BB Rock Shelter - Dunkelschwamm
This mission has two separate maps, the first one players must take and defend an area. The second map is more of a typical walkthrough map where players clear hallways and reach an objective to end the map.
Author: Buschbaum
Date of final release: 2022
Maps in package: 2
Map review of BB Rock Shelter
(originally posted on SCMapDB)
BB Rock Shelter is a (as of yet) two-part map series for Sven Co-op. The first follows an attack-defend playstyle, while the second is a walkthrough map. Both employ a vanilla sensibility in large, sprawling natural environments with heavy use of sloped terrain. Players are given many assault weapons (assault rifles, shotgun, SAW, explosives), but virtually no accurate long-range weaponry, making the maps very action-first.
The first map involves storming a hill bunker full of grunts. The area leading up to the bunker is mostly a big open desert pathway, but there are rocks on the way guarded by turrets. By hopping from rock to rock for cover, destroying turrets along the way, players can move up and eventually take the bunker. Once they've done so, their spawnpoint will change and enemies will start appearing from the player's original spawn and also the canyon walls surrounding the arena to attack the bunker. Thankfully, the players also have some helpful grunts helping stand guard. Over time, many types of waves will come in to accommodate the assaulting grunts and massassins, such as alien grunts, or later voltigores. There are lots of fun areas to defend from, and despite the lack of ranged weaponry we had a lot of fun optimizing defensive positions. After some time, some rocket launchers unlock as well, which made things even more fun. We believe there's meant to be a trigger which takes us to the next map, but the time ran out as we defended and nothing happened.
The second map is a rather impressively scaled underground tunnel system which players move through, collecting keys and backtracking. I'd say this map has excellent brushwork, some really kickass action sequences, and terrible navigation. When you're not running down long tunnels, you're crawling through labyrinthine vents, and when you're not doing either of those you might be hanging onto the sides of a cliff in one of the later segments. The key fetching is trite and dull but it gets the job done of sending players back and forth across some fun arenas of respawning HECU and aliens/ Due to the large number of explosives and the SAWs we were wielding, we often felt decently prepared for when it dropped large threats like sudden voltigores or a gonarch in a tight space. I can't say I felt there was a tremendous sense of progression, since we just kept moving back and forth and it was never clear right away which door would open next. However, it was a lot of fun, and it was very pretty to look at in terms of brushwork. The scale of the tunnels and the slopes and jagged cave tunnels really work fantastic here- better than I've seen in most other maps.
If you're looking for a defense map to play, or a walkthrough map to play, give either of these a try. I'd recommend them. Don't expect a smooth level transition, as we didn't get one.
Pros:
- Great brushwork- some of the best natural environments and tunnels I've seen
- Fun assault weapons
- The defense map is great fun to optimize strats for
- A lot of the gunfights are balls-to-the-wall but never feel too overwhelming
- Spawn areas have tons of restock supplies
- Moving checkpoints
Cons:
- Broken trigger in the first map prevented map completion
- Moving around the second map is a chore
- T key hunts are kinda boring
- The assault weapons are great, but the large maps often leave me thirsting for something long-range
- Second map begins feeling directionless before long
Score: 7.3 / 10
Comments
Post a Comment