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The Great Pyramid by abbath81

DJ Full 7 9 8 6
JesseG 7 8 8 7
Jose 6 8 9 10
Lara_Fox_Croft 8 9 9 10
manarch2 6 6 7 6
Mehrbod 7 7 8 6
nerdfury 5 7 7 7
Ryan 7 7 8 9
The Snarky Lesbian 5 5 5 6
 
release date: 07-Jan-2020
# of downloads: 125

average rating: 7.22
review count: 9
 
review this level

file size: 172.00 MB
file type: TR4
class: Egypt
 


author profile(s):
email(s):
circleoftyrantsnk@hotmail.com

Reviewer's comments
"(5) Gameplay & Puzzles: Level 1, adventuring outside the pyramid, was pleasant enough. There were no traps or puzzles, however the exploration and platforming kept me engaged, even though the quad bike not having a reverse did sour things just a little bit. The progression/flow was a bit muddy, meaning that I would feel like I was exploring the main path, but then I realized I was just grabbing a pickup or secret on a side path. No big deal, though, and I had a decent time. I'm sorry to say that I didn't enjoy level 2 at all. The first half of level 2 wasn't unpleasant, but the tasks weren't very interesting and I just felt like I was going through the motions in a generic Egyptian tomb. The second half of level 2 was very frustrating for me. I spent too long on a dull pushables puzzle involving 3 blocks, and thought I was done with it once I opened up a path. I continued onwards, struggling past a bunch of sliding traps, only to see that a gate was closed. "I did all that for nothing?! YARGGHH!" I think it is bad game design to allow the player to get past the sliding traps without first fully resolving the pushables puzzle (and thus opening the gate). So, I reloaded and continued with the pushables puzzle... more dull pushing and pushing. I struggled past the sliding traps again, used the lever beyond the gate, and it really frustrated me even more that the sliding traps weren't deactivated on the return trip. Adding to the above frustrations, the player can softlock themselves regarding the revolver/revolver ammo near the end of the game. (7) Enemies, Objects & Secrets: Enemy encounters with the shooting goons were thrilling, and I liked that there weren't that many medipacks, so you really had to be careful with those guys. I also enjoyed the final scorpion battle. Static object decor looked nice, although there were a few rooms that looked empty and needed more decor. The builder utilized a couple of trap objects that aren't often seen, but I would have liked to have seen more. Furthermore, as mentioned above, I really am not a fan of backtracking through traps. I think it's much better to deactivate them on the return trip, or to provide a shortcut route. (7) Atmosphere, Sound & Cameras: The atmosphere and architecture were a huge improvement compared to the builder's debut release. I didn't think any area was too "boxy" in this adventure, and the builder did an excellent job of making the sandy dunes and rock outcroppings look organic in level 1. The architecture is a bit on the simpler side in level 2 but I don't think that's an inherently bad thing and I didn't subtract a point for that. The background ambience and music cues were used well, although I think it would have been better if tense music cues played to indicate timed runs. I think both levels 1 and 2 are lacking in some camera cues regarding objectives, which added to my frustration level. (7) Lighting & Textures: I spotted no misshapen textures, however, the textures in level 1 looked very repetitive and I would have liked to have seen a lot more variety. In level 1, the lighting is consistently flat, and the sandy stone areas tend to blend in with each other. It would have been better to use more texture and lighting changes to highlight areas of interest. The flat lighting does continue in level 2. There are certainly some rooms with attractive lighting in level 2, however in many other rooms I was wondering to myself, "where is all this light coming from?". I do appreciate that the builder didn't create an almost-pitch-black underground tomb (one of my pet peeves). That said, I would have liked to have seen more feasible light sources such as torches on walls, and then having an ambience created based on these light sources, with varying light intensities within a room. Overall, I think this level is a huge step forward aesthetically compared to the builder's debut release. On the flip side, I think the gameplay was a step backwards, with the last 25% of the game being too frustrating for me. I believe there is a good kind of challenging and a bad kind of challenging, and I'm sorry to say that I felt like this level leaned towards the latter. 5/7/7/7." - nerdfury (08-May-2021)
"First part is better, second is very predictable with all the elements known from the other levels, but if you didn't play a lot of them, you should enjoy - maybe except from that pushblock/squishblock corridor. Texturing is HD but it could be much more varied, as well as the lights. Secrets were probably the best touch." - DJ Full (13-Nov-2020)
"An ordinary, but decent Egyptian adventure in which you have to discover a so-called vast pyramid, and have fun riding a quadbike. The worst element of this game is its lighting because it's too flat and unrealistic. It could have been handled way more genuine and qualified, but I appreciate the effort of the author regardless. Thank you!" - Mehrbod (28-Mar-2020)
"Here we have a quadbike to ride, some timed switches, mummies to blow up, and a large pyramid to explore. I would have appreciated the pushblock puzzle more if the objective was something less obscure than colored lighting. And if you fail to solve it before getting past some difficult squishy traps, you are met with a closed door instead of a pickup, which means you need to get past the traps three more times before continuing; this should not be allowed to happen. A more serious issue is if you don't get the revolver, you can get stuck in the rising sand pit, because you are expected to use the lasersight on a gem to open the exit. Thankfully I was able to use the grenade gun instead, but it took a few tries because of the friendly fire that can damage Lara. The architecture is good, but the wallpapered rooms take away from the immersion a bit. Overall an adventure that plays well, but too unforgiving if you miss something. 1 hour 9 minutes." - JesseG (16-Mar-2020)
"g&p: I enjoyed the puzzles, there is no real storyline ingame, the gameplay in a general way was pleansant to play, I was really proud to finish the level, as close to the end I was poisoned and I had no medikit left. I'm far from being an expert level, but I find the level pretty fair. Maybe some more medipacks here and here would be good but it was pretty ok. One thing I was a bit disapointed about was the fact that you have to shoot something in a small space (the lion gem), I only had grenades to shoot it. When you want player to shoot something in a hole, be sure that the player will have ammos. The grenade gun is not really the best weapon to shoot something like this. I was surprised when I realised what was the levels name, and for an itam name, the horseman gem. Maybe change the name would be great. Also the load camera of the first level was not good, you have to be carefull with this kind of details, it is quite important. I believe that you need to improve your script. E,O&S: I had two of the three secrets, I guess the shotgun was part of the 3th secret 'cause I never found it. Enemies were pretty hard to deal with ( I prefer short fights).Objects were nice, except the quadbike, because I could not find the reverse option that the jeep got, so I had to reload a previous save to be able to jump with the ATV. Except that the surrondings were very nicely decorated. A,S&C: Everything was nice to me, except for the cameras, maybe some more cameras would have been great. The atmosphere was very nice, felt a bit like TR4 and TR1 to me, a mix of the Sacred Lake and Egypt levels from TR1 maybe.It worked nicely. I was really under the spell of the egyptian landscape that the builder made. This builder got skills on decoration, but need to work more on some other things like the script (you can take a look here: https://www.treditor.hu/7/gmac/nglemanual/ngle07.html ) L&T: nothing to complain about, except that it seems that the builder didn't put a sun in any room, too bad, Lara's skin looks way better with sun bulbs. Except that nothing to say, I saw no texture issues.And the texture choice was nice. To sumup, this level is very nice, not perfect, but not far at all. I believe this builder will soon be someone well known and appreciated by the builders and players. Keep building, and take your time to release levels, and don't forget to find testers that will help you to fix things like levels name etc etc." - Lara_Fox_Croft (13-Mar-2020)
"Really a good effort, at least for the architecture and texturization, creating credible environments nice to explore. The atmosphere is good too, with a good use of cameras and musics. The gameplay is not so good, at least in the first level with a lot of backtracking and finding often dead ends only to get some pickups. The secrets are easier to get than the normal gameplay. Another error was not to place the revolver in the final areas, when you really need it, and some revolver ammo too to be sure the players can shoot the gem without problems. I liked the pushblocks puzzle, but in that area the corridors with the double smashing pillars were almost impossible to cross, and I finally had to use one of the Dutchy's savegames (thanks). Definitely, the author should think about another kind of gameplay, more friendly for the players, and place some more pickups here and there. Anyway an adventure with a good design, but only for expert players." - Jose (29-Feb-2020)
"This 40 minute level is a definate step upwards for the builder and I really liked the atmosphere of the first level where you explore around the titular pyramid to finally enter it. Texturing was rather clean and the lighting decent, if a bit monotonous. In the second level the visuals were not so good, many simplistic and boxy areas, wallpaper textures and dull lighting disturbed the good feelings from the first level. Gameplaywise it really has something on offer, while there is indeed a lot of to and fro and annoying dead ends (you travel a long path just to find a closed door you need to open elsewhere, or you just find some ammo), there are a few decent challenges and here and there a creative touch as well in terms of jumps and especially traps. The quadbike tour was also fairly nice, but without the reverse mode a bit annoying. What I disliked was that you can easily miss the lasersight and need it later on, then you can only hope to have a grenade left in your inventory or elseway you will be stuck for good. Overall enjoyable though and I hope the builder continues with his work. Found all three secrets." - manarch2 (02-Feb-2020)
"Small preface if you decide to play this one: Save often!
So this is kind of a weird set, since the level names seem to not be in order (received the levels yesterday), but otherwise it worked for me. However something seems a bit wrong with the sound. The first level had no background noises for me, and occasionally Lara would do an "aha!" when picking something up, but only sometimes, even when it happened it would glitch out quickly. In the second level the sound was fine. Speaking of the second level, the graphics in there made a lot of sense and the lighting was great, meanwhile the first level was a bit too deep into the pastel colors. Specifically fifty shades of sand colors everywhere, but I saw some monkey enemies and that was cool, because that looked like a model I have not seen before. Also there was the guide from TR4 as an enemy, that was a new one for me as well.
So what do I not like? Kind of everything else. From the riddles to the buggy gameplay as well as the level design. The biggest offender on the latter is the first level, that first has you climb the strangest structures, dick around somewhere in the bottom area where you never quite know what you are doing, and it included some obnoxiously hard jumps. Then you find a crystal and another key item, and for the latter you backtrack all the way back to start and climb an area for quite a while that eventually leads to the keyhole. Key and keyhole where as far away from one another as they could have been. If I had found the keyhole first I would have been incredibly salty. Don't do this please. Later in the same level you get a quad bike that you then have to balance over the tiniest structures, at the end you find a ramp. Designed in a way so that when standing at the end and just driving up you cannot do it (especially since you cannot drive backwards), so you need to combine it with an earlier jump that ended in a curve. That was horrible, and since you cannot turn there you have to load an earlier save. Awesome. Some of the "solutions" to find your next path are quite odd to find, but for some reason the secrets are really easy to find. The second level immediately looks better, even if findings things seems even harder and the "puzzles" become even more annoying. From a timed double-ramp-advance to pushing blocks for minutes on end into slightly differently colored corners, and no, you cannot climb these blocks, you have to awkwardly glitch over them diagonally. Speaking of glitchy, you can actually get stuck in this level. As you come towards the end there is a time trap (because of course it's timed) where you have to destroy a gem in an upwardly slanted crack in the wall (so you cannot hit it with the shotgun). Turns out you will have to hit it with the Revolver you may or may not have found in the previous level. I found every secret but no revolver. I managed to destroy the gem by abusing the Grenade Launcher's AoE, but essentially you are stuck there if you did not find it. A1 testing right now. Additionally, the gate immediately afterwards opens when you come near it, and then closes, even if you are still standing in front of it, at which point you will be stuck again to load another previous safe. But you really don't want to go through there anyway, cause the room it leads into has you fight two giant scorpions while being surrounded by firespewers. Thanks mate, I hate it. Take my advice, bite the bullet on this one, just stand in the corner and take the damage and poisoning while you destroy them with your Uzis (if you found those lol), then heal up and move on. Everything else will make you rage until a vein bursts in your forehead. Which was really sad to me, cause it looked like the level was getting better graphically, just the riddles really fell apart at the end." - The Snarky Lesbian (21-Jan-2020)
"There does seem to have been a resurgence in updates for levels already posted on this site, which does seem a bit disconcerting. But that's another discussion for another day, and this one can now be played without any issues (the only odd thing being that the level titles seem to have reverted to the stock TR4 script names). Now, onto the level in question. As far as scenery goes, this is really quite beautiful. The sandy NG Egyptian textures are utilised nicely, the atmosphere is well captured and the builder seems to have a good grasp on audio file usage. However, the gameplay was quite aggravating in parts, particularly the numerous backtracking sections and the exact precision required for a few of the traps. There was also an invisible platform section that was more tedious than it should have been. Ammo and weaponry was also on the scarce side, but that shouldn't really be a major issue unless you expend all of the ammo in quick succession. There is enough to go round. A few more camera hints would have also been useful once an action had been triggered, although this game is relatively linear so that shouldn't be too much of a problem. I did like the way that the block puzzles, timed runs and quad bike ride was set up, though. There definitely has been an improvement on the aesthetics side of things from this builder's debut effort and if a little more thought is put into the gameplay aspect, we could be seeing something really special one day." - Ryan (15-Jan-2020)