Mapcore’s Exotic Places competition, started
last May, has recently ended and 10 finalists
have been chosen. I’ll show these 11 entries
in this video - they’re available for download
from the workshop. Links in this video’s
description.
This was going to be a brief, objective video
where I remained impartial to the maps on
display, but I couldn’t do that. I was amazed
by the imagination and talent of the mappers
involved in this competition. The first map
I loaded up impressed me so much I was disappointed
because I assumed I had already seen the best
one- but I needn’t have feared because each
and every one of these is a masterpiece! They
all possess that natural, polished look we’ve
grown to associate with the finest maps that
CS:GO has to offer. Long gone are the days
of boxy rooms and flat backdrops. These are
vivid, beautiful places which would have made
the top 3 of any competition the game has
had up to this point. They’re masterpieces.
Although the competition is over, they now
have a month to polish these entries, and
the winners will be selected on March 16th.
First prize is $7,500, second is $4,500, third
is $2,000 and 4th gets $1,000. As well as
this, Valve are handing out special CS:GO
and Valve-related merchandise, the maps will
be added to Mapcore’s Faceit HUB for 4 months,
will get a spotlight on Mapcore, and of course
they all get eternal bragging rights for being
awesome and stuff.
So what counts as ‘exotic’? Your mind
might immediately jump straight to tropical
islands, but the rules explain it can also
be intended to mean any ‘locations seen
infrequently in CS:GO’. So I guess a base
set in a Martian crater would have been equally
valid!
To try and keep it fair, map sequels weren’t
allowed- because somebody choosing to call
theirs ‘Dust3’ might have a bit of an
unfair advantage. Reskins of existing maps
also weren’t permitted. Just imagine a Martian
base with the exact same layout as Mirage.
Spooky.
You might be surprised to hear that maps made
before this competition ARE allowed, provided
no complete map layout or proper art for it
had been publicly released. Let’s face it,
there’s no way the judges could know if
your map was started last year or in 2012,
so as long as there isn’t evidence of anything
having been released before this competition
started, anything goes! And when the competition
gives you a generous 9 months to work on your
entry, I don’t know how much of a head-start
you’d really need any way. That’s enough
time to make a new person!
These maps shown have already passed the first
stage of judging, where Fmpone, Puddy and
Tophattwaffle scored them on 4 equally important
qualities: fun, theme, graphics, and polish.
Next month they’ll be reviewed again with
help from the Guest Experts to decide the
ultimate winners.
So, in random order, decided by Microsoft
excel, we start with Mutiny! Pirates. Pirate
ships. Little islands with a palm tree in
the middle. And a beautiful oldy-fashioned
village, with a few nice towers to help you
get your bearings. They’ve even built an
interactive website for this level, complete
with before-and-after screenshots, information
on the map’s camping spots and a guided
tour of the island.
Swamp is like something out of Left 4 Dead,
based around an abandoned industrial site
in the outskirts of Louisiana. It’s a tight,
compact map with potential for plenty of close-quarters
action. And the map’s location also influences
the gameplay. Bubkez (Maker of Mirage) has
posted on the discussions page for the project
explaining why they made the swamp water slow
you down. Apparently you can play this level
without ever setting foot in it, but if you
choose to then it will open up new, high-risk,
high-reward routes around the map. Fun fact:
at 626 MB(!) it is the second biggest download
here. And explains why I was sat waiting on
the workshop page for so long.
Anubis is an Egyptian map with huge amounts
of detail. Most mappers stop, or at least
drop the level of detail once it goes beyond
the playable space. But not here! There are
tiny details, far beyond the level itself,
that I doubt anybody will ever see. But because
it’s there it really brings the place to
life. I spent most of my time staring around
at the towers and decorations- it nails the
feeling of being a lived-in place. Just ignore
this floating palm-tree. The warm pinky-yellow
colours really make it an inviting environment
to explore and there will be great visibility
even with the most problematic of custom character
models. So what’s the story behind this
one? Apparently, Egyptian locals are fed up
of noisy tourists misbehaving in their town…
so plan to get rid of them by blowing up the
main attractions.
Jingshen is set around a fictional place amidst
the beautiful landscapes of Asia. In the distance
are huge, looming tree-covered peaks disappearing
off into the mist, and in the foreground is
a quiet village with plenty of open areas
and an unusual amount of low walls, which
definitely makes this map feel less claustrophobic
than most. But saying that, I’ve never played
a map with as many one-way drop-downs as this
one. I played with bots to get a feel for
the map and had a laugh when on the first
round, the terrorists decided not to meet
in middle, leaving all of the CT’s stood
at terrorist spawn, confused.
Basalt is set in Iceland, with black volcanic
sand, bright, colourful buildings… and a
cool parallax effect on these shrubs. Oh and
of course, the hexagonal basalt columns. This
map’s location is bleak. But undeniably
beautiful. And it’s about time one was set
in Iceland. It’s a country of exotic, alien
landscapes. I have a lot of respect for Iceland.
Being from Cornwall, I’ve seen a fair few
big waves, but they’re nothing compared
with what Iceland gets. This beach in particular
-I’m not going to try and pronounce it-
is like something from a nightmare. Tourists
are frequently getting washed out to sea by
rogue waves here. And as if it isn’t scary
enough there’s a 50-metre finger-like rock
sticking out of the sea. It’s like something
out of Prometheus.
Graveyard is set in the future, and doesn’t
look anything like the name might imply. The
Suez Canal has dried up, leaving a warship
stranded in the desert. If you squint it could
even be something from Star Wars. My impression
when playing this map was how well it worked
for Counter-Strike gameplay. The props and
cover are all classic Counter-Strike, but
thanks to the setting, it all feels distinctly
new. A lot of the map is set on a slant, which
is a really unique twist on normal gameplay
and makes even the most basic of actions feel
a bit… different. It might be time I stopped
playing CS:GO on a playstation controller.
Mustang is beautiful. It’s like monastery,
but brighter, cleaner and with prettier mountains.
It’s light, it’s airy, it’s colourful.
On one side is a huge mountain, on the other,
clouds to hide the ground far below. It feels
like a place from Spyro! Readability remains
good- cover is reassuringly simple and reliable
and it’s pretty obvious what’s there for
gameplay and what’s there simply for show.
Just remember: if a roof is green, it means
you can stand on it. Layout-wise, this is
one of the more complicated maps in the competition-
there are MANY corridors and passages through
this level, a few one-way drops and a few
corridors you can see through but can’t
enter. I’m sure it will be patched but if
you want to go exploring, do it at T-spawn.
Ivory is the only hostage map to reach the
finals. It is the only map set at night, and
at 157 MB, is the smallest map, but despite
that it still manages to cram in some nice
touches like this custom hostage model. It’s
situated in a luxury hunting lodge, where
South American Police must try to rescue the
hostages before it’s too late! I swear this
is like, the 3rd map in this competition that
Yanzl has helped to texture.
Chlorine seems like Aztec, but look closely
and you’ll notice a water-slide. It’s
an abandoned water park, hence its name. And
a cool twist on what could have been just
another jungle setting! It’s painted in
warm, cosy evening colours. There’s even
a night-room, which is jarring if you aren’t
expecting it. This map blends the two themes
together masterfully. Being a fan of Left
4 Dead, I’m still expecting a zombie horde
to come pouring out of the tunnel of love
any second.
Victoria is situated by Victoria Falls in
Africa. Fortunately you’ll have plenty of
time to see them, with a lot of the map running
along the edge, and even overlooking the drop.
There’s some beautiful architecture to be
seen elsewhere, with lots of curved ceilings
and walls and a light brown colour being used
throughout this map.
And last is Mocha- the largest download of
them all at 632 MB! The story for this one
is excellent- terrorists are dissatisfied
with the quality of South American coffee
so try to blow it up. This level is light,
it’s colourful, has plenty of custom-assets
(632 MB!) and I particularly like the curved
roads everywhere. Like I said at the beginning-
long gone are the days of boxy rooms and flat
backdrops.
Next month we’ll know the winners. These
are the Guest Experts who will assist the
Mapcore judges with this competition. I’m
happy I’m not one of them. I have enjoyed
simply running about and playing on them.
And I wish them all the best for the competition…
and even those which don’t win are still
winners in my heart.
I got a message from Vodka4Kidz (Don’t do
it, children!) saying it was a shame that
only the top 10 (cough 11) entries get attention
and that I should show the other ones as well.
While it sounds like a good thing to do, my
time is limited and it’s better to let a
dedicated team of judges to decide which maps
are the best. But because the standard in
this competition was so high, and because
the judges left a list of honourable mentions
which MAY still be considered for the top
10 should some be disqualified, I decided
to quickly try these out.
Bregov is a perfectly functioning map with
a clean look and a reasonable amount of detail.
And yes, Yanzl helped provide custom assets
for this one, too. I guess it only falls short
of the others by having a more generic interpretation
of what ‘exotic’ is- but I like the map
and the middle section sports some quite original
ideas.
Cappadocia is a CRAZY map! There are loud
sounds, car alarms and chaos overhead as hundreds
of hot air balloons float about all over the
place like dodgems. The setting is certainly
unique- I didn’t know a place like this
existed until I googled it. So good on Neptune
for making this one. It might not have made
the top 10 but for all we know it could be
the second best hostage map in the competition.
Feast is another perfectly good defuse map.
It’s detailed, has nice lighting and no
real flaws to speak of other than that it
isn’t that exotic. It’s just a town with
some nice shaped balconies- which I think
probably made it score poorly for ‘exoticness’.
It’s got some interesting drop-downs in
middle and a lot of narrow corridors which
would make this one feel unique to play.
In Gongji, locals are annoyed by how long
they have to wait for trains, so have decided
to blow it up. Dank. This night map is well
lit and clean. It reminds me of Backalley,
actually. Sort of like a 1.6 map that’s
been given a face-lift. Look at how small
the moon is! I couldn’t see anything that
would stop this map from scoring highly, so
I can only assume it didn’t make the top
10 because of the insanely high standard of
this competition.
Oasis reminds me very much of Crown. It’s
a huge castle, built in the middle of an endless,
featureless desert. It’s got bridges, towers,archways
and everything you’d hope a castle would
and is all done to a consistently high standard.
While its setting is exotic, it begs the question:
is it still exotic if desert castles have
been done in Counter-Strike so many times
before? I think this is another entry denied
the top 10 just because of the high standard
set by the others. And because there wasn’t
any water.
Rampart’s got a unique theme. It’s situated
in a historic WW2 bunker complex that’s
under attack from local insurgents. The theme
is consistent, it’s well put together and
kind of makes me want to play some Rising
Storm. It’s a shame there isn’t more detail
in the distance because I can’t fault the
level itself. Younger me would look at a map
and judge how awesome it would be to defend
it from an attacking army- and this certainly
scores highly in that regard.
Safi is MASSIVE! Or at least, it feels like
it is, with a castle on a hill overlooking
what seems like an entire city. It looks like
it’s done without any custom assets, which
I feel is the main problem with this map!
It means that when you have to make something
new, like a castle or some kind of decoration,
you have to ‘botch’ it out of blocks and
pre-existing textures, and the result never
looks quite as good as if a 3D modeller had
created it for you. This can be a problem
when the theme is ‘exotic’, which kind
of implies a setting that hasn’t been done
before.
Of course, not everybody can -or wants to-
team up with a dedicated 3D modeller. I’ve
always worked alone and without custom assets.
A few years ago you could have gotten away
with it, but these days, it’s increasingly
common for maps to have custom assets, and
it’s raised the bar beyond what a lone mapper
can hope to achieve. I feel like Radu’s
gone as far as he can on his own with this
map, now he needs to team up with somebody
else to give this map the unique assets that
it deserves.
And lastly, Zenith. Wow! Although not in the
finals, this has got to be among the best
looking CS:GO maps ever. It’s an exotic
location, it’s been lovingly detailed, and
went through hundreds of iterations to get
here. There are even timelapses showing the
development through over 250 versions of the
map. So how didn’t this reach the finals?
Either the gameplay must be lacking, or the
judges didn’t like the theme.
There’s also something else going on.
They started working on this map in 2015.
It was already polished and coated in custom
assets before this competition even started!
This caused quite a lot of drama over on its
forum entry, with people debating whether
it should be allowed or not. Its makers didn’t
try to hide any of this- they were honest
from the start. The competition judge, FMPone,
even chimed in to say that it was okay. But
the discussion continued.
I explained the rules at the start of this
video, saying why they were the way they were.
This submission is one of those fringe cases.
It abides by the rules, but some people still
aren’t happy about it. And I bet you had
it made the top 10 (11), the list of people
unhappy with it would have been even higher
still! Whatever the reason, it didn’t make
the finals, though is technically still in
the competition, on stand-by should something
disqualify one of the finalists. Who would
have thought that judging a competition would
be so hard?
Glad I’m not.
Judging it that is.
