Jump to content
The Dark Mod Forums

Why are there no more new fan missions in the missions section ?


^^artin

Recommended Posts

People absolutely are producing new missions, it just happens quietly until someone's ready to reveal it or suggest a beta test. There's even a call for beta testers in this very sub-forum:

Crafting missions takes time. It's not unusual for there to be silence for a while and then multiple missions arrive from several different people within the same month.

  • Like 2
  • Thanks 2

A word of warning, Agent Denton. This was a simulated experience; real LAMs will not be so forgiving.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Creating even a small mission is a big effort and rather time consuming.

  • Like 2
  • Thanks 1

My missions:           Stand-alone                                                      Duncan Lynch series                              

                                      Down and Out on Newford Road              the Factory Heist

                                                                                                  A House Call

                                                                                                  The House of deLisle                                                                                                  

                              

Link to comment
Share on other sites

My old answer to this question used to be, well, you know, you could always make a quick FM for everybody to solve that problem. A person could make a contest sized FM in like 1~2 weeks.

  • Like 1
  • Haha 2

What do you see when you turn out the light? I can't tell you but I know that it's mine.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

@demagogue

I do know. I even tried years ago, but I couldn't even get the dark radiant running on my pc.

@thebigh

I do know. It' s just that no new missions came for an unusual long periode of time now, I would say.

 

I'm happy to hear that the fan mission editing is still happening ! :)

Thanks for answering to all of you.

 

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

18 hours ago, demagogue said:

My old answer to this question used to be, well, you know, you could always make a quick FM for everybody to solve that problem. A person could make a contest sized FM in like 1~2 weeks.

Yeh, I have to get mapping again.

My missions:           Stand-alone                                                      Duncan Lynch series                              

                                      Down and Out on Newford Road              the Factory Heist

                                                                                                  A House Call

                                                                                                  The House of deLisle                                                                                                  

                              

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 2/26/2023 at 11:43 PM, ^^artin said:

@demagogue

I do know. I even tried years ago, but I couldn't even get the dark radiant running on my pc.

@thebigh

I do know. It' s just that no new missions came for an unusual long periode of time now, I would say.

 

I'm happy to hear that the fan mission editing is still happening ! :)

Thanks for answering to all of you.

 

Keep in mind also that mission size, and complexity have increased dramatically since the beginning.
For a lot of veteran mappers, it can take over a year to get a map made and released.
The last dozen missions have for the most part been pretty massive, with new textures, sounds, scripts, models etc.
We seem to be long past the point of people loading up the tools, and banging out a mission in a few weeks that's very barebones. We still do see some of those, but I noticed in the beta mapper forums and on Discord, that mappers seem to make these maps, but don't release them, and instead use the knowledge gained to make something even better. Could just be bias on my part scrolling through the forums and discord server though.

  • Like 1

I always assumed I'd taste like boot leather.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Personally I rather play small to medium sized missions, but this is against the will of most mappers currently.

Why not make a serie of small to medium sized missions with a storyline, maybe campaign, instead of one super large mission that takes 2 years or more to create. Seems more productive. If it's a campaign, just add missions to it via updates later.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I spent way too long searching for this.

I cannot find the thread but we had a long discussion about large vs small missions and I think the final tally was that most players and map authors preferred missions that were nearly as large or larger than the original Thief missions such as Baffords.

TDM was partly a reaction to the smaller missions in Thief: Deadly Shadows and the hope was that we would eventually be able to offer missions that looked as good but were larger than TDS. Now we have some truly monster sized missions so the need to constantly create big mission might be excessive?

  • Like 2

Please visit TDM's IndieDB site and help promote the mod:

 

http://www.indiedb.com/mods/the-dark-mod

 

(Yeah, shameless promotion... but traffic is traffic folks...)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think the initial cost for mission setup/learning LEANS towards medium or large missions being released, than many smaller ones (of any quality level).

Seems this is a mission drought - probably because some big-masterworks arn't quite finished yet, and nobody made any mini-missions (this YEAR?!)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It's good to understand that people making missions, this isn't their job. They don't get paid for it. So we have to find time out of our lives to work on the level. On the one I"m working on, I've been working on it for 5 years lol. I really need to pull my finger out, but time! 

In the meantime, try replaying some of your favourite missions in a very different way you usually do. :)

Edited by NeonsStyle
  • Like 4

I have an eclectic YouTube channel making videos on a variety of games. Come and have look here:

https://www.youtube.com/c/NeonsStyleHD

 

Dark Mod Missions: Briarwood Manor - available here or in game

http://forums.thedarkmod.com/topic/18980-fan-mission-briarwood-manor-by-neonsstyle-first-mission-6082017-update-16/

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 3/4/2023 at 12:22 PM, JackFarmer said:

By the way, it would be even better if many more players would post their opinion in the release threads of the respective missions; I think it doesn't matter if it's positive or negative. Because the knowledge that your own work is played by many people, might be motivating as well  - and was also likely to give the authors a better idea of how many people were playing the missions in the first place.

Hmm...That does sound like a good habit, I really need to get myself to do that.

I can see one problem here being personal (not on my part) and that is being introvert, I'm very sure most people aren't too willing to give a negative review because they fear they'll get into a conflict and they don't want that, as an example.
Or they simply feel too embarrassed to make a review, let alone one in public and have somebody else get in the argument.

Honestly, to all that, all I can say is...Have no shame of yourself if others are trying to shame you for no good reason whatsoever other than their petty sycophantry.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

A theory:

I think a lot of people either started or re-committed themselves to grand creative projects at about the same time during the first few months the pandemic lockdowns. That caused a surge of both high quality projects being completed and creators finding themselves in burnout during the last year, due to life returning somewhat to normal with the accompanying loss of free time. I suspect things will pick up slightly in the latter half of 2023 as the people who didn't finish their projects recover enough stamina for another push.

Expect a few years of weird boom-bust cycles going forward as the world recovers from the pandemic pinch and the resulting shockwaves (and I'm not just talking about TDM FMs either).

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Even if everything in your mission list has green ticks, there's still motivation to replay missions because there's just so many ways to do better. Whenever you complete a mission the game will autosave just before the mission stats screen, so reloading that save provides a means of reviewing how you did in your earlier attempt and what you could have done better.

You might want to replay on a harder skill level, you might want to try to achieve a higher loot score, you might want to get your stealth score closer to zero or ghost the entire mission if possible, etc. Some missions have optional objectives, did you get them all? Some have secrets, did you find them all? Whenever you play a mission for the first time it's never going to be optimal due to its unfamiliarity, so replays give you an opportunity to find a way to do better.

  • Like 1

A word of warning, Agent Denton. This was a simulated experience; real LAMs will not be so forgiving.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I also replay missions I like just because they're fun.

  • Like 1

My missions:           Stand-alone                                                      Duncan Lynch series                              

                                      Down and Out on Newford Road              the Factory Heist

                                                                                                  A House Call

                                                                                                  The House of deLisle                                                                                                  

                              

Link to comment
Share on other sites

19 hours ago, kin said:

I think this is the longest waiting period for a fm to show up in the download section.

The longest interval was 10 months. That was between the 1.0 beta and 1.0 release time.

There have been several 6 month spans so to be the 2nd longest span ( 7 months ) we would need to have no mission releases before April 7th.

  • Thanks 1

Please visit TDM's IndieDB site and help promote the mod:

 

http://www.indiedb.com/mods/the-dark-mod

 

(Yeah, shameless promotion... but traffic is traffic folks...)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

  • Recent Status Updates

    • Petike the Taffer

      I've finally managed to log in to The Dark Mod Wiki. I'm back in the saddle and before the holidays start in full, I'll be adding a few new FM articles and doing other updates. Written in Stone is already done.
      · 4 replies
    • nbohr1more

      TDM 15th Anniversary Contest is now active! Please declare your participation: https://forums.thedarkmod.com/index.php?/topic/22413-the-dark-mod-15th-anniversary-contest-entry-thread/
       
      · 0 replies
    • JackFarmer

      @TheUnbeholden
      You cannot receive PMs. Could you please be so kind and check your mailbox if it is full (or maybe you switched off the function)?
      · 1 reply
    • OrbWeaver

      I like the new frob highlight but it would nice if it was less "flickery" while moving over objects (especially barred metal doors).
      · 4 replies
    • nbohr1more

      Please vote in the 15th Anniversary Contest Theme Poll
       
      · 0 replies
×
×
  • Create New...