/vr/ - Retro Games

Combat Shock 2 - http://www.doomworld.com/idgames/?id=16966

thanks to the anon who told me that, unlike the first, the sequel has skill levels. thus follows a report for 100% kills on skill 2 (HNTR), pistol starts, no savegames.

1. one death which was my own stupid fault. missed the SSG too, somehow.

2. this was pretty annoying, several deaths usually due to blindsiding by projectiles which can travel Further Than You Think across the map's open design.

3. tricky in places but i somehow got 100% first time. suspect i was lucky. love the theme (pictured)

4. died once. over 2000 monsters is hardly Not Too Rough but you get so much health/ammo it usually doesn't matter. 100% second attempt.

5. very frustrating. amazingly, 3000 monsters counts as Not Too Rough? 30+ minutes to make a significant dent in this number. not terribly hard due to plentiful resources, but still requires what i consider too much planning/tactics for the lowest skill level. the worst part is the teleporting revenant horde at the very end of the map. it surrounds you from without to subvert circle-strafing; instead you must survive inside an angry cloud of missiles, any one of which can remove half your health. dying after 60+ minutes careful play is thoroughly disheartening.

6. this one fails, i'm afraid. i'm sure there's some strategy but the whole point is that the lowest skill level should not require trial and error. plus, later on there are some really obnoxious pillar jumping / crusher sequences too. no way anyone could call this Not Too Rough.

7. an easy 100% first time. seems out of place, maybe intended as a warm-down?

summary: first impression is often "wow how does this count as Not Too Rough?" but it's mostly easier than it looks (with the obvious exception of map06). one pattern emerges: the author consistently underestimates the difficulty of dealing with large crowds of revenants. however, other than that he seems capable of balancing slaughter maps for wider audiences.