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[Adrian]

Greetings! I've been lurking around here long enough, so I think it's time to share some of my work. For the past week, I've been re-creating one of my favorite levels from Deus Ex, the DuClare Chateau. Not only did it have awesome music, but I loved the mysterious air to the place. It was so majestic and cool; I wanted to capture that feel and bring it to GE:S. Of course, the single player layout had a fair share of dead-ends and wasn't fit for multiplayer. I took some creative freedoms and tweaked it.

=== Phase 1, drawing the layouts ===

Spoiler for Hiden:

Exterior outline


Floor 1 outline


Floor 2 outline


I soon realized parts of the chateau are cramped, so I decided to re-work the original underground areas and build vertically, adding more playable space to the map. If you remember, the entire underground section was a massive dead-end. That won't fly in mutliplayer.

Underground outline

(Graph paper makes life so much easier)

=== Phase 2, building it from the ground up [Alpha stage] ===

I wanted to make the entire map from scratch, so I chose not to export anything. Plus, exporting from other games/engines could get messy if you're like me and don't know what you're doing. With that in mind, I kept Deus Ex open in one window while working in Hammer, constantly tweaking the scale. And let me tell you, the scale in Deus Ex is massive. Over six days, I had the entire layout with basic lighting and basic optimization, and this is where we are now.

Images are much darker in a browser than the actual game, even though I turned my brightness up in-game

Spoiler for Hiden:

Facade


Back exterior


Foyer 1


Foyer 2


Dining room


Kitchen


Computer room


Living room


Back room


Stairway to 2nd floor


Nicolette's hallway


Nicolette's bedroom


Balcony overlooking the foyer


Beth's hallway


Beth's bedroom


Wine cellar, path to outside entrance on right, cellar tunnel on left, kitchen entrance in center


Cellar tunnel, wine cellar on right


Cellar tunnel, stairway to upper floors on right


Early WIP of super computer room, with excavation leading to cellar (breaks in the walls are placeholders)


Stairway to outside hatch behind the chateau


And last, but certainly not least, an overview

Here's the download for the current version, alpha 6.
http://www.mediafire.com/download/mx35dshvnx9dvim/Chateau+Remake%2C+Alpha+06.zip

I think it's safe to say I'm just about out of alpha, considering all the basics are done. I spent the majority of this week tuning the flow and layout, making sure it not only made sense but was easy to navigate.

I appreciate you taking the time to read through this, enjoy! I'll definitely keep this updated as I make progress. I'm aiming to have the entire project finished by the end of April, though that seems ambitious. Only time will tell

*EDIT*: Added spoilers on all the pictures to make scrolling less of a hassle

[killermonkey]

Wow. I am extremely impressed, and I am even more impressed that you used the dev textures properly to ensure height and proportions were kept accurate.

Well done!

Cannot wait to see how this evolves. Cheateu was a very cool level in Deus Ex (not my fav though).

[Jonathon [SSL]]

and I am even more impressed that you used the dev textures properly to ensure height and proportions were kept accurate.

This. This map would probably have a lot of awesome potential to have a similar ambiance to Bunker

[TriDefiance]

This is something I'm definitely looking forward to. It looks great, gives me a feeling of bunker/archives mix, and overall the design of it looks stunning. Great work indeed Adrian!

[soupcan]

Looks great, I'm sure it'll have a nice atmosphere to it. Can't wait for the final release.

[XtremeWRATH]

Im so giddy that so many maps are being done right now, this one looks pretty good layout wise. Never played Deus Ex though so i have no idea what to expect look wise

[namajnaG]

Pure genius. Well done man.

[major]

I like the solid start. The foundation of a map is very important. Your slow solid base is looking very good.

Very interested in this!

[Adrian]

I appreciate all the feedback; it means a lot and gives me more reason to see this through to the end A few nights ago, I held the first playtest for the map, where I received some excellent advice.

=== With that said, on to the pictures! ===

Spoiler for Hiden:

A few rooms inside the house were cramped and most of the doorways were just very narrow choke points.

Living room/office, opened up


New and improved bathroom!


Since there was only one way into Nicolette's room, and two windows overlooking the front, it was easy to sit in there and camp. I fixed this by adding a new passage to her room from the bathroom through her closet.

Nicolette's room, with new closet entrance on right


The underground was essentially a maze of hallways and rooms with no height variation, so I rectified the situation by opening up the main cellar.

Cellar tunnel 1


Wine cellar, from cellar tunnel


Cellar offices/cubicles, with stairway to upper floors on right


Cellar offices/cubicles, from front entrance


Cellar tunnel, stairway to backyard hatch


 I also played around with the entrances to the super computer room, and left only one excavation tunnel and added a new security/checkpoint kind of hallway.

Security hallway to super computer room


Super computer room, still heavy WIP (Excavation to wine cellar on right, security hallway on left)

I just realized now, that if I wanted to add light in front of the monitors, I only chose the green ones. The white screens seem bright enough to emit enough light, but I completely overlooked this!

This is all I have for now. My next focus is on adding some cover/more details outside, such as hedges, statues, gardens and fountains. I hope this is enough to wet your appetites until next time!

*EDIT*: Added spoilers on the pics to make scrolling a bit easier

[soupcan]

Looks great. Really love the use of angled brushes in the map.

[Jonathon [SSL]]

The brushwork O_O

AWESOME!

[Lord_Crow]

I so can't wait to jump in for the next playtest.

[namajnaG]

Woah, that is one hell of an improvement from what we have played the other night. You're on fire!

[Emilia]

+1 Adrian.

Keep at it. Looks awesome so far.

[Adrian]

I'll be taking a break from this over the weekend, since I'm going to Savannah to visit my school. In the mean time, I thought I'd share something, rather than nothing. My next main focus is what will be outside, and I have plenty of ideas flowing. So far I've drawn this horribly out-of-scale diagram to try and represent the basics.

Spoiler for Hiden:

Outside outline

This is what happens when you try and work on anything past 3:00 am, and you're half awake after taking some melatonin.

The idea is to have the hedges outline the terrace on which the chateau sits. I plan on opening the hedges up at strategic spots, but I really wouldn't know where to start with them just on paper. I'm also planning on adding some cute little gardens outside for the armor, or something to that effect. That's all for now!