Journal #6778

Posted 13 years ago2010-09-18 18:06:19 UTC
I just played a castle HL1 mod that you probably never heard of yet. Because it was released very recently.

Like reissues and project quantu------ screw that. You don't really need an exposition this time. Let's get straight to the points. I fiddled around with the mod for like 10 minutes because the console crashes my WON HL. So what I did was, I removed all the WON-offending folders from the mod structure (cldll, dll, resource, media) and then it works. Alright then. I will take this from the top down for all you guys. (Read: spoilers ahead. It is recommended that you play first, and read this later)

Remember I was playing in WON software mode, so for me the brush faces disappear regularly. I wouldn't comment on the maps' aesthetic quality because then most people would get ridiculously low marks there.

This mod has some problems, which I'll get to when I get there. We'll divide this article by list number style, for extreme coherence.
Adventure begins here
0. The castle. What can I say, it's a cool little cobble castle that kinda reminds me of super mario N64 for a very obvious reason. Fun.
What's NOT fun, though, is that gold-dang ladder. I fell off it the first time and end up walking around the next 4 levels with 15 HP. Very, very uncomfortable.

1. Hotdog's castle - Oh boy. The rspeeds for me were atrocious. I spent, like, 20 minutes trying to figure out this puzzle. But wow did I feel like some blind idiot when I found the fuse. Doh.

2. Skals temple of death or whatever temple it is - I don't think it matters how strong you are, if you run into those "residue processing machines", you are done.

3. Capt. Terror's complex - A nice looking lobby with a nice, simple puzzle.

4. Deadeye - this thing is about half of the entire mod. But there is a big problem: With 15 HP I spawned into this map taking fall damage, and died. The second time around, I tried to get health off a red soda machine, which exploded but didn't kill me. Oh, but then the screen faded and I was forced to load the last save. The third time around, I crowbarred some bird posters and the fade-load-save thing happened again. That area took me forever to figure out.

Towards the end of this part the HL quit with another missing texture warning. I think the texpack in question was "deathtex.wad" which is easily available on the internet. Be sure to get this before you play this mod.

5. srry - Typical predisaster scenario where you try to reconstruct the four big letters to your favorite website of all time.

6. jeffmod's flat: Well I spawned into this map stuck to the floor. The info player start's position is fine but you have to realize that if I transition into this map from a fall, chances are I would be stuck in the floor.

Also that pipe was really hard to get into.

7. psilous - this is the (second to) last map, and finally we are told that we're playing as Gordon freeman. But I walked out of my dorm and saw "Bond" pasted to the doortag. So, I guess, I'm James Bond going undercover as a Gordon Freeman today. Awesome.

There were lots of fireflies in the bathroom, which leads me to believe that something very wrong is happening in there. I don't wanna know.
I don't know if this mod will be updated or not, but if it is, I hope that this journal is read and its contents contemplated. Good day, everyone!

2 Comments

Commented 13 years ago2010-09-18 19:24:56 UTC Comment #63147
Oh, but then the screen faded and I was forced to load the last save. The third time around, I crowbarred some bird posters and the fade-load-save thing happened again. That area took me forever to figure out.
Sorry about that, in the original uneditted maps, you were not allowed to shoot the pictures on the wall. If you did, the screen would fade to black, you hear an annoying sound and the game load the last autosave. Tetsu0 replaced the textured of those pictures, removed the sound, but left in the fadein effect. What was i thinking to put that in the maps in the first place?

I'll post this in the Castle Disposed map comments as well, so Tetsu0 can fix this in the next release.
Commented 13 years ago2010-09-18 20:23:55 UTC Comment #63148
2muchvideogames, The Mighty Atom,
I appreciate the review, first of all; its always nice to know that somebody out there appreciates my work =]
Secondly, as i only release a map once in a blue moon, I'm not too familiar with mod layouts, and as a newb when it comes to this ,i have made a LOT of mistakes with this mod.

The last leg of the mod is noticeably rushed, which i am not proud of, and i really should have noted that the mod is primarily a steam mod.

I plan on fixing this mod as soon as possible. While i am logged in right now, and responding to this journal, it takes many hours to trouble shoot and fix all the issues presented..
It takes people like you to play the mod and find the problems in order for the whole thing to get fixed.

all in all this whole experience has been a great learning experience for me, and i really hope that i can avoid these mistakes in the future.

People learn more by failing than succeeding. =]

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