As anticipated, here's some in-editor screenshots from my ongoing StarCraft project, Flags in the Dust. These captures were taken from SCMDraft2, hence the wider view. I would like to point out that I'm still using StarEdit as main tool of development, with SCMDraft2 as a support utility for tileset manipulation. Why? Because, to say it bluntly, SCMDraft2 is a pain in the ass to use. Don't get me wrong, the author did a great job at creating sort of a Swiss Army Knife for StarCraft, but whoever tested it must have had their heads up their butts. StarEdit is compact, intuitive and reliable, whereas SCMDraft2 is cumbersome, complicated, and somewhat unstable (even the various debugging functions are practically useless, if you have a vague idea of what you're doing). Is it normal, in your opinion, to have to navigate countless windows and tabs just to place the resources? What was Blizzard thinking when they discarded StarEdit in favor of a third-party editor that is not even included in the game, leaving newbies with basically no easy way to create maps? We'll never know.
What SCMDraft2 is really useful for is advanced terrain rendering: tileset indexed, illegal placement of units, extended doodads, sprite placement, all of these features are great tools for crafting convincing landscapes, and they are the holy grail for creative mappers who wish to go beyond StarEdit's limitations. I had already taken advantage of these functions in Champions of Khandia, and I'll continue to do so throughout the development of Flags in the Dust and any other following project. To view these images in full size and bypass the redirect timer, right-click on the preview and select "open image in a new tab".
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| New compelling terrain features will make their debut in this campaign | |
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| Industrial complex showing the use of custom doodads to make buildings more eye-catching | |
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| A part of the large swampland featured in Mission 2 | |
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| Interlaced grass, dirt and mud | |
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| These shorter than usual grey doodads will not be displayed correctly in SC:R | |
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| Just like above, the custom blue tiles in the small pits will not show up in SC:R | |
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| The installation tileset is not very suitable for tile blending, yet something interesting can be obtained | |
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| A lot of work went into making the edges of these space platforms as smooth as possible | |
| Pr0nogo's reaction to these screenshots (circa 2022, colorized) | |
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