This map contains a wake up, 3 test chambers, a central area incoporating the last puzzle, and a medium sized BTS area.

The map itself tries to remain in keeping with aperture labs scenerey and texturing, but uses two new portal fizzlers, and a new fizzler mechanism in room 3 which I haven't seen before. (sorry if this has already been used!) A walkthrough will soon be on youtube, I'll edit this when it's up. The map is medium-long and medium difficulty, and follows a small story with a nod to everyone's favourite song at the end. Criticism is welcome, and I'd love to know what you think! Screenshots are up at href=http://s46.photobucket.com/albums/f113/Laurie2907/The%20Electric%20Castle/>
but I'm not a fantastic artist

Download database at: dload.php?action=file&file_id=203
Comments are welcomed.

Moved. It is generally good form to copy the description and screenshots into the release thread.

ok. firstly. this map looks really good. and aside from a few MINOR texture issues i didn't see anything that looked really bad. there are however a few errors that i found. from the VERY start of the map. i would normally put spoiler tags on these, but as they don't really effect gameplay (except negatively) i won't this time

errors:
1) in the opening of the map. all is black... if you push ANY of the direction keys while its black... then when you "awake" from the vault you cannot move. you have no choice but to restart the map.

2) if you leave the opening room BEFORE getting the portal gun, you are screwed you have no choice but to restart the map.

also the energy ball puzzle is much easier to beat if you do this http://img518.imageshack.us/img518/237/theelectriccastle0000lt1.jpg don't know if that was intentional, or you didn't think of it. but its how i beat the puzzle first (before doing it the right way)

and this is more of a gripe than an error. but i didn't think this looked right. the floor just looks to "thin" for a big metal texture
[img]http://img204.imageshack.us/img204/7379/theelectriccastle0001ft2.jpg[/img]

other than those things i think you did a good job. keep up the good work.

Thanks for the advice, I meant to set the door in the first room to open on touch in case you forgot the portalgun, but I must've forgotten -.- also, thanks for the 'solution' to the first chamber. I'll stick a noportal area over that for the next release but I won't have much time for the next few weeks. Hopefuly I'll manage to grab a moment to upload a new version next weekend

that's is mine solution, no bug abusing, like the one founded by rellikpd
http://it.youtube.com/watch?v=kPpWdBE_9Bo

I'm truly awed that someone will put up a speedrun so quick after I uploaded it - you're awesome dude! my solution is up at
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=dwF9ntHZSZM

infernet89 wrote:
... no bug abusing, like the one founded by rellikpd

lol i've seen you use such bugs but you are still the speedrun king imb gleem though both these new maps (inc: [WIP]Chamber_01) don't leave you much room to speed run lol

and SSWEEEEETTT YOU GOT THE WCC!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

My quick review:

Looks amazing. Definitely keeps with the Aperture theme.
The fizzler/solid wall mechanism was sweet. Some more of those puzzles would be great if you make another
One gripe I had: The blood-smeared floor below the blue wavy energy wall made me think that the blue energy would kill me. The falling sparks added to it.

Overall, great map!!!!

I agree! Thought it was a great map, loved the new fizzler puzzles, especially the moving one.

The one gripe similar to rellikpd's was in the room with the blood on the ground that Talgoran mentioned if you bring the cube thats on the button inside there's no way to get out. I got to the button without the cube of course but then I had to restart the map.

This was a fun map. I believe I found an unintended solution in the room with the mobile fizzler though.
you can fire a portal through that gap, then walk through the wavy blue fizzler behind you to the area where the stairs rise out of the floor and place the opposite portal there.

Very fun

Nice map, and I believe I have found an unintended solution in test chamber 1:
you can put one portal right under the ball launcher and the second portal under the ball catcher (the portal will be created even under the elevator switch), the catcher will catch the ball even if it arrives at a 90? degree
is it the shortcut you are talking about in your readme file?

I don't remember talking about any shortcuts in my readme ^_^ but that's the same solution Rellikpd found I knew it was there, then forgot to fix it before the final release sigh

ah, sorry, now I see, that was readme of another map I was playing today
scratches his head

and I liked your "moving fizzler" puzzle, it was original and pretty clear to solve

I'm still learning about mapping. What does it mean when you get the message "Node: Graph out of date"? I see that message frequently on these custom maps.

Here's my never-made-a-map version: the node graph is some part of the map related to AI that is created when the map is compiled. When this happens, the node graph is given a timestamp of the current time. If it is too long after this time stamp that the map is opened, the game assumes the node graph is too old to be correct and re-compiles.

I believe the trick around it is to set your system clock ahead a year, then compile, then set your clock back.

It doesn't affect game play which was my concern, so in light of that, if its out of date, who cares?

Because having what seems to be an error message pop up at the very beginning of your map might cause people to be pre-disposed to think they see other errors.

It's a "level of polish" thing, I think.

Point taken. I'll go with your advise.

Wow, it has been mora than 2 years since the release of the map! I have just played it and wanted to make a comment as I normally do after playing a map. It was good and original, except there were some texture errors like columns sticking out of walls on the other side, but no big deal. I'm going to play your other map The Beta Complex now.

Keep up the good work man.

It has also been more than 2 years since the previous post. Please try not to bump so much.

hanging_rope wrote:
It has also been more than 2 years since the previous post. Please try not to bump so much.

Yes, I can see that but I can't get your point. what's the problem? Does it matter when I play and comment on the map? Do I have to play the map as soon as it's released? I simply wanted to pay my respect to the map maker since they work so hard to make a map and all we do is post our opinion on it. Do these threads have time limits? If so why isn't it locked? If you don't want to read "late" posts why don't you just click "unsubscribe topic"?

The main problem is that it makes the forums a bit more messy, as old threads are mingled with the new.
Another problem with it (that is specific to this board), is that most of the people that used to be on this forum have left, including farragar, so your kind comments to the author are entirely unlikely to ever be read by the creator of these maps.
A general rule is: If the map's thread is not on the first page of threads in the board, don't reply (unless the timestamp of the previous post was relatively recent).
Of course, in a case like this where the author is unlikely to read your post, it is better to locate them through their own website and compliment them there.

I don't know why you are making this a personal problem, maybe you own the website or something. And I don't know how I'm supposed to know whether the author have left the forum. But probably they were right because you can't even post a comment freely. So I'm going to leave this forum as well, and let you be in peace. Good bye.

Uhhhh rope I see that his comments on old posts can get annoying, but it shouldn't really be a problem unless hes bringing up 8 topics a day. but on the other hand, kataruna you shouldn't leave just because of that...

Yeah nice way to keep a forum alive. This place has died once besause of stuff like that.
A general rule should be, if a forum has no action whatsoever, let people post please and don't be so uptight about the rules.

Kataruna has a point, old treads should be locked after a certain ammount of time.
It would prevent confusion for the newbies. My two cents

Whysopro? wrote:
unless hes bringing up 8 topics a day.

Damnit.
I came back from a 2 week holiday to see that all these topics had been bumped and stupidly thought it had all happened within 2 days. Derp.

hanging_rope wrote:
Whysopro? wrote:

unless hes bringing up 8 topics a day.

Damnit.
I came back from a 2 week holiday to see that all these topics had been bumped and stupidly thought it had all happened within 2 days. Derp.

Okay, Hanging_Rope I got your message on Youtube and I gave up leaving the forum. I thought this was a forum where a map maker opens a topic for their maps and the players post comments on it. And I didn't know that the time matters so much. Maybe a map maker would lock the topic to his map after some time if he no longer wants any comments. Or maybe the topics would be put in order of the date of their first post. So that oldest topics would always be last and newest topics would always be the first. And when a comment is posted on an old topic only those who have subscribed to the topic would be able to read that post, particularly the map maker himself.

I don't see your point, rope. There are not many topics bumped that it should really matter.
At least me, as a map maker, am glad to receive feedback 2 years after release.
Plus, it keeps the forums alive.

Yeah, lock might be good after a couple of months,, I thought this was a new map, anyways I am downloading now and I am gonna try it XD

Mek wrote:
I don't see your point, rope. There are not many topics bumped that it should really matter.
At least me, as a map maker, am glad to receive feedback 2 years after release.
Plus, it keeps the forums alive.

Yes, I'm really sorry about all this.
It probably won't happen again, unless I'm really tired and stupid.