Let's Build Our Hideaway

Title: Let's Build Our Hideaway
Link: https://www.gamemaps.com/details/20396
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=462957476
Author: James D. Carnahan
Survivors: L4D1
Notes: Best played with human companions.

Let's Build Our Hideaway, jokingly also referred to as "Let's Rebuild Society Our Hideaway," is a four-map campaign that actually implements more of a scavenge element than the "let's build" mechanic. You start out on a sailboat having crashed into a plane on an island (it's unclear as to whether or not you were on the plane or boat first). You explore the island to find out that other people attempted to build their own community to escape the infection but due to inevitable circumstances, didn't make it. The first map is where most of the building takes place; you have to gather resources all around the island to set up a house. The other maps entail leaving the island, going to a city to grab windows and other materials, and then finally adding the windows to the house.

While the campaign's premise is okay, it unfortunately doesn't hit the right notes. The first map is overburdened with finding materials and constructing a house. This isn't a typical let's-build in that there's a progression of items from a low tier to a high tier. Rather, you actually start off with a tier 2 weapon at the campaign's beginning, and building is relegated to holding 'use' to take piles of bricks or rooftops or to place walls or roofs on the house, or constructing an electric fence surrounding the house as a light barricade against infected. The first map has most of the building elements out of all the maps and it will probably take the longest by far. If you don't know what to do or if you miss some necessary materials, you might be wandering around for the better part of half an hour. Resources really aren't too much of a problem but there's a lot of aimless wandering.

I think that one of the worst parts of the map is this armory shelf in the house that takes two whole minutes of holding 'use' in order to lockpick, when by that point you'll already have access to a Tier 2 weapon and an ammo pile. I just don't get it. I did in fact hold 'use' for almost the entire amount of time, but right at the very last second, I got pounced by a jockey that came through the open door because the bots will freely leave that door open. The thing that's really annoying is that you are completely reliant on the bots for two entire minutes if you attempt to lockpick that weapon stash. My recommendation is just to not even bother, honestly. I want to iterate that holding 'use' to pick up materials or construct part of the house, whether it be for ten, fifteen, or even twenty seconds isn't necessarily bad. However, two minutes is just beyond the pale to be reliant on the brain dead AI of the bots.

The second map is really short but we had a situation where Bill spawned outside the saferoom and got destroyed by a charger, so Francis also left the saferoom to try to rescue Bill on his own. You can see by the above screenshot how well that went. In any case, once you leave the saferoom you'll be greeted with a terrible sight, a ton of boxes to search to see if you just so happen to choose the right one by accident. Once you do, you leave on the same sailboat you arrived on. Apparently someone said they wanted windows. In a zombie apocalypse... Because that makes sense. But whatever.

In the third map, you'll arrive at a city where your goal is to find some windows and other supplies. This just boils down to having to find two trucks containing the objects you need and then returning to the start. If you know where you're going or just happen to be lucky, you can finish this map in about two minutes. If you don't you might be stuck wandering around the town for ten or more minutes. The last map has you back at the island where you make your way to the island, carve holes out of the brick walls, round the ends off, and insert the windows. Once that's all done, you go inside the house, close the door, and end the campaign. Seriously, that's it.

This campaign is a real anomaly. It makes little to no sense and gets bogged down in its own ridiculous attempts at logic. The island would be an okay idea if the map was polished, looked good, and had some better indicators as to where to go. As it stands, there are some areas that are a bit hidden and aren't even that interesting to look at. Another thing that really bogged the game down for me was a ton of notes strewn all around that were supposed to be both journal entries and a dialogue script. There's really some attempt at a story here but it just doesn't make any sense and I really don't care. I wouldn't expect any other players to care, either.

The "let's build" part of the title is pretty misleading. There's no real relationship that this has to other let's builds that use Rimrook's mechanic. The let's build aspect of this is finding enough arbitrary materials and holding use on a house. If that sounds fun to you, I wonder if you really enjoy Left 4 Dead 2's gameplay. From a level layout perspective, the main island map that you're on is okay, but not good enough to warrant playing on for three maps unless it was really much better detailed and polished. The third map, taking place in the city, is fairly barren and doesn't have much to look at or admire. In any case, you're not making much progress there, only going to find materials just a fair bit away from the starting point and return. Seeing as the design of that map is fairly open, it doesn't lend itself to much interesting gameplay.

I can tell that the author did put in time into making this campaign, and it has the initial stages of some kind of unique ideas here. There are even some creative little additions like allowing the toilet or sink to restore health. However, those small positive aspects don't keep this campaign from getting bogged down in a slow pace of building arbitrary pieces of a house. Plus the story doesn't appeal to me and it doesn't make any sense as to why you would want to make your shelter from the zombie apocalypse structurally weaker.

Difficulty: In terms of gameplay, this campaign is easy. The difficulty comes in figuring out where to go and leaving yourself in the hands of the bots if you play by yourself. 

Final Verdict: While the idea could have been interesting, figuring out where to go isn't actually fun. Nothing looks particularly good and there isn't a lot of good sign-posting as to where to go. If you play with friends, I suppose you can take turns building parts of the house while you cover each other from infected, which could be a little fun. However, this doesn't stop the campaign from halting the gameplay dead in its tracks for the players who do have to stop and do nothing while they build very small portions of the house one by one. If holding down the 'use' button for long stretches at a time sounds fun to you, then by all means go for this campaign. But here it doesn't even serve a purpose like it would in a more traditional let's build map and so it just comes across to me as a big waste of time.

Rating: 1.75/5.