Garrysmod.org News (wooooo!) http://www.garrysmod.com/news/?p=5469

Release site with more images: http://area51.bunglist.com/
1st Server: steam://connect/gmod.bunglist.com:27015
2nd Server: steam://connect/gmod2.bunglist.com:27017

About
I took the idea for the basic layout from the "real" Area 51 in the Nevada desert using Google Maps (so secret it's on satellite view!) and from various websites dedicated to the base.
Intended as a sandbox build map with something for everybody and designed for long-term use on busy servers, after 6 months of development and many betas tested by Bunglist Build regulars (thanks guys!) we are ready to release this map to the public.

Now available for download now is a "Release Candidate" version, any problems discovered in this version will be fixed before the final release, which will be posted here when it is done.

If you want to see map now the latest version is up on our server, drop in and have a look around!

Features
Technical
* Does not require any additional games - no need for HL2 Episode 1, Episode 2 or CounterStrike Source
* All textures and models are packed into the bsp with Pakrat - so no missing textures or models
* The whole map zipped is only 19 MB, unzipped only 49 MB (smaller file than hugeflatcontruct).
* Above-ground surface is maximum Hammer grid size
* All hangars and popular build zones are Area Portalled for reduced-lag building
* Teleporter network with central hub near the spawn point
* 3D skybox, maximum Hammer size and 16th scale
* Real-life terrain imported into Hammer from US Global Survey DEM satellite data
* Total ground area is approximately twice the size of flatgrass
* Optimized using every technique covered on the Source SDK developer wiki (compiles in about 10 minutes)
* High security Admin room

Surface
* Large open spaces for vehicles and large contraptions
* Huge sky - great for planes, even big enough for Spacebuild ships to fly around
* Two giant runways with interconnecting taxiways
* Control tower with lift for a great view of the surface of the map
* Three hangars with closing doors and area portals for private, lag-free building
* One very tall hanger for particularly large contraptions with a large lift to the underground
* Pool hangar - the pool can be emptied and refilled
* Terminal building
* Bumpy area for vehicle suspension testing
* a UFO!

Underground
Giant underground area almost as large as the surface, including:
* Dirt racetrack, perfect for jeeps, airboats and your own vehicles
* Massive underground reservoir with shipbuilding jetties and ramps
* Dark rooms for discos
* Missile silo with concealed launch bay doors, control room and booster pads for "helping" things into the sky
* Anti-gravity chamber
* Shooting range with, respawning barrel targets, mounted guns and an NPC battle with a Strider, Combine soldiers, manhacks and antlions

Video

View YouTUBE video http://youtube.com/watch?v=WNbspl8huaI

Video by Spark Media

Images
View from the top of the tall hangar

View from the top of the control tower

Race track

Release site with more images: http://area51.bunglist.com/

Download
Release Candidate 1
* Primary link: http://bunglist.ukgamers.com/maps/gm_area51_rc1.zip (19 MB)
* Secondary link: http://files.bunglist.com/maps/gm_area51_rc1.zip (19 MB)
* FPSBanana link: http://www.fpsbanana.com/maps/112485
* Garrysmod.org (uses bittorrent):


Players - extract to your garrysmod/addons folder
Server owners - extract and place the bsp file in your garrysmod/maps folder

Credits
Mattster.t - the in-map maps and lots of ideas and testing help - "you know what we could put in..."
GMan - some sign textures, lots of ideas, testing and bizarre comments - "Herp-a-derp"
All the regulars at Bunglist Build - thanks for all your suggestions and testing
Helios - mapper of freespace03 and 06 - my hangers were inspired by his (but built from scratch)

Thanks for mentioning that, I almost downloaded it.

Can I ask: why did it stop you?
It's only secured to keep the UFO controls from being spammed.
If it's a problem for a lot of people I'll release an unsecured version too, or default the system to "off" so it can be turned on from inside if needed.

I like the map a lot! It looks nice and is not too blocky. The only thing i do not like is the Roads in the base. They're way too big and give a glassy reflection which looks blah.

I played it on the server and its by far the best map ive seen that has been properly built, good job :D

Admin rooms suck. Apart from that, it looks gut :D

Pretty boring textures and admin rooms are never good.

Looks good, I love the skybox!
The rest is a bit meh, But it's not bad ofc.

Great job.

Alt of OP?

That would be funny.

Really really blocky in my ipinion :P
ALso HDR to bright .

Is there an underground area?

Are you just judging from the photos?
It's not compiled with HDR...

Yep, the underground area is where most of the interesting stuff is.

I was restricted on what I could put on the surface because I was trying to keep fairly close to the aerial photos of the real Area 51

EDIT
Added a pic of the underground racetrack to the FP

Doesn't look like A51 at all. Nobody liked my A51 flatgrass, but at least I applied a custom texture of an A51 scan to get the angles and lengths perfect.

you didnt scale the skybox textures. its supposed to be 0.012568 or something.

Judge for yourselves: http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&sour...85745&t=h&z=14

* The runway layout is roughly correct - had to adjust the perspective to fit in the grid.
* I took liberties with the buildings because at proper scale they would be shoebox sized.
* The skybox terrain is from the US Global Survey Satellite data, so if that's inaccurate then you better tell the US Government.

cool i'm downloading looks nice

Looks pretty bland and too spacey from the pictures.

i need it big and spacey for apwns star trek ships

That's exactly why its so big - we run Spacebuild Model Pack (SBMP) on the first server and often have all 12 slots full - it doesn't seem empty with 12 players in! (admittedly it is a bit big for singleplayer unless you want lots of room for an epic build or for flying something around)

It's arranged so that there are several build areas big enough for most contraptions, each separated from the others by area portals to allow 12 people to be building at once with manageable lag.

bunglist got it right i need a big map for space build + apwns ships

Good idea that...could be handy for Area 52 (Cheyenne Mountain Complex/Stargate Command) another map I've got in early beta - I've done the DEM data for the mountain and collected quite a bit of info on the internal layout, I'm thinking aerial photo overlays could really help with lining stuff up perfectly - thanks!

Tried the map , i think its fecking awesome :D

Brush work is awesome except the runways, idk if area 51 is shiny as new as it was. And use point_spotlight

i think a night time copy of this map would be nice

I'd be happy to do a night version!
Once we're sure any bugs in release candidate 1 have been dealt with, I'll get right on it.

what texture did u use for the sand?

One thing I would like to highlight that you don't see in many maps is the ability to engage/disengage an NPC battlefield underground that's mighty fun to jump into.

I think I have probobly spent hours held up underground with nothing to keep me company but a phx plate and a shotgun... oh and the one in the maps quite good Too :P

nature/blendrocksand008c - its a blend texture so I can fade the alpha to rocks on displacements like the bumpy area, ramps and the hills. This texture initially looks like rocks when placed - you have to invert its alpha channel before it looks like sand.

I used another blend texture for the underground racetrack - concrete/blendconcdirt004a to help distinguish the track from the walls.

If you have trouble finding any of these, just get GCFscape and browse through the GCFs in your steam/steamapps folder. Don't extract them all to your garrsymod folder though because pakrat will then try to pack materials that are already included with gmod, leading to larger-than-needed bsp files.

EDIT:
You could also use pakrat to open this map's bsp and extract any of the textures or models you want (works for any bsp with anything packed into it).

btw how do you get the ufo to move ?

Gr8 map.

Sent you a PM

How do i get to the super secret admin room on my server D: "no its not mutliplayer just wanna see U.F.O"

PM'd you too.

I think I might release a version with the admin room protection turned off by default for those that don't like it and for singleplayer use. What do you guys think?

w8, if it's area 51, wheres the groom lake?



@Map

can i make my own?i mean, i'm not stealing ur idea, like, but how's the name? gm_area52?

Groom Lake is a dry (salt) lake bed, its just a flat bit of ground - I meant to put it in its proper position the skybox terrain but couldn't find a decent texture that didn't look either really weird or like concrete.
After a few tries I figured that it doesn't matter much since its in the skybox anyway - just encouraging noobs to noclip out of the grid trying to get there, so I left it out and hoped nobody would care/notice.

Also if I put the lake in then I'd also have to put in a scaled version of the absolutely massive bomber runway that runs across it from before the base was built in its current form.

If anyone knows of a good salt-lake bed texture then I'll stick it in (if it looks less weird than before)

:P


EDIT:
Area 52 is already taken. Amongst other things its another name for the Cheyenne Mountain Complex, where Stargate Command is located in Stargate SG1. (Also, until recently, home to NORAD, featured in a few films including War Games)

I've actually got an early beta of my own Area 52 map - I've already done the terrain for the whole mountain and put in the correct positon for the famous entrance. I've also collected quite a lot of details on the internal layout, so I think it could turn out to be a nice map!

ok lol tnx, i'm making the groom lake, with water tho but smaller version,

Groom Lake is a DRY lake - no water, only salt.

See here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Area_51

or look on google maps. The lake is so flat that it was used as a runway for planes both before the current runways were built and also as an emergency landing destination for USAF bombers until recently.

dude i know, i just said i'm gonna make a version WITH water, i didnt say it has water in REAL life

Ok mate, no problem, just pointing out that it's not really Groom Lake then, nor is it Area 52.

uhm yea lol, sorry about that, i knew it was dried out before

Hey Could you pm to me How to get into the admin room as well as control the Ufo?

This gives you a better idea on how Area 51 actually looks like
http://maps.google.ca/maps?hl=en&sou...8147458&li=lmd

Actually this is a better link I've already posted both a few posts ago and on the release blog for this map. Only maps.google.com has the full pan and zoom capability that is removed from most of the region-specific flavours of Google Maps.

PM'd

btw if you do make a night time copy of this map can you make it so the ufo uses lights when it's flying

The ufo does have 8 point_spotlights on it but the fog seems to cancel them out, i'll see if increasing the fog draw distance helps in the final version.

EDIT:

Going further and casting lights onto the ground is tricky though, cos the only way to do that is with env_projectedtexture (same way ep2 flashlights are done) but that can be laggy/crashy (or it was when I tried to make a day/night cycle map with them. Worked fine in sp but crashy in multiplayer)

Congrats. I made a news post for you. :)

Excellent! Thanks!

I'm on garrysmod.com - I feel special :)

Where is the admin room?

+1. On this kind of map of epic proportions, I wanna see it all.

Can you Pm me the admin room and ufo? i want to put it on my server for me and my friends.

Same here.

PM'd both of you.

Also added a quick youtube video to the FP, check it out :P

I literally made a facepunch account to ask for the exact same thing. Awesome map btw.

PM'd, and thanks bud!

same question also love the map it is awesome

Would like to have directions to the admin room and/or UFO, please.

this map's awesome, i just downloaded it and saw the underground

Just started downloading this map.
PM me how to get to the admin room, so I can do it as soon as I wanna :V

Pm to the admin room would be wonderful. Otherwise I have a few critiques: First of all, excellent map overall. Very well done, and very large. Some doors and walls however are ridiculously thick. The bridge that's attached to the launch room control booth would be made more awesome if it was retractable for security. The large hanger has a small catwalk halfway up - if you expanded on that and added a ladder with a small control booth, the hanger could be a lot more useful.

I mean, overall it was a wonderful map. I'm pointing out a few small things, and really thats all they are. Keep up the great job.

I have to agree on the size part, I felt that the buttons where bigger than me sometimes.

How do i get to the admin room?

i just want to fly the ufo

Just post the info about the admin room, instead of having to PM everyone. It's annoying.

how to get inside the admin room???

OK, OK, I'll post the way into the admin room in public :P

The Admin Room & UFO Controls
Getting in is a little complex and I'm considering changing this for the final version:

You need to go down the big vehicle lift in the tall hanger then at the bottom turn right and right again so you are looking at the wall level with the back of the lift. Stand on the floor, noclip and go straight ahead through the wall - you should either end up in a plain room with 4 teleporters or get teleported to the control tower base (if you missed). Keep trying until you get into the room with 4 teles (might take a few tries to get it right).

Take the second tele from the left - all the others will kill you.

When into the next room turn right and take the tele there into the admin room.

Don't noclip in the admin room or the security system will throw you out. Also don't touch the spinning beams for the same reason.

The UFO controls are straight ahead of you next to a monitor - they look like a white play and stop symbol.

Hope that's detailed enough!

The reason I have it this way is that we use uclip on our server, so non-admins can't noclip thru walls, making the admin room totally secure to all but admins, giving me a place to code e2 or be AFK while I eat cake without getting murdered with a jeep :)

Thanks for the comments, it all gets taken into account for the final version!

Some of the doors are pretty thick, but only the underground ones are really thick, (as with the walls) but underground stuff IRL is much chunkier to support lots of weight - all the underground stuff in the real Area51 would have to support enormous landing planes and probably is designed to withstand bombing to a certain degree.

The Silo catwalk being made retractable has been suggested before and I almost did it then, so now I suppose I have to do it :P

The tall hangar catwalk I intended to do a lot more with but must have got sidetracked - I'll get right on it!

The size of the buttons - yeah I know what you mean, the first set of buttons I originally made are 4x too big (meant to make them easier to spot), later on I switched to using keypads for most stuff cos I preferred the look. I'll go thru and replace all the old huge buttons with little keypads (or maybe black & white ones like the silo control room) for the final version.

i got the map but where is the ufo at

I love the map! It's fun to spawn zombies everywhere and just fight and explore, but one question: I can't figure out what this one control panel does, it moves the pool aside and opens a a big sky door, but I can't figure out anything else. Either way, I love this map, especially the race track. :D

Looks nice but the runway looks to shiney

Put something on the pads at the bottom of the launch gantries, open the silo roof, then press one of the big boost buttons.
Try standing on it and getting a friend to press the button :)

Oh, and for spawning zombies, the range is the best place as the area around the strider is fully AI noded with cover and interest nodes (incluing entry/exit pinch-point nodes for the ramps and barrier gaps), so your zombies will be able to find their way around.

Try triggering the range's own NPC war (press any of the keypads around the range) and adding your own NPCs to it - can get pretty epic with a couple of Antlion Guards and some City Scanners thrown in for effect :P

It's nothing special, but the race track looks kinda cool.

Could you PM with the admin room instructions? =S

Check the Admin Room Entry Instructions I posted above.

Totally unrelated, but - the video we included is now in youtube's Top 100 most discussed youtube gaming vids today!

Whoops >_<

How the fuck did this get on the front page? I think I remember people bashing this in the pimpage thread, maybe not. But nobody liked it at the time, and it doesn't seem it's changed at all.

Edited:

Scratch that, it has a lot of cool little features but it's still a build map. We have too many of those.

This is the first thread I have ever made about this map. It's development has not been discussed here before.

It's front page on garrysmod.org with over 1900 downloads since it was first released 2 days ago, has a news post on garrysmod.com posted there by Bredirish123, a garrysmod.com admin who saw it here (not by me although I'm very grateful).

If you've seen another thread about this it's probably about a different map. If it's that similar, have you got a link so I can check it out?

I built this map for our own server and released it because I thought others might want to make use of it too. No offence was meant and I didn't mean to overflow your library of build maps. IMO, if you don't like or want it, don't download it, I'm not forcing you.

It wasn't its own thread, it was in the map pimpage thread. I'll check though.

Edited:


Yeah, nobody liked this one.

Area51 maps aren't exactly uncommon. Thought this might've been yours (from memory, hadn't gone back until now) that had evolved, apparently not.

The guy who made that map already posted on the first page of this thread. I'd never seen his map when I began making this one.
http://www.facepunch.com/showpost.ph...7&postcount=14

In the interests of maintaining a healthy creative community I would think it's best to encourage the creation of all maps that there is a demand for. I have never understood the FUD about build maps here. Granted there are some awesome SP maps around but I can't say I've been spoilt for choice for technically well-built varied build maps to run on my servers. Most popular seems to be the various versions of Freespace.

And as for Area 51 maps being common, I've never played another one anything like this and I searched around a bit (granted i didn't find BJK's map).

Oh hah, didn't see that...somehow.

maps with huger underground vast open areas are bad

make a lab and a base with everything like black mesa

not a bunch of massive open rooms