Once the player deals with the new "resident population", it's worth taking a minute to look around. You start out in an open courtyard. As in Trojan, the sky is fiery red, but even more fiery than before. This moon is clearly not a friendly "M class" planet. It would be interesting to speculate on life support for the colony in this environment, but we'll have a better opportunity for that on a future level. There are a number of other features of this level that are unique for a map based on the M1 engine. The authors have taken great pains to make this feel more open than is ordinarily possible in M1. To do this in spite of the polygon limit, there are a lot of compromises here. I'm sure that some of the true mapmakers will have a lot more to say about this, but it's quite evident that great pains were taken to make do with less. The polys tend to be very large and huge swaths are plastered with single textures. There are a lot of circular structures, but the polygonal approximations are much cruder that in M2/I/AO. This level uses 255 polys - not a poly to spare! Another feature of this level is the way structures are stacked on top of each other. For example, there are two circular rooms that fit squarely one over the other, much as would be expected in a real structure. We'll see this again later. The various rooms fit together nicely with excellent flow and interconnectivity. There are also some new scenery objects here, including a couple of pine trees. All in all, Matt and Andrew did a superb job of making this place seem real.
Whichever direction the player takes, the first terminal they come to will be a message from Shaki, the AI who sent us here:
Hello there Human. I am SHAKI, the colony's last remaining computer AI, but who are you? . . . There is no time for minor discussions at the present, there is work to be done. . . I'm afraid to tell you this but you are going to have to do some fighting for me. . . Some time ago, the colony's sensors detected $Bfive$b unidentified spacecraft orbiting the New Arizona moon. . . Fifteen hours later, the aliens gave the colonists "the worst". They bombarded the colony's only military facility, annihilating it within hours. . . Meanwhile, their computer forces were attacking the main computer. They destroyed the colony's other AIs, but I managed to hide myself away. . . I faked my own death and shut down. . . Your mission here is to explore this section of the colony. . . Once you are done exploring, return to a terminal.
Hmm, maybe our suspicions were overblown (yeah, right). This Shaki seems reasonable. OK, let's go exploring. In contrast to the last level, this one is highly nonlinear. There is no set order of exploration and there many places to visit. At one point there is a transporter that will take the player up to the ledges overlooking the first courtyard, where you can pick up some extra ammo. At another the player will come to a well-guarded room containing the AR - an absolute necessity as we'll encounter our first troopers here. Not many on this level outside of an inaccessible room with a bunch of them, but that will change soon enough.
Perhaps the most important finding on this level, however, is a terminal with a message from an unidentified source:
'Who am I?' you ask. What difference does it make, the chances of you finding out are slim, the chances of you being alive tomorrow are even slimmer. Here are some more questions for you. Who $Breally$b killed the colonists? Was it really the aliens, or perhaps the Congregated Earth governments funding this puny colony. The answer is: "believe me, you would rather not know". I know who did it; the colonists don't know, but these aliens know for sure, so what $Breally$b happened?
The significance of this terminal will become fully clear only at the end of the game, when the identity of the mysterious source will become known. For now suffice it to say that things are not at all as they seem. The seed of doubt has been planted . . .