[map] Broken Palace

This is a a discussion topic for the map "Broken Palace" by Finger which can be found here

Map description:

2003 map competition entry

Map screenshots:

Amazing work. All of the flowing water and lanterns are really a nice artistic touch. You make all those textures yourself? Once again; kudos.

Thanks. 90% of the textures were either made from scratch, or manipulation of source images from the web. The others were shaderlab, cs, and tfc.

Playing this map you could think you were in China. Excellent atmosphere and textures! You capture the theme perfectly. Brilliant map! Great job mate!

Sorry we never go that play test time in Finger. Great map however.

from my forum post

I wasn't planning on revealing my votes, but I have to say this is most definately my choice for winner. Why? First, it carries out its theme visually with great success. The indoor/outdoor areas work great, the water works great, the textures are amazing. Finger even took time to superbly retexture the health/armor chargers. The lighting was fantastic. The flow was smooth, I found myself running all over the map. While the corridors at first seemed a little too similar looking, this quickly passed. Weapon placement was terrific, especially the egon which requires more than a little work. Seriously, what is not to like? Well, one thing - the paths in the zip aren't completely Steam compatible. Like it or not, Valve's spoiled brat of a program will be our bastard to worry about soon enough, and it does not include any folders named SIERRA. Similarly, people with CS retail are gonna have a tiny problem figuring out where the map goes. You may say, "but if they're not stupid they'll figure it out" - before you bring that argument up, let me remind you that they purchased CS retail. Anyway, so pathing from the half-life root on up woulda been nice but that's really the only thing I can possibly complain about.