Ambush - Dunkelschwamm

  

    In this map player's get attacked right away by a wave of enemies, I guess players get ambushed.

SCMapDB page

Author: Lymphoid

Date of final release: 2002

Maps in package: 1

Map review of Ambush

(originally posted on SCMapDB)

by dunkelschwamm | March 26, 2022 | 7843 characters

    Ambush is a walkthrough map for Sven Co-op that is really interesting to me from beginning to end. There are a lot of "bad" Sven Co-op maps which fail on basic technical concepts, but what intrigues me about Ambush is that every rookie mistake features a kind of jerry-rigged compensation- the problem is never "solved", it's only rendered inert by a workaround.

    Here's an example: The players spawn in a truck in a tunnel. The truck takes up a lot of the tunnel, but overall both are pretty cramped- the tunnel's size not helped by having a truck wedged in it. The player's weapons are all supplied as items around the truck. Now, any sane person might think that the clear solution to an issue like this is maybe making the tunnel larger to better accommodate players running amok in it, and giving the weapons to the player when they spawn so they don't have to clamor to grab their arsenal before going to battle. Instead, the weapons, ammo, and armor are scattered around the truck so haphazardly that the revolver is under the truck and the players must climb over the front of the truck to even access the part of the cramped tunnel where the HEV pickup is. Don't worry, though- mapper Lymphoid has thought of a solution to this problem: the front of the truck has ladders to help you climb over it to the HEV. Now, this is a shitty solution that feels bad and the ladders are wonky as heck to use. Don't worry though- mapper Lymphoid has thought of a solution to this problem: the front of the truck is also destructible, so players can break it to more easily access the HEV. This is such a wacky solution to a problem that didn't need to exist and it perfectly encapsulates the mapping philosophy which permeates the rest of the adventure. There's this ringing bell that goes off in my head, like the great fairy of ingenuity has arrived, but has left behind her sister the pixie of practicality.

    Now that we've set the tone, let's add the atmosphere: the map looks awful. It's fullbright, the brushwork is wacky, texture alignment draws eyes to brush seams, and there's no coherent theme throughout. They all remind me a bit of old early 90s shooters, like the pre-Quake stuff. Especially the maze (we'll return to the topic of the maze). Part of that retro appearance, however, rings with that bell of ingenuity- instead of the practical approach of lighting your map and making it look good, mapper Lymphoid instead opts to make each area a garish facsimile of a vaguely understandable location, like a cement walkway, or a room with science tubes, or dingy horrible maze. Every location is memorable, so it's hard to necessarily get lost- that is, unless you don't understand what to do next.

    What to do next is not always apparent. In the aforementioned science tube room, there are three identical tubes: one contains the longjump module, one contains the HEV suit, and one contains the scuba air apparatus. Behind the tube with the air apparatus is a vent, so you have to access that. However, that tube, which is identical in every other way, is the only destructible one. Every other tube is not destructible. The only tell that this is the way to go is that there's a vent behind the tube, seeable through both sides of the glass. Again, later there is an area after fighting several gargantuas in a row (we will get back to that too), there are two large fence gates. One can be climbed over like a ladder, the other cannot. Climbing the fence is how the players proceed. There is another part of the map that we ended up cheating to get past- a puzzle involving a security override button in a high-up nook. Signs on a wall indicated that the mapper seemed to think there would be enough players to form a human pyramid and press the button. We had been using trick shots to throw satchel charges into the button hole. We couldn't find a good angle from the ground to shoot into the hole or we would have successfully pressed the button that way. Once the button was pressed, a door opened at spawn and we had no indication given to us that our next intended move was to backtrack to the beginning of the map and proceed to the maze.

    Alright, I said I would get back to the maze. The map has a maze. It's not the worst maze in the world, but it makes a solid attempt at it. See, the maze itself is pretty harmless- it's a maze, it's pretty easy to intuit correct directions from tangents if you're familiar with the patterns which emerge from very intentionally designed mazes and the space they're allowed to take up. There's even a shortcut that opens up at the end of the maze so you don't have to play it again, so what could possibly be wrong? Well- at the end of the maze there's a pit of lava which your only recourse for getting around seems to be swimming through and tanking the damage that comes with it. We got through this because I had carried at tripmine from a distant part of the map and placed it where we could platform through the lava. The lava even seems to have an invisible platform at the end of it which makes climbing out confusing and difficult, causing more deaths. That means the player must complete the maze every time they want to attempt to get over the lava until somebody makes it and opens the shortcut. Thank goodness for that shortcut or this would have been a massive problem. I can't imagine having to clear the lava every time I had to go back to deal with the respawning gargantuas.

    On that note, let's talk about combat. This map has a lot of it in the most annoying variety: constant enemy spawners. It's not the lightweight enemies either- we've got dozens of respawning heavy weapons guys and in the end of the map gargantuas. They're placed in annoying spots where each one that reappears lets the player know they're in for a continual headache- such as heavy weapons guys right around the corner from spawn, or right outside of a tunnel you have to crawl out of. This is a typical gimmick in some Sven Co-op maps, and it's just really annoying to me- when enemies repeatedly spawn in place in advantageous points in a map with no indication as to when they'll stop, it undercuts any sense of progression or conquest on the part of the player- instead making each kill a moment of confusion and frustration as we wait to see how annoying the map is going to continue to be. It would literally read better and make more sense if it was one enemy with the health of 6 than 6 enemies which each take the place of the last with no indication of when (or if) they'll stop. It's not a fun experience and is, personally, the reason I will not revisit this map.

    I suppose that brings me to here: would I recommend it? There's much I haven't brought up, and much that makes it more interesting and frustrating. I don't think I would recommend this map unless you need filler for a server rotation on a very high traffic server. Clearly at least one of these puzzles is intended to be solved with lots of bodies, and the combat indicates that there should be lots of people dumbly running around firing weapons instead of tactically trying to take over positions. Personally, it's a no for me. I think this map does a handful of interesting things, but overall is shoddily made and poorly conceived and the player experience suffers for it.

Pros:

• Novel approaches to amateur problems
• The shortcut after the maze was good thinking
• I like some of the given arsenal
• Fighting gargs is fine I guess

Cons:

• Maze was boring and bad and unecessary
• Every puzzle in this was annoying
• Every firefight in this was annoying
• The map was ugly as hell.

Score: 4.4 / 10