In the Shadows

[golden_boy]

Seconded about the slime not looking enough like slime. I also thought it could be water. I wouldn't have jumped in there (and hence not found the library, and perhaps not died) if it actually looked like it might hurt people.

[Eloke]

Hello, everyone! I'm happy to be here, it's amazing how much, both in terms of quantity and quality, this community has created.

First of all, sock, your mapping is just superb. The initial screenshots were amazing, and it looks even better ingame.

Running the mod in Fitzquake 0.85 requires max_edicts n command. Without it the game returns "ed_alloc: no free edicts" message. I assumed everyone here just has it added to the command line. Still, I haven't found anything about it in readme.

My first run through the mod was a bit short since I accidentally switched to Nightmare at the very beginning. But that might be just me jumping into the game headfirst, without reading the manual properly. Still, maybe the first message you recieve after shooting the pillars could be something like "Not every glowing bit should be shot".

There are some doors locked by single wooden horizontal bars across them. Those bars looked quite thin and were low enough for me to try breaking them. Switching the texture to metal, maybe?

There is some repetition, since every room and hallway (at least, in the start area I managed to see) shares the same floor/wall/column/ceiling texture set, which can be confusing sometimes. Could I suggest some colour variation? Like, for example, coloured lines painted on the walls guiding to different map sections in the beginning of Half-Life 1? You have most of your geometry trimmed along the edges, so colouring the trims could be enough, without changing the major surfaces. One or several main routes could be marked this way, while secondary/secret passages could be left as they are.

Is there any visual clue that slime in the first room (with a demon, ssg and elevator) is actually slime, not water? They're both green-ish and I was stupid enough to dive in.

Hell Knights don't turn on each other after being hit by a fireball, at least on Nightmare. Is that intended?

I must mention that I haven't ever played Quake 1 before, so most of the problems above might be just me being new to both configuring and playing. In that case, sorry.
There's a demo of my first playthrough, but it's surprisingly heavy, being 23 mb and lasting only around 5 minutes. I've used 'record n' and 'stop' commands, assuming they're the defaults for that. Has something gone wrong?

[gnounc]

i want to kill the demon, and its corpse fall dead inside the circle, and get a gift : )

ya, he thought that the secret area that had a dead demon in the pent was a cue to a secret down stairs near the pit of bones.

exactly

[R00k]

ya, he thought that the secret area that had a dead demon in the pent was a cue to a secret down stairs near the pit of bones.

[sock]

it just felt a bit like the storyline was documenting how to sacrifice demons in the circle, and then I had a chance to do it myself.

Ok I think I know what you mean, you want to kill the demon while standing inside of the floor pentagram and get a surprise gift for doing it?

[gnounc]

I dont know what I had in mind, it just felt a bit like the storyline was documenting how to sacrifice demons in the circle, and then I had a chance to do it myself.
The sacrificial circle brings your attention, if you're trying to kill a demon in that circle, you'll be paying attention, if you werent then maybe you dont deserve whatever the reward would be.

Quad? Haste? Pentagram of protection? Doesnt have to be much, it would just be neat if it was something. Something with some pretty visuals to go along

Yeah I wouldnt have found the noclip secret if I wasnt trying to figure out where that event was lol.

[sock]

Theres a demon, and a sacrificial circle.

Umm, that demon you see as you come down on the lift. He spawns in and then attacks the hell knight, they fight and the knight usually dies leaving a very weak demon for the player to finish off. Once the demon is dead the particle effect on the summoning circle is switched off. I can certainly add an extra particle effect to the circle being switched off but what else did you have in mind?

Also something like this (special events) suffer from the worse possible problem, if the player does not look in the right direction any surprise/effect will be missed! Getting players to notice things in games is the hardest thing to do. I totally understand why Valve did the look at trigger in HL2 because otherwise things that are setup will be missed.

Also I am glad you found my noclip secret!

[gnounc]

Sorry I forgot where it actually was. I was talking about this right here.

er no..I mean this right here..

Theres a demon, and a sacrificial circle.

[R00k]

i think gnounc means in that secret area where there is a dead demon, if you kill the other one from behind the door in the pent circle then it does something special....

[sock]

Daz from custom gamer (youtube channel) has posted a couple of video review/playthrough's of the MOD. If you cannot play the mod then these video's should give you a good impression of what it is about, plus they are short enough to watched during a lunch break!

Part 1 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcoMu-w1dvE
Part 2 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TG77nf9QumQ
Part 3 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1RGbxniJz_g

@gnounc, There is only one dead demon in the start map lying on a pent circle. I am not sure what to do with this because dead bodies in Quake don't interact with bullets (or anything) and I don't want to implement code for just this one instance. It certainly would be cool to do something with this body but at this point I am not sure what.

[gnounc]

I meant the underground chamber. the library iirc.

[sock]

Very much enjoyed the methodical puzzle like quality of the new stealth mechanics

Yeah that is how I wanted the stealth to work out, each encounter is like a puzzle, which enemy do you turn first, which enemy needs distracting, which enemy can safely be poisoned or ignored? I wanted players to stop, think and plan their way through a map. This is essentially what stealth is about and probably the hardest thing for a vanilla "run/gun" player to see because they have to approach things different.

I'd be interested in seeing some documentation or tools released for for the mod.

I need to finish off all the code and features, but it is certainly something I want to do, release all the source files and let other people play with it.

In the sacrifical chamber of the start map, I thought if you killed the demon in that sacrificial circle something would happen.

Well the demon is dead already, it is a visual clue that demons are around (you can hear one behind the locked door) and to be careful.

[gnounc]

In the sacrifical chamber of the start map, I thought if you killed the demon in
that sacrificial circle something would happen.

That would really leave an impression if you had a reward for doing so, complete with special effects

[Amran]

Very much enjoyed the methodical puzzle like quality of the new stealth mechanics, as well as how packed each of the levels are with details and exploration. Wonderful job on this, and I look forward to future releases.

I would also like to weigh in and say that I'd be interested in seeing some documentation or tools released for for the mod. Seems like it would be fun to build a level for it.

[sock]

@splitterface, I have demo's showing a full run of s1m1 and s1m2 without a single kill. I even published a small video showing part of the run on s1m1 for people that had no desire to play stealth but wanted to see what it was all about. Also when you are finished with your run, post your stealth stats (check console) I am curious to see how you did.

Daz from custom gamer has posted a video review of the start map.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcoMu-w1dvE