Quake goes Brutalist again in another free map pack celebrating concrete

When two of a game's weapons are nailguns, you should probably expect players to be enthusiastic about construction. Following last year's excellent Brutalist Jam map pack, Quake mappers have reunited to release another free load of levels inspired by Brutalism and concrete. The 30 maps offer good honest fragging in everything from concrete cities to murderous mystical puzzle boxes. Honestly, I'd recommend downloading the pack even if only to see the hub level and marvel at quite how good Quake can look when made for modern PCs.

31 mappers contributed to the Quake Brutalist Jam 2 map pack, making their concrete hells over three-and-a-half weeks. For some folks, this was their first map. Others are clearly grizzled veterans. I'm glad to see people still getting into Quake mapping in the year 2023, and the chunky, towering, often-repeating architecture of Brutalism seems a great style to start working with.

Some maps are very literal with their Brutalist buildings, pouring classic chunky concrete structures. Some true concrete as a sort of default material of reality, the material you would find in abstract spaces created by otherworldly entities, in crumbling contrast to the gleaming marble of Heaven and jagged obsidian of Hell. Some of my favourite maps do both, transitioning from reality into unreality without changing building materials. Some very good uncanny concrete otherworlds.

As with the first pack, I enjoyed seeing the different ways people worked with the theme. A few classic Brutalist cityscapes, including one estate with concrete cat sculptures. A good number of unsettling towering unreal spaces cast in mundane concrete. One world tree whose spiky concrete twigs reminded me more of the iconic warning landscape for long-term nuclear waste storage. One map ends in an Action Quake 2 joke, which did make me laugh. A low-gravity space installation. Giant industrial facilties. A map from the original Quake campaign stretched upwards and repoured with concrete. Concrete contrasting with meat. Great times.

I really enjoyed poking around and seeing the full range of concrete creations. I think maybe I prefer the first pack but this was fun to explore too, and I recognise that my preference might partially be down to novelty. And I do really appreciate that this time, the hub tracks which levels you have already completed. As you finish maps, their glowing white portal in the door room will go dark. Very handy.

You can download the Quake Brutalist Jam 2 map pack from Slipseer and will need to use an updated Quake engine like the steadfast Quakespasm. The map pack also includes Copper, a nice little mod which tweaks and rebalances Quake in tiny little ways.

For more free Brutalist fun, do also check out delightful first-person explorer Babbdi. See if you can escape a grim city while playing with tools including climbing axes, a motorbike, and a tootable trumpet.