Reviews range from spooky to imbalanced for this map. What do you think?
Always trust the community to come up with unique adjustments to game assets. A Valorant fan has recreated the popular map, Bind. But there’s a twist. The time has changed, it’s night in Bind now.
In a video posted on the Valorant subreddit, user /u/-Atom1k- gave the community a glimpse of how Bind would look at night time. It is scary. The video was made with a map import script hosted on github, according to /u/Walkergaming.
While Bind during the day seems very bright and makes for a very uplifting mood while playing, the night version does not give us the same feels. In fact, the night version, with its awkwardly placed lights (lumens) feels very spooky. The creator has also added some water sounds and asset movements for trees and waters.
The video gives us some Wolfenstein 3D vibes where you are alone moving through dimly lighted corridors. Turning corners on this night map will get a scare out of most people.
The Reddit post has over a 1000 upvotes, with players clearly loving the map. A night-time mode was a long-standing demand by a section of the Valorant community.
Community Reactions
Pearl is also a night-time map, but it’s underwater and the impact of night is significantly lessened. The map was recently introduced into competitive play at VCT Champs Istanbul and teams have been bringing out unique strategies and playstyles on the map.
The community reactions ranged from awe to surprise to players analyzing why this map looked so different (apart from the nighttime).
“Probably cos there’s nobody existing in an area where we’re used to seeing people/activity on it,” said one Redditor on why the map feels so eerie.
Another Redditor didn’t even want to play Valorant on the map. Instead they were probably transported to childhood memories of playing Hide and Seek.
“Looks so good I would love to play with my friends in custom , hide and seek would be the best game mode.”
Speaking from a competitive balance point, one Redditor rightly pointed out that balancing the game with night mode maps would be a new task altogether task.
“IMO This is why night themed map can be pretty bad in the game since it's so dark that you can just tuck yourself in the corner and be camouflage as fuck, but it can be counterplay by just making lights more brighter or just add night vision goggles.”
Well, how did he make the Valorant night map?
“I used over 100 lights, and Unreal engine hates that when it's not packed into a game. This was done in unreal engine 5, You can see the difference with the textures, because this is using better versions of AA,” said the creator. “The overall lighting is used with lumen and All meshes are nanited. I added some cool things like water sounds, real water and tree and bush movement. A little smoke for the ac's, and one damaged ac unit. Also added better ambiance sounds.”
Regardless of whether we see a fully night map in Valorant, these creations definitely stretch the limits of our imagination. While there’s a lot to think about when designing a map, including competitive balance, agent outlines and more, having them in a custom mode could be a great idea for Valorant players that want to try something new.
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