Posted by martinloki on Sat Jan 29th 2005 at 8:40pm

Thanks for a great series. I played through it on normal mode and found that it was a good challenge. My speed of play wasnt the fastest since I was exploring a lot, and I play conservitavely (read "like a scardy-cat"). I finished in about an hour and a half. I often had a glut of ammo, but almost no health (50% most of the way though), and suit power was almost non-existant. I like maps that way though. I have a AMD2500+, 1G ram, and a 9800pro. The only slowing that I noticed was during the final battle. Otherwise the levels looked and played beautifully.

To answer your questions:

- Was the experience fun? What would make it more
fun?
I really enjoyed the experience. I found that i spent a large portion of the time parinoid that something was gonna jump out at me, or that I didn't see a well placed enemy that was about to ambush me. I like that feeling, so it works for me. Only in the very last scene did I feel like the odds were impossibly stacked agianst me. If I didn't play like a coward I don't think I could have beat it. I really like the balance of the enemies and enjoy playing levels where I only average 50% health. As to what could make it more fun, I love antlion battles and wouldn't mind a few more of those. And maybe tone down the final scene. Not the battle, just the lead in. (but that may just be me. Other people may love it as is)

- Any non-progression issues (you are stuck and cannot
continue)?
I only found one area that you cannot get out of. At the bottom of the stairs which lead into the room with the power switches for the robot you can get caught between the stairs and the wall. This is true for the stairs on both sides of the doorway. I only found this because i was looking for more secret areas. You have to either reload or noclip out of there. If you need a better description I can get you a screenshot. Other than that I did not find any issues this time through.

- Game flow, were you often confused about what to do.
Did the solution also confuse you?
The vault sequence confused me, I hadn't come across the vault yet, so it was extremely confusing. But I think that was just because of the pressure I was under (which was pretty fun) in that area, but even when i was in a safe room it took me a while to figure out that I needed to backtrack.

Also the aux. power/buttons confused me. I though I would need to do three different tasks since there were three buttons. Once I got the Grav gun and cleaned out that area I was out of enemies and had to hunted around a while for a computer room (to allow a reboot) or someother way to fullfill the other requirements that the button messages gave. I went and did the power thing, but didn't test the buttons since I thought i was still missing something. (maybe a generic message for all three that power is needed and then switch over to the other messages once that has been fullfilled. Or just two lines, one with your current message, and one with the power message.)

- Lighting issues and overall aesthetics, textures &
props
With the exception of two areas I liked the textures and props throughout the series. Both of the exceptions are in the first level, in the first courtyard, (the one with the tower in it.)

First, the light on the floor beneath the tower stops your movement dead. This seemed really awkward to me. I might be biased since I was backing away from a fast zombie when I discovered this, but maybe a nodraw spike over it to allow the player to go over it, but keep the prop. (Admittedly I haven't tried that, but I think it should work)

Second, I was huunting for secrets and found that you can put a barrel in the corner next to the breakable grate, under the cargo container, and hop up to try to get up to the container platform. Once on top of the barrel you can see through the walls since you are looking at the top of the shapes which appear (or not) to be nodraws.

The lighting throughout felt right, at no point did I pause and go, "wtf?" I also like your use of (I'm assuming) displacements inside; the ground comming up through the floor at the base of the elevator is a good example.

- How did you feel after beating it?
Mainly, I felt relieved. For the vast majority of the game I had felt tension and I think that if it had ended more traditionally I would have felt a fair level of satisfaction. However, with all the insanity at the end I found that my only option to get out alive was to press the button and be a coward. It wasnt until the very end that I came out and had to fight. And that took a few times before I knew what had to be done. Also, the look of the mech itself was a bit underwhelming and its look didnt seem to fully fit into the world you crafted. (I know you've had more experience with mapping and that poly count is an issuem but could you use models and get a bit more detail in?)

One last thing. I know that you said there are some known issues that will probably not be fixed in the final release, but I have to ask. What was up with the wierd dark blotches on the dirt in the first area with antlions? I spent quite a bit of time with them and could figure them out. Are they artifacts of the antlions?

Thanks, -martinloki
(Sorry for the long post)

Posted by Spartan on Sat Jan 29th 2005 at 6:17pm

My only complaint is that you listed it as a HL1 map. I've seen people doing this a lot and it is getting annoying. Nice looking map by the way. [addsig]

Posted by ReNo on Sat Jan 29th 2005 at 4:20pm

Judging by the screenshots here and in your profile, this is looking like a really high quality effort and should prove quite successful seeing as its one of the first. I look forward to playing this sometime [addsig]

Posted by Tylak on Thu Jan 27th 2005 at 6:24pm

Thanks Reno. Okay I changed it to HL2. I'm still getting used to this site so I'm bound to make a lot of oopsies. Good looking out.