[underTaker]

Hello!

The map, i wrote about in the post about my previous one, is finally released! It is city map as well, but this time it is bigger, has more puzzles and takes you more time. It is supposed to be sequel to the previous one. Duke has destroyed 3D Realms office controled by the aliens, and now he has to get out of the city.

I hope this one will be at least as good as the previous one. It also supports dm and coop. It is supposed to be hard, since i've seen a lot of easy maps, which took me about 10 minutes to complete, here - i've wanted to do some challenging, yet balanced.

Download:
http://www.sendspace.com/file/vuldxf

So - have fun, guys

[Jblade]

Played it through, excellent stuff Found it a bit dark in places so if you're going to tweak it throwing in a pair of night vision goggles would be nice (unless there are some and I missed them)

[underTaker]

Thank you
Oh, it could be dark actually - my monitor has really huge contrast, so i can't see how dark it really is.

Spoiler

There is one pair of nightvision googles at that kind of abandoned hairdresser's.

[Forge]

Played it. 95% of the map is fun & exciting. Really like the layout and floor plan. There were some pretty bad cramped indoor spots & I didn't use the RPG (or the Devastator & Shrinker - except I found the player could avoid all those commanders and get to the exit, but I went back and killed them with these two weapons just for personal entertainment). Pigcops kept shooting me through the sprite floor in the area below the ramp to the yellow keylock - messed me up cause I could hear them, but I'm standing in an empty hallway below the stairs and I couldn't see them (didn't die but got pretty beat down).

A few map errors. A couple of your dead end hallways could be reached by jumping over the sprite gate (in the ramp area on the way to the yellow key lock) or going through the unblocking grating (in the green ooze tunnel on the way to get the yellow key). The blue key can be reached because a certain sprite lets the player get access to the edging around the outside of the building - so that section used to gain access to the edge around the outside of the building can be skipped.

[Mikko]

What to do in the sewer? I managed to raise the water level but what good did that do? I have the blue key too but haven't spotted a lock so far.

[High Treason]

Awesome map! Had real fun playing through it, but I missed the blue key and couldn't find a legit way out of that building (With the emergency elevator switch part), I ended up having to exploit myself through a window to get back outside and locate the key. There were a couple of other game breakers but those only really happened because I play in a way that tends to break things and they weren't so significant as I can't remember much about them.

All in all a very enjoyable experience.

[underTaker]

Thank you guys I see now how many bugs i left there, it makes me feel silly. I hope they don't affect gameplay too much. I wanted to do sequel to this map as well, i found one of my old projects, which perfectly fits this one, and has pretty cool design. I'll try to work around with that map as well.

[Forge]

Mikko_Sandt, on 10 June 2012 - 12:37 PM, said:

What to do in the sewer? I managed to raise the water level but what good did that do? I have the blue key too but haven't spotted a lock so far.

You have to use the blue key to unlock the area that leads into a lab. There you shoot a button that drops the bars keeping you from getting into the room with the yellow key at the end of the small sewer water tunnel.

The blue lock is in the "room of no return" at the top of a lift. It's the room of no return because if you enter it without the blue key then you're stuck unless you crouch-clip exploit through one of the sprite windows to get back out into the street area.
The lift is the one where you must blow up an acetylene bottle which will drop a computer bank out of the way so you can go back around to the lift and shoot the button through bars to activate it.

[underTaker]

Oh, damn, thing, which Forge said about is my terrible mistake. I've just made a little fix. You can download fixed version now, where you can enter vents behind the plants to get out of that building. It was my intention at first, i don't know why i skipped it.
Oh, and sorry, Mikko i didn't respond - i didn't see your post before
I've replaced download link.

[Forge]

High Treason, on 10 June 2012 - 12:43 PM, said:

....but I missed the blue key and couldn't find a legit way out of that building (With the emergency elevator switch part), I ended up having to exploit myself through a window to get back outside and locate the key....

I was a little more descriptive about it, but HighT had mentioned it earlier.

I was hoping you'd put out a fix before I decided to review it.

[underTaker]

But you guys let me know about that, and i fixed it Thanks! I hope rest of the bugs doesn't affect the gameplay too much - fixing them would be a bit too difficult to me.

[Forge]

Reviewed:

http://www.scent-88....foreverplus.php


edit: not sure if it's just me, but if you use firefox the page looks misaligned. it's ok with opera or ie

[VinsaneOne]

Great job on this map! Congrats on your 96/100 and 4/5 star rating too.

[Micky C]

I'll check this map out when I get time, which won't be for about 3 weeks.

Also, the 4/5 star user rating means someone voted it excellent but another person voted it average

[underTaker]

Thank you guys I didn't even realise that this map is so big!

[Forge]

Micky C, on 12 June 2012 - 07:25 PM, said:

Also, the 4/5 star user rating means someone voted it excellent, but another person voted it average

When a new map gets uploaded to the server it automatically gets a 3 star vote by default (i didn't make the system so I can't explain why it's this way). Since there are two votes and the average score is 3.5, the map has received one default vote of 3 and one user vote of 4. It also appears that the star scoring system rounds up to the next whole number instead of giving a half-star score.

I'm glad you're satisfied with the score I gave it, but Mikko will probably also do a review and provide a score so you can get a better average of perception across the board.

[Mikko]

Reviewed: http://msdn.duke4.ne...foreverplus.php

Forge, on 10 June 2012 - 09:22 PM, said:

You have to use the blue key to unlock the area that leads into a lab. There you shoot a button that drops the bars keeping you from getting into the room with the yellow key at the end of the small sewer water tunnel.

The blue lock is in the "room of no return" at the top of a lift. It's the room of no return because if you enter it without the blue key then you're stuck unless you crouch-clip exploit through one of the sprite windows to get back out into the street area.
The lift is the one where you must blow up an acetylene bottle which will drop a computer bank out of the way so you can go back around to the lift and shoot the button through bars to activate it.

I actually missed the vent that leads to the flooded bathrooms so I had no idea what you were talking about. (I had blown up the vent but didn't notice that the floor led to an opening.)

[underTaker]

Thanks for review Mikko
Thanks to you, guys, i know what i should point at when creating next maps, i'll try to move along the path you directed me in your reviews

[Mikko]

dude, put some more streetlights there or somethint to make it more interesting, colors and shit, if you look at the first screenshot it shows what's wrong with the otherwise good map.

[underTaker]

Streetlights... why the hell i didn't think of them ;o Okay, i'll give more attention to such details, i know they make everything more interresting, but i just didn't think of it then o.O

[Puritan]

Do not pay too much attention to "detail -whores"...
Your map is excellent as it is.
Keep it coming our way.

Or do we want to end up with just one or two 'uberpolished' maps a year instead of 10-15 enjoyable maps?

Some of the guys around are scaring new mappers away...

[ck3D]

took me 58 minutes, killed all enemies, found 6 out of the 7 secrets. i liked it a lot, as far as looks go no map needs more detailing than that in my opinion. the atmosphere was awesome although the beginning did feel claustrophobic and i was not a fan of all the backtracking. as you can tell from the amount of time i spent playing the map i thought the layout was confusing and i got lost more than a few times ; i also spent a while wandering about with the blue and red keys, without knowing what to do with them at all. it took me a while to notice the sewers for instance and little things like that. i was expecting the map to end after i got out of the first building - boy i was wrong. it felt like playing two maps in just one, to me. it was pretty immersive as an experience though, and i don't mind long maps (if anything i love them). the firefights were well balanced, challenging enough to be fun, i did die a few times but mostly from my own stupid mistakes (ie. i somehow managed to kick one of those pipebombs under the sprite staircase in the last building trying to get rid of a slimer... oops). what i didn't like though was the unfairness of some of the respawns... having monsters respawn in your back like that when you enter a room, or right in front of you in a corridor with nowhere to take cover isn't the most enjoyable thing. well at least it made for a few surprises. i loved the design for the most part except the sewer section that was really really cramped, so much that duke could barely enter some of the corridors without stepping on sprites or getting stuck because of a low ceiling... you went overboard with that section. also i am not quite sure how i managed to make it into that second building, the one locked from inside after the first outdoor area... an explosion blew up one of the walls as i was exploring and trying to find my way inside, i am not sure if that was a poorly placed touchplate that only got triggered on the 8272th time i entered that area, or if one of the troopers trapped inside the room accidentally shot a c9 can... i was stoked to find my way but not too sure as to whether or not it was a happy accident.

all in all a good effort and a solid map, i liked it... just found the layout confusing and somewhat claustrophobic. but the design was nice, and the firefights were entertaining. i would rate it around 85 / 90% maybe.

[Mikko]

It indeed was a bit cramped too. I actually played it first on a laptop which only made it more evident.

Still, a good map!

[underTaker]

@ck3D, according to the second building enterance - there are doors in thoose dark sideways that leads you through toilets to building's interior.
Well, i'm really aware of the fact that my maps are somewhere cramped - i just keep doing the same thing over and over, i'll have to pay more attention to prevent it!
Thank you for all your support, guys

[ck3D]

yeah do not get me wrong, i really enjoyed the map. i am merely just pointing out the few little things that bothered me a little bit, but this certainly does not mean my experience with the map wasn't good. about crampedness i used to be guilty of that too, with time i learned to let the rooms in my maps 'breathe'... but the sewer section really was the only part of the map where i thought it actually got annoying, and hindered movement.

looking forward to your next map

[underTaker]

I know, i know And i'm grateful for that Fortunately the sewer part was a pretty small one. The biggest problem with that is it's ceiling is a little bit above another sector's floor, which causes bugs. Next time i'll do a little bit bigger rooms

[burymeinsmoke]

I would echo some of the same complaints about how cramped and confusing the level is. The same thing happened to me with the wall blowing up, but then I died and I couldn't get it to happen again. I was also troubled by how dark the map is. It's really frustrating to not be able to tell where you're going, especially in the alley that you have to walk through multiple times. You said you were aiming for challenging and balanced but I think you ended up with a little too much challenge, or at least not enough health packs in the second half.

But I say that as an armchair mapper. At the end of the day, it is a very impressive map. It has the same semi-linear feel to it that I really liked about Forever and One More Day. I didn't like it as much as the Forever and One More day, but bravo for creating such a large and interesting map. Keep up the great work, and I look forward to future releases from you!

Plus, you win the Dukie for most bathrooms in one map

[underTaker]

Haha, i was waiting for someone to notice all the bathrooms

[burymeinsmoke]

It's a Duke Nukem fan thing. We're used to bathrooms, haha.

You might be interested to know that your map took me 54 minutes to complete, I killed 251 enemies and left 0, and I found 4 secrets out of 7.

Also, I reread my last post and it sounded more negative than I intended. To be clear, this is a seriously stellar map.

[underTaker]

I'm highly opened for all kinds of criticisms - i want my maps to be better in the future, so i'm really grateful for showing me all the minuses my maps have