A little excessive here with 6
screenshots when comparing to all of the other reviews I've done here on Da
ReceszZ. However, as the aware reader might have noticed there's a couple of
things, which seems odd: The Fiffy name has already been used for levels,
and the above 3 screenshots look a lot like the 3 on the bottom.
Explanation: This is a rare remix of a old classic!
"Fiffy Remix" is besides
its name and the monster placement a totally different level from the
original made way back in nineties! Only at the first glance however! First
a little introduction to my point: George Fiffy aka "REoL" who
made the original "Fiffy1" made this complicated and rather weird
story, and not without a portion of humor, about you being B.J. Blazkowicz
(!) watching Wheel of Fortune which gets interrupted by the news; Mt.
McKenley has been taken over by Hell Spawn building a headquarters on the
top! I guess that explains somewhat why there's tech merged not so luckily
with hell textures/flats! Here's the point: "Fiffy Remix" by Steve
Robinson doesn't try to evade this virtually doomed in advance theme! I
don't know how, but he's actually managed to pull out the very essence of
the original map and elevate it to a modern level which George Fiffy could
only be proud of! I think the result is a level which looks like something
George Fiffy imagined but couldn't achieve at that time the original map was
built. Steve Robinson has accomplished to make a map which has a unique
feeling to it with all it's colors and amazing architecture. The best thing being
that he's not changed the physics of the map very much. The doors, hallways,
rooms etc. are all almost identical in size. He's actually only modified
them to better accommodate the needs of the audience of today, which is to
have no mis-aligned flats, no un-marked key-doors, no unpegged textures, no ridiculous
height differences, no 0 brightness rooms and no monsters stuck in walls or
each other. I enjoyed playing an old classic level all dressed up in new
better fitting clothing.
When it comes to gameplay I was
indeed very glad for the fact that Steve Robinson had chosen to remove some
of those Cyberdemons. That many doesn't really fit into a level of this small to medium
size. Instead he's replaced some with Baron of Hell's. The original also
suffered from an extreme amount of ammo. Steve hasn't evaded much from the
placement of objects, monsters, ammo, health etc. He's just cut it down to a
more reasonable amount. And like the original you're going to have a hard
time if you pick the wrong room of the many there is in the big start area.
Behind one of the doors is a shotgun and behind all the other are monsters!
It's a bit easy blasting all those demons to bits and pieces in the big
outside area with all those barrels; it's great fun though and a clear
reference to the old-school design which "Fiffy1" represented.
Play an old-school level again!
Only this time it's more pleasing to the eye with great modifications to the
existing work! Too bad that the low originality factor pulls the score a
little bit down: It is after all only a remix.
