This is the second area of the map, apparently located in now-swamped former factory area. As Gordon gets his direct path rendered unavailable due to Combine shutting their asymmetrical massive dark-blue metal gates before the player's face, he must now dwell a bit through this area, have a bit of a fun with bullsquids and houndeye packs, and then further infiltrate the Combine industrial compound. This part of the chapter should be compared to the final maps of Route Canals.
This is a non-HDR version (takes a bit too long time to compile), but that shouldn't be difficult to imagine the picture with some more brightness.
THE IMPORTANT QUESTION IS:
Does this feel canonical enough for you? 'Half-Life' enough?
Any thoughts on map's atmosphere will be appreciated. Not that I have some problems or that I stuck, I'd just like to share the current work with you guys, so it won't be unpleasantly surprising to have too much grass or too much sunlight or whatnot.
P.S. I planned making the map abot 50-60% bigger, but I already reached a 98.9 score on planes limit lol. My first time actually. And that is with some brushes->props optimization already applied.
It has the HL look and feel. As for the atmosphere, since you're making this a part of the old storyline the atmosphere could use a little more darkness with little to no plantlife and stuff but that's just my opinion.
It seems strange to me that plants are even possible to grow anymore, considering the years of constant combine industrial pollution. But as I am aiming for total nature extermination, your direction might be a little different from mine.
Theres really no other thing I can think of, you nailed this.
Yeah, I've probably overdid the vegetation on this map, but I don't think there can't be one at all. Ravenholm had trees, Xen flora and fauna seems more or less abundant in RtB scripts. But don't worry, the green life is made much less abundant already, and there isn't one really beyond the canals.