Best level/mission in a game

[wautd]

Based on the most bullshit tread, which levels had the most awesome designs? For me:

Medal of Honour: Sniperville (or whatever was the name). About 10 snipers hidden in a bombed town. Died dozens of times on highest difficulty before I could spot every sniper.

Hitman Codename 47: the Budapest hotel. Imo that level was ahead of its time and still is one of my favorite Hitman levels. The final mission in the sanitarium was great as well; creepy atmosphere and I was totally unprepared when suddenly an army of SWAT storms in

Call of Duty: first level in Stalingrad. Shamefully stolen from Enemy at the gates but great none the less.

[Vendetta]

It would be cheating to say "Citadel Station", so I'll come up with a single mission from it: Blowing the reactor.

You set the self destruct on the Citadel reactor (in doing so you have to go inside it, braving massive doses of radiation), then high tail it back to the elevator, up to the hangar deck and into an escape pod (narrowly avoiding a messy end at the hands of one Edward Diego on the way), only to find that the escape pods are locked down by The Bitch! AAARGH!! Panic stations as you pelt through the residential level to the security level and try to get yourself up onto the bridge...


Sheer panic and madness.

Also, Janice Polito's office on the Von Braun.

You know why.

[Arrow]

Call of Duty: United Offensive - the Casino MP map. It had it all, tanks, snipers, hiding holes, cover, and arty, all dumped into one small deathtrap of a city block. Its one of my favorite maps of all time, for shear number of ways you can kill or be killed in a WWII FPS. And because I was able to refine tank hunting with a Panzerfaust to an art in that map.

Call of Duty 2: Caen - I find it to be a large, well designed map with lots of places to set up ambushes in. Its fast pace, and its design encourages teamwork and tends to quickly kill loners.

Note that the above are for Team Deathmatch games. I haven't try them in other game types.

And then there's the ultimate level - Freespace 2: DIVE! DIVE! DIVE! I almost shit my pants the first time I played that level.

[Arthur_Tuxedo]

Based on the most bullshit tread, which levels had the most awesome designs? For me:

Medal of Honour: Sniperville (or whatever was the name). About 10 snipers hidden in a bombed town. Died dozens of times on highest difficulty before I could spot every sniper.

I fucking hated that mission. That one's on my "Worst of" list.

Anyway, I'd have to nominate the first level of Crusader: No Remorse. Sure, every level in that game was completely awesome, and some maybe even moreso than the first, but the first level is your first glimpse of the game (duh) and really lets you know that you're playing one of the greatest games of all time right away.

[Nephtys]

Half Life 2, Ravenholm. The ultimate physics demo/moodiness level.

[brianeyci]

Missionforce : Cyberstorm. Too long ago to remember the exact level but had to be one of the missions where you attack and assault a heavily armed base on "very hard" extreme super-impossible difficulty level.

Damn I miss that game.

Brian

[Bounty]

LoZ : Ocarina of Time, Water Temple. You're moving through a pretty standard dungeon and head into a new room - only it's not a room, it's a giant, eery ankle-deep lake shrouded in fog. You walk ahead and find a small island with a dead tree, no enemies, no items, no nothing except this giant, grey, empty, kiddie-pool deep lake in the middle of what should be a small Temple.

That's when your shadow shows up. Identical to you in every way, with the same arsenal, the same moves, except he's just a semi-opaque, faceless shadow. And he knows every move you're going to make. If you swing your sword, he blocks with his. If you attack, he sidesteps and retaliates in milliseconds.

When you finally beat your shadow, the lake just...vanishes and you're left with an empty, small, normal Temple room.

That battle was at the same time the most frustrating and the most incredible in any videogame I ever played. Absolutely perfect in mood and execution.

[Mr Bean]

For best first time playing it through.

Call of Duty
Stalingrade, The boat ride, the charge up the beach, then the run agianst the MG's from cover to cover. I had headphones on, when the boat got hit, I had real friggin shellshock from the explosion since my sound was turned up waay to high for that level. When I got off the boat and I listened to the nice Commisar's explain the Russian method of war before being shoved up the beach by one helpful Commisar because I lingered to long. That entire mission from start to end was one thrill ride, it started slow and by the time it ended I WAS whooping it up with the rest of my virtual comrades.

[Dooey Jo]

Actually, since the other thread reminded me about Castlevania64, I'm nominating "The Villa" from that same game. That place is just pure awesome creepiness, especially the first time.

LoZ : Ocarina of Time, Water Temple. *snip*

It's just too bad you spend most of the time in that temple running around shouting to yourself "where the FUCK am I supposed to go?!"

[Bounty]

It's just too bad you spend most of the time in that temple running around shouting to yourself "where the FUCK am I supposed to go?!"

Nah, that just when you miss the third Ocarina tile.

EDIT : the thread in Testing reminded me of this one -

Body Harvest, Greece 1916. The Bugs are attacking and if they can kill eat enough humans, you lose. What do you do ?

Sneak into an airfield, hotwire a Sopwith and provide air support. Swooping down and strafing bugs = teh awesome.

[weemadando]

Based on the most bullshit tread, which levels had the most awesome designs? For me:

Medal of Honour: Sniperville (or whatever was the name). About 10 snipers hidden in a bombed town. Died dozens of times on highest difficulty before I could spot every sniper.

I'm sorry, but WHAT? That's topping my worst of list...

Best levels:

HL - Surface Tension, fucking AMAZING level, I loved the amazing action feel of this section.

System Shock 2 - Recreation Decks.

Crimson Skies - Hollywood

Hitman: Codename 47 - Budapest Thermal Baths Hotel

Call of Duty - Stalingrad Landing and Pegasus Bridge

Call of Duty 2 - Caen and the mission from the demo (tank borne infantry assaulting the walled town)

No One Lives Forever - Space Station, on the plane and skydiving and Wreck Dive (the most terrifyingly ACCURATE dive mission I've ever played in terms of visuals and sound)

No One Lives Forever 2 - The Tricycle chase.

Genearlly any level that lets me shout: OH YES! FUCKING YES! And brings a tear to my eye. Prime examples - the introduction of the Colossus in FS2, generally any "last stand" mission...

[weemadando]

Definately got to add to that list:

Call of Duty - Stalingrad/Red Square.

Call of Duty: United Offensive - The Guns of Navarone.

Rogue Spear - Sargasso Fade

[NeoGoomba]

Medal of Honor: Frontline - Arnhem Knights. That mission was perfectly chaotic, and the choir music in the background gave it such a haunting atmosphere that I caught myself stopping to listen...and then a tank busts through the wall and blows me to hell

Legacy of Kain: Defiance - Kain vs. Raziel. Playing as both badass undead bastards as they kick the hell out of each other, with Raziel going insane and Kain turning all noble as they beat the shit out of each other. And what a sweet finish. VAE VICTUS

[Exonerate]

Half Life 2, Ravenholm. The ultimate physics demo/moodiness level.

Agreed. During that level, I was in my paranoid-NS-playing mode... The speed of some of the zombies really surprised me.

[Alyeska]

Medal of Honour: Sniperville (or whatever was the name). About 10 snipers hidden in a bombed town. Died dozens of times on highest difficulty before I could spot every sniper.

Your fucking crazy. There is no way that section can be fun. Who the fuck enjoys having to replay the same level a dozen times?

[Noble Ire]

I love, and still do love Assault on the Control Room from Halo, and Metropolis from Halo 2. The levels themselves are fairly linear, but for me, nothing beats the awesomeness of using the Scorpion tank against NPCs. 100,000 Year's War is comparable for Covenant vehicles, as is the Banshee dogfight near the end of Halo 2.

The last few levels of Jedi Outcast and Jedi Academy were also quite enjoyable (although in each, the final boss was hideously easy), simply because you had the full scope of your character's powers available, with plenty of stormtroopers and dark jedi to use them on (and few puzzle areas).

[Drooling Iguana]

No One Lives Forever 2 - The Tricycle chase.

Those three words just put NOLF2 at the very top of my "absolutely, positively, must find" list.

[phongn]

TIE Fighter had many a fine mission in it, especially when you got to fly with Lord Vader.

[Grandmaster Jogurt]

GravityMan's level and boss fight from MegaMan 5. The whole antigravity thing just makes that entire level a blast.

Speaking of MegaMan games, the first level of Dr. Wily's castle in MegaMan 2 is also great. The music is some of the best on the NES and the design of the level just feels like you're assaulting the bad guy's fortress.

[Civil War Man]

Chrono Trigger - Destroy the Lavos Core. Priceless.

I also enjoy the mission where your character is an uber-killing machine and just starts wading through these masses of enemies that present no real challenge. Like the Thousand Heartless challenge in KH2 or about 2/3 of KOTOR2.

[SirNitram]

Third and next to last missions of C&C: Renegade.

They really epitomized the whole thing: Yea, you're one unstoppable badass warrior, but you've got the entire might of GDI behind you. Honestly, compared to that, the temple interior was a letdown; sure, it was huge and cool, but it became tedious quickly and it lacked both backup and vehicles, my favorite parts of the game.

[Darth Raptor]

The battle with The End from MGS3. So much fun.

[wilfulton]

The final mission of WH40K, Chaos Gate, where the space marines hunt down the Chaos Lord Zymran in his lair. I loved the music score to that one too, it was one of my favorites.

(It's even more fun if you exploit a bug in the game, letting you equip a devastator squad with all heavy weapons. Nothing like a couple multi-meltas to help root out heresy wherever it lies...)

[Lancer]

Far Cry; Treehouse.

Trigens almost all over the mission, and nicely placed stuff like 4WD's and miniguns to wipe them out. Eat a few thousand RPM, Mr. mutant monkey.

The Dam level is also pretty amusing. It was painful at first, but I quickly learned two things: Five shots to the head from an M4 will easily drop a monkey Trigen, and Trigens can't swim.

[weemadando]

No One Lives Forever 2 - The Tricycle chase.

Those three words just put NOLF2 at the very top of my "absolutely, positively, must find" list.

I'll elaborate...

You (the every so sexy Cate Archer) are sitting on the shoulders of a very angry and enormous Scotsman, madly pedalling a tricycle after a terrorist mime who is try to escape through your stereotypical African market from a 1960's spy film on his unicycle.

That is how awesome the No One Lives Forever games are. Everyone should fucking well play them.