Sven Co-op Map Reviews

      Battle exactly one boss in an well made arena using barnacles to fly around the arena and summon bombs. The map ends when the one boss is dead. SCMapDB page Author: Streamfox Date of release: 2017 Maps in package: 1 Map review of Bossbattle (originally posted on SCMapDB) by dunkelschwamm | April 24, 2023 | 3350 characters      Bossbattle is a battle against a boss. Which boss? Why, the gargantua, of course! How are you going to fight the gargantua? Why, with a barnacle and timebombs, of course!      The setup is pretty simple: a big indoor arena sizeable enough for a player to maneuver around a gargantua, complete with grapple points for the player-held barnacle. Press buttons on ceiling-bound grapple points when they highlight to place bombs directly beneath, then lure into gargantua into said bombs when they go off. The buttons are chosen seemingly at random, at which point it's up to the players to grapple up to it and press it. This can be a chaotic frenzy as t

      Battle exactly one boss in an well made arena using barnacles to fly around the arena and summon bombs. The map ends when the one boss is dead. SCMapDB page Author: Streamfox Date of release: 2017 Maps in package: 1 Map review of Bossbattle (originally posted on SCMapDB) by GrandmasterJ | April 24, 2023 | 2817 characters      The entirety of this map is one boss battle in a fancy arena. Players have barnacles only and must press buttons on the ceiling to summon bombs, and then lure the gargantua boss into the bomb. It's a really short map with only one thing going on, but it is done really well.      Players get dumped in a spawn zone with a little rack filled with barnacles, not the enemy, but animated models that actually grant us barnacles. A lives meter is on one wall and the gargantua's health is displayed on the other, there are also boss health meters inside the arena. Floating health symbols of various colors (showing various amounts of health regained) l

      The original Half-Life: Echoes mod was released in 2018, and one year later the Sven Co-op conversion came out. It's a more modern conversion of a more modern mod. It's got striking visuals and great sequences and the converter did a great job making it ready for cooperative play. SCMapDB page Original map author: James Coburn Conversion author: kmkz Date of original mod release: 2018 Date of final Sven Map release: 2019 Maps in package: 15 Map review of Echoes (originally posted on SCMapDB)  by dunkelschwamm | April 21, 2023 | 5248 characters      Half Life Echoes is a mod for Half-Life which is ported here to Sven. Having just played through it, I think this whole 14-map extravaganza can be broken down into the following: set-pieces, environmental art, gameplay, and story.      The set-pieces of Half Life Echoes are mostly pretty good. There's long-form puzzles, like a giant grinder that needs multiple explosives shoved into it, or leading enemies into one

      The original Half-Life: Echoes mod was released in 2018, and one year later the Sven Co-op conversion came out. It's a more modern conversion of a more modern mod. It's got striking visuals and great sequences and the converter did a great job making it ready for cooperative play. SCMapDB page Original map author: James Coburn Conversion author: kmkz Date of original mod release: 2018 Date of final Sven Map release: 2019 Maps in package: 15 Map review of Echoes (originally posted on SCMapDB)  by GrandmasterJ | April 21, 2023 | 4696 characters      Buckle up for a long cinematic adventure, we have a highly praised Half-Life mod converted for Sven Co-op and it has been lovingly ported. This mod has some great production and we start off strong with a cutscene and voiceover that all players can see! Cutscenes often leave players out but that doesn't happen here and that indicates the quality level of pretty much the whole map series.      I can see right in the fir

    The title gets us ready for boss after boss in some sort of a rush, but instead we have a bunch of teleporters to arenas filled with normal enemies with lots of health. There is also a button that needs two people to press it and that completely neuters the map. SCMapDB page Author: enuze Date of release: 2017 Maps in package:2 Map review of Bossrush (originally posted on SCMapDB) by dunkelschwamm | April 17, 2023 | 4119 characters      Bossrush is two maps: the bonus map, and the map that is not the bonus map.      The map that is not the bonus map gives the player 10 boss battles: 8 to choose from a grid of portals in any sequence, and two at the end. These boss battles take the form of enemies with extremely high HP in cube rooms fought with shotguns, MP5s, pistol, and revolver. Sometimes a clever spin is put on the battle, such as some invincible enemies aiding the main target enemies. For the most part, though, fighting comprised of running backwards from enemies wh

      The title gets us ready for boss after boss in some sort of a rush, but instead we have a bunch of teleporters to arenas filled with normal enemies with lots of health. There is also a button that needs two people to press it and that completely neuters the map. SCMapDB page Author: enuze Date of release: 2017 Maps in package:2 Map review of Bossrush (originally posted on SCMapDB) by GrandmasterJ | April 17, 2023 | 4276 characters      The whole idea behind this map is fighting a handful of enemies with really high health and that's pretty much it. After all the enemies are dead we get to fight some boss waves before the map ends. There is also a bonus map, I think we can get to it via a secret in the first map, but we didn't find it and instead manually changed level to it. The bonus level is much the same as the first, but all on one flat expanse of land.      So players start out in a room with a hallway we can't enter with a button above the doorway, and a

      The stated goal of this map is to test the team strength of the players. This is done by putting a monster with a lot of health in a big box and then having players shoot them repeatedly. SCMapDB page Author: TheAmateur Date of release: 2010 Maps in package: 1 Map review of Boss Test (Team) (originally posted on SCMapDB) by dunkelschwamm | April 17, 2023 | 3958 characters      Boss Test Team is, as its description suggests, is a boss map intended to test team strength. If that is its objective, I can tell you right now this map fails at its objective. However, it is a fun little boss map. Let's dissect a bit.      There are four bosses: a garg, an apache, a voltigore, and a Tor (with a second Tor, I think, that gibbed almost immediately at a headshot from a mounted turret I was using). These bosses operate by being normal versions of themselves, placed in arenas that do little to emphasize the strengths or dynamics of the battle, injected with thousands of hit poi

      The stated goal of this map is to test the team strength of the players. This is done by putting a monster with a lot of health in a big box and then having players shoot them repeatedly. SCMapDB page Author: TheAmateur Date of release: 2010 Maps in package: 1 Map review of Boss Test (Team) (originally posted on SCMapDB) by GrandmasterJ | April 17, 2023 | 4547 characters      This map is made just to test 'team strength' if the map description is accurate. The very first boss to test our team strength was a gargantua stuck behind not one, but two tiny ledges which made him easy prey for us. Seriously, the map loads us up on rpgs right before this, we are sitting on a pile of ammo shooting a gargantua outside of its range. My teammate said something along the lines of "what a test for our team".      I guess I should back up and talk about the weak class system. Players spawn in a room with a scientist and an HEV suit behind glass. The scientist's na

      This map is a visual as well as an architectural mishmash. Players must navigate the unusual level design and appearance to find giant floating blue orbs. Collecting ten out of twelve will end the map. SCMapDB page Author: Keen Date of release: 2012 Maps in package:1 Map review of Boredgasm (originally posted on SCMapDB) by dunkelschwamm | April 16, 2023 | 3390 characters      Boredgasm is a scaven ger hunt map where players search for some (not all) blue orb sprites in a dadaist maze of Keen's nightmares. Memes and internet randomcore plaster the walls in such a way as to evoke seizures if not properly con ditioned on multiple tabs of imageboards while mainlining adderall.      The maze is pretty wacky, with all of the intentionality of the Backrooms. Halls twist and turn, indents and apparent doors lead to nowhere (at least in our playthroughs) and occasionally lead to death traps. To assist in navigation, players are given a near-complete arsenal (no power weap

      This map is a visual as well as an architectural mishmash. Players must navigate the unusual level design and appearance to find giant floating blue orbs. Collecting ten out of twelve will end the map. SCMapDB page Author: Keen Date of release: 2012 Maps in package:1 Map review of Boredgasm (originally posted on SCMapDB) by GrandmasterJ | April 16, 2023 | 3211 characters      This map has a lot of author credits and is labelled as unfinished. Plus the main author, Keen, is known for his wacky mish mash of artstyles. The result is a crazy melange of twisty hallways, secret doors leading to secret areas, and some unique and tasteless art.      We start off more or less in the middle of the map, from the map description I know we have to look for blue orbs and press on Picard's face, but none of that is communicated in-map. We spent a good long time exploring all the crazy nooks and crannies and finding orbs before running out of places to find and pressing on Picard'

      This map touts many puzzles and platforming, some of it is even decently clever. The visuals are trippy and interesting and I just now learned from the map description that the whole thing is fullbright, it looks great for fulbright. SCMapDB page Author: TheBard Date of release: 2009 Maps in package:1 Map review of Braindrain (originally posted on SCMapDB) by dunkelschwamm | April 16, 2023 | 2757 characters      Braindrain is a platforming puzzle map that pulls some intelligent tricks, some bullshit tricks, and does so with eye-blasting visuals and some fun audio.      First of all, the texturework is great. There's a good number of visual effects that go on in this map, some of which I rarely see (like distorted perspective stretching in a hallway) and the fun looks carry the map. Between every puzzle is a cute little interesting area, and each area is interesting in itself.      There are some really fun puzzles. The map begins with a grid you must fall through

      This map touts many puzzles and platforming, some of it is even decently clever. The visuals are trippy and interesting and I just now learned from the map description that the whole thing is fullbright, it looks great for fulbright. SCMapDB page Author: TheBard Date of release: 2009 Maps in package:1 Map review of Braindrain (originally posted on SCMapDB) by GrandmasterJ | April 16, 2023 | 3604 characters      This map has a variety of non-combat challenges. It advertises itself as a puzzle map but I would say it has just as many platforming elements to it as well. There are a couple areas that are annoying and tedious that I cheated around but I[m having trouble feeling guilty about it.      So my teammate and I start the level and we are at the top of a big room filled with red gridlines. We are standing on transparent floors that have light red gridlines on them and there are multiple floors of this down to the bottom of the room. The puzzle is to crawl around lookin

      There is only a single room in this map and after a while enemies start spawning in it. There are supplies around but not much else. The map ends in less than four minutes. SCMapDB page Author: Keen Date of release: 1999 Maps in package:1 Map review of Bypass (originally posted on SCMapDB) by dunkelschwamm | April 15, 2023 | 1734 characters      Bypass is a very, very short map which involves shoving players in a strangely shaped room wherein soldiers and ammo constantly appear. The room is shaped like a ring-hallway with ramps leading down to a central ring around a base pillar. The base pillar has HEV and health and around it around ammo pickups. Back up at the outer ring are weapons. It's a pain in the ass to grab any of this stuff as you spawn in the action, but after a couple false starts unloading the pistol into the nearest grunt's head you find what you're looking for.      The map looks fine in that really boring Black Mesa style. It's like pl

      There is only a single room in this map and after a while enemies start spawning in it. There are supplies around but not much else. The map ends in less than four minutes. SCMapDB page Author: Keen Date of release: 1999 Maps in package:1 Map review of Bypass (originally posted on SCMapDB) by GrandmasterJ | April 15, 2023 | 995 characters      The map description and pictures really encapsulate this entire map experience. The room is a hexagon, the outside area is raised and has a shotgun and mp5 and the lower area is sunken in and has ammo and health and ammo chargers. Human grunts spawn in at set times. Then the map ends since it only lasts for 3 minutes and 40 seconds.      This map feels like a waiting room. Like an elaborate level transition that just dumps enemies on players in tight confines while we wait for a door to open. There is so little here to experience, so little on offer. Pros: there were supplies the map had a short timer, perfectly ending the map whe

      Wakka Wakka, welcome to first person Pac-man. This map was ripped from another mod called 'Boomario', look it up on moddb if you want. I don't know how the map works in the mod, but here players get crushed by Pac-man again and again until they escape. SCMapDB page Original mod author: Diz Conversion author: Pastacake Date of original map release: >2014 Date of final Sven Map release: 2020 Maps in package: 1 Map review of Boomario Pacman (originally posted on SCMapDB) by dunkelschwamm | April 15, 2023 | 2151 characters      Boomario Pacman is a port of a man from a mod that I guess is called Boomario. It seems like it's meant to be a troll map for players to savescum in, or in this case, meander about with respawns until players solve it.      The premise is terrible and simple: navigate a confusing maze where every wall is the same color, full of respawning enemies including grunts, while the players are equipped only with melee weapons, as an invin

      Wakka Wakka, welcome to first person Pac-man. This map was ripped from another mod called 'Boomario', look it up on moddb if you want. I don't know how the map works in the mod, but here players get crushed by Pac-man again and again until they escape. SCMapDB page Original mod author: Diz Conversion author: Pastacake Date of original map release: >2014 Date of final Sven Map release: 2020 Maps in package: 1 Map review of Boomario Pacman (originally posted on SCMapDB) by GrandmasterJ | April 15, 2023 | 1661 characters      Boomario is the name of a mod for Half-Life over on moddb and from the description I can guess that this is the origin of this map. Players are thrust into a Pac-Man game where zombies and human grunts, some reskinned to be Half-Life 2 Combine, litter the maze and respawn infinitely. A big yellow Pac-Mac ball roams the halls and splatters everything in it's path. I should also mention we are only equipped with a crowbar and wrench and t

      How well does a game made for the N64 fit into Sven Co-op? Decently as it turns out, the whole map is interesting temple architecture that players must explore (and blow up) to unlock new areas. There are lots of weapons, not just grenades, and respawning enemies to use them on. SCMapDB page Author: Lymphoid Date of release: 2022 Maps in package: 2 Map review of Bomberman 64 (originally posted on SCMapDB) by dunkelschwamm | April 13, 2023 | 4157 characters      Bomberman 64 is a recreation of two levels from Bomberman 64 in Sven Co-op. It accomplishes this with what I presume to be a near straight-brush remake of the maps, with various standard Sven enemies and weapons filling in for Bomberman foes and items.      Both maps share similar objectives: activate interactive elements of the map by finding gold cards, then use those interactive elements to reach gems. Then, fight one high-HP monster as the boss. It's very straight forward.      What's less straight

      How well does a game made for the N64 fit into Sven Co-op? Decently as it turns out, the whole map is interesting temple architecture that players must explore (and blow up) to unlock new areas. There are lots of weapons, not just grenades, and respawning enemies to use them on. SCMapDB page Author: Lymphoid Date of release: 2022 Maps in package: 2 Map review of Bomberman 64 (originally posted on SCMapDB) by GrandmasterJ | April 13, 2023 | 4936 characters      I've never played Bomberman 64 but I have seen parts of it and I grew up on a Nintendo 64, so the whole map was still very nostalgic for me. It was a bright, somewhat flatly textured, land with lots of platforms to jump on and explosives to toss around.      The map is very nonlinear, we start in a big open area with platforms, cages, breakables, there is a lot to get our attention right away. Despite all of this, the most important breakables are stone textured and don't look really breakable. There were som

       BMTCoop, a cooperative map (hence the coop) made by BMT (hence the BMT). It's a rather short shooty experience in good ol' Black Mesa. SCMapDB page Author: BMT Date of release: 2001 Maps in package: 1 Map review of BMTCoop (originally posted on SCMapDB) by dunkelschwamm | April 13, 2023 | 3690 characters      BMTCoop is an old silly Sven Co-op walkthrough action map. If you're looking for oldschool Sven Co-op action, this really houses it. An obtuse switch puzzle toward the beginning, enemies spawning in over and over again in oddly stilted timeframes as you hope the waves will eventually end and a door will open (don't worry, it will!), a bizarre choice of weaponry borne of 2001 naivete when approaching the Half-Life arsenal, and an absolute cluster of enemies thrown at the players with little thought of the balancing whatsoever.      In some ways, BMTCoop plays almost like a late Serious Sam map shortly after (and immediately preceding) the first (an

       BMTCoop, a cooperative map (hence the coop) made by BMT (hence the BMT). It's a rather short shooty experience in good ol' Black Mesa. SCMapDB page Author: BMT Date of release: 2001 Maps in package: 1 Map review of BMTCoop (originally posted on SCMapDB) by GrandmasterJ | April 13, 2023 | 1930 characters      This was a quick walkthrough map where we fight waves of monsters in a very Black Mesa environment. We even get a cutscene at the end of G-man giving us the credits. It took us less than ten minutes to beat it and we had some fun.      We start off in a room with a revolver, health, and HEV chargers, players only spawn with medkits. There are plenty of supplies and we are always topped off, I think we died once due to monsters spawning on top of us. Which they do very often, the combat is almost entirely wave based with enemies dropping out of xen effects.      We pick up the shotgun later and shotgun ammo appears more frequently as we near the end of the m

        There is not a whole lot of breaking or getting free, this map is an obstacle course with a moving elevator. It's a real fun concept and it is executed fairly well, but Sven Co-op elevators will kill players more than any obstacle in the map. SCMapDB page Author: Beather Date of release: 2004 Maps in package: 1 Map review of Breakfree (originally posted on SCMapDB) by dunkelschwamm | April 10, 2023 | 3591 characters      Breakfree is a gimmick map which plays and sounds like an old Sega Genesis boss map. An elevator takes you through a vertical obstacle course- intangible to the elevator, but quite tangible (and deadly!!!) to the player. All of it spectated upon by an evil scientist running an experiment! How does it work?      Well, first of all it doesn't. I'm not going to mince words here- I have a lot more I want to say about this map, but the first thing to mention is that elevators are fucking broken in Sven Co-op and this map relies on elevators a