SBWT Mapping Competition: Top Man

[Ivory]

Alright, how this works is that you may vote in the poll here / discuss the entries IN THIS CATEGORY ONLY
I cannot stress this enough, don't mix anything up. The polls will be open for 7 days max, or until opinions and such dry up.

Your options will be for each entry (sans funbox maps), or to keep the original version of the map. However this option can only be posted in the thread because I want to hear a good reason to why. Failure to do so will result in your vote being discounted.

Sound fair enough? Keep in mind should this explode, judging will fall purely to Mike and myself.


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Entry 1 - Reidakk
The map is somewhat solid. Lots of open space (perhaps too much), heights to explore. But I feel it's painfully symmetrical. I would of loved to have seen more differences between the two sides. As it stands now, it feels a lot like the current core top man, except with more elevation and open space.

Entry 2 - Rozark
Now this what I was hoping for, plenty of fighting space, but it's interesting. There are places to go and run around. Though I wonder if you should do something about that hiding spot by Wire. There's also a lack for places to use all these mobility items/weapon. Top Spin being the only thing that requires Rush Coil or Mega Ball jumping. Otherwise this map feels pretty solid and I don't have much to say about it.

Entry 3 - Smashbro
First thing is first. Care to point out to me at what part in Top Man had a wind current that blew you to the ceiling?

Anyways, I feel the layout is too small. It wouldn't support large matches as well as the original Top Man did. Too many cramped areas and such. It could of been spaced out more like having the Hard Knuckle Platforms in the deathpits instead. Though I suppose if there was more room, the whole "melee weapon centric" focus of the map would be less effective.

However the wind gimmick hurts the map a lot. The core maps shouldn't be including new gimmicks in unless it's needed. You could of had thunder claw wires or the top actors to reach higher ground.

You also have three top spins, one in a more out of the way area, and the other two in easy to reach areas (the corner ones). I'd replace the easier to reach ones with something else. However two skull barriers side by side? Why? Why was this ever considered a good idea. There should only be one skullbarrier, nonetheless not side by side.

Entry 4 - Copy Robot
The strongest map  in my opinion. The size is about on par with the current core Top Man and it manages to take a robot master with rather bland tilesets and make a really interesting level out of it. The level offers many ways to get around it and you don't always have to be waiting on a top to get you around. Unless of course, Skull Barrier or Eddie is in question.

The thing  that bothers me most though, is in one corner of the map there is a top that is mandatory to get up. Every other part of the map, there is another route close by.

[Ceridran]

I had to go with Copy. While somewhat flat, it wasn't painfully similar to the original, like Reidakk's map.

.. I might revote Rozark if I can get to looking into the maps again.

Revoting Rozark. Now that I think about it, it felt the best.

[CutmanMike]

Reidakk - This one has a very Arena feel to it, kind of like the old Top Man map. In that aspect there's not too much to say, there's a lot of higher up segments that I feel won't come in to play very often due to the flat nature of the map.

Rozark - Now this map feels like a classic doom deathmatch level. The flow is great. I don't have much else to add! I likes it!

SmashBroPlusB - This is a very crowded map with a lot of melee weapons, which did make it very hectic and fun in a niche way. I replacing a core map though, I dunno.

Copy Robot - Another flattish arena-esque map that MM3TOP seemed to characterize. This one is okay, the flow is a bit awkward here and there like that massive spike floor (maybe should just be a pit) and spinning top you have to wait for to climb a ledge.

[Blaze Yeager]

I am voting for Rozark's Top Man. I have to say what Mike said regarding his map is extremely true, it reminded me of an old school Doom map. I can't really say another thing about it other than fixing the one ledge near Wire Adaptor.

[Hallan Parva]

As a mapper I feel compelled to defend my decisions. It's not being stubborn or anything but to rather explain why I did what I did.

First thing is first. Care to point out to me at what part in Top Man had a wind current that blew you to the ceiling?

The wind gimmick hurts the map a lot. The core maps shouldn't be including new gimmicks in unless it's needed. You could of had thunder claw wires or the top actors to reach higher ground.

I'll get back to you once you show me where you cannonballed through the air on Gyro Man. Or when Gravity Man pulled a Mega Man V with mass-changing shenannigans. Or where there is a single pit in Burst Man.  ... Maybe the last one's a bit of a stretch, but seeing as how mostly everyone was hyped up about the spinning top platforms in Top Man when they literally occupied two screens I figured I'd try to be semi-original and include Top Man's other love of pits and climbing in a unique way.

If it's so much of a big deal it can be changed into a thunder peg, but honestly I thought it would be fine.

I feel the layout is too small. It wouldn't support large matches as well as the original Top Man did. Too many cramped areas and such. It could of been spaced out more like having the Hard Knuckle Platforms in the deathpits instead. Though I suppose if there was more room, the whole "melee weapon centric" focus of the map would be less effective.

The reasoning for the narrow hallways and compact design came from a problem I saw in the original Top Man as well as Reidakk's Top Man Remixed (he released it earlier so I already knew what it was like).

Basically, you have a lot of really awesome mid-to-long-range weapons such as Knight Crush, Thunder Bolt, Power Stone, Yamato Spear, and Flash Bomb in the original as well as Blizzard Attack, Search Snake, and Magnet Missile in Reidakk's cover. On top of that, the layout is very wide-open and flat, and Top Spin is hidden in some side path that takes extra time to travel along and has a chance of death alongside it.

The first thing I wanted to establish is that Top Spin would not under any circumstances "suck ass" on my map. Immediately afterward, the second thing I established is that I wanted people to use more than just Top Spin. Being a fan of shenannigans, the idea of making a gentleman's melee club was formed, and I shoved in every good melee weapon I could think of. Water Balloon is there because I wanted a mid-range weapon that isn't awesome at extreme range, and it's not named Quick Boomerang. Hard Knuckle's there as a nod to Top Man himself while also offering something worthwhile for going after Thunder Claw.

After playing every Top Man map, I have to say that my map has the advantage in weapon spread. In every single game I've played, every weapon on the map was used often and someone had it still out by the time the round ended. In Reidakk's map, the entire upper portion was practically ignored throughout most matches. Despite having two other options besides the tops (floating blocks and Tornado Hold) the vast majority of players stuck to the ground. Even in Rozark's well-praised map, nobody bothered to go out of the way for Top Spin when you had the superior Gyro Attack in every other corner. Seeing a literal rainbow of players, from the common Claw and Spin to the sheltered Homing Sniper to the kamikaze Oil Sliders to even the Duo Fist left in the pit... it added a nice variety to each match and it's something few core maps can pride themselves on.

As far as their placements, though...

You also have three top spins, one in a more out of the way area, and the other two in easy to reach areas (the corner ones). I'd replace the easier to reach ones with something else.

I wanted Top Spin to be the "star of the show", so ideally you could quickly reach a Top Spin from any spawn point in the map. Putting Top Spin on an upper platform might have made it "out of the way" but after flipping around Top Spin and Slash Claw about 50 times I just got tired of moving them and quit. A possible fix would be to perform the following switches:

Move the 3D Floor Top Spin to where the side path Star Crash is.
Put that Star Crash where the Top Spin used to be.
Switch the corners around (Top Spin turns into Slash Claw and vice versa).

Two skull barriers side by side? Why? Why was this ever considered a good idea. There should only be one skullbarrier, nonetheless not side by side.

Skull Barrier is an interesting situation. I've placed two Exit Units side-by-side in maps before under the same principle, which is that one player can effectively pick up only one copy of the item. It's not like Beat Support or Rush Coil where some jerk can use one before picking up the other; trying to use an Exit Unit will take you away from the other one and you really have to work to get back there. Since v3a, you can't fill up your Skull Barrier with another Skull Barrier, so I put two there to help spread the love and prevent the MM4SKU problem of a section of a map being literally useless for 75% of the game.

Skull Barrier was put in to give players a sort of "breather", to take a break from the madness. If you're going to run through a segment where you think there's going to be a lot of trouble, pop your shield and enjoy the scenery. For about two seconds. With all the power weapons on the map, Plant Barrier didn't make a lot of sense and Exit Unit would probably put you in worse shape, and once Skull runs out you can probably one-shot or two-shot the guy using it anyway. Again, didn't seem like a big deal but I guess some people got a bit upset from it.


That's pretty much it, I'm typing up some lengthy reviews of each map so you won't see anything of that sort from me quite yet.

[Jatea]

I totally looped the song for Copy's map  
why are emoticons a thing

But yeah I don't really like choosing anything so I won't
I still like all of them over vanilla, though

[Linnie]

It's a real toss-up between Rozark and Copy Robot. I loved the layouts of both of them. I'm going to give my vote to Rozark just because I liked the feel a little better, but I think both of them are about equally great.

[*Alice]

Reidakk's is quite large yet without much variety. I don't really like it.
Smashbro+b's map is too claustrohobic and the rising air thing is not really a fun gimmick.
Copy's map contains too many wide open spaces for me.

Rozark's map manages to actually encourage you to use the Mega Ball as a platforming utility and the map is fun in general.
I'm voting for it.

One more thing: The rising platforms in Reidakk's map are bugged:

(click to show/hide)

[Knux]

Voted for Rozark's as well. About the only thing I could not like is a Top Spinner around the corner. But it's Top Man! :P

[Myroc]

Reidakk

This map is too large, and too uninteresting. Very poor aesthetics, particularly because of the mis-scaled textures on the hovering glass blocks, and the fact that it doesn't look very different from vanilla top man, whose poor aesthetics were one of the primary reasons of being selected for a revamp. The center part made a clever use of the top platforms, though.

+ Clever use of top platforms
- Too big
- Looks ugly
- Horrible layout

Rozark

I'm not sure what everyone sees in this map. The layout works, but overall the map is very boring, and feels a bit too open, with not enough content to make use of it. The map looks very dark and uninteresting with the overuse of the dark interior textures. People have said that this map feels like a Doom map, although that doesn't neccesarily make it any better. It has some pleasing ramps instead of everyone else's odd-looking stairs, but overall, that's really all I can say about the map. It's not terrible, but it feels very sub-par.

+ Ramps, I guess?
- Boring and empty.

SmashBroPlusB

This is, oddly enough, my map of choice, which isn't what I was anticipating, although that isn't really because of the map being of stellar quality as it is the general lack of quality in the other maps. (While they are all better than vanilla Top Man, I wouldn't let any of these maps into the core without some sort of adjustments). I am particularly fond of the weapon selection and its emphasis on close-quarters combat (although I'd like to see something else but Homing Sniper as a way to round out the armory). The layout is initially confusing, but is quickly understood, and is pretty solid once you look past that. That said, the map is not without its shortcomings. For one, the map is lacking in the visuals department, as while it is slightly more pleasing to the eye than vanilla Top Man, it is not by much. There's also the completely random wind sector that feels completely out of place in Top Man (and, while I'm not one for shoe-horning in gimmicks, would be much better if it was replaced with some variant of top platforms), and some odd design decisions. Overall, this is my favorite of all the Top maps, but that's only because it has qualities to make up for its shortcomings.

+ Great weapon selection
+ Good layout
- Poor aesthetics
- Out of place wind sector

Copy Robot
This is, by far, the most visually pleasing of the bunch, and an excellent example of how using the textures is what is important, rather than the quality of the textures themselves (although having interesting textures help significantly). I'm afraid, however, that's really all I can say about the map, I feel the layout is on the worse end of the spectrum of the entire competition, and, Reidakk aside, is definitely the worst of all the Top maps. In addition, the top platforms feel like they're only there for the sake of being there. The map looks great, but when that's all it has going for it, it really feels below average.

+ Excellent aesthetics
- Poor layout
- Top plaftorms feel superfluous

Korby

While this map is disqualified, I laughed for almost two minutes straight upon seeing it.

[fortegigasgospel]

I'm going on Rozark here, good solid layout. The map has a good feel to it. Also bonus points for using a remix of the GB Top song.
Smash's seemed a little to much like a cluster of huh? Sorry Smash.
Copy's was ok, also, WAY too easy to get the Treble Sentries.
Rei's felt too much like the old one to me.

[Geno]

I'm gonna vote for Rozark.

And not because everyone else did.

[Gumballtoid]

Copy gets my vote. The map is aesthetically appealing, incorporates the spinning top platforms that felt right, and had an overall solid layout.

EDIT: I'd like to point out that the wind gimmick used in Smash's submission could fare really well in a Dustman Remixed.

[OrangeMario]

I voted for Smash's topman.

Understanding that his map lacks much in visual detail and eye candy, visuals were the last of my concern; not important atm, as that can be fixed somtime in the future.
Besides getting the winning 20 kills in my first try in Smashes map (pitted with SRK2 and, I think, Messatsu), This was the only map that gave me more confidence in using topspin, without fearing that messastu players would annihilate me upon spawn. because of the fact that topspin was near by when I spawned, I had a better way to defend myself to getting some other desired weapons. In most maps in the core, it was a weapon that anyone would see from a mile away and instinctively avoid it like roboenza. However, because of the slightly cramped layout and the abundance of corners and short hallways, I had a much more easier time surprising enemies running around a corner to my left or right with a spin to the head. Players don't see it comming that often, and its much more rewarding to use topspin on the fly.

Of course, the wind gimmic may be nice and all, but I feel that it kinda deters the consistency of the MegaMan 3 flow; this gimmic might fit better in Windman's stage more than topman. I'd only say: replace that gimmic with the anticipated rising and falling top platforms.

Again, topspin shines more in this map, and I love the idea of focusing battle with melee weapons.
I just hope that people get the joke to the Hidden music in his stage...

Smash Wins my vote in this one.

[Shyster]

I really think Copy Robot used the top platforms well without creating the useless upper sections of Reidakk's Topman (which are still a blast to navigate). I am a bit worried about the treble sentries though.

Rozark's was just a little too... boring I guess. Solid, but no flash.

I suppose Smash's concept is... unique. It really is just confusing  and too cramped in the end, and wouldn't be fun in most circumstances. Too experimental I suppose. And also, the wind gimmick really did come out of nowhere, and would look pretty glaring in the vanilla game.