Creating in Hammer for Alien Swarm

So my mid-year break is coming to a close, and to wrap it up nicely Alien Swarm was released about a week ago. Alien Swarm is what you'd get if you merged Diablo with Left 4 Dead - a top-down playstyle with hordes of enemies constantly running at you. It's a whole lot of fun. The best part is that it's free - and it comes with the source code and SDK to tinker with.

So I decided, why not. I'll give modding a shot. And I have to admit, I've impressed myself. In this past week I've learned to model dynamic levels, create dynamic AI nodegraphs, and create interesting triggers inside of Hammer. The test map I've been working on - called "The Room" - is a holdout gametype where you are thrown into a building with a bunch of supplies and have to survive through wave after wave of increasingly difficult swarms of Aliens.

It's designed around 4 players on Hard, and intended to be an unfinishable scenario (simply because my friends and I love a good challenge). I've had to overcome a lot of issues - spawns not working, aliens getting stuck, models disappearing. I even had a few issues of my own design - how would I make a wall blow out, just as an extra special event during the level? And then that resulted in its own issues - how do I prevent the AI from wanting to go through the fake wall to get to the Marine?

Learning to create in Hammer has been a spectacular experience, and I see myself doing this a LOT more in future. I'd love to dip my toes into modding for TF2 or Portal 2 once it's released. And I certainly see myself working on more Alien Swarm maps in my free time even while my classes are going. It's really amazing the feeling of achievement you get when you create something with an idea in your head as to how you'd like it to work, expecting to go into a play test to see it break in new and interesting ways - only to see it somehow all fall into place in the most fantastic way.

I've still got a lot of work to do on the Room, and there's a few bugs (the non-alien, non-swarming kind) that I need to iron out. But then I will happily make a release for feedback.

You can download Alien Swarm for free over Steam!


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