Ijed: Absolutely ridiculous, yet very good indeed. Less of a map or even an episode, more of an experience. Good designs but less refined / consistent than the other maps BUT somehow more atmospheric and gripping for this. The slightly chaotic nature gives it a disorientating Quake / Zer feel that works well. Some bits are a lot cooler than others, maybe some of the bits could have been trimmed down, but then again it's OTT nature is part of the charm. The gameplay is similar, slightly more random and chaotic in places, and exciting because of that. Thankfully a lot less gruelling than Warp, in fact surprisingly fun for it's size. Some of the setpieces are rather tasty, and the start was actually pretty fun the 2nd time around. I got 21/31 secrets, some of them were great, getting 3 Quads in a row around the slime pistons was fun. The early GL is the broken long drop, right? 

The additions n stuff:

Nail Enforcer - slightly too sci-fi-ish but a quality model and a good addition to the arsenal.

Floyd - slightly silly but I can't help but love this guy. Good fun especially dotted around silently.

Flame Enforcer - fuck off.

Z-Aware Ogre - at least it's differentiated from normal Ogres. Fine.

Chainsaw Ogre - basically a Fiend, fair enough. I don't like the animation so much.

Hunter - very high quality model and great fun to fight in various ways. Again a bit too sci-fi for Quake.

New effects: Smoke, steam, particles, destructible cladding, sparks, glass - all great and used really well in the maps.

Lasers that damage you just a little bit: Very sensible.

Auto-saving: Even more sensible, really useful in immersive maps this big where it's all too easy to forget about saving. The very small risk of being auto-saved on 1% health is definitely overriden by the larger risk of getting 200 monsters in and having forgotten to save. 

And yes, long drop is Donald Ducked. 

And the spawn? 

Not sure how as I ended up spawning/killing 350 of them...

Spawn boxes: cool, characterful, good fun.

Nu Mega-Spawn: good, well done, kinda ominous but fair to fight.

Nu Spawn: Easier to kill? Works well. I sometimes forget the damage is the same and casually shoot one next to me, doh. 

Bloody excellent in this pack...

<Shambler> holy fuck
<Shambler> the big outside area with the pistons.....i never even visited there on the 2nd play through
<onetruepurple> okay then
<onetruepurple> how did you manage to skip a huge outside area?
<Shambler> no idea
<Shambler> i had a look, thought "oh yeah i remember that", went back inside and went another route 

<Shambler> otp: up to 25
<onetruepurple> noice
<Shambler> i think that's the best i can do
<Shambler> there should be *something* in the floating crate room but i can't see what
<Shambler> there might be something that opens after you kill the reactor
<Shambler> although you don't need to do so to exit
<Shambler> someone should do a "least kills" route, i bet you only need 1/3 - 1/2 to get through 

 

"Only" about 500 kills are necessary. 

Theres only the MH secret there.

That whole area is me failing to fix func_water properly - the reason behind the exploding button.

Oh well. 

How can one describe the unimaginable work, playtesting, optimizing and dedication that went into this project? The sheer amount of fine tuning that needed to be done? Each time I play I find small details I never noticed before. The intense scale of each map far exceeds anything I could have ever dreamt of seeing in Quake, but that just goes to show just how far Quake has come. Far down the road, a decade from now if the Quake community still exists, we are going to continue to look back at this project for inspiration, motivation, and admire the prodigious effort that was required to bring this behemoth to life. It even leads me to believe that I have a theory that you guys might truly be insane, in the best way possible.

As I'm sure you can understand, I didn't record any demos while playing this. I knew before hand that was a huge release, and I wanted to take my time with each map, look at everything there is to see, immerse myself in the enviornment, and play at my usual "slower than the average player" pace. I'm speaking on behalf of every map in this pack. Everything just screams quality. The lightning sets the mood of a dark industrial place. The monsters provide an interesting combination of futuristic and offbeat, from the enforcers riding on hover-discs to ogres wielding two bloodied chainsaws, and oversized tarbaby's that split into smaller ones from being damaged. These monsters don't necessarily fit with the theme, and yet at the same time, they do.

The actual architecture of each map is nothing short of a magnum opus. It's huge, its detailed, its complicated, its mind boggling. It's even somewhat discouraging, as I gaze at each map inside and out, I know full well I could probably never pull off something this sophisticated, and at this magnitude. How almost each area is interconnected to another, where nothing is completely linear. How backtracking is carefully coordinated, sometimes twice or more, seeing the area you just visited change slightly. The amount of careful planning that had to go into these maps is a task I personally could not forsee myself accomplishing, that's why I feel somewhat discouraged, it's simply too good.

I know it sounds like I am gushing, and I am. Whatever small faults these maps may have, everything else about them obliterates it. You can complain about gameplay being unfair, too little health/ammo or some other flaw, but you simply cannot ignore the fact that these maps WILL go down in Quake history as some of the best, for almost every category: Brushwork, lighting, size, cleverness, original ideas, the list goes on.

I do however, have to deduct one point out of a thousand for re-binding my mousewheel keys and switching from my preferred gl_renderer. That's a huge no-no.

But what else is there to say? If huge maps are not your cup of tea, download it anyway just to appreciate the intense amount of legwork put into this project, because I get a strong feeling nothing is going to ever come close to something like this again, but I am willing to be proven wrong.

My final score: 999/1000 

Not to diminish the efforts of everyone else, but this map pack is outstanding in every regard. I know and appreciate that almost every map that has been released in the last years has been a lot of work and a cause for many frustrations for its author. I know that working with Quake and its tools can be a pain in the ass.

But the amount of blood, sweat and tears that must have gone into these maps is simply amazing. There are few mappers who pour this much work into their maps, and who reach the level of perfectionism as hrimfaxi, ijed, and mfx have. I just find myself blown away by this aspect the most. Goddammit, I know how hard it is to motivate oneself to keep working on a large project over the course of months and years, and that you guys have seen this through to the end is just fucking great.

But for the record, I disagree with Orl on one point: I don't think that this is the pinnacle of Quake mapping. There have been releases in the past where people have said the same thing. I'm sure that one fine day in the future, some crazy fuck gets an idea in their head for an even crazier project, and if they're persistent and lucky, they'll even finish it. But I agree that it will be hard to top this one. 

crazier project -> Ok! 

It says something about this pack that I've replayed it in the last weekend, then replayed Telefragged AGAIN to get moar secrets then watched Daz play the damn thing too.

Like Warp I think this pack is more significant and memorable than first appearances suggest - although unlike Warp it's fun enough to play repeatedly and/or continuously. At first it's easy to get overwhelmed with the sheer size of it, whilst on replays (/watching the custom Derping) some of the subtleties come out.

Such as: The sheer interconnectiveness and non-linearity. Making maps this large is one thing, but making them this connected it really impressive. The spawn boxes, well placed to spawn more spawn or get hit in combat, very fun. The amount of secrets. Some of the evile and gothic touchs in ijeds map, which sometimes seem random but enhance that atmosphere and quake style (like the RL room and the screens on the wall there). The use of dog ambushes combined with heavier enemy combined with early Rocket Launchers... Making good challenges out of standard quake enemies without relying on hordes...

P.S. Ijed: In the big outside pistony area, can you get the YA without an RJ? Also are there any secrets in the two outside train areas?? 

It's good to know the work is appreciated. And where things need to be tightened up.

Piston Area: yes, there are in fact four secrets to get there, all of which involve climbing up a single route - the further you get along it the better the secret you get. Secret Hint: Jump on top of the lowest piston to start with, then keep looking around. 

I got the MH, YA, and Quad...hmph. 

 

Still can't see how to get YA without RJ... 

Lowest piston, on to roof of tunnel, grab MH, double back, jump across onto pipe, then on top of large crate and then to roof to get YA, then climb ladder and jump from roof on to beam trims. Jump between trims until the end, then jump across and grab ladder on vertical beam leading up to roof of lift building. From there, jump across to rock spire and then onto the tallest piston for Quad and Hunter Party. 

That route is marginally less useful if one has already rocket-jumped to the quad itself and thus got the Hunter out of that crate... 

RJ only secrets in the map, there's always a way to get there from a shotgun start as it were. 

....after you've pressed the button to stop the square pillar piston things? 

You must use the pistons to get up there, and then press the button that stops the slimey thingy majingy. 

Bastards. I GJed up there. The RA later, I had to reload for tho. 

Mfx I am literally having leg cramps right now. I can't handle it. I am 10 mins into your map and it is so god damn good. AAaaa!