[RELEASE] Siebenpolis

[ck3D]

MetHy : yeah, the vents in that map are merely optional shortcuts if anything. except the one in that apartment building that Forge was mentioning, that you have to use in order to get out of the room and make it into the hallway (a fat commander then blows up the door for you and you get the shrinker in the next room), all the other vents are optional.

if you visit that one apartment building first, you can then flip a switch in the hallway to take those bars down (in addition to one of those 8 switches) then use the building's ventilation system in order to make it to that other apartment on the other side of the alley which also has another of those 8 switches hidden in its bathroom. or you can also enter that one other apartment through the window on the other side of the alley (located just in front of that huge 'play duke on ten' ad, a few stories above that abandoned van with one of the two yellow keys)

[ck3D]

The room Forge had a hard time to find is also the one that took me 15mins and had me go around the entire map btw.

A kind of 'hint' that could have worked and been fun would be a viewscreen showing the view from inside the room, through the window, looking at some unreachable building; so then the player would just have to find the unreachable building and look into the right direction.

yeah, that would have worked too, classic but always pretty cool. i will keep this idea in mind for a next map, if i ever release one.

[methy]

if i ever release one.

I feel like I've been hearing this for the past ten years 

[Forge]

A kind of 'hint' that could have worked and been fun would be a viewscreen showing the view from inside the room, through the window, looking at some unreachable building; so then the player would just have to find the unreachable building and look into the right direction.

^this

the pal and shading pretty much hid the up signs. i didn't even notice them.

one of the first windows i noticed had a trooper shooting at me from it. This also helps.


On a different note; i did have several issues with the combat aspect of the game as well - mostly due to the openness and the scattering of weapons, health, and ammo. I found myself on multiple occasions in some pretty bad trouble.
One time I was holding nothing but a pistol, about fifty ammo, a couple pipebombs, and sitting at around 35 health because of a fat commander spawn ambush while i'm looking down at the street loaded with mini-battlelords and an assortment of other minions. Bad times.

[ck3D]

i know which section of the map you are refering to - that segment where you take an elevator up to an office to flip one of the 8 switches, then a window opens and you get to make it back down to the streets where battlelords have spawned in three key locations. i can see why that part could indeed be tough if you are low on items, that fight was never a real problem to me though because of all those cars and crates that are intended for cover, plus all the battlelords are on stayput and can't chase you. i usually just hide behind the cars (where their bullets can't reach me) and snipe them one by one. by the time you get to this section of the map (which requires that you might have found at least one of the two keys first), you should have cleared most of the main streets and thus got your hands on either the freezer or the RPG. if you haven't, you can either fly out of the window straight to earlier sections of the map and scavenge through them for forgotten items on some of the high ledges, or instead choose to take the elevator back down in order to make it back to the streets and run to the back alleys hiding behind the cars in a more pedestrian fashion (steroids might help).

but yeah, if you are really unfortunate, bad situations like the ones you experienced can happen, i guess. i'd like to be able to say that they are bound to be likely to happen in most unlinear maps, but they really aren't - unlinear maps that are actually good always have offer options for everything, i guess. yet more stuff to keep in mind for the next one.

[Forge]

bad luck on my part. No freezer. No RPG. No jetpack. I cleared enough of the street to get to the key inside the vehicle with no roof. Wasted most of my pipebombs & all my chaingun & shotgun ammo killing the mini-battlelord and enemies that spawned. Avoided the spawned newbeast by closing the elevator door, used up a bunch of pistol ammo and a good portion of health getting rid of the fat commander. Now I'm looking at three mini-battlelords guarding the street along with the other aliens that haven't woke up yet and I have to survive long enough to find supplies that are difficult to see and are mostly scattered around the locations that are still infested. I couldn't even go back and get a jetpack for lack of ammo and health to clear that building.

That was probably the worst of it, but there were a couple other times I was either out of ammo or couldn't find any health.

Just the nature of open maps I suppose. There's always the opportunity to choose the wrong path and get stomped on.

[Merlijn]

I also found it hard to find out were the weapons and items were, for example I missed the RPG the first time and only found it the second time I visited that alley. The color scheme just makes it a lot harder to spot stuff. Even for me, and I always scavenge every corner of a map for goodies. ck3d may have underestimated that.

The map will probably be a lot more fun during a second playthrough though, now I know how the map works.

[ck3D]

i think i put at least two RPG's in the map ? the first one you are likely to encounter is in a secret place in that back alley, but i think i also threw in a second and maybe a third one in more obvious locations you get to visit later on. but yeah, you are spot on about how the palette might make it harder to spot the stuff, i remember completely missing the freezer myself during my own first playthroughs, it is in plain sight in the middle hub, i had just put it there, and it is my own map... that probably says something.

[ck3D]

if i ever release one.

I feel like I've been hearing this for the past ten years 

i am scared of death, or any potentially incapaciting incident that could occur out of the blue and prevent me from continuing / finishing my personal work. it's not just duke 3D maps, those are for fun, it's everything i set my mind to or start as a project of some sort, in everything i try or dabble in. everything i start usually takes a while to complete, i am not one to half ass my shit, and i am always suspiscious (if anything) that i am not going to be able to fulfill my vision by making it a reality because of something unexpected coming up. here, now you know a little more about the type of person i am. i think we are all fundementally like that, to various and more or less subconscious extents, anyway, and those anguishes are (at least part of) what pushes us to actually do things, and drive us to make our ideas reality while we still can.