The gameplay was intense. I’m not sure how it is supposed to be played on Generations Arena, but it was pretty fast and strong without mods. With only 4 nightmare bots and me, there were quick frags and a lot of blood. The bots were average though when it came to tactics. They recognized that there was heavy armor near the water, and tried to claim it, but seemed to get stuck. I think the area was a little too small for them. Bots also did not know how to get to the quad damage, or even know that there was a hole to get to the portal. Bots mainly stayed at the two main rooms that had the most portals. Other than that, they put up a good fight. The use of many portals was pretty fun. There were a lot of invasions of personal space, but I can’t say whether this is a good thing or not lol. The area was a little bit cramped (Out of the 80 frag limit, I managed to get about 13 gauntlet kills).
The textures were great. There was a great variety of different textures found throughout the map, each of them enhancing the visuals of the map. I liked how the bricks fell out of the wall, revealing the circuits. I also liked the black, void-like portals. Were they from Quake I?
The sounds were fine. Though the text document said there were no new sounds, there was a new sound when entering the room with the quad damage. Don’t get me wrong though, it was a pretty good choice for a noise, I found it funny every time I went in there too lol.
The layout of the map was good. The architectural design of the map was pretty good. I was a little confused with the water near the heavy armor though. How does the water stay in the air, and why does the water drip? I liked the idea of it though.
Overall, it is a good map and a keeper. It should be fun to test with real people when I’m at school. I need to check out the mod that it is supposed to be used for though, and also the original map. 7/10
SW12:
set cg_playerColorLevel to 192,
set color1 and color2 to whatever you like.
That should get Ranger's custom colors working..
The bots did seem to like to hide around the corners in the central room... Doom got me a few times with the shotgun as I was coming out of the hallways at that junction.
I do agree with the reviewer on a few points.
It seems that the scale is not entirely consistent. The center room, where you find the entrance to each episode's hallway, does feel confining in particular. The hidden area, where you would have originally went to fight Shub-Niggurath also feels a little tight.
The big bars that lift up in the flooded room take way too long. This is especially problematic if you're coming out of the teleporter behind them.
There needs to be better clipping in the lava hallway. I was able to rocket jump OUT of the map through this area.
Other than that, I think that the basic construction is solid. The textures seem appropriate, if not a bit limiting. The lighting seems average. The map does have a lot of nice little details though. The falling water from the floating pool is a great idea! There are also plenty of spots where damage has been incurred through battle, revealing a technology beneath the gothic facade.
I played the map using the Generations Arena mod. Despite some flaws, I'm definitely going to keep it on my hard drive for future play! :)