Unless I missed some major announcement, that's almost certainly hyperbole. 

Is it intentional that the eclipse in the start map skybox spells out ƎOE? 

 

Meanwhile, maps 5, 5½, and 6:

http://www.quaketastic.com/files/demos/otp_eoe_5to6.zip

Map 5:
Just as good as the previous map. Better in some aspects: the visuals are really good - probably the first large scale map in this episode that looks like it has earned its size. Unlike some earlier maps, this one has both great vistas and good fiddly details (I loved those cute custom-made flame braziers) in a good proportion.

The beginning was a lot like a reimagined (AD_)E2M2, but it maintained its own identity throughout. Easily the most vertical map of the lot so far - I had a kick every time a lift required me to shoot a button, using shootables for progression is something id1 did a lot must modern maps don't, which is kind of a shame. Generally this map was the one with the strongest sense of place so far.

However, in some aspects it's a bit of a step down from map 4 - starting with the weapons from the previous four (and over 80 rockets to boot) I've found this one to be by far the easiest map. I imagine it's probably tougher from shotgun start. I enjoyed it (some very satisfying setups) but I don't think I was ever in major danger on skill 2. That ending area could easily have housed ten times as many monsters and it did and it would have been a fantastic finale - though I realise there were specific guidelines to follow.

The one major complaint I would have to make is the progression was a little weird at times. I didn't even realise the SK door was the SK door, since the symbols were blocked by bars (why block a key door behind bars?) - sure, that one's on me. But apparently there's no way to even access the room with the GK door before getting the Gold Key itself - it's a little thing but it's kind of questionable design, and a little sloppy after the very well crafted map 4.

I think you also gave qbsp and vis a much harder time that necessary, with some straight up unneccessary unaccessible areas. I would be very surprised if this map needed to be bsp2 at all (this goes for all maps so far, to be fair).

However, it's still a really good effort, and a very solid map on its own. The first one I got 100% kills and secrets on too!

To be continued... 

Map 5½:
RIP to my 80+ rockets. This one was basically a Doom map in disguise, what with hordes of weak hitscanners and plenty of explosives.

Essentially a speedmap with a fun gimmick, and some interesting texture choices - not too sold on the deal with the holographic floor, but everything else looked okay.

This map kind of feels like it was an afterthought in the grand scheme of things, since it's so small and so easy to find. But maybe it's a nice change of pace to have the secret level be just a small bonus rather than a huge AAA map, if people are bound to miss it.


Map 6:
The difficulty spike is real. I lost (read: forgot to record at all) my first attempt through it, which is sad since it was a mad run through a mad map. The highlight is obviously the lava pit and the massive carnage therein: it's rare when Quake lets you go full ham with the Quad and the Pent at once, and moreso when it still remains a challenge - but interestingly, it was more of a race against time, since you're on a tight timelimit and the monsters keep coming. (All those decino videos are paying off in spades.)

The layout wasn't the most interesting, basically a variation on the small-hub-with-big-areas-branching-off approach - which is fine, but again like in map 3, I found myself wishing for more interaction between each of the discrete areas. Would also be nice if more was done to break up the symmetry in each area (map 5 did this very well), but I also understand this had to be quickly finished for reasons :(

All in all, a decent map. You woolly twink. ;-) 

That ending area could easily have housed ten times as many monsters and it did

as it did 

http://www.quaketastic.com/files/demos/eoe_demos_05.zip 

http://www.quaketastic.com/files/demos/eoe_demos_06_07_ankh.zip 

I enjoyed the various themes presented in this episode, it kept things feeling fresh. I didn't find the secret level legitimately but played through it nonetheless. Fantastic work by all!

Full playthrough, hard skill: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FTzjP4LlCXI 

http://www.quaketastic.com/files/demos/eoe_demos_08_ankh.zip

I liked this map the best from the whole pack. Great atmosphere. Scary and beautiful.

I don't have a demo for map 9. Stopped recording after dying for 5th time. 

http://www.quaketastic.com/files/demos/otp_eoe_7to8.zip

Map 7:
Decent map, though kind of weird to include a map that was already released several months ago in the middle of an episode of brand new content.

Competently made (for a first release) though I'll never be a big fan of mixing base and runic themes, personally.

Could probably have done with a better layout and more texture cohesion. I'm a fan of mixing multiple wads but this one felt like throwing the kitchen sink at TB, sort of.

I did enjoy the back to back Quad rampages though :-)


Map 8:
This one gets big points for the atmosphere, even if the build quality is just "okay". Those huge, dark chambers with lava were a great visual, fitting for a penultimate map of an episode. Some more care could have gone into the colored lighting, though, as you ran into the same problem as somebody else did 10 years ago: https://kneedeepinthedoomed.wordpress.com/2010/11/07/orange-light-green-walls-far-out-experiences-with-colored-light/

I liked the emphasis on traps in this one, a nice change of pace after lots of regular combat. That one particular "long crusher" was definitely an example of the lateral thinking that I would expect from the author, very happy to see this kind of out-of-the-box approach again after it kind of died in the late 00's.

The layout might not have been the most interesting (lots of corridors) but progression was logical, and varied enough to not get me bored. I found the ending a little unsatisfying though, even though the idea was definitely good - I was able to funnel the vast majority of the DKs onto the tight catwalks and pick at them from away with the RL. Probably worth exploring this kind of thing with a differently built finale.

Good map overall. 

Thought I had replied. Valid critique tbh, map ended up being a collab due to time constraints but was started by myself. I was under the impression I could knock out a map on a smaller scale but as usual I needed help :-/

I have a lot of maps on the slow burn that I am trying to complete but they will take a while to finish (one in particular is coming together nicely though but may slip to 2021).

As for the map itself it was originally going to be a little less linear, the final ending area was going to be in the church and the well was going to be a teleport to the rooftop for a secret Quad fight.

I still like how it turned out overall and I appreciate Greenwood helping me get it done. 

I made a blind video of the episode on Hard difficulty: https://youtu.be/336YTaFMKkM ; Secret map was found but was not played.

Good job everyone for this ♥ ! The first maps are just beautiful. Only Bunker of Barzai made me slightly disappointed, as it was quite a bit of a constrast with the different maps, being way some squary and simple than the rest.

Obliteration Domain however was definitely that one map that made me shat my pants several time, especially at the beginning. That was a really fun experience. 

I have played through the first two maps now and did not hear any music playing. Is this intended or what's going on? Using Quakespasm-Spiked (x64 build from Oct 17, 2020). 

Just found out CVAR bgm_extmusic was set to 0 for some reason. Facepalm. 

I'm stuck on Bunker of Barzai. I watched the youtube video posted by Orl, the problem is that after I enter the room that is closed by the gold key I kill all the enemies, I get only one more to go, but there's no monsters left, so the platform to the room bellow is not opening :( I'm playing on easy, so probably the monster is missing there, kinda disappointing. Any ideas, except cheating? 

Holy Cow! You found an issue that I didn't notice, since very few folks play on easy. That's entirely my fault. I overlooked a trigger_counter sequence when creating that particular skill level for that map.

Here is a fix that should solve the problem. Drop the "maps" folder in your EoE install folder and you should be good to go. You will probably have to restart that level by typing "map eoem7" in the console, or load a save point prior, for it to work. I apologize for the hiccup. Easy playtesters are hard to find. :)

http://www.quaketastic.com/files/single_player/maps/eoem7_fix.zip 

Greenwood, thanks, I'll try it. No need to apologize, it's a great episode for Quake and it's free :) 

I'll focus on what I really liked:

The music throughout. Excellent ambience.

Map 4 - “The Augur’s Mold” by Rhoq. Very old school and vanilla like. Really nice.

Map 6 - “Knavel Orange” by Fairweather & Greenwood. Just beautiful.

Map 9 - “Terrorcotta” by Markie Music. Yet another masterpiece by Markie. Some really neat secrets as well.

Overall a very fun and varied episode. 

I picked this up again after a break, quick comments:

Map 4 warmed the cockles of my grisly grotto heart. What a fun place to work through. This is the map I had paused in previously, and it was nice that even without remembering anything about my context I had no problems progressing... very navigable for a somewhat big/complex area. A real accomplishment for Rhoq!

Map 5, ha ha, I knew the author (JPal) before I looked. A build reminiscent of missionpack-era architecture but a little more neat and detailed, beautifully scaled spaces to run and fight in, always nice clarity about the playable area / where to go / what to do ... just a top experience beginning to end.

Thematically both maps were pretty safe -- but very confident, "turned to 11" compared to the scale of their inspirations, and packing some good nostalgia. Excited to see where it goes from here! 

Almost forgot to add a bit of appreciation for the music track in map 5. Reminds me of parts of the Alien soundtrack, which is a neat juxtaposition for the giant-partially-ruined-medieval-castlefort setting. 

Finished! Great work dudes. I hope folks that might have overlooked this in the "fall deluge" of Quake map releases will eventually come back to it.

More quick notes:

Secret map (Downfire): Some silly fun. Lasted about long enough. :-) A fine palette cleanser.

Map 6 (Knavel Orange): Quake being mean to me in funny ways. In several spots it was funnier to me than explicit "joke maps". Love it. This one's a gem.

Map 7 (Bunker of Barzai): Has this been tweaked a bit since the previous release? Felt about the same, which is fine really since the original was nice, just curious. Still like the lava diving! This map does feel a little "off" inserted at this point in the episode sequence where the maps are getting more tense and weird.

Map 8 (Obliteration Domain): Quake being mean to me in scary ways. Genuinely put me on edge! It was interesting to compare my "what's going to happen to me when I do this / go in there" reactions between this map and map 6.

Map 9 (Terrorcotta): Yeah this one's good, like people say. :-) Nice work fighting against the "sameyness" demons of using this texture theme. Good structure to the way you work through the map, and good pacing as well, although maybe it gets a LITTLE bit too swingy between the extremes of "exploring with mild occasional shooting" and "SUPER HORDE MODE". Several lovely surprises leading to fun fights. The music track's also doing a lot of heavy lifting to set a sort of alert-and-excited tone to the exploration.

My only criticism of Map 9 would be that the final fight was a little familiar. Circle strafe around the big boss, dump ammo, dodge as best you can and try to make some infighting happen... you know the drill. And a little savescummy too (skill 2), although it's hard to put my finger on exactly why; perhaps because the Cthon missiles seemed to be hitting and killing me even when missing me. Probably hitting on geometry behind me and having a quite large area damage effect. Anyway, it's tough to make a final boss fight work in Quake, and I don't think this stuck the landing, but the rest of the map was superb.


I think some folks mentioned that you start to really have an arsenal carried into the later maps which can trivialize some of the combats. While that does have an effect, I still had a lot of fun fights in the last maps. Partly because rockets and grenades are just fun to use! and also there's some close-up stuff that doesn't lend itself well to rockets or grenades. A bit of an issue but I've seen it bite much worse in other episodes.

I would love to have seen some sort of small connection or thematic progression across the maps, something that makes them feel more like a sequence that means to be in that particular order. But I realize that's a tough row to hoe when you're organizing this sort of thing. 

Thanks for the feedback! Glad to see that you had a nice experience with the episode. Some great guys put a lot of work into it.

However, you didn't comment about maps 1 through 3. I'm sure that JCR, FifthElephant, & I would like to know your thoughts about those too. :) 

Oops! Hmm. Well, that was in October so my memory is foggy :-) I will have to come back when I replay! 

Cheers. EoE is mostly pretty good so far :) Up to map 8 now. I did enjoy the first couple of maps - old school base vibe without being tired.