This was an entry for a competition at FacePunch.com.
Work your way up the mountain path and then through the caves until you reach…..well, let’s see how far you get.
- Title: Mountain Caves
- File Name: hl2-ep2-sp-mountain-caves.7z
- Size : 25.15Mb
- Author: Chris Thürsam AKA Project-90 (Steam: porkjet_90)
- Date Released: 23 August 2010
- Copy mountaincaves.bsp into your Half-Life 2: Episode Two Maps folder.
- Launch Half-Life 2: Episode Two
- Open the console and type map mountaincaves.
- Press enter/return or click the Submit button.
- Play and Enjoy.
If you require more help, please visit the Help page.
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WARNING: The screenshots contain spoilers.
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24th August 2010
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24th August 2010
This review contains spoilers.
When I first started the map I was worried because almost immediately I encountered an invisible wall. I hate invisible walls, they are lazy mapping devices. Anyway, the FPS slowed down quite a lot at the beginning but soon settled down. The map was atmospheric and detailed. Of course the limits of the Source engine give some of the mountain views a strange look, but ti’s still pretty good.
I enjoyed the few obstacles in my way and the combat is fine, if a little repetitive. It’s the little touches that I like. The dead Combine and rebels lying around, the nooks and crannies to wander into, the use of sounds.
There is a great underwater section, that is done really well, and also a nicely played out cave section. Emerging into the daylight you find yourself at a base that clearly looks like it’s had to defend itself from headcrabs and zombies.
The author tells me it was rushed and contains bugs, and he is right, but even as it stands I have no hesitation in recommending you play it.
I’m looking forward to more of his work.
25th August 2010
Out of curiosity, when you mention the invisible wall, do you mean the one that keeps you from getting back to the car? I didn’t notice any other invisible walls besides that one, and I didn’t really mind since it just made sure the player didn’t accidentally wander the wrong direction. I’m more upset when there’s an invisible wall in the middle of a map.
25th August 2010
Yes, the one to stop me getting in the car.
25th August 2010
I’m still debating on whether I should make this a personal favorite. It certainly comes close. I’ll use Play It Now as a placeholder, as there’s no doubt that it deserves that much.
VERY atmospheric, excellent visual vistas, and the exploration aspect was its own little puzzle, like finding your way through a maze.
The only thing that could have made this better was if the ending included a gonarch attach, where you had to quickly help out the rebels before the base was destroyed by it. I can’t pin exactly what did it, probably how you only ever fight zombies and headcrabs, even though you see combine corpses scattered all over, compounded by the overall sense of seclusion, it all screamed that there should have been something big at the end.
It actually reminded my quite a bit of Dear Esther, but with just enough combat to spice things up.
25th August 2010
I have decided against giving this a Personal Favorite, mostly on general principles. Play It Now will suffice. There are two primary reasons that it missed my PF mark:
At the beginning, the first obstacle you run into is a drawbridge that needs lowered.
This made no sense to me at all.
The other minor issue is more of a personal quirk.
25th August 2010
The link to the PP server appears to be broken. No biggie as the Filefront one is working just fine, but thought I’d mention it.
25th August 2010
Fixed, thanks.
25th August 2010
I can’t reflect any keen enthusiasm by giving it a PIN.
It is a must play though. Many will enjoy it, I think.
It does have bugs giving the odd weirdness.
I also had some FPS lag which I could have sorted by dropping my screen resolution a step or 2. I didn’t bother as it’s just one map.
For a map made ‘on the rush’ it’s OK. I would love to see it corrected and extended into a map pack or mod.
Atmospheric, not much hard combat.
25th August 2010
This is odd, usually I’m the one that finds the bugs. I did notice the FPS drop, but only at the one scene
What were the bugs, as I can’t recall anything that caused problems for me.
25th August 2010
After a long time of not having the time to play and only Portal mods for the most part being the only new files on the site (I got Portal when it was free, which reinforced the reason not to get it), this was a nice surprise. For me the underwater sequence was a little bit like Space Mountain at Disneyland in LA, but without the bruises left on my arm from the grip of my ex.
As for the invisible wall at the start, for me at least it was no different from starting inside a 3 wall room that has been about at least since the days of the original Doom (Ah, the memories). Any bugs were totally ignored and unnoticed, as I just wanted to play what I come to this site for, Half life 1/2/EP1/EP2 single player first person shooters.
26th August 2010
I can’t quite bring myself to give it a PIN. I didn’t come across any bugs or irritating features other players have, and I thought the scenery and fog was well utilised. The caves were something we haven’t seen a lot of in maps. But while I enjoyed the map I was a tad underwhelmed by the experience. A few combine soldiers would have lived things up a bit.
26th August 2010
A great “feeling” about this map, intriguing how it was designed. Definitely should have been that competition’s winner.
26th August 2010
I enjoyed this map. The cave was great. Pity it was only one map. I would like to see more.
26th August 2010
There’s a lot to see here and it’s fun to explore the remnants of a battle. However, I did not have my fair share of the battling and so I am disappointed overall.
A final battle would have been perfect but apparently the mapper did not think “going out with a bang” is the sort of thing maps aim to do.
27th August 2010
At last a HL2 mod with some substances, it seems such a long time since I played any thing that one could call a pleasure to play.
I am not a great lover of enclosed cave type formats; however, Maintain Caves is well constructed with plenty of breaks from the underground world coupled with a few imaginative bridge crossing sequences.
It’s lacking Combine action but the ending could be a good lead into Part 2 with a match up of Rebel and Combine forces.
Overall well worth the download and play through.
27th August 2010
I miss the gameplay videos.
Will you be making any more William?
I mean *Phillip*
28th August 2010
Yes, definitely. But with so few releases recently, there hasn’t been much that has excited me.
28th August 2010
Wow.
Seriously, this was an incredibly beautiful map, lots of fun to play. Too dark in a couple areas but I do believe that was the POINT.
The vistas, environments and mood are all just superb. At first I wondered, “oh my am I in a spot that I wasn’t supposed to be?” but nooo, very well designed.
I seriously want to be able to map like this, this is just so gorgeous.
30th August 2010
Well done all around. The fog enshrouded background, lush vegetation, ambient sounds, massacre scenes, water caves, and the ending were all top notch. The boss zombie battle was well scripted. With all the health packs laying around I was expecting an insane battle but what I got was fun with the insane missing.
The only negative items were minor; invisible wall and an over-abundance of ammo and weapons. However, the saw blades came in handy especially for one unlucky zombine.
18th November 2010
I kinda liked this mod. Great mapping experiences, and Zombie battles, although it was a bit boring, and I’d only play this once. Cool mod though.
7th December 2010
well worth the dload, thanks to the author for a nice map well done. i agree some combine would have added to the fun of this map as well as a “big bang” ending, but i think this map is layed out perfectly for a continuation of the theme. i would hope the author would expand on this.
14th December 2010
Extremely pleasing map.Beautiful scenery.The fighting was a bit on the easy side.Not sure how I missed not playing it before.
18th January 2011
As this map has reached the top 3 of the MapOTY, I had to play it, even if cave environments are really, really, not my kind.
First of all, I was amazed to see so many elements in one single map. No downloading time at all, and you have houses, moutains, great cliffs, underwater sections, many tunnels… It’s really a good utilisation of the ressources.
Then, the first part of the map is very atmospheric, the action comes more and more until one big battle in the caves. I’m a little bored of zombies, but this was still fun and well-done.
Maybe a little too easy (too many healthpacks and ammo throughout), but I’ve had some challenge overall.
The underwater tunnel sequences were cool, it was like “time warp” under water, a really cool idea.
I hoped to see a final battle with all the Resistance and the turrets against hordes of zombies, too bad there wasn’t.
Overall, it’s really wonderful mapped, with some cool elements. Worth a PIN. But not my MapOTY.
22nd January 2011
I don’t know how I missed this gem. This inventively named map has some gorgeous visuals. It’s easy to see that it’s painstakingly designed. The only thing that prevents me giving it a personal favorite is the monotony of the combat.