please stop with the walls of text, the mods will most likely ignore them... As constructive feedback, aren't detailed walls of text often a good thing? It's better than having everyone raging and throwing in single-line hissy-fits. |
please stop with the walls of text, the mods will most likely ignore them... Err, because explaining an idea is bad? --- Anyways, beyond the points brought up, I've noticed: 1. No information on pointers or usage of them in scripting (for triggerers who hate dialog boxes like me!). I happen to LIKE using structs, and a lack of pointers makes me wonder why you ever added structs in the first place. Don't remove them, but instead readd pointers (they were part of the beta before I joined apparently). 2. GetHandleId or some sort of equivilent needs to be readded. It is a simple function that will take anything, be it a timer, a unit, trugger, whatever, and returns a unique integer. This lets us use hashtables and such to save data to units/triggers/timers, which is beyond useful for making custom spells. I understand Blizzard wants us to use data editor purely for spells; please don't. You simply can't make spells in the data editor like you can with a script. You can emulate a great deal, but scripting does let you have a lot more control. 3. Some sort of function to damage a unit. I don't notice one. 4. Some way to get the current mouse position. This just opens up so many possibilities for awesome spells and cool games that. 5. Make the lowest timer interval shorter! For a timer, you cannot make it fire more than once every 0.0625 seconds. In Warcraft III, you could go as low as 0.01 and make much smoother projectile systems, updating multiboards, etc. Most other ideas in this thread are well done. Popularity system needs to go, local hosting would be but not required, and increased map limits would be nice. |
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Edited by Half on 8/5/10 12:50 AM (PDT)
please stop with the walls of text, the mods will most likely ignore them... tbh hes probably write. Concise writing is a lost virtue, and I'm probably not one talk because I frequently throw these giant rants on these threads. So on that note. Their isn't anything inherently wrong with Popularity. My opinion is that it isn't so much popularity thats killing maps. Its actually an accessibility/visibility issue. And Blizzard loves accessible right? -Empty Maps should not be in competition with ones that are not. This is one of the primary reasons why popularity does not work. This represents a twofold problem. An empty lobby is incredibly disheartening, and the chances of me being in an empty lobby for a game with zero to no interest for hours is very high in a low rated map. As a result, people rarely play these maps because they know most of the time they'll be dumped in an empty lobby. If only active maps were on the same tier (with inactive maps being lower), these maps would have a dramatically higher chance of being played. Why people don't play low rated maps isn't just that their low rated, its because they take forever to get started. Most simply don't. The second problem this fixes is it alleviates competition amongst low and mid rated maps themselves. (which is absurdly intense, think starving dogs in a put -_-). Tried and trashed maps aren't placed are easily separated from the diamonds in the rough. -The second problem is also a problem of accessibility, the lack of local hosting. This isn't a problem in itself, but causes a host of issues. Its very hard for a user to play an unpopular map he saw online, due to the elimination of local hosting. Often maps have been downloaded thousands of times, but not experienced a single play on b-net, relegated to editor testing in order to test them in single player, often in case of maps meant for multiplayer, and have no AI. In addition, mapmakers have to go through tons of logistic hurdles in order to distribute their maps worldwide. These are the primary issues with CMs right now. And I don't mean you guys blue :p. The third problem is related to the last two. A user cannot "plug and play" any map he wants. If a user finds an awesome map online he really wants to play, in B-net 1, he could simply download, put in map folder, host, and wait fifteen minutes top. To do the same thing in b-net 2.0 is often impossible, or takes hours of waiting. |
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All I have to say is that I have been working on an rpg since beta and have been completely shut down due to size restrictions. This games map making community will be destroyed before it even comes about if these basic issues are not fixed fast. I understand the desire to try to control the creative engine surrounding the map editor and I couldn't personally care less about making money off the maps but without some quick changes the community is going to die before it can begin.
Be a little less authoritarian and a little more libertarian and your custom map community will thrive, dont and it will simply never exist. Your choice! |
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Edited by DaveKap on 8/5/10 1:10 AM (PDT)
1: 5 second countdown, not 30. You can't even do anything for that 30 seconds, not even quit, so why have the countdown at all if the game automatically starts?! If you're going to have an automatic-start feature, have the game start as soon as everyone joins. If you're not going to have the automatic-start feature, have the countdown be 5 seconds.
2: Search! Both positive and negative filtering please! This way I can search for DOTA types only or, inversely, filter out all DOTA types! 3: Removal of maps from the list. If I've played the top 10 and I'm sick of seeing them, I'd like to be able to remove them from the list altogether so I never have to play them again. 4: Larger list to browse! Having to hit "display more" over and over to get past the top 50 that I've already played is the most annoying feature ever! 5: Just bring back the old way! Starcraft 1's system was not perfect, but it was 200% better than what you're giving us now. 6: Allow out-off-region maps to be displayed. I can understand you not wanting US to play with EU, but why can't US play EU maps and vice versa? |
Thankfully, in hearing that the Blues are working on these issues let's throw in ideas on how Blizzard could make this system better. Remember, they can add new features without removing any. Also, give the host more controls, like not auto-starting the map. |
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1. Only display maps on the 'join' list if they have someone in them.
2. The most recently hosted maps should appear at the top, not the 'most popular' 3. The 'create games' list should let you choose from all available maps. I suppose you could leave the 'popularity' thing in there provided there is a shortcut for you to select one of the maps on your computer. 4. Publishing maps are nice for players who can't host but if you CAN host please let us host more than 5 maps -- which means downloading the maps we play into a regular download folder with names...just like wc3 5. Stop censoring / deleting / moderating maps. I can explain precisely why your decisions are flawed but unless you ask me to explain I'm not going to bother. You guys screwed up, HUGE. I have no desire to play sc2 or make maps until something major changes. What infuriates me is that if you left the hosting/custom game system as it was in WC3 it would be infinitely superior. Whoever was in charge of designing battle.net 2.0 should be fired. Seriously. You guys have gone from the best to the worst company in one game release. Don't you have any good designers left? |
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1. Better custom game search criteria (rating, author, name, new maps, type, etc)
2. Fix the damn keyboard/mouse controls lag. That renders the 95% of maps unplayable, specially fps and arcade games. 3. Add missing triggers like "Revive Unit", "Change terrain height" and "Change terrain cliff height". 4. Banks stored on server so they can't be hacked. Increase their size too. 5. Allow map publishing on ALL servers with 1 account. I needed to buy 2 copies of the game to publish my map on EU and NA servers and still it's not published on asian servers. 6. More publishing space, 20MB is too low. Maybe you can increase it to players that reach a certain amount of players joined on their maps. 7. A periodic event on bnet that features a couple of maps choosen by blizzard. 8. Make difference between join game and create game. Join game should allow to join existing rooms, not empty rooms. 9. Remove the publish censorship on maps containing banned words. |
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Edited by Eustgar on 8/5/10 4:14 AM (PDT)
1) If you wanted be able to have a pseudo-map naming system while maintaining the current popularity system you could have some sort of a pull-down menu after you clicked a map. On this menu there would be several choices; on a standard map-say lost temple-you could select "Pros" "Beginners" "No Rush" etc.; if you selected "Pros", you would be put in a game with other people who selected "Pros". The limited choices for the menu would be build into the individual map and chosen by the map designer (in the case of lost temple, Blizzard), and usually would just consist of a couple of choices (some maps might not need this function at all). So if you clicked on DotA, you would be prompted with a menu that asked if you wanted -sd -ap -arem etc., and you would automatically join the appropriate game lobby.
2) I'd like to see some sort of rating system. Players should be given the option of liking or disliking the map after they play it, and such stats should appear next to every map when you're browsing through them. There are some really terrible maps that get popular because they have the same name as a good SCI or WCIII map, but are really just awful, awful attempts at a remake. But once they get up on the popularity list they go down painfully slow or not at all. Also, a rating system could be used to help differentiate the endless sea of maps that are played twice per hour. 3) If a rating system is created, be able to sort by rating, sort by more than just 4 categories, sort by name and plethora of other things. 4) This is a minor point, but calculate popularity in terms of the number of people who've played the game in the past hour, rather than the number of game played. Otherwise, with a equal number of total players playing both, single player maps look 10 times as popular as any 10-player maps. 5) It'd be nice if you increased (or removed) the 10 MB per map cap and total map upload cap for all users. I am skeptical you will do that, so I'll just say I think its especially important to increase it for users who've demonstrated their map making abilities and already made popular maps. If someone has made a map that is played 100 times per hour or more, it seems reasonable to give a much higher MB cap the average SCII player. It would be a shame if there's a SCII map on the level of quality of DotA a year from now that is limited by the current MB cap. 6) Be able to play single player custom maps in single player (offline) mode... |
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Just thought of a suggestion, if it hasn't already been suggested:
Add a "Favorites" list for custom maps. Allow players to set maps they've played as favorites so that it will be easy for them to find these maps later, and allow them to browse through them on the join game and create game menus. |
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Regarding the map publishing limit, 5 maps per account is not enough. 8 seems like a more reasonable number for the average map maker. Also, 10MB limit per map isn't satisfactory, nor is the 20MB limit per account. 50MB for accounts should be better, and the only restriction on map size should be how much of the space is left on the account.
Furthermore, I for one would be willing to pay a fee (either a quarterly or yearly subscription) to have access to more hosting space (starting as low as 150MB) as well as the ability to upload many more maps than the standard limit (30 maps sounds like a good starting point). More prolific map makers would likely be willing to pay more to have access to more space/map slots, too. I wouldn't expect to pay more than $15 a year for 150MB/30 slots, as other developers offering a similar service for their games charge less. (Specifically, Bungee and Halo 3, and their "Bungee Pro" upgrade model.) |
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Edited by Andernerd on 8/5/10 7:47 AM (PDT)
The map publishing limit isn't good at all. I don't really mind the 5 maps per account, but why would 10 MB be the max for a map size? My GMail is free and it gives hundreds of times that much space! Is it the bandwidth issue with people downloading the map? Then perhaps you should make it possible to download from other publishers!
The Popularity system is also messed up. It will be all but impossible to introduce a new map a year from now. |
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Edited by slimmjimm on 8/5/10 9:00 AM (PDT)
these points have already been made here im sure but...
- no more popularity system please - add search - the countdown timer to start games is ridiculously long (15s or 10s would be better) - the 20mb limit restricts what people can do with your map editor. if you really want to see what the community can produce you have to get rid of it. edit: the 'show more' button is a bad idea..it would be much better if you just use a scroll bar. it might seem like just an aesthetic change but it will make it easier for people to see how many different maps are really out there, so maybe more than the top twenty will actually get played |
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-20 mb upload limit. This isn't Hotmail in 1998, this limit must be increased.
-10 mb limit per map. Also way too small. -5 map limit. This is terrible considering that deleting a map will also delete it off battle.net for everyone. It makes it harder to test maps, it makes it harder to make smaller maps (like what if you're an amazing mapmaker who wants to make a one-day-project minigame? not possible if you have to save 5 slots for the big maps). -How map removal is handled. Please, don't screw over the people who keep the community alive for years on end. Don't make people waste 50 hours of their time if a few simple modifications would make a map fit and acceptable for upload. -Popularity filter: normalize it. A 10 minute 4 player map becomes popular multiple times faster than a 1.5 hour long 14 player map, regardless of the quality of either map. -More filters: Recently Created Maps (give the last 10 maps or so created with the "CREATE GAME" feature). Popularity for different time intervals (normalized, of course). Featured maps which could come from new features such as popularity for the day, a user rating system, most searched, or something like that. -More search options: Allow youtube-like search options for custom maps. Allow mapmakers to tag their maps with descriptive words like "tower, defense, solo lanes, cooperative" so that users can search for these words and find a map most appropriate for them. -User interactivity: allow players to leave feedback directly to mapmakers. Allow users to thumbs-up or thumbs-down maps after playing them. When chat channels come, consider creating a chat channel for each specific map if people want to join it. -Map editor: allow Real ID tells to reach people logged into the map editor. You can be seen on the friends list, you should be whisperable here! The SC2 system has great potential but right now custom maps are really blegh. This is the feature I bought SC2 for (pretty much) and I know custom games are huge in the Blizzard RTS community. I hope a custom game system revamp is really high priority on Blizzard's list. |
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First and foremost, fix the popularity thing.. everything else should be on the back burner until the maps can naturally be played.. until then, most map makers will be frustrated and annoyed. NOTHING else matters until then.
everything else i figure will come in time, but in my opinion, this one thing should be fixed asap.. every coder needed, no other priorities until its atleast a semi working system. |
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In addition to all the complaints listed here and in other various threads, I'd like to add that a 5-map maximum is absurdly low. Most of the community won't even use their upload slots, as most of the community are not map makers.
I for instance, will never make a map because I don't have the time or dedication to learn the map editor, nor do I have any real ideas. However there are many people who are full of inspiration and are limited by this arbitrary and incredibly low limit. That's why I have volunteered my upload slots to whoever needed them on Team Liquid, and was able to help out a person who needed some extra space. Therefore if you see any maps published by "Meta" please know that they are actually "FlopTurnReaver"s maps and not mine. Everybody knows how easy it is to steal other people's work using the current system and I'd like to point out that for some people to release the full volume of their creative work they have to risk just that, and I think that's morally wrong. |
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Popularity as the ONLY source of finding custom maps is what's killing it. If there was an option to sort by either popularity (what's implemented right now) or by newest games (a la Warcraft 3 or the orignal Starcraft), I think everyone would be a lot happier. The porn 'games' and massive amounts of DOTA could sometimes be annoying, but that system was wayy better than the same games over and over again.
Search engines would also be helpful. And definately NO limits on uploads...5 maps? 20mb total? I mean come on, what is that? |
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Edited by Musashi on 8/5/10 10:34 AM (PDT)
The ability to sort by a category or tag system for maps you know the tags or catagorie for and just want to play those. The Popularity system is fine for custom maps, but I really don't want to see maps made by blizzard on the first page, or the same map next to each other Like Fastest Map Green. New Versions of Custom Maps should replace the older one in the popularity system. Off topic but sort of relevant please make the Custom Game Achievement description say what it actually wants you to do in a better way. Its confusing to many people.
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