Differentiating Maps Through Gameplay, part 2

Previously I used Left 4 Dead 2 to showcase “thematic gameplay“, a development philosophy whereby each map in the game gets a subtle tweak to the core gameplay loop to make it feel different from the rest the game has to offer. Payday the Heist is actually another masterclass in this philosophy, so to reinforce my point I thought I’d discuss how a second title used thematic gameplay to create very memorable and distinguishable heists. 1. First World Bank First World Bank doesn’t really have any gimmicks, as it’s setting the baseline for the rest of the game. One after… [Continue Reading]

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HOLY FUCKING BAHRAG AN ACTUAL TF2 UPDATE

I knew this would happen. Just as I’m getting my teeth into an update for one of my favourite games, my other favourite games all get updates and news as well. In this case, while the Plains of Eidolon came out on Thursday 12th, here we are not even a week later with Jungle Inferno, that update we’ve been waiting for. After more than a fucking year. And amazingly, it’s a multi-day update. Something we haven’t seen properly since the Uber Update. Which was back in 2014… no… 2013? Er… A really fucking long time ago. I suppose that’s what… [Continue Reading]

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Left 4 Dead 2 – Cold Stream

I had a really hard time deciding upon my least favorite Left 4 Dead 2 map. I’m so addicted to the game I can honestly play any of them, and they each have their own charm. In the end there were three that I had to decide between. Part of me wanted to say No Mercy just because I’m decently burnt out on it. People pick it WAY too often, especially in versus, and its one of the easiest maps in the game so there’s no real challenge in even playing it. That being said, it’s a damn good campaign… [Continue Reading]

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I Love Community Maps

Where do I start, community maps have been around for a very long time, my first foray into multiplayer source games was on a community map. Specifically on TF2 of all places, all i remember was it had a LOT of orange and was called cp_orange, in fact a fair amount of any source engine based community map used this colour, along with a bunch of grey. I’d like to think this is because valve used the colour orange in their source engine logo, but I think a more logical answer is that it provides a very good contrast between… [Continue Reading]

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3 Things I Love About Badwater Basin

I take in a deep breath and look over the land with great fondness. Ahh, Badwater Basin. Nope, not that real life basin of “bad water” over at Death Valley. I’m talking about one of the oldest maps in the Team Fortress 2 universe, the second Payload map added to the game. Yep, good ol’ pl_badwater. That’s right, the little basin in the shape of Australia, you bloody fruit shop owners. Badwater Basin has always been one of my favorite maps in Team Fortress 2. I believe I started falling in love it when I was a wee lad with… [Continue Reading]

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MeeMs Thoughts on What He Loves (Specifically About Portal)

After the release of Portal 2 I continually found myself to be more and more critical of the maps held within games, through no fault of their own. An odd realisation had come to me when I realised that the maps in Portal and the sequel have two very important core properties which I feel greatly improved my experience playing them, as well as introducing an intriguing set of rules. Beyond the simple colour scheme of the original Portal lies one key factor that is simply that the white and black zones that make up the walls are the one… [Continue Reading]

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Coming Soon – A Week of Love and Hate 3 – Even More SPUF

It’s that time of year again. After the supposedly love-filled month of February comes the dreary month of March, which can’t be asked to snap out of winter and become the prettiness of Spring. Spring is April’s thing, March couldn’t give a shit. But March is also the time for A Week of Love and Hate, Number 3. That’s right, the community-writing fun fest is here to annoy you all. For those of you who don’t know, A Week of Love and Hate is about people writing articles about things they absolutely, uh, love and hate. Then a week is… [Continue Reading]

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Day of Deceit

A couple of days ago I was watching a YouTube video showing upcoming shooters. Overall, nothing really caught my eye. The “new” ones I’d seen before and I hadn’t found them interesting to begin with, and the others were remasters. But one game… One game most DEFINITELY caught my attention. Days of War. Now you may be pondering why this one game had caught me hook, line and sinker while the other games hadn’t even managed a blip on my radar. There’s a very, VERY good reason for that. You see, I was a Day of Defeat: Source player for… [Continue Reading]

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Scream Fortress VIII is here!

Yep, number 8. Scream Fortress fucking 8. It’s here. What’s in it? Maps, cosmetics, unusual effects, the usual stuff. All community stuff mostly. Also, Maple Ridge Event. I haven’t played that map since my 4v4 days. Holy fuck. Really, all this year is is an extension of the Merasmissions from last year. There’s new missions for the new maps, and a new key and crate, and cosmetics. I’ll be updating this a bit at a time. Anyway, I’m just posting the information here for here’s sake. I made a SPUF thread as well but you don’t care. Oddly, there’s no… [Continue Reading]

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ctf_Hellfire

Hellfire is a Mannpower map added during the Scream Fortress 2015 event. I may be writing this article on Hellfire, but I refuse to even play it because I find Mannpower stupid. For all I know it could be a great map for Mannpower, but that’s like saying “I bet nail clippers are the least painful way to snap your teeth“. I just genuinely cannot get into Mannpower in any way, shape, or form, and since Hellfire is the only map in the game that’s Mannpower-exclusive (the other maps all being remakes of pre-existing TF2 maps) it’s the one map in… [Continue Reading]

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