KSpeed: Semi-Speedmapping WAD(5 Maps)

I have been making WADs for about 4 years and have never finished a single thing. I wanted to change that, so here it is.


KSPEED is a semi-speedmapping project that was made in a span of 5 days.

Keep in mind these maps are not very good. I still am not too good at monster placement. I am also very, very bad at making boss maps. Like, very bad.

Screenshots: http://imgur.com/a/CwrB2
Download: http://www.mediafire.com/download/5xu68xb0hn3ajb0/kspeed.zip


For use in ZDoom.
(Made in Boom format, but lifts won't work with PrBoom and PrBoom-Plus for some odd reason)

I would also love any criticism you have to offer.

Enjoy!

I gave it a quick look with no monsters(ZDoom is an utter pain in the ass on this laptop) and it looks pretty cool for a speedmap set, although it kind of mostly consists of hallways connecting rooms(a problem I have as well). Also I found this:


I humbly request that you leave it in. And try checking if you have tags on your lifts: having tags with no lifts is kind of a ZDoomism that trips people up sometimes.

hi there. some thoughts:

- decent aesthetics, you have a good sense of moderate/minimal detailing, color schemes, etc.
- every map was pretty much a linear hallway of rooms connected to rooms. It's worth experimenting with interconnecting more areas of the map and letting players approach rooms from different directions, or do certain tasks in an order they choose.
- a similar grievance is that the gameplay is pretty much: open a door, there are monsters in the room facing you, kill them from the door, go into room, repeat. Doom monsters are much more threatening when in attacking in groups, from different angles, from different heights. If you break away from the room-->hallway-->room design definitely try and 'attack' the player from multiple directions at once.
- arch-viles and cyberdemons on their own aren't very threatening nowadays, feel free to be meaner :D. A general guideline is that no room monster on its own is dangerous given enough room to move (or sufficient cover).


some other misc tips:
- the player can hit switches that are 48 units away, even if there are raised floors in the way (as long as they don't connect to the ceiling). I noticed I could prematurely hit a switch to get the YK in map 3(?) I think.
- I'd recommend putting block-monster lines around most teleporters, feels a bit cleaner that way.

These maps are not bad at all. They're looking okay, quite well detailed, some areas are even nicely atmospheric (I also like the presence of new music). You apparently didn't try any hard to impress the player with special design or gameplay - many mappers try to do so, even speedmappers - and that might be the main reason why they won't be considered anything special.

Combat is really mild, and doesn't offer much challenge for an experienced and prepared player. When I started mapping, I've also used monsters sparsely and was afraid of setting up too unfair situations, but later I've found out that players prefer the interesting situations to deal with, rather than consequent one-or-two-monster encounters and door fights. Here I can recommend using every aspect of leveldesign to make a fight interesting - increased monster count, various attacking angles and heights, taking advantage of the environment (limited space, darkness, varied terrain). Generally, to improve your monster placement, consider it already when building the rooms and structural detail.

Rooms + hallways centered design is not that interesting as well, when the map just leads you from one point to another, from one simple fight to another, or to another switch to press to open yet another branch. There are more interesting ways to build and structure a map. Since you were speedmapping, your approach is understandable of course. Anyway, Ribbiks advises you well.

I've actually enjoyed playing through the mapset from pistol starts. I've died on my way, not due to a hard game, but my inattention - it happens to me too often. I felt the maps were easy. Quite well balanced ammo-wise, and health wise too. You could have even lowered the counts of both a little bit, but if the player struggled, the game would lose the rest of the fun it can provide. Actually, being able to get through the levels comfortably was satisfying, that deserves a praise.

So all in all: Like Ribbiks, I recommend making more interesting and challenging fights, less linear layouts and perhaps try to interconnect rooms, employ more height and light variation and detail that actually (and preferably, mostly!) has an influence on gameplay (window with monsters, columns to hide behind), in a way that gives a less than usual feel, that's interesting to look at and play through.

Seeing your design and usage of detail, I think you map very well, those rooms were not just simple rectangles and the textures were fitting and creating a theme. This was a simple, but nice little mapset. So, good luck with further mapping!

Problems I've encountered: MAP02 features a hell knight closet that doesn't open. MAP03 has a red torch stuck in a wall (behind yellow door), multiple monsters didn't teleport from their dummy sectors, and as Ribbiks said, YK switch can probably be activated before the bars lower. MAP04 had a confusing moment with a blue key switch (where do I go when I don't have the key?), but that was actually no problem.

Wow! Thank you all for the help! I will certainly try all this on my next wad!

The maps were pretty decent, i did not see any real difficulty getting through any of them though, i would suggest to use more traps to amp up the difficulty