I just remember one streamer having a bit of trouble with it* so not the clearest trap ever. There is surely others who just rush through it. 

I thought the spike corridor trap would be another crusher corridor trap, so at first I tried to run through it, yes. But that's probably dumb on my part, since the corridor was very short, and crusher corridors tends to be longer.

Anyway, I couldn't figure out any secret. Those must be really well hidden this time... but I couldn't find all secrets in Sandy's maps either.

The pacing was great, interconnection was great and very clever all around, the amount of ammo and health was perfect, and the combat surprised me at how well it was done. 

Just realised I haven't commented on this (I thought it would be in bad taste to start a thread and then be the first to comment, and then I forgot entirely).

Only played the first version so far, so I can't comment on the changes you've made. Not much to say except that I thought this was great and really captures the essence of Episode 4 maps, recreating their bizarre atmosphere without replicating their technical shortcomings. I played on skill 1 and thought it was hard, but not too hard; just appropriately so for an E4 homage.

I though Unholy Ossuary was good too, by the way, but this map captured my imagination more. There have been a few good and id-like runic maps over the years, whereas I struggle to think of any maps that have captured E4 as well as Well of Lost Souls. PuLSaR's The Elder Reality obviously comes to mind, but while I think it's a fantastic map, it's more of a modernisation of the entirety of E4 condensed into one --beautiful and unmistakeably recent-- level. Your map, on the other hand, feels like a lost E4 map from 1996 (in a good way, and minus the bad texture alignment etc.).

You wrote on QuakeOne
Honestly I'm a bit obsessed with the original mapping styles each designer had
and it shows in your work; you seem to have an exceptional understanding of the id designs. 

GGRC played your map!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Iz7P0ixWdU 

@MissBubbles speedrun under 1m30s? you didn�t go underwater at all! 

I loved the oldskool style of it and the encounters, though they were pretty hard. The only complaint is that I can't backtrack to the start of the map where I left a lot of health packs. Found only one secret by accident. And I couldn't figure out how to avoid traps, though I like maps with traps.

I want to see more maps from you in future.

skill 2 demos: http://www.quaketastic.com/files/demos/ew2_pulsar.zip 

I just finished playing this on skill two and really liked it. Some comments:

- Early Quake maps depended a lot on skillful use of lighting to make up for less geometric detail. This combined with the texture themes is why Quake has such a strong atmosphere still and no other game I can think of duplicates its recipe. You nailed this mix of sturdy chunky geometry with bold shadows and bettered the original iD levels in build quality.

- I liked the progression which is intended to make the player feel a bit trapped and lost by the labyrinth and disorientated by the falls and teleports - well done. I thought the ability to go right to the end but then have the option to go back and access every part of the level aside from the first start room was a courtesy to secret hunters like me who want to find them all but not be forced to restart the level.

- Found all four secrets and they are fair. Got two in the first go and found the others by back tracking through the empty map. Nice secrets.

- Traps where good - punishes the hurried player the right amount.

- Combat was fun - yes I died enough times but die, learn, win gets your through. You couldn't get too sloppy burning health and ammo but it wasn't too tight either.

I'd definitely go for more maps like this. Original iD Quake flavour in look, progression, secrets, layouts and combat setups. I've played hundreds of maps but I'm not bored yet. 

Thanks for mapping this map, it gives me a lot of inspirations. Most of time I keep hearing people not liking this episode, and this map improves those little aspects that wasn't that polished in episode 4. This also proves to me, actually try couple things after some testing. Thank you again. Can't wait to see your episode 2 map. 

@Jaromir I'm not sure what you mean?

@PuLSaR Thanks, I'm glad you liked the oldschool feel! I assume that you mean you were unable to backtrack after the Gold Key trap commits you to the second part of the map? Otherwise, the rest of the map is completely accessible once it has been finished ( with the exception of the spawn room, which has no items besides shells on lower difficulty. ) There is a teleporter in the exit room for just this purpose!

@Scragbait Thank you Scragbait! I'm happy to hear I did a good job with capturing that " chunky but atmospheric " feeling. :)

I always try to include a means to let the player go back and explore the level, so I'm happy to hear it was appreciated.

@Newhouse Thank you for playing it! I'm flattered to hear that it inspires you. I hear E4 get a lot of flak too, and I find it to be understandable. People tend to not like Petersen's work (particularly in Doom) but I feel that in Quake his work shines the most. His maps are still a bit ugly, but in my opinion they have some of the most evocative atmosphere. When you play E1 & E2 a lot of the time you're like " Ah, this is a castle " where as in E4 I find myself thinking " what on earth is this place? " and it fills your imagination with many dark and twisted possibilities for the purpose of the place you're in. That's just my two cents anyway!

Anyway, using your comment to segue into my next point, I'm glad to hear you're looking forward to the Episode 2 map. Unfortunately, it may be put on hold for a little while. I'm going to be taking a little bit of a hiatus from Quake mapping until I feel that I'm ready to come back to it. I like to work on all sorts of games, and lately Half-Life has caught my interest. I probably won't be gone long since I tend to flip-flop between projects depending on what my mood is for the week. I'll still be active in the community for sure; but I'll be taking a break from the mapping in the mean time! 

It is great to jump around and play with designs of different games. You bring some retro but fresh maps to the table so I hope to you see return again and again with more projects!

Good luck to you! 

Good classic map, much like your previous release.

However, I found this one to be a bit overly corridorish.
The difficulty seems to vary depending on whether one gets the armors, the first YA in particular.

Demo 

Played this before seeing there was a newer version. OP should be updated. 

I was pleasantly surprised by this map, I was not expecting a well polished, trap infested and very cool encounter layout map! The screenshots for this map don't do it any justice.

We all ridicule Sandy Peters for E4 being so rough around the edges, but underneath all the dodgy texture choices and weird brushwork is a gem with plenty of cool encounters and traps. This map certainly takes many of E4s elements and sprinkles them along a good linear path.

I was surprised by many of the teleport traps, liquid surfaces and the lighting! It has that really cool Quake like contrast with bright torches and darkness engulfing the corners and ceilings.

The encounters are classic setups, with ogres up high raining down grenades and knights sneaking and patrolling around most corners. Patrolling monsters is something I don't often see in new maps nowadays. Plenty of awesome fiend traps and loads of good fun zombie infested rooms to bounce gibs off the walls.

The secrets are certainly not easy to find and most of them are hidden paths often in darkness (which is totally fine for Quake). My first playthrough of the map I got none! Its always tricky to understand how someone will choose to hide stuff, but once I realized the style it was easier to understand where and how.

The thing that really shines for this map is the encounter surprises. It is so easy nowadays to become jaded with new Quake maps after seeing so many over the years, but this map genuinely had me surprised and going "Oh that's cool!"

Looking forward to playing more maps from MissBubbles! 

I thought u must have avoided the first zombie encounter altogether to reach such a low time 

Finally played after reading sock's comments. Not much to add but I do agree there's a level of polish in this release you should be very proud of. Don't stop mapping you are way too good at it!

And here's another thought: I'm not a big fan of ep4 but your map makes me want to go back and replay it. That's a tall order, thanks! 

Oh, this was pretty cool. I thought it would be harsher after a quite intense beginning, but the difficulty was just right. Visually, I prefered Unholy Ossuary, but gameplay-wise they're both great. Keep 'em coming.
Now I got to play your Lunar Catastrophe for Doom.
My playthrough (with Polish commentary):
https://youtu.be/AmxqyZSxw5s