Top 1.0% reviewer
Only 5 users have written more helpful reviews.
Packages
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Foodblocks
Solid cubes of food for mass storage or building.
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Riddance
Hide or rid yourself of unnecessary items from games and mods without any code
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Secrets of the Moon
Discover the true nature of the moon
Maintained Packages
This user is also a maintainer of the following packages
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AdvTrains BBÖ 1080
AdvT. SupplementalBBÖ electric locomotive 1080 and ware wagon
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AdvTrains DB 160 (E60)
AdvT. SupplementalAdds a DB BR 160 / E60 electric shunting locomotive for advtrains
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Advtrains Freight Train
AdvT. SupplementalAdds a set of freight wagons and a lightweight locomotive for AdvTrains
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Advtrains Orient Express
AdvT. SupplementalA locomotive and carriages of the CIWL Orient Express
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AdvTrains Subway NY
AdvT. SupplementalSubway cars loosely based on New York/American transit
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AdvTrains Train Rocket
AdvT. SupplementalA model Stephenson's rocket and some barrel wagons
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AdvTrains Trans-Siberian (Transib)
AdvT. SupplementalA Russian TEM-2 and large coal hopper for AdvTrains
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AdvTrains Zugspitzbahn
AdvT. SupplementalA locomotive and passenger wagon of the Bavarian Zugspitzbahn
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TfL S7 Stock Modpack
AdvT. SupplementalLondon Underground / TfL S7 Stock pack for AdvTrains
Blows everything that came before it out of the water
AdvTrains Livery Tools fulfills the brief for just about every discussion put forward so far about livery features for AdvTrains, and does so in such an intuitively designed, user-friendly way. Marnack has achieved here what many have discussed but not actually gone and done.
Before Livery Tools, the best we had was doxygen_spammer's Multi-component liveries (part of doxy's Minitram). That involved the use of the external dependency on Bike Mod, and an arduous process of memorising and recalling a few "special" numbers on the Bike Painter to apply special painting functions. No more! With Livery Tools, it's all laid out in an intuitive formspec with so many presets to help you along and an instant preview.
Livery Tools is survival-friendly, with a crafting recipe provided for Minetest Game (the only really support game for AdvTrains) to craft its core item, the Livery Designer Tool. The Designer Tool has four tabs:
Livery Tools brings us the ability for in-depth customisation for those who want it, plus the ability to make templates to inspire. It's a creative breakthrough, and I can' t recommend it enough.
Best passenger coaches (carriages) mod for AdvTrains to date
Based on previous work for InterCity/Nightline carriages originally made for LinuxForks Moretrains, Marnack presents us with a whole new world of customisation in this mod which is the first to have support for his AdvTrains Livery Tools mod. Unlike most carriages, which at most offer the ability to change a single colour, this set is customisable in-depth.
Classic Coaches also comes with a great set of features that are better than many AdvTrains mods: Door animations, crafting recipes, livery customisation and internationalisation support.
I recommend Classic Coaches to anyone who wants a quality set of diesel/electric locomotive-hauled passenger carriages that stands well on its own, and enthusiasts who want to customise their rolling stock. Players could create customisations on this solid foundation to add company logos to their rolling stock easily and use them in a variety of colour options.
I can't recommend Classic Coaches in a few niche scenarios. First, drawing these coaches is more computionally expensive than using flat textures due to the number of overlayed and colorised textures present on each wagon, so maybe avoid them if you are playing on a potato, or a tightly constrained server (the server must calculate the texture strings to apply when a carriage pops into viewing range of a player). You can use the mod without AdvTrains Livery Tools if you want.
Security by proper means, though could be more expansive
It can be hard to discern when to grant certain advtrains-related privileges, especially given the lack of protection checks for privileged users, who can then go on to abuse them. The interlocking privilege by default will let players modify TCB information in any area of the world, even ones they can't build in. This, for example, could let the wrong people remove interlocking from a section and cause a denial of service or crash.
This mod will restrict TCBs and some signals (compatibility not guaranteed) to make it only possible to modify them if the user has permission to modify the area. This does mean you may need to operate your server in a different way than you currently do. It may not be suitable in 100% of cases either. For instance, say you have a public railway network and deputies, helpers and so on who are meant to be able to help troubleshoot issues like stuck trains. Those deputies need to be given protected area access to key parts ofthe railway infrastructure so they can do their duties.
Don't worry about locking admins or high-level railway staff out of signals either. The mod at time of review also does not obey the protection_bypass privilege (this is not something the engine does by default, kind of annoyingly), however it does grant access to anyone with the train_admin privilege (which also grants access to place, destroy and drive all trains as defined in the core modpack of AdvTrains.)
Lastly, this mod should hopefully be made obsolete, but the author is quite right in his current comment that it is just not timely to get changes into AdvTrains at the time of writing.
Get extensive info on trains without leaving the game
While the presentation is kind of a wall of text, in-game presents the best place that this information could be provided. While the AdvTrains train catalogue tries to do its best at providing information on all train content that is available, it is subject to becoming out of date as well. With this mod installed, the information is generated from the actual data of the train as it was registered with AdvTrains, making it impossible for it to be out of date.
A great feature that is included is a 3D preview of what each wagon looks like that can be orbited with the mouse/touch controls. Finally, you can find out what the bottom of every train looks like. I know you want to.
This is billed as still a Work in Progress, but there are only some minor improvements I would make: some headings, since variation of the text size helps navigability, and maybe some kind of split between more basic and more advanced information sections. Also the use of proper item names instead of itemstrings and give the speeds in the internally-used m/s (this is the unit technically already used without being named; technically a node per second is only a m/s by convention, but anyway..) as well as km/h and maybe mi/h (mph) if we want to be generous.
Elevates the onboard experience
Without this mod, rotating the camera around to see better from inside a train can be very annoying, as the game feels like it is fighting you quite often. With it installed, you get to rotate the view while driving or a passenger.
Even better, the mod sets the position of the camera properly. Now rotating your view around won't orbit your camera in a big arc around a central point, instead you get what you would intuitively expect: the view rotates while you stay fixed in your seating position.
Further, this mod properly enables wagons have front and rear driver's seats, something that didn't make sense when you had to stick the player's view close to the centre of the wagon to let them look well enough out both sides and still be able to escape by right-clicking the wagon's hitbox.
Of course one day maybe we can hope that we won't need this mod, because it only exists due to a deficiency in the game engine. But it's very good to use right now.
Eat a brownie out of captain celeron55's filing cabinet
A lot of the time spent on this game, SSS for short, definitely went on the development of original assets. Those are good and at times you somewhat forget you are playing a block game. The game's story is a solid middle score, not bad, not great. Its puzzles are not satisfying and the game leans too heavily into its randomisation features. Nathan (game's author) probably also should have cut some content rather than leaving it in the submission, because a half-baked feature is often worse than not having it.
The game has persistence issues. In SSS, the items you find around the ship are decided randomly and also do not persist permanently. The ship's power status can also be reset by logging in. This leads to a very poor sense of direction and guidance, as if you are never quite sure how to follow a chain of logic to complete the game. It is also possible to accidentally skip loads of content, such as speedrunning the route to the end after (game event that is a spoiler) instead of waiting; or by getting lucky and collecting many ID cards at once, then proceeding to an area with a 2-3 security level gap from your last important door.
The game leans too heavily into randomisation. The loot randomisation has many nonsense results, such as finding officer ID cards in the Cadets' quarters or my personal favourite, a brownie in one of the captain's filing cabinets. I know the game development had limited time, but I think statically placing the objects would have worked better in the Jam Time; that way they could be placed logically.
(continued in comment)
Got lost on the way to the protest, killed myself to escape
Insane Protestor greets you with a big load of content warning tags when you view it on ContentDB, and fair enough. It's an edgy kind of a game, but not really particularly so when you get down to it. You're first presented with a happy upbeat soundtrack, which plays throughout and provides a kind of sinister juxtaposition to the violence and destruction of the actual game. It definitely has a story, with pictures and all, though who you are ends up mattering little in the violence and destruction that follows.
Insane protestor seems to revolve around one core gameplay goal: fill the destruct-o-meter. Unfortunately, doing this won't actually achieve anything. Nor will dying cause a lose condition: you will just respawn in your apartment, destruct-o-meter still rising. You will soon end up pursuing other goals like trying to explore the city. That there's an item dupe if you reload the game does'nt matter so when victory is nonexistent anyway (perhaps there's a message in that fact). The city is somewhat lacklustre, but at least it has been filled with a good number of assets from a lot of mods. Thanks to Insane Protester I know know xdecor has a good toilet model, for instance, or there's a fire extinguisher mod.
Even disregarding the lack of a win condition, the game is just not smooth either. Buildings are mazes, and your speed sends you careening down every stairwell to take fall damage. There are many ways to crash the game by right-clicking nodes or the intro formspec. The combat is unsatifying because both weapons are bad: the pipe bomb always seems to damage you no matter how far you throw it, and the throwable firebomb doesn't seem to actually deal any damage.
Lacking good architecture, good code, good story beyond the introduction and good gameplay elements means I can only recommend Protest as a 5 minute thing you play just to be edgy for a bit and to see what stuff there is out there for Minetest in various mods.
Proposition 65 warning
This mod contains items that are known to the state of California to cause cancer and birth defects or other reproductive harm. Thankfully, this does not affect Minetest players.
Edit: It now does affect Minetest players, beware!
The systemd of Minetest mods
So far as I understand the history, Basic materials was thrown together by VanessaE as a library to hold intermediate crafting items for her various mods like homedecor. It's since been adopted as a de facto standard by various other mods to the point it feels like you need to try to avoid it if you don't want it, rather than wanting it and downloading it by choice. I suspect there are so few reviews for this mod precisely because so many people have it installed automatically as a dependency through ContentDB without asking specifically for it.
Basic Materials fits in an annoying spot in all kinds of mod soups, whereas I really feel like the only game it properly belongs is Dreambuilder. The mod soup problem only gets worse with the fact that this mod is getting ported to other games now, because what's the point of playing a different game if it's all just Basic Materials?
Things I like about Basic Materials:
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Great for use on the streets
Leave a few of these around the streets and let people go through publicly designated trash; or keep one in your house. My only complaint is that it doesn't have pipeworks support, but the pipeworks mod has its own trash can for that purpose.
Conceptually sound but too rough to consider except as a WIP
First a list of things I quite appreciate:
However I find the art a bit inconsistent and there are a few assets for signs that may have been copywronged from railsigns.uk, despite being attributed (the author should recall that in the absence of a licence statement, copyright remains all rights reserved). I also think the author missed a big opportunity to use display_modpack for the plethora of 'Stop \<color> of \<x> cars' signs - simply allow writing two numbers in a formspec attached to the sign. Then only one sign node definition is needed per colour. A consistent font or small set of fonts and texture resolutions should also be used instead of a mix of pixel and smooth fonts. Some signs also have a very tiny size in the world, which makes the illegible from more than about half a metre away, yet they still have the same size selection box. Others have a very high resolution which causes a big framerate drop whenever they are wielded in-hand; a separate in-inventory image can address this.
The overhead line equipment, or as it's referred to in-game "OLE" without explanation: A like the idea of modularity in height and flexibility of track spacing. However, the lack of any wire at 30 and 45 degrees to match the track is a bit dissapointing, even if it would take a lot more to implement. Also, this is not actually the first attempt at OLE for Advtrains - MBB actually made a more basic system back in 2017. Although the britsignals OLE is more complicated and a bit thinner on the wires (which is usaully more desirable), the MBB mod actually manages to get a better colour contrast including darker cables and has a separate messenger/return wire .
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Recommended for people with experience in digital logic, but not beginners
While still obviously a work in progress, this game suffices as a demonstration of how to apply digital logic principles with mesecons and a demonstration of several digistuff components. It does not introduce digital logic principles to someone without that background, but is good as a kind of recipe book for people with some experience already. Perhaps in future it can also introduce the basics.
The text is sparse, or sometimes missing, and you will only get out as much as you put into interacting with each exhibit. I was able to understand the interface to some of the latches, for example, without understanding their internals, but further study and interaction would lead to a better understanding.
Better care should be taken to guide the flow and mark prerequisites in some places. I did not understand the I/O expander when I visited the magnetic swipe card exhibit, so marking a prerequisite of I/O expanders for the swipe card, or removing the use of I/O expanders from the swipe card exhibit would be more helpful.
In terms of performance, the exhibits are mostly tolerant to quick switch flipping and the use of clocks that are off by default helps performance too. I was able to get the I/O expander direct connect exhibit stuck with one pin on though.
I was a bit confused to see the use of 1's complement representation in the display decoders. Perhaps it is easier to build than 2's complement for a display decoder, but 2's complement is vastly superior for arithmetic. Also the sign bit would usually go on the left of all the place value bits in my mind.
The exercises are still also definitely a work in progress, with the second one having several 'wrong' ways to solve it. A good series of exercises can be hard to put together but a well-put-together one would certainly add a lot of value.
Kind of rough, kind of laggy, kind of buggy, and not always intuitive, but we love what it can do
Advtrains is the kind of mod that has twofold appeal: From the perspective of people who will never learn its ins-and-outs, and from those who will learn all about the mod and enjoy its richness. It's the definitive method of public transport for Minetest - even the boats and buses of linetrack are based on this core, and teleports can't compare. The way all trains are always operating, even through unloaded areas, is just the beginning of its rich features.
The track system is first class among railway mods for block games, with 30 degree increments, slopes, 45 degree slopes, diamond crossings. No limitations on placement. It's still not 'realistic' but it leaves minecart tracks looking janky.
The signalling and interlocking system has profound depth, though at cost of complexity and being notoriously hard to learn. If you're a lover of signals, this goes beyond OpenTTD or Factorio. Save yourself some trouble and ask other players for help learning.
The trains can also carry your cargo. Moving stuff by train is great fun, better than any other way I can think of. Challenge yourself to build a realistic freight railway, and then sit back and enjoy automatic operation.
Don't like driving? Need to run a timetable? Want something even more elaborate? Start with basic ATC tracks and station/stop rails, and later discover how automation and full control is always available through Advtrains' Lua environment "LuaATC" for anything the train can do.
I have to admit Advtrains' faults: It's hard to learn, it can lag your server badly (the more trains the merrier.. er.. laggier) and one misstep with LuaATC can crash the server. The selection of trains is growing but still not that broad across people/goods, city/country, nationality. It's not super survival friendly. Waiting around at a station for a train to come is probably even less fun in a video game than real life. But I just can't name anything that gives you this much control of computer game trains!
Straightforward and attempts to be balanced
This mod offers the option of a single-use teleport potion or an infinite-use pad. 4 diamonds (+some other materials) are used to craft teleport potions and 4 of those + some other materials makes the pad. Honestly haven't used single teleport potions before; you could contrive such a scenario though: perhaps you're making a minigame and want to require a diamond target to reach before entering another area? The destination coordinates can be set freely. The cost of 2 teleport pads for two-way travel isn't cheap enough to be available in the early game but you will eventually unlock pretty much free travel.
Recommended for teleport hubs on servers at spawn locations to create a hub-and-spoke teleport network. Also recommended if you want to play survival and unlock teleportation eventually, while also keeping a cost to convenience of keeping multiple pads in your network at once.
Not recommended if using multiple dimensions/planets as that might make it too easy to bypass the proper methods for travelling to other locations. If you think teleportation should always have a cost, you could also remove the pads and have only teleport potions in the mod.
Ugly and not appopriate to survival mode
I've never liked travelnet. It's way overpowered and the recipe is way too easy for the utility it provides. Despite this, it is widely used on servers in survival mode. It really only belongs on creative mode or 'survival-lite' type servers i.e. where while resources are technically not unlimited, they become abundant very quickly. This mod fork is associated strongly with the Pandorabox server, which falls into the survival-lite category because of the amount of public teleports and the ease of setting up a teleporting quarry ship and mining dense ore patches on the moon. If that kind of context doesn't appeal to you then I don't believe this mod falls in line with your true survival philosophy either.
The texture is awful, even in a variety of colours. You may have nostalgia for it, but I don't. A 'fancy' option is requested against the source repository and stuck due to merge conflict. This is an admission that the texture needs work, but also a kowtow to the old textures by not replacing them.
Another problem: arriving at a travelnet with no floor underneath can cause you to fall.
The setup of a public travelnet is easy. It's not without confusion though. The setup formspec will tell you 'don't change the network name if you don't know what it does', then never proceed to explain it to anyone. How do you set up a private one? It's done by prefixing the name of the station with a (P). This is not explained and I only know it because I asked other players. The README should have this info. The README is incomplete and the only other doc is the API spec. Clearly the devs care more about other devs than end users.
This mod is ancient (2013) and we deserve better. For survival I would much rather recommend teleport potion, which is somewhat more expensive and is only one-way single-destination. For running a server, I would rather recommend warps or funnily enough, another mod used on Pandorabox, telemosaic.
Good, up-to-date, survival-friendly
Moretrains is some of the best work for AdvTrains, in my mind tied with Marnack's DlxTrains. It preceded that mod and was definitely the best at the time, and it is continuing strong.
Moretrains is a mixed bag with many individual mods with different themes. Pick and choose which ones you want; there's a good variety of eras, lightweight carts or mainline stock, and a mix of freight and passengers. It isn't a modpack for metro/subway trains though.
Unlike some other train mods, moretrains is survival-friendly. It uses some of the standard components like basic trains like wheels and driver's cabins. However, it is also strongly tied to Minetest Game at the moment (but most stuff for advtrains is :()
This particular package is a fork of rubberduck's original work (forum thread) maintained by people over at LinuxForks server, where I should disclose for integrity I do often play and know the people well. It hasn't been on the ContentDB until now because we wanted to make sure we weren't stepping on rubberduck's toes by moving too quickly to publish this fork.
What's new in this fork?
So definitely download here or through the source link rather than the forums. Enjoy!
Motion sickness alert
The control scheme is about as intuitive as it can be in 3D space, just takes some learning. The gameplay requires intense spatial reasoning which I think is fine. Even if some people are better than others at it, that's just how it goes, much like how not everyone has the aptitude to be a l33t FPS 360 no-scope sniper with impeccable reflexes. As far as gameplay is concerned, you can't go wrong.
However, Snake 3D suffers from problems present in other mods like advtrains and digtron, where the camera rotation will be lost while attached to a moving entity. Add to this the way it moves in discrete increments and the attached segments of the snake is jarring and the net result is it is just not good for people like myself who are prone to motion sickness. Others have also pointed out how limiting the camera to within the rectangular prism of gameplay is unhelpful.
Conclusion: Play it if you don't get motion sick easily, avoid otherwise.
Hard to start but intriguing
It took me a while to understand what was happening but I came to grips with it eventually. It's technically impressive and I enjoyed exploring it. It doens't look like its ready for you to create your own adventure, but the one included is enjoyable for sure. It seems it might also be possible to softlock yourself out of going back to certain rooms due to the 2-portal-max limit; I think I did this with some of them.
Lack of sound was a bit dissapointing, could have easily re-used Minetest Game sounds and yes some quiet peaceful music or ambience might have helped. SFX for entering newly discovered rooms would push it into a real exploration experience.
The portal barrier states need a bit of a further explanation and even though I think I finished the game by making it to the mine, I'm only guessing. Red = invalid configuration; blue = more than 2 portals in this configuration; pink = sides completed so far are valid, but the portal is incomplete.
I'd love to see an easy way for you to build your own puzzle worlds in it as well. Using the portals at the top and bottom might also be an interesting addition.
It's worth playing for the experience of figuring it out and progressing through the game, but I hope the author continues to improve it because it was a bit hard to start and there's no included documentation in-game or in the game files.
A code nightmare and full of re-used code and assets
From the moment I launched it this game had my CPU running flat out on one core for no apparent reason. We'll get to the bottom of that and other technical problem issues. For now, gameplay: It told me presents were in a few different aisles but there are no signs on the aisles to tell me what number they are. Actually, it turns out this is the z-coordinate of each present. Also, I didn't have damage turned on when I started it, so I was actually cheating without knowing it. Games can override this if they know what they're doing.
So you eventually find at least one present, congrats, it wasn't on the shelves like the others and it was green. At least it doesn't matter if you have colourblindness when the special presents are in a different spot. You run back, place it down, easy enough. Then it tells me I can leave. Leave how? and do what? There's no door, the wall is impenetrable and the world outside is flat and featureless.
At this point you begin to ask what's original in the assets here. Mobs - from an old mod by PilzAdam. Walls - copper blocks from minetest game. For some reason all of MTG default was included. Shelves - from infinite IKEA. I guess the present texture is original? The git history is a mess and there's no licence file in the game's (1) original mod.
Now why does it 100% my CPU? All of the code runs in a globalstep and while the author, mercifully, added most things in a conditional in that globalstep, the entire warehouse of copper blocks, shelves and presents is replaced every single globalstep. Look, clearly the author is new to coding and probably overlooked or didn't fully understand this, but I just find this inexcusable.
Comments: Improvements
Entire budget went on soundtrack
I was missing the soundtrack when I first launched it due to having Minetest muted. Woops! It's a bit less boring with the soundtrack going, although at a grand total runtime of 73 seconds it will wear thin pretty quick. I thought it must be a professional/semi-amateur track originally composed elsewhere, but a look at the licence file and OGG metadata will reveal it's an original composition by ExeVirus in REAPER. I have to say the soundtrack does build the mood, but a good soundtrack doens't automatically make it a good game.
It's also the same schematic map with the same spawn point every time, and I really don't think the map layout made any real sense, it's more of a race track than a sensible road layout.
I didn't quite get why bicycle mod was chosen as a vehicle base instead of driftcar. I had some actual fun playing driftgame and one thing I think this game should aspire to become in the future is more like that, with procedurally generated streets. Other elements can be incorporated later as well, but good driving is always what one expects in a 'grand theft' type game.
I can see this project going some place like a drive-by shooting PvP game in a randomly generated arena and ending up being pretty fun. But for now I would hold off from playing it except if you want to do a few laps in the box while listening to the epic soundtrack, and then quit.
Looks spartan, but you won't see everything on your first playthrough
Finally something that feels like its own game with SFX, MSX and custom texturing & HUD. It gets a little repetitive with the same grey brick walls and music, but it's worth exploring several times. The bugs that it does suffer are bearable and there are no huge UX blunders either. I see a great future for it if the author improves it.
The music and a slick looking UI will get you going and ready to play. When you land into the world, you may find it pretty monotonous pretty quick. However, since some of the other reviews I read revealed things I hadn't seen, and I myself discovered more on successive playthroughs/attempts, there's variety out there, it's just a bit sparse at first. I don't know what to say about the inconsistency of props and guards that I found throughout the jail, whether it's good or bad. Finishing your game can be a little anticlimactic and I didn't realise the air in front of me was indeed my escape.
There are two stats to manage: Health and sprint. There is a variety of food, beverages, enemies and weapons to be found. Play it multiple times to discover more. Be aware some enemies are plain-clothed.
The bugs have to be acknowledged: Health sometimes won't show, there are randomly dark areas, dynamite blowing up the light, you can cheese it by digging the walls (why are they diggable??), guards that deliberately try to avoid eye contact and pretend they don't see you or who like to stare at the wall for long periods.
The inability to save a game in progress is a little frustrating. The main menu should only show if no level is in progress.
Conclusion: Play it blind for the joy of discovery, bear with the monotony and bugs for a little bit. If not, be hopeful that the author will improve the game later enough for you to enjoy it.
Comments: Ideas for improvement
Game requires heavy manual intervention
Pac-Man itself is a good basis however Arcade3D fails to be fun, intuitive or automate the right parts. It's derivative to the point of probably being copyright infringing (I am not a lawyer; this is not legal advice), but it's not worth the rightsholders of Pac-Man suing over. It's also not the first Pac-Man game for Minetest.
However, with a bit of a clean-up, the game could be good. Work has clearly been put into the visual art, I chuckled at the player model in a good way and the use of spheres for pills seems sensible, including not having too many polygons.
The idea of making your own arena is defeated when you realise the game has no way to spawn ghosts and pills for you. A good level editing experience is possible within the Minetest engine, so I exhort the developer to make better tools, which would be marking spots for the ghosts and pills to spawn, being able to start/stop a game intuitively, and of course not leaving the player inside the arena wall when placed.
Pacmine, part of myArcade, has the game starting feature down pat: right-click a starter node. The pink gates in Arcade3D make no sense, something myArcade handles better by having you right-click a node to start a game. However, Pacmine also suffers the issue of poor pill collision detection with server lag, so having the pills as nodes is better for that. Some comparisons to Pacmine wouldn't be helpful; Arcade3D being its own game is fine.
Conclusion: The promise of being able to make your own arenas is enticing, but as-is the game fails to deliver a good Pac-Man clone or level editing experience.
Recommendations in comments...
Poor at guiding, lacklustre presentation
I wanted to enjoy some good movement mechanics and a well-guided experience. Instead I landed on the floor and had no idea how to get back up. There was no mention that it has to be done through a command, not on the ContentDB page, not in the game's root directory README ; instead I just granted myself fly and flew up to the start point again.
The lack of inclusion of a sprint mod lets it down; I don't see why it wasn't included, it's an important part of other block game parkours, and there is no issue with server lag if it's just as singleplayer game. I won't blame this game's developer for the changes to bouncy blocks, where they used to be much more fun but were changed to limit the jump height somewhere in the Minetest 5.x series.
The fact that some of the diggable blocks drop themselves and others don't was arbitrary and shouldn't have been done, especially when they look the same.
Lack of sound also lets the game down. With footstep sounds and a sprint sound it could have been better. Including (toggleable) music could have also help and wouldn't have broken competition rules to include minetest_game footstep sounds and a Creative Commons music track as far as I know.
Overall: A known-good idea for a game, but not implemented well enough as it is to recommend.
Great for isolating screenshots
This mod is really useful for taking pictures of a small scene like a few nodes in a specific arrangement, an advtrains train or a mob. Just enclose it in a green screen (or one of several other colours) and take a screenshot of it. Then in your favourite editor e.g. GIMP, select that colour and turn it into transparency. Instantly isolated! Note: For best results isolating, disable anti-aliasing,
Not as blocky as some kitchen sinks
First let me say this is a well-put-together modpack. Highlights include: * Containers come with locked variants * Good variety of areas of in the house & home * Balanced crafting recipes * Dynamic features like animations, basic interactivity where appropriate
However, homedecor doesn't gel with me, and maybe it won't with you. I'm not intimately familiar with the modpack's history, but it seems to aggregate several mods or parts of other mods, like cottages roofing. This does result in a 'kitchen sink'*, but it's alright as you you're downloading a modpack and can disable bits that don't suit you.
Many models have some combination of curves, noticeable polygon count, and higher resolution texture that doesn't fit into a 16px block type aesthetic. I find that which items have had a high-polygon treatment and which haven't seems a bit random, and each mod has some of these spread through the pack. If all the models had more polygons, the whole thing would be cohesive and the net effect would be better. I'm particularly confused why the couches from lrfurn had curves added that actually seem to make the whole thing look worse. If all models were consistently block or highpoly it would be better.
I think the '3D extras' mod should be a config option.
Homedecor locks you into the Basic Materials system for crafting. Sure, there have to be concessions to add intermediate crafting materials and so that available recipes aren't exhausted. The problems caused might be better explained in a review on Basic Materials. Suffice to say if your server has a forked technic or other mods that haven't commited to Basic Materials it can create minor problems. Given the size of this modpack, nobody wants to be making their own set of dozens and dozens of crafting recipes.
In conclusion, only play with homedecor if you're willing to sacrifice visual consistency to get a large collection of stuff. Otherwise, use a few different decor mods for similar effect.