<...>
Somehow curves
are not that easy to navigate though, so don't expect great playability.
I disagree with this — this level is actually very playable, and this is one of its strongest advantages! The conceptually fantastic thing about this map is obviously in its geometry, and therefore it's very attractive both visually and gameplay-wise! 🎢 Sure, this is an experimental level, but truth be told, the experiment went very well :) The curves are indeed not easy to navigate, but, in my opinion, this is exactly what serves as a layout for some great playability!
It's very impressive that something as original as this release had already been created by the year 2000 on an engine from the year 1999. Aardappel mentioned in the readme file that he tried to build such a curved map in both Q1 and Q2 but wasn't able to finish it in either case because of how complex the brush work was. The author also mentioned that he had succeeded in constructing a similar map for Quake 1. Well, as we can see, les efforts paient 😉
Oh, I really do! In fact, this is what gave me an impulse to upgrade my vote for this release from 4 to 4.5 — apparently, I somehow managed to forget or not to point my attention to the fact that here Haste is given for the player automatically with their spawn and lasts for a lot of time.
I think the texture work shall be cared about in every level, and lack of something should not stop one from offering something else. In fact, the texturing is what I cut 0.5 points for, as I'd like for the map to be somewhat brighter and have a more diversified color palette. CURVY could have been bigger too, but the immediate durable Haste along with the blur effect on the walls completes the work on comfortable navigation all over the map, at that it also makes the gameplay more dynamic and fun.
I'm not sure whether it was exactly this level (or whether there was one at all) that inspired the following release, but HODQ3DM1 by RRROOOAAARRR is another well executed curved map and is indeed very original and creative gameplay-wise (as well as visually).
@Colton Thank you very much for the bot support patch, without it this map couldn't have been a 4.5/5 for me! It might have taken about 16 years, but it really was well worth it :P
The Quad Damage and syringe Medkit also add some additional points to the gameplay on CURVY. Aardappel, if for whatever reason you're reading this more than 23 years after this map was revealed to the public, I'd like to let you know that I think that you did some outstanding job on this level, and that's both conceptually and in terms of gameplay!
Well, it's not surprising, considering it comes from the author of the WadC programming language and Cube game engine, and one of the original founders of Freedoom :) I've bookmarked this map and would love to see you creating more awesome Q3 levels like this! 😀
shame no real gameplay included.
unlike "short circuit" with its winding halls plus great gameplay. [bots please atleast]
to Aardappel: Maps will show up in the menu when you don't have an aas file. All you need is an arena file and a levelshot.
to those complaining about gameplay: take a look at the frikkin' README! It clearly states this is an experiment, not a playable map.
When will people learn that readme's actually can be important?
niptlar/johnny: duh. it was meant as an experiment. critizing the gameplay is rather pointless. Me, I am suprised it even _works_.
blitzz/mrdo: it won't show up in the menu when there's no .aas, and I can't generate one because BSPC hangs on this map (it goes berzerk because of the many curves). This isn't my fault.
If issues like these were addressed, and if the level was more than just a figure eight, then it would have been much more memorable. As it stands, this map is strictly a concept demonstration.
Mildly interesting as a study in vertex-dragging but unplayable as a Q3 map... mappers might want to have a look, since it's a small download.