| Q:
Do you like the new design? |
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No
Rest for the Weary
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Wow. My first gothic map, and I must say, it came out great.
By this point in my map making "hobby", i had
become very used to the editor and comfortable with it.
I decided, that after two futuristic levels, I would make
a gothic level. Only this time, I decided to make it look
good. And pretty good it looks! As you can see from the
screens, I started to use many new types of curves, as well
as some animations, the fire in particular. I also cranked
up the detail level from my last two maps. I think that
for a third map, it is rather detailed, with borders, trims,
little nooks and crannies, models, and whatever else adds
to the looks of the level. Therefore, I have decided to
give the map a pretty good rating on its looks. But looks
arent everything, unless of course we're talking about cindy
crawford. =) But this isnt cindy crawford, and not the cindy
crawford of quake maps either, so all the other aspects
of a quake map are important here. Btw, I woulda given the
looks 20, which is actually a little bit high considering
some of the other maps out there, but since you can see
the upper level's side hallways from the castle courtyard,
I took off a couple of points. Lets talk aesthetics, shall
we? Remember, if you dont understand what Im talking about
in these reviews, check out the definition of things like
"aesthetics" here.
The aesthetics of the map are pretty good, except there
is only one entrance into the castle, and that's at the
back of the long hallways. So, if you're in the courtyard
and want to get up to the red armor, you have a lot of walking
to do. I should have put more entrances into the castle,
and I know where they should have gone as well. But otherwise,
the map flows well on both levels, and you wont find yourself
lost anywhere. The map obviously has the castle or fortress
style, minus the cool towers with the spikes coming out
of the sides. The basic layout is pretty simple. There is
an outside courtayd which is home to a shotgun, lightning
gun, mega health, haste, and ammo. The mega health and haste
powerup can be reached only from the accelerators in the
castle. Leading into (or out of) the courtyard are two fairly
long hallways. The hallways are not identical; one hallway
has slanted sections cut out of the wall, the other has
curved; also, there are different power-ups in each hallway:
a rocket launcher and +5 healths in one, ammo and two +50
healths in the other. At the end of the hallways there is
a small room that connects them. This room contains a bounce
pad to get to the castle. In the castle there are two rooms,
and hallways that lead to the linear accelerators (which
lead to the raised Items in the courtyard). In the castle
you will find health, a red armor, and some ammo. I've been
kicking myself for not putting a rail gun up in the little
circular space high up on the front of the castle (you can
see it in the left screenshot), but oh well. Thats pretty
much all for the aesthetics. Playability is pretty good
in this map, but the error of having only one entrance to
the castle makes for battles occuring often at that spot,
reducing the areas of battle in the rest of the level. Bots
follow a somewhat repeated pattern of weapon collecting
by going through the courtyard and RL hallway. Then they
go to the castle and take the accelerator to get to the
mega health ledge. They never get the haste powerup unless
they start out right next to the accelerator that leads
to it. Silly bots. =) As a final note on the playability
aspect of this map, it plays a good tourney and even 3-4
people deathmatches. Finally, we get to the fun factor.
This map is a blast to play! I still play it every day!
The only reason I took off of points for the Fun Factor
section is becasue if you have no friends and play with
bots all the time (j/k), you will know what they are going
to do, and end up camping where you know they're gonna come,
then blasting them. So, all in all, this is the best map
of mine that i have reviewed so far (but not the best I've
made!), and it is worth the download to play in. Go on and
have a blast. Is it just me, or are my reviews getting longer?
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A
cool lookin castle |
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The
wood that never burns out? |
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Ratings:
Looks - 18/25; Aesthetics - 20/25; Playability - 20/25; Fun
Factor - 22/25
OVERALL
RATING -- 78/100 |
Download
Now -- sykotrny1.zip (1,275
K)
Email syKotic -- syko_quake@yahoo.com
Visit syKotic's site
-- syKotic's
Lair
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