In a long line of singleplayer Quake I and
II releases comes Satyr, Alk14 for Q2. Kona's
experience keeps growing and it truly shows
here; Satyr packs excellent design and combat
in a new map dressed in medieval, stone, and
wood overtones, including a bit of IKBASE (likely
unknowingly on the author's part), making the
overall visual presentation one of the most
diverse ever seen in a Q1/Q2 map.
The quality of the level design is quite impressive
with the aforementioned styles meshed with one
another in a theme that may seem trivial at
first but truly adding to the effect of the
story. While Quake maps don't need a story to
thread gameplay, the effort towards explaining
the situation is definitely appreciable. As
for routing, the layout slowly leads through
the vertical component, passing by some impressive
architecture and neat designs (although the
level of complexity is somewhat mid-range),
through a variety of intelligently-placed staircases
and ramps, ending in an arena with just enough
room to make the final fight challenging but
not so much as to make it too easy.
Featured here are 197 enemies, but fortunately
they're not all immediately spawned; only a
fraction of them are, with the majority of them
teleporting in. Most of the Q2 enemies make
at least one appearance but are sorted out and
placed in optimal position so as to evoke plenty
of out-of-seat moments, keeping combat fresh
and consistent. The intertwined layout lends
itself to map-crawling, guaranteeing new suprises
in old places, thus rendering consistent pacing.
And the pacing is fast and furious, starting
heavy and ending even heavier, but still very
feasible on Hard.
Although the lack of good lighting makes certain
fights tricky, Satyr is without a doubt among
Kona's best and most polished releases all things
considered, and is most definitely recommended.
