...on the QExpo front page. But it is an excellent map which I intend on replaying later on (LordHavoc has been playing it in DPmod, which is just insane... grunts lead and do more proportional damage in that...)

HeadThump you make a very good point regarding tricking the player, and I agree with you even though I may not act it in the game - perfectionism and whatnot makes me feel like a failure if I die in a map, but then I couldnt be bad at a game (of course not, impossible!) and thus would chide the mapper instead of just admitting that he got me. However, I failed to clip the trigger that spawns in the last shambler before the end somehow, and thus wandered the base for a good extra 15 minutes trying to find out just WHAT I needed to do. I only finished the level technically because I returned to the vore area, got locked in, made the jump to try and get to the other hall, fell, and THAT spawned in the shambler. So... a great map, which I finished on accident after a lot of wandering.

Normal skill btw, 125 kills, 5/6 secrets found. 

That's a tidy little thesis Headthump, but it doesn't change what is fun and what is not. It's not even relevant, since I wasn't complaining about teleporting monsters (a standard device in quake if anything is). My beef is that fighting shamblers and vores with no cover is lame, and it'll always be lame regardless of any highfalutin words about how much more accepting players should be.

As for the suggestion that I shouldn't dare criticise this map: fuck off. I'll call it as I see it, thanks. 

of my 'neat and tidy' thesis, I'm dealing directly with the shambler matter. I thought Than
handled it well and I was defending his overall approach to mapping.

And, don't try to hijack this thread with an idoitic flame war, this thread is about Than's map, and that is IT. 

And I stand by my original comment, which is an honest criticism.

Yes, this is not the thread to rip into the ridiculous idea that criticism stifles creativity - if we are going to take that any further, I'll start a new one. 

looks pretty good, it coudld have been lit more creatively, but apart from that it's quality work.

Wasnt too keen on progression, it's one thing to allow exploration etc, but this was a bit confusing as to where to go next.

Shambler fights were fine by me. 

doesn't stifle creativity -- you guys arguing about it does. 

Are easy. Vore fights are also easy if you have enough space to manuever around the Vore.

Keeping a Shambler at bay is easy if you do the Shambler-shuffle. The Vore is a bit trickier, as long as you have enough space around the Vore to circle about. Once the Vore is gone, you can easily move past a corner, and all 50 Voreballs are gone. 

well done than, clean map, good layout, good routing/flow especially around the gold key. fun. good ending. had to search around a bit how to get the silver key and had forgotten where the silver switch/door was.

what is the lift in the hub good for (the one that says, activated elsewhere), didn't need it somehow.

Engine was Joequake, found 1 secret (MH), found pretty much all weapons except for RL, is there one?

skill 0 (I, uhm, have a short attention span *blush*) didn't watch time, perhaps 25 minutes or such.

thank you.

minor nitpick: r_speeds a bit high in places? could look through some doors, for example in the start room, probably maxsurfs or one of those things?

This map, like Antediluvian and e1m1rmx, should one day be in a "Quake Remapped" project ;-)

someone please make the corresponding wiz-metal map :-) 

yes golden_boy there is a Rl :) nightmare secret :) with a extra surprive go find it... 

nice work. Solid architecture, imaginative layout, good fights, good lighting.

Good work, Than.

3 secrets only btw 

very nice level, than!
complex design, balanced gameplay, interesting brushwerk with alot of angles and cozy nooks and crannies all over. also, i liked the promising ending ;) shambler ambushes were intense and fun, and the level has properiest idbase atmosphere ever... i didn't expect one can make such giant remake of dm3.

now i'm waiting for the dm5rmx ;) 

bla 

Cue blatant self promotion.

We've done a mini review of DM3RMX on RPG's QExpo booth. Looky here: http://qexpo.quakedev.com/booth.php?id=55&page=171 

What Paul said.

Also I forgot to mention in the review that I got lost once, and I noticed a bit of lighting that was unsourced. For shame, than! You're letting pro mapping go to your head. 

Thanks for all the feedback, both positive and negative. I've read all the comments and have written my responses below.

shamblers/vores
Three shamblers is nasty if you go the wrong way, which is entirely possible if you miss the signs and panic when you hear them teleport in (I think I probably would do if I didn't know what to do). However, I'm certain there is enough ammo on normal skill and probably hard to take all three down without going to get the shaft. Of course, it depends on how much ammo the player wastes (picking up boxes when nearly full, missing shots etc.) so perhaps I should have thrown in a couple more boxes just to be on the safe side.

Fighting single shamblers with no cover is not particularly difficult, though I guess the one at the end is a bit cheeky as it appears in a tight space and he can get a cheap hit or two in if you aren't very quick. The vore that appears beforehand is supposed to land on the ledge, and always has done every time I tested the map.

There was a reason for that little door closing, but I forgot what it was now - I think the end fight was going to be quite different, and I didn't want the player retreating into the little cubby hole, but then I changed it :)

lighting
Some of the lights in there are actually directly copied from the original. The starting point for the map was to extract the entities from the original bsp using aguirRe's tools and use them as a guide to build the rest. The early lighting was entirely Romero's work, and I tweaked and changed most of it out by the time I had finished.

I tried to give the level a sort of radiosity feel to it without using Riots radiosity tools, so there are many bright lights and also a lot of very low brightness lights with attenuation multipliers set to 0.25 or so, so perhaps that is where the unsourced lighting is. Also, I probably forgot to add a few light sources in my rush to have it finished ;)

Finally, the lighting looks REALLY ass in regular gl engines that don't feature overbrights or anything. It takes out 50% of the contrast or so and the visuals lose a lot. In Fitz on my pc it looks good.

Having said all that, I didn't really go to any great lengths to be exciting with regard to lighting, as I was trying to keep it similar to the original map for DM purposes.

progression
As for the map progression, I was trying to get the most out of the existing layout without adding too many extra areas. I did add several, but aside from the final area and the small pool control room (after getting the gl) they kinda fit neatly onto (or above) what is already there.

I wanted to reuse areas multiple times, because I like passing through the same area multiple times and having different things happen each time, and I also was trying to get as much gameplay in as possible.

Some of the testers found the layout confusing, and some didn't. I was aware it might be a problem, so I did add a lot of arrows and messages in particular problem spots (at the shambler ambush and when getting the silver key.) The exit is also highlighted several times, although the slipgate not functioning and the ability to go back to the start of the level (you have to do a couple of tricky/annoying jumps) from the end pit might also confuse.

The reason there are so many lifts and extra routes is mostly for coop players - especially the corridor from the start to the end and the lifts in the pool room and round atrium. With just one player, the lift in the round atrium has something to do with the super secret, but I won't say any more than that.

There is not a lot of exploration, by the way - it's fairly linear but if you take a wrong turn (miss a cue, forget where to use a key or just get lost) then yes, it can be a bit confusing :/

DM
Paul: In response to your review, the layout and item placement for DM was supposed to be more or less the same - the source is included for anyone who wants to make improvements to the DM layout (more fun for FFA for example) or map in general.

FPS
I wasn't really concerned with r_speeds. The epoly can get a bit high in the pool room, and the wpoly is around 1000 max (from what I have found) in the final wateralpha'ed version. I could have kept them to 800 or so, but some of the testers wanted transparent water, and a couple encountered problems as they had wateralpha set to 0.5 or so in their config, so they were able to see the armour secret before finding it themselves. 

Great map, I really enjoyed it, got lost and died once, but didn't come across any major problems.
Very nice work. =) 

http://speeddemosarchive.com/quake/ 

http://underworld.planetquake.gamespy.com/quakerev060724b.html 

but this will be one of those maps I play only after a good meal and a nice shower ;)

@Headthump:
in Doom the monsters are much slower and inflict less damage then in Quake.But if you spawn some shamblers right on the player without cover then some will see it as unfair because they fry him instantly.
I have often been so annoyed by these situations that it really spoilt the fun playing a map, along the lines of "right, otherwise you wouldn�t get me anyway". 

I claim to be Than's biggest fan boy.

I'm such a big Than fan that I even stalked him to the point of getting a job at the same company as him. He got a bit scared however and ran away to Japan. 

and less evolved ways to handle difficult situations like the Shambler ambush. I liked Than's approach because the situation was open ended in your choices of where you could go. I ran back to where I left a an ammo box, and I managed to telefrag one of the Shamblers while doing so. 

i didnt have any problems with ammo or difficulty, in fact i thought it was very well balanced. 

http://underworld.planetquake.gamespy.com/ss/dm3rmx1.jpg

:( :( :(

Maybe I should have gone to a bit more effort with that area to get it to look good in regular GL engines.

Glad to see it added to the SDA by the way :)

Regarding speedruns, there is one HUGE shortcut I realised exists. It was not intentionally built as a shortcut, but it looks like it would be good for nipping through. Don't know how good it would be in a 100% run though. 

on normal i didnt find the 3 shamblers that difficult, i had to try, but i wasnt desperate, using ssg and ng.

now throw a fiend into the mix and it either gets easier or harder... (id probably get the fiend to leap into a shambler). 

killer map than, I guess what Vondur said really - proper idbase atmosphere with modern visuals :D

The layout was great - I didn't get lost at all really. The smablers schooled me though :<

Here's my first run demo if you fancy a laugh :}

http://kinn.leveldesign.org/demos/dm3rmx_kinn.dz