Crates and Barrels!

Haha, that's cool but not nearly as interesting the as the toilet one..

Yeah but blowing crates up (de_dust) is just pointless and boring

Where do people get all that time...?

Quote from User Err0r

See, now that is a thing I'm not really that sure, I have played NS for several years, in several clans, and I can't actually put my mind on a map that has extensive amounts of crates and that they would alter the gameplay in to a way or another, we have had clan matches almost every map ever built on NS and I have never tought that someone had an upperhand because of crates or any other map element.

Don't get me wrong, there are alot of crates and barrels and such in the maps, but they are not "unnaturally" in anyplace like in the middle of nowhere without apparent reason (like they are in CS, where they are used purely to alter the map layout), and aliens can walk on walls, fly and blink so crates don't create obstacles like they do in CS.

Think about the poor little skulks. Some crates are positioned to conceal a skulk so that a marine will pass by the crate, unaware of the skulk hiding behind it, and then the marine gets bit. Same can almost be applied to marines. In faceoff, the upper doorway to the alien hive, if I have no marines to go into the hive with me and I don't have high level, theres a crate right next to the doorway that I hide behind for cover. If that crate wasn't there, I could have been skulk food more often, resulting in different game results.

Also in ns_lost, there's a hallway that marines almost always used to relocate to, near alpha hive, there used to be a res node next to this hallway. In the end of this hallway are a few crates. Some comms drop specific structures cornered between the wall and the crate so the structure has less surface visible for skulks to bite.

As for "for no apparent reason", many crates in ns maps seem to just be there, rarely do these maps show signs of a crane to lift the crates (SOME do, but rarely) or conveyor belts. And the doorways are too small to indicate any heavy machinery (ie forklift of the future) to move the crates. Hell, you can have a room with only 2 tiny doorways, and the crate inside is way bigger than the doorways.

Was not even going to answer this but what the hell. Yeah sometimes some crates can get some marines killed, or aliens, but there are many forms of gameplay elements to counter them, motion detector, cloak, jetpack, grenades, heavy armor, in opposite to CS which actually has as much gameplay elements as Wolfenstein 3d. Still while crates may create an upperhand in one skulk vs. marine match up, the outcome is never on the favor of the one holding the crate card, a good rine can make swiss cheese out of that skulkey even if he is "concealed" by that evil crate, I usually go giving freebies to the usual camping spots, and when a fade comes around, there is very slight change that the crate will hold your life, believe me. And when introduced the slight nuances of gameplay in NS like welding doors shut and stationary turrets, commanders, again, the crates are your least problem, since a good commander can really siglehandedly turn the tide (assuming that other marines are not 8 year olds), there is no dice for the crates to do that. So gameplay vise crates and barrels are just really some decoration, as opposite to CS where crates conceal you when you place a bomb or give you a great camping spot.

But obviously this is a matter of taste, since you feel that crates can make or break your NS gameplay. But I give you this, now that I tought about it, there are crates in the middle of a tunnel in few CO maps, so some of them are put there just for the novelty of it. I just never tought about it since I have never said "fuck that skulk bit me because he had that crate advantage, since if he didn't I'd whoop his ass".

Quote from Pericolos0

crates are awesome. It's one of the things that really really belong in video games. I mean even people who work at warehouses have probably hardly ever seen a real wooden crate like they exist in video games.

Frankly, I don't remember seeing a proper (video game) crate in my whole life.

Do such things even exist?