Mapathon/map contest/bring your child to mapping day/jump_jam

[pants]

Video form of below in nutshell



(ty to Superchuck for the video)


Schedule:
Australian/New-Zealand Time (AEST)
Start: 25th June (Saturday) - 7 AM
End: 27th June (Monday) - 12 PM (noon)

US-West Time (PDT)
Start: 24th June (Friday) - 2 PM
End: 26th June (Sunday) - 7 PM

UTC Time
Start: 24th June (Friday) - 9 PM
End: 27th June (Monday) - 2 AM

Mappers Streaming for the Contest
If you want to see some hot hot mapping action this weekend!

www.twitch.tv/seresean
www.twitch.tv/superchuck_
www.twitch.tv/SyroRJ
www.twitch.tv/rnc1839
www.twitch.tv/bshear
www.twitch.tv/shunixjump
www.twitch.tv/protist_
www.twitch.tv/oatmeal_tf
www.twitch.tv/afterglowtf2
(Judges who may stream some of the maps)
www.twitch.tv/gibustf

What is this ?
The main idea behind this is to get people who either haven't mapped before, fail to finish maps due to motivation or otherwise love staring at grids to sit down over ~2 days and just make some form of a jump map.

The map does not in anyway have to be complete. A submission with 3 awesome jumps may be better than 20 rushed dev-texture jumps.

If you want to participate as a mapper:
Join this steam-group. Updates will be posted here as well as there. Additionally it will likely be used to submit the maps to make things manageable.

http://steamcommunity.com/groups/jumpjam


Categories and prizes

Currently the following categories are proposed:
- Best overall
- Best new mapper (i.e. no maps submitted here on or tempus)
- Most unique
- Best visuals
- Freestyle (if any get submitted)

Lizard the Wizard has kindly donated some new major prizes. These include 4 steam games: Doom (new one), Fallout 4, the Witcher 3 and the Division.

- I could assign these directly to categories but I'm leaning towards Best Overall and Best New Mapper getting first pick of their choosing and so forth down the order I've listed the categories above. Freestyle wasn't assigned a major prize mainly due to the uncertainty of the number of participants, but if there is a good submission I'll try to divert some of the misc. prizes towards it.


Misc Prizes are currently are a few hats/cosmetics/wep from myself and some kindly donated by Boshy, Elandi and Simon.



If anyone wants to throw in some assorted stuff for prizes let me know.

Rules and guidelines
Based on feedback the following rules/guidelines are:

- Must start a new/blank map (i.e. blank .vmf file). No working on partly done/abandoned stuff.

- No prefab maps. Font pre-fabs and the jump-mapping resource packs are fine.

- No group submissions. Individual effort only.

- Submitted map should be as the .bsp, i.e. properly compiled. If custom textures are used make sure it is packed. Also make sure it runs in-game, don't want to have to deal with "engine hunk overflow" errors etc.

- Lastly, the map should have working health and ammo regen (func_regen, where applicable and trigger_hurt), working teleports and no significant errors like massive leaks. Please no func_brush for making no sticky walls. Use clip_vphysics instead. Func_brush only for intended wallbugs.
Submissions won't be rejected on these grounds but will probably be judged harshly.

Extra Submission Rule
In addition to giving the compiled .bsp and the raw .vmf file you should also attach at least ~3 pictures showing your progress in hammer with the filename clearly visible as well as the date on the taskbar. Zoom the 2D views out so the whole map is visible at each stage of development and just centre the 3D view anywhere the map is visible.

Please have the 1st picture of the blank file with the views zoomed out so we know its blank. The 2nd to nth picture showing midway development (e.g. end of first day or something). And the final picture of the finished map in hammer; again with the 2D views zoomed out enough so that its all visible.

Example pictures

http://imgur.com/a/9kcFO

EDIT: if you are streaming on twitch showing starting from a blank file and pretty much most/all of the development on there this is a bit superlative.

Resources
For newcomers to mapping/hammer, heres a few things that may help:

Forum resources: (allowed) pre-fabs, tutorials, misc links
http://jump.tf/forum/index.php/topic,956.0.html

Tutorials: Afterglows series (great starting point for 0 experience in hammer) + Tophatwaffle (valuable for stuff like packing maps and/or adv stuff):
http://jump.tf/category/mapping-tutorials/

[Sere]

Interesting. I dont think any good maps will come of this, but it seems fun.

Also if anyone needs to learn to map, go watch afterglows map tutorial series.

[879m]

You're just trying to divert my mapping energy from jump_when....

that being said i'd still do it

[pants]

Its about creating map energy \[-_-]/

[Exile]

I feel like this would lead to even more badly spaced jumps

[CyanBoterham]

Would be nice to see what people can do in that timespan though. It doesnt have to be a final version either. Spacing can still be improved after the contest is over.

[Superchuck]

Do it over the summer, and during a time that Ill actually be free

[John]

ah yes the ol' "we're out of maps so let's run a contest to make more dev maps"

i'm down to suffer along w/ u guys

[200]

damn good idea, would it be fair to release a map I was working on for a while before? or just like a quick 24h tf2maps-like jam?

[catfoosh]

wasn't hexahedron done in 24h? If so, I think a weekend is a better idea

[pants]

The idea is more for just a 'jam' style event rather than trying to output an entire map. Get people motivated, get new people to open hammer, have fun staring at grids etc.

wasn't hexahedron done in 24h? If so, I think a weekend is a better idea

I also suggested this because of time-zones etc.

Also, some additional considerations:

Would we want to either have a few judges or let everyone vote (and if so, can you vote your own submission). Categories may include: best overall, best visuals, most creative jump, best newbie mapper...

When do we want to hold this, e.g. in a few weeks?/months?

Also, I've thought of making some short promo or something. But if anyone with a lick of talent wants to, just let me know.

[catfoosh]

hmu if you need a cheerleader

[Shunix]

i would do this 

[gibus]

Not implying that someone would cheat (there's no reason to without a prize), but how would you make sure someone made the map in exactly 24 hours? ?

I know a 48 hour game design competition that makes people base their submissions on a given theme; You could also make people record/stream their mapmaking.

Or I guess if the only point of this is to make new maps then it wouldn't really matter at all

[Zike]

If this happens can it please not be all soldier maps and have at least one demo map that isn't another obnoxious airpogo t6