Taris RP

Description
You know, I was just asking when the Taris mapping contest was announced "Why do mapping contests always have to require small maps? If they allowed bigger maps then we could get some great RP maps". It's a nice coincidence that this Taris RP map is being released while the Taris mapping contest is going on. Some of you probably remember Cydon (Ki_Adi_Mundi) for his Yalara roleplaying map which was a very nicely made map for roleplaying but was really lacking in the visuals, something that really turned some people off the map. He returns now after having "set out to do better, even if only slightly" with a map based on Taris, and I've got to say that he succeeded.

[b]Accuracy:[/b]
I want to start off by first of all saying that this isn't a map that was built to replicate the KotOR version of Taris. Everyone who's played Knights of the Old Republic knows that Taris got the $*#@ blown out of it by Malak's sith fleet, and so seeing as this is set over 4,000 years after that we can guess that the city was rebuilt and obviously the passage of time has changed some things as well. With that said, there's no mistaking that this is definitely Taris. Everything from the architecture to the sky, lighting, and of course the KotOR music just screams 'TARIS!' I was confused how the author calls Taris' lower levels the 'Undercity' when the undercity was ACTUALLY that dark and scary place on the floor of the planet that housed horrible monsters like Rakghouls and Igear.

[b]Content:[/b]
To say this map is a [i]large[/i] map for roleplaying is an understatement - this map is massive. You start off near one of two ships, either on the upper levels by a Republic dropship or in a lower-level hangar outside a familiar Nabooan ship which, by the way, is enterable and features all you'd expect from a ship including a briefing room, crew bunks, bridge, refrigerator, and more (I couldn't find a bathroom though... WHY DOESN'T ANYONE IN STAR WARS EVER HAVE TO GO TO THE BATHROOM?!) If you start in the upper level then you can go down one of those suspended walkways that Taris is so famous for and visit a number of locations. You've got a nice upper brow cantina; a government building complete with senate room and military base (Which in and of itself has a ton of content, including a shooting range, armory, and prison); and various other rooms for different government or military purposes (Who knows half of what those crazy feds do?) There's also a Jedi Temple with some really cool things like a display of floating rocks in the center of the entrance area, a nice library, a council room, and basically everything you'd expect from your average Jedi Temple.

Also on the upper level is a door that leads to a nice lift-area that takes you to the lower levels, specifically a starport area (The area that houses the other spawnpoint at the Naboo shuttle). This then leads out to a dark and grimy lower area with a bunch of doors as you walk down. The doors lead to a bank (Which I thought was kind of odd to have on the lower level rather than the upper level); a cantina akin to the one in KotOR complete with crime lord throne, singing lounge, and combat arena, however the arena isn't even close to the complexity of the KotOR arena which was like an actual gladiator pit - this one is just a small sand box in the floor. Then you, of course, have the sewers which KotOR made so famous. In short, there's a lot to do on this map.

[b]Visuals[/b]
Yalara had potential to look great but the lack of appropriate lighting, some weird terrain bugs and too simple architecture, and a really bad choice of textures in some areas just destroyed that potential. The author took just about all they they did wrong in the last map and did it [i]right[/i] in this one - probably for the better because Taris is cooler than Yalara anyway.

The very first thing I can say is that this looks like Taris. The architecture fits and the lighting is great in almost every area, from the Taris sky to the grimy lower level. There are a few places that look worse than the others due to what I guess would just be low-quality architecture and/or textures, such as in the senate room which looks too blocky. There are other areas, however, where the quality of the map really shines, such as in the main chamber in the Jedi temple or the entire outside plaza of the upper levels.

Something that caught my eye was how the author makes use of a lot of sprites to make it look like air traffic is busy all over Taris, and it works really, really well on the upper levels as you look at the criss-crossing lanes of traffic in the sky. Unfortunately when this is attempted in the lower levels outside a window, the effect doesn't look nearly as good; just looks like 2D toy ships flying 3 feet away.

The lighting is very well done, more more so than in the Yalara map and makes a wide use of shadows and actual light sources rather than just blanket lighting. It makes the map look so nice.

[b]Conclusion[/b]
All in all this is a very nice map and definitely an improvement in quality over Cydon's last project.

~Laam'inui