just when i needed some classic quake!

Really good maps

Great, you don't see many Mesoamerican-themed maps.

Not all levels are perfect, but many of them are good and many are also very heavily populated with monsters in small arenas!

I'm a big fan of the Koohoo Theme, a lot of talent involved in this jam, surprisingly refreshing to play vanilla style quake.

Very high standard in this map pack!

Good work everybody; thanks for sharing!

Given that I'm not a massive fan of the Koohoo texture set, I was expecting to not find this pack as appealing as some others. I was definitely wrong in that assumption. There is a very high level of skill on display across this pack, and the theme is utilized in way that is distinct and surprisingly varied. Gameplay is very strong here and the level of consistency makes this feel more like a cohesive episode than simply a loosely themed set of maps. There is only a single map here that I would consider below par. The rest are easily 4-5/5 entries. Difficulty on some maps is borderline sadistic (to be fair, I play on Nightmare regularly), so this may be a bit challenging for more casual players. Personally, I enjoy that, but it isn't everyone's cup of tea. Fantastic work - this should be an automatic download for most everyone.

Personal Highlight Map: Ancient Trenches of Vellamo by Zigi

Visuals - 4/5 Atmosphere - 5/5 Gameplay - 5/5 Difficulty - 4/5 MittensForKittens' Rating - 4.5/5

As an insightful fellow once said, "It's like déjà vu all over again." This jam was a blast to play like all the jams I've played, and when I finished, I loaded up the original "The Castle of Koohoo" to compare. It's been many moons since I've seen it. The jam maps are pretty faithful to the original in quite a few ways, but I was most amazed at how well the original has held up since its 2001 release.

Thanks for the jam everyone!

Thoughts on the first few levels I played:

Ish's map... varies between fun challenges and frustrating "surprises". (The first one of which killed me more times than anything else in the map, consecutively). Some slightly weird item placement too - I missed the nailgun for almost the entire map, and so was wandering around full of nails with nothing to use them with. When it works, it does work, but it doesn't work (for me) as often.

Entsoy's map... I feel similarly about to Ish's. There's some nice flow to the thing, but some of the setpieces I just couldn't do (even on skill 0) without god mode [I am speaking of the vore room, of course].

RickeyT23's map... whilst it's not trying anything as complicated as the other two, I enjoyed a lot more consistently. The only niggle is that the very very steep staircases seem to cause fall damage pretty often if you try to run down them...

Rest of the maps:

Greenwood's is very clever, but it was exhausting enough that I stopped playing after getting to the big door opening and assuming that was the end. The endless driving forward and pressure can only last so long!

Eduardo Sanchez Barrios: I really enjoyed, although finding (the easiest two?) of the secrets made it more fun.

Chris Holden: also a fun map, with some interesting progression (and a slightly misleading start).

Zigi: could have been the easily best map in the set - and most of it is great from the stealth setpiece to the escalating flowing combat and traversal... it's just a shame that the jumping sequence after the stealth section, and the over-long swimming sequence are there. Maybe it's the best map even so.

Scythe: a nice, quite quick, map with good progression.

radiatoryang: a really interestingly "open" level that feels nonlinear even though it really isn't. Lots of mixed environment. and a "twist ending"!

iYago: dark oppressive start, and I think some of the lighting could be a bit more balanced (the "pitch black" areas don't always help), although there is some excellent use of lighting for atmospheric effect.

Major problem for me, quakespasm 94.3 also vk quake also other quake engines ive tried. They wont let me pick up keys. But they let me open doors that need keys, they i havnt picked up. Once i open door without key, then go find say gold or blue key, it lets me pick them up. So at moment, i find certain gold silver blue doors, open them up without key, then find the key, and it lets me pick them up, where it wont, if door is not open. What bug is this ? ? ?.Even in quake original game, it does the same.

Solved - Using all other engines 32bit versions.Once i used 64 bit versions, of same engines, everything runs ok now. So a bug, using 32 bit versions on a 64bit system, when 64 bit system has system 32bit folder , runs other 32bit exe also....."Strange"

Greenwood's is :chefkiss:, really he's got a signature open+vertical kind of mode that works great here. Falling into slime and pits could be super-frustrating but for some reason I had fun with it here? just abuse that quicksave key.

Great to see another map from iYago! I had actually just replayed Hushed Walls a day or two ago. Really hitting your stride here, inventive and good-looking. This was darn tough in spots (skill 2), and I'm not sure if I was supposed to cheese that pile of enforcers like I did or run away (or do something smarter). But it all worked out in the end! Maybe the Koohoo theme makes it feel a little more OK to have traps and more generally "unfair" arrangements?

I could probably pick entsoy's map out of a lineup just by looking at it. :-) This one is a little more "traditionally playable" than some previous entsoy stuff while still being super atmospheric. Lots of cool little touches, and a fun take on having an evocative cliffhanger ending.

Yang's map: whoa. Great reveal moment at the start. It looks like maybe it's going to be an outdoor arena-style map reminiscent of a couple of "earlier Yangs" but then turns out to have a winding path going indoors and out. Fun pathfinding, good fights, and some perfectly-framed visuals. (I particularly liked a moment with scrags coming up out of big wellmouth.)

Rickyt23 gets the award for Best Use of Ziggurats in a Quake Map or Motion Picture. Neat to have that unusual amount of verticality to fool around with! Also some fun quad placement, and good ammo metering in the early going (skill 2).

I just did NOT get on with the initial moments of Ish's map. No ammo while under fire, forced slime swim, into a nail trap, into a fiend-to-face. Unless I reaaaallllly missed something there? If not: Part of the issue is just that the surprise-punishment level requires savescumming; part of it though is that this is so unusual for Quake maps that I keep unsuccessfully looking for an alternative path.

Anyway. The rest of that map is pretty great. :-)

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And I'm super impressed with zigi's entry. First off it's a looker, with some nice contrast from wood and light stone textures. Gnarly fun combat encounters that put on a lot of pressure with (sometimes) not that many mobs. A neat almost toy-like maze structure to poke around in too.

The swimming section in general was a bit much (and I like swimming sections in Quake maps!). Some poor what-to-do-next readability at one spot, and in general too many stretches that spend too long underwater.

The end though is just a big continuous WWWAAAAARRRRRRRRGGGGGHHHHH and I like it. :-) Overall very cool. Kind of hard to believe this and some of the others can be "cranked out" so quickly for a jam!

Played them all in skill 1 (forgot to set up skill 2 as usual. Killed all i found.

Overall a good pack but has some parts that stand out on the bad side on half the maps.

Entsoy, Greenwood, and Ish's maps seem to be made keeping high brightness settings on mind, and can be painful to play if not setting the brightness so high. Ish's and Zigi's skill 1 is closer to the usual for skill 2. Ish, iYago and Zigi's has some big spikes in difficulty, which can become a unavoidable death trap for the first run. Those spikes become a walk in the park or a no insta-death encounter in iYago's map if taking certain secret items.

Chrisholden: solid map in all aspects but a bit repetitive and overscaled. Reminds of a turtlemap.

Eduardo: mostly solid gameplay and decent looks.

Entsoy: good looking, solid, novel ideas, very detailed jam like, and atmospheric, but has some gameplay issues due to the overdetailing.

Greenwood: interesting and varied layout and combat situations, good secrets, and mostly solidly built, but has some serious gameplay issues at the beginning.

Ish: has lots of good ideas, good secrets, a well interconnected layout with varied encounters and hectic fights, but the execution is not as good as it has some big spikes in difficulty, enemies appearing from apparently nowhere, and relies on the player dying a few times on some encounters to go on. Has some serious lack of ammo at the first third.

iYago is mostly a solid experience with varied encounters and interesting secrets in a tree shaped layout, but has several very cramped areas where it is easy to get stuck, relies on some encounters on teleporting enemies almost touching the player and has two encounters which are pretty much like an insta-death trap for the first run, save if finding certain secrets.

Radiatoryang: it is good looking, has some good secrets and good for those who like to explore while keeping a tight and mostly linear progression. Provides a solid experience while the gameplay is not much hectic or threatening. The scale could be reduced a lot for the sake of the gameplay.

RickyT23: solid experience and some interesting ideas in a tree shaped layout around a courtyard, while that he had not enough time for it showed on it in some encounters.

Scythe: solid map which seems to go with id1 style in purpose, in both looks and gameplay. A bit easy or bland sometimes but a fun experience. Interesting secrets.

Zigi: interesting use of modules to speed up the creation of similar rooms plus other areas where he went for more conventional overdetailed brushwork. Encounters are overall good and varied and have good ideas, but they mix some bland ones with other that stand out both on the good or on the bad side. It expect the player to be aggressive on the flooded area or be punished, which it is also cramped and leads to some issues. It also has a time where it is hard to tell where to go next. The last encounter depends a lot on how much armour is left on the player to survive it for the first run, even on skill 1.

I really enjoy retro maps like this. Great job!!!

These are my gameplays. More to come:

• https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLsLTjUB6iFirWfX1XCmin3YkslJymBRNn

based quake

based mappers

Ambulatory Remix (rj7_chrisholden) is big and beautiful, but sadly it's also the one thing no Quake map can be: boring. All that wide open space, but it's so symmetrical and so predictable. I think basing it on an existing old map was a mistake: I know Chris Holden can do much, much better.

The Lost Koohoo Temple (rj7_eduardosanchezbarrios) is nice while it lasts, but it's over quite quickly and doesn't quite seem to get into its stride. The last bit is fun with the quad, though!

Endbringer (rj7_entsoy) is ... hard to evaluate. It has good atmosphere, but a lot of empty spaces. Towards the end it loads you up weaponry, armour and health, then tells you "It is waiting for you", then ... it ends. I walked through the door that I assumed would lead to a climactic encounted, only to find I'd finished the level with only 33/55 kills. Since there are no secrets, I can't imagine where the other 22 monsters could be.

... Oh, unless they were zombies that autodestructed when I killed the four vores in the deep-underground section. But usually you still get the kills when monsters autodestruct (e.g. at the end of Episode 1 when you kill Chthon), so I don't know what's going on here.

Anyway -- it was a very anticlimactic end.

Koochie Koohoo (rj7_greenwood) is satisfying to discover, though it's a shame that the whole ground-level swamp area that you begin in is basically useless. (Yes, I know about the secret, but that doesn't count for much). The verticality is fun, and the progression mostly feels pretty intuitive -- though right at the end, when it told me "The exit is available" it took me ages to find. Probably my own fault. My biggest real complaint is how strongly it relies on spawning new enemies in when you reach certain places. Good fun, though.

I am stuck on Knarled Fantasm (rj7_ish). Having made it through the ludicrous opening with huge amounts of save-scumming, I am in the big open area with the silver pillar and the three gold locks. I have opened two of those locks, but can't find the third gold key. When I touch the center pylon it tells me "you touch the center pylon" (wow!), but ... what actually changes as a result?

I gave up on solving Knarled Fantasm (rj7_ish) "legitimately" and grenade-jumped up onto the low platform that overlooks the first open area of the game. From there, I explored along the corridor and up the staircase, and eventually cleared everything out and found the final gold key. With that done, is was relatively simple, having saved up the pent, to win the final big combat with the classic pent+quad combo.

All in all, I found this map unsatisfactory, despite all the good ideas it contains. The opening was not hard in a grimy satisfying way, but in a tedious save-scumming hard-work way that left me feeling the author hates the player. From there, the difficulty was pretty well judged to be really hard but not unfairly so, and it was satisfying to make my way through several demanding areas with low health and ammo. But then it all fell apart again with the failure to progress. Nearly really good; actually not very good at all.

Much of what I wrote above about Ish's map also applies to Beneath the Stones of the Fallen Sun (rj7_iyago). Great atomosphere and lots of ideas, but too many places where the difficult is simply unfair rather than challenging. I fought my way through to the end more out of obligation then enjoyment.

The Close and Holy Darkness (rj7_radiatoryang) may be the first map in this jam that I have enjoyed from start to finish, my only real quibble being that the ending is a bit anticlimactic if you've saved the quad. Lots of exploration, and a pervasive feeling of place, and an unusual use of sunniness in the Koohoo theme. I missed two secrets and two kills. but was delighted to find the rocket launcher (alas, too late to be very useful).

Confirmaton for the underworld (rj7_rickyt23) is very much cup of tea: an exploration of a big environment where much of the combat happens in open areas rather that (as happens too often in some of the other maps in this jam) in cramped corridors. I cruised through it enjoying every moment, but perhaps feeling it was a bit too easy, maybe a touch underpopulated. Definitely one of my top two in this jam so far, though.

Lost in Time (rj7_scythe) is the very definition of short and sweet. It's a really nice level, there's just nowhere near enough of it.

Last a definitely not least -- most, in fact -- we come to Ancient Trenches of Vellamo (rj7_zigi), a big sprawling temple with a good blend of exploration and combat set pieces. It's nice that, on the whole, the levels have got better as I've moved through this pack in alphabetical order of author :-) Really good stuff here, and even if I felt maybe the underwater section was pushed a bit too far, the bottom line is that felt really pleased with myself for coming through it.

Only 199 of 227 kills, and just 3 of 9 secrets. Fine: it gives me something to come back to.

In summary, a pack with the high quality maps, but also too many that seem to hate the player. I like games to be fun.