Dark Carnival: Remix, oh Dark Carnival: Remix. What a loss of a map with massive potential. This map was almost perfect, and I thought for sure that I would be giving it a rare 10/10 rating. However, the finale almost ruins this Custom Map, and leaves you with a foul taste in your mouth afterwards.

This map is simply an almost-universally improved version of the original, classic Dark Carnival vanilla campaign, up until the ill-fated finale. I loved exploring the familiar-yet-new areas of Whispering Oaks Amusement Park in depth, searching every nook and cranny for secrets and consumables, checking out the improved rides (especially the water slide and the Tunnel of Love), and playing all of the minigames. I liked the changes to the Gauntlets in this map overall too. The Coaster is now a more difficult Hard Gauntlet that is slightly longer, and the Stadium Gate is now a much longer and somewhat easier(?) Very Hard Gauntlet around the ferris wheel and its surrounding grounds. It was great to see the ferris wheel actually feature in the map itself as something you can visit and interact with, and you can apparently actually ride it, although I missed this on my first playthrough.

As for the finale itself, it’s a Defend-Run And Hold Buttons-Tank-Run And Hold Buttons-Everyone Run To The Microphone-Defend-Moderate Gauntlet-Tank. This Finale is awesome in terms of visuals, sound, and theatrics, but just plain awful from a game design and gameplay perspective, and as a result is extremely frustrating on Expert. The only Finale that I’ve played that is arguably more rage-inducing on Expert than DC:R’s, is the one on ‘The Bloody Moors’, and that’s saying something.

The problems with the finale are as such: before reaching the Finale area itself there is an obnoxious mini-Scavenge event requiring you to fill a generator with 4 Gas Cans, followed by a slow-moving train you have to wait behind as Specials continue to spawn behind you, followed by a large area filled with military tents; which you need to search each time for bombs/Defibs, the Common Infected hordes and Specials don’t pause when you’re within the Finale area like they’re supposed to normally so that you can plan and set up, there are absolutely zero Pills/Adrenaline to be found anywhere on the final Chapter (not within the Finale area itself nor the large area before it), there are actually less supplies provided than in the default Dark Carnival finale (two less Defibs, no Gas Cans, less bombs, no Pills/Adrenaline, etc), there is way, WAY too much going on during the Finale itself (IE being forced to run all over the place; up and down the stadium stairs, onto and off the stage, from one side of the stadium grounds to the other, stuff you have to do in the back areas behind the stage after opening it, an initially-unclear microphone objective on the stage near the end, and you even have to Defend and fight Tanks at several points in between running around), Infected can spawn from almost every nook and cranny and quickly surround you, Common Infected respawn constantly en masse other than during the Tank fights, the stadium grounds are cluttered with more junk than is necessary, the stadium bleachers are uneven terrain; making the mobile fights there messy at best, the loud music (which only gets louder) makes it even more difficult to hear Common/Special Infected sneaking up behind you as you’re forced to run all over the place (this isn’t nearly as bad in the vanilla map, as you can just hold a position and cover certain angles), and the finale simply goes on for too long with such limited health supplies provided.

After breezing through the rest of this Custom Map no-problem with some pretty capable Expert players; we ended up failing the finale about 5 times in a row. After this, we got tired of the repetitive and downright sadistic slog that this finale had become, and decided to just lower the difficulty to Advanced, rather than bash our heads against a wall for hours to try and beat it ‘legit’. We then beat it easily and called it a day, with all of us mentally drained from the experience. If you’re going to play Dark Carnival: Remix on Expert, be sure to bring an A-team for the Finale, and be sure to save Pills/Adrenaline and some Bile Bombs specifically for this insane-difficulty Finale. Otherwise, to save your sanity, just lower the Difficulty down to Advanced when you reach the Finale.


For more Expert Custom Map Reviews and ratings, see my full Collection here. https://steamcommunity.yuanyoumao.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2252724380