Cara
Cara is a Territory map released in the Beta 3.0 update. It's unique for both its presentation and gameplay features.
Stats
- Map file: te_cara
- Mode: Territory
- Authors: See Authors
- Release Date: Beta 3.0 (October 2014)
- Theme: Urban, forest
- Capturing Time: ___
- Pick-ups: Food (x_), Armor (x_), and Ammo (x_)
- Stage Hazards: cliffs and bridges
Overview
Cara is notable for changing several rules in the revamped Territory mode, first used in Sandstorm which is seen as the one with the basic layout.
Not only there are only two territories, but they're in constant movement; instead of actual places the "territories" are two horses wandering in the map on a specific trail. The horses, called the Ammo Horse and Health Horse, replenishes the players' ammo and health, respectively, when they're inside their capture area and when they're posessed by the team who captured them.
Unlike Sandstorm and Tortuga, there's no countdown when all territories are captured by the same team. Since there are only two capture areas as opposed to three or four, and the fact that the horses are near each other, meaning that capturing them can be done in a short period of time, the 30-second time limit was removed so that rounds in Cara can last longer.
Since the territories are always in motion, Cara is also notable for not having specific respawn points for classes. Like in Trinket Wars, where a player respawns near the trinket carrier of his own team, the players in Cara respawn a couple of feet away from the horses so that they don't have to run throughout the map to reach the horses. If respawned too far, a small cave in the middle of the map can lead players to the other side of the layout with ease.
Presentation
Cara is unique for having a specific season for it's graphics: fall; the leaves falling and the landscape covered with shades of red and brown makes it stand out from other maps.
The level is divided in two areas: the city and the woods. The city was built under the foundations of a medieval castle and it uses most of its architecture as the city's border, including its drawbridge. After leaving the drawbrdge, the players pass through some ruinsfollowed by the woods that flourish on a narrow valley, where some dead trees serve as natural bridges over the horses' path; a small shed is installed in one of the cliffs. As the folliage gets more intense, the players pass through a northen gate which leads to the city. Despite using the castle for protection, players can fall into the water in two occarions: in the northen side, where a water mill can be seen pouring water to the mouth of the river, and near the drawbridge, where a small destroyed harbour can be seen with an installed crane.
The cave has an inside chamber, possible used by mine workers; it leads to four places: the ruins, the shed, the small gate's entrance, and the street in the corner of the drawbridge. The latter exit is washed by a partially underwater river, which caudal can be seen in a waterfall in the hill near the northen gate; its currents are quite strong and it flows at the mouth underneat the drawbridge.
It's worth to mention that, due to the map's intense lighting and several props and folliage, Cara can show several optimization problems and framerate stuttering in low-end computers.
History
Development of Cara started in 2011, with Jahhur as the main mapper, after working in maps like Frostbite and Arena. His original idea was to make one moving territory (originally a wagon) and two stationary ones, but LordTrilobite suggested removing the stationary territories and adding a second moving territory. The paths of the territories were widely discussed, planning the idea of each going through opposite directions and facing each other at some point in the map. The idea proved difficult to insert and it was decided that both wagons would follow the same path with a couple of feet away from each other.
At some point in development Jahhur left the development of the map, which made Lhorkan and Jimonions, a new member of the team at the time, to step in and rebuild the map from scratch while maintaining Jahhur's original concept. Jimonion's environmental art lead to the map's unique autumm presentation.
In the Man-at-Arms trailer, footage of a near-complete version of Cara was shown, with some differences such as slightly different lightning, the placeholder horses and themselves being called "Wagons".
Beta 3.0's troubled release lead to Cara being released with several graphical bugs and optimization problems due to the maps' intense lighting and tree placement. Some of the bugs were fixed following the update's release and Beta 3.1.
On December 2016, screenshots of Cara were revealed, showing substantial updates on the level design, including a complete cover of the skybox in the corner after the water mill and a shack at the exit of the drawbridge. The updated version of Cara will be released sometime in 2017.[1]
After several delays, a new version of Cara was released alongside the October Map Update 2017 patch. This new version makes massive improvements regarding optimization and performance, adds new background buildings that cover the once-baren water area pass the water mill, the work-in-progress shack was replaced by ruins, several new props were added and the central cave has new paths that ease players to access all areas in the map. Not only that but an easter egg was added: the Caramount Theater, a place that, although still blocked by players, shares a glimpse of a movie theater complete with posters and everything. Cara's loading screen was also updated.
Authors
Cara's lenghty development lead to several artists of the PVKII Team to work on various tasks of the map. After Jahhur left the map unfinished, Lhorkan stepped in as the lead mapper and Jimonions as the enviromental artist. Gaz contributed to the map by working on birch tree models, Spock worked on it's skybox and Sir Bubbles made additional contributions.
The placeholder horse model and rig were build by Francis Charette, and it was later replaced by the model built by 3D modeler James Davis, with rig developed by Kordaling. jRocket worked on the horses' animations.
During development on improving Cara, Jimonions left the project, and as result the update was left unfinished for a considerable amount of time. Colonel Sanders, Gaz and Schatzmeister stepped in to finish the update, taking care of optimization while Gaz updated the map's layout.
Trivia
- In Cara's drawbridge, a castle with a long tower can be seen in the horizon. The castle happens to be the same one from Fort, placed in the 3D skybox as a model rather than a brush.
- Early in development several names were proposed in order to replace Cara's name, including Rumrun, Grogwagon and Payload. In the end Cara was maintainted as the map's official name.
- Cara's meaning is still unknown to everyone, even though it can be translated to "face" in portuguese, and "way" or "procedure" in indonesian.
- Despite replacing the wagons, Cara's original release had the horses producing the wagons' sounds rather than clopping, for no one at the time had produced a clopping sound for the horses. Only weeks after the release of the map that Bryn Schurman, also known in the forums as TheForgotton, audio producer of the mod and voice actor, provided the clopping sounds of the horse by using two cocconut shells, the same way as the running gag from the movie Monty Python and the Holy Grail, where squires and knights use cocconuts to make the impression that they're riding a horse.
| Official Maps |
|---|
| Booty | Forgotten - Island - Pinegrove - Townsquare |
|---|---|
| Trinket Wars | Desertruin - Fort - Frostbite - Temple - Tortuga |
| Last Team Standing | Arena - Cathedral - Gravedanger - Town |
| Territory | Cara - Sandstorm - Tortuga |
| Deathmatch | Fort |