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Eregore

HYMN: A Heretic Community Project!

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HYMN: A Heretic Community Project

What's next? Now that I have all the submissions I will create a new thread with an episode alpha, including level order (all maps will be included!) Then we play each others' maps. We give one another feedback and suggestions for improvement. Once we have given and gotten feedback we polish our maps for the final release! Stay tuned . . .

Hymn of the Fallen Lords (HYMN): A Heretic Community Project!

Heretic mappers, get ready, this is the community project you’ve been waiting for! Anyone can submit a map! You will have until April 1st (04-01-13) to post a link for your level here in the forum. If your interested in joining just let me know, and I will add your name to the roster. File submissions will also be added onto the roster listed below.

After the submission deadline (04-01-13) I will announce which maps have been selected as levels for this episode. There will be 8 levels selected, 9 levels total, including one of my own. Once these levels have been chosen BETA testing will begin. Mappers of the selected levels will have another chance to tweak and balance their levels, making final changes and adjustments before the final release.

If your map is still incomplete by the deadline SUBMIT IT ANYWAYS! Those who have their maps chosen will get more time to fine tune their entries. Also, If there are over 18 entries a second episode will be created as well. All level submissions will be donated to the Blasphemer project as well, another great reason to submit a map.

I will be using the following set of criteria to select which 8 levels are to be included in the episode’s final release:

-The new texture pack has been used. Get it here: UPDATED v4a: https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B9TgHAsj1BGtNTVHeHE3ZHdvQ0U/edit
-Design for limit extended vanilla format for Heretic. Compatible ports should include Heretic+, ZDoom, Vavoom, Legacy, Doomsday/LibHeretic, and Eternity. Vanilla Heretic is also accepted.
-Levels are designed for ‘wand start’.
-Levels integrate 2 or 3 ‘fantasy’ themes. Examples: medieval towns, castles, lava caves, swamps, dungeons, catacombs, temples, icy areas, etc.
-Levels display clever, integrated, non-linear layouts.
-Medium sized maps. Somewhere between ‘3072 x 3072’ and ‘4096 x 4096’ is recommended.
-Game-play should be challenging but not exceedingly (impossibly) difficult.
-New music is allowed, but not necessary. If there is new music it should reflect the Heretic fantasy theme.
-All of Heretic's enemies, weapons, and items can be used.

This episode should be more complex and more detailed than the original Heretic episodes, so that it feels more modern, epic, and interesting than the original. Can’t wait to see the creativity! Happy mapping!

About the texture pack: Textures are compatible with Zdoom, Vavoom, Legacy, Doomsday/LibHeretic, and the Eternity ports. 180 textures and flats have been carefully selected from both Medieval and Baker’s Legendary texture packs. A few select textures from Cage, Eternal Doom, Gothic Doom, and Community Chest 4 have also been included. Everything is Heretic themed and provides crucial supplements for the very limited original Heretic palette.
Download: UPDATED v4a: https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B9TgHAsj1BGtNTVHeHE3ZHdvQ0U/edit

Roster:
-A.Gamma (project support) - https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B9TgHAsj1BGtWW03YmRNdHk0UzQ/edit?pli=1
-Boared - http://www.mediafire.com/download.php?8k1w7kjc7121w07
-Cacowad - v2 http://www.mediafire.com/?92d6bzpppx3izap
-dilks - http://dl.dropbox.com/u/62350852/CastleZ%20v10313.wad
-DooMAD - http://www.teamhellspawn.com/adetic.zip[url]
-Dragonsbrethren
-Egregor (project host) - [url]http://www.mediafire.com/?frzmli8i73mhmb6

-Dragonsbrethren
-Egregor (project host) - http://www.mediafire.com/?frzmli8i73mhmb6
-EvilNed01 - http://www.filmklubben.eu/wads/Badlandsv2.wad
-LakiSoft
-Olympus
-Optimus - ftp://ftp.untergrund.net/users/opti...ymn_optimus.zip
-Philnemba
-ShadesMaster
-Stygian

Special Thanks:
-Quasar (for port compatibility support)
-Wesley Johnson (for port compatibility support)

Mapset Donation to the Blasphemer Project:
To encourage and support the community creation of free IWADs, this project will donate ALL map submissions to the Blasphemer project http://www.doomworld.com/vb/doom-general/62832-whats-happening-to-blasphemer/. If there are any mappers that do NOT want their levels donated to Blasphemer they must say so when they place their submissions.

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Not thrilled with ZDoom being the recommended port. It's what I primarily use for Heretic, but I'd rather see the maps tested with the Heretic+ hack before release and fixed if any ZDoomisms (Or JHereticisms, or Legacisms, etc.) managed to sneak their way in.

Not sure if I'll contribute to this or not. I have the start of a vanilla Heretic map sitting here rotting because I have no idea what direction to take it in.

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Entryway hacked the DOS executables to extend their limits (and in the case of Heretic, exposed some item shortcut key stuff). You can grab it from the PrBoom-plus site:

http://prboom-plus.sourceforge.net/

visplanes[MAXVISPLANES]       : 128    * 8   = 1024
drawsegs[MAXDRAWSEGS]         : 256    * 8   = 2048
SAVEGAMESIZE                  : 196608 * 16  = 3145728
activeplats[MAXPLATS]         : 30     * 256 = 7680
vissprites[MAXVISSPRITE]      : 128    * 8   = 1024
linespeciallist[MAXLINEANIMS] : 64     * 256 = 16384
openings[MAXOPENINGS]         : 16384  * 4   = 65536
As far as I know, this is the only true limit "removing" (really extending) Heretic engine. I'm not sure how authentic JHeretic or Legacy are, but I know ZDoom doesn't expose all of its changes as compatibility options.

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You know, although I don't think aiming for Zdoom is a really good idea, I might make a map for this one since I have been itching to map for Heretic for a while now.

Also, I haven't tested Heretic+, but it seems to run in DOS, am I wrong?

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A.Gamma said:

Also, I haven't tested Heretic+, but it seems to run in DOS, am I wrong?


It's the original Heretic exe, hex-edited to have larger limits on a few static arrays.

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I wish you luck with this. But the textures in the pack are generally pretty hideous. Lots of ugly recolors and lots of even uglier dithering.

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Although I don't have much time at the moment, I might be able to design a map in the christmas and winter holidays, so I might submit something.

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You know, after expending the whole night trying different Heretic Sourceports and how they behaved, I think that the best option here might be if maps were made in vanilla format but with Zdoom/Legacy limits in mind.

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A.Gamma said:

You know, after expending the whole night trying different Heretic Sourceports and how they behaved, I think that the best option here might be if maps were made in vanilla format but with Zdoom/Legacy limits in mind.


That was my original thought. But now I feel that, as a community project, making it straight vanilla will cut the confusion and encourage more to participate. Most mappers creating 'medium' sized levels probably won't hit any limits. Besides, its not exclusively vanilla; there is some new content, the texture pack.

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Eregore said:

That was my original thought. But now I feel that, as a community project, making it straight vanilla will cut the confusion and encourage more to participate. Most mappers creating 'medium' sized levels probably won't hit any limits. Besides, its not exclusively vanilla; there is some new content, the texture pack.


Yeah I saw it, I'm not really sure about the switches or if Legacy/JHeretic support the ANIMDEFS lump.
Anyway now you got me intersted and I'll make a map for sure after you decide on a sourceport.

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Memfis said:

How about some monster placement guidelines? Like can maulotaurs be used on the early maps?


Creativity is up to you! While this will be an episode in the sense that it will be 8 regular levels and a 'secret' level, they should all be designed for wand start, so if maulotaurs can be reasonably defeated from wand start in your level, go for it! I will most likely choose the order of the episode's levels based on the submissions.

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Sign me up since I've been wanting to make another Heretic map for quite some time however I'm just going to make my map vanilla using only stock textures if thats ok.

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EvilNed01 said:

The level I'm making is growing into somewhat lava themed, and I'd love to incorporate this little monster I found at Realm667.

Since the intent is to be compatible with any limit-removing Heretic port, it is not possible to add ZDoom-exclusive content like this.

You could perhaps transcribe the DECORATE code into DED for Doomsday and EDF for Eternity; but Legacy would still be out of luck as it has no content definition language.

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EvilNed01 said:

Question,

The level I'm making is growing into somewhat lava themed, and I'd love to incorporate this little monster I found at Realm667.

Is that OK?

http://www.filmklubben.eu/bilder/Lava.jpg


As Gez said, we're aiming for a cross-port compatibility so that more people will be able to play and thus Zdoom content is a definite no.
Anyway good to see you're making your map, I was afraid everyone had forgot about this project.

Also, don't forget that we updated our textures so make sure to download them and to test your map with at least two of the intended ports (Be it Zdoom, Vavoom or one of the Eternity alphas).

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a little question: the size limit of the level includes also non-playable section of the maps, like outdoors or other decorative things?

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walter confalonieri said:

a little question: the size limit of the level includes also non-playable section of the maps, like outdoors or other decorative things?


Its a suggestion for playable area, so no technically, decorative 'view only' areas can be huge (especially for epic views), but ultimately the suggestion for a medium sized map is so we don't get ultra forever impossible maps. Think mediumish . . .

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A.Gamma said:

You did not update the textures, so they won't show up on anything but Zdoom.

Screenshot taken on Jheretic.
http://i.imgur.com/JzROq.png


I'd actually like to know what was done to the MOSSRCKA-E textures in the texture wad (something carried over to EvilNed01's duplicates in his pwad); they display fine in the ancient Dday 1.8.6, but not 1.9.

Also, when I extracted those textures out and put them in my own test wad, they displayed fine in 1.9.

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A.Gamma said:

You did not update the textures, so they won't show up on anything but Zdoom.

Screenshot taken on Jheretic.
http://i.imgur.com/JzROq.png


I'm probably gonna sound like an idiot here... but...

What? Huh? Que? I don't know how to do that.

I edited this in Doombuilder. I only used zDoom to test it.

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EvilNed01:

As this project evolves the resources have been updated. Download this:

http://www.mediafire.com/?td7a1vw2h72b9sb

Remove the old texture pack from your level, and place this new one there instead. All the textures should replace correctly, only now with cross-port compatibility. Hope this helps!

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