Gameplay mods and Doomworld

Personally I don't care about gameplay mods much and the rare times I try one I generally don't even finish MAP01 with them. The only one I actually played with (played, instead of checked out by goofing around in a single map) was Samsara where I went about halfway through Hexen Deathkings.

Sorry weasel but "would be better with dedicated maps" remains firmly my view of the matter.

And on the opposite side of the coin, I'm not seeing enough "just ZDoom" maps anymore. For the first few years, we had things like Hell Factory, Void and ZDoomCMP1 (at a stretch) (yeah there's numerous more but then we'll be here forever). And now, if there is custom maps for anything, it's designed for some other mod (or effectively is its own mod). Or is basically some full on story extravaganza. I liked Zen Dynamics as much as the next guy, but does everything have to be?

Basically, nobody's really making straightforward ZDoom maps anymore. It's kinda odd.

Gez said:

Personally I don't care about gameplay mods much and the rare times I try one I generally don't even finish MAP01 with them. The only one I actually played with (played, instead of checked out by goofing around in a single map) was Samsara where I went about halfway through Hexen Deathkings.

Sorry weasel but "would be better with dedicated maps" remains firmly my view of the matter.

Sounds to me like you haven't really given any of them a proper chance, if by "goofing around in a single map" you mean "IDFA and checked out the weapons." But if you insist, then I shall not push on it.

You know, I've tried mapping. The only map I ever released, No Rockets For You, was essentially me taking scraps of the various junk bits of unfinished maps I made in the past and slapping them into something vaguely coherent. I suppose it wasn't received poorly, but considering those bits of maps were made over a few years' time, I'll probably never find the inclination to try making another map. It's just not for me. There are already hundreds if not thousands of great levels available, with more being released every week, and I see no real reason to join the flood, considering that I don't feel my work is anything special.

Gez said:

Personally I don't care about gameplay mods much and the rare times I try one I generally don't even finish MAP01 with them.

Same here. I get all this work and then - plain old simple MAP01? Ugh..., sorry, no.

Edward850 said:

And on the opposite side of the coin, I'm not seeing enough "just ZDoom" maps anymore...
Basically, nobody's really making straightforward ZDoom maps anymore. It's kinda odd.

Yeah, that, too. I really miss mods like Hell Factory, or Dark 7, which stayed true to Doom gameplay, just using ZDoom features to enhance things a little. Of course they haven't disappeared completely but 10 years ago there was definitely more of them.

But at least partially I choose to blame the Doomworld community for that, too, often complaining that mappers should restrict themselves to more basic features so the ZDoom-naysayers can play them, too, in their engines of choice - meaning Boom features at most.

I don't blame Doomworld for that, only because it didn't really become a trend since around Brutal Doom. While it may not be directly responsible, I noticed an all too common trend of people complaining about maps not being compatible with their favourite weapons mod.
What I don't know if it was Skulltag or ZDoom that started that all too annoying trend.

The trend of going back to the mapping basics predates Brutal Doom. The number of maps with ZDoom features has been declining over years.

Ultimately it's the same as some people complaining that a mod needs engine XYZ and does not work with ABC.

Both types of complaints may persuade some mappers to go for the lowest common denominator - just because a few, but very vocal people can't adjust.

the russian doom community has their own forums. the french doom community also has one, if not as active. i think theres a czech forum too but iirc its even less active than the french one.

Graf Zahl said:

Same here. I get all this work and then - plain old simple MAP01? Ugh..., sorry, no.

Fire up Oblige every time you try a new one out.

Linguica said:

How many marginally-active Doom forum communities are there anyway?

You could add Realm667 to the list, though it looks like the forum database wasn't rolled over when updating the site. 3DGE also has a small forum which replaces the spam attacked EDGE forum on Sourceforge, and if you're really desperate to pad a list - there's The Doom Universe.

EDIT - somehow managed to forget that Odamex, ZDaemon, Steam and even Bethesda have forums.

I remember, and miss, a time when DW was less vanilla/Boom-centric and more interested in implementing advanced features. Since lack of maps in gameplay mods seems to be a sticking point, perhaps a community project to map with a specific gameplay mod in mind would bring the communities closer together?

Captain Red said:

Fire up Oblige every time you try a new one out.

What does that change? I still get a map using stock Doom resources that simply wasn't made for the gameplay mod and would play better without.

Graf Zahl said:

But at least partially I choose to blame the Doomworld community for that, too, often complaining that mappers should restrict themselves to more basic features so the ZDoom-naysayers can play them, too, in their engines of choice - meaning Boom features at most.

I think this is more of a byproduct of demo-recording activity than an anti-ZDoom bias. If something is playable in PrBoom-Plus and other Boom-related ports, it's more likely to get serious attention from speedrunners and other competitive players, arguably extending the wad's lifespan.

Graf Zahl said:

What does that change? I still get a map using stock Doom resources that simply wasn't made for the gameplay mod and would play better without.

lol its not that hard to find maps that go well with the intended gameplay style. when I was testing out demonsteele I fucked around in some old skulltag invasion maps since both are pretty arcade-y. a lot of people seemed to be playing it with slaughter maps which also seems like it would go well. it would never even occur to me to load something like that with the stock iwad

if you are complaining about gameplay mods being boring in map01 don't play map01 it isn't that hard jfc at least use -warp to go to a better level

Hambourgeois said:

if you are complaining about gameplay mods being boring in map01 don't play map01 it isn't that hard jfc at least use -warp to go to a better level

I find gameplay mods boring. Period. I don't want to search for maps that may play well with them. I'm more interested in newly made maps than newly made weapons.

Gez said:

Sorry weasel but "would be better with dedicated maps" remains firmly my view of the matter.

This "would be better with dedicated X" is a completely counterproductive view, though.
Not everyone is a mapper and not every mod is trying to make a TC. And even if they came with maps, there'd not be a guarantee they'd be good--even if they were good, that's not even going into the "great maps, I wish I could play them vanilla" I've seen before.
That's exactly why they're gameplay mods. They modify the gameplay.

If the problem is "would be better with dedicated X", then where does it end?
It's the same mindset of trying out a new mod and going "ugh, again?" when you load it up and see the same pistol as before. Or going through a new mod and seeing STARTAN and quitting because you've seen that texture so many times before used in boring ways. Or deciding to pass over because it doesn't have a custom soundtrack as well.

At this point I'm being extremely facetious, yeah. :p
But I just find that view to be really silly.

Besides, making dedicated maps actually would dramatically hurt a gameplay mod because you're limiting the amount of play it can have. Instead of letting it be loaded with other things for different experiences, it limits people to just have the same experience again and again and again.
One of the big selling points of Doom modding that people praise is its flexibility, why should something be so restricted?

jute said:

I remember, and miss, a time when DW was less vanilla/Boom-centric and more interested in implementing advanced features. Since lack of maps in gameplay mods seems to be a sticking point, perhaps a community project to map with a specific gameplay mod in mind would bring the communities closer together?

This is just me spitballing, but I think there's a significant portion of the Doom community that is mostly "over" advanced features as an attraction in a Doom level.

When the source code was first released, and for several years afterwards, everyone was very excited and gung-ho about extending Doom's feature set and adding in new stuff. Some of these things were fairly straightforward like mouselook and jumping and limits removal. Others were less so, and are pretty baffling in retrospect. Boom, which was intended as a sort of natural, non-destructive extension of the Doom engine, added in (default?) weapon recoil for pete's sake, which I don't think a single person enjoyed and left enabled. MBF, a Boom offshoot that arose in large part because the author wasn't happy with the direction Boom was taking, added in helper dogs. Then of course there's ZDoom, which basically abandoned all pretenses of maintaining the "classic" Doom experience with its numerous default gameplay changes, and added in ACS and DECORATE and basically became a modder's paradise.

I think with the passage of more time, a couple of different factors started to agglomerate. First is that the group of Doomers that had been around during this initial flurry of activity either drifted away or lost that same excitement for Doom engine extensions, and it stopped being a novel, cool thing to take advantage of because it was there. Instead, being able to mod a Doom engine to do all sorts of crazy crap was just part of the normal landscape and not terribly exciting. Second is that the "retro" movement really took hold, where old games stopped being generally old and not worth mentioning, and started being neat and valuable by dint of their retro-ness. This was helped along, I think, by the faux-retro revival in indie game development, the rise of game streaming and speedrunning communities, and the general aging of the gaming population and the tendency to look back fondly on the things of their youth.

Anyways, all of this conspired, in my view, to turn Doom, for a lot of people, from a game meant to be modded and transformed and extended, into one that was valuable precisely for all of its retro limitations. There's something inherently "Doomy" about new levels juggling the same gameplay rules in a new environment, that is lost with a gameplay mod that adds in explosions and uppercuts and whatever, and that turns a lot of people off now.

I tend to prefer mapsets, personally, but I'm still game to try gameplay mods every now and then. Admittedly I very rarely return to them after blowing through to MAP06 of Doom 2 or so (the only counterexample I can think of being Samsara, which I like messing around with semi-regularly), but I'm glad they exist nonetheless.

Gameplay mods that include maps to accomodate (like Reelism) I'm a bit more likely to return to than mere gameplay mods, I must confess, but I recognize not every gameplay mod is designed for that kind of thing. (And really, Reelism is the kind of gameplay mod that wouldn't work in an ordinary level, anyway, necessitating custom maps; most gameplay mods aren't that tightly tied to custom Things that weren't placed in your average mapset.)

I've gotten really into quite a handful of mods in the last few years (The Stranger, Psychic, uhhh Complex Doom, lots of others though) but I too have been often pretty disappointed there weren't more people (ie anyone) making maps specific to those mods. it's obvious enough why, I guess, as has already been mentioned, but I would really love to see the gap between mappers and modders bridged a little more.

I think all the comments DW sees where people are saying "you could really just make this Boom compat" (which I myself have said before, I think) have somewhat discouraged me from mapping for ZDoom recently without me really realizing it, and I suspect a lot of others too. I spent a lot of time working on some maps for MBF compat, trying to add a lot of stuff in via dehacked and planning to squeeze as much as possible out of it, but it took me a while before I sat back and really realized I could just be working with ZDoom and be able to do whatever I wanted with zero of the hassle. demos are great and I appreciate there's a scene for that, but ultimately I'm interested in just making the fun experience I want to make, so if that means I lose out on people making demos, I'm ok with that. I eventually realized also that generally the comments about shifting something from ZDoom to Boom came from the same handful of people every time and my impression that everyone would rather play something in PrBoom really only came from several people (of course there are more, but I suspect it really isn't as one-sided here as it seems, especially judging by this thread).

a few months ago I actually had some pretty strong urges to try mapping for Metroid: DN, and before that I was really hyped up about trying to make some maps for Psychic, but I think ultimately the newness and unfamiliarity scared me away, and my own self-criticisms of my mapping didn't help. not only do you have to make a map, you have to make a map and make damn sure it takes advantage of all the cool new things and new gameplay style of whatever mod you're mapping for, so suddenly there's a lot more I feel like I need to be checking to make sure I'm doing right, or doing enough of. in the end I don't think it's particularly that difficult, and I really would like to try my hand at making something actually happen, but it would be great to see more of other people doing that too.

so it doesn't need to be that X mod is made only for Y maps and they're inseparable; even just a single "here's a set of 5 maps I designed specifically for this mod so you don't have to play Scythe 2 for the 500th time just to experience this mod" would be awesome (I do love me some Scythe 2 with every new gameplay mod I find though).

I would definitely love to see one of the millions of community projects that pop up here be oriented for a specific gameplay mod one of these days :D

Tango said:

I would definitely love to see one of the millions of community projects that pop up here be oriented for a specific gameplay mod one of these days :D

For one gameplay mod might not be too good, but a community project for maps to compliment various gameplay wads might be interesting to do, especially if the "needs its own dedicated maps" thing isn't going to die down.

A whole bunch of massively-different gameplay wads (Psychic, Nazis, Hideous Destructor, Project MSX, etc, etc) are thrown into a hat and shuffled around, distributed to different volunteers. Whoever gets X wad gets to create one level with an aesthetic or playstyle that compliments a gameplay mod.

I have a hunch that very few mappers would actually jump on board, but it might be an interesting experiment, at least.
I'm the shittiest mapper around, but I'd still be willing to give it a shot.

TerminusEst13 said:

I have a hunch that very few mappers would actually jump on board, but it might be an interesting experiment, at least.

From experience, I've had considerable difficulty getting anybody interested in community projects in general, so if you do want to get this going, I'll wish you luck. Then again, you seem to have a better handle on keeping people organized than I do.

I think Linguica more or less hit the nail on the head. I have started working on a map and not used doom in doom format (or other doom engine games' equivalent formats) maybe twice ever. I see the appeal of the scripting and mapinfo is very useful, but a lot of the mapping specific features don't really seem that compelling to me. Eternity's linked portals are the only thing that seems cool or interesting really, and even those have some kinks to work out according to the wiki.

TerminusEst13 said:

That's exactly why they're gameplay mods. They modify the gameplay.

And it's not something I'm really interested in.

Not my cup of tea.


And yes that means that there are many modders whose output, by default, does not interest me, independently of their quality.

TerminusEst13 said:

If the problem is "would be better with dedicated X", then where does it end?
It's the same mindset of trying out a new mod and going "ugh, again?" when you load it up and see the same pistol as before. Or going through a new mod and seeing STARTAN and quitting because you've seen that texture so many times before used in boring ways. Or deciding to pass over because it doesn't have a custom soundtrack as well.

I don't get tired of the stock weapons and textures. For soundtrack, if I hear "running from evil" at the start, well, I have Jimmy's Jukebox autoloaded for a reason.

I do get tired of the same old maps. Then of course I could try new maps I haven't played through before, but then I run into two potential problems: the first: if the result is unbalanced, is it the map's fault or the mod's fault? Or both? The second: if the map is for ZDoom and has scripted events or custom content, will it play nicely with mods?

Recently I have been making deathmatch maps and thinking to myself - this area would be really cool with some rain and thunder effects. This portal could use some translucent/scrolling/warping textures. Ambient sounds would be cool here. I should add a super cool new weapon to spice things up. 3D floors would make this map layout really interesting. Could use a skybox here. Jump pads - awesome!

But then I remember that I would be restricting myself to Zandronum, and the Zandronum dm scene is dead or near-dead as far as I can tell. If people are actually going to play and enjoy my map, I'm going to have to make it Boom format and ditch a lot of my exciting ideas. It's frustrating. I had to give up on my Strife DM project because there simply is no audience, I mean it was fun working on it, but ultimately fruitless.

One of my favourite multiplayer wads is Sabbat Martyr DM, a deathmatch mapset featuring cool new levels with ZDoom features and even new weapons. It never gets played anymore. Ever. It's shame because it's a really neat wad, I had a lot of fun with it back in the ol' Skulltag days.

I remember when EDGE had an active modding community.. new maps and new mods would be released for it all the time. It seemed then, though, that people got tired of gameplay mods (weapons, etc...EDGE was one of the first) and started doing actual TC's. Back then there was really only Zdoom and EDGE for major stuff that wasn't Dehacked related.

From the sound of this thread, it seems Zdoom hasn't hit that point that EDGE hit at one time, though people continue to pump out pretty interesting things for that engine, so they might never.

There was a low point in the community, right before 1.35 became the last EDGE release, that anything Zdoom related raised everyone's blood pressure (inversely, deflated their hopes) because people stopped caring about mapping and started caring about DDF/DECORATE (custom content, and we know how that race turned out). Then there was the port reputation here at Doomworld itself, any OGs like myself remember that?

When DOSDoom became EDGE there were a lot of issues in those early years I can remember here at DW that turned off people...it seemed that DW wasn't all impressed with gameplay mods/sprite rips, which was very common at the time and branded EDGE "that engine". Now, they are even more widespread to the point I can't really pick out a specific Zdoom mod from the next...seems like history is repeating itself. Any complaints people had about EDGE at that time should be next to gone now! :)

I guess what I'm trying to say is that EDGE users became confined to their community for a reason, the same as ZDoom users...it's not Doomworld's fault (I love this place, honest!) but the encouragement of "original" WADS was so heavy here at a time that people still find it easier to work with rips. I can understand and appreciate that now, but it shouldn't be surprising.

People should map for 3DGE more often. Lots of interesting things you can do that can be pulled off fairly easy, and often with impressive results. I'm improving RTS and adding a custom script language for cameras now and with the new framerate bump I do hope it catches on, even for Vanilla or BOOM-based maps.

<tom_> dosdoom has turned into EDGE
<tom_> which stands for extremely dumb gay engine

WildWeasel said:

Or Hideous Destructor, which is well regarded for not being easy to play, period.

Your skill is not enough.

Bloodshedder said:

&lt;tom_&gt; dosdoom has turned into EDGE
&lt;tom_&gt; which stands for extremely dumb gay engine

Worse was said about it, unfortunately.

Linguica said:

This is just me spitballing, but I think there's a significant portion of the Doom community that is mostly "over" advanced features as an attraction in a Doom level.
[...]
it stopped being a novel, cool thing to take advantage of because it was there. Instead, being able to mod a Doom engine to do all sorts of crazy crap was just part of the normal landscape and not terribly exciting.
[...]
Anyways, all of this conspired, in my view, to turn Doom, for a lot of people, from a game meant to be modded and transformed and extended, into one that was valuable precisely for all of its retro limitations. There's something inherently "Doomy" about new levels juggling the same gameplay rules in a new environment, that is lost with a gameplay mod that adds in explosions and uppercuts and whatever, and that turns a lot of people off now.

I started my very first maps as a youth in Vanilla format, then as soon as I was introduced to ZDoom features, I was hooked on adding them into my maps for quite a few years. New sprites? New enemies? Different gun behavior? Rad! I never tried to deviate too far from the "as-is" Doom gameplay, and I got a few decent ideas out - UAC Rebellion comes to mind - using a very limited amount of ZDoom effects.

For some reason though, looking back on it, using the uzi from Shadow Warrior, the shotgun from Duke, and all the other bits and pieces just seems "kiddy". I get that vibe about the majority of gameplay mods (like Brutal, of course.) Maybe it was just because I was experimenting with it a lot more when I was a child. Vanilla Doom just has this perfect balance and 99% of gameplay mods just seem like "stepping on toes." I'm sure this all just comes down to what I'm used to, though.

Captain Toenail said:

Recently I have been making deathmatch maps and thinking to myself - this area would be really cool with some rain and thunder effects. This portal could use some translucent/scrolling/warping textures. Ambient sounds would be cool here. I should add a super cool new weapon to spice things up. 3D floors would make this map layout really interesting. Could use a skybox here. Jump pads - awesome!

But then I remember that I would be restricting myself to Zandronum, and the Zandronum dm scene is dead or near-dead as far as I can tell. If people are actually going to play and enjoy my map, I'm going to have to make it Boom format and ditch a lot of my exciting ideas. It's frustrating. I had to give up on my Strife DM project because there simply is no audience, I mean it was fun working on it, but ultimately fruitless.

One of my favourite multiplayer wads is Sabbat Martyr DM, a deathmatch mapset featuring cool new levels with ZDoom features and even new weapons. It never gets played anymore. Ever. It's shame because it's a really neat wad, I had a lot of fun with it back in the ol' Skulltag days.

Yeah, I completely understand this.. Sometimes I go in with the vanilla limits in mind and I rarely run into 'humps' that way, but there are times where I simply need a 3D bridge, but because it would limit me to Zandronum (1/3rd of the Deathmatching population, more or less) I have to do all this fucking around to get the desired effect, or worse, just have to scrap the idea altogether. I guess I should take the risk of making a Zandro/Zdoom DM pack at some point. It couldn't hurt to try.

Sabbat Martyr was a lot of fun, and I sorta wish I had my 'adult brain' while mapping for that. (I was like 14 or something) My maps are far and away the worst in the pack and overall bring it down for those too lazy to make a maplist. I was basically cramming DM starts into what should have been SP maps..

Edward850 said:

And on the opposite side of the coin, I'm not seeing enough "just ZDoom" maps anymore. For the first few years, we had things like Hell Factory, Void and ZDoomCMP1 (at a stretch) (yeah there's numerous more but then we'll be here forever). And now, if there is custom maps for anything, it's designed for some other mod (or effectively is its own mod). Or is basically some full on story extravaganza. I liked Zen Dynamics as much as the next guy, but does everything have to be?

Basically, nobody's really making straightforward ZDoom maps anymore. It's kinda odd.

Yeah I miss those quite a bit. I'm attempting to make my in progress level be a "Just GZdoom" sort of map.

Tango said:

I was really hyped up about trying to make some maps for Psychic

Dude, hit me up if you're still interested. I've needed an excuse to kick off the Psychic singleplayer campaign mapset for ages now. :D