scampie skill 0,
i gave up beating this level on skill 3

http://www.quaketastic.com/files/demos/spy_xmasjam2018_scampie0.rar 

Mainly because I wanted to find the NM entrance myself. I have skipped reading this thread to avoid spoilers.

Fun map Negke! Makes me want to go back and play the original. 

Im stuck in Moonlit Keep by Shotro. I've pushed one button, that opened the gate with 2nd button inside, I pushed it and went outside, so the gate closed in front of me. Am I stuck? 

Yeah. I tested for hours (all difficulty modes with several playtesters) without a problem but on the final compile for the release (I changed a light value and compiled), for some reason, a trigger that requires the ax upgrade won't fire anymore. There were other minor problems but even after fixing all of them this issue still remains on the map. I am contributing to the DLC and will fix this problem but sadly this made it into the final compilation of the map before submission and passed all testing. 

Recorded some demoes for the maps on the first floor (+the secret map) on skill 1.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/0rrfi5y2k6eyx9k/xmasspipper_demoes01.zip?dl=0
Excited to play through the second floor tomorrow. 

Wow, what a map! Can't wait for its extension in 2019, according to the secret room I've found.

The mail box on the roof is cool too! 

==================================================
(in my play order, taking notes as I go)

Strideh 1 (clergy): Nice gloom and good use of color. A bit hard to jump around the rafters and I got caught on some book cases where you have to jump up before the ladders, but other than that was a good layout. Liked revisiting areas.

Naitelveni: Wonderful! Only complaints are that there was only 1 secret, too short, some trim was wierdly oversized, a couple roof textures were rotated kinda funny, otherwise solid and great details. Loved the spike bars and your shelving is great!

Spipper: The best "my house" map I've ever seen. Amazing details. Hilarity. Just, great. The ending was so funny I was dying. It was brutally hard though. Had 4 health for half of it and exited with 1 health. I had to fight the wraith with an axe in the living room. Fun but sheesh a box of shells on the mezanine or something would have been nice.

JCR: Wierd theme. Well executed. Nice secrets! Didn't like how you could get behind the large teleporter on the edge of the cliff (the one that redirects to an exit) an not get back out, needed a secret and a door to get back. Took me forever to find the exit after hitting all 83 kills and 4/4 secrets...turns out the large teleporter turned into an exit...maybe should have added Exit signs that appear by it or a note body next to it.

queenjazz: Wow...cool vibes...wish it were longer. Liked all the gadgetry and the music was intriguing. Had a peppy space garden fight feel to it. Liked your buzzsaws and use of bobbing rings. Nice!

JCR2: Love the theme (wierd too but better). A bit dark in places. Could have used more health or more light. New rule, no sparks allowed above water...or sock should fix the splash noise. Your exit elevator peeps through the floor underneath. Very cool. Wished there was a prize for destroying all computers...or maybe I missed one, still couldn't find the last secret area.

Shotro: Very oldschool. Nice and tight and dark. Surprising that it fits in 1024...or does it? Secrets were great! I still missed 3!! Had to noclip past some zonked doors but figured it you'll fix it for the follow-up.

Ing: This was rather lame, just add ammo to make it work. Sneaking idea wasn't bad but without getting secrets I don't see how you could kill all the enemies which I think is a bit lame. Oh well. Interesting power failure and security breach idea though. I didn't like the insta-kill latrine, rail, or invisible forcefield.

Ionous: Excellent start. Loved the shadowaxe fight! Probably my favorite axe encounter ever! I was thinking, superb as usual at this point.... Then there was the elevator. The elevator to get down to the lower level sucked so bad...should have been a door. I got stuck fighting that stupid elevator while trying to fight the other guys. Shot like a bajillion shells into the floor between levels as the elevator went up over and over and over--that or fell in the lava 50 times. There was no floor to stand on and dodge down there! Hate that stupid corner room, terrible setup. It was downhill from there. I loved what you did at the exit switcheroo, hated fighting chthon with an axe though, not cool. Some respawning ammo would have been nice...had 0 ammo for the chthon fight and ran out halfway through the firelord fight....although I killed the firelord by jumping out the window on the top floor and axing him in the head - probably my greatest axe kill of all time but seriously WHERE. IS. THE. AMMO!

Pinchy: This was perhaps the most eerie and mysterious map I've played in a long time if ever. The whole time I was like What? What? What? Where am I? Very cool theme. Marble was nice. Love love love the extending ladder!!

Shambler: Probably the best map I've played in a long time. SOOO tight and loved every bit. Couple doors ghosting through walls but was otherwise superb and loaded with details. Did not dissapoint.

Bloodshot: Really good. Loved the usage of ice...chill out! Your mountains were great! Cool ice shattering and the rotating floor trap doors were really cool! Good setup overall.

Strideh 2: Best new theme ever. Reminds me so much of Crusader: No Regret/No Remorse. Amazing lighting. Top notch. Did I mention the lighting was excellent. Oh the mutagenesis fluid glow was great! Also, those are best pipes I've seen in Quake yet. Incredible visuals overall. Gameplay was good, but I was able to spam the boglords from up top pretty easily, but then again it was good to have cover. The skorpions coming out of the mutagenesis fluid areas was a great way to keep with the story of the level. Best one in the pack so far for overall visuals, play, story, and everything.

Only 5 more to go... 

All of the player combat fits in the 1024^3 space... except one secret. The secrets do go outside the bounds for items and the enemies will attack from outside those bounds. I thought the 1024^3 box is pretty apparent from my perspective but it is good to hear that players are questioning it. Really wished that door wasn't broke though. A remix/fix is on its way with the DLC release in a few days. 

Got around to playing some more tonight on stream.
https://www.twitch.tv/videos/349095068

Did Spipper, Strideh(1), Ionous, Qmaster, Ing, Shotro (think I broke it though!), Ish & Rhoq, JCR (2), and Nait.

Lots of cool stuff in these. 

I'm extremely new to the Quake Modding community and I have one very quick question regarding Xmas Jam 2018. Lets say I wanted to post a wall of text type review of all the maps in this jam with some links to my youtube playthroughs of said maps, would this be a good place to do it? I know Quaddicted is the review site but the jam hasn't been posted on there yet and I don't know how y'all do things around here. 

Yeah this is the place to do it.
Hopefully it should go up on Quaddicted eventually. 

Entering the City of Pale by Bal

The blueballs I got from exiting the map were a prime example as to why the 1024 limit should be more strict. I practically forgot that the map is not actually going to let me visit the rest of the city until I was about 2/3 done with it :(

Visually it's an outstanding map, obviously. Felt like some medieval version of Blade Runner actually, with the fog and the candlelit windows in the distance, and the feeling of skulking like a rat through the lowest decks of an absolutely massive city...

Really reminded me of the kind of things necros was doing in Quake before disappearing, with animated setpieces featuring unreachable enemies as actors, and vast masses of brushwork outside the playable area to increase the sense of place. The moving bridge setpiece at the start was exactly that sort of jam, and I adored it greatly.

The textures from Daikatana E3 usually don't work for me, but with the colored lighting and the hours of photoshopping spent on them, it didn't take long for the aesthetic to click for me.

So once again, it's quite a shame that we don't get to spend too much time in this dingy seashore medieval metropolis, and not only because of the 1024^3 limitation, but because the map is actually pretty short even considering its size. The Bal map from last year ran for at least twice as long, with a lot more of revisiting of areas and a tighter layout - this map, being a much less abstract affair, consequently features a visibly simpler layout. It's well designed, though, and also nicely interconnected (I liked the unlockable ladders, reminded me of Rubicon 2).

There's around 100 enemies on Normal, and while the map begins as relatively difficult (my early game misplays were punished pretty strongly), the ancient "harder to start than it is to finish" Q1SP syndrome also surfaces here, since after you get the stronger weapons, the enemies come in bigger quantities but not necessarily stronger types, which doesn't make it more threatening. I wouldn't say the map bored me, but it could have been more interesting in the middle section.

I wasn't the biggest fan of the ending and the apparently infinite Imps either - having monsters pop up on the intermission screens while I already had 100% kills, while also having used enemies that don't increase the counter, gave me an overall feeling of unfinished business (as if I didn't already have it, thanks to the setting).

Overall, a very well crafted map, but not quite a masterpiece. Perhaps I should just need to replay it on Hard to completely get it. 

Scampie: Really good. Nice secrets! Interesting shambler caves, was tempted to axe my way through the shambler but once there was a 2nd one I figured it best to move on.

Ish & Rhoq: Good layout, liked the room especially right above the ladder...good corner ledges. Could have done with another secret maybe. The ramps to nowhere were interesting, liked how they ended up leading somewhere by the end.

Ish: Interesting, liked the abyssal maze of ductwork...nice use of the theme. Very interconnected, nice! I didn't like how dark it was and I had 0 ammo for more than half the map. Of course it didn't help that it was dark and I didn't know what the ladders looked like at first...it always always takes me ages to find ladders unless they are 1. Well lit, 2. Obviously a ladder and not trim/pipes/vines/single-rope, and 3. Have a giant arrow and a sign saying Ladder or Ladder Access...seriously though a small arrow might help. It wasn't until close to the end that I found out there was a ladder litterally right where you start.

sock: Insanely awesome as usual. Trimmed to the max, skulls on books were nice. I love the stairs...the simple angled parts and how they draw you to the direction you should go. The ceilings are great too...liked how the beams don't touch the top. The angled in portions really give a solidity to the place and make it feel sturdy, cozy, and look great. Excellent ITS-type secrets...liked how you disabled the illusionaries. Amazing custom textures...figured out the oreo bit right off lol. I might use your black bricks to remake the Black Cathedral from hipnotic someday.

Bal: Tie with Sepulchre and Swampy for one of my most favorite maps of all time. You really nailed the atmosphere...skybox was ridiculously impressive. The beginning drawbridge sequence had me staring for the first minute just watching the drawbridge and taking it all in. I had fun axing all the death guards in the beginning, ramped up nicely from there. The hell knight jumping across the rooftop really took me by surprise! Nice and interconnected. Simply amazing overall. Found all super secrets. Nice mailbox. Amazing..also yes the view was nice ;) I probably spent as much time noclipping around at the end as did playing it and it was a long one. Excellent gifts at the end too. Definitely needs to be longer...I have just a taste now and now I'm starving for the rest.

negke: Ugly, confusing since it is too symetrical, didn't realize there were 2 courtyards at first. Wierd layout, not sure what was up with the transparent fiends...NO EXIT. :(

Merry Christmas All! This was great! 

Abyssal Nimiety by Ish

Arachnid Nimiety more like. I swear this map had more spiders and scorpions than all the ones I've played combined.

Felt pretty much like a sequel to your underwater jam map, with some common motifs i.e. a looped, almost DM-like layout, hardcore-bordering-on-excessive difficulty, and the textures that I don't have a single clue as to where they came from, but somehow they remind me of negke speedmaps from the mid-to-late-2000's.

I rather enjoyed the exploration based progression and the twisty layout, but I suspect I'd have more fun with more health/ammo/around around ;-) I played on skill 1, and what's there is just about acceptable for Hard.

If anything, this map helped me realise that almost 3 years in, and two dozens of maps with change later, I can truly say that I find AD gameplay more annoying than fun in principle. :(

Still, I enjoyed the map, and it makes me want to up my own layout game. Thanks for making it! 

Incredible jam you guys, really impressed with everything on show this year.

Of all the maps though I am stunned at Bals entry, truly a masterpiece of design and I hope to see another jam on this dkt texture theme.

I would have liked to see co-op spawnpoints as standard, some of these demos start with a lot of telefrags. Also the start map should have reset guns and ammo, I had to keep restarting the server and losing the progress of which maps were completed.

Anyway, here's the link to the demos for every map (90ish mb)-

http://www.quaketastic.com/files/demos/5th_xmas2018demos.zip

Only 1 map couldn't be completed and it's due to final trigger not firing. (sorry bloodshot) 

Just letting you all know that I streamed some of the XMAS Jam earlier today and you can find that here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ovi6hDvG04

I got through close to half of the maps here, below are the ones I played through (sorry these are not in order of playthrough). Don't worry I'll get to the rest in a Part 2 and 3 if I have to.

Entering the City of Pale by Bal
Airgapped by JCR
Fully Integrated by JCR
Hall of Shards by Pinchy Skree
Aftermath by Queenjazz
A Christmas Romp by Spipper
A Crooked Clergy by Strideh
Mutagenesis by Strideh
Train Station Infiltration by Ing
And the super secret map from Negke! 

you have to cache the demos by going to the start map first. At least that's true on my machine. Also the readme tells you which engine I used and a link if they dont run on your preferred engine. 

Gift of the Boxlord and Cop Speed Gentlemen by Qmaster

I ended up playing the second map before the first map, probably the right thing to do since the first map is much better than the second.

Both decent layouts but navigation felt stunted, spent a lot of time falling through holes or climbing pipes. The fact that both are very dark didn't help matters.

The first map was nice conceptually, though the eventual Boxlord fight was hindered by the area, some more arena-like design would have been decent. I also liked the violet snow unlike some haters!

The second map didn't mesh with me very much, sorry. :( Good job on getting two maps in the pack, though! 

Finished playing all the maps on stream just now, also did a kind of quick post-mortem on mine while I was at it.
https://www.twitch.tv/videos/349921664

Was a great pack overall, so many cool maps. I'm still in love with Spipper's christmas experience, and Strideh's second gorgeous map.
Also thanks for all the kind words on my map! 

One more thing - your maps would have benefitted tremendously from using (a lot) more ambient sounds, even just the Quake sky ambience. 

xmasjam2018_bal 5
xmasjam2018_bloodshot 5
xmasjam2018_ing 3
xmasjam2018_ionous 4
xmasjam2018_ish 2
xmasjam2018_ishrhoq 3
xmasjam2018_jcr1 3
xmasjam2018_jcr2 4
xmasjam2018_krampus 3
xmasjam2018_naitelveni 3
xmasjam2018_negke 4
xmasjam2018_pinchy 3
xmasjam2018_qmaster1 3
xmasjam2018_qmaster2 3
xmasjam2018_queenjazz 3
xmasjam2018_scampie 4
xmasjam2018_sham 4
xmasjam2018_shotro 2
xmasjam2018_spipper 4
xmasjam2018_strideh 4
xmasjam2018_strideh2 4 

*evile growling voice* S̡͠҉̲͈ͅh̢̻̟̠̜̀a̮̪̠͇̫͞ḑ̸̹̦̝̕ͅo̸͕̗̼̦̪͙ẁ͍̤̺̰̪ ̸̢̭̫̪̦̞̟̕a̫̯̗̘͕͝n͏̛̣̗͓͚d̛̙̻̺̯̦̺̥̻̕͡ ̡̙̤̕F̠̲͖̫͈̬͢͡͝l̸̫͖͔̝̖̗̝̦a̗͔̰̟̕͢͡m̢̡̛͍͚̗̯̹̮̖̯̦ȩ͇͉̭̯̕ͅ!̧͎̭͕̻̤̖̕!̛̮̲̬̮͜!̧̹̹̠̖̮̮͚̝̘͘!͏̶͙̹ by Ionous


I'll have to eat crow for something I haven't even physically said yet. When I first saw screenshots of this map (in usual ionous fashion i.e. a high resolution of 1024x768), I wasn't actually very enthused by how the map appeared - I thought the colors were clashing and the whole thing was a bit too derived off Firetop Mountain.

So of course as soon as I loaded the map and took a few steps, I realised that I was a big doodoohead to ever doubt the ionous.

Obviously there are still shades of Firetop, but the architecture is chunkier, the metal is more prominent and more colorful, the fog is thick and sulfury, and the ceilings are ornate and intricate, all of which makes the map stand well on its own.

As was the case with Qmaster's both entries, though, the near absolute silence made the map a little unatmospheric, which was a shame.

In terms of reusing the space and fitting within the xmas jam limits, this map is a clear winner so far - Shambler managed to fit a Warp Spasm map within the 1024 cube, which is admirable but this map is a lot more elegant, and barely feels like it was anyhow constrained. It's not quite as tightly packed as the 2017 ionous map, but it's still a full size Q1SP.

And what a fun Q1SP it is, too. I played on Normal so I didn't experience any of the previously reported overcrowding and/or ammo starvation - the only "horde" was the big flock of lost souls up top, and that was easy to take care of with my shotguns. (I wouldn't have minded getting some other weapons than just shotguns, though...) If anything, this map helped me realise that there's still hope for me and AD to get along!

The trademark ionous secrets are here too, of course, tantalising and plentiful alike. I managed to hunt down a total of 5 in my demos, found one more while hopelessly noclipping later, and am completely dumbfounded with the last one. At least I found the one that's the most traditional of them all, and it did not disappoint.

The boss battle caught me by total surprise, while I really should have seen it coming. I think a more peaceful denouement than a Firelord at the exit would have been appropiate, though - unlike in real life, one climax is just enough ;-)

Basically, an excellent map, and a hell of a ionous Q1SP to cap of a year full of ionous Q1SPs. Thanks for making it! 

I found it interesting how this failed-SM185-entry-cum-xmasjam-map was named Shadow and Flame - my own SM185 entry was titled "Forged in Flames" before I realised I could make the map a brief encyclopedia of the denizens of Quake. 

Since when does AD actually have the Death Brigade from Quoth?!

All that we need know is the Polyp and the Gug and we can get rolling! 

A Christmas Romp
Small, but very interesting. I liked solving puzzles, but not everything was obvious the first time. A wagon with demons looks cute :)

Hall of Shards
Too simple, but thanks :)

Chapel Perilous
Very cool! I liked the sound atmosphere. But most of all I liked a lot of moves. The map was linear, but due to the fact that I had to constantly raise and lower somewhere, I completely ceased to realize where I was. Very cool done.

A Crooked Clergy
Beautiful and atmospheric. I liked the detailing.

Aftermath
Some incredible jumble of metal. It was interesting, but too short

Airgapped
I liked it. Detailed. For a while I ran around in circles for a long time, not understanding what to do. In the end, I found the buttons that I needed to shoot. But even after destroying all the monsters, I unfortunately did not find a way out. And I broke everything that could break :)



Shadow and Flame
Interesting architecture, interesting gameplay, a lot of unexpected moments, it was fun.

Gift of the Boxlord
Beautiful architecture and beautiful game. I was very careful. I had to move in small steps. :)

Train Station Infiltration
Simple enough architecture and a tough fight. Not enough beprivopasov. I tried to go several times, but not always successfully.

Moonlit Keep
I could not pass the map, because there are a lot of mistakes. In one place I closed myself. I tried to start over and go the other way. I managed to pass this place, but then I closed myself in another place and could not get out. In the end, I stopped trying again.

Surrounded
Good but too short

NoQuarter
Good performance. I liked the template idea. Good gameplay. There were some interesting solutions.

Fully Integrated
I liked it. Technologically. Small but nice



Cop Speed Gentlemen
Simple enough, but good gameplay. Feature: a lot of knights, but they were not very effective.

Abyssal Nimiety
For several attempts, I could not go far. Perhaps it was necessary to choose some other strategy. The space was too closed. There were several places where it was impossible to pass without loss. And the ammunition was not enough in my opinion.

You see me, you a stranger. I see you, I see danger
Not great, but very pleasant. I liked the detailing. Perhaps in the end it was necessary to put a stronger monster. I played at level 1.

Mutagenesis
Technological. Good detail. The gameplay was good. The last arena was a bit complicated, but that was her interest.

Coal in your Socks!
Nice, nice map. I liked the secret areas. Creation of a full lock of secrets was created.

Frozen Demise
Real winter, good atmosphere.

Entering the City of Pale
Awesome atmosphere! Good details! Interesting gameplay. Many different passages, but they did not allow to get lost.


Doomic Recycling
Good Doom style map. It is a pity that there were no secrets