“You are sent on a mission to destroy a combine base.

So, you have been scrapped of everything but the bare minimum, a pistol and a crowbar.”

Firstly, please excuse the larger than normal featured image. It’s Half-Life 2 running on 16 monitors at 16K resolution. You can see the full video here: GAMING at 16K RESOLUTION?? – HOLY $H!T from the Linus Tech Tips channel.

Secondly, I’m back from my holiday and feeling refreshed and raring to update the site.

The BlackMesaDoorVille Mapping challenge is underway and at the time of posting this chat has 16 days left.

I’ll be posting some recently released mods over the coming days too. I’ll also be re-adding the CONTACT and SUBMIT pages very soon too.

I’d like to take this opportunity to reminder all users that the RTSL Twitter feed is the best place to stay up to date with all the news related to the site, including details of livestreams.

Talking of Twitter, I’ve started a new daily (hopefully) tweet series called RTSL: On This Day, where I post a map or mod that was published on the site this day. In case you didn’t know, I take the map or mod from the On This Day page. It lists everything that was posted on that day, all years and all types of posts. Take a look, you might find something interesting.

Other plans this month include LOTS of mapping and I want to finish Wolfenstein: The New Order and even start Old Blood.

Well, that’s me done.

What plans do you have for August?

Hello and welcome to the very first Black Mesa Mapping Challenge.

This game offers so many mapping opportunities that it is a great shame more SP maps haven’t been released.

Hopefully, this mapping challenge will encourage mappers to make their first BM map and also inspire mappers who have already released a map to make another one.

Full details, including the theme, deadline date and exact rules are below.

I’ll be honest and say I wanted to fix the dates for the whole year in January and release them but as it turned out, it was better not to due to the addition of the new 50-Hour format.

Below are the dates of the remaining mapping challenges in 2017.

I do not envisage changing them but I will be open to the possibility.

YAY! Finally, got this agreed. Initially, I was going to be working with the Crowbar Collective but cancelled at the last minute and now I’ll be running this alone. Like all other mapping challenges, this one WILL have a theme but unlike all other mapping challenges, it will be for Black Mesa (obviously!).

I have also added another week to this challenge to help with modders new to the BM set up. I actually wish I had finalised these dates sooner and could have give modders even more time to get comfortable with the engine etc – sorry.

With the last two 50-hour challenges having over 20 entry maps each, it would be crazy not to do at least one more. As for the previous two challenges, the theme will be open enough to fit 50 hours of creation time. Think of these challenges as more experimental gameplay styles than traditional HL2 releases.

Challenge 4 of The Hammer CUp will be 19 days and have a theme that requires entrants to balance design, polish and gameplay.

Challenge 5 of the Hammer Cup will be a special theme and has an extra week.

Another 50-hour challenge to finish the year. And no, it won’t be XmasVille or SantaVille, or RudolphVille – in fact it WILL NOT be related to Christmas at all.

As I said, I wish I had set and announced these dates earlier, especially the Black Mesa one, but I didn’t, so sorry. Here’s hoping for a spectacular release of SP maps between now and the end of the year!

CromulentVille is the second 50-hour mapping challenge.

It contains 21 entries.

The focus of this theme was to create a perfectly cromulent map.

Hello and welcome to the second 50-Hour Mapping Challenge – CromulentVille.

Below are the details.

PLEASE READ THEM CAREFULLY.

As always, if you have any questions, you can either post a comment or if you require a private reply, send Phillip an email: [email protected]

Your task is to create a perfectly cromulent map.

Is your map silly? Absurd? Weird? Hilarious, crazy, or a complete joke? Great! These are all cromulent maps and they’re exactly what we’re looking for.

Use this opportunity to embiggen your creativity.

If your map leaves players saying, “WTF did I just play?” – perfect!

Make players laugh, make them cry – but make them FEEL something. You have 50 hours!

GOOD LUCK!

You are once more putting on the HEV suit as Gordon Freeman.

Your mission is to recover a newly developed technology by the resistance, known as the “citadel buster”, before the Combine manage to destroy it.

You NEED to get the walkway raised.

In fact, you HAVE to do it yourself.

Find the correct route to the control room and do not let ANYTHING stop you.

Just a very quick post to let you know that the second 50-Hour mapping challenge will be announced at 10pm Central European Summer Time on Friday 7th July 2017.

Full details will be announced then, along with all the rules and the theme.

The deadline will be 12pm Central European Summer Time on Sunday 9th July 2017.

And, yes, the header image is a vague clue, but it’s NOT TheSimpsonVille!

If you have ANY questions, except related to the theme, please don’t hesitate to ask, either here in the comments or by email ([email protected]) if you prefer a private answer.