Mattioz Pack - V1.4.4 - Chemicals Update. 1.4.4

Yo, I've been following the development of this for a bit now. Here's my honest take on the pack thus far:

Turquoise Hill: Great track all around. The "new" track of the pack as of writing this, and it definitely shows how far you've gone as a map maker. 5/5

Genocide City: Honestly, the only map left that needs a redesign. It's not good. The theme is spot on, and there are parts I like, but many jumps between buildings leave little time to regain control before you careen off the side into the pit. 2/5 I usually SOC this out

Chemical Plant: I'm a little mixed about this one. It's great, but some of the sludge puddles can seem kinda cheap or unfair in placement. Great otherwise. 4/5

Advanced Emerald Hill: This is where I started seeing your development and was happy to see how things were going. One of my personal favorites, though, the hills seem to have a white stripe across them atm. 5/5 with a few nitpicks graphically

Metropolis: Holy crumbs this is a massive glow-up! A mixed track initially turned into one of my all-time favorites both layout and graphically. The music seems to lag slightly before looping, but that's just nitpicking at this point. 5/5 well deserved


Overall, the pack has improved heavily over time, leaving Genocide City left as the only outlier in a pool of great tracks. Highly recommend this for any server, and I look forward to any future tracks and updates :)

Generally, this map pack is pretty ok. The layouts are pretty safe but they have their problems which I'll get into.

Genocide City: This map I have problems with the most. The paraglider sections are not good at all. Both sections are just simple straights that could have just been road and the landings are extremely rough. The 1st section does attempt to give a bit of landing room but it's very short and immediately followed up with a hairpin turn. The 2nd section is basically a right angle turn with no landing room. In fact, it's so not safe to land there that it's way easier and faster to just skip the intended landing area and glide to the next section. The shortcut also has enemies that can be abused to damage boost through the offroad far enough to hit the speed panel and take the cut without a shoe in vanilla behavior. And finally, the last item box row is right at the end of the track and obscures the turn enough to mess people up, even with the accompanying signage.

Chemical Plant: This is my favorite map out of the pack. I like the sliptiding sections the most. The zipper placements on this map are weird. I'm not sure what their purpose is outside of being used for recovery. The shoe cut at the Mega Mack (underwater) section can still be brute force'd despite being glued due to the speed panel. All you need is a well timed red spark.

Advanced Emerald Hill: This map is pretty decent. I don't have too many complaints outside of the shortcut being able to be brute force'd due to the speed panel (hmm this seems to be a pattern) and the last item box row being even closer to the finish line than the one in Genocide City and therefore not even being able to be used considering you're barely able to mash an item out in that time. Once again, love the sliptides.

Metropolis: This is my 2nd least favorite map. I question the decision to put an invincibility cut that saves about a second or so at the very beginning of the map where no one can roll invincibility at the start of the race. Right after that section is the most confusing speed panel into spring panel I've ever seen. They're so small, how is one expected to take it somewhat consistently? The shoe shortcut can't be easily brute force'd this time, even with the speed panels inside but I don't like how it spits you out facing a wall. And finally, the paraglider section at the end feels completely tacked on with barely any thought. Once again, it's just a straight that could have been a ramp of some sort. You can't even utilize the paraglider to its fullest existent by flying over the rails because of impassable linedefs.

Will probably follow up with some more bonus problems and slight nitpicks in discussion in the future.

Welcome to releases!