Most probably:
- Focus on brushwork detail and eyecandy in general over gameplay.
- Streamlining on gameplay or how a Quake map should be.
- Coop is MP, Quake MP sites have been on a decline, and this is a SP site, even more focused on Quake and in SP than ever before.
- This is not 1997. People don't gather on other people's houses to play anymore. 

 

!gather on other people's houses to play Sad but true. All good points. 

This Christmas I am getting a bunch of people and gathering at a person's house and literally playing coop and deathmatch quake in singleplayer levels. THIS IS 1997. 

I have tried to gather people for LAN or internet play like in 199x in the last decade, but even people that were fanatics back then are not interested, so i only was successful once or twice.

By the way I can testify about the not gathering part that is being commented: i came back to the University for a second degree and to save money i went to a shared flat with students: apart from the typical problems from the big age difference what i found out is that almost no one of them played with other people, but play with strangers over the net, and even with that they don't play much save the guys hooked on some Pay to Win or mmorpg. Strange times indeed. I think that even us played more back then than the kids nowadays. 

the guys hooked on some Pay to Win or mmorpg.

My wife would probably fall under this category. She plays MMORPGS a lot, and she's developed a close circle of friends with whom she talks every day over Discord.

But there's a twist. She's actually going to meet with them next week in England, doing nerdy stuff like Dungeons and Dragons and more MMORPG-playing, I'm guessing. It was a surprise for me to hear about them having an actual gathering.

(As a side note, my MMORPG days ended around 2006-2007, when I stopped playing Runescape.) 

sorry dude but nobody ever played coop, EVER. you couldn't find any server running coop, and if you tried to make one nobody would play it with you.

the only time coop gets played is on a LAN if you hold them there at gunpoint and force them to play it with you. and friendly fire turns it into a dm so it wont stay a coop game for long... 

Coop party with your brother, your father, and your 5yr old nephew = 5yr old nephew blasting everyone and everything with rocket launcher....then stealing everyone's backpack.

I was that 5 yr old and it was totally awesome. 

it could be possible engine side or quakec-wise to dynamically add coop spawns for maps that dont have any, if the coop cvar is set.
so just add it in markV to do so and all maps are coOp’erable. :D 

Technically coop starts aren't necessary as it falls back to use standard player start...it's just more annoying/funny when everyone telefrag gibs each other at next level load or after blowing themselves up at once. 

I don't think spawn points are the major stumbling point when it comes to co-op, here's another couple of possible QuakeC fixes :

* Making all players non-solid to one another like L4D
* Having players join the server in observer mode, and only allowed to spawn once a spot is clear

The real problem comes when you have one-way features in your map, and add the ability to respawn. Think of E1M3, with the fake-out trap lift at the end of the map. It doesn't matter in single player that the lift never returns, if you die at the top you have to restart. But in Co-op you respawn, which is why the map opens a teleporter up there after the lift leaves.

It's that kind of thing that co-op compatibility is concerned with. It's very easy to make assumptions that there's only one player on the map when setting up triggers, and have that reasoning broken in co-op. Even just things like how large the lifts are, whether you have arenas that trap "the player" for a while, these things matter for co-op. 

* Making all players non-solid to one another like L4D

I believe Mark V has this. But only at spawn.

But in Co-op you respawn, which is why the map opens a teleporter up there after the lift leaves.

Excellent point. Ypu've inspired me. I am going to review this thread and do a coop video!!! Damn you Baker!!! 

there's also the issue of the route from the start point back to the action being too far and kind of boring -- hub-based layouts where that route is always nice and short would be better for co-op. For example, E2M6. This assumes players know where to go, though :) 

The teleporter is also for SP. After fighting for the exit, the player can still choose to jump down the hole and get some health that was left lying around. In that case the teleporter is a workaround for not using a second permanent lift. 

@metl: there wouldn't be much penalty for dying if you came back right where you died, but yes on sock or Orl-sized maps it is good to add shortcuts and maintain tighter hub or revisiting designs or else coop would become a chore. 

If you want a penalty, maybe add a respawn timer so players have to wait a while before respawning? And make it so players can spawn on the living teammate's location. This would make the time penalty more consistent. Right now it's no penalty at map start and a huge penalty if you have to travel 3 minutes to get to the front lines. This way it would always be e.g. 15 seconds. 

Oh I actually like that idea. I might just steal that for my mod. 

I'd say, adding to that; if all/both players die then game over! 

both #47 and #49 would make coop SO much better. 

please, something like https://www.coopordie.com for Quake1 ;) 

SM188: The Age Of The No Penis Mapper

Theme: Re-read Baker's magnificent first post and make a map inspired by / in response to it.

Obviously this is quite conceptual. It's up to you, as the accused no-penis-mapper, to interpret it. You could acquiesce to Baker's words of wisdom and make a map featuring no penises but lots of coop starts. Or you could make a tribute to the great orator and make the whole map an enormous penis. Or anything in between.

If that's all a bit avant-garde, just make "classic Quake with a modern twist".

Restrictions:
Any wad - vanilla Id1 only - runs in Quakespasm and Mark V

Deadline:
12am GMT Monday 17th September (4+ days from now).

Submit to:
teamshambler@googlemail.com

(I know this is a bit soon after SM187 but I wanted to do it while it's vaguely topical). 

if I ever release another map I am trying to keep my genitalia intact and continue to support coop (lol). I like the idea that if a player is killed, during the spawn timer his (or her) camera would show what other players are doing. I played some of the AD maps coop at Christmas and that was pretty good, but signposting becomes really important and most of us who still play SP are used to way more demanding layouts than would be suited for the average round of coop. Having shortcuts open up as pointed out above is great, but it may be more complicated to implement in modern maps which can be more nonlinear. 

http://quaketastic.com/files/shamsp3.zip 

Why not do it "Halo Style" and respawn players next to an alive player who isn't in combat (no damage taken or weapons fired for a few seconds for example)?
Obviously a bit more complicated but far from impossible to create. This would cut out a lot of the issues (one way things, annoyingly long walks, etc.) that people have brought up so far, from what I can see.