Exploration

Description
Been a while since there was a big JK2 map. Quite a while indeed. Believe me when I say this one is big.

Anyway, a run-down of the main areas.

You'll spawn on a landing pad outside the temple. Look around. See all those little ridges in the cliff? Yeah, those ones. And the little holes? Good. That's a fully explorable cavern system. Anyway, let's ignore that, and look at the map itself rather than the out-of-the-way extras. Going inside, we've got the temple set-up. Lava, pillars, doors and stairways. So far, so standard. I found the texturing here somewhat bland, like I did with the rest of the map. In the two back rooms, there are big floating blocks with pictures on them. Not attached to the wall, just floating. The lava doesn't reach all the way dwown, so if you jump in, you'll end up underneath it with only 60% hp lost - something the author should fix in a future version.

Through the door to the left (from the entrance), you'll find a small jump challenge, and another two doors. The door on the right will take you to the council room. That place is a break from the usual mould - go see for yourself. Straight ahead, you'll come to the "city" area. Wide, open area with a large courtyard and a lot of wooden buildings to jump around, as well as a bit of rock climbing. Like everywhere else, the lighting is mostly ambient. Not much to comment on here, the screenshot explains it all.

Back at the entrance again, the door on the right leads to a large duel room, where the duels take place on a floating platform. If you fall to the floor in here, you'll notice a massive glitch - you can see through the void. Try not to fall, though, because you can't get out.

Behind the teleport point in the "city", you'll find portraits teleporting you to two other rooms. There's the long jump room, which is pretty plain, and another jumping room which involves vaulting - again quite plain. The one room that wins it, however, is the massive climbing room. It really is that big, and fun to try getting to the top of, although there are a few parts you can't [i]possibly[/i] get past via legitimate means. One fun thing I found was getting to the top and jumping down, trying to land in the pool at the bottom - which brings me to another glitch, when accessing this pool from the tunnel below, it's possible to get trapped between the water brushes, as they haven't been appropriately caulked.

OK, so that's the tour (with a few rooms omitted, for the sake of them being hidden). Now onto good and weak points.

The good points. The map is big, there's plenty to explore, and there are plenty of areas which will give some rather unorthodox duels. Some areas are almost standard, but this map adds a somewhat unique twist to them. Structurally, the map isn't really lacking, although the architectural style is somewhat primitive it's very appropriate. Take into account this is a first map, and I'd say it's leagues ahead of it's brethren.

For things which need improvement, the lighting is uniform almost everywhere, although there are shadows and some entities have been used. At least it's not a -meta compile. Texture choices are somewhat plain, and in most cases not the prettiest textures which could have been used. Z-fighting shows up in quite a few places, and in some areas you can see right into the void. The sheer size of the map causes FPS issues at times, and some of the areas could be a little more closed-off. Some of the challenges are borderline impossible.

I'm really not going to bother sending Acrobat to the Master Sticky in search of tutorials - it seems there's more than enough understanding of Radiant here. As far as first maps go, it has all the cliché problems new mappers leave, but those habits will fade over time. It's very rare for me to see a map I enjoy playing about on, so kudos for getting through to the harshest critic, Acrobat. All I can really suggest is to practice and refine your technique.

For the downloaders, I'm going to be honest - there are better maps out there. However, should you want some fun rather than eye candy, and/or a fun little game of cat 'n' mouse, this map should suit your needs well enough. There's certainly plenty of space for it.

~ Kouen

[b]Bot Support:[/b] No
[b]Custom Models:[/b] No
[b]Custom Textures:[/b] Yes
[b]Custom Music:[/b] Yes

[b]Gametypes:[/b]
Free For All

(PS: Sorry for the lengthy delay in getting this up. Real life took over, and I forgot to pass all the files I was reviewing on to someone else.)