Valve Developer Community:Community portal

Welcome to the Valve Developer Community! From here on in you can forget Valve - every page you see with an edit tab, including this one, is likely written or at least altered by someone in the community (though Valve staff are sometimes among them). If you want to do the same, go right ahead! Otherwise, take a look at the Categories or run a seach to find what you want. (If you do decide to edit any pages keep them relevant.)

Recommended sites

This is a list of alternate resource sites for Source games in alphabetical order. It is by no means complete but please, if you add to it keep to decent sites and do not link to simple map download databases.

Cross-purpose and general

• Half-Life @ TOZCentral.net - Add your Media, Mods, Bots, Maps and Tutorials for Half-Life and Half-Life 2
• Handy Vandal's Almanac - One of the original top editing resource sites for Half Life, contains some HL2 info. Linked to in Worldcraft's help menu.
• HL2 Mod Central - General tutorials
• HL2World.com - Half Life 2 Knowledge Base
• Interlopers.net - News and general resources
• Leak-Free - Among the most comprehensive listings of all Hammer 4 errors you might get, and tips to solve them.
• Mapcore - A great place to get mapping, modelling and texture help from industry pros.
• Mod Database - Free listings of mods for almost every moddable game. A great database full of tons of information on mods that are out there.
• Modhelp.net - A developing modding community.
• Nem's Tools - Several useful Source tools including GCFScape
• The Snarkpit - Mapping and modelling community site
• Sourceblog - General tutorials (Many on Texturing/Skinning)
• SourceWiki - Unofficial and older Source Wiki
• VERC - The Valve Editing Resource Collective. This site's predecessor, which offers primarily HL1 resources (Official)
• Wavelength - One of the original sources of HL1 editing material, now steadily servicing HL2
• Wunderboy.org - Several useful Source tools including VTFTool
• RUST Gamedesign.net - Some helpful modding and mapping tutorials.

Professional Tools

• Adobe Photoshop - The standard image editing tool in the industy, used by professionals all over the world.
• Paint Shop Pro - The professional cheap alternative to Adobe Photoshop. For those who don't want to break the bank.
• 3D Studio Max - Powerful tool for modeling and animation, one of the industry's best.
• Maya 3D - Excellent modeling and animation package. Considered to be the best among modders.

Programming

• Hl2 Coding - Has some good hl2 related coding tutorials and has great forums for coders to chat.

Mapping

• aKilling.org - Source Mapping tutorials, Files, child-safe forums.
• Edit Life - Mapping articles and forums
• Half-wit 2 - Another collection of Mapping tutorials
• zombies Optimizing-page information on optimizing your map
• zombie's *Edited* Optimization Page An in-depth guide to optimizing your maps.
• Creating uneven terrain (displacements)

Modelling

• Cannonfodder's Tools - 3DSMax Importers and Exporters, Dispgen - Displacement Terrains from heightmaps, StudioCompiler - Model/Texture Compiler/Decompiler, winBSPzip - BSP Packer
• RnL Forums' Lightwave Plugins - Lightwave mesh export plugins. Not currently available, but may be in the future.
• CG Talk The largest and most useful model discussion/news site on the internet.

Resources

Content for your project.

• Image * After - 10,000+ free images and textures.
• Mayang.com Textures - Free textures for your maps and mods.
• Moddb texture site directory - Directory of free, ready to use game textures.
• MorgueFile - Free, high-resolution stock photography.

Other

Other pages that may be of interest.

• Game Design Theory - Interesting for art directors, team leaders
• Ken Birdwell's Gamasutra article - The Cabal: Valve’s Design Process For Creating Half-Life (registration required)

Modifications

• HL1 Third Party Mods
• HL2 Third Party Mods
• Official Mods

ModDB Mod List

• Half-Life
• Half-Life 2