Map of the Month winner for January 2011!
"Beach Party is inspired by the infamous D-Day landing at Normandy during World War 2. However, this map has been given a Half-Life makeover, with Barney taking the place of the Allies and the Marines taking the place of the Germans. One thing I do have to mention about this map is that it's hard. Real hard. Cruelly hard. Make sure you read the readme before you head in and don't feel bad if ye olde God mode comes a-callin': Penguinboy and I both had to use it."
If YOU can beat this without any sv_cheating... you get a Twhl trophy. Maybe.
Tip: In the beginning try to use some of the suitcharger in your nice little boat, maybe that can help you survive.
but what I would suggest is slowing down the firing rate of the turrets (not the model ones) as it would help the fact that people have to godmode.
+Pretty nice architecture for a WON software buddy.
++RPG grunt
-Having to use godmode most of the time
Pretty cool entry, if you just removed maybe a couple grunts, and slowed down the firing rate on the turrets (again, not the model-based ones) I think this would have made the top 3.
though, now I see it was waaaay harder than I anticipated it even with the medkits scattered around. I had a 11-year old (not dimbark) playtest it for me and he died many times though eventually he got past the beachhead (and the version he tested didn't have the medkits scattered around). I thought putting the medkits all over the beach would counter the difficulty problem, since when I tested it I had around 95 health when I cleared the beach. (mappers shouldn't test their own maps for difficulty)
Okay so I can lower the firing rate of the beach pillboxes and reupload later on see if that improves the gameplay
the boats look nifty though
(i had an 11 year old, not dimbark, playtest it) ha ha
EDIT: just played it. when you the beach is all the map, theres still heaps of fighting in land! thought the pill boxes were a bit tricky to shoot into and the wire kept making me bounce back which was anoying, but this is actually really cool
++Excellent idea!
++Fun gameplay
++great use of monsters and cyclers to mimic d-day soldiers fighting, dying and dead!
++health chargers in the ships and broken ones on the beach: Priceless!
++creative us of the original hl materials
+/-Nicely built but some things could have been a bit more detailed/realistic
--you could have poached some excellent ambients from dod to make for a very realistic sounding warzone
--would have like to have seen a little intro sequence, perhaps having the landers approach the beach giving you time to contemplate the suicidal task before you like the original d-day soldiers. you could have added chatter from the barneys praying and stuff =)
--would have liked to have seen this bigger. you could have used some of the dod maps modeled after d-day as a template and for tips to make the beach seem "endless" by blending the skybox with the terrain.
--would have loved to have seen some battleships and destroyers in the sea behind the landers, laying down artillery on the beach!(i built an entire destroyer out of brushwork you could have used, plus i be you could have found tons of garry's mod models you could have ported for this) as well you could have added some strafing allied aircraft for fun!
All said, i'm rating this 5 for creativity and fun. Just excellent!
*****
Texturing — 8.5
Ambience — 1
Lighting — 6.5
Gameplay — 7.5
Video Review
Bottom Line
I dare say I enjoyed the challenge presented to me by Beach Party, although I probably wouldn't attempt another invasion without a few more dependable allies at my side. The mapping is fairly average but at the end of the day it could have been a lot worse and 2MuchVideoGames should be commended for actually making a map with purpose, rather than a simple beach themed kill box.