If you’ve ever wanted to make a map, I know exactly how you feel. I’ve wanted to mold a Deathmatch level with my own hands for over two years. In fact, I wanted to do it so much that I convinced one of my professors to advise a for-credit project that would let me design, from the ground up, my very own level for Unreal Tournament 3.

If you feel like playing the first open Alpha of that level, take a look at my last blog entry — it’s got download links to everything you’ll need. But if you, like me, want to make maps almost more than you want to play them, perhaps you’ll be interested in something else.

I’ve written up a sort of meta-tutorial for level designers who are just starting out in UnrealEd. It’s not a step-by-step how-to, but rather an overview of the mentality you should have as you work through your first map. Now, granted, I’m no expert mapper, but I’ve learned a lot in the past eight weeks, and I’ll continue to learn more over the next eight. Just as my map remains incomplete, so does this tutorial. But it, like the map, will keep growing, and in the interim, you might just find a couple thoughts in there worth filing away in the back of your mind.

Interested? Awesome. Take a look at it, then, and feel free to tell me what you think!