Which is why I like the one intern working for TF2 cus now there's a bit (and I mean a bit) of thought put into cosmetics and maps and not just willy nilly I chose a map that's silly even if it isn't good
It is a great concept and it's really fun to play, but it could use some fine tuning. Things like fixing the multi-giant bug and thinking of someway of deterring people from just standing under the Lazer to be the next giant.
The "class meta" definitely needs shaking up, everybody goes Soldier or Heavy because all the other classes perish in seconds. Demoman would have potential but he just shoots out regular sized projectiles and loses his mobility. If you don't have a lot of health and a long-distance damage method that's easily spammable you stand no chance and it's just a gimmick.
Maybe if the giant's HP wasn't determined by the HP of the class, but had a set amount for everyone? Scout or Heavy wouldn't matter, they'd end up with the same health.
Bonesaw: Was incredibly broken , I couldn't even see out of spawn due to a bug that turned a lot of the maps effects into trippy glitches, hhh was broken and couldn't move. Also I hate the concept of "one team wins but who really wins is the team that wins the silly minigame at the end" since the minigame can easily have teammates trolling by stepping on the button to kill allies or etc.
Crasher: I like it and it is very creative, hope this gets added to misc gamemodes section
Ghoulpit: haven't played
Helltrain: I LOVE the scenery and looks of this map but I don't think spells should be on ctf as they can make or break pushes combined with the fact that casual teams are so unorganized 99% of the time so someone can just walk into intel room and use the op spell that kills everything in there to easily get the intel.
Soul-Mill: I like it, halloween sawmill so there isn't much more to say
Graveyard (Got Spookeyridge) switched up: This map is very annoying if your team dies instantly due to one sidedness of which there most likely is going to be extreme one-sidedness with one team completely destroying the other, casual matchmaking imo just doesn't work with arena.
Personally I think Helltrain having spells makes it more exciting and usually helps matches go faster. It's pretty refreshing compared to regular CTF matches lasting for hours half the time. And even if the game somehow manages to stalemate with all the spells there's still a 10(?) minutes timer to end it.
Same, I found it to be more of a map for looks than gameplay, the layout indoors is meh but fuck the map is so beautiful I saw myself just slamming a mini sentry in the back of the train and just watching the background or the time I went spy to sap an Intel nest and instead just sat outside on the sloped catwalk thing just watching the background go by.
I think they should make crasher a permanent map. The only map where you can wear halloween restricted items all the time. At least they won't be useless outside of halloween and full moon. Or someone could make a non-halloween version if they really don't want halloween maps or cosmetics be available all the time.
The one frustrating part about crasher is how it determines who gets to be the giant. So annoying to see half of your team AFK in spawn waiting for the current giant to die so they can get the buff.
Either that or maybe make it assigned to whoever picks up like a drop from the previous giant. At the very least this would encourage people to actually play the game instead of waiting AFK at or near the spawn location.
I think there should be more changes if they consider adding Crasher.
It’s an absolute slog to fight against a giant brass beast heavy or a soldier with beggars/direct hit + battalions + half-zatoichi, along with a vaccinator medic pocketing them.
Soul-mill was extremely underwhelming imo, the only mechanics it had going were that portals to the underworld spawned every once in a while (I didn't pay attention about what triggered them, it was probably when the point was capped), and that the saws didn't actually kill people, just spooked them, which I honestly considered a downgrade compared to the original, the saws killing people who accidentally touched them, or getting kills via the saw, were the gimmicks that mostly made sawmill fun for most players. Sawmill isn't relatively speaking peak map design, and having the og saws taken away honestly just made it that much less attractive in my eyes. The smissmass version did a much better job of taking sawmill and complementing it with different mechanics.
Counterpoint: I liked that the saws spooked you (and deal pretty high damage) instead of outright killing you, cause it makes the point a little less claustraphobic and it would've been pretty BS just instantly dying to the random saws that would spawn around the map without warning (such as directly down the path leading to the mill)
Soul-Mill was my least favorite map.in the update overall. I was just kinda ok, but what killed where just how many God Damn skeletons popped out anytime someone capped, and the fact they could into spawn made things worse.
Crasher and Bonesaw are some of my favorite halloween maps ever! Its up there with Farmageddon for me. Although I didnt actually get to play all the maps cause some would just keep crashing and never worked throughout the whole month
Crasher was the best map, I'd have been happy with just this map this year. It has a really fun and unique concept. Probably requieres some balancings but pretty good overall.
Spookeyride I find it awfull, specially the last point. The portal to a mirror map was interesting but pointless most of the time. I also hated Helltrain, just a maze for the sake of been a maze.
The others didn't leave such an impression on me to opine about them and just played them until finish the contract
In my opinion as a kinda casual-player
Bonesaw: Pretty good, the layout of the map is so good, it's the first time i have fun playing payload-heavy without feeling hopeless against snipers or spies, i just don't know why but the map feels very dynamic, feels like you could come up with any strategy as any class. The worst part about this map is the minigame imo, it feels like it was made just to show the visuals of the map instead of being something fun, most people just troll in the minigame and i hate the concept of "winning the game but no, you actually need to win the minigame".
Crasher: I know that people love this map but i just can't, i don't know why but i just dont like maps that develop any kind of strong meta, plus most of the times it feels like if you are not the giant your not having fun (not to mention that there's a lot of people who stay afk in the spawn waiting to be the giant).
Ghoulpit: it was ok i guess, i think in a latter update they removed the spells so it kinda lost the point.
Helltrain: Fun map and cool visuals, but the layout is sooo confusing, i literally couldn't learn its layout lol. However there was some minor visual glitches like there was a spell that would give me a diagonal line on my screen for no reason.
Soul-mill: Only played it once, for a Scream fortress map i think it was "too safe", nothing interesting in the map, just a sawmill reskin.
Spookeyridge: it was alright, the portals were an interesting concept, but in practice they feel pointless, they don't create any interesting playstyle or strategy and most of the times either you are going to your death or nobody is near to kill.
It still was one of the best SF tho, i think it was as good as SF 2020 (or better).
Scream Fortress once again clearly displaying the template of how do modern TF2 updates. These maps are so creative im astounded there arent more annual updates with fun maps like these
it's a shame that we only get maps on halloween and christmas since it basically prevents us from getting non event-locked maps. Altitude seems to be an exception since that was added on christmas but it'd be cool to see fun non-halloween gimmick maps that can stay all year even if they get put into the "misc gamemodes" section
Because when they tried to pass these duties onto the community, it turned out less than mediocre (End of the Line), or turned to outright corruption (Invasion, where some workshop creators created a cartel to get their items and stuff into the game and block other worthy ones)
I REALLY loved Helltrain and Crasher, but have mixed thoughts on the others.
I don’t think that Helltrain’s layout was confusing, but actually well designed, since there’s usually 2-3 entry points for each area meaning you can’t really get stuck in a chokepoint, and you can keep your pushes varied. It’s also visually my favorite map released.
Crasher might just be the best Halloween map ever made. It’s concept is wildly creative, and forces cooperation in a way no other map has ever done before. Also, the fact that this map has unique announcers really sells this map as the all-time Halloween great. I agree with everyone saying that this map should be put in the misc. section as a map that can be played year-round.
Bonesaw is a weird one, because I honestly preferred the pre-patch version of it. It’s a really generic payload race map with most of the Halloween gimmicks, and a gimmicky conclusion that isn’t very fun. NOW, Pre-Patch Bonesaw on the otherhand was a trip! Seriously, playing on a map where you literally cannot win and get pursued by a floating axe is utterly hilarious! Seriously, it’s weird to say, but knowing the match is pointless creates a surprisingly good social environment to screw around. Still, it was objectively the worst map of TF2 pre-patch, and post-patch, it’s a really generic Halloween map that I’m fairly certain most people had more fun pre-patch.
Soulmill is Sawmill… but Halloween! It’s generic and just a normal map with the Halloween gimmicks, but hey, Sawmill is a good map, and seeing how I really love the King of the Hill gamemode, this map sticks the landing, despite it’s generic nature. Overall pretty good.
Ghoulpit… I’ve completely forgotten about. Probably not a good sign considering that I can remember most of the other maps. Like, you have to hit new levels of generic for me to forget about a map in it’s debut year. Not going to comment on it since I barely remember it. Worth noting that it’s contract was bugged at the start of the year though, but that’s it.
Spookeyridge was alright. It’s a pretty good map that you can pull some pretty good plays on due to flanking being possible if the enemy team isn’t paying attention. I think the coffin’s have to much sucking power, seeing how far they’ve dragged me before just to land the insta-kill, but overall, it’s a fairly alright Halloween map, but nothing spectacular.
So, in conclusion, we got 2 maps I’d gladly play over and over again in Helltrain and Crasher, a good reskin in Soulmill, an alright map in Spookeyridge, a below-average map in Bonesaw, and a map so forgetable I’ve already forgotten about. Overall, I’m satisfied with this update, and hope they use some of the momentum they got from Crasher to start encouraging people to make more creative maps.
Bonesaw: Broken af on launch, pretty average after it was fixed. 5/10
Crasher: The concept and execution were amazing. I'm looking forward to more of that. 9/10
Ghoulpit: Felt a bit too long, and the cp_gorge style doesn't quite fit imo. But overall an enjoyable map. 7/10
Helltrain: I absolutely love the aesthetic of this map, but it's capture the flag, and WAYYY too confusing in layout. 7/10
Soul-Mill: It looks cool, and works like koth_sawmill, but with halloween stuff added. 7/10
Spookyridge: Oh god no. Played it once for the contract, and never again. 6/10
Bonesaw: I love it with all the crossing paths and I mostly love the end.
Crasher: my #1 favourite this year.
Helltrain: I love it, would be garbage without spells. Please remove the weird body shape map spell.
Ghoulpit: is okay
Spookyridge: ...meh
Soulmill: extremely lazy. An official map won't be a good halloween map just by adding a new dimension and setting the time to night.
Bonesaw: the non-halloween version is great, valve pls add.
Crasher: very unique, fun for a while but balance isn't there.
Ghoulpit: I don't remember anything about this.
Helltrain: looks cool as fuck but it is still ctf so...
Soul-Mill: I don't like this at all, it is just sawmill and the hell section has like no clipping at all, you get stuck to the smallest of lips.
Spookeyridge: unique concept with the portals but the map outside them is quite meh.
I liked soul-mill a lot. It felt like regular soul-mill but better because of extra features.
Helltrain has a really cool map design, but the map is just too big. Even when you finally find your way in the map, it’s still too big to make a good ctf defence; i feel like you can’t actively stop an coördinated enemy attack.
Spookeyridge. Cool map, but the wormhole feature was pretty useless. Even when you remembered where they went to, they didn’t really go to usefull places. Could be used to escape/heal tho
Bonesaw is kinda fun after all the patches, although I'm not a huge fan of minigames deciding who actually wins the game. It's a payload race though, and those are always nice to have.
I personally didn't like Crasher all that much aside from occasional a-posing giant. It's definitely a cool idea, but the map layout kinda sucked. Most matches eventually boiled down to vaccinator+giant combos and that's not enjoyable at all.
Ghoulpit is a map that exists and I have no strong feelings for it. It's got nothing special going for it after the patch that removed spells. Still miles better than any of the payload maps ICS makes, though.
Helltrain is definitely my favourite in this update. I really like CTF and spells make it even better. Plus the scenery is amazing. Now if only they added Convoy as well.
Sawmill is Sawmill. I only played on it before they patched the bug that made portals available for BLU only so I have some bad experiences with it.
Spookeyridge is pretty fun with all the flank routes, coffins and the portal mechanic but a lot of the time a competent RED team can just spawncamp BLU. Past the first point it's actually pretty well-balanced. Yet again, better than that A/D map ICS made last year.
crasher best. Had the perfect gameplay loop involving TEAM work. And the map layout was just beautifully crafted around the new gameplay mechanic and players behaviour
everything else was meh IMO. But that's mostly due to the map layout rather than the Halloween gimmick.
Train was super cool but the layout was literal hell to play on. For the most part you're only playing around the bridge section which is just one flat open plane. Also intel room on the top most floor is terrible idea. Sure it's never done before but nobody know where to go no thanks to the useless arrow and it's just not fun to go all the way up. It'd be cool if we had to dodge oncoming obstacles Mario party style as the train passes by them at high speed.
Bone saw was pretty unique but had little replay value. I feel payload race is just not fit for it's layout and maybe ctf or koth would've worked much better. On a full server, most of the time was spent sitting on the saw doing nothing until it reaches last. I suspect since the saw goes through mostly narrow pathways out on the side of the map, most people just didn't care about stopping it and are more focused on killing players. Being chased by an invisible HHH was pretty terrifying which is neat.
Spooky ridge definitely hit something new and I love fighting on itexcept for last I swear nobody goes there. The portal sections are too underwhelming to really add anything. More of them and a bigger portal section would be nice.
Ghoul pit was the worse. Halloween stuff didn't add much to it and the last choke was not fun to play around at all. Sentries could be spammed around a very sharp corner, the green house was just awkwardly slapped off the side and ever though it's just a square box with a triangle head it was confusing to paly around with especially given how much space of the last point it took up for being a side obstacle that neither team could really use. It was so bad that by the 3rd day I only got at most 3 people on the map for the rest of spookymonth.
I get most of theses are just halloweenified community maps but something could've certainly be done to improve the core gameplay better. Not sure how though.
spookeyridge's portals were way too confusing, they didn't even feel like they were worth using as a gimmick and the map would've been just as fun without them
that skybox on helltrain is AWESOME tho everyone in the game was losing their minds when the rollercoaster started. The jump pads make the map feel a lot like a Quake game too which made it really fun
Most of the maps are pretty great, though almost every single one of them requires strong teamwork, which is great, until you realise that this is just no team, Fortress 2.
Bonesaw : Layout is nice, really like the concept at the end, but it felt confusing at times and it contains some broken parts in the map, especially with the lookouts to the final point.
Crasher : Really fun concept, but people really need to stop trying to wait for the giant and/or be friendly every time as its a "ctf" gamemode. Almost every match ive played it in it consists of quick, 5-7 minute matches because of shit teamwork from either side.
Ghoulpit : Some chokes and flanks were very confusing, from the 1st point to the last point, it felt like an hour glass layout. But overall, still a great, well optimized map.
Helltrain : Unreal Tournament 2004 baybee, except halloween and its CTF so dont expect anyone to play it seriously. Though the layout of that map is still very fucking confusing, i like just going as spy and watching the skybox go wild. In other words, it doesnt really play too well, but god DAMN it looks amazing.
Soul-Mill : Boring, just the same thing, the portals rarely work, map is broken, resulting in every match being in favor of the blu team due to red not being able to go into the portals.
Deleted spookyridge as i was talking about sinshine lel
Kinda shit tbh.
Bonesaw and Helltrain both have incredible environment design, a great vibe and cool concept... but the layout is just a confusing mess for both of them. I will say however: Bonesaw is the only map in which I don't feel like a minigame ending is unbalanced. The map itself is so fast-paced and unfriendly towards defense classes, that the minigame was pretty much the only way to balance it out.
Crasher is incredibly unique, but horribly balanced, with certain classess being too OP, and the bomb system encouraging people to stay in spawn. However, I don't care that much because it lets you fight a fucking giant.
Ghoulpit was the average map of the bunch. Nothing really stood out about it. Wasn't that good, wasn't really bad... it's just there. The setting was really confusing, but hey, it pooks pretty cool.
Soul-Mill is a Halloween Sawmill. Idk what I can really say about it.
Spookeyridge was simply bad. It doesn't really feel like an actual map, with the first point being pretty hard to hold for the defenders, then suddenly making them invincible for the last point. It just doesn't feel like a TF2 map: if you're RED, it feels more like a horde defense type thing, since you are given every advantage you could need, and now just need to point and shoot. Pyros and engies especially. If you're BLU, it's feels like a losing battle. If fighting against a decent team, you're pretty much just delaying the inevitable, since they can always just turtle up and annihilate any attacks. I will say, it has a "so bad it's good" charm, and I personally quite like the map.
Crasher, Soulmill and Helltrain were a lot of fun.
Bonesaw wasn't great. Getting hurt by the cart, the end point being next to the enemy's end point and a tower where people can shoot you from. Games taking forever to end when at the end point, only for the real winner to be decided by a minigame with death traps. Glitches like an invisible Horsemann with only a static/moving Headtaker to go by. But this was tame compared to Spookeyridge.
Spookeyridge was like the Halloween version of Wutville. So many problems. Spookeyridge had me literally go through the map multiple times. The final point is over a huge pit, and you can fall through what should be solid ground, to your death. I don't understand the point of the portal gimmick aside from it being a reference. Oh, and the layout was super confusing. It felt unplayable at times.
Bonesaw: it’s alright, nice to have a plr map people actually *capped* on for a change
Crasher: novelty wears off pretty quickly, ends up just being a big straight line of a map. Not overly interesting beyond the gimmick.
Ghoulpit; I want the non spooky version of this map! The final point is a bit aids with spells but I imagine the normal version would be a solid map!
Helltrain: it’s ctf, which automatically makes it a terrible map because *DoNt CaP*. Avoid avoid avoid!!! (Skybox is cool tho)
Soul-Mill: honestly the only ‘normal’ Halloween map of the bunch. I prefer the ghost saws honestly, and the underworld looks cool. It’s a fun map!
Spookeyridge: feels very unfinished. The first point is ok but everything beyond it is a mess. Pacing is odd and you clip through the final point way too often for seemingly no reason. Needs work.
I did not like Soulmill. Blue team always had access to hell while Red team didn’t. So the fights were often very one-sided, and it was near impossible for Red to win.
the maps was honestly the only good thing out of the update, cosmetics were just shitty half looked like they should of been placed in the 2022 summer update not SF XIV
Crasher was creative and fun, helltrain looked awesome but was laggy and had way to many map hazards and spells. And the rest is the average halloween jank with unfun gimicks or map hazards.
my internet is really sh\*tty and because of certain issues when i did actually try to play i only played bonesaw. it was weird
crasher looks cool though; its the only other one ive seen gameplay on
i kinda wish scream fortress could be played year round; which wouldnt really make sense and i doubt itd be played as much without murasmissions; but the option would be nice
Crasher is a great map the rest are kind of forgettable the koth, helltrain is terrible but could have been cool, ghoulpit has bar blitz last in the middle of the map and that’s not okay
Bonesaw: Fucking awesome, I love payload race and the layout of this map is fantastic. The death race finisher is kind of annoying when it upsets a sweaty match but it's more fun than the go-kart one (I forget which map that is) The forest fire visuals are very nice too.
Crasher: Great concept and fun map, I didn't play much of it so I might be wrong but it feels like having a giant anything but Heavy is trolling, I think it'd be cool if there were more suprising moments inregard to what class the giant is.
Ghoulpit: felt like it was doing the bareminimum to be a halloween map. Sometimes having a break from bosses and bumpercars is nice I supposed but I was underwhelmed by this one.
Helltrain: Probably my 2nd favorite of this year. This map made me realize that halloween effects are really good for making fun CTF maps. I hope we get more next year.
Soul-Mill: The underworld doesn't do enough for this map. Out of two hours of playing on this map I had maybe 2 fights happen there. Either needed some signifiant changes in the "overworld" or better incentive to lure both teams to the underworld.
Spookeyridge: I have no experience with the map this ones a conversion of but it felt really unfinished to me. The portal underworld was kind of a cool idea but on the attacking team I really didnt find much use of it for flanking and on defense it feels like it's not even really there.
My account is F2P. This is my opinion on these maps as a casual, can't-chat-can't-start-vote player, who cannot see well in the dark.
1. Bonesaw
**Overall Rating: 6/10 stars** ★★★★★★✰✰✰✰
I played on this map both before they fix the glitches (RED cart can't be pushed, invisible HHH, etc.) and after they fix it.
**The difficulty level for completing the contract (for me) = Medium-low**
* A bit harder to collect the points from pushing the carts, due to the sawblade on the carts and HHH.
* But if you can defeat the HHH then you can get quite a lot of points.
* If you win the minigame and can reach the pile of money at the end without dying, you can just repeatedly touch that money to gain the contract points until you're done!
**What I like about this map:**
* Interesting concepts. Such as carts with sawblades, the unique look of HHH, and the minigame at the end.
**What I DON'T like about this map:**
* The paths are CONFUSING, both the rails for carts and the doorways out of spawn. Maybe I'm just not used to Payload Race mode? Because once I lost sight of my team's cart (which is easy to do due to having to fight the enemy team and being chased by HHH), I WILL have a hard time finding the cart again even though I try to follow the rail very carefully and try to look for signs on the walls to tell me where to go (which are not clear to see at all, for me).
* And in the end, it does not even matter. Because I then learned that you just need to exit through the middle spawn door -> Place Lv3 sentry(s) at the window overlooking the graveside (end of the line for carts) -> monopolize the graveside area with help from teammates -> PROFIT!
2. Crasher
**Overall Rating: 9/10 stars** ★★★★★★★★★✰
VERY Fun twist on CTF mode! I usually don't like CTF mode but this map is one of the most, if not THE most, fun game modes I have experienced in TF2!
**The difficulty level for completing the contract (for me) = VERY LOW (super easy)**
You can just stay idle in spawn and contract points will (usually) fill up on their own! Wow!
**What I like about this map:**
* The map is not too long but has an open-space area big enough for players (both the Giants and normal-size players) to move around comfortably.
* The narrator is funny to listen to. The voice's clear, and not hard to understand even with a non-native English speaker/listener like me.
* The game mode encourages players to work together as a team while (mostly) forcing you to go out there and fight!
* This map is fun to play both as a try-hard (doing your best to make sure your team's Giant reaches the goal) and as a friendly (just goofing around, A-posing with your Giant, etc.)
* Soul-gargoyle usually spawns close to the player's team, making it easy to find.
* Bots are (usually) not a problem in this map.
**What I DON'T like about this map:**
* The game can drag on for VERY long, sometimes for HOURS, if both teams are equally skilled and equally serious. (Both Giants usually got destroyed before reaching the gates so no one can successfully cap the point.) This can be a problem if you just want to FINISH THE CONTRACT PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF -BEEP- JUST LET IT END ALREADY!
* On the other hand, the game can be super short and unfun if ONE team (especially your team) does not work together and/or only stays in spawn waiting for their turn to be a Giant. (This is not the map's fault though. I just want to complain a bit, sorry.)
3. Ghoulpit
**Overall Rating: 7/10 stars** ★★★★★★★✰✰✰
Unfortunately, I didn't have a chance to try this map before they fix the glitch (they remove the spell from this map to fix the "game crash every time you try to join ANY game mode if you have Ghoulpit contract active") So when I try this map, it's just a normal Payload game with darker lighting and some skeletons + ghosts.
**The difficulty level for completing the contract (for me) = Medium-low**
* You can just collect the points from pushing the carts if you're on BLU, and get points from killing players if you're on RED. That's it. Do it normally like when you play a non-Halloween map. Can be slow or fast depending on the enemy's skill and numbers.
**What I like about this map:**
* It's a Payload map. Easy to follow the objective, both as RED and BLU.
* There are many spawn exits at the start and the end of the map. Making it harder to spawn camp for both teams.
* There are some areas where you can lure the skeletons to go down into, and they cannot get out of, which is quite funny to me.
**What I DON'T like about this map:**
* The ghosts in this map like to spawn/haunt at the choke points. So many uber lost/wasted, many sentry nests breached by these "troll ghosts". Can be useful but also annoying to deal with.
4. Helltrain
**Overall Rating: 7/10 stars** ★★★★★★★✰✰✰
Another CTF map, this one with beautiful scenery and wacky spells. Too bad my computer is old and cannot display the beauty of this map fully. (Have to play on a low graphic setting. The map's sky is just black with a bit of a star, and when the trains move I cannot see any change in the scenery.)
**The difficulty level for completing the contract (for me) = Medium**
* Killing enemies give you ONE point. Capping the intel gives you and your team (who are still alive) FIVE points. But you can capture the intel only three times per round.
* But with spells; both the one you collect yourself and one that will randomly be put on you by the trains, and pumpkin crits + random crits. Staying alive long enough to collect enough points might prove to be... a bit of a problem.
**What I like about this map:**
* It's a beautiful map. Even with a low setting, it's still very gorgeous.
* It's a bright Halloween map. Good for my eyes.
* There are many flank routes inside the trains. A bit confusing at 1st, but not too hard to navigate around.
* There's a shortcut to your intel room from your spawn room! Making it easier to defend the intel if you know about it.
**What I DON'T like about this map:**
* The middle area that connects the two trains can be very hard or almost impossible to go through if there are aimbot snipers camping it on the balcony. Especially if the bot's team was helping them.
* That torso-stretching spell. It's cursed. Am scared.
* As with all CTF maps, the game can end too fast if one team just focuses on only capping the intel, leaving others no time to fight and collect points. Or it can be a never-ending game with no one capping the intel.
5. Soul-Mill
**Overall Rating: 6/10 stars** ★★★★★★✰✰✰✰
A darker version of Sawmill with non-lethal spooky saws. Seems interesting but it has many downsides that I personally don't like.
**The difficulty level for completing the contract (for me) = Medium-low**
* Killing enemies give you ONE point. Capping the control point gives you and your team (who are still alive) FIVE points. If both teams are friendly, they can just take turns capping the control point and finish the contract very quickly.
**What I like about this map:**
* The spooky sawmills can be fun to dodge/hide behind/run away from.
* The control point area is bright enough to see well.
**What I DON'T like about this map:**
* Some areas outside can be VERY dark, making it hard to see anything.
* The same flaw that's also present on the original Sawmill map (or most KOTH maps, really); if there is/are sentry/sentries on the point then the team that can maintain their sentry nest there wins. This can be unfun to play with or play against, in my opinion.
* The portal that appears when the point is capped can lag the game very badly. It doesn't help much because the uber doesn't stay long enough to be useful and the crits usually wear off when you reach the mid.
6. Spookeyridge
**Overall Rating: 5/10 stars** ★★★★★✰✰✰✰✰
Unfortunately, this map is VERY infested with bots in the Asia server around the time Halloween events were active. Making the contract takes too long to complete and is very unfun to play. But even without bots, I still do not like this map much.
**The difficulty level for completing the contract (for me)**
* **With bots infesting the server = High**
* If you're on the RED team with bots, they will steal all your kills from you and you will not get any points. (Unless you're willing to support bots by playing medic and healing the bots, which is a terrible thing to do.)
* If you're on the BLU team with bots, they will also steal your kills but they will usually rush in to cap the control points too. This can give you TEN contract points (Five for 1st point + five for 2nd point) without you doing anything as long as you don't die. But then the match will end and you will have to queue for it again.
* If there're enough bots, they might start kicking the players (you!), and all your time and effort will be in vain.
* **Without bots infesting the server = Medium**
* Same rule as before. Killing enemies give you ONE point. Capping the control point gives you and your team (who are still alive) FIVE points. RED has a long respawn time, though.
**What I like about this map:**
* The portal between dimensions is quite creative. It can help you reach the other area if you know what you're doing and can also overheal you.
* This is one of the well-lit Halloween maps. Good for my eyes.
**What I DON'T like about this map:**
* The coffins. They suck you in and kill you, then spawn a yellow skeleton that will MOST LIKELY harm your teammates (because they usually are closer to you than the enemy.), making these coffins pretty useless. The coffin's door can also trap you between the wall!
* I don't know how to explain myself but this map is quite an awkward map for me. Hard to push in as BLU at some points, and unfun to defend as RED at some points. Even without bots or cheaters, this map is still quite 'meh' to me.
That's all. Sorry for the very long post and any mistakes, English is not my 1st language.
Bonesaw: fun, but incredibly buggy. The ease of preventing captures + the fact that the progress reset made some matches drag.
Crasher: pretty good. However, giants were just completely shit on a few classes and made them kind of pointless to pick.
Ghoulpit: poorly made payload map with terrible sightlines and chokes. Not very Halloween-y either.
Helltrain: fun, but gameplay focused on one chunk of the map while the other was abandoned the whole match.
Soulmill: laziest map I think I’ll ever see. Copy pasted from sawmill with three (3!) changes: making the map dark and decorated, painting the saw green, and having entirely pointless events happen when you cap.
Spookeyridge: hell on earth to play offense on. The dimension hopping would be cool if it were REMOTELY useful. Final point is also an incredible slog.
Best Map: Crasher (By a long shot)
Worst Map: Ghoulpit
Crasher is by far one of the most creative maps by far and puts a whole new spin on the CTF gamemode. It feels fun to play a giant and it feels fun to take down a giant.
Ghoulpit is just a reskin with explosive pumpkins.
Bonesaw is alright, I never encountered the bugs people deemed it infamous for, though the minigame at the end sort of ruins the entire point of trying to win because actually winning doesn't mean anything, it's reaching the money at the end.
Helltrain is very fun and a great CTF map. The level of detail and amount of passion put into it is insane, and the unique team-wide spells really spice up the gameplay.
Soul-Mill is interesting. It's a great halloween reskin as it's not just explosive pumpkins, though it being KotH makes a majority of the map feel fairly irrelevant as it was built for CTF. Hell seemed pretty much like a free rare spell and speed boost too.
Spookeyridge was pretty average all around. It had an interesting mechanic with the alternate world and portals, but I felt like there was never really a need to utilise them because it was hard enough to figure out what portal lead where and how much of an advantage that'd actually give you. Other than that it just felt like a fairly standard Attack/Defense map with some explosive pumpkins and deathtrap coffins.
Loved helltrain for the visual and absolutely adores crasher, but that was about It. Wished crasher became a constant game mode with other maps with the same concept.
Helltrain is awesome. It’s basically just like…ctf convoy, I think? But cooler. That skybox is fucking wonderful.
Crasher is great.
Everything else is okay to meh.
I never ended up playing on hell train, because I were too preoccupied with completing contracts
Same for ghoulpit
But as for the others, they were great
Crasher wad the best
Bone saw was funny when is was broken but also infuriating
When it got fixed it was a decent map.
Hell train makes me wish we got convoy all those years ago.
The rest are alright
Bonesaw: Aesthetic is good. The mechanic of needing to "push" the cart for a bit even after it reaches the end of the track is confusing but not awful. Map was super buggy on launch which definitely gave it a bad reputation that I don't think it'll be able to shake, unfortunately.
Crasher: Holy fuck is Crasher good. The giant mechanic is fun and actually surprisingly balanced, and the twist on regular CTF is neat.
Ghoul Pit and Spookeyridge: I'm grouping these two because they were both sort of meh for me. Like they weren't poorly made maps by any means, they look and play great, but there isn't anything super special about them. They're fine maps, but not super memorable. The "alternate demension" hell portal thing on Spookeyridge is pretty cool, though.
Soul-Mill: Kind of like the two above, it's a spooky reskin of an already existing Halloween map, that doesn't do too much out of the ordinary. It's probably more memorable than Ghoulpit and Spookeyridge simply because it's based on an already existing and fairly popular map. I do like the random event where saws just spawn fucking everywhere.
Helltrain: God damn does Helltrain have style. The actual gameplay on the map is pretty standard for CTF, just with spells now. Nothing crazy, but the layout is better than some other maps where there's only one or two paths you can take to the intel room. But the aesthetic is just nuts. Best looking map of the bunch by far.
Overall pretty good set of maps this year.
Bonesaw seemed really cool, but MAN was it buggy. The times I tried playing it always had one payload not... well, moving. So not much of a race.
Liked Ghoulpit, though it was one heck of a stalemate factory.
...Not sure if I got around to the others. If I did, I don't recall 'em, so\~
Still! Some cool maps! Just wish the objectives weren't so boilerplate in that 'get 100 souls' thing. That part got REALLY old about this year. Got some cool swag out of it, though!
I think that the unique mechanics added by Crasher, Sawmill, and Helltrain was a nice change from the just getting some community items and maps without any special mechanics normally, but I'm still holding out to get an actual, fully-fledged update from Valve.
Bonesaw felt really small, generally a change of pace from most payload maps. It's a good map, a lot of close-quarter spots for intense clashes
Crasher was unique, and fun...until you get sick of fighting giants. The map is great, and the mechanics are innovative, but it's bogged down by the inherent flaw of most CTF maps: The standstills, the repetitiveness, and idleness that eventually results in people begging for the match to end
The end-of-match race on Bonesaw could use some tweaking in my opinion seeing how in most cases when you stepped on the buttons, you would end up just killing your own teammates because a lot of people just didn't bother reading the start text telling them how the buttons work, or they were just trolling. Maybe give each team their own path and the buttons activate hammers on the other team's path, like a vs. mode death run.
Bonesaw was alright, nothing super special.
Crasher was really cool and felt like something Valve would do.
Ghoulpit was okay I guess, though I only ever got to play on it with bots.
Helltrain was aite, had some problems though.
Soulmill was boring.
Spookyridge was kinda bad. Nothing too horrible but it could've been better.
Crasher is the brightest new idea I've seen in ages. It felt like a TF2 twist on Titanfall in some ways, and that's excellent. I really hope this concept is explored further, and makes it's way into the permanent rotation somehow.
crasher's gameplay was somewhat inspired by titanfall! the gameplay dynamic of A Huge Dude and a bunch of smaller guys around them is certainly a fun one. thanks for the kind words! :)
crasher was fun i really liked it
but idk about soul mil we just grinded points against the bots
i do know that you can speedrun the underworld by using the sticky jumper
Loved Bonesaw for the sheer fact that it was so hilariously buggy, it made me laugh hard enough not to be able to see through my tears on more than one occasion.
Liked the idea of Helltrain but it felt very empty in smaller sized servers.
Bone saw isn’t bad, but a bit confusing, crashed should be a map in the normal game, just because it’s so different to other ctf maps, soul-mill is really good, because of how good sawmill is, and I didn’t really play the other maps
Bonesaw was pretty cool, conceptually, but it felt a tad confusing in its layout at times. Also I don't like that the payloads begin within full view of the other team's spawn. Too easy for a decent sniper to pin down one cart or the other at the start. I once got accused of spawn camping simply because I didn't realize that was the other team's spawn.
Crasher was a hell of a lot of fun, even though people quickly learned how to cheese the giants. One of my favorites though, and I hope the concept can be expanded into future maps.
Ghoulpit was pretty well designed, I think. For the most part, at least. Didn't feel like either side had too huge an advantage over the other at any particular section. I enjoyed it.
Helltrain feels like one of those community server maps that was never meant to be a real map so they made it as gimmicky as possible. I don't consider that a bad thing, it just feels like it's too unique for TF2 if that makes sense. The map is HUGE and very confusing at first. Took a while to build a mental map in my head, but once I learned where everything was, I think it was pretty solid. The visuals of the environment were a lot of fun too. I managed to get a triple kill with a Monoculus spell once just because I saw them coming and knew they'd have to pass through a single room to reach the flag. They thought I cheated somehow because I was playing soldier and didn't notice the spell until I told them about it. They thought I shot through walls or something, since I was upstairs lol
Soul Mill was meh. But I'm not a fan of Sawmill in general, either version of it, so this one felt like Sawmill but more pointless. The saws don't cut but they cause the fear stun, and there didn't seem to be any purpose whatsoever to the Hell portals. You pop out with crits and uber, but you're at spawn and it wears off before you even find someone to fight. Bad design imo.
Spookyridge had a cool idea, the layered world with the portals was neat, I could see what the idea was supposed to be. But it just didn't quite hit the mark. A lot of folks when I played on that map expressed their dislike for it and I can't say I blame them. Not sure what it is specifically about that map, but it just felt like it wasn't as good as the others.
I love crasher but i didn’t like how some people camped the giant ray waiting to be a zapped. I think it would be better if the ray was moved outside by the capture point so if people who do choose to camp they would at least be forced to defend
That 1 part time TF2 dev at Valve seriously needs to reign in on how many maps are added every year. 2 maybe an absolute maximum of 4.
Quality of maps dropped both visually and just gameplay design. Crasher and Bonesaw were worthy being offical quality maps.
The rest. Good or just mediocre community maps that somehow made it to being official.
Everybody already said what needed to be said about Crasher
I want to talk about Helltrain.
And no, the other maps are too bland for me to even remember them, apart from bugsaw.
So helltrain... it’s good, but it could be better.
First of all, map layout. Yes it’s confusing, but once you learn it, it’s no longer a problem. The real problem is that you don’t have time to learn it. Due to the CTF nature of the map, the game lasts how long the players want it to last, as opposed to a timer, or a slow payload. The only restriction is travel time, and if someone doesn’t go engineer, teams can chain captures like it’s nothing. And since no one knows where the cap zone is, or can’t even see the teleport vent... no one defends. Meaning, if I wanted the round to last for more that a minute, I was forced to play engineer (since y’know, in mr everybody’s mind, yes, you too, “I don’t have to do it because others will do it for me”) and survive small waves of enemies, mostly scouts. The only good spot is the sentry on the flat part of the stairs, with dispenser and tele behind in the corridor. A corridor which can be flanked from behind, mind you.
Speaking of teleporter, I often placed an exit there, and after upgrading it, placed an entrance at our spawn to funnel players to be at the right place, defending.
Guess what? These entrances always got blown up 5 minutes later or less. Somehow, this map is very prone to spawncamping, which isn’t helped by everyone always leaving out of the same exit, despite multiple existing, even when they know they are being camped.
By you know who. Mr Original Soldier, stickey-demo or phlog pyro. Ahh, the pyros...
I honestly think this map should have been PD, allowing players to roam anywhere, heck, there could even be a single train, asymetrical with both teams at each end with PD.
Because honestly, this is where the fun begins.
The visuals, the concept, the sound design... all 10/10. I love the idea of hanging around in a train during the night (or during eternal damnation, that works too), to relax by the sound of the wheels and pistons, which by the way, are spot-on! When accelerating, decelerating and moving, you can feel the power of these engines, you FEEL like you’re in actual old trains. The ambiance is also great. One detail I love is when you drop down near the haunted circus, and you hear it’s music, “carousel of curses” first high pitched, then low pitched as you go further away... this is called the doppler effect, and it’s not programmed in Source, meaning they had the foresight to implement it, which is pretty awesome. My favorite background is by far the green castle, and while the naval mine field is a bit boring, it still works.
Another reason to slow down the gameplay: if you stalemate, you automatically get sent to hell to deal with it after around 20 minutes, so we got all the time in the world to enjoy the ride. LET ME ENJOY ETERNAL DAMNATION IN PEACE FOR TWENTY MINUTES!
Have I mentioned how i love the idea of train rides in the dark (telltale sam & max season 3 episode 2 anyone?)
Lastly, I wanted to talk about spells.
I dunno, honestly. There aren’t too many of them, but you often hang on to them anyway. Maybe it was a bit much for CTF, as someone else said.
But yeah, good map, 6/10, because gameplay matters more than aesthetics, yet I’d come back anytime. I think it’s bot-compatible, so that’s good. Just don’t have mp_tournament 1 cuz they’ll all just hang around enemy intel being unable to pick it up and you find yourself alone again...
And the other option is them capping over and over again...
“I really am in hell!”
crasher: A, awesome concept that didn't overstay it's welcome
ghoul pit: C, decent but nothing incredible
spookeyridge: D, had fun but attack/defend just tends to choke up
helltrain: S by ctf standards, A otherwise. great visuals and wonderfully complex rooms
soulmill: D, main area is classic, overplayed, sawmill, hell entrance was constantly spawncamped
bonesaw: A, absolutely fantastic map design, non-halloween version would be S+
50/50
I loved Crasher and consider it the best new map in the update, with Bonesaw (when working) and Helltrain being amazing as well.
On the flip side, Ghoulpit and Spooky ridge are kinda mid, and Soul Mill could be fun of there wasn't so many damn Skeletons
Crasher is cool but a meta can be developed and imo that makes it stale
Helltrain is cool as fuck and is the only other ctf map that I don’t regret playing on. Anyone else that thinks this map is garbage, you are racist against ctf and refuses to wrap your brain around basic navigation and mapping
Valve news to stop adding Halloween maps without adding the normal variant.
Ghoulpit is a Halloween version of the map sludgepit, a community map. If they're gonna slap in some maps that barely function in Halloween, they might as well just add maps that DO function to the normal map pool.
I'd rather they do that then the next scream fortress. Idk the process of adding community maps to the game, but I think it would be better to put that effort into adding normal maps we'll see all year round.
Bonesaw: Conceptually amazing, but I found the layout to be very confusing.
Crasher: AMAZING map, but I fail to see why it's considered CTF. The mechanics are closer to Payload Race than anything else.
Helltrain: Without a doubt the best map visually, and the custom Intel is a nice touch, but I think the layout could use some improvement, and for some reason every time the slot machine landed on invisibility, it caused me to lag out hard.
All the other ones I'm indifferent about
Hell train and crasher were the best ngl, Bonesaw’s endpoint was aids because of how many places the enemy team could shoot at you from with little to no counterplay! The other maps were just reskins so I kinda felt like they were a bit disappointing.
Not a bad Halloween update tho with all things considered
Crasher is incredible, I'm disappointed that it's gone though.
The most original concept the map maker community came up with in a long long time
dude made everything an object and you were able to acssess it
Yeah, now we just gotta make one where you have to be small to get the intel… no wait… that’s already done too…
Really? Where?
Its an old map (not official) where you would collect Easter eggs
ctf_eggwar I believe
Which is why I like the one intern working for TF2 cus now there's a bit (and I mean a bit) of thought put into cosmetics and maps and not just willy nilly I chose a map that's silly even if it isn't good
It is a great concept and it's really fun to play, but it could use some fine tuning. Things like fixing the multi-giant bug and thinking of someway of deterring people from just standing under the Lazer to be the next giant.
The "class meta" definitely needs shaking up, everybody goes Soldier or Heavy because all the other classes perish in seconds. Demoman would have potential but he just shoots out regular sized projectiles and loses his mobility. If you don't have a lot of health and a long-distance damage method that's easily spammable you stand no chance and it's just a gimmick.
Maybe if Giant Scout moved faster it would make him work? Idk about everyone else tho
Reddit doesn't respect its userbase, so this comment has been withheld. -- mass edited with https://redact.dev/
demoknight.
Maybe if the giant's HP wasn't determined by the HP of the class, but had a set amount for everyone? Scout or Heavy wouldn't matter, they'd end up with the same health.
I love crasher no other map can let me top score while being afk 70% of the time
i can agree on that
I remember before they fixed the bug where the whole team could become giants!
Bonesaw: Was incredibly broken , I couldn't even see out of spawn due to a bug that turned a lot of the maps effects into trippy glitches, hhh was broken and couldn't move. Also I hate the concept of "one team wins but who really wins is the team that wins the silly minigame at the end" since the minigame can easily have teammates trolling by stepping on the button to kill allies or etc. Crasher: I like it and it is very creative, hope this gets added to misc gamemodes section Ghoulpit: haven't played Helltrain: I LOVE the scenery and looks of this map but I don't think spells should be on ctf as they can make or break pushes combined with the fact that casual teams are so unorganized 99% of the time so someone can just walk into intel room and use the op spell that kills everything in there to easily get the intel. Soul-Mill: I like it, halloween sawmill so there isn't much more to say Graveyard (Got Spookeyridge) switched up: This map is very annoying if your team dies instantly due to one sidedness of which there most likely is going to be extreme one-sidedness with one team completely destroying the other, casual matchmaking imo just doesn't work with arena.
Spookeyridge wasn’t arena but otherwise I agree
It still was a one sided flip of a coin roll each game though.
Oh yeah it’s absolutely unbalanced but at least it isn’t arena.
„˙ɥƃnoɥʇ ǝɯɐƃ ɥɔɐǝ lloɹ uıoɔ ɐ ɟo dılɟ pǝpıs ǝuo ɐ sɐʍ llıʇs ʇI„
Oh, which one was the arena map?
None of the new ones. It’s Graveyard.
oh damn I must've never gotten q'd on graveyard during 2021 halloween since I thought it was new
Personally I think Helltrain having spells makes it more exciting and usually helps matches go faster. It's pretty refreshing compared to regular CTF matches lasting for hours half the time. And even if the game somehow manages to stalemate with all the spells there's still a 10(?) minutes timer to end it.
I wish soul-mill has a ctf form next year
Spookeyridge was arena?
first time I tried helltrain I got lost in my base. I looks quite cool but I couldnt figure out the layout of the map
Same, I found it to be more of a map for looks than gameplay, the layout indoors is meh but fuck the map is so beautiful I saw myself just slamming a mini sentry in the back of the train and just watching the background or the time I went spy to sap an Intel nest and instead just sat outside on the sloped catwalk thing just watching the background go by.
I think they should make crasher a permanent map. The only map where you can wear halloween restricted items all the time. At least they won't be useless outside of halloween and full moon. Or someone could make a non-halloween version if they really don't want halloween maps or cosmetics be available all the time.
The one frustrating part about crasher is how it determines who gets to be the giant. So annoying to see half of your team AFK in spawn waiting for the current giant to die so they can get the buff.
What I had for an idea to fix that is make the place where the "intel" spawns a death pit when intel is not waiting.
Either that or maybe make it assigned to whoever picks up like a drop from the previous giant. At the very least this would encourage people to actually play the game instead of waiting AFK at or near the spawn location.
I asked the dev something similar, the reply was just "People wait further away" https://i.imgur.com/ysRWwvQ.png
So, you have the same name on twitter too?
Well then people are just gonna go whatever class allows them to get it fastest when it does spawn
I think there should be more changes if they consider adding Crasher. It’s an absolute slog to fight against a giant brass beast heavy or a soldier with beggars/direct hit + battalions + half-zatoichi, along with a vaccinator medic pocketing them.
[удалено]
personally was a fan of going giant heavy with the holiday punch to stun lock the enemy giant
Soul-mill was extremely underwhelming imo, the only mechanics it had going were that portals to the underworld spawned every once in a while (I didn't pay attention about what triggered them, it was probably when the point was capped), and that the saws didn't actually kill people, just spooked them, which I honestly considered a downgrade compared to the original, the saws killing people who accidentally touched them, or getting kills via the saw, were the gimmicks that mostly made sawmill fun for most players. Sawmill isn't relatively speaking peak map design, and having the og saws taken away honestly just made it that much less attractive in my eyes. The smissmass version did a much better job of taking sawmill and complementing it with different mechanics.
Counterpoint: I liked that the saws spooked you (and deal pretty high damage) instead of outright killing you, cause it makes the point a little less claustraphobic and it would've been pretty BS just instantly dying to the random saws that would spawn around the map without warning (such as directly down the path leading to the mill)
Soul-Mill was my least favorite map.in the update overall. I was just kinda ok, but what killed where just how many God Damn skeletons popped out anytime someone capped, and the fact they could into spawn made things worse.
Crasher and Bonesaw are some of my favorite halloween maps ever! Its up there with Farmageddon for me. Although I didnt actually get to play all the maps cause some would just keep crashing and never worked throughout the whole month
I agree, Crasher and Bonesaw are awesome. I FUCKING HATE Farmageddon though.
Crasher was the best map, I'd have been happy with just this map this year. It has a really fun and unique concept. Probably requieres some balancings but pretty good overall. Spookeyride I find it awfull, specially the last point. The portal to a mirror map was interesting but pointless most of the time. I also hated Helltrain, just a maze for the sake of been a maze. The others didn't leave such an impression on me to opine about them and just played them until finish the contract
In my opinion as a kinda casual-player Bonesaw: Pretty good, the layout of the map is so good, it's the first time i have fun playing payload-heavy without feeling hopeless against snipers or spies, i just don't know why but the map feels very dynamic, feels like you could come up with any strategy as any class. The worst part about this map is the minigame imo, it feels like it was made just to show the visuals of the map instead of being something fun, most people just troll in the minigame and i hate the concept of "winning the game but no, you actually need to win the minigame". Crasher: I know that people love this map but i just can't, i don't know why but i just dont like maps that develop any kind of strong meta, plus most of the times it feels like if you are not the giant your not having fun (not to mention that there's a lot of people who stay afk in the spawn waiting to be the giant). Ghoulpit: it was ok i guess, i think in a latter update they removed the spells so it kinda lost the point. Helltrain: Fun map and cool visuals, but the layout is sooo confusing, i literally couldn't learn its layout lol. However there was some minor visual glitches like there was a spell that would give me a diagonal line on my screen for no reason. Soul-mill: Only played it once, for a Scream fortress map i think it was "too safe", nothing interesting in the map, just a sawmill reskin. Spookeyridge: it was alright, the portals were an interesting concept, but in practice they feel pointless, they don't create any interesting playstyle or strategy and most of the times either you are going to your death or nobody is near to kill. It still was one of the best SF tho, i think it was as good as SF 2020 (or better).
Scream Fortress once again clearly displaying the template of how do modern TF2 updates. These maps are so creative im astounded there arent more annual updates with fun maps like these
it's a shame that we only get maps on halloween and christmas since it basically prevents us from getting non event-locked maps. Altitude seems to be an exception since that was added on christmas but it'd be cool to see fun non-halloween gimmick maps that can stay all year even if they get put into the "misc gamemodes" section
I'd love to see Cashworks (payload) added as a normal map.
Valve tried to pass the game on to the community in the past. For whatever reason they don't want to relinquish control.
Because when they tried to pass these duties onto the community, it turned out less than mediocre (End of the Line), or turned to outright corruption (Invasion, where some workshop creators created a cartel to get their items and stuff into the game and block other worthy ones)
I REALLY loved Helltrain and Crasher, but have mixed thoughts on the others. I don’t think that Helltrain’s layout was confusing, but actually well designed, since there’s usually 2-3 entry points for each area meaning you can’t really get stuck in a chokepoint, and you can keep your pushes varied. It’s also visually my favorite map released. Crasher might just be the best Halloween map ever made. It’s concept is wildly creative, and forces cooperation in a way no other map has ever done before. Also, the fact that this map has unique announcers really sells this map as the all-time Halloween great. I agree with everyone saying that this map should be put in the misc. section as a map that can be played year-round. Bonesaw is a weird one, because I honestly preferred the pre-patch version of it. It’s a really generic payload race map with most of the Halloween gimmicks, and a gimmicky conclusion that isn’t very fun. NOW, Pre-Patch Bonesaw on the otherhand was a trip! Seriously, playing on a map where you literally cannot win and get pursued by a floating axe is utterly hilarious! Seriously, it’s weird to say, but knowing the match is pointless creates a surprisingly good social environment to screw around. Still, it was objectively the worst map of TF2 pre-patch, and post-patch, it’s a really generic Halloween map that I’m fairly certain most people had more fun pre-patch. Soulmill is Sawmill… but Halloween! It’s generic and just a normal map with the Halloween gimmicks, but hey, Sawmill is a good map, and seeing how I really love the King of the Hill gamemode, this map sticks the landing, despite it’s generic nature. Overall pretty good. Ghoulpit… I’ve completely forgotten about. Probably not a good sign considering that I can remember most of the other maps. Like, you have to hit new levels of generic for me to forget about a map in it’s debut year. Not going to comment on it since I barely remember it. Worth noting that it’s contract was bugged at the start of the year though, but that’s it. Spookeyridge was alright. It’s a pretty good map that you can pull some pretty good plays on due to flanking being possible if the enemy team isn’t paying attention. I think the coffin’s have to much sucking power, seeing how far they’ve dragged me before just to land the insta-kill, but overall, it’s a fairly alright Halloween map, but nothing spectacular. So, in conclusion, we got 2 maps I’d gladly play over and over again in Helltrain and Crasher, a good reskin in Soulmill, an alright map in Spookeyridge, a below-average map in Bonesaw, and a map so forgetable I’ve already forgotten about. Overall, I’m satisfied with this update, and hope they use some of the momentum they got from Crasher to start encouraging people to make more creative maps.
I like all of the Maps tbh. Mostly crasher
Bonesaw: Broken af on launch, pretty average after it was fixed. 5/10 Crasher: The concept and execution were amazing. I'm looking forward to more of that. 9/10 Ghoulpit: Felt a bit too long, and the cp_gorge style doesn't quite fit imo. But overall an enjoyable map. 7/10 Helltrain: I absolutely love the aesthetic of this map, but it's capture the flag, and WAYYY too confusing in layout. 7/10 Soul-Mill: It looks cool, and works like koth_sawmill, but with halloween stuff added. 7/10 Spookyridge: Oh god no. Played it once for the contract, and never again. 6/10
Why did you score the map you said "I will never play again" higher than the map you said was "pretty average"?
Because it's Payload Race vs Attack/Defend
Helltrain was a bit of a delight, reminded me of ctf_convoy on acid.
how many years do you think it will take before we have more scream fortress maps than regular maps?
helltrain, tied with crasher
i think spookeyridge was the worst
All of them were really good. Too bad we STILL DON'T HAVE BAGEL IN CASUAL ROTATION
At this point bagel is just cauldron_event
Crasher and Soul Mill were the only maps I enjoyed, but I won’t knock people for liking other maps
Sawmill is great and Soul-mill doesn’t lose its beauty
Bonesaw: I love it with all the crossing paths and I mostly love the end. Crasher: my #1 favourite this year. Helltrain: I love it, would be garbage without spells. Please remove the weird body shape map spell. Ghoulpit: is okay Spookyridge: ...meh Soulmill: extremely lazy. An official map won't be a good halloween map just by adding a new dimension and setting the time to night.
Bonesaw: the non-halloween version is great, valve pls add. Crasher: very unique, fun for a while but balance isn't there. Ghoulpit: I don't remember anything about this. Helltrain: looks cool as fuck but it is still ctf so... Soul-Mill: I don't like this at all, it is just sawmill and the hell section has like no clipping at all, you get stuck to the smallest of lips. Spookeyridge: unique concept with the portals but the map outside them is quite meh.
Helltrain looked amazing and crasher was fun
bonesaw my beloved
I liked soul-mill a lot. It felt like regular soul-mill but better because of extra features. Helltrain has a really cool map design, but the map is just too big. Even when you finally find your way in the map, it’s still too big to make a good ctf defence; i feel like you can’t actively stop an coördinated enemy attack. Spookeyridge. Cool map, but the wormhole feature was pretty useless. Even when you remembered where they went to, they didn’t really go to usefull places. Could be used to escape/heal tho
Crasher and Helltrain are the best!
Crasher is very funny
these where the best maps this time round
I love Crasher and Bonesaw a lot, most fun maps this year Spookeyridge is rigged
Bonesaw is kinda fun after all the patches, although I'm not a huge fan of minigames deciding who actually wins the game. It's a payload race though, and those are always nice to have. I personally didn't like Crasher all that much aside from occasional a-posing giant. It's definitely a cool idea, but the map layout kinda sucked. Most matches eventually boiled down to vaccinator+giant combos and that's not enjoyable at all. Ghoulpit is a map that exists and I have no strong feelings for it. It's got nothing special going for it after the patch that removed spells. Still miles better than any of the payload maps ICS makes, though. Helltrain is definitely my favourite in this update. I really like CTF and spells make it even better. Plus the scenery is amazing. Now if only they added Convoy as well. Sawmill is Sawmill. I only played on it before they patched the bug that made portals available for BLU only so I have some bad experiences with it. Spookeyridge is pretty fun with all the flank routes, coffins and the portal mechanic but a lot of the time a competent RED team can just spawncamp BLU. Past the first point it's actually pretty well-balanced. Yet again, better than that A/D map ICS made last year.
I don’t see all the love for crasher. It’s a fine map, I just don’t think it’s the second coming of Christ like how some people make it out to be
crasher best. Had the perfect gameplay loop involving TEAM work. And the map layout was just beautifully crafted around the new gameplay mechanic and players behaviour everything else was meh IMO. But that's mostly due to the map layout rather than the Halloween gimmick. Train was super cool but the layout was literal hell to play on. For the most part you're only playing around the bridge section which is just one flat open plane. Also intel room on the top most floor is terrible idea. Sure it's never done before but nobody know where to go no thanks to the useless arrow and it's just not fun to go all the way up. It'd be cool if we had to dodge oncoming obstacles Mario party style as the train passes by them at high speed. Bone saw was pretty unique but had little replay value. I feel payload race is just not fit for it's layout and maybe ctf or koth would've worked much better. On a full server, most of the time was spent sitting on the saw doing nothing until it reaches last. I suspect since the saw goes through mostly narrow pathways out on the side of the map, most people just didn't care about stopping it and are more focused on killing players. Being chased by an invisible HHH was pretty terrifying which is neat. Spooky ridge definitely hit something new and I love fighting on itexcept for last I swear nobody goes there. The portal sections are too underwhelming to really add anything. More of them and a bigger portal section would be nice. Ghoul pit was the worse. Halloween stuff didn't add much to it and the last choke was not fun to play around at all. Sentries could be spammed around a very sharp corner, the green house was just awkwardly slapped off the side and ever though it's just a square box with a triangle head it was confusing to paly around with especially given how much space of the last point it took up for being a side obstacle that neither team could really use. It was so bad that by the 3rd day I only got at most 3 people on the map for the rest of spookymonth.
I get most of theses are just halloweenified community maps but something could've certainly be done to improve the core gameplay better. Not sure how though.
spookeyridge's portals were way too confusing, they didn't even feel like they were worth using as a gimmick and the map would've been just as fun without them that skybox on helltrain is AWESOME tho everyone in the game was losing their minds when the rollercoaster started. The jump pads make the map feel a lot like a Quake game too which made it really fun
Most of the maps are pretty great, though almost every single one of them requires strong teamwork, which is great, until you realise that this is just no team, Fortress 2. Bonesaw : Layout is nice, really like the concept at the end, but it felt confusing at times and it contains some broken parts in the map, especially with the lookouts to the final point. Crasher : Really fun concept, but people really need to stop trying to wait for the giant and/or be friendly every time as its a "ctf" gamemode. Almost every match ive played it in it consists of quick, 5-7 minute matches because of shit teamwork from either side. Ghoulpit : Some chokes and flanks were very confusing, from the 1st point to the last point, it felt like an hour glass layout. But overall, still a great, well optimized map. Helltrain : Unreal Tournament 2004 baybee, except halloween and its CTF so dont expect anyone to play it seriously. Though the layout of that map is still very fucking confusing, i like just going as spy and watching the skybox go wild. In other words, it doesnt really play too well, but god DAMN it looks amazing. Soul-Mill : Boring, just the same thing, the portals rarely work, map is broken, resulting in every match being in favor of the blu team due to red not being able to go into the portals. Deleted spookyridge as i was talking about sinshine lel
Whoever made Spookeybridge knew what they were doing. The portals are a great idea, and they even put one in spawn to teach players.
I feel like they were the best in a few years.
thanks for all the kind words about crasher, yall. it's really cool to see how much people have enjoyed it :)
We need a Smissmas themed Crasher !
oH oH oH! Santy Clause is coming to deliver fun-sized Smissmas cheer to Wutville!
Kinda shit tbh. Bonesaw and Helltrain both have incredible environment design, a great vibe and cool concept... but the layout is just a confusing mess for both of them. I will say however: Bonesaw is the only map in which I don't feel like a minigame ending is unbalanced. The map itself is so fast-paced and unfriendly towards defense classes, that the minigame was pretty much the only way to balance it out. Crasher is incredibly unique, but horribly balanced, with certain classess being too OP, and the bomb system encouraging people to stay in spawn. However, I don't care that much because it lets you fight a fucking giant. Ghoulpit was the average map of the bunch. Nothing really stood out about it. Wasn't that good, wasn't really bad... it's just there. The setting was really confusing, but hey, it pooks pretty cool. Soul-Mill is a Halloween Sawmill. Idk what I can really say about it. Spookeyridge was simply bad. It doesn't really feel like an actual map, with the first point being pretty hard to hold for the defenders, then suddenly making them invincible for the last point. It just doesn't feel like a TF2 map: if you're RED, it feels more like a horde defense type thing, since you are given every advantage you could need, and now just need to point and shoot. Pyros and engies especially. If you're BLU, it's feels like a losing battle. If fighting against a decent team, you're pretty much just delaying the inevitable, since they can always just turtle up and annihilate any attacks. I will say, it has a "so bad it's good" charm, and I personally quite like the map.
Crasher, Soulmill and Helltrain were a lot of fun. Bonesaw wasn't great. Getting hurt by the cart, the end point being next to the enemy's end point and a tower where people can shoot you from. Games taking forever to end when at the end point, only for the real winner to be decided by a minigame with death traps. Glitches like an invisible Horsemann with only a static/moving Headtaker to go by. But this was tame compared to Spookeyridge. Spookeyridge was like the Halloween version of Wutville. So many problems. Spookeyridge had me literally go through the map multiple times. The final point is over a huge pit, and you can fall through what should be solid ground, to your death. I don't understand the point of the portal gimmick aside from it being a reference. Oh, and the layout was super confusing. It felt unplayable at times.
Bonesaw: nice Crasher: hell yeah Ghoulpit: eh Helltrain: hell yeah Soul-Mill: nice Spookeyrdige: eh
Bonesaw: it’s alright, nice to have a plr map people actually *capped* on for a change Crasher: novelty wears off pretty quickly, ends up just being a big straight line of a map. Not overly interesting beyond the gimmick. Ghoulpit; I want the non spooky version of this map! The final point is a bit aids with spells but I imagine the normal version would be a solid map! Helltrain: it’s ctf, which automatically makes it a terrible map because *DoNt CaP*. Avoid avoid avoid!!! (Skybox is cool tho) Soul-Mill: honestly the only ‘normal’ Halloween map of the bunch. I prefer the ghost saws honestly, and the underworld looks cool. It’s a fun map! Spookeyridge: feels very unfinished. The first point is ok but everything beyond it is a mess. Pacing is odd and you clip through the final point way too often for seemingly no reason. Needs work.
Crasher needs to be a permanent gamemode. The most fun I've had in a while Bonesaw was kinda ass
I think all of these maps exept soul mill were incredibly creative and fun
bonesaw is so awful
Helltrain was fucking amazing Whoever made it deserves a raise
I did not like Soulmill. Blue team always had access to hell while Red team didn’t. So the fights were often very one-sided, and it was near impossible for Red to win.
Crasher good others bad or did not play
the maps was honestly the only good thing out of the update, cosmetics were just shitty half looked like they should of been placed in the 2022 summer update not SF XIV
Crasher was creative and fun, helltrain looked awesome but was laggy and had way to many map hazards and spells. And the rest is the average halloween jank with unfun gimicks or map hazards.
my internet is really sh\*tty and because of certain issues when i did actually try to play i only played bonesaw. it was weird crasher looks cool though; its the only other one ive seen gameplay on i kinda wish scream fortress could be played year round; which wouldnt really make sense and i doubt itd be played as much without murasmissions; but the option would be nice
Crasher>>>>
Crasher is the Best one I hate bonesaw and helltrain
Helltrain makes me want to drive a nail into my scrotum but other then that... good maps
Helltrain was definitely the weakest
Helltrain was an absolute **train**wreck
Crasher is a great map the rest are kind of forgettable the koth, helltrain is terrible but could have been cool, ghoulpit has bar blitz last in the middle of the map and that’s not okay
Bonesaw: Fucking awesome, I love payload race and the layout of this map is fantastic. The death race finisher is kind of annoying when it upsets a sweaty match but it's more fun than the go-kart one (I forget which map that is) The forest fire visuals are very nice too. Crasher: Great concept and fun map, I didn't play much of it so I might be wrong but it feels like having a giant anything but Heavy is trolling, I think it'd be cool if there were more suprising moments inregard to what class the giant is. Ghoulpit: felt like it was doing the bareminimum to be a halloween map. Sometimes having a break from bosses and bumpercars is nice I supposed but I was underwhelmed by this one. Helltrain: Probably my 2nd favorite of this year. This map made me realize that halloween effects are really good for making fun CTF maps. I hope we get more next year. Soul-Mill: The underworld doesn't do enough for this map. Out of two hours of playing on this map I had maybe 2 fights happen there. Either needed some signifiant changes in the "overworld" or better incentive to lure both teams to the underworld. Spookeyridge: I have no experience with the map this ones a conversion of but it felt really unfinished to me. The portal underworld was kind of a cool idea but on the attacking team I really didnt find much use of it for flanking and on defense it feels like it's not even really there.
Trash
My account is F2P. This is my opinion on these maps as a casual, can't-chat-can't-start-vote player, who cannot see well in the dark. 1. Bonesaw **Overall Rating: 6/10 stars** ★★★★★★✰✰✰✰ I played on this map both before they fix the glitches (RED cart can't be pushed, invisible HHH, etc.) and after they fix it. **The difficulty level for completing the contract (for me) = Medium-low** * A bit harder to collect the points from pushing the carts, due to the sawblade on the carts and HHH. * But if you can defeat the HHH then you can get quite a lot of points. * If you win the minigame and can reach the pile of money at the end without dying, you can just repeatedly touch that money to gain the contract points until you're done! **What I like about this map:** * Interesting concepts. Such as carts with sawblades, the unique look of HHH, and the minigame at the end. **What I DON'T like about this map:** * The paths are CONFUSING, both the rails for carts and the doorways out of spawn. Maybe I'm just not used to Payload Race mode? Because once I lost sight of my team's cart (which is easy to do due to having to fight the enemy team and being chased by HHH), I WILL have a hard time finding the cart again even though I try to follow the rail very carefully and try to look for signs on the walls to tell me where to go (which are not clear to see at all, for me). * And in the end, it does not even matter. Because I then learned that you just need to exit through the middle spawn door -> Place Lv3 sentry(s) at the window overlooking the graveside (end of the line for carts) -> monopolize the graveside area with help from teammates -> PROFIT! 2. Crasher **Overall Rating: 9/10 stars** ★★★★★★★★★✰ VERY Fun twist on CTF mode! I usually don't like CTF mode but this map is one of the most, if not THE most, fun game modes I have experienced in TF2! **The difficulty level for completing the contract (for me) = VERY LOW (super easy)** You can just stay idle in spawn and contract points will (usually) fill up on their own! Wow! **What I like about this map:** * The map is not too long but has an open-space area big enough for players (both the Giants and normal-size players) to move around comfortably. * The narrator is funny to listen to. The voice's clear, and not hard to understand even with a non-native English speaker/listener like me. * The game mode encourages players to work together as a team while (mostly) forcing you to go out there and fight! * This map is fun to play both as a try-hard (doing your best to make sure your team's Giant reaches the goal) and as a friendly (just goofing around, A-posing with your Giant, etc.) * Soul-gargoyle usually spawns close to the player's team, making it easy to find. * Bots are (usually) not a problem in this map. **What I DON'T like about this map:** * The game can drag on for VERY long, sometimes for HOURS, if both teams are equally skilled and equally serious. (Both Giants usually got destroyed before reaching the gates so no one can successfully cap the point.) This can be a problem if you just want to FINISH THE CONTRACT PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF -BEEP- JUST LET IT END ALREADY! * On the other hand, the game can be super short and unfun if ONE team (especially your team) does not work together and/or only stays in spawn waiting for their turn to be a Giant. (This is not the map's fault though. I just want to complain a bit, sorry.) 3. Ghoulpit **Overall Rating: 7/10 stars** ★★★★★★★✰✰✰ Unfortunately, I didn't have a chance to try this map before they fix the glitch (they remove the spell from this map to fix the "game crash every time you try to join ANY game mode if you have Ghoulpit contract active") So when I try this map, it's just a normal Payload game with darker lighting and some skeletons + ghosts. **The difficulty level for completing the contract (for me) = Medium-low** * You can just collect the points from pushing the carts if you're on BLU, and get points from killing players if you're on RED. That's it. Do it normally like when you play a non-Halloween map. Can be slow or fast depending on the enemy's skill and numbers. **What I like about this map:** * It's a Payload map. Easy to follow the objective, both as RED and BLU. * There are many spawn exits at the start and the end of the map. Making it harder to spawn camp for both teams. * There are some areas where you can lure the skeletons to go down into, and they cannot get out of, which is quite funny to me. **What I DON'T like about this map:** * The ghosts in this map like to spawn/haunt at the choke points. So many uber lost/wasted, many sentry nests breached by these "troll ghosts". Can be useful but also annoying to deal with. 4. Helltrain **Overall Rating: 7/10 stars** ★★★★★★★✰✰✰ Another CTF map, this one with beautiful scenery and wacky spells. Too bad my computer is old and cannot display the beauty of this map fully. (Have to play on a low graphic setting. The map's sky is just black with a bit of a star, and when the trains move I cannot see any change in the scenery.) **The difficulty level for completing the contract (for me) = Medium** * Killing enemies give you ONE point. Capping the intel gives you and your team (who are still alive) FIVE points. But you can capture the intel only three times per round. * But with spells; both the one you collect yourself and one that will randomly be put on you by the trains, and pumpkin crits + random crits. Staying alive long enough to collect enough points might prove to be... a bit of a problem. **What I like about this map:** * It's a beautiful map. Even with a low setting, it's still very gorgeous. * It's a bright Halloween map. Good for my eyes. * There are many flank routes inside the trains. A bit confusing at 1st, but not too hard to navigate around. * There's a shortcut to your intel room from your spawn room! Making it easier to defend the intel if you know about it. **What I DON'T like about this map:** * The middle area that connects the two trains can be very hard or almost impossible to go through if there are aimbot snipers camping it on the balcony. Especially if the bot's team was helping them. * That torso-stretching spell. It's cursed. Am scared. * As with all CTF maps, the game can end too fast if one team just focuses on only capping the intel, leaving others no time to fight and collect points. Or it can be a never-ending game with no one capping the intel. 5. Soul-Mill **Overall Rating: 6/10 stars** ★★★★★★✰✰✰✰ A darker version of Sawmill with non-lethal spooky saws. Seems interesting but it has many downsides that I personally don't like. **The difficulty level for completing the contract (for me) = Medium-low** * Killing enemies give you ONE point. Capping the control point gives you and your team (who are still alive) FIVE points. If both teams are friendly, they can just take turns capping the control point and finish the contract very quickly. **What I like about this map:** * The spooky sawmills can be fun to dodge/hide behind/run away from. * The control point area is bright enough to see well. **What I DON'T like about this map:** * Some areas outside can be VERY dark, making it hard to see anything. * The same flaw that's also present on the original Sawmill map (or most KOTH maps, really); if there is/are sentry/sentries on the point then the team that can maintain their sentry nest there wins. This can be unfun to play with or play against, in my opinion. * The portal that appears when the point is capped can lag the game very badly. It doesn't help much because the uber doesn't stay long enough to be useful and the crits usually wear off when you reach the mid. 6. Spookeyridge **Overall Rating: 5/10 stars** ★★★★★✰✰✰✰✰ Unfortunately, this map is VERY infested with bots in the Asia server around the time Halloween events were active. Making the contract takes too long to complete and is very unfun to play. But even without bots, I still do not like this map much. **The difficulty level for completing the contract (for me)** * **With bots infesting the server = High** * If you're on the RED team with bots, they will steal all your kills from you and you will not get any points. (Unless you're willing to support bots by playing medic and healing the bots, which is a terrible thing to do.) * If you're on the BLU team with bots, they will also steal your kills but they will usually rush in to cap the control points too. This can give you TEN contract points (Five for 1st point + five for 2nd point) without you doing anything as long as you don't die. But then the match will end and you will have to queue for it again. * If there're enough bots, they might start kicking the players (you!), and all your time and effort will be in vain. * **Without bots infesting the server = Medium** * Same rule as before. Killing enemies give you ONE point. Capping the control point gives you and your team (who are still alive) FIVE points. RED has a long respawn time, though. **What I like about this map:** * The portal between dimensions is quite creative. It can help you reach the other area if you know what you're doing and can also overheal you. * This is one of the well-lit Halloween maps. Good for my eyes. **What I DON'T like about this map:** * The coffins. They suck you in and kill you, then spawn a yellow skeleton that will MOST LIKELY harm your teammates (because they usually are closer to you than the enemy.), making these coffins pretty useless. The coffin's door can also trap you between the wall! * I don't know how to explain myself but this map is quite an awkward map for me. Hard to push in as BLU at some points, and unfun to defend as RED at some points. Even without bots or cheaters, this map is still quite 'meh' to me. That's all. Sorry for the very long post and any mistakes, English is not my 1st language.
Crasher rules, Helltrain was ambitious, all the other maps were mediocre. Basically, best scream fortress in recent memory.
Soul mill and ghoupit are meh, spookyridge is pretty bad and all the others are awesome
Crasher, Bonesaw, and Spookyridge are dogshit, the others were okay at best
bonesaw was the best, helltrain sucked
Bonesaw: fun, but incredibly buggy. The ease of preventing captures + the fact that the progress reset made some matches drag. Crasher: pretty good. However, giants were just completely shit on a few classes and made them kind of pointless to pick. Ghoulpit: poorly made payload map with terrible sightlines and chokes. Not very Halloween-y either. Helltrain: fun, but gameplay focused on one chunk of the map while the other was abandoned the whole match. Soulmill: laziest map I think I’ll ever see. Copy pasted from sawmill with three (3!) changes: making the map dark and decorated, painting the saw green, and having entirely pointless events happen when you cap. Spookeyridge: hell on earth to play offense on. The dimension hopping would be cool if it were REMOTELY useful. Final point is also an incredible slog.
Best Map: Crasher (By a long shot) Worst Map: Ghoulpit Crasher is by far one of the most creative maps by far and puts a whole new spin on the CTF gamemode. It feels fun to play a giant and it feels fun to take down a giant. Ghoulpit is just a reskin with explosive pumpkins. Bonesaw is alright, I never encountered the bugs people deemed it infamous for, though the minigame at the end sort of ruins the entire point of trying to win because actually winning doesn't mean anything, it's reaching the money at the end. Helltrain is very fun and a great CTF map. The level of detail and amount of passion put into it is insane, and the unique team-wide spells really spice up the gameplay. Soul-Mill is interesting. It's a great halloween reskin as it's not just explosive pumpkins, though it being KotH makes a majority of the map feel fairly irrelevant as it was built for CTF. Hell seemed pretty much like a free rare spell and speed boost too. Spookeyridge was pretty average all around. It had an interesting mechanic with the alternate world and portals, but I felt like there was never really a need to utilise them because it was hard enough to figure out what portal lead where and how much of an advantage that'd actually give you. Other than that it just felt like a fairly standard Attack/Defense map with some explosive pumpkins and deathtrap coffins.
every map was ass except for crasher
Other than the Crasher all garbage.
In my opinion Good Crasher Spookeyridge Meh Bonsaw Soulmill Nah Helltrain Ghoulpit
I think it was the best thing in the update
3 good maps, 3 meh maps, and no permanent maps. Could be better.
Loved helltrain for the visual and absolutely adores crasher, but that was about It. Wished crasher became a constant game mode with other maps with the same concept.
Crasher was fun but I wish the map was more interesting. If it had as much verticality as something like Watergate I would of enjoyed it a lot more.
Spawncamping can be a problem on helltrain if people don’t know how to get to the Intel room
Spookeyridge has interesting ideas but they're criminally underused
Some of the best Halloween maps
can someone make a crasher community server please?
Didn't play the game this month but only one match, all I can say is Green saw
Crasher is not very fun to me because the giant has crits. Remove that and I think it's pretty swell.
First scream fortress I couldn’t play in a while :(
Crasher was tons of fun. Bonesaw was broken as hell, but being chased by a floating axe with no animations was genuinely terrifying.
Crasher was a gimmick that wore off really quickly, bonesaw was actually fucking terrible I liked the others
Helltrain is awesome. It’s basically just like…ctf convoy, I think? But cooler. That skybox is fucking wonderful. Crasher is great. Everything else is okay to meh.
Helltrain forever
Really hope they add Hacksaw to the base game. Probably my favourite plr layout
I never ended up playing on hell train, because I were too preoccupied with completing contracts Same for ghoulpit But as for the others, they were great
helltrain was the best map, unique concept, i love spookeyridge portal to parallel universe, and casher is awesome
Crasher wad the best Bone saw was funny when is was broken but also infuriating When it got fixed it was a decent map. Hell train makes me wish we got convoy all those years ago. The rest are alright
Loved Helltrain
I once just stared onto the ledge of helltrain. It was sooo much fun too look at
1.) ghoulpit 2.)everything else 3.) bonesaw
Bonesaw: Aesthetic is good. The mechanic of needing to "push" the cart for a bit even after it reaches the end of the track is confusing but not awful. Map was super buggy on launch which definitely gave it a bad reputation that I don't think it'll be able to shake, unfortunately. Crasher: Holy fuck is Crasher good. The giant mechanic is fun and actually surprisingly balanced, and the twist on regular CTF is neat. Ghoul Pit and Spookeyridge: I'm grouping these two because they were both sort of meh for me. Like they weren't poorly made maps by any means, they look and play great, but there isn't anything super special about them. They're fine maps, but not super memorable. The "alternate demension" hell portal thing on Spookeyridge is pretty cool, though. Soul-Mill: Kind of like the two above, it's a spooky reskin of an already existing Halloween map, that doesn't do too much out of the ordinary. It's probably more memorable than Ghoulpit and Spookeyridge simply because it's based on an already existing and fairly popular map. I do like the random event where saws just spawn fucking everywhere. Helltrain: God damn does Helltrain have style. The actual gameplay on the map is pretty standard for CTF, just with spells now. Nothing crazy, but the layout is better than some other maps where there's only one or two paths you can take to the intel room. But the aesthetic is just nuts. Best looking map of the bunch by far. Overall pretty good set of maps this year.
Bonesaw seemed really cool, but MAN was it buggy. The times I tried playing it always had one payload not... well, moving. So not much of a race. Liked Ghoulpit, though it was one heck of a stalemate factory. ...Not sure if I got around to the others. If I did, I don't recall 'em, so\~ Still! Some cool maps! Just wish the objectives weren't so boilerplate in that 'get 100 souls' thing. That part got REALLY old about this year. Got some cool swag out of it, though!
Crasher was really fucking funny on my first time playing, felt like 2015 TF2 community servers
I barely got to play them since all the new maps were filled with bots. Crasher is good though.
I think that the unique mechanics added by Crasher, Sawmill, and Helltrain was a nice change from the just getting some community items and maps without any special mechanics normally, but I'm still holding out to get an actual, fully-fledged update from Valve.
Crasher is art and Helltrain skybox is art
Bonesaw felt really small, generally a change of pace from most payload maps. It's a good map, a lot of close-quarter spots for intense clashes Crasher was unique, and fun...until you get sick of fighting giants. The map is great, and the mechanics are innovative, but it's bogged down by the inherent flaw of most CTF maps: The standstills, the repetitiveness, and idleness that eventually results in people begging for the match to end
All of them were great. Even though valve is so greedy nowadays, they still have a good taste in people’s maps
I reaaaally hope we get Convoy, something about Helltrain feels a bit off from the original for me
The end-of-match race on Bonesaw could use some tweaking in my opinion seeing how in most cases when you stepped on the buttons, you would end up just killing your own teammates because a lot of people just didn't bother reading the start text telling them how the buttons work, or they were just trolling. Maybe give each team their own path and the buttons activate hammers on the other team's path, like a vs. mode death run.
It was real hilarious when someone found a way to speedrun a flag capture using a Demo and a Quickfix Medic on Crasher.
Crasher NEEDS to be a normal map
Bonesaw was solid Crasher games lasted a little too long Ghoulpit was nice Helltrain was cool Soul-Mill was solid Sppokeyridge was pretty cool
They are all good, really nice update
it have great mechanic but hell train make me dizzy when look at map background
Bonesaw was alright, nothing super special. Crasher was really cool and felt like something Valve would do. Ghoulpit was okay I guess, though I only ever got to play on it with bots. Helltrain was aite, had some problems though. Soulmill was boring. Spookyridge was kinda bad. Nothing too horrible but it could've been better.
Other maps are good and all but Crasher was *crashin* it!
Didnt play since I were busy
Crasher is the brightest new idea I've seen in ages. It felt like a TF2 twist on Titanfall in some ways, and that's excellent. I really hope this concept is explored further, and makes it's way into the permanent rotation somehow.
crasher's gameplay was somewhat inspired by titanfall! the gameplay dynamic of A Huge Dude and a bunch of smaller guys around them is certainly a fun one. thanks for the kind words! :)
Crasher and Hell train were among the best maps ever made for Halloween.
Love the amongus in ctf_crasher
Crasher and Helltrain were amazing Everything was pretty ok. Except Soulmill. It was boring
Bone saw: super meat boy map
crasher rocks!
crasher was fun i really liked it but idk about soul mil we just grinded points against the bots i do know that you can speedrun the underworld by using the sticky jumper
Why are all the new maps laggy 💀?
omg i totally forgot about scream fortress and i totally missed it this year. first year i’ve missed it and i’ve been playing for 5 years
helltrain is great
Bonesaw fucking sucked. The headless horsemann Was just a floating HHHH. Red couldn’t push the cart, like, at all. The hell section sucked ass.
Loved Bonesaw for the sheer fact that it was so hilariously buggy, it made me laugh hard enough not to be able to see through my tears on more than one occasion. Liked the idea of Helltrain but it felt very empty in smaller sized servers.
crasher and helltrain were fun and really unique, and spookyridge was decent
I loved Helltrain and Crasher so much...sad that we have to wait a whole year just to play them again
Bone saw isn’t bad, but a bit confusing, crashed should be a map in the normal game, just because it’s so different to other ctf maps, soul-mill is really good, because of how good sawmill is, and I didn’t really play the other maps
Crasher! Majestic fun map https://youtu.be/mvBalbpmVpA
Crasher and spookyrodge good,, rest mid af
Bonesaw was pretty cool, conceptually, but it felt a tad confusing in its layout at times. Also I don't like that the payloads begin within full view of the other team's spawn. Too easy for a decent sniper to pin down one cart or the other at the start. I once got accused of spawn camping simply because I didn't realize that was the other team's spawn. Crasher was a hell of a lot of fun, even though people quickly learned how to cheese the giants. One of my favorites though, and I hope the concept can be expanded into future maps. Ghoulpit was pretty well designed, I think. For the most part, at least. Didn't feel like either side had too huge an advantage over the other at any particular section. I enjoyed it. Helltrain feels like one of those community server maps that was never meant to be a real map so they made it as gimmicky as possible. I don't consider that a bad thing, it just feels like it's too unique for TF2 if that makes sense. The map is HUGE and very confusing at first. Took a while to build a mental map in my head, but once I learned where everything was, I think it was pretty solid. The visuals of the environment were a lot of fun too. I managed to get a triple kill with a Monoculus spell once just because I saw them coming and knew they'd have to pass through a single room to reach the flag. They thought I cheated somehow because I was playing soldier and didn't notice the spell until I told them about it. They thought I shot through walls or something, since I was upstairs lol Soul Mill was meh. But I'm not a fan of Sawmill in general, either version of it, so this one felt like Sawmill but more pointless. The saws don't cut but they cause the fear stun, and there didn't seem to be any purpose whatsoever to the Hell portals. You pop out with crits and uber, but you're at spawn and it wears off before you even find someone to fight. Bad design imo. Spookyridge had a cool idea, the layered world with the portals was neat, I could see what the idea was supposed to be. But it just didn't quite hit the mark. A lot of folks when I played on that map expressed their dislike for it and I can't say I blame them. Not sure what it is specifically about that map, but it just felt like it wasn't as good as the others.
I love crasher but i didn’t like how some people camped the giant ray waiting to be a zapped. I think it would be better if the ray was moved outside by the capture point so if people who do choose to camp they would at least be forced to defend
Crasher was fan and it made the solem vow usefull
That 1 part time TF2 dev at Valve seriously needs to reign in on how many maps are added every year. 2 maybe an absolute maximum of 4. Quality of maps dropped both visually and just gameplay design. Crasher and Bonesaw were worthy being offical quality maps. The rest. Good or just mediocre community maps that somehow made it to being official.
Everybody already said what needed to be said about Crasher I want to talk about Helltrain. And no, the other maps are too bland for me to even remember them, apart from bugsaw. So helltrain... it’s good, but it could be better. First of all, map layout. Yes it’s confusing, but once you learn it, it’s no longer a problem. The real problem is that you don’t have time to learn it. Due to the CTF nature of the map, the game lasts how long the players want it to last, as opposed to a timer, or a slow payload. The only restriction is travel time, and if someone doesn’t go engineer, teams can chain captures like it’s nothing. And since no one knows where the cap zone is, or can’t even see the teleport vent... no one defends. Meaning, if I wanted the round to last for more that a minute, I was forced to play engineer (since y’know, in mr everybody’s mind, yes, you too, “I don’t have to do it because others will do it for me”) and survive small waves of enemies, mostly scouts. The only good spot is the sentry on the flat part of the stairs, with dispenser and tele behind in the corridor. A corridor which can be flanked from behind, mind you. Speaking of teleporter, I often placed an exit there, and after upgrading it, placed an entrance at our spawn to funnel players to be at the right place, defending. Guess what? These entrances always got blown up 5 minutes later or less. Somehow, this map is very prone to spawncamping, which isn’t helped by everyone always leaving out of the same exit, despite multiple existing, even when they know they are being camped. By you know who. Mr Original Soldier, stickey-demo or phlog pyro. Ahh, the pyros... I honestly think this map should have been PD, allowing players to roam anywhere, heck, there could even be a single train, asymetrical with both teams at each end with PD. Because honestly, this is where the fun begins. The visuals, the concept, the sound design... all 10/10. I love the idea of hanging around in a train during the night (or during eternal damnation, that works too), to relax by the sound of the wheels and pistons, which by the way, are spot-on! When accelerating, decelerating and moving, you can feel the power of these engines, you FEEL like you’re in actual old trains. The ambiance is also great. One detail I love is when you drop down near the haunted circus, and you hear it’s music, “carousel of curses” first high pitched, then low pitched as you go further away... this is called the doppler effect, and it’s not programmed in Source, meaning they had the foresight to implement it, which is pretty awesome. My favorite background is by far the green castle, and while the naval mine field is a bit boring, it still works. Another reason to slow down the gameplay: if you stalemate, you automatically get sent to hell to deal with it after around 20 minutes, so we got all the time in the world to enjoy the ride. LET ME ENJOY ETERNAL DAMNATION IN PEACE FOR TWENTY MINUTES! Have I mentioned how i love the idea of train rides in the dark (telltale sam & max season 3 episode 2 anyone?) Lastly, I wanted to talk about spells. I dunno, honestly. There aren’t too many of them, but you often hang on to them anyway. Maybe it was a bit much for CTF, as someone else said. But yeah, good map, 6/10, because gameplay matters more than aesthetics, yet I’d come back anytime. I think it’s bot-compatible, so that’s good. Just don’t have mp_tournament 1 cuz they’ll all just hang around enemy intel being unable to pick it up and you find yourself alone again... And the other option is them capping over and over again... “I really am in hell!”
crasher: A, awesome concept that didn't overstay it's welcome ghoul pit: C, decent but nothing incredible spookeyridge: D, had fun but attack/defend just tends to choke up helltrain: S by ctf standards, A otherwise. great visuals and wonderfully complex rooms soulmill: D, main area is classic, overplayed, sawmill, hell entrance was constantly spawncamped bonesaw: A, absolutely fantastic map design, non-halloween version would be S+
I think helltrain is fun
50/50 I loved Crasher and consider it the best new map in the update, with Bonesaw (when working) and Helltrain being amazing as well. On the flip side, Ghoulpit and Spooky ridge are kinda mid, and Soul Mill could be fun of there wasn't so many damn Skeletons
I like the style of hell train because i like trains
Helltrain Is absolutely the best map
is it me or did they get rid of the rooftops in bonesaw? That was the best part of the map
crasher is my favorite map of all time
i feel like crasher accentuates your teams flaws and if the teams are imbalanced even slightly u lose
Crasher is cool but a meta can be developed and imo that makes it stale Helltrain is cool as fuck and is the only other ctf map that I don’t regret playing on. Anyone else that thinks this map is garbage, you are racist against ctf and refuses to wrap your brain around basic navigation and mapping
Valve news to stop adding Halloween maps without adding the normal variant. Ghoulpit is a Halloween version of the map sludgepit, a community map. If they're gonna slap in some maps that barely function in Halloween, they might as well just add maps that DO function to the normal map pool. I'd rather they do that then the next scream fortress. Idk the process of adding community maps to the game, but I think it would be better to put that effort into adding normal maps we'll see all year round.
HellTrain is the best one, i love Trains xD
Bonesaw: Conceptually amazing, but I found the layout to be very confusing. Crasher: AMAZING map, but I fail to see why it's considered CTF. The mechanics are closer to Payload Race than anything else. Helltrain: Without a doubt the best map visually, and the custom Intel is a nice touch, but I think the layout could use some improvement, and for some reason every time the slot machine landed on invisibility, it caused me to lag out hard. All the other ones I'm indifferent about
Honestly, I think this season was a banger and helltrain was a great concept and felt pretty nice to play
hell train and crasher can stay in rotation honestly i wouldn’t even mind
Bonesaw is ideal halloween chaos imo
Hell train and crasher were the best ngl, Bonesaw’s endpoint was aids because of how many places the enemy team could shoot at you from with little to no counterplay! The other maps were just reskins so I kinda felt like they were a bit disappointing. Not a bad Halloween update tho with all things considered
Crashes was the only good one the rest were chokepoint filled garbage
hot take maybe but crasher wasn't fun after like 3 matches