up in google how to be better at the game but instead got curious of the contribution aspect of the TF2. I just missed the infamous polycount contest and was again disappointed that i could have joined that instead of wasting my time sulking in the corner and religiously telling myself “your art will starve you to death, and your death will not benefit your art.” By this time I pretty 18
Workshop
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Workshop
much accepted to myself that my current job of the time as a graphics artist is my best compromise at using my artistic skill for monetary compensation. I’m not that good at business then either and i had to learn that on the job for the next few more years. This realization brought me to the conclusion that i should just stick with my job and try and devote whatever “art” leftover on a smaller hobby. The burning question on every self-respecting artist of how to balance making art for quality or value, at this point, has been replaced with a general acceptance of my lot in life and how to use the remaining time i have for the good of my family and my sanity. Thats when i was in my mid-20’s. So what better way to spend that time than to try a new hobby which is 3D modelling for TF2. It all started on this road when i invested 1 hour of my very precious time in viewing “Helljumper’s blender Tutorial”. Really. Everything i needed to learn to break in to the TF2 item creation scene is in this video. Every newcomer that asked me since then, i have pointed to this wonderful video. Because of this i had the courage to just do whatever i wanted to do for this area of the game. What i liked about this game is that it doesnt take itself too seriously. Its a refreshing take at the genre and just at the right moment where Pixar animation is becoming all the rage in media. The beauty of it all is that the items and models are not restricted to war or military themes. This is something i 20
massively prefer since i’m not deeply entrenched on the game industry nor its fads. Because of this i took a route that some artists in the community didnt like. Back in the day, (frankly it still lives on to this day), there is a sharp emphasis in the community with hi polycount and high quality production of items. There was an overwhelming concensus that if its low quality and time wasnt dedicated enough to it, the item would not be well received. I tried to fit in that mold in my first few items. But with such an uncompromising approach, it inevitably took longer to make an item. Some took even weeks. This is something that we all did. Then my first few items were accepted. some were modest quality and some werent. I thought about my workflow and found that it would be to my benefit to just crank out a lot of items at the expense of quality. This notion, although not
Workshop
The C.A.P.P.E.R Turn your enemies in to ash!
publicly pronounced, was critically panned by my peers and because of this i got the label of a “quantity artist”. It was hurtful, seeing i still pour out a lot of myself on each work but i understood their criticisms. But nevertheless logic in me prevailed. I partnered with psyke and we were really making items really quick back in the day. On average we could finish and submit and item in as little as 2-3 days per item. At some point, we even made 7 items in 6 days. I was aware that the quality is lower than most contributors, but by working with psyke and working within valve’s impression of a guideline meant that i have more time to the things i like and need to do. Because of this economist approach, we were able to brand ourselves as reliable and experienced in many areas of the community. This garnered the attention of many other companies which landed us on many other projects. I worked mostly behind the scenes on this Mayann Project. I served as operational manager on some of the aspects of the project. I gave
The Captain Space Mann Be the hero of the cosmos as seen from TV!
The Watergate Collect beer and deposit it into the UFO beam to score points! 21
“We’ve been working on the project for almost half a year now. We’re happy we were able to publicly release the project and hopefully we’ll get valve’s attention on the matter”
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Workshop
needed advice and strategy on how to market and pitch the project to the community and valve. I also served as props, concept and model artist for the models and map. For the movie that’s still in production, i served as writer and screenplay along with storyboards for the animators. Also, I’m really excited to show you all the finished movie that the team cooked up for us. There’s still a lot of things left to do, but we have a few great easter eggs laid for the eagle eyed. The movie also highlights the wonderful and awardwinning talents in the team. Now, I’m more business oriented and i’m finding less and less time to devote on art. I shifted my focus on managing and producing and i think that’s where i will stay for the next few years, whether its in TF2 or in real life. And here is my advice for you — keep making art. There is no singular formula for success but each on of us has a fixed equation for satisfaction. Whatever that equation is for your satisfaction is up to you to discover. However, success or not, its satisfaction on what you have created that truly drives an artist either backward or forward. Maybe in time that publisher that long alluded my gaze and longing would come to you instead and ask for the rights to publish your life and career.
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Maps
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Maps
Mayann maps
Tim «YM» Johnson, creator of cp_manor event, cp_snowplow and pl_hoodoo maps, tells us about his contribution to the «Mayann project». He is responsible for the creation of pl_ququmannz and arena_sacrifice maps. 25
Mapmaking
Throughout my level design career I’ve used two monikers, in the early days I used Youme and sometimes around the close of the first decade of this millennium I dropped all the vowels and became YM. Youme operated as an enthusiastic teenaged hobbyist, YM has become a professional. Youme made early successes with pl_ hoodoo, as YM I seized opportunities like a 2010 art pass competition and the End of the Line project in 2013 creating cp_manor and cp_snowplow for each respectively. Despite moving away from TF2 level design towards independent virtual reality games work, I joined the Mayann Project in 2015 and started work on two new levels for that project, the soon to be released pl_ ququmannz and arena_sacrifice. Of course there were many levels along the way that didn’t end up officially included in TF2 but I consider them successes in their own right, cp_furnace, pl_halfacre, pl_haste, tc_strata, koth_stark tc_strata pl_halfacre
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Mapmaking
cp_furnace,
pl_haste
koth_stark
I started with Source engine level design due to the emptiness of Steam in the early days. “What’s the Source SDK” I wondered after playing many a round of HL2DM. Discovering that I could make levels for HL2DM was a bit of a watershed moment, suddenly I could put things I’d made into a game that other people could play. Only, I had no idea how to optimise those levels so I was leaving my computer on all night long doing 12 hour compiles because I just didn’t understand that I was inadvertently creating monsters. Roll on another year and I’d met some other source level designers on the internet and had learnt that 12 hour compile times were absolutely not normal. I dipped into making levels for Portal briefly but quickly settled on Team Fortress 2. There’s just something about level design for multiplayer that’s gratifying. Being able to throw up a level onto a server and have people playing and enjoying something you made feels a ton better than single player level design where you can’t join other people playing and you don’t ever get to experience the level properly yourself. 27
A typical Hamm Hammer’s an interesting bit of software and I have some strong opinions about it now that I’ve been using it for almost a decade. In the early days using Hammer to create levels was all I really knew, I didn’t have any understanding of different ways to make game art so I just accepted it’s quirks. Now I know that actually some of those quirks are what set Hammer out as being one of the best level design tools available to developers, even though it’s 2016 and the core of Hammer has remained unchanged since the 90s. I could talk at length about how current level design tools aren’t as good as Hammer, and in fact I helped Robin Yann Storm make a GDC talk on this topic! The long and short of it all hinges around BSP tools, level geometry made of blocks that are manipulated and chopped up into shape. Many engines like Unreal moved away from BSP level design because it tends to 28
create more blocky levels and modular 3D meshes made in other software allow for more visual detail, as a result they suffered in their ease of use as level design tools. They’re good for art, but not for designing. Hammer keeps that iterative loop flowing, if a doorway is too narrow it’s easier to make it wider by just adjusting the geometry but if you need to make a 3D mesh doorway wider you have to edit that mesh in another piece of software. The iterative loop is important for fast design! (If you’re interested the slides are here and the video of the talk is available to subcribers). Today when using Hammer I can iterate pretty fast, I’ve started levels and had 24 players testing them within only 3-4 hours. Often in those days I’ve taken the next hour or so to make changes and within another 2-3 hours have another full server of players testing again. I just don’t think I could do that if I was using
mer view an editor that didn’t have as good BSP editing. A level that’s working can go on like that for a week or two, getting two versions tested in a single day usually only happens in the first day or two when I’m busting out new ideas. It’s normally one per day or every other day during those first two weeks just because I’m spending time doing other things. With TF2 levels I try and focus on focus on just the level design, TF2 already has a ton of awesome assets to reuse and get inventive with, if I need any unique set pieces I like to work with a single artist who’ll create what’s needed. With my non-TF2 game design work I like to try and handle as much as possible myself, I’ve had Photoshop as long as I can remember and picked up 3D modeling in Univeristy, I’ve been slowly building on those skills over time. Though in the interests of getting things finished, I’ve been working with artists because at
some point you need to know where to call in help rather than spending forever learning new fields. A level for TF2 takes a lot of work, the full amount of time I’ll spend on one will vary, and often runs for many months due to working on other projects concurrently. Though not always! cp_ manor was created over the span of 2 months for a contest and pl_haste was created in just 3 days during a 72 hour event with a total of 45 hours spent working. I’ve been working with the Mayann Project team since July 2015 which puts the current elapsed time at 8 months, though, as with every other level, the development hasn’t been constant as I’ve been working on my virtual reality game development as well. JPRAS approached me in July 2015 about the project and asked if I’d help create a level for it. The intention was to use parts of the level in the SFM short 29
Mapmaking
The first version and the 10-th version of arena_sacrifice
and for the level to start where the short finishes. After the stipulation that it was to be a payload map I had more or less free reign over what the design of the map took though there were some general pointers for the beginning and end of the level to help tie it thematically into the animated short. I had a level roughed out by the end of July and made 14 revised versions between then and the end of September. What would become pl_ququmannz was born. There weren’t too many big changes in that time, if you’ve seen the final version you’d definitely recognise the first version. Mostly the changes came as lots of smaller things that each nudged it in the right direction, looking back now it’s actually surprising how little it’s changed! 30
Mapmaking
In September I was experimenting with some entities in TF2 and realised I could probably mimic Arena:Respawn without using a server plugin, I tried this all out and threw it into a basic layout and arena_sacrifice appeared. The setup was similar to Arena:Respawn where teams fight to the death with players capturing the central point to revive their team, except instead of capturing a control point I had players grab an intelligence briefcase and jump into a central deathpit with it before respawning their team. I had no idea if people would actually make the sacrifice for their team, and if they did I wasn’t sure it would be fun. But it was! It was a huge laugh with dead players using their mics to
encourage the remaining living players to make a sacrifice and get them back in the game. Sacrifice saw just under a dozen iterations between September and November, mostly to entity work. Players found crafty ways to break what I’d done and I worked out better ways to do things so the whole system got revamped several times over. The layout changed entirely over this cycle as well. The first one wasn’t doing anything for me so I scrapped it and started from scratch 4 versions in. The new layout worked much better and hasn’t changed a whole lot since then. So by November both maps were playing well and I was happy with their greyboxed stage.
Arena Sacrifice 31
Mapmaking
It was roughly at this point I stopped putting out public versions and started detailing the two maps privately, sharing them only with the Mayann team. I created some temple brick textures in Substance Designer and got to work. Nothing is spared from iteration though and even that brick texture went through many changes and was remade from the ground up three times over so far. We’re pretty happy with what we have currently though it’s not totally locked down and could see changes. Until the last month or so I’ve been working completely on my own with the maps, I’ve made some temporary and some simpler models for them, knowing that my placeholder models will be replaced by nicer ones made by artists on the team later. Foliage props made for the short are currently undergoing the conversion into game quality assets which means reducing their complexity a ton and where necessary building collision geometry for them. In an animation scenario collision is all hand animated, but in a game the physics engine calculates interactions so objects like palm trees only gained collision meshes when they’re ready to be put into the maps. It’s exciting to be working on a pair of levels at the same time, and to have a team of people creating a whole new set of assets. The only time I’ve done this before was with Mann Manor, for that map my partner Alex was working on all the Halloween and mansion themed models and textures, this time the Mayann team is making awesome jungle and temple themed assets. Usually I with TF2 levels only a small amount of new material is introduced per level and often nothing at all is new, getting an entirely new environment to work with is thrilling. I can only hope Valve like the work we’ve done so far and want to bring this project into TF2 as an official update. The SFM short is excellent, I know the community will love it regardless of if it’s released in an official update or not, the same with the stuff people outside the team are making, there’s some excellent stuff out there already. Getting to wrap it all up neatly and share it with the wider TF2 community who are just interested in playing rather than making would just be icing on the cake (well, it’d also be putting food on the table, but it’s not all about money you know?) 32
Mapmaking
The stretch between first and second capture points in the first version of what was to become pl_ququmannz
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Unusuals
Unusuals of Mayann
Team Fortress 2 always was a game with glorious amount of particles. Unusual effects added to cosmetics are the part of particles goodness too. The upcoming update wouldn’t be totally full of no unusual effects in the store. We had a chat with Chaofanatic and LoganMcCloud and they shared their thoughts about the update and talked about their achievements.
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Unusuals
I am Martin Ellis, also known as Chaofanatic. I worked on the unusual effects from the Robotic Boogaloo, End of the Line, and the Invasion Update. I met Logan McCloud some time in 2014 after he offered to help me with fixing broken cubemaps in Source Filmmaker. Because of his artistic skill and creative ingenuity, Logan has been doing work on effects with me since late 2015, starting with Scream Fortress, and is now my go-to guy for creating sprites and getting help with making effects as good as they can be. I have been making unusuals for Team Fortress 2 since early 2013 when I was brought onto the Robotic Boogaloo community update specifically to make unusual effects for it. However, I have been making effects long before then, since around least 2010 or 2011 for Team
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Fortress specifically, and still having an interest in effects even before that through video editing! I created effects for TF2 on my own for a year or two, until BANG! contacted me about doing some laser effects for his Medic weapon: The Precision Cut. This was the first time I had created an effect specifically for someone else and it was absolutely thrilling that somebody needed my skills. Since then I have worked on over 15 weapons for Team Fortress 2 and countless other assets for maps and the like. I was approached specifically to do unusuals for the Robotic Boogaloo update and since then I’ve been on several other community updates handling effects work in general. Currently I am working on the Team Fortress 2 Mayann Project!
Unusual effect
End of the Line
Robotic Boogaloo
Invasion
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Death at Dusk Frostbite Molten Mallard Morning Glory
Anti-Freeze Electrostatic Green Black Hole Phosphorous Power Surge Roboactive Sulphurous Time Warp
Abduction Atomic Subatomic Electric Hat Protector Magnetic Hat Protector Voltaic Hat Protector Galactic Codex Ancient Codex Nebula 35
Death by Disco features pixelated dancing skeletons that were made by Logan.
There have been patterns with unusuals and how the community reacts. For example, most people hate orbiting unusuals! They want more unique looking things that stand out above everything else, things that look one of a kind, as opposed to another set of floating icons to spin around them. Ironically, the Death By Disco effect is essentially orbiting skeletons! The key to making a good unusual is to come up with something unique that will stick out to people. While I try to include alternate colors for my effects to add variety, I don’t want to milk that alone by making 5 variants of the same effect. I’d rather create strong new effects that are unique and varied from each other. Invasion was a lot of fun to make effects for cause the alien theme let me do a lot of space themed stuff, and it gave me a lot of options. 36
Unusuals
I even got to resurrect a scrapped effect from the Robotic Boogaloo because of it: Magnetic Hat Protector! Some of the difficulties of working on unusuals are simply coming up with strong effects to make within the themes of the updates. Often times things require custom graphics that I can’t make myself so I have to ask folks like Sparkwire or Logan McCloud to make them for me. Making each new effect unique is difficult because of how many unusual effects there already are in circulation. Unusuals should try to be kept more or less around 50 sprites total at most. It’s not difficult to work well within these limits though, Death By Disco only needed 3 sprites total for the skeletons and the disco ball, the rest of the sprite budget was spent on the flashy effects!
50 sprites
That exact number is a constraint that has to be followed if you want to create a hat with unusual effect.
Left: The original scrapped Boogaloop effect created for the Robotic Boogaloo update. Right: Magnetic Hat Protector from the Invasion Update. 37
Unusuals
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Unusuals
Making effects for the Mayann update has been a challenge because of the specific unique theme of the update. The Mayann project has overall required a great deal of custom graphics to make things work. My favorite effect We’ve put out for it so far is Mystical Fauna, where Logan and I worked together to have a swarm of butterflies flutter around the hat. They have a unique behavior where when the player moves the butterflies will trail freely behind them and catch up again when the player comes to a stop. Logan created the butterfly sprites themselves while I figured out the behavior of the effect.
Purple
Blue
Orange Various butterflies colors are presented for that effect. Check out the fog that enhances the tropical vibes!
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Unusuals
The Cursed One
Blessing of the Ancients Both unusual effects are perfect for the ancient Maya theme. Squareshaped clouds might have just ascended from an old tomb to shape an ancient creepy-faced deity right above our heads.
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Another effect we’re proud of from the Mayann update is Blessing of the Ancients and the Cursed One, originally pitched by Raabbit. Logan McCloud actually went and painted special sprites just for the effect, giving it a unique look and feel different from any other effect in the game! While it does not have a special complex behavior like Mystical Fauna, the unique style and artwork of this one really makes it stand apart from the rest! We’re really proud of this one!
Unusuals
We have a lot of good plans for the Mayann update, however they all require custom graphics in order to happen, so creating content for it has been slow since the unusual effects are rather lowpriority compared to update promotions, model creation, and the vast amount of other assets required. But in the end I think we’ll be able to provide a lot of interesting content for the update overall! I hope in the future we’ll be able to
work more on things outside of unusual effects in the future. Unusual effects are awesome, but I love getting to do bigger things as well. Thanks for reading, it’s amazing to get to work on so much content for this game and to get to work with so many talented people!
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Showcase
In the part you can see all the things, that’ve been sent to Workshop for Mayann Project. The editors distribute most of the things among three main categories which are jungle, maya and treasures.
A young Maya shaman’s kit named “The Almighty Scorchzolotl”. Click the picture to see names of the authors of each object presented in the set .
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The set of objects named ÂŤThe Mayann MachoÂť made by several independent authors. This set includes a fancy mayan warrior hat, cloakscarf with the skulls of those who disrespectedly stood in the mayan way and authentics slippers made just for chilling in the pyramids. That set is definitely worth paying attention to.
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Sacrificial aborigen’s masks – what could be better? The answer is: the same mask, but with unusual effect.
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A snake on the belt is a creative way to ward off unwanted intruders. It’s quite easy to throw the serpent at your enemy as a distraction and leave the sentry.
A hat decorated by leaves is a perfect accessory, if you need to camouflage in the jungle. Besides that, it’s a pretty stylish part of aborigen’s outfit.
The truly bellcose helmet for our fearless Soldier. Legend says that some culture had these headgears available only for the village leaders and military commanders.
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The eclipse has been a sign of doom since day one. Here it looks authentically scary in the Mayann theme.
Aborigines have never missed the chance to look glorious on the battlefields. So isn`t it a good idea to use this original idea in TF?
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You want to show everyone who’s the real Treasure Hunter? Then this unusual effect is exactly what you’ve been looking for.
War paint makes you a real man in battle. It is a sign that shows your bravery in your jungle rushing, treasure hunting and ancient warrior-fighting journey.
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A dagger carved out of stone is the thing that Spy’s inventory has been lacking for so long.
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The infamous demolition expert has finally made his way into TF2. Demoman is the perfect Vinny from ÂŤAtlantis: The Lost EmpireÂť.
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Miguel and Tulio made their way to the jungle to find the marvelous El Dorado. In TF2 they are most likely to find blasts and control points but that can`t stop them from fitting so well in the game setting.
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A set of jungle-themed objects fantastically fits the Mayann theme. Every single objects completes the authentic look of every character.
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Companions always looks great, especially in a form of a fabulous tropical bird. Demoman obviously keeps some secret storage for those birds that he might smuggle from somewhere. He still keeps his favorites to himself: his faithful parrot and this green thing of wonder.
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The rumor says the Maya warriors kept their hair long till the day of their defeat. Oh, wait‌ this must’ve been some other culture.
Everyone hates the pesky mosquitos, but Sniper is smart enough to find a way to ward them off. Unlike the poor Spy. This unusual effect is exactly what you need in the jungle.
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To prevent the snakes from getting in your boots you have to wear some protective gear. It’s the right time for Soldier to wear those in the jungle.
Heavy never looked as menacing and majestic as in this Mayan outfit. Yet he manages to look twice as menacing when he is about to plunge a ritual knife in your flesh.
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A real treasure map just above your head! It looks like everyone will get the gold‌ Everyone except you.
Maya has always equaled to danger, so it’s logical to have the special effect that will demonstrate that.
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The ancient Mayan calendar will tell you the exact century when the Earth will be destroyed. Only if demoman won’t destroy this calendar first.
Our beloved German combat medic has also updated his outfit to match the team.
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A set of various fancy accessories for the mercs.
A new faithful Engineer’s friend to keep him safe in danger.
Holy ancient gods, this is the exact minigun Maya used for their sacrificial rituals!
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Soldier won’t be disappointed with this priest cape that would help him with initiation of the young mercs.
How do you make the biggest scary guy even scarier? Just give him the ancient beast mask and up you go!
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Once again, we were presented the set for the tomb raiders and jungle travelers. It contains cool practical outfits and various weapons to use in the presence of danger.
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Loadouts
Model: Scratch
Summer shades on the head with Heavy tourism and Jungle booty making heavy looks like pretty tourist in the jungle
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Model: Tea
Shooter's Sola Topi is saving head from the sun and complements the image of a walk through the jungle, created by Cozy Camper, Outback Intellectual and Poacher's Safari Jacket
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Model: Quadwiq
Stylish SmokePoacher's, Summer Hat and Safari Jacket are making this look very fashionable, completed with Cozy Camper and Fancy Spellbook 64
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Model: YeWelshTabby
Completely camouflaged in Hunter Heavy and Gone Commando, heavy still kept a fashionable Soviet Gentleman on his head
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Model: jnkns
A comfortable WellRounded Rifleman and a cotton Flak Jack look good in the jungle. Digit Divulger will help not to get hurt about different branches 68
Showcase
Stylish Wet Worker and Extra Layer in black paint are making this look seems hidden. This appearance completed with Triggerman's Tacticals
Model: Sidewings
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