Affliction - GrandmasterJ

 

    Affliction is a standalone mod converted to Sven Co-op set in Black Mesa. There are a lot of maps for Sven with the same story, this one is fairly standard.

SCMapDB page

Original mod authors: Toni Hiltunen

Conversion authors: Outerbeast

Date of original mod release: 2002

Date of final Sven Map release: 2021

Maps in package: 2

Map review of Affliction

(originally posted on SCMapDB)

by GrandmasterJ | February 19, 2022 | 3285 characters

    This map set started off on a really cool car crash that send players down into a tunnel. It's a fun scripted event. Unfortunately survival mode is on by default. I usually turn that off when I play, the first map was fine, there was only one death between my teammate and I. The second map however has some brutal poison followed by a heavy weapons grunt which killed us a lot, making disabling survival mode a must. My first death on this map set was from climbing inside a destroyed computer, the bottom of the computer was concave and I was falling, when I got of the computer I took massive fall damage and gibbed.

    The two maps were originally part of a standalone half-life mod. It's obvious that there was been some tweaking to get it to work in Sven Co-op. Teleports are very common, I saw my teammate disappear and reappear right before my eyes in every other hallway. A very nice quality of life improvement are checkpoints. My teammate and I didn't die much, but when we did we never spawned back at the start of the map. Sometimes this meant we missed out on HEV or ammo, but getting right back to the action was a breeze every time.

    My biggest complaint about the map would be the layout and look of it. Both maps have this sort of open concept feeling, there were very few barriers to progression. Most glass windows were breakable, any rooms we could see we could enter and there were a lot of branching paths. The level consists of long empty hallways looking like typical Black Mesa. Only a few areas felt inspired in any way, the beginning truck crash spawn area, a broken bridge, a courtyard with a tank, the rest just felt like bland rooms. Most of the map just wasn't notable. It would be fun to explore the many avenues the map offers, but so much of it looks all the same and its just not interesting.

    The combat was fun, there were plenty of fun combat situations and there was plenty of ammo, health, and HEV scattered around to support players. This map is so well equipped that I considered keeping survival mode on until I had to run past poison perfectly placed to scrape off all 100 of my suit power and forcing me to fight a heavy weapons grunt, a tank, and Tor one after another. There was a spawn point after the poison but there was also no HEV here and we were not going to brave the poison to go back and get some only to lose it again running past the poison.

    The map has a lot going for it, frequent spawn point updates, plenty of ammunition and HEV, solid combat. But a lot of it blends together due to uninspired map design painted with the same old Black Mesa setting. Its a fun but very forgettable map.

Pros:

• Plenty of ammo scattered around the level, plenty of health and HEV as well
• frequently updating checkpoints
• solid combat
• fun introductory car crash sequence

Cons:

• boring level design, focuses heavily on hallways
• boring level aesthetic, its only the uninteresting areas of Black Mesa
• That poison halfway through the second level was nasty and unavoidable
• survival mode and the second map do not mix

Score: 6.5 / 10