Happy New Year: Ball Dropping Danger! Free Map!

Well, I may be late with a free Christmas map, but I'm barely early with a New Year's Eve map!

Again I want to thank you for a great 2010. This blog and my maps, would not be what they are without all of you supporting me. Thank you so much for a great 2010!

And here's to all of us that we have a flawless 2011. I'm still a few Dark Alley map sales away from hitting the numbers I need to produce a second map. But if we reach that goal, I've got a few big surprises for everyone for 2011.

I've always wanted to experience New Year's Eve at Times Square. And since I can't convince myself to endure that level of madness... I felt mapping it would be the next best thing!

For you New Yorkers, hopefully this map adequate captures the feel of Time Square. I'm in New York for business often enough that I was OK with watering down One Times Square to its bare essence. Ok New Yorkers, I know that Broadway comes in on an angle and isn't at a perfect 90 degree, but square grid maps lead themselves to right angles.

I also cut out the Police Station and the Recruiting Center. I have nothing against either structure, I just couldn't get them into the map without losing the side elements I wanted.

Those of you that remember my Martian Clockwork map know that I'm a fan of balls and this map has both a Dick and a Ball! That's right! That's our old, old, old pal Dick Clark on the side of that building. And that's a 12 foot diameter ball! Look out Dr. Manhattan.

Also, unlike the North Pole, this map contains very little hindering terrain. So look out Clown Prince of Crime, odds say that the Caped Crusader is in that mailbox!

If you want to rock your battles on this Rocking New Year's Eve Map, you can find it here.

Happy New Year! I'll see you in 2011.

-CL

Merry Christmas: North Pole Nightmare Free Map!

Yo Ho Ho! or just Ho Ho Ho!
It's Christmas and who doesn't like free gifts!?! This has been a wild 2010 for me. I started this personal challenge to design 26 maps in 52 weeks. With your encouragement and your kind words, this has blossomed from what was really just a pipe dream to my mass producing one of my maps for the public. Last February, I had no idea that my work would be so appreciated. Thank you!

Way back on December 10th, I previewed this map over at HCRealms. I was hoping to finish it two weeks ago, but with barely a few hours left before Christmas, it's done and ready to download.

I actually started this map a few years back and it was originally intended for a horror game and was riddled with dead elves, dead reindeer and a dead Santa. In the end I decided to clean this one up a bit and use it for more friendly battles.

Santa's workshop is a Stealth player's heaven. There are tons of workbook benches, ornaments and trees to hide in. Looks like Batman has been a good boy this year.

While vectoring the green lines around all those tables, I started thinking about Snow as a game element. One would expect Arctic snow to be deep and hence able to be submerged in. And it's made out of water... so with that I thought, "Eureka! Snow is water terrain!" Merry Christmas, Aquaman! All that snow becoming water terrain lead to some unique and intricate map areas. You need to really watch and plan out exactly where you're stepping and where you want to go.

I hope you like it and you can download this map here.

Thank you again for reading and Merry Christmas!

-CL