Looks like you feel asleep using the bathroom! You wake up and start to go back to work.
Of course, something doesn’t feel right and then the shit really hits the fan.
Make sure you stay aware of you surroundings at all times – it could save your life.
Basic Details
- Title: Critical Cargo
- File Name: hl2-ep2-sp-critical-cargo.7z
- Size : 58.62MB
- Author: JetBlack
- Date Released: 17 May 2012
MapTap Users
Download directly into MapTap [58.6MB]
You MUST have MapTap installed before using this link.
Download Options
Manual Installation Instructions
- Copy the maps and cfg folders into your Half-Life 2: Episode Two folder.
- Launch Half-Life 2: Episode Two
- Open the console and type map critical_cargo2.
- Press enter/return or click the Submit button.
- Play and Enjoy.
If you require more help, please visit the Technical Help page.
Videos
The playthrough below is provided by Podcast 17 Let’s Play. See more of the playthroughs on this site: VP: Podcast 17
The playthrough below is provided by Custom Gamer. See more of his playthroughs on this site: VP: Custom Gamer
Screenshots
Click on the thumbnails below to open a 1024 pixel wide image.
WARNING: The screenshots contain spoilers.
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Reader Recommendations
Total Downloads
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2,457Overall
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1Today
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7Last 7 days
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10Last 30 days
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51365 days
Meta Review Data
Statistics based on 5 comment(s) with meta review data.
Installed:
Using Gauge: Users
Manually: 5 Users
Time Taken:
Average: 0 Hours, 11 Mins
Shortest: 0 Hours, 4 Mins by JetBlueChest
Longest: 0 Hours, 20 Mins by Daken50
Total Time Played: 0 Hours, 54 Mins
Using Gauge: Users
Manually: 5 Users
Time Taken:
Average: 0 Hours, 11 Mins
Shortest: 0 Hours, 4 Mins by JetBlueChest
Longest: 0 Hours, 20 Mins by Daken50
Total Time Played: 0 Hours, 54 Mins
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Jump to a review
Got yourself half-mod and half-movie here. The author tries to put a new spin on how we view these things and he has done a pretty good job.
The mapping is a little basic for my liking and it could definitely have done with more beta testing, as image 17 show – it’s easy to walk through trucks.
I got stuck for a while in the second map but that was because I didn’t look around carefully. That said, the exact nature of the situation is usually a case of waiting and a little more direction, perhaps from the voice actors “Don’t let him touch anything!” might have speeded up my realization.
I didn’t particularly like the bullet time effects but they didn’t spoil the mod either.
I have a feeling most will really enjoy this and with some more polish I would have raved more about it.
Definitely worth you time but it should have looked prettier.
The scripting and pacing of the cut scenes is top notch, it’s a real shame the author didn’t spend as much time crafting the actual game play segments.
When you do have control over your character, I found the combat to be incredibly frustrating. The lack of any sort of health readout is the main culprit here, even though the maps are pretty easy, there is one section in particular where the difficulty suddenly spikes and I died numerous times, the closest auto-save being back at the start of the area.
The scripted sequences were incredibly well done however, very cinematic, I liked the use of slow motion.
Unfortunately at the end of the day, I just don’t like this kind of game design. On rails scripted scenes with no player input is what we need to move away from in this medium, imo 🙂
it’s stuck on the actually “cargo” part
No, it’s not stuck you are. Look carefully around – you can escape.
I have removed your recommendation – I thought that once you play the whole map you might want to revise it. or not, that’s your choice, but since it relates to a misunderstanding, it seemed best to remove it for now.
okay I give it another try 🙂
nope, he doe’snt stand up after the crash
looks like its just for me
That’s a shame. If you use MapTap I could send you a save from just after if you would like. The reason I say MapTap is that it seems saves and demos created for maps installed by MapTap must have the same folder structure to work and therefore mean you would have to use MapTap.
I’m going to have to be rather critical of this one.
My main concern with this map pack is that the control is taken away from the player way too often, in my opinion. Most of the time you’ll be looking at cutscenes or sometimes even looking at a black screen while sounds go on in the background.
Also, I thought the scene where you sit in a van was just another cutscene. I became annoyed by the length of it and only then did I realise that I was acually supposed to do something. I think the map should do a better job of communicating to the player that he’s not supposed to just wait for something to happen in that scene.
Also the lack of a crosshair is kind of a weird choice to make. Personally I don’t like that.
I think slow-motion was also way overused. I think the mapper wanted to create a cinematic feeling with those slow-motion sequences but when 50% of your time is actually spent in slow-motion, it becomes annoying. To me, slow motion also counts as taking control away from the player because there’s not much you can do if the time is going at 10% of the usual.
I guess there was a lot of good entity-work involved in the creation of this map pack, but I honestly didn’t find this fun to play.
this may be short but it shows how well you can take advantage of the hammer editor when you know how to…. and allthough the slow motion sequences can make shooting awkward at times you could easily get used to it
in regards to gameplay well its basic run of the mill… nothing special metro-cops and combine however I dont believe the author was concentrating too much on gameplay ,instead he wanted to show how you can turn bog standard hl2 maps into something more creative
I especially enjoyed the “metal gear solid” genre music selection… this gave the map a intensive action feel and is a change from the “atmospheric” background music we normally associate with hl2 maps
when I saw the file size for Critical Cargo (58mb) I was expecting at least half and hour of hl2 map action… however I presume the additional action sequences took up a large slice of the 58mb.. but using the same action sequences in a full mod would require a significantly larger file size
in summary I would call Critical Cargo a “test map” and im impressed with the results…. I can only hope “jetblack” is busy creating a full hl2 mod .. I hope so !
good map… well done mate !
i have to ammend my review…. still receives a PIN however when I reached the steps at the end of the corridor scene it displayed “TO BE CONTINUED” … now from previous mods this normally indicated the end of the mod/map and we can expect a continuation of the mod/map at a later date
however when I ran the map second time around I then realised that the map continued… however thats when it gets a bit odd !
the gunship scene when you get blasted off the building is extremely well constructed… however when you awake being guarded by the metrocop you cant interact with anything and the map seems to “stall” … infact I left it running and went to make a cuppa and I was still unable to continue from this stage
a similar problem occured in both “PENETRATION” and “ROCK24” mods were the npc would simply stare at you with no interaction.. however you can edit the game.info txt file which sometimes fixes this issue ,so I shall try this later on ……
still a impressive map !
You actually need to do something in the area you refer to. Look carefully at the sign on the door.
This was a perfect example of style over substance!
Miigga1 has said pretty much all of my gripes on this so I won’t repeat what he’s said.
I started this and just felt as though I was being controlled rather than in control, when I got to the train ride I assumed there would be an event similar to the start of Opposing Force. After a while I began looking around and stabbing the ” use” key to no avail. The item you need to ” use” seems to need near pixel accuracy to affect it and some times disappears.
it’s quite obvious the author knows how to use his tools as when you get rid of tech tricks he’s used, it looks good. However he needs to learn how to include better gameplay as this was almost no fun for me.
couldnt agree more… for visuals I gave it a PIN however thats solely for visuals…. gameplay needs more attention
did you have any problems with the start of map 2 were the metrocop is guarding you…. I couldnt continue from there… there was no way to move and no controls worked… I tried to edit the game.info txt file and change the SteamAppId from 420 to 415 …. however this didnt work
its a shame since im looking forward to running this map ….. any idea,s
Hi Brian.
First I think you are over complicating the problems with this mappack! Take a look at andyb’s video, it show’s how frustrating getting out of the container/train was and listen to how many times he hit the use key before it worked! Changing the SteamAppId is not relevant to this mappack, it’s all about the poor choice of the author.
From what you are saying, you haven’t finished this so you might want to revise your rating (that of course is entirely your own choice) when you finish it.
As you are already aware I have known of you for quite sometime, so I am more than happy to be of help. You already know how you can contact me.
The start of the Map is not the Metrocop in the container, which means (I think you used maptap) you didn’t start out at the beginning. Again look at andyb’s video, you will see look’s don’t always = good gameplay.
There are some interesting visuals with the slow-mo explosions but overall I found it kind of frustrating to have the control taken away from me most of the time, to have to move at slow speed, no suit, etc. It certainly looks like a lot of effort was put into it but I don’t think I would replay it again
Its not a map at all but more a interactive trailer for a game. Nothing to do except kill half a dozen combine.
Pros
Good scenes (if they work)
Cons
Missing player clips
continuous scene lockups
No clue as to what to do
No HEV so why give crowbar for 1 hit?cant change weapon
Blurry section ran to long
I have more I didnt like but thats enough.Its nothing more than a trailer but its interactive and that didnt even work.It took 12 tries to do this video because the scenes dint cache right.
Blind run of nothing really
Wich is the starting map, launching this mappack from Map Tap: critical_cargo2???
Yes, critical_cargo2. The same as if you launched it manually.
Hey Phillip, I just want to repport an issue I have with this mappack installing it via MAPTAP.
The issue is that: When I launch the 1st map of this whole mappack via MAPTAP and I quick save, I just couldn’t acces to those quick saves when I look for them directly from HL2 EP2 game, my quick saves just don’t appear at ALL!
I mean when I use MAPTAP to install-launch and play just one map, everything is fine, but when I install-launch and play with more than 2 maps, the quick saves are not hold in the HL2 game at all!
Have you tried loading the map in MapTap again and then loading a quicksave? Remember, MapTap creates a special folder for each map/mappack, so the saves are not aprt of the standard game installation, in the same way that a mod’s quicksaves aren’t.
Yeah thanks Phillip I did precisely that, launching from maptap and my quicksaves were alredy there, I got it!
Ok so this is really interesting and I wanted to give it a PN jsut because those lonley 2 PN recommendations look so lonley in there.
But for me the propper recommendation would be a Maybe?, why? well because despite this was really cinematic and precisely for that outstanding from any average mappack or mod, this whole release felt like a very bad demo alpha verssion due to the many flaws this mappack has. For me the second map was a TOTAL and I mean total disaster, I just couldn’t see the action sequence inside the cargo truck with the metro cop, I had to noclip in order to trigger the whole sequence and everything was wrong after that, so I had to charge manually the last map where actually you have the only few seconds of action, and there it was also interesting because of the combat but to many flawas on it still.
I hope to see this someday finished propperly and I hope we see a really cool outstanding different HL2 combat action cinematic mod., but so far the whole thing feels like a very low polished alpha verssion of something still in progress.
Well I realized evidently that I played the second map wrong, and aftger seeing the videothrough I did play the 2nd map right and it was cool, but still that low polished demo feeling is persistent in me, I really hope something greater and better came out of this job.
I won’t disagree with any of the issues other commenters have pointed out, because I experienced most of them as well. I still liked it. I felt like I was watching an exciting fourth-wall-breaking movie. Watching, though – not really playing.
I never like giving any authors map an avoid it tag because I can appreciate the time and effort that gets put into these and the fact that Im allowed to play it for free but IMHO this was a really bad map. I think andyb has pretty much covered what I thought of this entry. considering the size of 53mb compared to another recent entry station 51 at 7 mb, this was just all show and no play
Surprised no one mentioned Outpost 16 for the resemblance it brings. And also for the conclusion we can all agree on, less and less control means more bad gameplay, despite the cool scripting and pretty cinematics. For this and for the slow mo combined with actual action (which I’m very curious about how it was done), the map pack feels more like a proof of concept. This should’ve been released only to testers so I really hope the author doesn’t stop here.
All 3 maps gave “node out of graph” message and all were kind of ugly and cried for optimization. But again, the flying ashes were still a wow effect for me and although I have some memories and a rough idea about how it was made, I’m still a newbie when it comes to particles etc so hat’s off to the author.
Now onto the ‘mod” itself:
– first map (or 2nd in the author’s counting) starts with the player facing a toilet.. wow. I guess it felt rather cool for most players but for a gender minority like me was just gross. Thank God for the nice music I had to listen while falling from the nth floor of a collapsing building!
– in the 2nd map, not having a crosshair seems to have pissed everyone off. I thought I had a good aim but I guess I missed pressing Use in juuuust the right spot to open the truck so I assumed it’s out of my reach and had to wait to get to a complete stop. So map went on for what seemed like forever! til I decided to give it another go. After the truck accident, again, too much darkness without anything really happening.
– why am I so slow? Am I supposedly injured, if so, maybe a reddish vision or me bleeding would have made sense, because to me, along with low fps, just gave me the impression my pc was slow somehow..
– I can hear a combine voice even after he’s dead?
– I found the burning combine funny because of his screaming, now I hate myself for being so sadistic. But after watching William’s playthrough, I see I’m not alone and mod was in fact supposed to be tad funny.
– so many invisible walls all over the map..
– loud bad music in the last fight.
– after credits, the 1st map is loaded again?
Mkay so a lot of weird stuff going on and like others said, this feels more like an alpha release and because I see potential, I urge the mapper to reach out for some tutorials or other mappers for collaboration, some beta testers and finally release it.
With this said, I can’t give it an “Avoid it” since it does have its neat elements which people should see and “play” at least once, although in the end it’s either for die hard fans who want to play everything that’s released or for mappers wanting to decompile and learn.
EDIT: weird lighting bug.. http://i.imgur.com/8DeEe.jpg
any chance of getting the soundtrack out of the maps?
three very short maps with quite a unique feeling. A little bit like a poor man’s “call of duty”.
I would actually like to see more of it… but only after the kind of sluggish movement and mouse is fixed (although I haven’t started EP2 for quite a while. Might be my game)
Manually
Medium
10 Minutes
Okay, this is one of those maps that I should absolutely love. The talent behind the ideas here is awesome. But it’s OTT and a little annoying at times. Those slo-mo scenes are cool but ..well.. OTT. Plus it’s all scripted – heavily – even though it still kinda works in places. When the car blasts through the wall I was loving it but then I came under attack and wondered where the trusty crosshair was! Like a movie this. It’s great but just too much. ?
Manually
Medium
15 Minutes
Many people might have not liked it, but for what it is, Critical Cargo is really damn good.
Its movie-like concept is very nice and it feels like you’re in some sort of action movie featuring Matt Damon. The mapping is really nice, even though it’s sometimes very blocky. There isn’t a lot of gameplay to talk about, and that’s probably the reason a lot of people here didn’t like it.
Overall, I would recommend checking out this mod. It may not have a lot of gunplay in it, but for its concept, it’s really damn good.
Cool map with many scripted scenes, but, sadly, very short and discontinued.
Manually
Medium
5 Minutes
Interesting concept. Not much fun.
Manually
Easy
20 Minutes
Very short but I really love the voice acting of the Metro police.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ROjNaJyians&list=PL5MfhJVT6wIKbXxhAvpcJxjx8m-uEG42x&index=164
Manually
Easy
4 Minutes