Its a good map pack to be honest.

agreed

I do know these BG guys are outstanding mappers in the most artistic sense of the word. But the fact that they would not take any kind of criticism and that they despise and attack anyone who dares to say they don't like their maps, literally destroys all their work.

0/10

When do maps stop being maps and start becoming works of art? This was the question i faced with this rather disappointing release. Although i think map design is a positive creative form of expression and i don't claim to be able to do any better the viralis pack crossed the line. MikiesRoom (not featured in this release) is an excellent example of a creative map with exceptional gameplay. Of all the maps in viralis i found wood the most playable with earth running a close second. The problem with earth is it is a little too easy to setup control of the outdoor area and gameplay is weighted here. As for the rail void, fire and metal maps - well the designers had to be on some heavy drugs when they made these (like aphextwins "drucqs "- lots of interesting textures but ultimately unpalatable). The upside is this - fire and metal (even earth) do both have excellent potential as ctf maps (just tone the textures down, please!) and i would like to see the developers take those maps there. But unfortunately with so many maps out there with excellent gameplay, true quake form and pleasing on the eye - this just doesnt cut the mustard.

wood is the best.

I'd like to know how you know, and why we're supposed to trust you? You admitted to not having done much mapping (failed even), you were not a part of the bgmp team, and as far as we can tell, you have not been a part of any community project of this kind....

Again, what this boils down to is your ignorant comments about the effort we put in to this pak, not whether or not you liked it. Criticism is one thing, fallacious comments, quite another.

BTW, you are the one who stated people didnt post negative comments out of "fear" of the bg community.

"I'm aware of what goes into it, trust me on that."

No, you dont.

And no one conspired to 'gang up' on you. We just all happen to think that your statements are asinine, and we told you so.

We can handle 'criticism' - all experienced mappers deal with it on a regular basis. We just dont appreciate someone who telling us that we didnt try as hard as we did on the last pack, and then aiming negativity at the bg community. Thats not criticism, thats an individual with an inferiority complex being a jerk for no good reason. Your comments are ignorant, uninformed, and offensive. Go crawl back into your hole.

Wow, you guys like to take things out of proportion don't you? Helps your weak story I suppose, as does teaming up. :)

I don't HATE it, I just prefer the first one, and I don't think the same effort that went into the first one, was present in the second one.

I'm aware of what goes into it, trust me on that.

But as everyone can plainly see, you've blown this way out of proportion, which leads me to the point of actually posting what I did.

To prove that criticism cannot be taken.

And if BG is to be feared, I can do but one thing: laugh hysterically.

"kindly take your effort quips and stick 'em up ur ass, & in the process i'll tell you how much effort you put in", said one of the young lads below.

Dude (to employ your laymen colloquialism), you can say "em" as a aspirated form of the inpersonal pronoun but to improperly express your rage and young testoterone anger by the following words, up ur ass, seems a bit feeble minded.

I would address your interlocutor as follows:

"How dare you berate me, you single brain celled protozoan! Oh, come to think of it, isn't amazing everyone that a dyslexic symian be able to actually phrase his monosyllabic thoughts into such trite and trivial verbiage?! Maybe a rectal enema of whatever fecal matter that makes up 95% of your being would be in order?"

See? With the proper ideomatic and correct syntax one can muster up the precise and concise ideas one wishes to convey to one's dialetic rebuttal.

Well, in the end, I take most Quake III pundits know little of the latter since trace elements of neocortex is dedicated to reading and writing nor has it been committed in their simplistic cerebral neuroarchitectural protocellular organ to other simple animalistic actions as pushing a mouse button.

Oh! The map! It's...it's...uh...it's...uh...a very nice map. There. I typed in words everyone here would understand. Yes, very nice map. It incorporates many ideas and concepts found in other games. Too bad it's Quake III where all you do is chase some firing lunatic around and achieve nothing. 8/10 for this map.

Those who despise it should improve it or stay quiet.

One more issue before I click on "Go on. Post something good" button from dork #3, PSI says, "lefty-no shit there's a difference."

That's incorrect. What he should've have typed is:

"Dear Lefty,

No shit there's a difference!"

Lefty needs a capital "L" since we are addressing an individual. And, "No shit there's a difference!" is a sentence on its own.

Now...how important is all this diatribe (this kindergarten verbal dribble), anyways?

fear the bg crew!

LOL!

Hey lefty, your "opinion" is that the first BGMP was better, it's not fact. I respect your opinion, I just happen to dissagree with it.

You have no idea the effort that went in to BGMP2, so please keep those ignorant comments to yourself. It just makes you look stupid. As much as I'd like to go in to detail the amount of effort that this team put in to this pak, I'll spare everyone else here the 10 page long dissertation. I think the quality of the product speaks for itself, even if you dont particularly enjoy it.

Creating a pak with 5 custom maps strictly following a specific theme and including custom textures, shaders, music and sounds created for the pak and adhering to the theme, then putting it altogether in a neat little package takes a lot more then time to accomplish. (that's without mentioning the comic, wallpapers, 7-8 beta tests per map and the inordinate amount of discussion that went in to the early stages of this project before a single instance of q3radiant was even loaded)

Thanks for taking the time to look at the pak, post your ignorant comments, and especially thanks for the "0" vote to bring the score down as low as you could for us. We appreciate your efforts.

lefty - no shit there's a difference. dude seriously.. i couldn't care less if you burned the pk3 to cd and pissed on it while pricking a 'bgmp team' voodoo doll coz u hate it so much. you always get love/hate's for a map & i know plenty that love it. BUT - you're trying to tell us.. the guys that made it, how much effort we put into it, and i'm telling you that's not opinion - it's pure bullshit.

you simply don't know about what happened behind the scenes, or 'why' it took so long (not that you have to know) and even WORSE, u've attempted mapping!! so u should know better.

kindly take your effort quips and stick 'em up ur ass, & in the process i'll tell you how much effort you put in.

btw, we gather in irc on tuesdays for Chaos' teaching of the 'BG ways'. 8pm est

Fear? Of what? Getting your door busted down and your wife kidnapped by the burial-grounds crew? Lol.

Your right that time and effort are not one and the same, but clearly we put a TON of effort into this pack (as well as time). Just because you dont like it doesnt mean we didnt put effort into it.

Psi, there's a difference between time and effort. One can put 25982305 hours into something and could still not be great... quality time...

I know it's not easy for people to disagree with the BG way, but I do. Most people either lie or don't say anything out of "fear". I know the last one was much better, and that's it.

mapper? not I... though I've tried and failed.

that is my real name, well, nickname at least. Besides, no one wants to know who I am. :) :) :)

hey ummm...wonder if I got your IP from Tig if it would match up with one I have at BG? maybe I'll change my name to "hmmm"?

snore...... run run run...

snore.

np kery, just lettin' ya know bout the tex.. easily mixed up & you're more than entitled to your opinion. :D

what makes myself, and no doubt the other mappers, wonder why we even bother to put so much effort into such a thing - is when someone says 'lacking effort'. no-one , and i mean no-one! has the right to tell us how much effort went into this, as only we know what went on behind the scenes and what it took to get these 5(6) maps out to ppl.

Sorry about getting the wood textures mixed up. They look so similar, I think it was an honest mistake.

Psion - It's all good. :) Honestly, I have NEVER made a map that was of any quality, so I am totally a couch quaterback, so I do appreciate the effort, despite my lazy comments. Thanks for the team's great work, and as I really did not want to be divisive, I rescind my comments.

lefty - you sound like a bitter mapper that got left out of all the fun.

.. & GIJOE? lol. if you can point me to another map-pack with a similarly done theme or executed to the same degree.. i'll pack your crack pipe free of charge!

btw, stop hiding & post a link to some of your work.

Leave your real name lefty, if u got the balls :P

... also the fact that 90% of the comments have come from burial grounds ... let's not be too biased.

Thanks for the comments guys!

"lacking the design and effort that went into the first one. "

Saying our maps lack the design that went into the first pack is subjective, so i wont argue that, but dont say that we didnt put the effort into it - we did.

The standards for maps have changed over the years as systems have gotten faster, so binding ourselves to the strict standards that existed when quake was released would not only have been unnecessary, but it would also have stifled our creativity. Yes, the frame rates aren’t especially good on some of the maps – but not to the extent that they are unplayable on any reasonable system. This map pack is not just about gameplay, or just about aesthetics – it’s about finding a balance between the two and having a pack that kicks ass all-around, rather than focuses on one element.

I thought the first one was better, more in tune to design, gameplay, and technical standards. Frame rates ARE horrible, only 2 of the maps really play well. (earth and water) Very blocky on the others, and lacking the design and effort that went into the first one.

And I really disagree with the "original idea" concept. Reminds me of an old GIJoe cartoon episode...

I didn't think they could do better than the first one, but this one is twice as nice. They also put a lot more work into the theme, and story.

The vertical action of Firewalker will knock your socks off. :o)

"Nothing that new here. Well done, but I guess I am looking for something new and exciting. I'll never play these maps, because there is so much out there that is more original (see Cardigan's estatica) and plays better. And the "nature themed" map should have been higher quality (see wviperw's decidia). Yeah, or maybe I'm just getting crotchety in my old age. :)"

kerygma- my map doesn't use the same textures as On-x's 'got wood'. i sourced them from custom packs, the net, and modified them a long time ago. :)

i'm hearing 'it should be this, it should be that'... jax's map plays well. if it was of 'higher quality', you wouldn't even see it on a server (same goes for all our maps.. you guys have to realise the amount of balancing between play & detail that went on). all i can do is suggest that people spend time with the maps to learn the intricacies of the layouts. they were tested for a lot longer than a single sitting. :)

I disagree heavily with the estatica comment. that map's main priority was a showcase of q3map2 (stated by cardigan in the readme), and i found it didn't play terribly well... you can't play decidia either, even though it is beautiful. not taking anything away from these gorgeous show maps, but they are unplayable on your average osp server. if all you're looking for is new q3map2 features & concept maps, this isn't what the pack's about (even though it does have numerous special features & loaded with original ideas).

hmmmm- that is untrue. gameplay was of utmost importance, along with the theme. we are players ourselves also. :)

Viralis is about an innovative, original idea.. balancing both a heavy theme & gameplay, & serving up some new, solid FFA action. which it does! :)

congrats to the team, the amount of work that went into this pack was astonishing. :D

maps were ok. the reviewer hit it basically on the head.

it seemed taht the team was more concerneed about sticking to the theme then playability. for the ammount of time it took for the pack to come out i was expecting alot more.

overall it was a good map pack but not great.

WTF did you forget Necrochaos map, you want harsh, get in any of these maps and I will show you harsh homie!

Maybe that was too harsh. I liked Psion's Wood (and on-x's CTF "Got wood?" with same textures) and Finko's Fire Walker (nice Quad :). Ok, bed time.

Nothing that new here. Well done, but I guess I am looking for something new and exciting. I'll never play these maps, because there is so much out there that is more original (see Cardigan's estatica) and plays better. And the "nature themed" map should have been higher quality (see wviperw's decidia). Yeah, or maybe I'm just getting crotchety in my old age. :)

These maps kick ass!

Ownage map pak. All maps are unique and it shows that they all were made with love =)

They perform good too, my system is a amd xp 1700 , 512mb (cas2) ram and my good old Geforce3 ti200 (128mb edition). I get no fps lag on any of the maps.

I love them all and can't pick out any one favourite. I enjoy playing on them all, depending on my mood =)

The music is very high quality map music and each track fits it's map like hand in glove =)

gg guys =)

The guy with the "XP 2400 Gig of DDR, Ti500" needs to get a grip on his system if he's getting lousy framerates in any Q3 map. LOL!

I appreciate the reviewer taking the time to write something up about the Viralis map pak, I just wish he was a little more detailed with his opinions.

Someone drag Tig out of retirement! :)

"A well orchestrated team effort. And as to the regen placement in Steel Force (BGMP9), there should be some risk in aquiring a power-up like that... it adds to the game play."

I would like to add that the locations and difficulty for the quad acquisition are proportional to the advantage one has when holding this powerup. All powerups should be placed like this, IMO.

Having been a beta-tester for this mappack, I can honestly say that the maps were tweaked to near-perfection before being released. I also credit the makers of the music that went along with the pak and those who created the custom textures.

These maps are designed to play with large crowds (a minimum of six for all) and that is where the gameplay shines.

For the record, I have XP1800 512DDR Ti4200 and have great framerates.

Excellent work fellas, I hope to be recruited for the next great project.

What isnt there to like? 5 maps for q3 that are well done and creative.

Bunch of talented mappers releasing maps that are far removed from the repititious gothic and base themes.

This map pack rocks.

Im looking forward to future collaborations among the BG crew.

Umm do any of you guys play q3?

No, we just download the maps to stare at them :)

AWESOME Work...Nothing but quality!!!

Congrats to the team. Can't wait for the next ones.

Umm do any of you guys play q3?

Game play is kinda cruddy, very slow. Only exception being Mortal Wounds. Frame rates are horrible (XP 2400 Gig of DDR, Ti500). Getting in and out of all the Quad area's make that powerup useless....though that's not necessarily a bad thing.

The only value , if any, these maps hold are visual. Sorry. Great idea, good effort, poor results. They just do not play well.

very good FFA maps, with my personal favorites being psion's, stormshadow's and jax's contributions. Finko's were good but his maps are always too open for my tastes.

framerates are low (main reason why I prefer bgmp1 over this release), but if you ave the system, it's well worth checking out.

I very nice effort. Really enjoy the maps.

What do you expect from the BG team !
Nothing but excellence IMO, theme wise you can't beat these maps with a bunch of friends :D

Can you cay BG Pak3 ?

A well orchestrated team effort. And as to the regen placement in Steel Force (BGMP9), there should be some risk in aquiring a power-up like that... it adds to the game play.

Great map pack!! I'm now waiting for the BG Map Pak 3 .. get to it guys :)

great work, guys :) i know you put lots of blood, sweat and tears into this, and it turned out well!!