Breakfree - Dunkelschwamm
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.
Author: Beather
Date of release: 2004
Maps in package: 1
Map review of Breakfree
(originally posted on SCMapDB)
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 as its primary gimmick throughout. In the gauntlet, in the loser tank, wherever I or my teammate hung out during the map we would spontaneously gib with a "smashed" obituary. We completed this map by noclipping back into the experiment chamber and completing the gauntlet that way, no longer minding the obstacles themselves as the sanctity of death had been ruined by poor circumstance.
To reiterate the previous paragraph: this map is broken and you will violently explode no matter how skilled you are at it due to the broken nature of elevators. Without sv_cheats on, this map is unfinishable without as much luck as a superhero with a lazily written luck superpower.
The actual concept is genuinely neat, and I'm sad it doesn't work. The obstacles aren't too difficult on their own, as cryptic as some are. Noclipping back into the map, only one obstacle genuinely offed me, and it was toward the end of the second part of the map: descending from the top, once the elevator has reached the top. It's cute: the map starts by playing Sonic 2 boss music during the ascent, but during the descent it plays Sonic 2 final boss music to mark the change in difficulty. Going doing IS much harder, as the floor is opaque and it's impossible to see an obstacle long before it reaches you. Your best hope is to sit atop two elevated blocks in the elevator so you have a tiny amount of time to react to an approaching obstacle. It's tight design- not necessarily great design, but it's very tight. I like how much natural progression the gameplay loop here creates, and it'd be great if not for the broken nature of the elevator.
If I were making this map, I'd have made the ground of the elevator glass, so players could see obstacles coming from below. And, for that, I would have been a fool.
If you complete the map without dying, you are rewarded with a shotgun and the ability to off the evil scientist. A button lets all the losers into the playpen. It's cute.
Anyway, overall, the map is broken. Wish I could recommend it based on its novel premise, but can't because you will die before the end due to engine issues.
Pros:
- Really novel concept
- Cheap minimalist gameplay that creates a genuine gameloop with natural progression through reuse of previously visited assets recontextualized
- Really cute reward at the end
- Really cute loser tank, where losers can watch the winners win
Cons:
- I wish I could recommend, but the map is broken because the engine is as finnicky as build around moving brushes. If not for this, the number score would be far higher
- Very little effort put into visuals- most of the map is just floating blocks in flatly lit area with stock bland Black Mesa textures- it's not very fun to look at most of the time
- I ran out of ammo with the shotgun and required a friend to back me up
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