THE SCREENSHOT TOPIC RETURNS

Time is a necessity in game development, I mean look at "nearly" every game based on a movie..do a lot of them turn out great? No, but that's basically because the developers behind those are restricted to a very limited time limit.

I, myself tend to get distracted a lot, so I end up wasting much more time than I should when making maps, like 1-2 days at least, and that's for really small ones. (I basically parallax everything on my maps so it tends to just eat away at my time. However, I do use the rmvx ace editor for things like cliffs, and water, so it takes up a little less time. Though, I still have to add details on those through parallaxing later on.)

That's all just for my mapping btw, I'm also currently making custom/edited sprites, and every frame takes up just heaps and heaps of time(1- 1 1/2 hours for the downward facing poses), since I'm nowhere near a pro spriter~ ;D

That map indeed looks way better Xenomic! Just a view pointers and my work is done.

- I really overdid the organic placement of rock and sticking to this three tile rule most of the time. However the way you mapped the basic layout surely is acceptable. It's not square enough to look like an amateur that just went into mapping. Though it doens't look detailed enough to be made by a neurotic detail idiot (which pretty much is implied by mine). However if you ever want to go as far as that I highyly recommand, as said in the pm, to use the cirle tool instead of the square tool to map out basic layouts for dungeons and forest.

- It might not be that obvious, but I did think a moment or two about placing the objects like stones and pillars. I grouped some of them so everything wouldn't look as cluttered. I can't detect this in your screen, but keep in mind that cluttering isn't something good and should be avoided. I tried to trample this problem by grouping up the staligmites for example.

- I don't know what you thoughts about the lava were, but I actually used the lava in some area's and looked at it like if it was a little map on it's own. I tried to use a cirle shape to map these little lava pits and you might notice how I only used the skeletons over there to set a more dangarous theme over there.

- Now my biggest tip ever: When I was mapping my version for the 1,5 freaking hours it lasted I wondered why I needed to do so many elevation. Then it occured to me that I had to do this because there was actually nothing to border the roof. You'll make everything way easier on your self if you are going to add this "roof" tile to the chipset and determen a maximum amount of tiles the wall will go up. This way you only have to use elevations between those borders and don't have to add rocks upon rocks to add detail in height.

I'll update this post later or post a new reply to show you what I mean. It's a really easy way of cheating, but does make it easier for you without losing "quality".

Again, Great job! You are a fast learner and as I said, mapping just takes loads of time =(.

Hmm, neat and well cleaned. You could add variation to the map by making a little utility room that is in fact clutered :p.

However you want to work with diffrent carpets to "fill" interiour desgins.

About this map: I like it, but maybe you could change some curtain for other tiles and I don't really like the roof tile. Al in all it's a good map with resources you have =).

Anyway Xenomic: I've made a simpler map for you this time, which this time only took 15 minutes to complete. It's ment to show you how I cheated my way in adding minor details, that look "good" but cut time seriously =). Since you are making a cave I just edited the chipset for this =D.

I'll fill you in step by step about he mapping progress of this one:



1. I filled up the map with ground tiles.
2. After that I used the "cirle brush" instead of the "square brush" to add the black roof tiles.
3. Weird looking ground spaces were made bigger using the ground tile with a "circle brush".
4. Added black tile to places which were still ground tiles (mainly corners) that shouldn't be ground tiles.
5. Added all the walls and fixed some places where it just looked weird (in my case I had a straight line of black in the lower richt corner which I wanted to break up.
6. This gave me round organic shapes.
7. I decided to have a elevated part in this dungeon in the middle. I places 1 tile high walls to achieve this illusion.
8. All the main walling I had, which were on the elevated spot were reduced by 1 tile.
9. Added the lavapool which sprung from a center. In this case about where the chest was placed.
10. Placed groups of staligmites. They were placed in empty corners, not in the patch of the player.
11. Added some stones, sometimes alone, sometimes in groups to mark out the path the player should walk in this map.
12. Added some skeletons to the lavapool. In case of the dead animal. Sometimes only a ribcase, sometimes only a skull.
13. Looked at the clock, took me 15 minutes.

As you can see I skipped the whole elevation part of the wall tiles. I left them away on purpose to show you what purely organic forms would do to the map using the circle tool. The use of the circle tool is obviously faster than going retangle and add the organic "smoothing" later.

I used a rooftile so nobody will bother commenting on how the whole thing looks flat. It's just cut off by the chipset so nobody expects something at the dark areas. I did however add ground elevation to break up the map a bit. As you see I used some cleverly placed wall tiles to give the illusion of groundtiles that go up instead of using stairs (it's weird in an organic envirronment to have stairs XD. If you do use them there should be more evidence of human interference (like some mining tools, a little bit of rail or random wooden studs etc).

Hope you like it. As said it's pretty simple in design, but 1 piece of ground elevation and "clever" use of the circle tool made it more dynamic. It shouldn't take up more time than using the square tool.

And yes I just noticed two mapping errors xD (forgot one black side tile at the middle piece of rock and I forgot to add some wall tile in the lower right corner).

The map (if you want it):

http://rpgmaker.net/users/Trujin/locker/Map0004.lmu

The chipset:

That's why you should always know how to at least recolor tiles.

Could be me, but using your tileset I stumbled upon a array of ground tiles:

I think the wooden floor makes more sense than red carpet EVERYWHERE.

author=Itaju
I think the wooden floor makes more sense than red carpet EVERYWHERE.

How does that make more sense? Serious question.

Why would anyone think to themselves, "Hmm yeah I'll make this part wood, that part stone, and I'll put some random carpet over there." If you're a snobby rich dude, you want to show that off in your house. Having a mishmash of different, poorly constructed floors isn't exactly a sign of nobility.

Say what? Diffrent patterns of wooden floors are for drunk carpenters? I guess this is something we aren't going to find in your house =p:

author=Trujin
Say what? Diffrent patterns of wooden floors are for drunk carpenters? I guess this is something we aren't going to find in your house =p:

See, the difference between this photo and the previous example is that in this photo, there's an actual pattern in the floor (which is not actual wood btw), which looks stylish. In the screenshot earlier, most of the floor was horizontal wood with some randomly misplaced vertical wood.

Real world, showing you're rich often includes not using carpet - carpet in most real world situations is used to cover up an otherwise ugly flooring situation, and stone tiling and hardwood flooring are considered rich and high end.