Bossbattle - GrandmasterJ

 

    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) litter the arena and do respawn, so quick and smart players can always stay healthy. There are short walls that the garg will ignore and lots of barnacle surfaces to enhance player maneuverability. I was clunky at first but I started to get the hang of it later. It all comes together to feel like some extreme sport.

    The level design is minimalist and uses flat grey, black, blue, and the barnacle color to break up the simple lines of the level geometry. It's not terribly interesting but I think it gives the map the feel of a gym and that goes a long way in fostering the extreme sport feeling I get. The lighting, contrasting red boss health boards, and gym aesthetic work well together. There is music but it's forgettable and kinda lame.

    After the last bomb went off and the garg was dead we get treated to our player models staring at a kingpin, then the map ends. I had a lot of fun with this map. Fighting the garg was not as annoying as I thought it was going to be, there were buttons on the ceiling that we had to press and large red arrows would point to them for us. Once I got the hang of the barnacle I could fly around the arena and run circles around the garg. When I did get hit there was plentiful health. I did die but not a worrying amount, the garg's stomp attack will hit players on the ceiling above it. The very simple level design and look was perfect and came together with all the other elements to really sell the atmosphere.

Pros:

  • The map nailed an extreme sport gargantua fight atmosphere
  • really good use of the barnacle and it was fun using it
  • the barnacle display deserves a unique mention
  • boss health display was really helpful
  • health pickups in the arena

Cons:

  • better music would have helped the map immensely
  • I don't dislike the garg hitting players of the ceiling, but the stomp attack doing that is weird
  • the map is very one note
Score: 8.5 / 10

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