Chris Bryant @LiterallyCrypt Twitter profile

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

6 months

There's not really a good reason to do it but if you really want to you can squeeze a solid prop out of 24 triangles

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

22 days

Half-Life Alyx is great because you can just look at a random corner and there's nothing there but it's still kinda pretty??

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

Ever realize you need a new piece for your modular kit, but all your artists are busy? In Hammer this is what's known as "A fake problem we can solve in 2 minutes"

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

2 years

Still can't believe Half-Life: Alyx was so good that it ended the VR Shooter genre

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

Hammer is so user-friendly that it beats Unreal even at something as simple as object duplication. This isn't a technology issue, it's implementation.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

More CS2 tools. Barring those player models, every single piece of geo you see here was made in the editor in the span of a night. God, I love Hammer 5.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

Oops! All Hammer Geo!

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

Wanna see some black magic? Hammer's Hotspot texturing can easily save you *hours*

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

5 months

Here's a quick texturing tip: If you Multiply a gradient, you get the smooth result you'd expect. But if you're looking for something noisy or generally more interesting, instead SUBTRACT the inverse of that gradient. Super nice for brushes, leaky walls, lots of stuff.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

Hey, Unreal, Unity? There people in my replies who are *blown away* that I made a level in the *level editor.* Maybe you guys could step your game up?

Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

More CS2 tools. Barring those player models, every single piece of geo you see here was made in the editor in the span of a night. God, I love Hammer 5.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

Still reeling over how absurdly easy and fast Hammer is. Did this entirely in Hammer, using stock materials and Hammer geo only. I gave myself a 2 hour time limit.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

2 years

I think I fucked up. I think I fucked up, man

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

Spent my night goofing around in CS2's workshop tools. Valve is still the only dev who really knows how to do tools.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

8 months

Stone Cold Steven Universe

@Bolt_451

8 months

Still thinking about the Smork alam

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

4 years

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

2 years

The next Half-Life game is only taking so long because Valve's trying to figure out how to put a train ride in the fucking arctic

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

You can UV your geo almost instantly with Hammer's Fast Texture tool. This alone would make most geometry tools a so much better. Again, this isn't revolutionary new tech. It's just implemented in a way that's quick and easy to do, something all level editors should be doing.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

3 years

TF2 fans any time Valve talks about something that isn't TF2

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

I'm not saying you *have* to make your railings in the editor. I'm just saying Hammer's tools are easy and fast enough that takes only 10 minutes from start to finish.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

"Hammer looks like a glorified modeling tool. What does it have that Blender, Maya, etc don't have?" How about getting a mesh usable in the editor in less than 7 seconds? Imagine how much time you're *wasting* by your favorite engine not having good in-editor tools.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

11 months

Valve really popped tf off huh

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

3 years

Source environment artists are all like

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

A lot of people see these videos and say something like "We need to bring back brush-based editors!" Well, guess what? Hammer doesn't have brushes anymore. Hammer is a static mesh editor. Its ease of use is *not* because there's brushes, it's because of the fantastic UI and UX.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

Okay so I actually hate the modular workflow. There's a time and place for it, but its inescapable ubiquity is actually a symptom of poor level design tools. Nonetheless, here's 2 hours of me trying it out in Hammer, never leaving Source 2.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

2 months

Every time

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

3 months

Thread of some of my Hammer/Source 2 musings so I can keep them all in one place:

Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

More CS2 tools. Barring those player models, every single piece of geo you see here was made in the editor in the span of a night. God, I love Hammer 5.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

4 years

@ChibiKinesis

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

4 years

Every spring, employees of the Black Mesa Research Facility are treated to an 8-day, all expenses paid vacation to the Crossfire Resort

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

Hammer's got probably the most useful context menu I've ever seen, every program should have this

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

"But, Chris! My team uses a modular art approach, not this outdated bespoke stuff." I've got great news: You control the buttons you press! You could still use the modular workflow you're used to. Doesn't this look so much easier than importing from Maya?

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

3 years

POV: You're playing S&box but you forgot to install Counter-Strike: Source 2

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

10 months

If you haven't heard, Half-Life's oft-forgotten final expansion pack, Half-Life: Decay, is getting a fan reboot, titled Peer Review. We just entered Alpha 3 and we're super excited about it!

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

If anyone's curious why Unreal's tools are (by admission of their engineer) not great for level design or user-friendly quad modeling, it's because the crew behind it believes level design is a niche use case for geometry in video game engine Unreal. Hope this clears things up.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

11 months

Shout out to Valve for openly setting the record straight: Now people can stop telling me that Uplink was aKsHuLlY cut from FAF/Lambda Core and that Further Data should be part of Black Mesa's campaign.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

Valve absolutely preaching

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

25 days

Decided I wasn't allowed to sleep until I could legitimately: - Launch to main menu - Start a mildly art passed level - Affect the level in some way - Do something in the level that ends it So TECHNICALLY I've already made the game & now I just have to make it better, riiiight?

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

7 months

Grappling with Save/Load. You would not believe the hell

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

Cordons are one of those QOL features that Hammer's had for ages and somehow hardly any other editor has it? Or the closest equivalent is a chore to set up. Veteran Hammer users will respond to this w/ "Duh, everybody knows about Cordons. Wait, other editors don't have Cordons?"

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

One of my favorite things about Hammer is that all of its operations stay on-grid when I want, meaning not only can I make geometry quickly, but it's also gonna stay easy to work with later.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

6 months

Haven't touched Hammer in a while, so did a corridor to freshen up on keybinds

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

4 years

Ya ever spend a little TOO much time on your fictional branding?

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

4 years

I gotta admit, there's something really comfy about working with Half-Life 1's textures

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

3 years

Remember Half-Life: Alyx's dope-ass credits music

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

3 years

Some Dude: *Makes Claims* Journalists: "BREAKING HL3 NEWS" Valve: "Remember that he's Just Some Gamer Dude making guesses" Journalists: "Breaking, Valve thinks we're silly to have trusted Some Dude" Some 'Gamer' Dude: "They called me a Gamer!"

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

Lot of Unreal Devs trying to tell me that I'm wrong here, or that there's faster ways to do it. The problem is that you're arguing against a fact. Fact is, not having to do something at all? Infinitely faster than having to do it at *any speed.* So let's remove that step, yeah?

Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

"Hammer looks like a glorified modeling tool. What does it have that Blender, Maya, etc don't have?" How about getting a mesh usable in the editor in less than 7 seconds? Imagine how much time you're *wasting* by your favorite engine not having good in-editor tools.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

"I still have to use Maya/Blender/etc. to unwrap, so why does it matter if I stay in the editor" Not if the editor has good UV tools! Hotspots and bounding-box quad unwraps knocks this out in less than 30 seconds, without a single import or export.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

3 years

Valve is so silent post HL:A because if they say anything at all the TF2 community will post a horribly compressed jpeg of nope.avi and scream about the heavy update or sth and Gabe is held hostage in NZ for another 6 months

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

4 years

I like PC Gamer's VR article because they say there's been "no single killer app" for VR but then proceed to talk about how HL:A sold out a $1k HMD and caused a 40% increase in VR users but it doesn't count because not all HL fans could play it because it's VR

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

2 months

@joewintergreen Maybe you could even host them on your own networks? And not be permanently locked out of playing once the publisher shuts down the servers. But alas

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

3 years

Y'know, having now played some Quake, Valve needs to get going with a Half-Life remaster. Not Black Mesa, not Half-Life: Source. Just, that little jolt to cement it into the modern age while respecting everything it is. You'd be hard-pressed to get me to play another game again.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

4 years

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

Hey wanna see something whacky

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 month

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

3 years

I firmly believe this ARG is responsible for how Valve fans will turn bread crumbs into skyscrapers

Valve Archive

@ValveArchive

3 years

Other Files/Alternate Reality Games/Portal 2 ARG/BBS archive/bbs_dump_pictures/progress1.png Found in folder:

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

18 days

I just want to say that nobody should ever try to make a game. It is pain. It is awful. I don't think anybody should ever try to do this. I've wasted HOURS of my day - and consequently my life - to problems that should never exist. It's truly terrible. It's still kinda cool tho

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

7 months

More babysteps: Footsteps! First pass at implementing. They're speed-driven, pick randomly from a selection of sounds by surface type, and also slightly modulate the pitch of each sound for a liiittle extra variation. Also landing plays two steps because I like how that sounds.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

7 months

One thing Unreal does right is the gizmo being emissive and actually interacting with the scene lighting, it's so cute I love it

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

5 months

It's weird that people talk about Half-Life Alyx like it's not a full length campaign and also better than Half-Life 2 because it's very much both

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

4 years

My Black Mesa map pack, Further Data, is a reimagining of Half-Life: Uplink, and is now available on the Steam Workshop here: It's my first solo release and I'm eager to hear any and all feedback you all have on it. Thankies for checking it out!

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

19 days

Building a system to emulate Source's IO system to simplify my level scripting

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

@thmsvdberg Yes, custom pivot point included

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

11 months

Oh yeah, for those not in the know, a few years ago I released Further Data, which was my own take on Uplink as an add-on for Black Mesa. It's a little rough around the edges (wanted to just ship it and be done) but it was mostly a solo project, so I'm proud of what's there!

Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

11 months

Shout out to Valve for openly setting the record straight: Now people can stop telling me that Uplink was aKsHuLlY cut from FAF/Lambda Core and that Further Data should be part of Black Mesa's campaign.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

11 months

Pretty sure the pipes alone in this map probably use an entire chapter's worth of the OG game's face budget

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

6 months

Originally I only wanted to make a couple grates for funsies, but I got a little out of hand. All Hammer geo. Inspo is obvious, I friggin' *love* Mirror's Edge.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

7 months

Dragging my roots with me kicking and screaming. At least it's starting to feel like home

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

3 years

Iunno if I've ever publicly said this but I genuiely went into Half-Life: Alyx expecting mild HL disappointment but a cool VR experience, and was instead blown away with some of the most interesting design and story elements, and I continue to be thankful that Valve managed that.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

2 years

Low poly again because I can (Not the Security Edition™), it's 3,123 tris and uses a single 2k map for the body, and a 512 for the windows

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

4 years

I would just like to remind everyone that this is a real thing that exists and is also free

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

7 months

Look, Gabe Newell isn't exempt from Eat The Rich, but I do have to acknowledge that once he kicks the bucket, PC gaming is *fucked*

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

3 years

Nobody would ever notice (or care) that I made the black ink reflect differently but I'm showing it to you anyway

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

Hammer isn't going to replace your modeling suite, but there's no reason you shouldn't be able to make the bulk of your level in the level editor. It should be easy. It CAN be easy. Also sorry about the cropping, I'm a 3D artist, not a video editor, I promise I tried.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

22 days

@monster_urby

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

6 months

Think I'm ready to wrap up this little scene and move on

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

3 years

Portal Crumch

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

Instead of asking "Can we get meshes from Hammer Into Unreal?" (yes) you should be asking "Can we get Epic to make Unreal's mesh and UV tools this nice?" (probs not but please try)

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

Real-time variant, if anyone's interested:

Source 2 Hammer - Sbubby Eef Freef

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www.youtube.com

Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

Still reeling over how absurdly easy and fast Hammer is. Did this entirely in Hammer, using stock materials and Hammer geo only. I gave myself a 2 hour time limit.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

Here's some shots that aren't zipping by like a coked-out squirrel

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

4 years

Not even gonna pretend I'm sorry.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

4 years

Black Mesa: Hazard Course is releasing on Black Mesa's Steam Workshop on December 29th, the 5th anniversary of the original release. It's lame that p much the entire mod is no longer up to our standards at this point, but it's nice getting to shine a spotlight on it once again.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

7 months

Cops when they see an acorn

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

7 months

I've been putting off NPCs for a while because it's really scary stuff, but here I go, diving into scary stuff

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

3 years

I pick on Source engine devs so much because I have been one for the literal majority of my life and am fully qualified to know how insane you have to be to continue to use this antiquated Quake-based tower of duct tape

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

@VST_plugin Valve's mastered the art of doing a lot with a little and it never gets old

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 month

I think this absolute flex of a map from HL1's update last year is probably visually my new favorite HL1 map

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

4 years

Potential mod for @BlackMesaDevs , I'm working on an upgrade to my old model, HD Pack Styled Sleeves because tbh it sucked. Here's v2.0 in progress #HalfLife #3DArt

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

7 months

Little victory

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

4 years

My Black Mesa map pack, Further Data, is a reimagining of Half-Life: Uplink. I aim to release it on the 15th, so that's fun.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

2 months

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

22 days

I'm using Hammer to build levels for my Unreal game. Hammer's not designed to do that, so there's some jankiness in my workflow. I'm writing programs to ease some of that jankiness.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

5 months

"How do you get the right PBR values?" vibes, my man

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

@mythicalguard_ If you're just starting off, I'd suggest starting with Source 1. It's a little simpler on the geometry side a you work with brushes, not meshes, and it's been around much longer so there's more documentation. Plus a wealth of different games/mods to map for, to try some variety.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

11 months

Sorry, still reeling, new Half-Life content in the year of our lord 2023. Valve pushed CS2 this year, they already hit their release quota for the decade, and yet here they are.

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

3 years

If Valve made the "What cat?" joke in a HL game today it'd get dismissed as being too much like Portal humor

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

2 years

Retro-style low poly M2 heavy machine gun

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

8 months

I complain a lot that there hasn't been a truly Great HL2 mod since the early 2010s at least but HL1 players literally never stopped eatin' good

HALF-LIFE: THE C☢️RE - SnCGames

@sncgames

8 months

"We're sorry, but all of our advisors are busy at the moment. Please hold and we will attempt to connect your call shortly."

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

5 months

Workin' on some generic trimsheets so I don't have to worry about creating unique materials for half my props. Got some polishing to do

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

5 years

Here's a pretty classic #Blocktober for me, back when I was working on Black Mesa: Hazard Course. I managed to scrounge up some old files of my favorite work from the mod. #HalfLife #BlackMesa #SourceEngine #LevelDesign #GameDev @BlackMesaDevs

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

Unreal bros can jump at me being so silly for not thinking its modeling tools are great for many level designers or simple modeling, but even the people making them agree, say that it's *by design*. This is why I rant about how tools could be better. They CAN be. They just aren't

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Chris Bryant

@LiterallyCrypt

1 year

@MosesMckeon So much so that there are multiple Unreal plugins to help streamline that process for the Source 1 version of Hammer. This version has native FBX exporting, so it's extra easy. Lots of people use Trenchbroom, there's a plugin called Mesh Tool, or just work in a modeling suite.

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