Tatooine: Tusken Canyon

Description
Each of the following six files has been made by the same author over the course of a very short time; to commemorate the prolific production of one author in such a short time I will write a short essay in six parts: "Caring for your work" or "why it's important that you spend more than an hour or two making a map or mod you plan on distributing."

Part 5:
The problem I see in this series of maps as a real contributing factor to the complete obfuscation of quality in favor of quantity is that the author perhaps didn't move past that initial fascination of "Holy Moly OBJECTS!" or thereabouts. Too many of these maps (all of them, in fact, as well as the two or three submitted before with similar flavors) fall prey to some simple, basic errors and design flaws that could be corrected if the author read some of the criticism levied at him - or even stopped to take a breath! It seems as though all these maps have just plateaued at one stage of development (that is, the "I can now place objects AT WILL" stage) instead of representing a gradual incline in skill and complexity.

[Continued in "Felucia: Imperial Settlement"]



"Tatooine: Tusken Canyons," by cyclonassasin, is a simple, Tatooine-ish map (which is fortunate, as it is set on Tatooine). Of the six he submitted today, this is probably the best-looking of the lot, although there are still a number of issues (the greatest of which is the blocky terrain seen everywhere). It notably lacked Tuskens, which seemed strange for a map bearing their name.

What could be done to improve it? Here are a few tips:

-The sky. Yes I will say this for every one of your files. You are not on Yavin, this sky does not fit, and you don't have any surrounding anything to block out that ugly black cutoff in the sky texture. Change it.

-Locals. Learn to add them. It's a great way to add flavor to a map, and especially if you plan on naming your map after them (Tusken Canyons, Jawa Tunnels, Acklay Flats... whatever), it would be a good idea to have them show up once or twice.

-Map size. Keep it small, keep it small, keep it small. This isn't a massive map, but I could see it tending in that direction. And without a lot of scenery to spruce up the map from command post to command post, you could easily fall prey to "too much walking" syndrome.

If the screenshots appeal to you, go ahead and give it a try.

-Mav