: I have to disagree here: This level is quite annoying to play. The automap is
: utterly useless; there are so many windows the entire complex is instantly
: visible (and overlapping) and one can't use the standard technique of
: looking for open-ended hallways, half-visible rooms, and so on. I have a
: lot of trouble memorizing the layout, having to constantly consult the map
: for the location of stairs up the second floor in particular.
That's at least partly intentional. I've always believed the automap made things too easy and detracted from the immersion factor. It's not that big a map and you ought to be able to remember the location of the stairs, without much difficulty.
The usual
: complaint of switches being far from their doors applies, and the spoiler
: guide admits that the switches are deliberately layed out to force the
: player to visit most of the level. And aside from the puzzles, I didn't
: find the combat all that difficult.
I didnt find the combat all that difficult but boy oh boy you shoulda heard the other project members scream! They made me tone it down immensely. Regardless, I deliberately tried to avoid the 'rear admiral' technique; where monsters teleport in, they rarely do it in places you've already been. I personally find that technique to be an admission of failure on the part of the mapper. It's as if he was saying he couldn't make a challenge without cheating. In fact I believe that the nardo group did their best to avoid that.
The mixing of technology and
: Renaissance architecture isn't done nearly as well as Mt. Vesuvius,
: although this could be accepted as meaning the Pfhor have built their
: installation on top of an existing human building instead of making it
: from scratch as they apparently did in MV (which returns us to the
: question of why there would be a classical stone building on a distant
: colony).
Well, if you don't like my texturing, you don't like my texturing :P (but what about my superb lighting?) To be honest I don't even remember the rooms well enough to try to rebut you.
It was in fact intended as a pfhor installation built in a garrisoned human building, you're correct. As for the distant colony - well, LRR was originally part of TI; I removed it in a fit of pique at one point which was since resolved, and we released LRR and EDM as part of a bonus pack which I believe we called: TI : the Lost Levels. As such we threw together a story - I'm a logician, and I've always kind of admired Cantor, so I wrote it around him. I didnt really notice that it wasn't supposed to be set on the earth of TI; and even if I had, I was not about to dork around with making it all alien or whatever.
Kind of funny the way answers turn out, eh? I bet half of the wild theories on the story page are attempts to make a bunch of developer fuckups like this, consistent.
