I was trying to keep my comments to a single medium length paragraph but things got out of hand. Oh well. I thought giving out a 50 rating was an extreme and unprecedented move but it seemed warranted.
Also my comments are more along the lines of my blacksmith review style than fitting closely to the rating format. Hope its ok.
50/50 agartha
When Lord Basse asked the judges approval to include a 3000 word story, I was skeptical. How could such a massive story be delivered while being relevant to a contest based on Map Design? Surely there is a goodly amount of reading to be done, but it in no way drags the map down, but instead elevates it upward to stratospheric heights, giving a deeper meaning to the contents of the map, and helping frame the context of the map design. The quality of the writing itself obliterates any concerns about it being a detracting element, while offering a surprising amount of interaction. The player wanders through an underground city searching for torn pieces of a diary, combining clues to gain the full picture of how events came about. By the end you reach a melancholic, mysterious ending but perhaps one with an element of hope and optimism to it. The story certainly gives a good explanation for the cities construction, lending a justification and explanation of the map layout and its omision would take away far more than it would add in ease of playthrough.
Moving on to map design, this map is a lovely jungle with a perfect combination of dense foliage and open areas with an elegant simplicity. The overgrown areas in the city are perfect, starting with the sense of life and utility from the infrastructure with a layer of neglect and tragedy in the encroaching vines and plants. The walled off district near the cities south-eastern exit was fantastic. The city's layout is quite nice with a ring of roads around a mountain, with a number of tertiary locations that lent a real sense of scope to this underground kingdom. One could argue that the map lacked in population and activity, being an abandoned city;however, I find this added a excellent flavor of mystique as the player wandered the streets of a very plausible and authentic city construction. Points of detailing highlights were plentiful with great building combinations and excellent usage of gaia objects. One point that stood out to me was in the East Temple Ruins, with bridges for walls and a gaping hole at one point. The abandoned ruins in the islands were nicely done as well. The river near the start with its desert terrain is strikingly lovely. Suffice it to say that every critera I have ever used for judging map design was generously met, and a detailed recounting of everything that look good on this map would be better done by simply directing the reader towards the actual scenario in liue of recounting every single bit of the map.
This map brought me back fond memories of reading "Journey to the Center of the Earth", a book I have not read in many years. My imagination was on fire, and I was even nervous about the dinosaurs from the story appearing, so vividly was this image painted. I had an immensely enjoyable playthrough and can scarcely find anything to complain about at all in this map. Could I nitpick on some cliffs not merging perfectly, or make an impossible-to-address complaint about the mountain pillars not being entirely convincing? Sure, but I could make similar tiny little nitpicks on every map in the competition;if that minor stuff is grounds for reducing the Attention to Detail by a point, then I could easily just lower the rating in that category by one point for each of the other maps as well. A 50\50 doesn't mean its unsurpassable perfection, but its damn close in my eyes. A fantastic map that is deserving of a massive score.
20/20
10/10
15/15
5/5
49/50 juval province
Juval is a gorgeous map with a variety of terrain types;the cliffed waterfront with the island minaret was especially eye pleasing. I loved the desert area with the sand ships;this area was quite intriguing and filled me with a desire to explore further out, though sadly every map has its border. The plain sand looked great in contrast to the city clinging precariously to the containing mountain. Towards the end the green valley area delivered a tranquil, laid back terrain that really fit the area. The swamp was a nice usage of the grassy shallows terrain;the beach below that was perfect with just the right amount of detailing.
Specific locations were a strong point of the map;I could only list some of my favorites, but it is difficult to avoid reciting the entire map in that case. The monastery of the dragon monks caught my eye as an impressive combination of buildings. The border fort in the desert cliffs, the mausoleum, and the bridge constructed of TC sections were all standing out for me. The ruby mines with multiple mills carrying water from an archway was especially impressive. The ploughed fields using a barracks roof was believable, and yes, the field with haystacks looks good.
The storyline was a good one, though maybe having the main character speaking some lines wouldn't have been out of place. The ending of this tour was quite amusing, and it was well orchestrated to take the player throughout the main points of interest, breathing a substantial amount of life into the province even beyond what the map design already achieved. I might mention that it was slightly unfortunate there was no border for the edges of the valley region, as when the map ends you can see unfinished land, and the same for my beloved full map printouts. Lastly, I might add that this was an inspirational and invigorating playthrough, filling me with many ideas and a sense of wonder and amazement. Thank you for that.
20/20
10/10
14/15
5/5
48/50 spires of heaven
This map was very creative and brought a wide array of impressive tricks, to the point that I am quite sure I have fully appreciated everything there is to offer. A stunner off the bat is the walls lining the river made of gravestones, which have been used to great effect across the map in a variety of tricks. They reminded me of usage seen in a AoCHawk (Chinese) map, but taken much, much further. A fountain, the walls of a garden, some pillars, and in combination with the spikes object to create a iron fence were more amazing uses of the gravestones. The map had all the usual map design elements expected for a city and all of them implemented at a very high level of detail. There are points of interest all across the map, but one that grabbed my attention was a backstreets courtyard with a dock used as a house;its a stunningly beautifully location. On a similar note, near the start was a blacksmith, market and archery range used very cleverly to create a number of smaller buildings in a wooded mountain. Maybe the only two areas that seemed slightly lackluster were the hill behind the Spanish wonder, which looked spectacular with its dragon mountings, and also the shipyard marshy area on the left, where I don't fully understand the walled+bridge construction below it.The story element was a welcome touch providing a nice emotional impact., though it didnt resonate with me to the extant it did with "Smile no More". This is a map loaded with tricks and superb off grid placement usage, and I am sure I will return here many times to analyze this one more in the future.
19/20
10/10
14/15
5/5
43/50 shandri lu-fire temple
I greatly enjoyed Shandri Lu, moreso than even the rating would imply. The atmosphere of the map was great, and I was a little spooked by the insane behavior of the villagers burning down their own town. The sound effects were an excellent touch and the hanging scene was very well done. The switchup of music was very well done, with the second track kicking in at a perfect moment. The earlier music suited those areas quite well in its own right. The combination of architecture on the map combined with the oriental gaia objects used as structures brought a unique, refreshing visual aesthetic to the scenario. The map design fundamentals were good as well, though some areas could have been blended better like the snowy into fire area. The icy pit of water was a nice touch, as was the farmer at the start;the main waterfall im not so sold on. A problem was that the map was quite linear and small;I would have loved to see more expansive terrain and I found myself wanted more and more of this map after having finished it. Some of the grammar and spelling was a bit off(not including that THS which was an accent), combined with some gaia object placement that seemed weak is why the attention to detail score is not higher, though there were some great touches in the map too. Overall a lovely entry which I had a blast playing through.
17/20
10/10
12/15
4/5
41/50 xochinayu-jungle map
Xochinayu brings a dense jungle map to the table, with towering mountains and vast structures for a massive fortress city. I quite enjoyed the perspective from traveling via river, with large structures like the twin minarets towering above you. Some of these building and mountain combinations did feel a bit overdone and symmetrical however. The jungle detailing is quite good with a mix of tree types, rocks and little details with sparing use of flower patches. The shoreline with the jungle coming into the water was good, but I came to desire the sight of beach and desert terrain at some points to change things up, which wouldnt have been out of the question to implement with the aid of UPs new terrain placement functionality. Building formations were a good source of creativity here, though on one hand while they conveyed an impressive sense of magnitude and architecture they sometimes tended to become a bit repetitive or symmetrical. There were some good tries, like the balcony overview and the bridge, though I think my favorite area might be the dockland area in the marshy swamp. The layout of the map seemed a bit chaotic as I found it hard to navigate and also to imagine how this fortifications would be of any use in the first place, being dissected with rivers and all. Lots of good scenes with goodly amounts of dialogue help bring the map to life, quite a good and creative entry all in all.
16/20
9/10
11/15
3/5
34/50 wilburshire
Wilburshire was a pleasant map with nice terrain and good forests. There is room for improvement in the terrain mixing while there are a bit too many grass patches etc out in the open. The layout of the village was excellent, as houses in this type of village were placed in a authentic small village fashion, though perhaps each could have had some attention given to creating a small yard or vegetable plot. There were many white outlines visible through the map from resources and deer, and I wasnt a big fan of the gaia path placement. The keep was not particularly inspired although it is sufficient to carry the day here. Other building combinations like the Fat Ox were quite nice. There was a goodly amount of life in the village but perhaps some more movement would be in order.
This map is on the verge of being very good, but it really needs more work done to add a bit of punch. Overall the map design itself feels a bit simple and underbaked while the template is a good one. There is good potential here.
14/20
6/10
12/15
2/5
32/50 blizzard
I found this map to offer an immersive experience with its take on a wintry blizzard, though it does rely heavily on UP features to make this happen. Thats not a bad thing, but the map design was a bit bland with its depiction of basic terrain, although you could also argue it depicts a harsh, brutal wintry environment in its simplicity. The usage of various too green items like forage bushes and grass snow undermines this argument however;a more focused approach to would be difficult but the effort may pay off well. The rocky areas meant to portray mountains may have benefited from working in the dirt gaia mountains and the pile o' rock object. The layout of the map seemed a bit simple with little difficulty, real or imagined, in crossing the pass. The little structures scattered around the map had a nice character to them, but i found the main town to be a bit simple. A bit more activity, less symmetrical houses and maybe some pine trees mixed in there. I quite enjoyed the map regardless of its shortcomings.
14/20
7/10
9/15
2/5
31/50 kratersee
The map offered up a war torn region that was pulled off reasonably well, but lacking a bit of life in the enemy camps;some combat or at least patrolling units would have added a nice touch. The map design was nice looking with good forests though perhaps a tad too many grass patches. Most of the combined buildings were pulled off well, but some buildings did seem to float, such as the houses beneath the lake or the burnt out city, which has several odd looking buildings because of mistimed elevation changes. When viewing the objectives ingame you can see the standard win conditions, combined with the nonfunctioning music this lowers the attention to detail scoring a bit.
13/20
6/10
10/15
2/5
"Excellent could be any map that has the quality of a ES random map or ES scenario. AoK is an excellent, award winning game. That's where I'd start." -AnastasiaKafka
"Hard work is evil. Bitmaps are stupid. Working on a scenario for more than one afternoon is stupid. Triggers are stupid. Testing your own scenario is stupid. The world is stupid. You are the Greatest." -Ingo Van Thiel