Frankly, S8 has long been in my sights as yet another sample of new content hastily added on TechCom that ended up being more trouble than it's worth because of its spammy style. The fact that its exact looks and "atmposhere" were already used in VK's previous map didn't help sell it much either :/. Seeing him decide on his own to address this by taking the map to a more sensible direction, however, has made me somewhat hopeful. So, instead of offering cynical remarks about SEKTOR8-THE-BATTLE-CONTINUES--ALSO-KNOWING-IS-HALF-THE-BATTLE-KIDS! (why must they all have a subtitle and be in capitals :s?), I'll rather reserve cynicism for once and offer some constructive comments instead . Here's some stuff off the top of my head.

- Your skills have indeed improved, VK, but I've yet to see a map from you that outgrows the very common "orthogonal" design phase that many beginner mappers go through (only 90° turns) during their development. Try seeing if you can come up with some more interesting ways for players to, for example, move from floor to floor. Add a few more jumppads too!
- Map is very heavy-handed with its vehicle loadout for its geometry and this, as you've pointed out yourself, leads to spam causing gameplay to suffer. I think a general toning down effort is in order here (TankMeDown?), meaning most big area-of-effect/splash damage vecs should go: Ions, Firetanks, Cobras, Dragons, Phoenixes. Considering that half the times your opponent will be on foot, your vec could be lesser and still pose a challenge for them to overcome. IMO, tanks, badgers, benders and pallies would be more sensible here (most EONS vecs too), assuming the fundamental geometric characteristics of the map remain the same after the redesign (i.e., still many narrow spaces).
Conversely, thinking with the pedestrian fighter in mind, they also could use some help setting boobie traps, moving around faster and defending themselves whether they're charging an enemy node or protecting their own: grenade launcher and a few mines per player might be a good idea for this map; bios, minis and jumpboot pickups too maybe. You could also try adding that EMP weapon thingy we used to have on Tricky/Floodgate, but in somewhat greater numbers. Of course its code would need to be changed so that the effect wouldn't last that long otherwise you'd end up with a few ppl spamming those and disabling vecs all the time. Anyway, just another idea there. Oh, those laser barrier thingies could be put to better use if they spawned closer to each lateral primary perhaps.
- In the same vein, rethink your shield/health/bonus pickups layout.
- I wholeheartedly agree with Thom's suggestion to remove the CVG (helps reduce the number of dependent files for the map too!). Perhaps supernuke will be too much with weaker vecs as well.
- On the other hand, I disagree about further adding gorz birds to the map. IMO even the phoenix is too much for these narrow spaces, let alone a falcon that at the hands of an experienced airman can get in n' out much faster and do even more damage. Maybe Auroras could replace the Phoenixes since that way you have a similar splash damage effect, but a slower craft that also has trouble defending itself at mid/long-distance (far inferior hitscan). Or just leave the raptors to duke it out on their own, whichever works best.
- The 2 bridge nodes in the main room with the holes you can drop through and the Hornets below need some rethinking IMO. No point having nodes stepping on eachother's... lockers; top floor middle nodes should be enough.
- Replace/remove those dreaded octagonal core lifts (with standard lifts/jumppads/teleporters); they take up so much space and make core fights on foot practically impossible to have at match-end times; oh, also remove those arrows emitters :s.
- Conveyor belt pathways seem pointless; I dunno that anyone's ever used 'em.
- Alternate, sneaky route to cores beside direct rushing?
- Colour-code the teleporters (especially above the cores); it'll help alleviate confusion as to what leads to where. In fact, why not try making them look a bit better if you have the time by changing around their base st.meshes and emitters?
- Once again, experiment with decorating the place with more variety so the entire map doesn't look samey. Lighting, area effects/sounds, particles, st.meshes and/or wall textures can all help. Labels or signs, localized smoke, leaking pipes, warning lights, items that make the place seem more human/useable, etc, etc.

Working on that.

What i'm doing right now;

New path to core.
Different style/texture use of the map.
Replacing vehicles.
I managed to get 4fps more. got 58Fps 60max (V-sync)
New jumppads.
And removed the corridors above core and below main level (where the phoenix is)

Oke i'm done with this

All new textures.
Spamm vehicles removed.
2 new paths at each core, 1 up, 1 mainfloor.
+ EMP mines
+ Some Spiders

Less nodes; more action on foot.

Edit:

Elevaters work now as they should work with triggers up and down.
Fps Greatly increased by at least 15 fps (on my system 25fps)
Brighten up the map with more colors.

...

The map weight goes from 50,3 Megs to 40,4MB!
Shield, health pickups placed wisely


http://www.mediafire.com/?sc56040b3yxxxwl

Some pleasant feedback: http://sharetext.org/AHK

New version is up,


Changes,

Great FPS increase, more decent average 50+ (previous has 35, at some choke points) In this case i had to use distancefog and new antiportals.

New vehicles, The alligator and the Turtle.

I wonder where that sudden FPS improve come from…

Hope you chose reasonable values for the settings in the Volume. If they are too radical, you notice stuff disappearing too soon.
I figured that CullDistance = Size * 10 + 1500 is a good formula.

New update;

Completely new textures, fog and the Bloodbath theme is changed to Acid fluid.

Have fun

Well let's see (if we had a link)…

I personally don't like the reduced fog distance as I saw it in the version you sent me. If you can't see as far as your instant hit weapons can shoot, then something is quite wrong.

And FPS can't be a reason for that, imho, as long as it stays above an average of 30 fps is all fine.
On my system (which is by todays means not really high end anymore) did I get a minimum of 50 fps, a maximum of 165 and an average of 100 with all settings maxed out and without any fog distance taking effect.
The map was by all means as optimized as possible without affecting gameplay.

This might sound selfish, but at a certain point would I not care about the minimum system specs for this game anymore if it means gameplay restrictions. Your opinions? Would maybe be good to know the overall hardware configuration of today's UT2k4 player base.

Of course does this criticism only base on the last version I had for testing, don't know how far VK changed it afterwards.


For the theme change: I actually liked the red in contrast to the already green fog. Everything being green would not be good for the atmosphere anymore in my opinion. It's your decision of course, this map made quite a big jump in style already anyway and looks slightly Asiatic around the Cores now, what's quite a big contrast to the metal/toxic theme.