Whats with the lack of love for Thy Flesh Consumed?

I'm not sure if people don't like it as much or what, but there seems to be a whole lot less discussion on these boards about episode 4 than any other Doom levels. I think this episode is probably my favorite bunch of 9 levels, and e4m2 and e4m6 specifically are 2 of my favorite levels. They're easily more memorable than anything in e2 or e3.

So what gives? My best theory is a lot of people might have skipped it. I actually never had Ultimate Doom (or even the full registered version) until about 1998. Seems to be why I've always appreciated Doom II more than most.

I don't know about everyone else, but i really liked the episode. What stands out most about it is the initial difficulty, there's few resources at hand as well as more enemies, heck even the Cyberdemon makes an appearance on several occasions. After the first few levels the difficulty mellows out and i guess the novelty of what seemed like a test of skill from the get go simply wore off.

Because of how difficult the first few maps were, these are the ones i remember the most. The later ones? Not so much.

I think the sky looked pretty good, and the maps were a hell of a lot better made than anything Sandy made in E2 or E3 (I think Tom's maps were really good, though).

There's definitely some really solid design in E4. You can tell that by that point the programmers had a much better idea of how to put maps together. They look good and are very (if not sometimes a bit overly) consistent, and provide a hardcore challenge that, as the "Ultimate Doom" box says on that back, makes the first three episodes feel like "a walk in the park." I personally wish there had been some new textures, not just a new sky and end graphic, but it's a solid episode.

E4 is most definitely my favorite Doom episode. E4M1, E4M2, E4M6, E4M7, E4M8 - all fantastic maps in the same episode. The only map I didn't really like is E4M5 - but it's not that bad. E4M1 was a great starter level, very hard and unforgiving -- it was the last map I completed on Nightmare in a single segment.

Thy Flesh Consumed is also a great episode for deathmatch, ever played E4M1 on -skill 3 in DM? It's great. E4M4 is another great one, and E4M8 is a blast when you have a four player LAN party. ID's iWAD maps were generally not suitable for a good deathmatch experience but Thy Flesh Consumed is an exception.

The music selection is also fantastic, though I could do without the music for E4M3, "Hiding the Secrets" has gotten old by now and I really dislike the music for E4M2 - I always change it. E4M2 will still remain as one of my all time favorite maps across any WAD, it's amazing such a great level could be completed in six hours.

Thank you John Romero!

The initial shock I received in E4M1 when all those sergeants teleported in cannot be forgotten.

It's hit or miss. E4M4 and E4M5 are particularly bad. M2 and M6 are two of Romero's best works, though.

Archy said:

iWAD

Last I checked, Apple aren't the ones who coined the WAD format terminology.

I still have nightmares sometimes with all those Barons of Hell in m2.

Harmata said:

I still have nightmares sometimes with all those Barons of Hell in m2.

I found the barons that teleport in in e4m1 to be much more scary, in the NIN "secret"

I really like E4; it's probably my favorite "theme" out of all the Ultimate Doom episodes.

E1 and E4 are the only episodes I can play through most of without getting bored or frustrated.

Foodles said:

I found the barons that teleport in in e4m1 to be much more scary, in the NIN "secret"

I dunno man, m2 has very "edgy" layout, you are almost always atop some narrow path or a small plateau, i think it creates more tension. You really don't wanna fall down, but then you encounter couple of Barons in a very tight spot, and suddenly jumping of a cliff becomes your only way out. Besides, a secret is a secret, we are talking about entire map.
EDIT: hmmm, you know, i just realized that maybe those were not the Barons that haunted me... THOSE WERE THE CLIFFS! (with barons atop of them).

I never cared much about e4... To me it is pointless and dull. Every time i try playing it i quit somewhere in map 2. Just can't be assed to put any effort into it, no interest. Dunno why. Maybe because i think it doesn't fit anywhere between doom 1 and doom 2 and is essentially just a levelpack with absolutely no thought given to any kind of story, and i don't like those.

Never been a big fan - it has some decent levels but I've never been able to get past the first level without dialing the difficulty down from Hurt Me Plenty to the next lowest skill level (!) - the later levels are still reasonably tough at that skill, especially E4M2 but that's pretty crap that they open it with such a difficult level.

I do like the Biblical level names like "And Hell Followed", although "Unruly Evil" sounds funny taken out of context from the line it's lifted from ("But the tongue can no man tame; it is an unruly evil, full of deadly poison.")

un·ru·ly/ˌənˈro͞olē/

1. Disorderly and disruptive and not amenable to discipline or control: "complaints about unruly behavior".

Makes me expect a bunch of Imps drinking 40s and spray-painting pentagrams on the walls.

I actually like E4M5 (and of course E4M2 also). But for me E4 is just a random wadpak, that has no relation to the original 3 episodes.

At first I liked e4 but afterwards it started to feel numbing when I got hold of enough resources. The initial survival feeling was gone

I hate E4 because the ugliness of the maps is on par with Doom 2.

.

The reason I hate thy flesh consumed is because it's too hard. I mean, there's a cyberdemon on the second level even on I'm Too Young To Die! And the levels aren't just that appealing to me. It has levels that I just don't like playing. But if I had to play it, I would.

I actually like E4 quite a bit, and I play it more than I realize.

I like Thy Flesh Consumed but it's basically a "PWAD" attached at the end of DOOM (resulting in the Ultimate DOOM) rather than part of id's DOOM games, which are the first three episodes plus DOOM II. Like Final DOOM, it was an afterthought project headed by Romero that didn't involve id Software as a whole. This puts it somewhat apart when discussing the essential design history of DOOM, and many threads here tend to do that. It's not really a matter of liking or not, but of what one is talking about and perspective.

Not that I complain about it at this point because I can handle it fine, but one thing that could have worked better would have been swapping E4M1 and E4M4, with maybe some item changes. Why start with a relatively brutal map and wind down to a weak one mid way?

myk said:

Not that I complain about it at this point because I can handle it fine, but one thing that could have worked better would have been swapping E4M1 and E4M4, with maybe some item changes. Why start with a relatively brutal map and wind down to a weak one mid way?

In fact, it would have been better if they kept the balance in check. By E4M3, you get stuffed with rockets until the end of the game. If E4M1 replaced E4M4, it would have not been as memorable if you could storm it with rockets and BFG shots from previous maps...

I don't know why everyone doesn't like E4M2. I find that to be my favorite of the E4 maps. Episode 4 had a great sky and the level design/difficulty played out real well in my opinion.

Antroid said:

I never cared much about e4... To me it is pointless and dull. Every time i try playing it i quit somewhere in map 2. Just can't be assed to put any effort into it, no interest. Dunno why. Maybe because i think it doesn't fit anywhere between doom 1 and doom 2 and is essentially just a levelpack with absolutely no thought given to any kind of story, and i don't like those.

That pretty much covers my opinion too. Nothing special, a bit dull and doesn't fit with the rest of the game - logically or anything else-wise.

Normally, when thinking about Doom, I don't really even consider Episode 4 as part of the game that I am thinking about. To me, Doom is three episodes with a loosely associated add-on that I consider a not very special optional extra.