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- Apr 24, 2012
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A mini mapping / level design contest with a focus on making beautiful, playable terrain, hero design and boss fights.
Contestants must create a short linear map with RPG elements, at least one well designed hero (no classic Warcraft 3 spells), a short backstory, at least one cinematic and one boss fight.
Contestants must create a short linear map with RPG elements, at least one well designed hero (no classic Warcraft 3 spells), a short backstory, at least one cinematic and one boss fight.
- 1st place: 55 reputation points.
- 2nd place: 40 reputation points.
- 3rd place: 25 reputation points.
- Entry: 5 reputation points.
- Judge: 5 reputation points.
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| Gameplay | - Voiced! - Enemies (save for two) had their own CUSTOM abilities, was pleasantly surprised to get jumped by the sneaking enemy or the mimic... - Abilities were custom and incredibly pleasing. - So many bosses, need to release a boss rush mode. - Bosses (save for the first) have detailed and interesting minigames to defeat them. - Gems being used to activate gates and reset their location was interactive the trade off of being confined to a 5 slotted inventory results in the opposite of fun. - Juggling the gems to get little bonuses of life of mana was something I hope to never see again, degening mana was one thing but to only get it when carrying a specific item? too much. - Gems also pigeon holed you into two gameplay modes: 1. do you take the red pill and die fast? 2. or do you take the yellow pill, and see how fast you can reach comatose state by autoattacking things to death. - Beam & Starting ability had some aiming issues. - Items were custom and had intriguing effects; however consumables became more of a burden than a blessing when items were a must for the difficult bosses. - Managing items affected movement, if I wanted to take an item out of my inventory I'd move, gems had a fail safe, other items did not. - Having "Diablo" style movement and locked camera on a melee character is extraordinarily painful, if you're not careful you can stumble past into enemies if you miss your commands. - Shades merged into enemies making a ball of death, meaning you needed to run away to attack the enemy you wanted. - First boss was horrifically annoying to fight, very little warning before casting his flurry attack. Being caught out by two of flurry attacks during the fight was essentially now a game of "How fast can I die so I can start over." Remembering this boss makes me cringe, and being the first boss you encounter will easily make it someones last if this is not tweaked. - I love a good hard game, but paired with the gem "Feature" this isn't hard it's unfair, can't say I'd want to replay this for gameplay. | 6/20 |
| Aesthetics | - B-e-a-u-t-i-f-u-l cinematics! - Cinematic was clear and provided an easily digestible story. - UI was fancy, but the purple didn't mesh with the blue/teal theme the hero brought. - Terrain was gloomy and soul sucking, the special effects that bring color are magnified exquisitely! - Playable area was well polished and fleshed out. - Voice in cinematic didn't match the chosen voice for the playable character which was disappointing. - Plethora of custom icons and models that fit well in the world created for them. - detailed map page with descriptions and plenty of images to showcase the wonderful terrain. - glad you explained not to play in 1.32, looks amazingly better in 1.31. (so glad to be back in 1.31) | 30/30 |
| Triggers | - Banshee boss drain lightning bugged out during the fight and stayed attached, later on it could be seen in the foreground. - Performance didn't dip too much. - Triggers seemed fine. | 8/10 |
| Total | Difficulty will be lowered when hell freezes over, GiT GuD. | 44/60 |
| Gameplay | - Wow so much to unpack here, short and (Insert Samuel Jackson Catchphrase) sweet. - Story was easily digestible but nothing special; however, My heart strings were pulled for the Ancients, a fondness that snuck up on me. - UI was refreshing and clear. - Movement and attack felt responsive and smooth, having them mapped to the two mouse buttons made me rethink my stance on camera locking. - Multiple Equipment / Upgrade paths means Multiple Replay value. - The creativity behind each piece of equipment create new and engaging way to play. - Abilities were customized and synergized well. (Please tell me how the druid's heal actually works, I've re-read it and still don't get it. I mean it, please message me, I want god damn explanation for that confusing secondary effect of healing 100% damage in the "last 2 seconds") - The Secondary resource rage was a brilliant direction that seamlessly went into the druid's morphing theme. - Music was fitting and fabulous, and lack of when nearing the final boss was an excellent touch to get a good "Dread" theme. - After casting the delays before being aloud to move felt clunky. - Bear form was rare and only got to see it during boss fights, though this may be due to my playstyle, speaking of which... - The druid's screenwide range primary ability made combat with lesser foes a cakewalk, cast, backup, repeat, never needed to cast the rooting ability but it made combat quicker if I did, which is the last thing I wanted to do. - Enemies save for a handful in the first location were nothing but health sponges, wheres all the work that went into the dryad not in the hyrdralisks for fungus treants? - Enemies in the third section were probably the worst offenders of my above point, stationary, sponge enemies, something from a bygone era. - Getting caught on terrain, specially during a boss fight that's throwing void bolts of doom is not enjoyable. - Second Boss spawn Obelisks that (to my eyes) didn't do anything. - Poisonous path was an interesting and non-intrusive hazard that made me excited for more hazards in the next area, sad to say my excitement for such a hazard faded into nothing. - Bosses galore, but some carbon copy abilities. - Final boss requirement to stick to one location to be healed was boring, dodging projectiles is way more engaging than playing " Sir Cooldown Cycler - the spammy magician." -"talking to the trees" at the beginning is required each time you playthrough making trying to replay a chore. | 18/20 |
| Aesthetics | - Cinematic are on point, panning camera, different scenes, very fun. - Stunning Terrain, colourful and lively with small details like animals in trees facing your direction, or the hidden archers, much of this is only in the hub world while the rest of the locations sorely lack this attention to detail. - Mixed feelings about the roots blocking your view, one hand it made the second location a little more harder and on the other I'd like to see please. - Splendid uses of both custom and vanilla models. - Dark theme and forested area was kino, the second "Fungus" was executed splendidly, the final area is supposed to be desolate, but the third area "Vale" was short and rather boring... What gives! - Plenty of previews on map page, but lacking the "Vale" location which isn't hard to see why. | 27/30 |
| Triggers | - Triggers are perfectly fine, no issues there. - Plenty of lag when the cutscene of the Ancient protector, though this the case when doing zoomed out shots in heavily doodad ridden areas. - mild lag during early boss fights when the overly detailed Mythic effects are spammed touhou style, but manageable. - intense, veering close to unplayable lag during the final boss with hydralisk hoards. - Performance outside of bosses was superb, inside boss fights you can cook a hot dog on your cpu when Mythic Models were numbering beyond ten. | 5/10 |
| Total | Magnificent, Marvelous, but maybe little too "Mythic" | 50/60 |
| Gameplay | - Not going to lie, got stuck before any real combat, second puzzle that required use of the swapping ability didn't make any sense until I turned off the camera in the editor and saw that the gate was staying open for two seconds regardless of how long you sit on the button. The sound upon stepping on it didn't scream "GO NOW" it gave me the impression that I had to wait the secondary sound played, reading on the maps page I notice I wasn't the only one. - Aiming the (Z) wand ability is very bad, their collision size magnified this problem tenfold. - Collecting tomes and the process of bringing them back the library was interesting but I feel you could of gone with a different route than making the player carry them one by one to the library. That said the library was an interesting way to explain story and delve deeper into mechanics. - Bran scrolls taking up a slot in the inventory seems pointless, why not have the option to change it at the church instead of Scroll of -1 inventory space. - Items that affected skills were neat and changed playstyle, being tied to an item meant sacrificing the items you needed to carry, and like the bran scrolls could of easily been swapped out in some menu. - I sat at the chapel pressing release & soothe for five minutes until I realized it gives or swaps these abilities with your hero. - picking up microscopic coins on the ground made me want to cry. - picking up said microscopic coins through the corpses that some enemies leave behind made me want to cry harder. - Lack of description for what makes any choice at the naming portion meaningful makes choosing pointless on first playthrough, however this still incentivises replay. - Phenomenal amount of items, itty bitty inventory space, which is somewhat solved with the... - Old friend arrives late into the game, but there's still.... - Soul echos to bring items back for you, which is nice, but I'd rather that be a permanent powerup than a space taken in my inventory, the fact that it's in game nearing the late game stages felt like a spit in the face. - I've only found two runes, disheartening! - Keys taking up inventory space gave me PTSD from warchasers. - Combat with bosses is clunky if you are a layman, but I can imagine with some practice that one can zip across the battlefield. - Combat with lesser foes were a mixed bag, other than health sponges, there were some with bullet hell type shots, unfortunately much like bosses the one and clear path was to spawn numerous bran X orbs and nuke them to death. - Game time was a little high, though this is impossible to average at the current time, this was definitely up there. - Spells were flashy, fun, and were incredibly unique, soul orb manipulation on a whole was incredible, I had first thought that I'd discovered a bug when I had tried to attack something to lure them into the orb only to find it zing off to attack them, but upon realizing you intended this effect I was all the more impressed. - The game features +7 wands / bran scrolls and numerous items that manipulate them were brilliant, grimoire spells as well scaled off of the stats of the player which made more interesting effects. - Music for warcraft is usually a tough choice, you chose classical, and it fits incredibly with the theme you've chosen. - UI is completely gone, and I must say I think it was a great choice, map would of been useful but this is overruled by the uniqueness of each location that gives natural land marks to orientate oneself. - Difficulty settings are welcome sight. - Nice dark souls references, but further to that point that you included a talk feature which brings life and personality to each NPC and in turn the world around them. - Voice acting, the tutorial voice in particular was excellent and ear-gasm, incredibly impressed and pleased with this. (did you do all the voices?) | 18/20 |
| Aesthetics | - Cinematics were beyond amazing, the opening is fantastic and it's music is wonderful, each one more awe inspiring than the last. Many Warcraft Cinematics try to emulate film, yours hits the mark. - Locations are distinct, and unique from each other. - Absolutely stunning opening cinematic - Doodads such as the stone ghouls & Sorceresses were stunning, the save locations with the reactive statues "lightning up" scratched a good special effects itch. - Spells special effects were on point. - Preview images galore and highly detailed overview of features. - Absolutely spectacular amount of Atmosphere, fog, changing weather, dark places feeling dark. - I had to turn on the lights when the scholar cinematic played, holding a crucifix was also required when the ghosts appeared. - Custom models / reskins are amazing, said models used to decorate made each location unique and memorable. - Terrain is a sight to behold, linear but not to the point where it got boring or had an iron grip on my wrist on where to go next. - Said Terrain that you use Rock doodads in place of the standard war3 cliffs was a noticeable difference and HIGHLY welcomed one. - Doodad house structures made pathing a nightmare, noticeable in the ghost house. | 30/30 |
| Triggers | - Gameplay was smooth, up until bosses like the final or the (Yellow Raven(?)/ Necromancer) boss, and in the area sealed with necromancy. | 5/10 |
| Total | Coming this winter, one man, one wand, and one scroll, have a date with a scary old man who keeps creepin where he doesn't belong! | 53/60 |
| Gameplay | - Lacking final boss, copy paste of the four heroes that you barely touched do not count as a boss. - Combat is typical warcraft 3 stuff, bang your weapon against the other and hope that the other falls down, abilities added some flavor but this got old fast. - Enemies were health sponges with vanilla abilities. - AOS Part was an interesting approach but I'm here for an RPG. - items were typical stuff, nothing game changing, dust of appearance showed up in the stores and I saw no point for it being there other than the red herring that there were "Secrets". - Heroes save for the starting hero were unoriginal and uninspiring as they used the vanilla heroes and oddly enough replaced they're interesting vanilla ultimate for basic vanilla abilities! Why!? -Any resemblance of a story was immaterial by the time Kael, Maiev, Muradin, and Illidin name's showed up. - External inventory was a creative approach but tedious to then try and pick up the items back up thanks to the cooldown. Typical scene for me before a fight was to drop everything pick up the potion and spend 3 minutes picking up the rest of my junk and THEN consume the potion and pick up my other 6 items to be in my main inventory. - Accidentally stumbling on the hot key for the external bag and dropping all your items is not fun. - Recipes for potions was an excellent touch, with ingredients found throughout the map or within neutral critters made me always keep an eye out for them. (guffawed audibly at cannabis seeds.) - Certain ingredient were never seen, or only appeared once (Ocean plant & Cattail), though this may attribute to my blindness brought on by nearing comatose from this map. - Puzzles were mechanically pleasing and had nice detail, save for the wall one. - First puzzle wasn't clear where the prize was until I got bored of searching for it and walked in the only direction I could. - Starting hero Spells are custom, but special effects being tied to such mechanically simple abilities made them dull in return. - Incredible Linear, seriously felt like falling asleep with this one, and with what I saw in creativity through the puzzles makes me incredibly sad the gameplay didn't get the same attention. | 4/20 |
| Aesthetics | - Cinematic was decent and covered what little story there was - Requisite number of Preview pictures. - Terrain is an eye sore and I swore I could see a scratched off logo for railroad company. - Enemies theme is some miscellaneous gaggle of random units that were strewn about map in some vague sense of theme, only differentiating factor was HUMANOIDS, WILD, WATER, absolutely nothing in between. - Custom models for doodads were great but the lacking terrain made them feel out of place and made me take pity on them. - items had some nice custom models to make them clearly different from each other, save for Scarab Amulet which had the model of a cooked crab? | 7/30 |
| Triggers | - Map Performance never dipped during my play through. - Last two puzzles didn't function properly. | 7/10 |
| Total | Adventures of Arius and the discount bag of holding. | 18/60 |
| Gameplay | - Combat was a roller coaster in the worst way possible, beginning sucks as you deal no damage and enemies swarm and can easily kill you, then once you reach late game you become an unstoppable killing machine who's only foe is a wicked vampire boss and then a deadbeat... - Final boss was a huge disappointment, has no defining characteristics or challenge; incredibly misleading since the other bosses had amazing abilities/hazards or at least one (bandit boss), further more the only time I see this overarching evil ne'er-do-well was during the final fight, leaving much to be desired. - Camera was unbearable at first, items such as two out the three barrels of explosive cannot be seen. - trying to go directly south makes me want to cry. (Notable examples being sewers & treasure room, and Arena when leaving the treasure room.) - Item doll looks nothing like a doll, only found it after my third play through, don't you dare try and tell me different. - Dummies dropped orbs and gold making gameplay too easy for something like the mage class, with this in mind the mage class would be nearly impossible without the orbs as mana regeneration is so slow, additionally I managed to block the abomination in the arena with gold coins and get away with no damage. - Abomination's burst of speed was excellent addition and stood out on it's own, shame that other enemies didn't get anything to make them unique. - Cinematic for graveyard pauses you but not the enemies that nibble at your legs. - Puzzle for mill was puzzling and enjoyable. - Gap in enemy levels, rats to bandits/undead was nearly impossible. - Never saw a point to buying the rings in the shop due to the two rings you get from quests. - lack of healing items or clearly visible healing source, I guessed as much with the priests but others might not find them as easily, furthermore as a mage they won't restore your mana if you're at full health. - Secret soul gem is available at level 1 is more of a pitfall trap that you can never return to once you fail. - Secret Tombstone has no reward, despite others having rewards. - Some doodads were angled wrong. (Cannons, Kraken, & evil Timmy eater impale.) - Archer's 4th ability is not visible. - Talents & Classes are creative and huge incentives for replay. - Abilities / Items are creative and exceptionally custom. - A fantastic plethora of sounds for birds, water, earth quakes, lightning and even unique enemy death sounds. - Secrets were difficult to find but achievable. - I adored chests, having to open them, the sound, and the pile of money and phat loot that drops, as well as the fact that they stayed behind and fit the scenery. - Replay value is through the roof, secrets & classes make this a must. - Floating text healing was offset in such a way to the caster that it was hard to see at times. | 10/20 |
| Aesthetics | - Cinematics were short and lacking, story suffers because of this. - Terrain is masterfully done, each scene is encompassed in a darling tableau with astronomical detail that resulted in each scene feeling unique and memorable. - Too much grey fog! - Requisite amount of previews on map page, 4/5 showing a definitive fog that hides the all your hard work that went into the making each scene. - Custom Icons and models chosen for items were excellent and stood out. - The player character wears typical items like weapons and armor, it looks wonderful and dynamic. - Dialog was clear and non-intrusive. | 28/30 |
| Triggers | - 2/3 the mage's arcane orb projectiles would occasionally not hit their target. - Map runs smoothly every time. - no issues with performance. - Dummy's being included in the drop trigger is boo boo in my book. | 7/10 |
| Total | The Legend of Gareth and the ten million health and mana orbs. | 45/60 |
| Gameplay | - Primal Horn damaging ability has a disconnect from when you cast it and when it actually activates. - Numerous tooltips are incorrect or result in zero for some values - Tempest suggests it reduces attack speed but this doesn't seem to be the case. - Golem Quest requires only 2/3 runes to be activated before the quest considers you ready for the big bad golem. - combat is typical stuff, items add some flavor but without them it's standard auto attack units until dead. The ghoul enemy with the explosion on death was a nice refreshing change, but unfortunately this was the only creative enemy up until the boss. - Any resemblance of story is thrown out the window upon unlocking the gate and finding the game has ended. - Dragon Roost building for no reason. - Vulnerable Obelisks in Shadowleaf, attacking them results in the Ancient protector stalking you until you're dead. - Keys differ in ability but cost the same. - Any item can be inserted into chests. - Chests with their interactions between the two key types was incredibly fun. - is typical of a standard RPG, differing paths broke up path and allowed for which location to go first. - items are custom, Primal horn being an interesting way for the player to be interactive with the world. - K̶e̶y̶s̶ ̶t̶a̶k̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶u̶p̶ ̶a̶n̶ ̶i̶n̶v̶e̶n̶t̶o̶r̶y̶ ̶s̶l̶o̶t̶ ̶w̶a̶s̶ ̶s̶o̶m̶e̶t̶h̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶f̶r̶o̶m̶ ̶a̶ ̶W̶a̶r̶c̶h̶a̶s̶e̶r̶s̶ ̶e̶r̶a̶ ̶a̶n̶d̶ ̶s̶h̶o̶u̶l̶d̶ ̶b̶e̶ ̶c̶h̶a̶n̶g̶e̶d̶ ̶i̶m̶m̶e̶d̶i̶a̶t̶e̶l̶y̶.̶ - Druid Pouch (second inventory ability) was a nice touch. bridge before entering shadowleaf. | 8/20 |
| Aesthetics | - Wonderful opening cinematic, panning and music melded well. - Music cues were excellent, my favorite being the fey essence one that fires when you cross the first - Terrain is pleasing to the eye, themes of each location are clear and defined, overall it it appears that the map quality tapers off significantly near the end making it clear that you were not finished, makes me wonder much better this would of turned out if you had used a smaller map size. - doodads are well placed with variation. - Missing Icon for Fey Essence in Quests. - Requisite amount of previews images, one of which shows a debug sammy icon! - Floating text for damage and healing was there, always love to see these, but confused more than enlightened due to Tempest using the wrong values for damage. | 15/30 |
| Triggers | - Cannot reach boss fire boss(Flute does nothing). - Vista in cave area lock the player in cinematic mode. - Doors in shadowleaf lock the player in after completing golem quest. - Performance drops during the low angle cinematics but otherwise lag is rare. | 0/10 |
| Total | Once upon a time... The end! | 26/60 |
- Judgement: 70%
- Poll: 30%
Cumulative Penalty
Each day adds the current day in % to the penalty.
Abelhawk: 1 day delay - 1%
FeelsGoodMan: 3 days delay - 6%
Ungoliath: 8 days delay - 36%
Assigned Staff: Mythic
Contest | Poll
This was a really fun contest, hope to participate in future ones.
