Breakdown Heist - GrandmasterJ

 

    This map is characterized by long twisty hallways filled with swarms of enemies that have high amounts of health. The gameplay is straightforward but takes forever to get through.

SCMapDB page

Author: Agent Zero the Koraa Hunter

Date of release: 2018

Maps in package: 1

Map review of Breakdown Heist

(originally posted on SCMapDB)

by GrandmasterJ | May 15, 2023 | 4315 characters

    I was a bit nervous to play this map because some of the comments mentioned a lot of enemies with tons of health and lack of ammo. That does not sound like a fun combination. Well, having played the map I can tell you that this map is a slog against tons of enemies with high health.

    We start in a hallway with basically enough HEV and armor to equip one player. The first obstacle is a hallway with a dip and sandbags protecting female assassins at the end. We snipe them dead and jump over the sandbags, only to be sandbagged ourselves by a veritable swarm of human grunts just around the corner. We tried to jump back but the female assassins respawned and we were trapped to die ingloriously about a minute into the map. This is the gameplay for the entire map. I think this map is a masterclass in how less can sometimes be more and tons of combat does not save a map from being boring.

    This map has a time limit and it got really close before we could actually reach the end. One of the comments said with cheats it took him half an hour, with two people it took over an hour. The map time is heavily padded out with fighting through these mires of soldiers, killing them endlessly until their squadmakers run out, which can be deceptive if we kill soldiers faster than they spawn in like the female assassins at the start. The addition of the sniper rifle makes killing dudes easy since headshots usually kills them in one or two hits. But it also means the optimal strategy is to pop in and out of cover getting headshot after headshot. Snipers only carry 20 rounds total so after that we have to go get ammo, of which there is 15 sitting around. Mindless and unfun shooting punctuated with getting ammo and having to share the limited amount with teammates.

    Eventually we get to the next room, a wrecked space with giant grey polygons I assume is supposed to be rubble. There is also some untextured surfaces in a collapsed hallway and both my teammate and I kept seeing seams in the wall, where the brushes don't quite line up and exposed more untextured surfaces. The map has a general sort of Black Mesay aesthetic but with the addition of looking pretty bad. There were some good attempts at detail work though, there were lights studded into the walls and floors of hallways and a lot of flashy computer stuff.

    The very next hallway we go to is long and full of snipers. While the beginning of the map isn't very long at all, the next areas are and it starts to be a real pain to travel all the way back to where I died. Dying is probable and running back to spawn for a restock is inevitable, so forcing players through these crazy long hallways drags out an already painfully drawn out experience. Eventually we find a pile of explosives but then we open up a new area and the explosives became very out of the way luxuries. The map had a time limit, we couldn't keep grabbing this stuff every time we died!

    I do hate to admit it, but we did cheat. We both died and my teammate spawned first and took all the HEV before sprinting down to the elevator that took us to the end. We had ten minutes left and the elevator spits us out in a room with like seven Heavy Weapons Grunts, so I felt like I had to. I charged my HEV and revived myself and we still completed the map with around 8 minutes to go.

    I didn't like this map at all. Swarms of enemies can be fun with lots of players, but the map doesn't have the ammo or HEV to support tons of players. Enemies with lots of health aren't usually fun to fight and this map is no exception, there were so many enemies and I was bored of it. The most difficult part of the map is killing all the enemies before the time runs out.

Pros:

• there are some fun details here and there
• the map had HEV

Cons:

• the combat is boring, repetitive shooting mostly in hallways with swarms of high health enemies
• not enough supplies for more than one player
• the level is laid out in a way that maximizes travel time to important areas
• the combination of the above three cons come together to present a really boring experience

Score:

4 /10