Best FPS level design

[Arbiter]

Multiplayer? Q2DM1 vel The Edge - my most played MP map not only in Q2 but thanks to community effort - in Q1 and Q3A as well. A shame Saber won't port it to Quake Champions because they haven't implemented water mechanics.

How moddable is the engine? Can't water mechanics be scripted? Wikipedia tells me that the game uses idTech and Saber3D at the same time - this might explain performance problems.

 

[Catacombs]

Who is the person that "friended" all posts in this thread yesterday?

The nicest guy on this forum.

 

[Arbiter]

Are there any good map packs for Quake 2

I haven't heard of any. Probably not, Q1 is king in this regard. However, I did replay Q2 last year with Q2XP which offers a nice facelift

Has anyone played RTX Quake?

 

[DalekFlay]

Has anyone played RTX Quake?

I tried it out, but it runs like dogshit even on a 2070 so I didn't play it long. It looked neat, but like the mod a few posts above it doesn't look like Quake 2's original design, which turned me off.

 

[oddech_wymarlych_swiatow]

How moddable is the engine? Can't water mechanics be scripted? Wikipedia tells me that the game uses idTech and Saber3D at the same time - this might explain performance problems.

I'm not able to paste link to source interview but anyway, devs said that they're not gonna do any water levers. Maybe if game was open for community to make mods, custom maps etc. but it's against QC business model so that's not happening.

 

[Pegultagol]

Some Dishonored 2 maps were memorable, including the Clockwork Mansion and the location featured during 'a Crack in the Slab'.

 

[kangaxx]

Even though it's an RPG, Deus Ex's level design is nothing short of incredible.

Liberty Island as one of the intro levels is stunning.

+1 for this. My personal favourites were always Paris and the sub base.

The missile silo was the only weak link IMO.

 

[octavius]

I.G.I-2: Covert Strike, which is like a poor man's Deus Ex and a more uneven game, had some very good levels too, being large, open maps with the biggest Z axis I've seen in a FPS.

 

[Ninja Destroyer]

 

[Lutte]

Great level design is when you quest arrow the next key.

 

[Tehdagah]

Quake 3

 

[cosmicray]

Duke Nukem 3d - Dark Side

 

[janior]

Original three Doom episodes.

 

[Boleskine]

This is a fun article from last month.

https://www.pcgamer.com/history-of-90s-fps-secret-rooms/

How secret rooms created the magic and mystery of '90s first-person shooters
By Jody Macgregor 18 days ago

The definitive history of why so many shooters told you "A secret is revealed!"

(Image credit: Apogee)

My enduring memory of the original Doom isn't sprinting from room to room shotgunning demons. It's rubbing against every suspicious wall, hammering the spacebar while Doomguy grunts and textures blur. Or flipping a switch, hearing a door open, then working back through the level to figure out where. That was the only way to find those secret rooms and avoid the frustration of finishing a level with a score of SECRETS FOUND: HA HA YOU SUCK%.

David Kushner's book Masters of Doom tells the story of how id went from making Commander Keen platformers to the definitive first-person shooters. It mentions that Scott Miller, founder of Apogee, wrote to id to suggest the first Keen game should have secret areas to increase its replay value, just as the Super Mario games had. John Romero, interviewed by our own Wes Fenlon, says their inclusion was never in question. "Of course Commander Keen is so Mario-like we had to put secrets in there," he says, "and so all the Commander Keen games have tons of secrets in them. Because the secrets in Commander Keen are so great and so fun, when we started making our shooters, even Catacomb 3-D had secrets in it."

Catacomb 3-D is often forgotten, but it was an important step between Hovertank 3D and Wolfenstein 3D back in the days when id felt the need to tell you in the title exactly how many dimensions a game had. But even though Catacombs 3-D demonstrated that secret areas worked in first-person—that it was fun to see a doorway appear in front of you, revealing a space you could walk around as if you were actually there—Wolfenstein 3D almost didn't have them.

(more at the link)

 

[Average Manatee]

Good level design is highly dependent on good monster design, therefore DOOM WADs in general have the best levels.

 

[Grotesque]

hexen 2.

 

[luj1]

de_dust2

If were talking MP as well then got to mention Q3DM6

 

[Arbiter]

Why is verticallity considered a good design?

 

[Durandal]

Why is verticallity considered a good design?

Because it requires that the player spends extra effort into figuring out their surroundings, making the process of figuring out how to navigate a level more satisfying, on top of giving the player and level designers more options to screw around with.

Therefore it stands to reason that 6DoF games like Descent and Overload have the best level design of any game.

 

[Butter]

Why is verticallity considered a good design?

If you're going to make a 3D game, you should employ all 3 dimensions in your design.

 

[Lyric Suite]

I think it's more about the general principle. Designers can have their ups and down and not every level ever made for a classic shooter is a masterpiece but it still matters that the player can still interact with the level and that space is used for the purposes of game play, whether we are talking about exploration or combat. I just despise the "theme park ride" experience a lot of modern shooters or modern games want to offer, where you are forced to respect certain boundaries and you have to compensate with LARPing. I don't want to pretend i'm doing shit i actually want to do shit.

 

[AdolfSatan]

games like Descent and Overload have the best level design of any game.

Preach, brother. On the other hand, how could you of all people not mention Marathon? Those games are amazing in how consistently good their map design is.

OpenSpades features some of the best maps I've seen in a multiplayer FPS. The one modeled after the storming at the beaches of Normandy is probably my favourite ever, no other game I played captured as well that feeling of warring chaos.

 

[Tehdagah]

I think it's more about the general principle. Designers can have their ups and down and not every level ever made for a classic shooter is a masterpiece but it still matters that the player can still interact with the level and that space is used for the purposes of game play, whether we are talking about exploration or combat. I just despise the "theme park ride" experience a lot of modern shooters or modern games want to offer, where you are forced to respect certain boundaries and you have to compensate with LARPing. I don't want to pretend i'm doing shit i actually want to do shit.

Most modern shooters have enormous maps.

 

[Lyric Suite]

You mean those open world shooters where exploration is meaningless?

 

[Old Hans]

I was gonna post this. BLOOD had some great levels