post 6 - Hammer is apparently Outdated

Well I presented my final project pitch and I was unhappy with the critique I received from my professor. I guess I just didn't quite understand exactly what he wanted me to explain in the pitch, and I went into too much detail in certain aspects and by the end I was asked questions that I knew the answer to, but failed to show in my pitch that I knew what I was talking about.

In my class not many people know what Tf2 is or how it is played, and some haven't even touched first person shooters at all. When I did my presentation I was supposed to show my research, and truthfully I showed most my research, a lot of it had to do with the technical aspects of Hammer. There are many things I didn't even realize I would need to do in order to finalize a level such as making player clipping, hinting, area portals, and other efficiency increasing tricks that are required to make a professional level. It turns out the professor didn't think that was important to share to the class and instead thought I should explain more of what Tf2 actually is than all the technical details that I would need to overcome.

I guess looking back on it, I presented the pitch as if everyone knew what I was talking about already, I mean I did a cursory "This is TF2" it has 9 classes and is team based, it has 9 different play styles that are all goal focused and not killing focused. He wanted more, he wanted me to detail each class and I guess to me, since I am fully immersed in TF2, I didn't even think of going into that much surface detail in order to explain the product.

I guess I learned a lesson in explanation. I am going to have to explain concepts to people for the rest of my life for my job, and I really need to understand who I am talking to and what they already know, what they need to know, and what they want to know.

Oh, and apparently the Hammer editor has a horrible pipeline and is extremely outdated. My professor is pushing me to use UDK, but I'm set on using Hammer. SCAD does not offer a class that uses the Source engine and I know I will have plenty of time to learn UDK while at SCAD but right now is my time to familiarize myself with a different level design kit and make the best of it. I have been playing Source games for years and I am ten times more interested in Hammer, and with this interest I feel I can really put my 100% into the product: I have a real passion for this project.