Squared Circle

ok at first i definately thought that it was a square arena around a square arena. but then i saw the details and stuff like that back area is a great idea. I worried about hammer and sheild doors but you can go through the teles and then nade them (i think) i can tell this took a lot of time/effort you have an alley merge for pete's sake. I know this is a killer map and i can't wait to get a game going on it

 

Well Alex, its about freakin time you pulled this outta your ass! Ive been waiting for months. I am glad the release is finally upon us. Ive been watching the progress of this map from somewhere about 50% completion, and I am very impressed with how its come along. Let me break the map review down for you.

Post - You have thought out your post clearly, as you do always. It is well informed and you included anything someone would need to know regarding your map. However, when it comes to screenshots, i see that is not your strong point. They do not show off your map well, and leave much to be desired. Basically they just dont sell it, and dont do it justice. I recommend you practice taking them to find the best angles you can use to make it as "shiny and pretty" as possible.

Map Construction - As always, you built a strong map. The construction is solid and theres little that couldve been done better. all interlocking is smooth and the geomerging is straight. This will lend itself to smoother gameplay, because there are not bumps. Theres little you can say about this section... either you did it well, or you didnt. In this case, you did very well.

Gameplay - This is definately where you excell. Every map you make is solid in this department. This map is surely no exception. You've balanced out every section of the map to where no part of the map is useless, and it all sees battles of some sort. The greatest part of this would be that those battles are different depending on the section of the map. The back of the map [nearest the normal foundry bases] sees alot of the close range battles, while the sections surrounding the "ring" feature alot of mid-ranged battle rifle style war. The weapons suit the map as well, although the flamethrower is a little redundant. If you do go for it, you won't really live long, so its not really worth it.

Aesthetics - This would be the section you seem not real interested in - which is fine. Aesthetics dont neccessarily matter, but they help. I'd like to see what you can do if you put your mind to it. Anyways, this map doesnt feature anything as far as eye candy goes, except like, the sweetly merged fencewall in the one room... Its so straight it makes me sick. you ****er.

Anyways, im rambling, and i could be doing something productive at the moment, like forging the same map ive been not working on for the last 2 months. On my last notes, id like to extend my advice to take some newer, more interesting screenshots, and include some sweet action pictures. I think it'd get you a bit more attention... since people only rate maps on the screenshots now adays.

 

looks like a great map. I haven't really seen that many competitive maps bases on sporting arenas or fields. That merging in the alley is really impressive and so is the interlocking. Overall a great map and in my opinion has the strength for a featured map.
Great Job!

 

Hey linu nice map, I downloaded and I'll check it out in forge in just a second. If you're up for some customs and testing on it later today I'll send you an invite. It looks like your layout would call for some amazing game play. Around the center boxing arena of the map, it's a series of platforms with cover, that are aesthetically pleasing. When you make you map like this the whole map seems to be equally controlled, not everyone in one hill on the map to get the sniper, if you know what I'm saying. It's also great that you used all of Foundry, it looks as if this could support a party of 12 easily. Great job on the layout, and as you always do, geo merging in the back halls, you've got to show me how you do that. I'll post something more helpful when I'm done with a forge through and some customs on it. Since I haven't played elimination in a while, and I had enjoyed the playlist, I'll try that as you recommended. Cya.

 

ok first off i had a ton of fun playing this map. Slayer with 6v6 is very solid, all the weapons nd spawns are placed well and nice job using the symetry option for some weapons. The main area is nice and big, open, and very well linterlocked and merged. What i really like tho is how you also used all of foundry. I love the back ally and use it alot during gameplay, and the teles are very useful for geting around the map, all in all i really like this map, very nice job.

 

"Its so straight it makes me sick. you ****er!!!"
-thesilencebroken

Ha =)

Great job on the alley merging, that must have taken awhile!
Exellent Map

 

way to add exclamation points to my quote lol

Linu,

I have still yet to get a fullsized game going on this, which is beyond my usual 2v2. If anyone would like to get together and play on it, let me know sometime.

I would like to finally get a good sized party going. Other maps have had the same fate since everyone went back to school.

 

At first, i thought that this would be just some small arena for like boxing. But the screenshots were truely impressive. Hell yes I will DL this. And how you got the fence wall to even fit in that one room, I will never know. Good Job, 5/5. And this definetly deserves to be featured, if not Bungie Favorited.

 

ALEX!

This map is sex.

Its great how the map manages to keep gameplay in mind, aswell as following it's Wrestling Arena theme.

You've done an excellent job. Even though we only had 3 people in the party and weren't playing that seriously, it was alot of fun.

(By the way you should change your font colour to THIS COLOUR for your map posts. It looks sexy on both skins, and makes it easier to read for people using the new skin.

The fence wall on the arena is simple but snazzy.

The stage is very well done, providing some great BR battles across the map. and the walkways along the wall are epic.
look I'm not much good at this stuff but
Great map buddy, I'm proud of you. I give you a high 5 o/ and two thumbs up.

Sorry this post isn't very big. I'm not much for writing long posts on maps. You're so good at it though. It makes me feel inferior lol.

All the best for the future, may your wildest dreams come true.

 

Ok well since im gettin my xbox360 back later on today, im going to give this a DL just to actually see if its as good as you say . So, by the pics it looks like you have used up all of foundry and the parts in the back look really original but The things in the front, like the things around the arena, they seem very plain and its been done before. I really look forward to seeing the map so I will get back to you in a couple hours with a real post that is actually worth a **** :]

EDIT:

Ok well I played a small game of 3v3 team slayer. It was actually quite fun and kept gameplay going. I'll evaluate more in the following.

Gameplay: 8/10- Gameplay was very smooth the weapons were fairly balanced and there were very small innocent flaws. Nothing big happened that affected gameplay and it involved alot of strategy and teamwork to get from one place to another.

Layout: 7/10- I really didnt like the layout all that much it didnt stand out to me that much. It kinda just fell there and twitched at my feet a little. I think there are a few places that could use work to. For example the hallway seems a little narrow and without cover since the objects always dissapeared on me. And the base with the uprightbridges kinda looked odd and plain.

Aesthetics: 7/10- The aesthetics were a little off to me in this post because of the weird pixel glitchy points and the odd bridges i mentioned above. Although it doesnt really mater I feel that you could have and have done better before.

Overall: 7/10- The map is a great map to play on if you are looking for a map that bases itself around gameplay and not on overall aesthetics. The design could use a little work but it plays nicesly overall so it really doesnt matter. I hope a v2 comes out with a nicer more eyepleasing layout but if it doesnt its still a map to be proud of. Good job linubidix.

 

Well this is cool. I like how it looks like an MLG map but of course is not MLG. I love those type of layouts. I think its cool to have an area under the bases also. It makes it like more rooms to fight close quarters. My only complaint is the top of the middle structure. I just dont like the high bridge walls, it seems like death central. I guess if I dont like it I could just stay out of it. Other than that its cool. I have tried merging in the alley before and I usually quit angry. So for that I give you props and it looks good. I agree with the 7/10 cuz that is quite a bit of power weapons too.

 

it is very well made, and while i havent been able to play a game on it yet, i can comfortable say, that a big party could comfortably fit in this map, i spent an hour finding every entrance, and allyway. this is definetly worth the download, and test run, or at least just to look at. this is big people.

 

wow this is one of the first maps thsa use all of foundry AND is a decent map. the interlocking is clean and neat. the map is pretty well rounded. i mean it looks pretty complicated, im not really a fan of teleporters in maps, but it this map rox 5/5

 

Squared circle, squared circle, squared circle. I almost think I have played on your maps just as much as you, lol. Well I obviously haven't but I'm pretty sure I would be close to it.

Firstly I would like to thank you for thanking me so much. I do realise that I was pretty much at every testing session and most of your forging sessions (besides the ones that you were "appear offline" to). One time I was playing SC when it was half done, the next night I sent you a message to invite me and when I arrived into your party the map was almost done. At the time I didn't really have a good understanding of how SC would play, because there were still budget glitched objects all around the arena. The weapons were still in the rooms, there were teleporters and walls in the main room and an eye hurting blue splotch of spawn points. Obviously these things were going to be removed (I hope they have been ). Once you had completed SC, I began to see how it would play. I didn't tell you this but I was a tad sneaky, I saved your map so I could find out all of the secret jumps and Carney holes. I did find most of them and I used them on people while playing in the test sessions (I believe I tricked you once or twice).



Elimination has become one of my favourite game types; almost all of your maps support your elimination game type; both Boulevards, Pankration and your new map Squared Circle. I believe that Elimination is the best game type for SC.
Team Slayer was fun; it did have some power points that were hard to lock down when a team already has them under control, spots such as the sniper tower and the other sniper tower across the main room.
FFA was the second best game type. If you stayed in the bases of foundry you would kill people when they were least expecting it. You could have the hammer or shotgun and BAM you shot-melee them in the face, good times. I found that being on the sniper tower with the sniper is a bad decision because there are so many Battle rifles on the map. I was getting shot from all angles.
Asymmetric game types are fun, when you removed the teleporter that was in the fence box I found it hard much harder to cap the flag/plant the bomb.

The spawns should be much better since I helped you move a few, you had them in traffic areas and putting them in places that not as many people go was a good idea.

Your first choice in weapon placement wasn’t the best. I didn’t say much because I wanted to know how they played. After one game I knew that there had to be some changes. I gave you a few ideas and I noticed you did use one or two of them.

Let me know if you want me to help with the next version.

 

OMG you posted it! This is a great map everbody and I recommend it to everybody. Fantastic origonality and geoglitching, the gameplay is falawless and not only that, it has a casual feel to it too!

Linibidix, try to be on this weekend so we can get a full game on it and I can make you your youtube video!

 

well, well, well Linu. I finally got in the game i was very anxious to play on this map. although it wasn't much people as i would prefer, 4 would have to do.

Map Layout/ Map Geometry: 9/10

First off let me tell you, i enjoyed the map a lot really. I found that your map contains some interesting feature. the one piece of geometry i found really interesting was teh barriers used as a surface. simply genious. i never would've thought of anything like that, even with my reputation as using movable objects as map geometry.
I absolutely LOVED how you used all of foundry so effectively. i haven't quite seen the use of the whole foundry map (including the back hallway) so amazing. Usually maps that do in fact use all of foundry, lack cover, therefore being to open, and sucky to play. not the story here. i found the lines of sight to be perfect, while you also had the choice to battle in open areas, tight areas, low areas, and high areas. If you want to fight in the open, go to the middle of the map with the ring. if you're more of one of the close quarters find of guys... stay in those back areas and lower parts of the map. The map caters to all styles of play, and that my friend, shows how good of a map this is.
however, the map layout had some downs. I found some areas to be a bit... jumpy. especially the back structure on the garage side of foundry. jumpy slows you down, and when your slow, your more liable to get BRed by someone when you are helpless just trying to escape. but due to limited supplies... it's understandable.

Weapons/ Weapon Spawns: 9.5/10

I found the power weapon spawns and spawn times to be pretty much on the dot. sniper spawns in a low and closed area, therefore it isn't too powerful as soon as it's picked up. Rockets spawn in a high closed area, also not in a powerful spot. Grav hammer spawns under the ring which is the whole center of the map, and yes, open. Not so powerful in open areas. Shotgun never respawning... great desicion IMO, shotguns tend to be one of the most powerful weapons in the game... other than the energy sword. And all the respawn times seemed to be great. didn't spawn too fast where someone could be in control of power weapons for a majority of the game, and didn't respawn to slow where gameplay would slow down and become a bit stale. But to be honest... The laser didn't become a big factor in the game at all. maybe since we were playing FFA and there was only 4 people. but nobody really even bothered to pick it up.
I found a BR or some kind of effective weapon other than the Assault rifle immediately, or shortly after spawning. to me, that's a good thing considering the assault rifle is a **** weapon... especially in that open section. it seems that all entry points and spawns in the open area have a BR somewhere close enough.

Equipment: 10/10
At first i was worried about Active Camo AND Overshield in the map. but after playing for about 5 minutes, i realized the long respawn times made them work out well together. Although you used the firebomb in the map... i was not upset with it at all. one firebomb was not powerful at all really, and again, a close range piece of equipment spawning in an open area, it could not easily be picked up and used directly on someone that was chasing you (unless you got mad grenade throwing skills) There wasn't too much grenades on the map at all, no grenade spammage occured during the game at all. In fact, there were a couple times where i was going with out grenades. After experiencing that, i came to learn i had to use my grenades wisely on the map. Congratulations, the map is noob proof =P. lol.

Gameplay: 9/10

Basically, all of the above paragraphs explained why this map played so well. It catered to all types of gameplay. Long Range, open battles, close quarters, tight hallways, you name it. There's a great variety of gameplay style. The weapons and equipment were pretty much on the dot, and the respawn system, was near perfect. The only thing i found bad was sometimes being confused by the layout because of the jumps and teleporters, and the other being venturing around the map trying to find people to battle. which can be understood due to my 4 player party. i haven't enjoyed a map this much that i've downloaded in a while. Simply, a must play for everybody.

Overall: (Average of above scores) 9.4/10

Comments: Yeah, that's a really good score... especially from me. lol. anyway, I really found this map to be very supporting of a competitive Free For All match. Even when sometimes i found myself looking for people due to the map size compared to the party size, i enjoyed playing the whole time. none of the noob combos and tactics were happening, and i truly think it's due to the layout of the map, the spawns, and the weapons. they all just seemed to come together and make some sort of master piece. It's already one of my favorite maps from recent maps released, i can tell you that. I really don't see any reason why anybody could hate this map. If it was up to me, this map would be featured already. I'll be playing a couple more games on this for sure, and it will definitely be staying on the HD for a while.

 

This is what I get for not being in the Competitive section for a while.
Well, I remember playing a couple games with you guys on it. And I really enjoyed it. I couldn't believe that it was Foundry because it seemed so enormous in size. I liked the mix of long narrow hall ways combined with some awesome close range pwnage.
I especially loved 1 flag on it. It had the right sort of CTF balance to it. Meaning that it is kinda challenging to get the flag, but once it's out, it is hard to return. Loved it. I already had this in my Hard drive.