The Green Herring
Community Chest 4 Leader
Posts: 958
Registered: 05-07 |
I'll respond to the topic in a bit, but first, I'd like to share some background. Although I played shareware Doom a long time ago, and I had Final Doom since it was new — it was, in fact, the only commercial Doom game I had (no, really) — I came to Doom in 2007 in large part because of Doomworld and its demo community. Prior to this, I was lurking in the 3D Realms forums. In the Duke Nukem 3D forum, I posted speedruns for user-made levels (links are all dead now) that were compatible with v1.5 of Duke Nukem 3D Atomic Edition — only for people to shrug because they couldn't play them in eDuke32, the local equivalent of ZDoom. This ultimately forced me to start a YouTube channel just to show them to the forum-goers. After a short while, interest seemed to dry up. On top of that, with the increased focus on DukePlus, the HR Pack, and the additions to eDuke32, I began to feel the community was focusing a little too much on fancy effects and gimmicks in lieu of good level design. By that time, I had rediscovered the Final Doom disc, become interested in Doom again, and been active on the Doom Wiki.
Ultimately, Doomworld attracted me with how almost every level of source port is in widespread use — so people continue designing for the original engine and work with its limits — and how its demo community was not only thriving, but open to the use of any level of source port no matter how old. Hell, people still recorded demos under Compet-n's vanilla-specific rules despite its website having not been updated since 2005! And so, I became active here with the release of my first two demos for Icarus. (They are available on the DSDA, along with the improvements I later made.)
Today, I remain here because of its supportive community, and because I enjoy speedrunning. I do so for these reasons:- Figuring out the best way to finish a level under specified conditions is something I like to do. It is a useful way to exercise one's logic.
- Doom speedrunning is surprisingly not all that complex when you come down to it — but at the same time, how to best apply those techniques provides for unique challenges on every level you play.
- Continuing Maikl's campaign to record demos on every level in idgames/levels/doom/ has made me play levels that I would have otherwise not been interested in — and, in the process, uncover some lost gems. Sure, I've encountered a lot of dreck (as vdgg suggests,) but that tends to happen when you go on a mission like this. More on-topic, however, this campaign has resulted in me playing many kinds of levels, from easy strolls to difficult journeys, from thinly-veiled deathmatch levels to complex missions, from ammo warehouses to veritable deserts, from ghost towns to slaughtermaps, from mazes to open arenas, from real-life reconstructions to surreal realms, and from luck-based missions to pure tests of skill. All of these have produced unique challenges for me to take on. I'm willing to bet that at this point, I've probably had more experience on more types of levels than most other players. I could be wrong, though. But most importantly...
- Doom is fun!
Wow, this post was bigger than I expected it to be. ;)
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- The Green Herring
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10-05-11 16:40 
