Lab11: LavaLab

..... No comment. I'll ask daubster to put this on the hldm server.
The map is just fantastic. The only issue are the windows. Too much bullets for them to break.

Fantastic, 5 stars

My hardware limits me to using the software driver

Good thing I have another computer that doesn't!

Ill review it afterschool.

Glad you could use my textures!

The map's got really awesome rock terrain that's not visible from screenshots at all. I felt the squareness of the main structure was just too overwhelming though. It's just a really strange map, it's got a kind of old-school inventive spirit you don't see much anymore with everybody shooting for ultra-realistic urban settings and such.

Yeah, the whole ultra-cubic exterior thing is lifted straight from the original (although the interior was a little more creative than that of the original...) I guess I could have gone for an octagonal lab, or something less symmetrical, but then I'd have never got the darn thing finished! (Spent too many nodes and other resources on the rock terrain! :-))

And as for the windows ... my windows are ALWAYS too strong! Not sure what's happening there...

Yeah, I wasn't sure if the windows broke at all at first, but I kept on throwing grenades at them when I saw the portal and they eventually gave in.

Whoa and when i say 'whoa' i mean, like, OMG...

This is just amazingly huge and has many very pretty, uber detailed, DISTINCT areas. Amazingly improved over the original, and i loved that one too. It's hard to imagine all this fits in one bsp, seriously... I didn't walk through the whole thing because it's, well... huge, but i noclipped through a great deal of the map...

+Grand scope of the map--did i mention it's very big? = )
+An intricacy of detail you rarely ever see in goldsouce maps
+very distinct, very pretty areas and vistas to the lava and outlying labs
+imaginative layout and design
+great general mapping
+cool idea/setting for a map
+I like the source style monitors and the hammer screel LOL

-almost too complex for my tastes
-probably too big for my tastes
-the stock window textures on those beautiful outlying buildings are horrible and really detract from the nice buildings
-can't think of any without going through more thorougly

Superb work on an epic scale, which is normal for your grand projects... Bravo! = )

* * * * *

srry: 4 stars is beneath insult for a map like this. even if you didn't like the map, the shear amount of work and time--not to mention the compile time must have been enormous--warrant a 5-star rating, nothing less. shame.

Well thanks for that...

It did turn out a little too big/complex even for my tastes -- and typically there's only two of us in it when I get to play -- but once you learn your way around it works pretty well.

The glass in the outlier buildings ... yeah. The texture works pretty well on a semi-transparent entity, but is a bit blah on the non-transparent world brushes. If I had a few more leaves to play with I'd probably build an empty room behind the windows and make them properly semi-transparent. (I will do that with the "Erupt" version anyway, so I guess there will be the potential for comparison... I may even give it a shot with LavaLab, but I'm pretty sure it will break the compile -- which, for the record, is about 16.5 hours on a 3Ghz machine with 3Gb of RAM...)

Edit: I tried several different ways to get transparent glass with a space behind in the windows around the edge -- and every single attempt broke the compile. The level really is that tight...