Ascii Art - Dunkelschwamm

  

    ASCII refers to the American Standard Code for Imformation Interchange, a system that supports text on digital platforms. The entire map is textured in white with black text.

SCMapDB page

Author: enuze

Date of final release: 2008

Maps in package: 1

Map review of Ascii Art

(originally posted on SCMapDB)

by dunkelschwamm | July 16, 2022 | 3329 characters

    Ascii Art is a map in Japanese that I cannot understand. However, with some patience, I *can* beat it.

    Ascii Art is a map that I presume is full of humorous content, but unfortunately for myself the humor is meant for another culture altogether. I'm sure it's very funny in the appropriate context, but I cannot say anything about the textual jokes or contextual humor. What I can say is that the map has a very stylish monochromatic style and very fun cartoony characters. The environment is very charmingly crafted around representing an ascii world in a way that isn't invasive or overwhelming, but just very tasteful.

    What is not tasteful is these elevators. Even if Sven Co-op wasn't so horribly broken that elevators cause me to explode like a rodent in a microwave just for riding them, this map has some ridiculously long elevator rides. I'm not sure what the purpose is supposed to be, but what it results in is really annoyingly long waits with walking to catch up to what's happening in battle- especially if I'm walking to catch up after what killed me last time was the elevator at the end of the trip. This is a huge problem that I think kneecaps the map if you don't cheat and noclip to the necessary locations. I'm willing to put up with a lot from maps but wasting my time with slow elevators in huge shafts crosses lines. If not for the ability to use noclip, this would have utterly soured the experience on its own for me. The map is almost characterized by the dysfunction of simple mechanisms- elevators and doors just refuse to work most of the time.

    Players are unarmed for the initial part of the map, but after a story bit, a countdown, and a shocking invasion of 4 low-poly zombies in the overworld, players take a ridiculously long elevator down to an underground lab where they use serious firepower to fight zombies, zombies, the tall zombies from MegaMonsterMassacre, and a gonarch. Then the players go back to the overworld, fight a bunch of baby gargs (who storm the front doors and block them when you first get up to the surface lol) before going up another extremely long elevator to kill another zombie. Then the map is over. Each of these enemies is given a cute thematic name and model, too. It's all very cute.

    There's a cute teleport halfway through the map that makes it appear like some stairs lead somewhere they couldn't possibly. It was very transparent to me but my teammate thought it was very well done.

    Very fun, unfortunately frustrated by dysfunctional func brushes. Very funny, I wish I didn't have to cheat to enjoy it. I wouldn't recommend it for a server, but if you're playing with some friends go for it.

Pros:

• Very good cohesive aesthetic that is super duper cute
• I really like the enemies, their models, and the fights with them in the underground base and streets
• I love the enemy sounds
• I think this map is full of good, fun ideas

Cons:

• The elevators are terrible, and Sven's brokenness with elevators in general makes it so much worse
• The doors are janky too
• Enemies can block doors after players first return to the surface

Score: 5 / 10