Hi all.

I know CoD4 is kinda an old game, and more modern ones are out now, but the league I play in with my "clan" is a custom map league, which means we can create our own maps etc.. ;-)

What I'm wondering is where people get their "layout ideas" from? Is it basically a google search or similar?

Also, been playing around over the last few days, and up until today everything was fine, but now, when I zoom out to see the top down aspect everything disappears! Any idea why this would happen?

Many thanx in advance.

Yafas

Yafas writes...

1. COD4 is not that old. It's a 5 year old game. In gaming terms, that isn't old. Plenty of people still play it (I do, on a daily basis).

2. Layout ideas come from actual gaming experience. Experienced players who are also mappers (such as the developers for example) make excellent, well thought out layouts, because they know about lines of sight, cover objects, and the best routes to use with the different gametypes (although, S&D seems to be the actual bench mark of a "good" map - if it has excellent placements of the A and B objectives, and good routes to them, it will be considered a "good" map).

If you want to make good layouts, just think about how it will play. Do you have enough cover objects to hide behind so that certain routes aren't cut off by a sniper hiding in a window somewhere? Just remember - a map can look aesthetically pleasing, but play badly because it was designed as a piece of art, rather than a practical map which players can actual play on. Getting the balance right between the 2 - art and practicality is the difference between a well thought out map, and a poor one.

3. I'm not sure I understand the "disappearing" problem you are attempting to describe, because I don't know if you mean in the stock game, or in a custom map you are creating. But I will go for the latter, and say you are describing a problem in your own custom map:

This will be caused by something called Level Of Detail - or LOD. All models have several models with different LODs. The ones with a short LOD will disappear once you are "out of range". This is an game engine thing - it tries to save on gamestate by not drawing items you shouldn't be seeing.

Make sure your choice of models has the right LOD sizes.

Maybe the cubic clipping button is pushed on the top tool bar.

Many thanks, got it sorted in the end ;-)