The sound effects were samey throughout. The constant thud of explosions far away, like a grade B war movie. Real ambience was lacking.

Despite the ocasional tight feel, the mapping was otherwise pretty solid. Lot’s of deadend routes to explore, and dare I say even a few secret places! The battles seemed very well balenced here as well. The construction of the maps looked very good, being almost entirley warehouse/industrial oriented. The author changed up the enviroments a lot by giving us several sub-enviroments, so the romp didnt feel stale. The author also tried to tell the story as the player moves through, by way of stratigicaly placed radios. So all in all, not a total loss. Is it worth playing? Yeah sure, espicially if your into hard puzzels, but not my cup of tea.

An interesting little story piece, beautifully crafted but the combat did stray into the ‘insane’ level of difficulty at times. That strider was way too tough with the rocket ammo almost underneath it!

Like CrowbarSka, I got pretty bad battle fatigue about midway through the mod. It never lets up. At first, the pacing is quite good and fast-paced. The enemies did a great job of leading you forward, often approaching from where you needed to go or unblocking the exit so you could advance.

As the mod progresses, the encounter design deteriorates into scenarios that pit you against small but very powerful waves of enemies that ambush you with no cover provided. When the ambush starts, where am I supposed to go? What am I supposed to do? Like SolidFake, I kept asking those questions. It reminded me a lot of the Strider Mountain school of encounter design. Some folks really love that stuff, and if you’re one of them you’ll probably enjoy this mod way more than I did, bottom line.

I felt the mod was pretty stingy with health too. The level design offered plenty of nooks and crannies to place item crates, but exploration was generally fruitless. The mod relies too much on the charging stations, so being able to explore for additional health and batteries in between them felt like a lost opportunity that would have helped break up the seemingly endless combat.

The thing is, up until the Combine building at the end, the mod is difficult but still fun. There’s one section with multiple snipers that felt completely unfair, since you don’t even see the other snipers coming, but it’s not the end of the world. Any bad part was counterbalanced by some good stuff. I liked the graffiti on the walls that kept dropping hints about what was going on. I liked the radio messages, at least in principle (they are far too long). It had some fun gameplay ideas (enemies shooting exploding barrels among the better ones). I’d even like the ending, all told. It’s clever.

But eventually, you get to the Combine building at the end, and that’s where this whole train goes careening right off the rails and into the ditch. I could go on about the absurd numbers of Elite Soldiers, or the cheap vanishing floor, but I think the spinning turbine that Phillip mentioned is especially worth noting. I hated this thing with a passion, mostly because even if you were to skip a rung on what’s fundamentally a rotating ladder, I’m pretty sure Freeman wouldn’t actually die. It appeared to be well within the survivable fall distance. Maybe I’d expect to take a little damage, but no. Here, you skip a rung, you die. Simple as that. You kind of have to play this part to understand what I’m talking about.

Even with that, I was going to give the mod the benefit of the doubt. Like I said, the good still outweighed the bad. But then you get to this last encounter. And it’s a doozy. Outlast infinite waves of Combine Elite, which respawn as quickly as you can kill them, for three minutes. Mind you, as this is going on, the thing in the middle of the arena is going nuclear and causing the screen to shake like crazy. That’s not fun and it only served to remind me of the mod’s less-than-stellar moments.

So, all told, the most I can give this is a PIL. It’s decent, but it does have a fair bit of frustrating or downright unfair moments. Like I said though, if you are a fan of the ambush-intensive in-your-face encounters in Strider Mountain, you will probably like this mod more than I did.

I really liked the hints spray painted in different areas to let you know your progressing as you should.

does it have a few flaws/glitches along the way,sure, but nothing that really takes away from the flow of the gameplay. Some areas I did feel you came under attack too soon but it just kept me on my toes throughout expecting a battle at any turn. well done and very enjoyable to play for a number of hours.

Thanks for the quick help Jasper!

The much better part was some good puzzles and environments. I give those an 8 out of 10. However
some of the puzzles should have had subtle clues to suggest a solution. For example I was in one building with 2 rail cars and a leaking pipe on an upper level. The railing at the objective could have been missing in one spot, for example.

Anyway, after numerous bouts of swearing at the game while enjoying other parts, I get near the end and quit. Not the PLAN of a good mapper.

Otherwise, excellent mod overall, despite the niggling little gripes (which I didn’t notice at all). Awesome job, bro.

Download now

It’s okay to play but don’t expect anything better, I don’t understand how this mod made it in the hall of fame

One more thing to note: I understand that when you take a close look there may be issues with textures, lightining, symmetry and god knows what else. I also understand that mod developers like Kasperg or Crowbarska are especially sensitive to this sort of issues and I think it is good that they are pointing them out. My advice to mappers and mod creators out there is: listen to what these guys are saying and try to improve your skills but don’t forget that most of the players out there want a fun gaming experience and couldn’t care less about visual perfection