I finally was able to play
Killing Floor's Summer Sideshow Event today and try out the new map - Abusement Park. That map is probably the hardest Killing Floor map I have played, I have never had so much problems with playing on the Hard Difficulty on any map.
Abustment Park is the freakiest Killing Floor map I have played, I don't know if I just haven't played in awhile or what, but I got spooked a couple of times, whether it be weird sound effects or the devilish looking creatures themselves.
Once that map started, I ran straight forward down the only available path with my partner. From there we started to run into the Zeds as we blasted through them with our pistols. Once we thought it was okay to continue, we walked up to a circular platform and decided to hold out against the mutants. We thought we were fine until we underestimated the Zeds and their spawn points; they started to come out of places that seemed like they were nowhere. There were so many that my partner and I got separated as I became the only survivor in the end. Of course, me being the last man standing, I run out of ammo while there were a few Bloats, Gorefasts and Clots; in the end, they were no match for me. We high tailed it to the Trader so we can stock up on our weapons. As Wave 2 hits, we ran to a hallway since we didn't know where to go in an unfamiliar map. We held out pretty decently with my shotgun and my partner's bull-pup, but our demise was inevitable as we got overrun and demolished.
After many, many deaths later, more players joined our game, but that was not enough to be strolling around Abusement Park without being killed. We had a full game going and we still had such trouble, even others had agreed saying that they've never had such a difficult time playing on Hard on any other map. About every round, about four of us have fallen under the brute force of the Zeds, leaving two others to fend for themselves; sometimes they would carry us onto the next wave, but most of the time we would go back to the first wave. In the end, I decided to give up and horde the rest of my needed achievements to gain Steampunk Mr. Foster.
Abusement Park is a truly challenging map for myself and apparently for some others also. The lack of decent hold out spots and only a handful of weldable doors, does make the game experience more lively as you are on the edge of your seat trying to survive and help out your teammates all at once. I'm sure if I were to play the map a lot more, I can find at least a couple of places that I could survive for a bit, but the best strategy for us was to run and gun, cover each others backs as we reloaded/cleared a path and run and gun down the cleared path - we kept doing that until the Trader was finally open for business. The new designs for the Zeds brought a great spooky atmosphere to the already dark and creepy map; this map has made the new mutants my favorite designs, and the Incredible Man Monkey being my most favorite. Even the music seemed to freak my out a bit, even though I've heard it multiple times while playing before. The map, new Zed designs, and the music all pulled it together and made it a perfect and challenging game experience.
Overall, I'd give Killing Floor and Abusement Park both a 8/10; they're both incredibly fun to play with friends and the map gives a good challenge, just not if you are easily rage induced.
