11 Comments

1. PlanetPhillip

   28th November 2009 at 5:25 pm

   

   I quite enjoyed Svea’s other release, called Above the Downtrodden, but this suffers from the same issue: not enough gameplay. A lot of Guildhall releases have the same problem and to be honest I don’t understand why they don’t sit down at the beginning of the term and make a larger mod, with each student making a small section – sure it would be quite hard to organize but the presentation would be so much better. Anyway, onto this map.

   Visuals
   It’s too dark. An Episode Two map should show its beauty from the beginning. I should be able to see that it’s EP2 just from the screenshot – not including recognizing Hunters etc.

   Gameplay
   Driving the Jalopy should be fun but this was like having dental surgery with rusty pliers. Where was the open road to cruise with my girl, Alyx, with the wind in my hair and a Hunter chasing me. Arh, the good old days.

   Layout and Design
   Pretty good, I certainly don’t have any complaints about it, except it could have been bigger.

   Summary
   Short but kinda fun. The problem is that if this were released in the middle of lots of other good maps, we would be happy but since it’s almost on its own it’s not so exciting.

   5 Words Or Less Review

   Hardly worth the effort.

   Reply
   1. Kyouryuu

      29th November 2009 at 12:32 am

      I agree with that sentiment, mainly because in a professional context, we’re long past the days where one designer did everything in a map.

      While I think it’s a great introductory assignment to get students to create individual maps, they must be exposed to the teamwork involved in cooperatively producing a larger cohesive product.

      Back in college, we had a class in software development. Unfortunately, most of my professors did not have much “real world” experience, being mostly limited to academic pursuits. So they shrewdly brought in this fellow who did software engineering and planning for a living at a local firm and we had to work together using C# and Visual Studio to build a program. Different people were responsible for different parts and when things either fell behind or ran ahead of schedule, the project would need to compensate.

      To me, that’s practical and very useful real-life experience. The bottom line is that generally speaking, individuals don’t make games. Teams make games. And if you’re angling for a career in game development, as I figure most Guildhall students are, I think the institution would be doing them a disservice to not put them through such an assignment. For all I know, maybe they do, but I haven’t heard of it.

      Reply
2. Phil

   28th November 2009 at 9:18 pm

   

   what there is, is pretty good – just disappointingly short

   Reply
3. Mel

   29th November 2009 at 3:14 am

   Too short to bother with, what we have is well done if a bit dark and it would have made a good intro to something more ambitious. I can only agree with the above sentiment map like this are a bit pointless from a general release point of view. The gamplay content is next to zero and just when you think progress is being made the map ends.
   I am sure such exercises serve a purpose for the author but they are little merit in them from a general playing point of view. Clearly the author has talent and with or without a team is capable of better things.

   Download if you have nothing else to do.

   Reply
4. Jasper

   30th November 2009 at 2:00 pm

   

   I quite enjoyed the Jalopy drive. I’ll own up and admit I drove off the cliff; worth it though for Alyx’s chuckle and retort.
   A great pity that there was not more combat. The map provided ample opportunity for combat but this was not exploited.
   The map is short but with brighter lighting and more combat I’d have given it a PIN.

   Reply
5. Darkstranger

   30th November 2009 at 5:52 pm

   

   There was actually no “combat” and maps were quite empty , with so much barrels in one place I was able to kill hunter very easy.

   Reply
6. Grey Acumen

   2nd December 2009 at 10:40 pm

   

   There’s nothing bad about it, there’s just not much to impress either. It was dark, and for some reason the car didn’t have any lights, and I’m almost certain it was supposed to either have headlights that you turned on with the same button as your flashlight, or it just had its headlight on constantly.
   there were all of 3 combine which barely did me any damage as I shot at them from around a tree that they didn’t quite seem to be aware was between them and me, there were headcrabs in the usual “pop out just as your starting to rush through without being careful” places, the two hunters you deal with were easily run over, I just straight out flattened the first one and then clipped the second one, only getting out to finish him off with a quick shot from the magnum. To put simply, you were utterly overarmed for the given situation. You could have easily run through the entire thing with ONLY the gravity gun and it might have been a little more interesting.

   Reply
7. andyb

   6th December 2009 at 5:20 pm

   

   I really dont know if I liked it or not.It needs/missing something?

   Reply

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9. eeVee

   2nd May 2010 at 11:12 pm

   

   Actually, the Charger doesn’t have headlights. One of the more annoying things about Episode 2.

   This was an interesting concept, but there wasn’t much combat and it was too dark and too short. Maybe it was supposed to be twilight or something. This would have been better if it were longer, or if there were more combat. (Why was the gate there? If they really needed to block the road wouldn’t there be more than 4-5 Combine and 2 Hunters? I don’t know, actually.)

   Reply
10. SolidFake

    25th May 2010 at 9:03 pm

    

    nice environments, good level editing
    but….
    bad enemy placement, I mean, what could be more boring than a hunter in the middle of a street which you spot from 300 metres, you simpy drive over him like it was a cat, the other 3 (or 4) combines were also boring, too less fighting in such a great environment
    also something was missing, some sort of environment sound, everything seemed so empty, already a bit melancholy

    Reply

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