World of Padman is a game that's usually played indoors, in front of the computer. But that's not how these three guys play WoP. They have transformed their garden into the map Pad Garden.
In the video they show a scene from WoP, then reenact it with water guns and balls in the family garden.
There are three scenes shown. At the end, the water guns (weapons) and items are shown.



The video is definitely worth watching and you will hardly be able to resist smiling

We think it is about time to give you some information about what exactly is happening with WoP at the moment.
You probably noticed that, although things moved along just fine initially, it got really quiet the last couple of month and progress on the game was slow. But we won't go into detail about the reasons for that, we would rather like to talk about the headway we're making again. The WoP members are back at work and there has been lots of activity in the last weeks.

We resolved to get a new version done till December, around Christmas would be a nice release date. In November, we hope, we could start the betatests.
So why the sudden change, why is there development again, you might ask. Well, there are reasons for that, which also lead us to GamesCom, unfortunately we can't give you more information about that yet, but don't worry, WoP will stay free, we don't plan to sell it now after all.

So now, let's get to the juicy parts and talk about what the new version will look like in detail, since we don't want to keep you guessing any longer. Here is a small, incomplete list of the features of the new version (there might be changes still):

- all textures (that's over 2000) have been revised. Regrettably for custom mappers that might mean that you have to adjust some of your maps for the new version.
- nearly all skins and many map obejcts have been jazzed up
- there are new menu graphics
- all old maps have been overhauled.
- The levelshots got a new design, also they show the gametype while loading now accompanied by a short explanation.
- There are ingame help-screens to explain every gametype and the weapons and powerups.
- Padman doesn't only get a brand new model but also five alternative heads for his alternative skins.
- There are five completely new playermodels.
- One new gametype: CTL (Capture the Lolly)... a variant of Capture the Flag
- Instagib integrated, to be played with the new "injector" weapon.
- at least one new SyC map, which will probably be PadShop (an additional one might be possible)
- Eight CTL maps, six of which are completely new.
- We created two new powerups for CTL.
- LPS gets only selected maps enabled now, which are preferably compact, some maps even have been adjusted for that (for example PadGarden Night)
- BB is getting wallhack symbols for better coordination of the teams.
- There will be glowing team skins.
- The weapon balance will be adjusted
and much more...



Hopefully you'll see that we really weren't idle, just slow.
The details might change still, it's possible that there'll be more content especially concerning the maps, let's wait and see. Now let's get to the "bad" news, and please don't throw any stones as us.
The next version to be released will be 1.5, not 2.0. We knew to really make progress we had to cut a big feature. Yes it is the singleplayer, as much as it pains us. We already had started work on it, there already is a completely new map, two new playermodels and a lot more, but our plans kept growing and the whole thing got too complex, so we had to make a decision that's not only hard for you but us too. If we waited untilthe singleplayer is done, this project could take another year and that was jus too long for us. So finally we decided to cut the singleplayer, focus on everything else and then, after the release of 1.5 have a look at it again. We also have to discuss that part in detail again internally and figure out what is still possible.
We still hope that you are not too dissappointed by our decision to cut the singleplayer and that you're looking forward to the 1.5 release with us.

Your WoP-Team

Last week we visited GamesCom, the biggest international gaming expo of Europe which once again opened its gates in Cologne. But we were attending it for the first time and joined the gaming masses on Saturday with doomdragon, Kai and ENTE, with the latter including his children. We were just visitors at the expo but there still was a sense of exhibition atmospheric feeling in the air that got us all excited. ENTE gave us some exclusive WoP-Team shirts (Making-of) which he created that did attract attention and even led to some of the visitors approaching us curiously to find out where the WoP booth was (but as we didn't have one, we just had to tell them the truth). Others had asked for a photograph or even an autograph but some however were too shy, which is a bit of a pity because we really don't bite.




We ourselves were, besides the games, interested in making new contacts or turning written contacts into personal ones and one of those was Gerrit from Spawnpoint - Institut für Computerspiel (an institute of computer gaming), who was thrilled about WoP. GamesCom turned out to be a great although exhausting experience which got us thinking that maybe we will have our own booth at a future GamesCom event? Till next time.

Additional pictures

The Mappingcontest is over

Finally, the contest has ended and the winners have been chosen. We've been surprised, but before we tell you about the winners, we'll give you a list of the jury members. The jury was:
-Pudding
-Chaosblubbel
-Haferschleim
-The_Brain
-Harmonieman
-Pixelmännchen

First, we'll show you the maps that got to the fifth, sixth and seventh place. "Dacharena" (Nasbit), "Kontestmap" (Gubba) and "the_match" (Nicklas2751).
The "Dacharena" has a World of Padman style colour scheme. Everything is very colourful. The block design isn't too good, and the close corridors don't help the gameplay. Sometimes the map reminds me of a labyrinth, so it takes a while to know how to get around.

Gubba's "Kontestmap" is clear; it's just a room with four walls. In the middle is a tower and there is a base on either end of the room, which spans the whole wall. The weapon selection isn't big and in every base there is a health station and padshield, so you are ahead, if you are the one that fragged first. The Jump pads are a bit inaccurate so you can't hide well.

"The_match", from Nicklas2751, uses all the weapons (except the imperius) in each of the two bases. You can get into a small room through a tunnel, in which you can fight each other. A door that you shoot to open, is a real spoilsport, like the small room, where you have to fire two balloons so that you and your opponent are eliminated.

Congratulations to GLL for fourth place. He gave us a space map, that he called just "1vs1_DM17". The lights on the stairs give a nice feeling, like The_Brain said "It gives you the feeling that you are an important person ".
The map is really colourful and has a large range of weapons. The map is symmetrical, so there's a base on each side. It may be a bit too colourful and you can't see the jump pads well. Edges, that prevent one from falling down too easily, would be nice, as well.

Hana-bi got the third place, with a simple marble map. Sadly, the jump pads are difficult to see, but there is lots of detail. The Balloony is the primary weapon, that helps to play in small passages, but disturbs the enemy. There's no health station in the upper area, but a padshield instead. The hiding spots are quite dangerous and often lead to death. The map is well-lit, without any obvious light sources.

The last two contestants had a hard fight. They scored the same points for their look, but one of them dominated in the gameplay. We can greet Phobos to the top of the winning stairs, who convinced the jury of his "Döner" map (it's something to eat in Germany, similar to a wrap.) But before that, we want to tell you about oregano's 1v1 map.

It is divided into floors. The weapons Splasher, Betty, Pumper and Balloony are all there. The health stations are distributed uniformly and there is neither a jumppad, nor a teleporter. In the middle is a tube, filled with water. You can find a betty and ammo inside. There are no annoying edges and corners, that could disrupt the gameplay. The padshield and padshards aren't distributed well, because they are together with a Pumper and a health station on the upper floor. This makes it easy for the one spawning at the top to win.

So now, we come back to the winning map. Phobos was the only one, who built an over-sized map, in the style of World of Padman. You're in a kitchen of a wrap store. On the floor is a cabinet and a ketchup tube. On the cabinet is the kebab skewer and a lot of vegetables, to fill your wrap with. It's being grilled at the moment. At the top is a shelf with a bubble g, a padshield and a health station. The other padshield is in the cabinet on the floor. The fight concentrates on the floor and everyone is searching for the padshield at the start, so the one who gets both is ahead.


Congrats to every winner.
You can download the maps here.
Stay cool, keep mapping

At this time there are a lot of mappers in the WoP Forum, especially new ones. This is why there will be a mapping contest. The aim of the contest is to create a map which can be played in a 1 on 1 tournament. The contributions should be visually attractive, with good playability. Details make your map more vivid and you should also included some good ambush positions. It doesn't matter if the map is a space map like Padcrash or an oversized map like Padlibrary as long as the map isn't too big (so that it takes too long to find the opponent). Powerups (Floater, etc.) are forbidden, as with the Imperius, which doesn't make sense in a 1 on 1.

The winning map will be played in the final of a forthcoming 1 on 1 cup. This cup will be played in normal mode. We will wait 3 days, and if there aren't 5 registrations yet, the cup will be restarted a few days later. Register today for the mapping contest by pm to "Pixelmännchen" in the WoP-Forum. The contest will end in 2 weeks at 4pm GMT-5 (10pm GMT+1).

At the moment the community is getting pepped up! Recently, there was a PadDay almost every second Sunday. Now, HF is planning an Instagib Clan Cup - the first in a long time.
It will be on the weekend of Friday evening (21st) to Sunday (23rd).
All rounds will be played in the "Instagib" mode - each round lasting 10 minutes.
It will first be played in groups, but in the final rounds, only the winner will advance.
You can announce the participation of your clan here, the more that participate, the more fun.

A new update is available in the WoP-Forum now, because here you can find a new Clan-Treff-Forum.
It is placed in the [Pad]Community area. You can get the latest events like Clancups or new memberships there.
A list of all current Clans is also available. Furthermore, it is possible to ask for a membership at a clan, or if you even have a clan, you can search for new members.

To always have the latest clan, you should watch in the forum if you are the leader, so you don't miss nothing important.

You can only visit the forum as a registered member in the WoP-Forum.
To do that, register here.

In the last time, the Padday has become quite a frequent event – and of course we don’t want this to change. Therefore a Padday is - after a two-weak break - going to be played again on this Sunday at 7:00 pm GMT. This time, we will mainly be playing on classic maps and on the server called “Padday” which is provided by Hectic.
Further information can be found on the forum (unfortunately this thread exists only in the German section).

For those of you who might not quite understand what I’m talking about: a “Padday” is simply an event for which we meet at a certain time on a certain server to have some fun and some frags.

Alright, as said before:

Sunday, April 25th
7:00 pm GMT
(8:00 pm CET, 1:00 pm CST)

Be there!

Nicola Capecci aka Neurological added two new tracks to his WoP music pack "Painted Death" and re-released it this week. Now it has 9 complete tracks. The new songs "Respawn" and "Water Horizon" fits very well with the album concept and ensures a strong mix of Metal and Hardrock. To update the pack simply download it again and overwrite the old version in your WoP sub-directory.


Download music pack! | Listen music online!

Meanwhile, Neurological was able to provide a soundtrack for his very first commercial project Dark Salvation. We congratulate him on this opportunity and hope to hear more of his work in other commercial projects soon. If there will be a WoP Soundtrack CD in future definitely some of his tracks will be part of the album.

I think only a few of you know the name John Carmack, but without his work on the Quake engine, and the co-foundation of id Software, WoP would not exist. Additionally he worked on the Doom and Wolfenstein 3D engines and he soon will set the cat among the pigeons with Rage.

For exactly that he will get the Lifetime Achievement Award at this year's Game Developers Choice Awards in San Francisco. The award will be given to him on March 11th, 2010.

Meggan Scavio, the Event Director of the Game Developers Conference said: "It's no exaggeration to say that John Carmack and id Software have had a monumental influence on all modern 3D games, but especially the first-person shooter genre. John is one of the key figures in the history of video games, and we're delighted to be giving him the Lifetime Achievement award this year.

PadWorld Entertainment is slowly waking up from hibernation and WoP 2.0 development gathered some momentum lately. We're not yet going full speed, but at least we're yawning and stretching. This is mainly due to the latest member that joined the team, who's currently settling in and started on some UI tasks already. Our new programmer is well known to the community, it is The Brain. He has contributed to and was involved in several community projects, so we had no doubt about his skills.
His applied a couple month ago, but it took us quite a while to bring ourselfes to make the commitment. Now we made up our minds and are happy that he was patient and kept his enthusiasm. The Brain has a couple last multiplayer tasks on his plate, and afterwards will help up push forward the singleplayer.

Finally the time has come again: on this Sunday, February 21st at 8:00 pm CET, a Pad Day is going to be played. We are going to play CTF, but also other custom maps will be present. Some of them are Saha’s Flat, Phobosroom, the Monkroom Map and Oregano’s Plane. In case you don’t have those, you can download them on the forum or – if you want to have it easy - just set autodownload on under Setup -> Options before connecting to the server.
The Server which is going to be played on is named "CTFmod v1.0" and provided by haferschleim.
Alright, as said before:

Sunday, February 21st
8:00 pm CET
(7:00 pm GMT; 1:00 pm CST)

Be there!

For a long time, Padbabs has been working on his map, and has amazed us again and again with screens that he showed from time to time that made the suspense rise more and more. Now finally the beta version of his map is available for download!
What has resulted from his long work, is a digital reproduction of his own room, in which you can – like in the Padmaps – romp around, hardly the size of a mouse, and frag each other joyfully.



It can be easily played with two dozen Pads, as it offers an unbelievable amount of space. You can choose between fighting next to the huge flat screen TV, on the writing desk, the armchair, in one of the shelves, or even just stay on the floor.
Also Padbabs shows great attention to detail. In one corner, there is guitar in the shape of the WoP logo, on the shelves there are the “Christmas Carols” by Charles Dickens and a Monk DVD. On the desk is a camera created only of brushwork and most of all, the sprayroom, which is in the interior of a church, is not to be missed.

The map is available for download here.

One Sunday evening, oregano4 surprised us with his brand new airplane map. Yes, a real airplane map with a realistic cockpit, seats for the passengers, and even playable overhead containers.



Those who love details will find them in this map. For instance, there are numerous colourful buttons and displays in the cockpit, the spray tunnel flashes very colourfully, and the spray room – the interior of a fridge – is an artwork in itself.
Altogether it’s a fabulous map, that’s why there isn’t much more to write about it. You can download the map here.

On this Sunday, January 31st at 8pm CET, there will finally be a "Pad Day" again!
A Pad Day is simply a meeting on a certain server to which everyone is welcome who wants to enjoy fragging and have fun.
This time, the Pad Day will be played with the CTF-Mod developed by the community which you can download directly from the server by setting autodownload on, or even easier: download it directly here.
The server on which we are going to play is named “CTFMod 1.0” and provided by Lutoma.

Alright, as said before:

Sunday at 8:00 pm CET
(7:00 pm GMT; 1:00 pm CST)

Be there!