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Whymes5

Restoring Deimos [Megawad - On /idgames]

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JudgeDeadd said:

That's right, I jumped, sorry about that. But that didn't really affect anything else in the map (I didn't jump in other places).


Yep, and since I don't want to redesign the levels more than I must, I will add a nojump flag to mapinfo when it's released. I just don't have it in right now for debug purposes.

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I had already hit that switch, but I've no idea what it did. Having just gone back in, it seems the switch that opens that wall is over nearer where the Cyberdemon is. Not sure how I missed it the first time, but it now gives purpose to the small room that only had a couple of Imps in it.

Whymes5 said:

Map13 is made to have different routes, so you can finish the level without having the blue key at all. Should I change it, or leave it? What do you think?


Ah, if that's intentional then alright. I only found it a little strange is all. You could maybe have had it so that there were a couple of blue doors there a small distance apart but inbetween is a MegaSphere or extra RL/PG ammo or something, as a reward for getting the key. As it is, you do get a MegaArmor if you go for the blue key, which does help a lot if you get it earlier in the map. Part of my frustration was that the switch at the top of the lift you mentioned is the one I felt should have opened up that teleporter, when it was actually a switch further away. Non-linearity is not bad, but when you are backtracking through the same area several times, noticing small differences each time you hit a switch gets progressively harder, especially if there are strong enemies to deal with as well.

Map 13 (Cont.): Having found that switch, I proceeded to go through the teleporter and eventually went to get the blue key. Unsurprisingly, I found all secrets and killed all monsters considering how long I spent exploring!

I will continue with this later in the week.

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degree23 said:

Map 13 (Cont.): Having found that switch, I proceeded to go through the teleporter and eventually went to get the blue key. Unsurprisingly, I found all secrets and killed all monsters considering how long I spent exploring!


Hm.. I could've swore that switch was supposed to do it. They might've got mixed up somehow. I'll try to reduce the switch hunts in both map13 and 11. Probably map 6 a bit too.

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Map 14: Interesting start here, it's a challenging Baron into Arch Vile fight even with BFG, though these things are to be expected halfway through a WAD. I'm less keen on the ending though. Visually, suddenly ending up in E1M8 seems very out of the blue, and the fight itself isn't very fun. The first half is not bad, but the second half is less enjoyable. Firstly, you'll have dozens of Lost Souls heading your way before you're able to kill the Pain Elementals. Secondly, if you don't kill the PEs then they have a habit of flying back out into the space while still shooting Lost Souls at you. Thirdly, is there any need for the outside floor to be so damaging without a radiation suit around? And lastly, the yellow candle stands you have near the exit are a real pain to manoeuvre across if you're still fighting enemies. There's little motivation to fight and every motivation to just BFG the Baron and go straight to the exit.

Map 15: The music for this map is great. I wanted to like this level, I really did, but at the end of it all I was left with was a massive sense of frustration. The four worst enemies to deal with from a distance or when they have a good line of sight are Arch Viles (because they'll just hit you regardless), Spider Masterminds and Chaingunners (because they don't stop firing) and Revenants (because of their homing rockets) and you have 2 of these monsters up on perches all over the place wave after wave. Most pertinently they surround the walkways above you at the start and you have no way of getting up there. Then repeat this several times more for each wave. Also, everything is so high above you that actually hitting them is quite difficult. The obstacles you can run into around the second area are also a pain as they camouflage quite well against the walls/Imps/Mancubii and I rocketed myself on them a few times. I really liked the concept, but it was more tedious than fun. Fortunately you kept Pain Elementals to a minimum.

And as that's the end of the first episode, I'll definitely stop there and tackle the second one later in the week.

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degree23 said:

Map 14: Interesting start here, it's a challenging Baron into Arch Vile fight even with BFG, though these things are to be expected halfway through a WAD. I'm less keen on the ending though. Visually, suddenly ending up in E1M8 seems very out of the blue, and the fight itself isn't very fun. The first half is not bad, but the second half is less enjoyable. Firstly, you'll have dozens of Lost Souls heading your way before you're able to kill the Pain Elementals. Secondly, if you don't kill the PEs then they have a habit of flying back out into the space while still shooting Lost Souls at you. Thirdly, is there any need for the outside floor to be so damaging without a radiation suit around? And lastly, the yellow candle stands you have near the exit are a real pain to manoeuvre across if you're still fighting enemies. There's little motivation to fight and every motivation to just BFG the Baron and go straight to the exit.

Map 15: The music for this map is great. I wanted to like this level, I really did, but at the end of it all I was left with was a massive sense of frustration. The four worst enemies to deal with from a distance or when they have a good line of sight are Arch Viles (because they'll just hit you regardless), Spider Masterminds and Chaingunners (because they don't stop firing) and Revenants (because of their homing rockets) and you have 2 of these monsters up on perches all over the place wave after wave. Most pertinently they surround the walkways above you at the start and you have no way of getting up there. Then repeat this several times more for each wave. Also, everything is so high above you that actually hitting them is quite difficult. The obstacles you can run into around the second area are also a pain as they camouflage quite well against the walls/Imps/Mancubii and I rocketed myself on them a few times. I really liked the concept, but it was more tedious than fun. Fortunately you kept Pain Elementals to a minimum.

And as that's the end of the first episode, I'll definitely stop there and tackle the second one later in the week.


Your comments so far have been really helpful. I just finished map28, so I will work on an INTERPIC and then address your comments.

As far as your comments about MAP15, I'm not really sure what I can do to make the fight more enjoyable. On one hand, if I take out the revenants and chaingunners, the map becomes a ridiculously easy zergfest since everything else is little threat (Except the archviles...), especially if you bring in a lot of high firepower from previous maps. On the other, as you said it's quite tedious. Would replacing them with another monster fix it, or is it still an issue? Or do you have any other ideas? I'm already considering removing the first redundant wave of monsters (the 2nd), since it's just doing the same thing as last time, and maybe one of the other waves since the map just kinda goes on and on it seems.

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To me the inherent problem is that Doom isn't fully 3D, so fights with a large vertical disparity aren't handled as easily as in more modern FPS games. Your rockets will often hit the top of the wall rather than the enemy you're firing at and at other times your rocket will just miss them as they've walked to the side. Another thing I forgot to mention is that when you get outside the first zone, the lone Chaingunner in with the PG is more annoying than dangerous. The stairs there are very steep and more than once I got to the top only to be punched by a Revenant I didn't see was there, which relates back to my first comment in this post.

I don't know if replacing with other monsters is a solution, because killing enemies that are high up is annoying regardless, it's just that those ones are the most annoying. The firepower isn't much of an issue because you give every weapon right at the start. True you might have more ammo from previous maps, but that didn't make this any more enjoyable for me. The problem wasn't ammo or weapons, it was the situation of having to kill a lot of high up enemies all the time. True, after the first 2 waves you can start climbing stairs to get to them, but then you just have more high up enemies around the outside of the castle. I just don't think Doom handles these situations that well, especially if you're not using freelook.

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degree23 said:

The firepower isn't much of an issue because you give every weapon right at the start.


True, but if this is played in cooperative or online, the BFG which is spawned at the start is a onetime pickup since it's scripted in ACS. Therefore only one player will have it. I'm not sure of any way around this. If you do let me know, but this is my first project with scripting in it so my knowledge of ACS isn't so great. Spawning more BFGs just get picked up as ammo. The BFG isn't actually accessible until you unlock the outer walls. Not to mention cells and rockets would be spread out more divided. These maps are OK to use freelook on... Jumping and crouching will be disabled in MAPINFO on the final release, so any other zdoom-only control is OK to use for gameplay testing.

I'll just play around with it and see if I can make it a little better. I'd rather not redesign the entire level, especially because I sorta like how each weapon is useful the way it is right now. It's a final battle where you have to use every weapon. I have only played through it on SP once or twice since its a pretty long fight, it didn't seem bad the one time I tried it online (just to make sure it worked online). I'm curious what you will have to say about map 30's rendition of this fight, if you choose to do it. (That one hasn't really been balanced, and seems a little anti climactic or easy in my opinion, though.)

I feel like we're missing each other's point just a little maybe, but I never really had much issue. I mean, double tapping the chain gun takes them out very accurately and theres a shit load of ammo boxes in the map for it. It just takes longer. That's why I am talking about taking out some waves, maybe a few lower HP monsters, etc.

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degree23 said:

Map 9: This area feels weird because it looks like you should be able to walk into the distance, yet you can't. That area definitely feels very ZDoomesque!


Sorry , I forgot to reply to this. I'm usually just replying to certain comments because theyre things that I'm having trouble fixing. I may not do anything with this area. Firstly, it already doesn't look proper anyways because the buildings which the hallway connect already dissapear when you go outside, so I would have to fix that too. Furthermore, the level is already in a sort of odd, otherworld? style. Finally, it doesn't affect gameplay in anyway, so I might just leave it like that. I added some fences there and it sort of destroys the look of the area. I place gameplay ahead of aesthetics if I can, but I don't see any gameplay gained by blocking it off, it's pretty easy to see it's invisibly walled off in about one second.

To savage: That's fine. In a few days I am going to run it on public zdaemon and zandronum servers for a few days. I'm making lightning fast progress on this last phase of development because I've been working on it a shit load, and I can tell you that the first episode is already a HELL of a lot better than it was even when I posted this thread, and it already was a fairly decent mapset according to feedback. But I'm beginning to see how that 'slot' was a bit useless. I've got enough feedback on IRC and the forums to sort of invalidate it. But feel free to review any sort of gameplay facet that bugs you.

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nxGangrel said:

Do you still need playtesters? If so, I wouldn't mind playtesting a few of the wad's maps.


Sure. Just play and leave comments here. But I will probably update the beta to a newer one by the end of the day today. So that people can test map28 and also make it a little less stressful to test.

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I started playing this megawad and recorded a bunch of zdoom (2.7.1.0) FDAs which you are welcome to:
http://www.mediafire.com/download/tu8yc69fqqp116d/rdeimos-mouldy.zip

I stopped at map14 as I had to give up on that map, and I kind of gave up on the whole wad at the same time, not my cup of tea I'm afraid. If I was to give more feedback then I'd be telling you to make it all different so not sure its worth it. But the demos might be useful at least.

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mouldy said:

I started playing this megawad and recorded a bunch of zdoom (2.7.1.0) FDAs which you are welcome to:
http://www.mediafire.com/download/tu8yc69fqqp116d/rdeimos-mouldy.zip

I stopped at map14 as I had to give up on that map, and I kind of gave up on the whole wad at the same time, not my cup of tea I'm afraid. If I was to give more feedback then I'd be telling you to make it all different so not sure its worth it. But the demos might be useful at least.


No offense, but I can see why you might have given up. I only watched your Map 14 FDA, and you seem like you weren't playing so well. Why do I say this? It's the simple things, like not grouping up the barons when you use the BFG. If they aren't grouped up, you won't do nearly as much damage. Also you seem like you're not playing very aggressively, it seemed like you were scared to shoot your gun or something. There is enough ammo to UV max that map on SP, I tested it myself after I got some feedback in this thread. Don't be scared to shoot. Another thing I noticed was you kept dying, and when you respawned you wouldn't even pick up the SSG and ammo sometimes that was RIGHT there when you spawn. Most people actually thought that map 14 wasn't so bad (not just on this thread, but in general). And I don't think it can just be chalked up to map familiarity, because the sort of things I'm talking about are things that apply to any map. I lost count of how many times you died to simple mistakes. And I'm just comparing that demo to other demos of the WAD people have PM'd me - they didn't have as much trouble as you.

I'm not sure what your feedback that you're speaking of would be, and that's why I'm bringing it up. So now I kind of wonder what it is about the wad you don't like (keep in mind, I do know there's some issues with it hence why it's in testing).

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Whymes5 said:

you seem like you're not playing very aggressively, it seemed like you were scared to shoot your gun or something. There is enough ammo to UV max that map on SP, I tested it myself


There's your problem right there. Without knowing the map and being given a room full of barons my first thought is to conserve ammo, because I won't know whether it will be more useful to keep the bfg and cells for later. When confronted with an unknown situation like this my primary tactic is to spend a few deaths playing sloppy and exploring the map before deciding on the best course of action. Both paths to choose ended with me running out of ammo, which led me to believe the mapper either doesn't know what they are doing, or has a very specific way in which this map has to be played. Judging by the lack of health it seems getting hit by anything isn't an option either. But what really made me give up was that 64-wide maze, that low standard of design is something that echoes throughout the wad and by that point it wasn't giving me enough incentive to see any more.

Thats just my personal taste of course. The gameplay in your maps is mostly ok, but I think it is limited by the very basic design in a lot of them. There were a few maps that stood out as more sophisticated: maps 08, 10, 12 and 13 and I enjoyed map11 (though it is fairly ugly).

You may still find the demos useful though, its always useful to see how other people play your maps as it opens your eyes to how other people play, and how things you might have thought obvious aren't always so.

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Whymes5 said:

Sure. Just play and leave comments here. But I will probably update the beta to a newer one by the end of the day today. So that people can test map28 and also make it a little less stressful to test.

Okay. I'll take shot of the earlier maps that hasn't been reviewed yet (as of posting this). I'll probably also review all the maps at one point.

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So here or my thoughts on Map08:
The level design, specifically the starting rooms looked pretty amateur. The room that required the yellow key had empty areas in HMP that had the chaingunners in UV, and they looked awkward. Also I think a few areas needed a bit more detail, specifically that mentioned room, and the yellow key room. On the other hand, the main area looked good and was a blast to play.
There was some cheapness to the level as well. For example, in the room where you needed to get the red key, if you fall down in the slime pit it takes away 10% of your health while there are monsters around you and in the pit itself. That's not cool. I don't want to worry about getting hit while taking a large amounts of damage from the flat/floor. I think the damage should be lowered. And in that same room there was no indication that you needed to hit the walls to get the red key. I figured it out after getting desperate to find out how to lower it (I punch objects as a last resort).
In the main area, there was enough ammo for the Plasma Rifle yet there wasn't one which could of been used for that main area where you are surrounded by demons. It's probably fine for a full playthrough but not from a pistol start.
Lastly, I think there should be more variety in the difficulty. I finished the map on HNTR, HMP, and UV, and it all felt the same. I don't think that was intentional.

Those are my criticisms. It may sound like much but I actually really like the map. It was fun dodging the attacks in the main area, and the level itself was difficult, challenging, and fun. I say it's a decent map. It's definitely not a bad one, but just short of being really good.

I didn't record my playthrough though. I just wanted to mention.

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I desided to test Map18.
The port i used is GzDoom 2.1-pre and played on pistol-start.

Here my thoughts:
The map has pretty much a Plutonia-style look. The flow of the map and the overall
progression felt very nice. Also some nice Baron trap is placed. The Mastermind fight felt more like a drag tought.
Also. There's one thing you should never do. Slow the players movement down in any way. Yes im talking about the water.
You are taking away alot freedom of movement which is quite unnecesary. In Doom you just need the usual movement speed to dodge enemy attacks.
Atleast thats how i feel about that.
Take that away and it feels quite unnatural.
The map itself didn't appear to have any mapping errors,besides the blue bars which can only be raised by the blue button again.

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death112 said:

I desided to test Map18.
The port i used is GzDoom 2.1-pre and played on pistol-start.

Here my thoughts:
The map has pretty much a Plutonia-style look. The flow of the map and the overall
progression felt very nice. Also some nice Baron trap is placed. The Mastermind fight felt more like a drag tought.
Also. There's one thing you should never do. Slow the players movement down in any way. Yes im talking about the water.
You are taking away alot freedom of movement which is quite unnecesary. In Doom you just need the usual movement speed to dodge enemy attacks.
Atleast thats how i feel about that.
Take that away and it feels quite unnatural.
The map itself didn't appear to have any mapping errors,besides the blue bars which can only be raised by the blue button again.


Strangely enough on zdaemon the water isnt deep enough to slow you. I'll make it 8 pixels shalllower. Thanks for review.

As far as you map08 review nxGrangel, I'll keep them in mind. Ive never played the wad under UV.

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Whymes5 said:

Strangely enough on zdaemon the water isnt deep enough to slow you. I'll make it 8 pixels shalllower. Thanks for review.

As far as you map08 review nxGrangel, I'll keep them in mind. Ive never played the wad under UV.


Ahh, yeah that sounds splendid. So i started playing all the maps, got 1-10 already done and ofcourse with demos of those first playthroughts.
I intended to play throught the whole thing and send you those demos with a file full of notes/thoughts.
Could take a few days, don't know how motivated i am.

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mouldy said:

But what really made me give up was that 64-wide maze, that low standard of design is something that echoes throughout the wad and by that point it wasn't giving me enough incentive to see any more.


Ever heard of an auto map? It's not really that big of a maze, either... By the way, there are even mazes in the IWAD maps. And this is the only one in the entire wad. I guess I can take it out though. But nobody complained about it yet so I didn't know people cared. Anyways, I don't know what kind of viable strategy involves ignoring picking up ammo, then complain about being low on ammo.

I found out that I put a little on the low side of ammo in some of the first episode maps, but again on the other hand, there is almost way too much ammo in episode 2. From a pistol start I ended map29 with almost max of all ammo, even with lots of cyberdemons in that map...

I probably seem a little harsh back. It's good that I have feedback from people that play it differently, it's the whole point of this thread asking for testers. But then again, punching everything to death is also a way to play it, and I don't know if I want to build a map based around letting people do that to finish... I was just pointing out some things that looked weird in the demo.


Original post updated with an updated beta for any interested.

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mouldy said:

Without knowing the map and being given a room full of barons my first thought is to conserve ammo, because I won't know whether it will be more useful to keep the bfg and cells for later.


To me that's the total opposite. Barons are the most ammo-intensive non boss enemies, and even with a RL you don't save that much ammo without really corralling them together, and even then that isn't easy. There are fewer situations more suited to using a BFG than the one provided at the start of that map.

Map 16: There is a LOT of SG ammo in this map as I ended with nearly full ammo from a pistol start. I only found the secret that had the Computer Map and Invisibility in, but I have no idea where the other one is. Hmm, water at the end. I've never played maps that have these in before, so I'm not sure what to expect. It seems I'm only able to go down?

Map 17: Ah, so is freelook essential for this part of the WAD? The small vertical tunnel sections aren't great for the reasons I mentioned earlier about Doom not really handling height disparity very well. The large sunken section with the Baron in the middle looks great, but I was being shot from so many different places, and the fact that Imps blend in very well with the colours here didn't help. Revenant homing rockets are significantly harder to dodge underwater, nearly impossible in my experience in this map. Spectres combined with underwater sections was also a particularly annoying combination. This part felt weird with invisible walls blocking the small edges there; why not just have the floor going all the way to the wall? I didn't find any of the secrets. The music for this map was awesome by the way, and I think it fit the theme well too, I just didn't enjoy the level.

Map 18: I've noticed you can't open doors that are part way through closing, which is a little annoying. Being slowed down in the outside fight is a real pain due to how many monsters are out there. The Spider Mastermind fight didn't really do anything for the map as you have easy cover to hide behind. Not too bad a map, just not one of the best ones so far.

Map 19: Ah, this awesome music track again! Is this fence supposed to go all the way around this pit? You can't seem to drop into it. A lot of the level is covered in damaging floors, but I didn't find my first Radiation Suit until after I had picked up all 3 keys. Health isn't exactly abundant in this map either, which didn't help. The Hell Knight behind the yellow door isn't great as you have so little room to manoeuvre without falling down. Having reached the final room on about 30 health and no armour, the fight there is ridiculous. Overall this level needs more health.

Map 20: I think this happened earlier in the WAD, but the use of the Light Amplification Visor to clear out the fog so you can see better for a while is used really well here. The elevator you go down after hitting the switch beyond the red door isn't great as the space is so tight and you can easily drop into the middle of the 3 Imps there. The Armor is obtained way too late in this level as you have already been through significant fights. I couldn't work out the purpose of these teleporters. My comment about the Armor is even more pertinent because the only thing you have to kill before you get to the MegaSphere is one Revenant. And I have to say that the end section is fucking amazing. There doesn't seem to be enough ammo to kill everything, but damn that is one atmospheric and dangerous ending where you can't stand still for too long. I only found 1 of the 5 secrets here; I have no idea where you're hiding them all.

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degree23 said:

To me that's the total opposite. Barons are the most ammo-intensive non boss enemies, and even with a RL you don't save that much ammo without really corralling them together, and even then that isn't easy. There are fewer situations more suited to using a BFG than the one provided at the start of that map.


If you don't shoot the barons and just run away from them, then you save 100% of the ammo. Thats why my first instinct is to explore that option since barons are often slow moving enough to avoid. That tactic doesn't work on this map as I found out, but as I said i dont mind wasting a few lives to figure out a general plan.

@Whymes5: I was maybe a bit harsh about that map, so I gave it another go and recorded a new demo (using the updated wad):
http://www.mediafire.com/download/eihv961cpyls6yu/rdeimos-14-mouldy2.lmp

It didn't give me that much trouble this time, in fact I ended with more ammo than I could possibly use. This map is a good example of what I mean by the basic design being detrimental to the gameplay. Most of the map involves opening a door and shooting at the monsters in the room, there are some occasional ambushes but they mostly involve running around monsters in a room. The map itself doesn't feature much in the gameplay other than providing corners and doors to hide behind. It does have some visually interesting areas though, and I wouldn't bother changing anything if you are happy with it.

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mouldy said:

If you don't shoot the barons and just run away from them, then you save 100% of the ammo.


That's not really a great point for two reasons. One is that this is true of any room that doesn't lock itself, that you can just not shoot and instead run and save 100% of the ammo. And two is simply my earlier point again; you can save the ammo... for what? The situation of grouped up Barons is one of the best (and by "best" I suppose I am also referring to ammo usage as well as situation as the more enemies you hit, the better value you are getting from each shot) uses for a BFG and you are highly unlikely to encounter a better situation to that ammo.

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I do see what mouldy says, but the thing that seemed annoying to me the most was not picking up the ammo. I can see how some might want to skip the first baron fight. The problem with that is that two archviles are in the door beyond it, so you'll probably want to clear that room out first. I thought that would seem obvious after the first death but mouldy kept trying to run past them which is why you ran into trouble. There are no safe places for a few rooms. I will add a few more ammo boxes near the start of the map and take a few out near the end, will probably change the maze a bit too.

degree23 said:

Map 16: There is a LOT of SG ammo in this map as I ended with nearly full ammo from a pistol start. I only found the secret that had the Computer Map and Invisibility in, but I have no idea where the other one is. Hmm, water at the end. I've never played maps that have these in before, so I'm not sure what to expect. It seems I'm only able to go down?


There's a secret near the shotgun. If you look at the wall, one of them is textured differently. To get to it, you have to get up on the raised platform around the room, straferun through the gaps by the doors, then go open that wall. I think it's pretty well hidden, maybe a little too much, but I thought it was a little bit unique so didn't take it out. It contains even more SG ammo though...

degree23 said:

Map 17: Ah, so is freelook essential for this part of the WAD? The small vertical tunnel sections aren't great for the reasons I mentioned earlier about Doom not really handling height disparity very well. The large sunken section with the Baron in the middle looks great, but I was being shot from so many different places, and the fact that Imps blend in very well with the colours here didn't help. Revenant homing rockets are significantly harder to dodge underwater, nearly impossible in my experience in this map. Spectres combined with underwater sections was also a particularly annoying combination. This part felt weird with invisible walls blocking the small edges there; why not just have the floor going all the way to the wall? I didn't find any of the secrets. The music for this map was awesome by the way, and I think it fit the theme well too, I just didn't enjoy the level.


This was mostly an experimental map, I guess it works for some and not for others. I'll think about replacing the revenants, I think I had the same problem when I played through it once.

degree23 said:

Map 18: I've noticed you can't open doors that are part way through closing, which is a little annoying. Being slowed down in the outside fight is a real pain due to how many monsters are out there. The Spider Mastermind fight didn't really do anything for the map as you have easy cover to hide behind. Not too bad a map, just not one of the best ones so far.


I don't know if you are using the newer version I posted or not, but I did change some of the doors since your comments made me realize that the wad is sort of a door-fest in some maps.

degree23 said:

Map 19: Ah, this awesome music track again! Is this fence supposed to go all the way around this pit? You can't seem to drop into it. A lot of the level is covered in damaging floors, but I didn't find my first Radiation Suit until after I had picked up all 3 keys. Health isn't exactly abundant in this map either, which didn't help. The Hell Knight behind the yellow door isn't great as you have so little room to manoeuvre without falling down. Having reached the final room on about 30 health and no armour, the fight there is ridiculous. Overall this level needs more health.


Noted..

degree23 said:

Map 20: I think this happened earlier in the WAD, but the use of the Light Amplification Visor to clear out the fog so you can see better for a while is used really well here. The elevator you go down after hitting the switch beyond the red door isn't great as the space is so tight and you can easily drop into the middle of the 3 Imps there. The Armor is obtained way too late in this level as you have already been through significant fights. I couldn't work out the purpose of these teleporters. My comment about the Armor is even more pertinent because the only thing you have to kill before you get to the MegaSphere is one Revenant. And I have to say that the end section is fucking amazing. There doesn't seem to be enough ammo to kill everything, but damn that is one atmospheric and dangerous ending where you can't stand still for too long. I only found 1 of the 5 secrets here; I have no idea where you're hiding them all.


The original intention of the final area was to make it so that fighting wasn't such a good option, but since some people will want to kill every monster I'll add some more ammo boxes here for that. It was supposed to be a dash to the exit, since the intermission screen shortly before mentions "the only way to survive is to escape" or something along those lines. There actually is a green armor near the beginning of a level, but it's again, in a secret. I'll probably move it outside and add a medkit in there or something instead.

Again, your comments have been really really helpful so far, and while I haven't quite dealt with all of them even in the newer beta, I'm still working on addressing some of them. Unfortunately in some of the maps the "door-hiding, hallway monster fights" are built in such a way so that removing them will take significant level redesign. I can fix some of it, but some of it just might have to stay in. Since this was my first megawad, I'll probably just have to leave some of those areas as is. Some of the maps don't have that problem, and I noticed it's usually the newer maps.

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MAP16

Testing form: http://pastebin.com/N6rNwvP6

This was a very easy and short map. I'm assuming it's meant to be a "breather". Personally, I didn't find it very interesting. None of the encounters were challenging at all; the only slightly harder moment was the very end, where you needed to dive into water blindly without knowing the location of the imp/lost soul inside. Still, I managed to complete it on the first try, without any deaths whatsoever.

I liked the visuals in the room behind the red door. As for the area with the red door, however, I disliked the hanging vines (the transparent textures)--the first time you enter this area, you first get to see them almost exactly from the side, so it strikes you how unrealistic they look. Maybe they'd look better if you made them into a more complex shape than a straight line.

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JudgeDeadd said:

MAP16

Testing form: http://pastebin.com/N6rNwvP6

This was a very easy and short map. I'm assuming it's meant to be a "breather". Personally, I didn't find it very interesting. None of the encounters were challenging at all; the only slightly harder moment was the very end, where you needed to dive into water blindly without knowing the location of the imp/lost soul inside. Still, I managed to complete it on the first try, without any deaths whatsoever.


It's supposed to sort of be a new episode introduction. I'll add another area or two and maybe change some of the encounters to be a bit more chaotic. Thanks for the review again.

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Whymes5 said:

The original intention of the final area was to make it so that fighting wasn't such a good option, but since some people will want to kill every monster I'll add some more ammo boxes here for that. It was supposed to be a dash to the exit, since the intermission screen shortly before mentions "the only way to survive is to escape" or something along those lines.


Fighting is pretty tough in that area anyway. There does seem to be enough ammo to clear out the inside section reliably, but if you want the maps to be UV-Maxable, then more BFG ammo will be needed for this one, even if you are able to one-shot the Spider Masterminds and two-shot the Cyberdemon you still don't really have enough. The ammo is not necessarily needed as you enter the final area, but maybe scattered on the battlefield. The "dash for the exit" idea is great as it's basically the only option for everyone but the diehard players. If anything, the dash could be made slightly more challenging by having a couple of left and right turns in it, rather than a straight dash. The huge tower is a big clue as to where you should be going as it is.

Fundamentally nothing much needs changing though as it's an outstanding area, probably one of my favourites of the WAD so far even though I didn't spend that long in it.

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I tried this wad, and like mouldy I stopped at map 14. I dont think I will continue to play this. I just want to point these 2 things (I played in single player on UV):
-There is no armor... I haven't seen a single armor bonus, just a green armor sometimes. And combine this with all the hitscanners present, and mid-tier monsters in cramped areas.
-Overall there isn't so much health... for example in map 09 there are only 2 stimpacks, at the starting area. And combine this with all the hitscanners present, and mid-tier monsters in cramped areas.
I dont thik it is worth to say something else from me... Good luck.

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Well I do have to say, map14 is the hardest map in the wad probably. So if that puts you off, just know that it only gets easier from there, so if you think you might want to keep playing, try map 16-30. Map1-15 and 16-30 have their own difficulty progression. But I don't think that even map27-30 is nearly as hard, since it's a lot more generous on item pickups.

There is armor in almost every level, but its mostly in secrets. I think the real problem is the reliance on secrets.

I watched your demo mouldy. It was very helpful. I'm still concerned you had to save to beat it, but I can see that this time the deaths seemed more reasonable, and more due to map problems. Although I think the reason for most of them was that you took too much damage in the encounter in the room with the star. Really, all I have to do to fix that is to add a few more medkits. You still seemed a little worried about using the BFG. Really I understand saving BFG shots is a good idea, but running around with 200 cells is more than enough. It's not a slaughter map as you can see by the monster count and other maps so really saving more than 2 shots is probably overkill. But I can tell you are not a noob doom player after watching the new demo. Just don't see why you're still so scared to use the cells.

For everyone playing, this wad really is meant to be played with freelook. It's a zdoom wad and as such I didn't really feel any reason to make it cater to no freelook, since it's not trying to be based on the original doom.

Another thing, it's very hard to balance a wad for both singleplayer, cooperative, and all difficulty levels, AS WELL as trying to balance both pistol starts and cumulative runs. This is leading to some difficulty in thing placement, and anyone that has mapped with a focus on trying to support all types would know. I was pretty certain I added more health to map9. Ill have to look into it again. The original idea of that map was actually to make no health at all, and have it just be a map where your health is whittled down 'til the end, it's a sort of symbolic map. As you can see, most people don't seem to like that. So I scrapped that idea. I think the health I added might be flagged to only appear in cooperative, on accident. Most of these maps have little experimental design elements incorporated into them which I don't think some people realize were intentional.


If I played through plutonia the first time, I would probably say it sucked too. I was only able to beat that wad on UV after learning each level, and many deaths (no saves). I think beating go2it alone took me a good week. And on some of the maps, I tried to emulate some gameplay from that wad. I found plutonia's gameplay pretty influential to me.. Of course, some of the maps are designed differently (generally less chaos, more rooms and less height variation, etc.), but the idea is pretty much the same; the armor is highly important, mistakes are heavily penalized, and each map has ways to clear it which are far more efficient than other ways. I'm just curious, do you guys also not like plutoinia? Noone really likes only being able to beat a level by just knowing what comes next, but really in a lot of wads and even other old video games, that really is the best way to beat them easily.

Finally, I hope everyone doesn't play a beta expecting it to be totally fun. As you can see there is some mis-balance in areas. That's why it's a beta. So if you want to play it just to play through, wait until it's released. You'll have a much better time, trust me.

Sorry for the wall of text. Just trying to explain some of the criticisms. But the critcism is really good, I don't want a bunch of people saying it's good. Even if I can't use it for this wad, I can always use the feedback in future maps.


To death112: I noticed the notes you emailed me mentioned a lot of secrets being given away in the automap. I had already fixed that in the most recent beta before I read your comments. Your other comments were helpful. Thanks.

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Whymes5 said:

Finally, I hope everyone doesn't play a beta expecting it to be totally fun. As you can see there is some mis-balance in areas. That's why it's a beta. So if you want to play it just to play through, wait until it's released. You'll have a much better time, trust me.

I totally agree with you there. Thats the point of testing it. You learn alot of things, if you just consider what other players think about it.

Whymes5 said:

There is armor in almost every level, but its mostly in secrets. I think the real problem is the reliance on secrets.

That's the real question there. Depends on the secrets. In my experience up until now, secrets weren't really an issue. It's just the thing that most of them are quite unuseful and I got the feeling that you're quite greedy with putting armor pickups.

Whymes5 said:

Another thing, it's very hard to balance a wad for both singleplayer, cooperative, and all difficulty levels, AS WELL as trying to balance both pistol starts and cumulative runs.

Yep, balancing for pistol start is quite a thing, but its not impossible. You might wanna focus on the playability for singleplayer first, instead of thinking to far outside of the box with multiplayer ideas. The majority of doom-ers play singleplayer anyways.

Whymes5 said:

If I played through plutonia the first time, I would probably say it sucked too. I was only able to beat that wad on UV after learning each level, and many deaths (no saves).

Yes, quite the same here. But to be fair, you can apply that comment on anything. Its about trial and error to learn something. Plutonia is by far the hardest iwad.

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