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165d960f3188b502263fdcbbb87ca110b9ae0cafbfd05755b03dee62e9103416
overall_rating
4.263157894736842
19
Codex of Enigma (sm186_danzadan) is basically a perfect small level, with interesting architecture, fun surprises and even a bit of narrative. Top quality work!
I didn’t much like Spawn Bath (sm186_ing) at first, but I am glad I persevered past my inherent dislike of spawns and got to experience the whole map. It’s fun to play through, with satisfying secrets. Most important, on the whole the spawns can be fought in interesting, intelligent ways rather than just having to suck it up and keep shotgunning until you get lucky. Good work!
The Suspended Tributaries (sm186_ionous) is the very definition of “short and sweet” – a brief climb up and around a hollow tower with just enough ammo to make it past the dodgiest points. Pleasant. Insubstantial. Like a speed-map should be 
I was really enjoying the crazy creativity of Hypertension (sm186_ish) right up to the end, when I reached the top of the map with 52 of 54 kills. Then … nothing. I need a gold key to make it through the final door to the exit, but I can’t find one anywhere, not even with noclipping. Looks like I’m stuck. What a shame.
Byway of bad neighbors (sm186_jcr) is another winner marred by what seems to be a bug. I was really enjoying this contrived by fun sequence of set pieces until I reached the third of the gold-key locations where you’re ambushed by the shambler and two fiends. When I’d killed them, the staircase back to the entrance door reappeared, but the door wouldn’t open and the gold key was was way up overhead (along with some supplies). Maybe there was a puzzle to be solved and I muffed it. But I couldn’t find any legitimate way out, so I had to fall back on flying up to the key. PIcking it up opened the door, and I was able to play on to the end. Shame.
Temple of The Bone King (sm186_muk) is another fine, inventive map with plenty of mechanisms and a nice sprinkling of combats. It took me a while to realise how I was able to get the silver key, but that’s on me. Otherwise the progression was nice and clear throughout.
This pack continues to delight with Elder’s Ash (sm186_newhouse), one of those clockwork-box maps where none of the level layout makes much sense but it’s still fun to make your way through the sequence or surprises and ambushes. Could the monsters possibly live here? No. But somehow I don’t mind.
Better still is Clay River (sm186_pinchy), a big open space surrounded by rooms, corridors and towers, with 100 kills and many, many ways to get picked off by enemies both distant and nearby. It’s one of those maps where the first challenge is just finding a way to stay alive long enough to accumulate some weapons and ammo – most invigorating. My only quibble would be that the ending is rather abrupt, especially as I was left with 11 monsters not found and killed.
Sarkistic Spite (sm186_prengle) keeps up the high quality with a cathedral-like terracotta space surrounded by corridors. This is another where my only complaint is the abrupt ending: I approached the silver-key door with 46 of the 52 kills, expecting a final battle beyond. Instead, I walked through and that was the end. (The last six monsters exploded like the do at the end of the House of Chthon.) Really nice to look at, though, and fun to work through.
The untitled map sm186_sham is set on a floating base, mostly outside with some indoor sequences, with the goal of progressing to an exit teleporter that you can see from the start but which needs a walkway to be extended to it. It’s good, but not inspired, and suffers from a rather 1990s aesthetic: blocky and overlit.
Scarlet Scourge (sm186_vaf) is another in the short-but-sweet category, and another reinforcing my sense that the way speedmapping was approached here was all about maintaining quality and compromising, where necessary, on quality. A good trade-off for sure.
Finally, Humility (sm186_yoder) is an excellent end to an excellent pack. It takes place mostly outdoors on a floating fortress, and features plenty of secrets and mechanisms to play with. I never figured out how to get some of the visible goodies (e.g. the pent) but that’s all to the good – life should have some mystery.
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All in all, this is an excellent pack, well worth anyone’s time. Despite the bugs in a couple of maps that prevented me from finishing them legitimately (or, perhaps just unreasonably hard puzzles), I’ve awarded the full five stars. There’s just so much goodness here, and really no clunkers.
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