General
-Based on your schematic, it looks like you are going to cut the lift in BMS B and add the net upward movement in your B1-B2 maps. You really don’t have to do this as your maps just need to be net neutral if the BMS B lift is kept. In HL, the movement from HL E-G is up, up, down. You can add a second down in E (by ramping down the tracks) in the “filler section.” Problem solved w/minimal modification of B.
-Think it’s too late to use Abrupt Awakening now. The piece was meant as an EXACT replacement for Sirens which played in HL’s A so it’s placement in the new B maps would be anachronistic. Note that Valve also drops the creepy, haunted theme after the HL A map as well which is another reason why this piece is inappropriate. For an ominous feel, Dark Drone would be better, but the only way I can see it working is in F, perhaps to accompany an HECU trap. Imagine all of the conveyor belts, etc. of the automated factory suddenly stopped w/the power going off and the area only illuminated by flickers…then you see HECU coming to attack you.
-Realistically though, I think there’s only 2 viable musical choices. My 1st choice is Soldiers Have Arrived for battle music. This piece is good for the HL E ambush toward the end of the section as the player is starting to get into HECU-controlled zones. Plus, the track also has a HL2 Ep1-2 feel toward the middle, which is cool. The only issue is that it’s a little long for the battle seen in HL so the battle in your E section would need to be extended a bit to accommodate the track, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. My 2nd choice would be a piano short for a puzzle in F to keep with the theme set by BMS.
-Someone mentioned wanting to see an HECU vs zombie scene in OaR. This has already been done in ST Uncut. A fresher approach would be having a pair of marines flush out all of the zombies in a room by throwing 3-4 GRENADES. This hasn’t been seen before in HL but would be cool to watch and makes up for the HECU not using enough grenades to flush the player out. This is best placed in the office complex but could also be introduced in the B sections.
-Generally speaking, instead of dramatically messing with the lighting here and in the A sections, you can alter it more naturally w/bullsquid spit, since it’s bioluminescent. Most of the tunnels you designed are kind of featureless and boring at this point in development (especially in A1). You can use the spit (and other fluids, like human, alien blood), corpses and gibs to tell a story.
2nd ½ of D
-Not sure if you were going to do a major cut here but I think you should keep it, both for the squid/sentry area and the supply room. Most importantly though, this map is useful because the length of the long segment can be used to DISPLACE the E map downwards (or in other directions) to create more room for an expanded G area later. You don’t have to copy the 90 deg turns in this section verbatim, just keep the long segment.
-The supply room here should be expanded a bit to accommodate the different enemy types. There’s a bullsquid, headcrab and a barnacle packed really close together which doesn’t make much sense. Why didn’t the barnacle eat the headcrab or squid and why didn’t the squid attack the headcrab?
-You don’t have to replicate the “Yore dead Freeman” sign here as it’s already been done in BMS I think. If not, “Your dead Freeman” is a better spelling. The only other sign that does need to be replicated is “Surrender Freeman.”
-At the end of this section are 3 marines who just stand there waiting for you which looks really stupid. Perhaps you could have them rappel down from a higher level or set up another type of ambush (e.g. coming out from a room). I favor the latter because I think rappelling behind moving crates would look fucking awesome in the F ambush to replace the weird shooting through boxes scene.
-You can add a non-functional crane here since there’s a claw in this area and in an earlier segment of D.
E
-Think you should stick w/my E schematic for the redesign (image 9 pitch bible). There’s nothing dramatically different about it as it’s essentially the same thing as HL E w/2 exceptions: 1) a convergent track early on which is necessary to use an RPG marine or TOW launcher BMS-style (i.e. destroys the tram). 2) the dynamite/C4 area becomes a mandatory segment and allows you to access an alternate tunnel where you can commandeer a tram from a marine (the most memorable part of E) and get to the marine ambush w/2 equally valid approaches. Not to toot my own horn here but this really is a close to flawless approach for keeping both fidelity to HL and working w/in BMS constraints.
-I think your redesign of the operable turntable is even more of a radical departure than what I’m proposing for E and there’s fewer justifiable reasons for doing so. You’re basically using my proposal w/2 alternate paths but displacing it AFTER the ambush whereas mine comes BEFORE. I think my proposal makes more sense because it actually makes the dynamite scene WORK (i.e. it’s mandatory and the explosion opens a hole in the wall leading to a tram that you can COMMANDEER. Your proposal doesn’t allow the latter scene to take place, which is one of the most iconic in HL OaR. Essentially, I’m making a departure from HL’s E using a much better rationale than what you’re using…unless you decided on this to circumvent some tram backtracking problem. For this issue, you should ideally recruit a programmer to help you fix it. It really sucks to make flawed design choices simply because the BMS devs didn’t have the foresight to pick up on this issue.
-Re: dynamite man…he shouldn’t be too hard to implement. My proposal basically gives the detonation purpose and I think you could do this in a way that’s similar to the car shop trap in ST Uncut’s G. Only this time, the player can CLIMB OVER the debris to access the new area. Again, if you swapped dynamite w/C4 detonated by remote satchel, you wouldn’t have to model the dynamite detonator or animate the marine to use it.
-As for the filler in the large loop, I think you should keep it. E is different from the other maps because there is more tram travel here than in any other map and the sense of travel is reinforced by having the player STAY ON the tram rather than having to get off frequently like in the office complex, which is mostly on foot. This is really the section that puts the player “On a Rail” and cuts here impact that feeling significantly. What you can do in the tram travel segments is use the parallel track design seen in BMS C (where the marines are on a tram shooting at you). This creates room to add very cool scripts for storytelling…there’s plenty to pick from in the pitch bible
-The large loop is also a great place to put a down-ramping section (for a net neutral change in height), which would help you from making unnecessary edits to the end of BMS B.
-At the vort encounter, where they are blockading the marines trapped by the boom gate switch, add a third STATIONARY marine BEHIND the tripmines to engage the 2 vorts deeper in the corridor (they don’t really do anything in HL). The 2 marines by the boom gate switch could be busy fighting several vorts that spawn on the lower tracks to explain why they weren’t helping him.
-A security room w/monitors can be introduced by the marine ambush showing them reinforcing the surface rocket area post priming.
F
-The E map is pretty packed with action so I think it’s appropriate to break this up at the beginning of the F map w/a complex puzzle on the level of (or slightly simpler) than the power puzzle in BMS A. This replaces the rather uninspired power box obstacles at the beginning of this segment.
-As this is a small map, you can SIGNIFICANTLY expand the vertical space here to showcase a Mat. Trans./factory like theme as well as expand the rail system above and below the player (logistically, the latter would need to be done in the non-looped areas). This is another good eye candy section and things that you can include: 1) more automated crate moving apparatuses 2) conveyer belts, perhaps carrying rocket parts 3) loader bots moving stuff around because quite frankly, they look fucking cool and are only used once in HL. They can be grimed up to match the feel of OaR.
-Have the marines that shoot through boxes instead ambush the player by rapelling down from a higher floor. Again this looks awesome and adds a little more variety to this section.
-The power box obstacles on the upper floor can be retained to keep fidelity w/HL, as they represent a significant stretch of this map.
G
-My G map schematic (image 10 pitch bible) is really nothing more than a sketch…it can be as dramatically different from HL or as undramatic as you like. The only things I’d like to keep are the skybox elements (e.g. Apache flying toward Apprehension, Ospreys deploying troops, etc.) for storytelling purposes. Don’t use any harriers or mantas though…these surprises should be introduced in ST.
-A lot of my suggestions which deal w/expanding the Mat. Trans theme in F can also be used here.
-Keep the zombie sentry trap ambush either here or ported to an upper floor of F as it’s pretty memorable.
-Do add an outdoor tram travel section because traveling on a tram outdoors is novel and fun (like driving in HL2 and beyond).
-If you are going to add a lake in the outdoor vista section (I think this is iffy because of space issues), use Lake Mead as a reference. The BMS hydroelectric dam is modeled after the Hoover Dam, which supplies water to this lake (I used to live in Vegas and have been to both places).
-A fun script could be placed in the distance w/5-6 vorts engaging an Apache.
-The one MUST DO in this section is to make sure that the end of G terminates indoors to facilitate a smooth transition to BMS C. Once the player gets indoors, you can have a dynamite trap cover the previous area w/debris. This accounts for the laser dynamite trap in G and prevents any tram backtracking problems.
-Don’t forget the sniper and make him easy to kill w/either MP5 grenades (preferable since you’ve killed him already w/grenades and RPG in ST) or hand grenades.
