Kona's Grindmill takes the humble square and transforms it into an implement of destruction. The map is full of squares, being basically square in shape, with a square outdoor plaza in the middle, and four smaller square rooms in each corner of the larger quadrangle. Long, straight hallways connect each of these outside rooms, while two staircases and an elevator link the sunken plaza floor with the elevated outside structures. Does this sound boring? Trust me, it's not. The author has added just enough irregularity to keep the underlying geometric shapes very interesting, indeed– each of the outside rooms varies slightly from each other, and a couple of corridors branch off the main form and jut into the plaza. The geometric pattern is further deviated from with the addition of a lone room– placed midway along one perimeter of the map. A teleporter on one wall links to one of the corner rooms on the far side of the map, while an elevator sinking through the floor links to the plaza via a jagged rock tunnel. The byword for this map is connectivity– and there is gobs and gobs of that. A well-interlinked design is fairly easy to secure on map as small and symmetrical map as this, but the author wasn't one to rely on that characteristic alone. It seems that every room offers some exit or view onto the plaza floor; no matter where you go on this map a way to cut directly across the board through the plaza is only mere steps away. A simple design but an elegant one– excellent. (A)

 

Gothic is a word that has become much maligned in the Q3 lexicon. This style of architecture and level design relies upon pointed arches, rib vaulting, and flying buttresses, along with moody lighting, gloomy stonework, and a smidgeon of Victorian influence to invoke a atmosphere that is oppressive, mysterious, and desolate. Unfortunately, the total overuse of the Id stock texture set with those same characteristics has doomed the style to unpopularity in this game. Every so often, however, you get a custom map that comes along and does gothic just right, and reminds you why gothic in Quake 1 was just so damn cool. This is that map. The screenshots speak for themselves– mixing equal parts dreary stonework, rusted metal, and spooky white and green lighting, this map just oozes with personality. Although there's nary an arch to be found, what there is that is gothic can be accredited to Rorshach's superlative Jackboot textures, which keeps the gothic gloom and doom, while also adding a touch of oppressive industrialism. The plaza floor is coated with cracked and dry soil, while the elevator tunnel seems to have been hacked out of the living rock. In a nice throwback to its gothic Q1 forebears, the teleporters have the same dead grey static pattern seen there. Against the dark and grimy background of this map, only the clear blue night sky overhead and ivory white moon stand out– adding a nice bit of color contrast. Superlative. (A)

 
 

Gameplay is FAST. I mean not just speedy, more than swift– this map flies, especially with 3 or more players. There's no delay between the booting of the game and the onset of swift and savage hostilities– when my playtesting team loaded this one up, the mad rush to be the first to snag the biggest, baddest pieces of iron was tantamount to a herd of stampeding water buffalo. This "run fast and die faster" style stayed constant until the very last frag. One of the things that makes this map so fast is the connectivity built into the main atrium; it's amazing how many entrances to that room there really are. If you're on the plaza floor an extra degree of paranoia is warranted, as turning your back for just a second will induce all manner of baddies to spring up out of entrances you didn't even know were there. Additionally, no corner of the board is more than a few feet of having some sort of field of fire into the plaza and over whichever fool happens to be running to snag the Megahealth placed out in the center. Another feature which keeps gameplay in different areas tied together are the long, straight hallways that connect nearly all of the corner rooms. With nothing to block line of sight, players in one room can usually see what is going on in the next, with obvious results. There's nothing more amusing of throwing a ridiculous volume of fire down a hallway and into a group of brawlers who don't even know you're there until your cap catches them right in the neck. I'd also hate to be the sad sack who is running down a hallway with another player in pursuit, only to find someone else entering the hallway from the other direction. (Can you say "Shit Sandwich?") With four corner rooms, it doesn't take a Nobel laureate to figure out where the guns are gonna be– the PG, RL, and RG all have their own rooms, while the humble SG shares space with the RA. The GL sits right above the elevator in the only non-corner room, while the YA sits mid-hallway on the opposite side of the board. The PG and the RL seem to be the guns to own here– with their considerable punch and rapid rates of fire, these weapons are the most aptly suited to every confrontation you're likely to find yourself in. Although the author suggests 2-4 players, as many as five is not out of the question– player lives will likely be short enough that weapon availability will not be a problem. Fed by small size of the map and the paranoia from a layout that never gives you a safe moment, Grindmill is a fast, furious, and fabulous fragfest. (A-)

 

This is a great map, and one that is quickly becoming the favorite of my playtesting team. It's got a great layout, visuals to match, and unbelievably fast gameplay fueled by outstandingly good connectivity. Not one to miss. (A)