Basic Details
- Title: The Evil World
- File Name: hl1-sp-the-evil-world.7z
- Original File Name: castle.zip
- Size : 1.18Mb
- Author: Martin Schultz
- Date Released: 28 March 1999
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Meta Review Data
Statistics based on 3 comment(s) with meta review data.
Installed:
Using Gauge: Users
Manually: 3 Users
Time Taken:
Average: 0 Hours, 28 Mins
Shortest: 0 Hours, 18 Mins by reaction
Longest: 0 Hours, 45 Mins by El_WaKa
Total Time Played: 1 Hours, 25 Mins
Using Gauge: Users
Manually: 3 Users
Time Taken:
Average: 0 Hours, 28 Mins
Shortest: 0 Hours, 18 Mins by reaction
Longest: 0 Hours, 45 Mins by El_WaKa
Total Time Played: 1 Hours, 25 Mins
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This one is a particular release in a medevial theme that should be tried by everyone (don’t know if it works with steam) I really like the way it was created perhpas all elements look a little oversize but it certainly create an original feeling
A unique way of exiting the mod… though realistic in an old castle, I suppose.
Yea it was a “crappy” way to end lol.
OK short with a sudden ending, can not remember much of the gameplay so see above postings.
I can’t get this one to run…
All it comes with is pak1.pak and ms.wad, and a readme
The readme says,
“Extract the pak1.pak and ms.wad to your “half-life\valve” directrory.
IF there is already a pak1.pak file in that directory, rename pak1.pak
to pak2.pak etc.
IF there is a ms.wad, you will have to make a backup, as ms.wad must have
that filename.
When the files is where they should be, start up half-life with console on
(run “hl.exe -console”) bring down the console, and type “Map castle”
maybe im doing something wrong..
I dont use steam.. so most of my mods go into the halflife\base directory.. or in valve\maps directory.. none of these work however…
Zach, rename the file to pak0.pak, if you don’t have one and try again. It worked for me!
After an experiment at BM with an too-high-powered laser you and some scientists and also security guards are thrown into another dimension – the readme says. I say, it’s more like another century – like the Middle Ages.
But however, story is ok: being in the other dimension, imprisoned by aliens, your objective is clear – flee at all costs! And eventually find / rescue more scientists. Luckily one day, they forgot to lock the door…
Pro’s:
-Good map architecture with nice lighting, new textures (but also looks always the same mostly)
-Neat combat action, good balanced, many weapons, not too much ammo, good enemy placement
-A few, easy button puzzles
-Story is ok
-No bugs
Con’s:
-Quite short playtime
-Variety in textures is missing, at least some outdoor areas are looking sort of unique
-No music or ambient sounds, would be great here
-Disappointing, sudden end
-Maybe a bit too easy for veterans (cause of weapons like Magnum, crossbow, shotgun, grenades)
For all of you who progressed to Half-Life from Quake II, like me, I’m sure you remember Strogg Weapon Plant 2, Martin’s previous release. It appeared right at the beginning of the year and was a perfect little combat exercise. With this unit, he’s also produced some of his own textures, and they do fit the theme quite nicely. Unfortunately, as you’ll quickly see when playing, they’ve been used somewhat relentlessly. While the scheme chosen looks quite good in places, the level would have benefited from a lot more variety in the visuals. The wood and stone combination gets very monotonous after a while.
Martin has made the slightly strange decision not to include any grunts in this level, which I’d say is a mistake; I suppose it might not have fitted into the theme he was aiming for but it seems odd not to use the best enemies in the game. Having said this, Martin has made pretty good use of the alien enemies he’s included. The gameplay doesn’t really come close to the standard we saw in Strogg Weapon Plant 2 but it’s not that bad either.
A more serious problem is the r_speeds. Entity poly counts shoot up in some places and it was quite sluggish at times; those of you with older hardware will probably struggle a bit. The ending is also rather underwhelming – in that there isn’t one. This seems to be quite a trend with Half-Life maps and it’s particularly bad here; I just swam into some kind of HOM and then the screen faded out. Not terribly inspiring.
This isn’t a bad release, it’s just a disappointment. I was expecting something of a very high standard after enjoying his last Quake II offering so much, but this wasn’t really of the same quality at all. I’m not sure it was such a good move to switch to Half-Life editing; he obviously worked quite well with Quake II’s features but, on the evidence of The Castle, he hasn’t got to grips with Half-Life’s yet.
Notes
This review is republished here by permission and was originally published Thursday, 1st April, 1999 by Morgan.
This review was originally posted on the Ten Four Website, which is now offline. Permission has been granted to republish the full review and more details can be found on the About page.
First of all, I really like the castle theme, is a breath of fresh air among the old mods that always stick to the default textures, that being said, I would’ve liked it more if it added a little bit more variety on the textures, the same stone and wood textures get old by the end, another thing is that it was too dark, I know I could play around with the brightness levels, but I believe that if the maps look too dark with the default half life brightness setting, then it’s doing something wrong
But anyway, about the level design, it was pretty good, it gives you a lot of ammo but without being drowned on it, the enemy placement was decent, and it had a few button puzzles, I don’t know, but it kinda reminded me of a Quake or a Doom level, the mod creator made mods for Quake II before so it probably has to do a little with that
Overall, I liked it, the biggest cons would be that it gets repetitive by the end and that it is too dark, but is still a mod that deserves a look
Manually
Medium
45 Minutes
The Evil World or Castle uses a new set of textures and takes place in, you guessed it, a castle. This makes it feel a lot more like a Quake map than an HL map. This is actually a good thing, it felt fresh and different to all the science labs or military facilities I’ve been blasting through recently.
It’s not just the visuals, the flow of the map is also like those found in Quake or Doom. Paths crisscross with each other meaning that once you pull a lever to open a locked door your path will loop around to where you need to be.
Combat is very well balanced. There’s plenty of ammo, some weapon variety and sensible monster placement. It’s all aliens here and they have been placed thoughtfully. You’ll get a nice mix of headcrabs, zombies, alien slaves and alien grunts.
What really made me enjoy this map was that if you can keep Barney alive he can follow you from the start of the map to the end. There are places where you’ll have to leave Barney, go and open a door then loop back around to grab him. It makes it almost feel like you’re playing coop.
The new textures are used well. There’s not a huge variety which could easily lead to the player becoming lost but because of the map flow this is never an issue (at least for my run).
This is a great set of maps with just enough new art to make it feel fresh. I highly recommend playing Evil World!
Manually
Medium
18 Minutes
I couldn’t make on hard because, so not worth even a try in this difficulty
The problem is that he doesn’t give good weapons during the first 1/3 of the game and starts to provide better weapons later on. So imagine an alien grunt requires 3 double barrel shots from a shotgun to be killed, that’s too much. Even vortigaunts requires too many pistol shots. There’s not even enough ammo to play on Hard.
The faniest thing is that you can bring Barney to the end of the level as long as you don’t put him in battle. So he’s like a kid following you everywhere. Besides you can find 2 Barneys more by the end. Why I can’t just bring all 3 Barneys with me so they can help me in battle?
Manually
Medium
22 Minutes