Smaugs Dream

Description
The first thing I saw on this map was the entrance hall leading out to a sunset sky. And man, that looked awesome. What impressed me most was that the author has made a real attempt to prevent the blocky fall-off you see in most maps, and although he's used the oh-so-annoying clip brush technique to prevent the player from walking around to the edges, it's a great look. :)

Maybe I should back up a bit first though. The map is a Lord of the Rings/The Hobbit spin-off, of a small area in the mountains where a dragon called Smaug lives. This map is a 3d-portrayal of the area depicted in the book. Before I say anything else though, I must point out, that for a FFA map, this is very small. I'd much rather recommend it for duels. :(

Okay, so I've already indicated my first impressions, now onto the rest of the map.
Well, it's very dark. So dark that unless you can see the doors at the end of the long staircase, you won't have a clue where you are, where you're going, or what you might've accidentally stepped in. The engraved doors are a nice touch; they look very much like the ones in the film when the party enters Moria. The architecture looked very basic, but the impression it creates is believable. The only real spoilers are the piles of money, which look ridiculous; they're floating off the ground and have smiley faces on them, and there is an area of splodge lighting which doesn't have a source. The music is, as you might expect, from the LOTR films.

Once you get down the staircase you're in the dragon's lair. I think the dragon is either dead, or asleep, because it didn't attack me, ;) but it was still nice to see a fairly good model instead of one made using brushes. The pillars looked a bit out of place though - well, not the pillars themselves, but the decoration on them just didn't seem to fit. Aside from that, well, there's not much else to see. But you can play it with bots as the author included bot support. Hurrah!

New Textures: Yes
New Sounds: Yes
Bot Support: Yes

~Szico VII~