[RELEASE] Bridge Between Two Islands

[Sanek]

It's not another LORCH map, but something that I hope you'll enjoy while waiting for new Merlijn's blockbuster.

Duke's mission is to destroy the big gun on the top of the island. To do that he have to get to the top of the first island, cross the bridge and finally destroy that BFG on the second island.

You can download it here: http://www.mediafire.com/?xp6gf3rd3dq1f34



I want to say thanks to DavoX for some of his early feedback and also I want to say a lot about Zykov Eddy. Eddy watched the production of the  map from the very first sector, and his feedback, support and encouragement helped me a lot. The thing that also helped me is the truck made of sprites that he made. I wanted to do it, but it turns out badly, and I was busy in other parts of the map, so, I asked my good old pal Eddy to help a me a little.

So, have fun, I hope you enjoy it.

EDIT: There is a little bug that was fixed, please, re-download!


CGS - review / download

[Loke]

Great map. Pretty hard though; lots of hitscan enemies in a large open terrain. I found it evenly balanced though.
Though I don't understand how you're supposed to get off the cliff with the button at the left side of the bridge? The only solution I found was to jump on one of the trooper's head and then jump back up. Obviously that's not the way you're supposed to do it, right?

[Sanek]

.
Though I don't understand how you're supposed to get off the cliff with the button at the left side of the bridge? The only solution I found was to jump on one of the trooper's head and then jump back up. Obviously that's not the way you're supposed to do it, right?

It's my fault. It seems that I raised the level of the sector and forgot about this place. Now it's fixed, I'm sorry: http://www.mediafire.com/?xp6gf3rd3dq1f34
(there's the same link in the first post)

[MSandt]

Gameplay takes a huge dive once you get across the bridge.

[methy]

Fun map! Took me 20 minutes!

I loved the gameplay all the way through, even till the end contrary to Mikko, because it was very progressive and got harder as you progressed. Enemy choices and placement were really good (I loved seeing the Octobrains slowly approach towards me flying accross the map as I was busy killing other aliens nearby). Ammo and health ratio was spot on too, as it forced me to use a bit of every weapon constantly. Gameplay was just really fun for me all the way through.

Design was pretty good too, lot's of open space with both good looking landspace in the background and enough details in play-area. Shading was lacking though, and considering the tons of spritework there is, it lagged a bit from times to times and there was some clipping issue. Nothing that hindered gameplay for me though.

I'm sure you could have found a more original name for the map though, and you should have asked somebody to check your english spelling and grammar from the in-game text.
The music fit perfectly the action and helped make me feel like "I was on a mission".

Found a couple of minor issues :

You can see some sprites through the ground a the end :



From certain angles you can see through the spritework here because they're not one-sided :

[MSandt]

Reviewed: http://msdn.duke4.net/hotbridgebetween.php

[DavoX]

It turned out quite well!!

BTW is there a reason why it has like 60 errors on mapster? that's a helluva lot of corruption.

Also, why all recent releases start with "B" ?

[Merlijn]

Woah, what's with all the releases lately? Played the first part of this level and I like the vertical progression, the scale and that huge ass sprite bridge. That must have taken some time to conctruct! Scale kinda reminds me of Clear the coast, I'll let you know my final thoughts when I finish this.

[methy]

Ah yeah I really liked the "Y-Axis action" (like Mikko would say in a review) at the beginning of the map. Almost wished there was more of it. The only problem with that is that monsters placement was lazy in that part since it only consisting in making them spawn just near you or in front of you.

[Forge]

I feel opposite about the enemy conflicts. they just seem random and haphazard until one gets across the bridge. I just find it odd that aliens are spawned scattered from one side of the play area to the other. The space is more closed in on the far side of the bridge so things are brought in a little tighter.
Found several issues. Most are of the visual nature-major one being the corrupt sectors cause the sprites to clip in and out of view or through the ground. Okay wall shading - bad sector shading, some sides of crates had textures that were incorrect/forgotten & left as something not matching the rest of the box. Other issues are exploiting the underside of the bridge (if the player isn't supposed to go a certain way and bypass button puzzles - the wall should be blocking) and getting stuck at water level under the bridge - since the fall is survivable from a few spots.
I liked the layout, the open spaces, the back ground scenery, and the sprite work. Architecture on some of the town buildings could have been a bit more creative. A couple of the buttons were placed like Duke is supposed to be eight feet tall, but were still in kick range - so not a big thing. The supplies and healing items were generously scattered around. Nice variety of weapons dished out only one or two at a time with enough ammo provided amongst them to take care of most of the combatives.

edit: and wtf with the ladders. the first one was broke and only allowed the player to get up so far before having to figure out how to get past the defective rung - then you went and copied it through the rest of the map - flaw and all.

[ck3D]

i won't be able to play this map until next week but the screenshots look real nice despite the few visual glitches others have spotted, looks like you have improved a lot and focused on a more personal style, looking forward to experiencing the actual level, once i have played it i will post my thoughts !

[Sanek]

Thanks to all for your comments.
I'm aware of most of the errors that you have listed here. Unfortunately, I forgot about some part of them, because there's so much other errors which you, fortunately, haven't seen. But I hope it doesn't hurt the gameplay itself (well, except where Forge is mentioned).
BTW, can someone post it on duke4?

[Micky C]

Done 

[ck3D]

i was going to post a lengthy comment but this site lags like hell everytime i try to type a long post, so i will have to resort to posting it at duke4, head over there for my criticism

[Puritan]

Write long posts in notepad then copy/paste.
Easy as that