Jump to content
Search In
  • More options...
Find results that contain...
Find results in...
dobu gabu maru

The DWmegawad Club plays: Stardate 20X6 & Monochrome Mapping Project

Recommended Posts

Monochrome
MAP09: A good map from Membrain—the layout is very angular and foreign, letting the player dart around this open map as they try to get a grasp on their surrounding. Only downside is that it’s a reasonably docile map about 9 levels in, the big threat coming from unexpected drops into damaging pits, otherwise the enemies are standard fare. But the layout really steals the show here, absolutely reversing my opinion on the mapset being too focused on visuals, as this is a very strange beast to explore. Good stuff.

Share this post


Link to post

MAP10 - Mono Asbest by FractalXX
Not much to say here, it uses some of the gimmicks used in the other fractalxx maps but not the zdoom doom scripts and uses a more conventional approach. It's ok, it's a little cramped and yet again the action is on the easy side.
Looks and gameplay are better than the previous efforts but a bit below the previous map, but it's by no means an awful map. Just average.

Share this post


Link to post

Monochrome
MAP10:FractalXX's best map yet, mainly because he steers clear of gimmicks and sticks with traditional gameplay. This map isn't without its blemishes however, as a love for height variation leads to many awkward fights on narrow stairs. The berserk can accidentally be picked up through the wall when trying to get the medikit on the opposite side of it, which is unfortunate. The Y and R letters on the floor should've been textured white like the B was, otherwise it's hard to notice. Also, there's not much of a finale here, the toughest battle probably being the close quarters combat with the revenant at the start. Visuals are pleasing amidst all these gripes, with a lot of alternating between the black and white to catch the eye.

Share this post


Link to post

Map 10: Mono Asbest

Another black and white map, this time by FractalXX. Overall not too shabby looking but it's a bit all over the place I think. I prefer the more coherent approach of the previous map on the visuals. Looks-wise the highlight is the final room with those pillars and crosses. Not a fan of how the doors were marked, could've been more distinguishable. Gameplay is rather laidback, no really tough battles in this map either, but the combat is enjoyable enough to keep me interested throughout the map. Claustrophobic fights are cool and all but when they are happening in a stairwell they get frustrating pretty damn quickly. Especially that fight after you grab the YK, there's not much else you can do other than peek and shoot from the ascending stairs until there's a big enough opening. The finale was also bit of a lackluster as it's just a bunch of hitscanners and two barons. A decent map, all things considered.

Share this post


Link to post

MMP MAP10 Mono Asbest

I actually thought this was pretty damn good. A much better offering than MAP08 despite the same gray being used. Fights were quite fun here, I'll even say that the stairway fights, although erratic, were actually kinda fun. My only complaint is it's too easy, but that's fine with me. No real standout encounters other than perhaps the final area. Also, it was another SSG/Chaingun fest for the majority of the level. Thankfully there's a berserk pack to punch monsters and conserve ammo (although there were a lot of bullets and shells lying around). All in all, one of the better maps so far. Final Time 3:49.

Share this post


Link to post

Map 10 -- Mono Asbest - 100% Kills / 100% Secrets
Another in the line of newsprint-themed maps, Mono Asbest is probably FractalXX's most reasonable offering. While it lacks the level of aesthetic spit-n-shine that 'Abusive' possessed, it also lacks the poor gameplay decisions that characterized that map (and in having gameplay that's worth even acknowledging it has already trumped 'Tessel Dose'). When speaking about Membrain's 'Coagulation', I said something to the effect that it plays like an ordinary (note that I don't generally use this word pejoratively) DooM II map that just so happens to have been rendered in black and white; I think that this is pretty much the case for Mono Asbest, as well, although I don't think the layout is as good as map 09's. Again, there is some modern-sounding BGM; it didn't exactly blow my skirt up (if you'll pardon the expression), but at least it was there. Thanks for taking this small but important map aspect into account, FractalXX.

The defining characteristic of the flow and action in this map is the relative lack of elbow room--some areas are quite cramped, and even the larger rooms (that is, 'larger' in the sense that their walls are farther apart) tend to feel a bit stuffy, as they usually have pillars or some other extraneous structures inside of them. There are also some rather pronounced height differences between rooms, as others have noted, although generally not within them. At no point did I find things cramped to the point where I felt like movement became a chore, and the aggressive playstyle I used here seems to have spared me any significant brushes with the sort of tall-stair chokepoint fights that some of the other players experienced. The map was very linear, but its smallish geometry and short run-time kept this from being too offensive. Combat fills the void but doesn't do much else here. Constriction is often a watchword for danger, but there's not much pressure on the player; there are no major encounters, and only a few small closets to serve as halfhearted traps. In all, the monsters seem like they have a more difficult time with the tight quarters than the player does.

Mono Asbest doesn't have any prominent deformities or neuroses, but it doesn't have a whole lot of personality, either (FractalXX's other maps, while they don't play very well, definitely have more personality). This is mainly a function of the sedate gameplay and makework layout; they provide an experience that, while inoffensive, is also not enough to capture the imagination in any real way, and I reckon that not enough wild and crazy shit is done with the monochrome aesthetic to compensate in this case.

Share this post


Link to post

MAP11 - Outpost Gamma by Jaws In Space
Wait a minute, this is another silver map. Jaws you lie :P
This map brought me nothing but pain and misery through a very bland playing area full of cramped/bland corridors and struggling for ammo throughout resulting in many non-berserk punching of imps and demons.
This map just left me feeling frustrated to be honest with the layout all over the place which compliments the hap-hazard monster placement.
In the end I guess there is plenty of action but it just didn't feel very fun and fluent.

Share this post


Link to post

Monochrome
MAP10: Jaws’ 4th map is a far more fierce and long one, pitting the player against a large assortment of enemies in 64-pixel wide hallways. Not only that, but ammo is deviously low for this outing, forcing the use of the chainsaw/berserk a numerous amount of times just to ensure the player can survive the next challenge. It’s an alright map with a very interesting mazey layout at the start, that slowly becomes too crowded as the map pushes on. At least it was challenging.

Share this post


Link to post

MMP MAP11 Outpost Gamma

I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say this was an okay level. Monster placement was too sporadic for my taste, but I can run through most of them and finish cleaning later. There were quite a few interesting tidbits to be found here. One was the blue key area which reminded me of TNT MAP04 for some reason. as well as the cyberdemon secret. It was a good thing I didn't use any rockets/cells in the previous levels, as well as having lots of shells/bullets from MAP10, as others have pointed out the scarcity of ammo on this level. I used plasma to take care of the cyberdemon as well as a few hallways which I found annoying to go through. I used rockets on the three archviles near the blue key as well as the imps on the ledges after the blue door. As for every other fight, again another SSG/Chaingun fest for the most part. I ended up rather empty in those ammo reserves but thankfully lots of health due to the soulsphere in one room as well as the megasphere secret. So yeah, it was alright, easy secrets, lots of health, some armor, but few ammo. Final Time 7:08.

Share this post


Link to post

Map 11 -- Outpost Gamma - 100% Kills / 100% Secrets
This is a revisitation of the theme from map 06, by the same author--a brushed silver building with occasional green nukage pools/vats--although this is a considerably more prolonged affair than that one was, and otherwise a return to the usual JIS idiom, with lots of cramped, orthogonal maze-slogging. Perhaps it's simply apathy brought on in me by having seen the same theme by the same author once in the WAD already, but I've come away from this one quite unimpressed.

Though it's exactly the same aesthetic theme, I feel that Outpost Gamma is less interesting to look at than Control Center was, which, perhaps unsurprisingly, is something I attribute to lighting/lack thereof. While it was hardly a looker, Control Center did develop a pronounced lighting contrast between its bright indoor areas and its rather dark outer yard, which contrasted well with the grey sky to establish a mood of a cold, unfeeling installation in some terribly remote place. In Outpost Gamma, the vast majority of the map uses one default light level, robbing the map of that sort of atmospheric dynamic. While JIS has tried to add interest with a secret outer yard and some nukage vats here and there, this mostly falls flat, as the yard is entirely bright/undetailed and the vats are generally just sunken rectangles in the middle of a couple of rooms that don't really impact flow in any way, meaning that their prime 'contribution' is a weakening of the monochrome aesthetic aspect.

Outpost Gamma also suffers for its lack of brevity. Control Center was little more than three rooms set side by side, but this map more closely resembles Support Storage in being replete with jumbled warrens of straight, narrow corridors connecting its discrete rooms. This generally does not make for an interesting environment to explore or fight in, unless something is done to actively complement or justify it. Support Storage had this quality to some degree, in that its high interconnectivty in concert with a lack of doors and other monster-impeding obstacles tended to turn the proceedings into an ongoing game of hide-and-seek with the monsters, but Outpost Gamma enjoys no such benefit, as a result of being full of blocking walls that operate as switches, which prevents monsters from following the player very far, or from sneaking up on or flanking him/her. Given the map's overall more linear character, this amounts to a slow, methodical grind through the preset opposition.

The best thing I can say for the map is that, as in Support Storage, combat is saved from being entirely trivial by surprisingly well-judged ammo/weapon placement, although the more linear nature of this layout means that how well-equipped you are tends to hinge on whether or not you happen to find the weapon-bearing side areas along the route, e.g. if you don't find a chainsaw within the first couple of minutes, go back to the start and look for one, and start wallhumping wildly as soon as you start seeing rocket pickups in the environment. Ammo tends to get eaten up grinding away at enemies on slightly elevated firing positions, as in the room with the replenishing vile/revenant supply atop the four-sided switchbox. The RL secret, apart from breaking the monochrome theme further, is possibly the most dangerous encounter, which depending on your outlook may make it a point of interest or may make it seem not worth the trouble. By the end of the map things start to get really sloggy, and having heavier firepower speeds things up, so if nothing else it's worth looking for for that reason--it gets you out of here and off to a more interesting place faster.

While thing placement is usually a better aspect of JIS' style, at this point I think it's pretty clear that his layouts/architecture need a lot of work to move beyond the level of pre-DooM budget shooters. For MMP 2.0, I think the best thing for him to do will be to focus his efforts on making one solid, cohesive layout (maintaining his propensity for tight ammo balance), rather than churning out a large number of maps all in a very rudimentary style.

Share this post


Link to post

Youtube didn't want to upload this last night twice, so I had to process this just now after work. I'm probably going to be a couple of maps behind the thread flow for the rest of my posts in this thread, my apologies.

Map 09: Coagulation (UV/Pistol start. 100% Kills/Items/Secrets.)

http://youtu.be/0Wpx1r0Tea8 = my playthrough of Coagulation.

Membrain's map is a technically interesting composition, but average otherwise in my opinion.

The entire idea of the map is quite an interesting one; the map starts out as this open-ended area with paths to be sidetracked down, upper platforms to ponder how to get to, and a nice mixture of enemies scattered around the place in both open areas and tight corridors. There's also some pain sectors in the 'very dark' areas of the floor, including one around the armor. Right from the get-go an Imp will fling his fiery stuff at you to get you going immediately from a moderate distance, which can lead to some stealthy infighting if you don't want the whole level atop you at once. The shotgun and 20 bullets of ammo is immediately available to your left and right. There's Hell Knights to be sniped from above, Pinkies to be killed below, pistolmen scuttling around, chaingunners above that I mostly got killed via infighting, Mancubi in some other high up area, etc etc. The exit is marked (on the floor) by a dark barrier which seems impassable for now.

All this changes however when you flick one of the 'switches' next to a dark pillar that's indicated by a candle. I didn't know this and only found out by chance that this was a switch when I saw it, but these switches change the level's layout quite literally. Suddenly pillars are raised, walls are raised and others lowered, and over time the level changes from an open-ended feel to a closed & linear one. Very well executed! Although it does make the level a bit awkward to navigate, it does flow nicely nevertheless and you'll figure out where to go eventually. The Super Shotgun is located across a running gap, where afterwards you'll need to fall down into the nicely coloured dark green pain sector area below and run up some nearby stairs around the corner. Two groups of 2 Revenants are located up on high after various switch exposures, which provide some irritating shoot and peek kills. An Archvile lerks around another area that changes to become a small 'maze' of sorts (which on the map reminds me of Dynasty Warriors 3's "Stone Sentinel Maze"), and also around this area is the lone secret of the map hidden in a secret wall; two stimpacks and the Megaarmor!
Eventually you'll be able to go through the 'exit' barrier after finding 3 candle switches to exit out the level.

Overall this was a technically interesting map with the switches changing the style of the level, but the rest of it was kind of average despite having a good flow to it. The visuals are alright (I kind of liked the dark green areas that indicated toxic 'pain sectors') and I liked how the visual details changed with the switches, but I've seen better use of monochromatic textures in this project already. The gameplay was average for me as well, with nothing really too challenging or particularly memorable, although it did have a nice flow to the combat and a mixture of enemies to deal with is always nice to see. As an experiment in changing the feel of a level with switch-related map design, this was an interesting one Membrain. What other map experimentations will I come across in the next 13 maps?

Share this post


Link to post

MAP12 - Abstraction Complex by Membrain
Medium sized map in the same colour scheme as Membrain's previous map. But this map is much more standard in it's a base styled level with good interconnectivity and layout requiring gathering all the keys and exiting.
The gameplay is pretty simple, most monsters are in front and any ambushes are few and far between which makes the level pretty straightforward which begs the question about it's map position as this is definitely a map I would put at the beginning of a mapset.
Pretty decent map.

Share this post


Link to post

Map 11: Outpost Gamma

This map is very much in the same vein as all the previous maps by Jaws In Space. Felt like Support Storage in silver, actually. Looks rather unimaginative with it's silvery walls and long, tight corridors. It's also a step back on the lighting department compared to the authors other silvery map, Control Centre. The maze-y design is getting on the been-there-done-that territory, but thankfully this map provides something that has been sorely lacking so far in this wad.

And that is challenging gameplay. It wasn't super hard or anything but it was by far the toughest map in the wad so far. As others have pointed out, the biggest reason for the jump in difficulty was the sparsity of ammo. Personally I thought the ammo balance was great, using your fists and the chainsaw was a must but if you conserve your ammo you don't have to resort to punching enemies that are less punchable. Difficulty aside, the combat was pretty straightforward. Kill everything at first sight and there will be no surprises.

Didn't really like this map very much in the end. The bland and uninteresting looks give a poor first impression and the rather straightforward combat could have used some variety but good ammo balance is somewhat of a saving grace here though as it adds to the difficulty and keeps things interesting combat-wise.

Map 12: Abstraction Complex

Veeery similar with Membrains first effort. Same black&white style is used again and it still looks good, though I did like the more open design of Coagulation better. Not much to say about the visuals really, same things that applied to Coagulation pretty much apply to this map too. The gameplay is very simple and easy, and I definitely agree that it would fit better at the beginning of the wad. Everything is pretty well thought out so I don't think I'd drastically change anything other than the map slot though. Ammo balance is good with the current enemy count and the fact that the player will use the shotgun/chaingun most of the time means that the enemies should be relatively small scale ones. And they are, since the level is infested with mostly hitscanners, imps and demons. Also adding more monsters would just make the level feel too cramped so that wouldn't solve anything either.

It's an alright map all in all. Slightly less interesting than Coagulation in pretty much all aspects so I wouldn't rate this just as highly as that one. Probably would have enjoyed it more if i wouldn't have played Membrains previous map beforehand since these two maps are so similar it's hard not to compare the two all the time.

Share this post


Link to post

MMP MAP12 Abstraction Complex

A fun, if uninteresting level, filled with easy fights and more SSG/Chaingun ammo to use up. Not much I can really say about it, although I like the colored buttons/doors. The level is almost entirely linear and short, and like others said would be more well-fitted in the beginning of the wad. Final Time 3:31.

Share this post


Link to post

The second part of Where's All The Data?'s Monochrome streamthrough is here! As always, a full review will materialize at the start of the following month, but if you're watching these videos then I suppose you're getting a pretty good idea of what sort of judgement is going to be passed on the day.

I do get lost on a number of occasions, so don't feel that you have to watch all of this 3 hour marathon.

Part 2 = http://www.twitch.tv/st_alfonzo/c/2426970

Share this post


Link to post

More catchup! But first, I wanted to say something about MAP03. After watching Suitepee's video review and seeing Jaws' comments about the map being a recreation of the Doom 0.4 Alpha's E1M10, I'm a bit more understanding of the poor layout - it was basically copying a map line by line. While it's an interesting artifact in that sense to recreate, I don't think there's any real reason to try and recreate it and then slap the vomit texture all over. There's a reason the map was left out of the original Doom ... the layout just isn't very good. Still, knowing that he was recreating another map makes me feel better about Jaws' work there.

Onto the newer maps...

MAP05: The Primitive

I would say this is the first "good" map so far in this WAD, and for some interesting and unique reasons. I've commented on my interpretation of the challenge before (i.e., use purposely limited texturing to force good level design using creative architecture, lighting, height variation, thing placement, etc.)

However, this level actually goes ahead and takes the "monochrome" aspect and uses it as a strength rather than a creativity-spurring limitation. The use of truly one-shade textures gives the level a distinct, "clean" look, almost turning it into an entirely different game. Doom is no pretty game in 2013, but I still get used to how it looks. However, compared to this backdrop, the monsters and items look horrendously ugly and pixellated. Da Werecat really uses the clean look here to create some interesting visual treats, but also follows the spirit of the challenge with lots of light variation, height variation, and architecture. Even with no textures, it becomes fairly obvious that it's supposed to be some sort of office building - we've got cubicles, the ability to go outside on the roof, and a giant abstract art sculpture in a lobby. In a way, the simplicity of it all actually lets the player's head fill in the lack of detail, making it more "detailed" than if it had been done with normal Doom textures and geometry. Just think of all the other "office" Doom levels you've seen and how this compares.

The gameplay isn't much to write home about - it's pretty darn easy for most of the map, and only one or two fights actually pose a threat - but the aesthetic design is really, really good and noteworthy.

MAP06: Control Center

This map actually comes the closest so far of meeting what I orginally understood the idea of the project to be. No texture fun here, as it's just chrome chrome chrome, but you can see where Jaws in Space reached out and played around with height and lighting to make things interesting. It's nothing great, but nothing bad, and there's a decent amount of fighting (even if most of it is one or two corridors). Decent little jaunt of a map.

MAP07: Brown Room

Right off the bat I was struck by the ammo shortage, as I ran out of bullets and had to punch some of the imps and spectres when I wasn't being careful. And I know brown isn't pretty, but the lack of simple alignment on things like the upper/lower textures of the ammo cubby holes seems like a poor oversight.

Gameplay is hit or miss, the start is very easy but the last few rooms can suddenly get difficult if the player isn't careful. Also some inconsistency in design - it's not clear that the ledge by the imps is a lift, or that the last black part is a switch when all of the previous all-black areas were teleporters previous.

MAP08: Tessel Dose

Sweet, Unreal Tournament music! Always a fan.

This is an arena-style map, and it's not surprising that it was made by the same author as MAP04 given the design similarities. I feel like this one is much stronger, as teleporting monsters out of thin air is much more agreeable in this setting than a "normal" map like Abusive. The fights are all pretty easy, though. There's also a rather bad HOM effect if the player goes past the outer ring that drops during the Cyberdemon fight (on the sides of the ring facing out).

Also, have to love that ending. I admit, like Lot's wife, I stopped and turned around the first time and died horribly.

MAP09: Coagulation

Big open outdoor map, which is a nice change of pace from the tight corridors we've had so far. Looking at the automap, the lines of this map are pretty sleek and fairly detailed, to the point where I feel like this map would be fun to play and entirely in-place in any normal megawad with normal texturing.

I did feel an ammo pinch early on, given that the weapons and ammo were spread out in a few patches, but once I finally got the SSG and chaingun and a few boxes of ammo it was smooth sailing. Very easy fights here.

There's a few non-intuitive aspects here - the candle/altars being switches wasn't clear at all (especially since the candles were out of reach), and the wall/bridge rising up to provide passage to the rest of the level also wasn't quite clear. (And what's the point of unleashing an AV in the area "behind" the new wall? There's no reason for the player to go there unless he's lost). Decent map overall.

MAP10: Mono Asbest

Woo, more UT music, and lots of fond memories. Man, I miss the days of LAN parties and Assault. :(

Slightly strange start at the beginning as I grab the chainsaw and get locked in... and open another way out. Thus I thought this might be a bit of a brain teaser map, but the rest is pretty generic corridor shooting, with easy fights. Monsters are always in front of the player, and even the ones that teleport into previous rooms can be heard from far away and never come and ambush the player.

Share this post


Link to post

Map 12 -- Abstraction Complex - 100% Kills / 100% Secrets
Membrain's second offering is rendered in the same aesthetic style as the first (newsprint textures, a white/grey base structure with a lot of black support beams/platforms), and evinces a lot of the same tendencies in flow and structure, as well. I personally didn't think it was as good or memorable as map 09, but it's a decent offering nonetheless, even if not one likely to draw many replays.

In terms of layout, this is really not too much more than one long corridor. Sounds dull, but it's disguised quite well, obscured by innumerable twists, turns, bends, staircases, and most importantly, a great deal of overlap. That is to say, one minute you'll enter a room and fight with some zombies on an elevated platform on one side, and then a few minutes later you'll find yourself on that platform, collecting a key and being shuttled by the perspective towards the locked door the key goes to. So, it's actually quite linear, but the way the route loops back on itself at several points mitigates the fact to the point where it's not a problem. This clearly well-planned map flow is probably Abstraction Complex's greatest virtue, relatively humble though it is.

The reason I don't rate this as highly as Coagulation is that the proceedings simply aren't as interesting. Coagulation didn't have much in the way of standout fights, and nor does this map, although neither is problematically empty or saddled with awkward, grindy battles. Coagulation, with its open spaces and gradually shifting terrain, is simply more interesting to navigate.

I guess what I'm saying is that, while there's nothing really wrong with this map, it doesn't have any real hook to it, either in terms of gameplay or aesthetic (and again, I suspect this map might actually GAIN something by being done outside the monochrome constraint). It's above average within the context of this particular mapset, but viewed in a vacuum I reckon it'd be very average, albeit a clean, competent 'average.'

Map 13 -- Tan Temple - 100% kills / 85% Secrets
A hamfisted 'experimental' map. I really don't know how else to characterize this. It doesn't look so great and doesn't play too well, but some of its ideas are worth talking about in more depth.

As the name suggests, the theme here is 'tan'--tan rock in this case, although there is some grey rock and ash for contrast, as well as some extraneous tri-color torches that sort of defeat the 'monochrome' idea. The most memorable aspect to the visuals would be the massive, looming ashwall sky (which I sort of liked, actually), and the flowing 'rivers' of ash cutting through the landscape in a couple of places, flowing down towards strange scrolling processions of the aforementioned torches. All of this is not unreasonable in and of itself, but the structure itself is pretty ugly, replete with bland corridors, flat, boxy rooms, and really tacky 1994-grade stuff like the giant letters spelling out the word 'Cliché' in the exit room. There are also some more ostentatious visual gaffes. Many will probably point out the HOMs that are visible 'behind' the aforementioned scrolling torch-teleporters, but I suspect this may be a port issue (this is supposedly a BooM map, and I played in GZDooM). No, I'm thinking of things like the three-key door facade, which lacks midtex bars on one side (and the side that has the bars would probably be better without them, as the ash texture looks wrong used that way), the horrid texture-blur in the secret soulsphere closet, or the way some of those black cross-shaped wall 'switches' are drawn slightly off-kilter (the one you're looking at as soon as the map loads is a prime example).

As aforesaid, this is 'experimental', meaning that it denigrates engaging combat in favor of a number of progression-based puzzle set-pieces. Some of these many players will probably have seen before; for example, the crusher room (where the crushers are largely irrelevant to anything you're actually supposed to do in there, oddly) lifts its puzzle setup directly out of 'Guardian of Ice', from the first hub in Hexen. Others are a bit less common (though all are ideas I've seen in PWADs before), ala the floor-tile teleporter 'maze' in a different area. Solving each of these puzzles ultimately nets you a skull key, all three of which are necessary to unlock the exiting chamber. This chamber, as aforesaid, has the giant cornball 'Cliché' callout. It's not entirely inaccurate, as the room is otherwise just a giant rectangle where you are invited to get a lone cyberdemon to infight with a single spiderdemon, but not very endearing regardless. The best aspect to the map would be the potential for secret-hunting; a couple of them are rather clever, and the BFG secret is useful for dispatching whichever party survives the cyber/spider duel.

The map passes the time, but does little else, as it is clearly one that values being 'different' over being well-paced or fun.

Share this post


Link to post

Map 10: Mono Asbest (UV/Pistol start. 98% Kills, 97% Items, 33% Secrets)

http://youtu.be/IsgeEQLTgUw = my playthrough of Mono Asbest.

A bit of a flat ending in FractalXX's final map of this project.

The map has a similar feel to it that the last map (Coagulation) did in the use of its monochromatic textures, but is more claustrophobic than that map.
You start out with a pistol guy to your right and the chainsaw in a small room straight ahead of you. Grabbing said chainsaw traps you in the room, and I thought it was some kind of odd trap where you had to time a run backwards out of it to escape (or even use the pistol zombie as a door block) but it turns out you just leave via a secret exit. The room this links into has the shotgun on the floor next to one of the pressure pad switches I've gotten used to seeing in FractalXX's other two maps, which triggers a Pinky and a Revenant to emerge from lowered walls.

Up the stairs is a room with two red/yellow key doors marked by glowing letters on the floor of 'R' (plus arrow) and Y', and the chaingun down a small ramp as you enter the room. Pistol zombies, Imps and another Revenant scuttle around, so I used the height advsntage to deal with them. A nearby pressure switch atop some bullets lowers a Hell Knight and Imps into play, revealing a berseker pack in the process and two medkits. A good health pool for those who struggle with this tame level. There's a hidden switch near this one behind the block, which reveals the first secret (and only one I find, to be explained shortly) via a lowered wall near the entry ramp, that has good ammo within.
Up the staircase with armor bonuses on one side and health potions on the other is the Megaarmor guarded by a lone chaingunner, which makes this map easier. Another switch, another Hell Knight and the red keycard is yours. A few teleporting pests emerge below. Through the red door is a few more Imps guarding another pressure switch above. Decent architecture in this room. Head back to the previous room and head down a new stairway (with blue torches on the way) to acquire the Super Shotgun! Then you step on another switch and reveal several Imps and a Baron of Hell. Momentum based stairway fighting for me here easily deals with the tanky Baron and friends. Head on through to another switch and an Archvile that's easily dealt with due to the pillar (and no corpses being around) that contains the orange skull key. Another switch, another lowering, another door to go through.

A few extra pests topside, then through the orange door I go! I get a Hell Knight and Cacodemon to infight here, as I pick up the medkit surrounded by health potions. Up the curved dual staircases is a room with lots of oddly placed orange torch props (and a few green ones to the side). Step on the switch and some more walls lower, revealing a mixture of low-tier enemies, as well as including another Baron. Acquire blue skull key and move to the last door (marked by 'B' on the floor).
The final room looks somewhat impressive, and I come to the realisation that this level is based off a church theme. There's a mixture of enemies in here including an Arachnotron, as several pillars circulate around the room. I sensed a big fight coming up, but then......just two Barons of Hell and a few low-tier grunts for the level final upon stepping atop the final switch. Urgh. I then stepped on another switch thinking it was just going to open another door/wall, but it ended the level. So much for exploring and trying to find secrets/the last monster I missed.

Overall, this was the least interesting of FractalXX's three maps in the Monochrome Mapping Project, and a below average/"meh" level overall for me. The gameplay was alright, the visuals were alright (if not reminding me of a tighter-packed Coagulation) but this level disappointed me, especially considering the spawning tricks I'd seen in Abusive and Tessel Dose. A bit of a more standard level, which was a bit dull. At least there was music though!

Share this post


Link to post

MAP13 - Tan Temple by Scypek2
Hmm this fails the project goal in just a few seconds, this isn't monochrome really :P
The teleporting area with the barons enraged me. The rest of the map gameplay wise was ok with a few traps etc. The map did look ugly and the the scrolling floors amused me. This is a rather abstract map on the whole.
Another thing, it's fine to mark the door like you did but I managed to grab 2 keys from that alcove only leaving me needing the red key which is a bit stupid.

Share this post


Link to post

MMP MAP13 Tan Temple

Yikes, this one was weird as fuck. Only 36 monsters on HMP, very low for a map in this slot dare I say. Fights were very odd at best, the only really notable one being the two cacos followed by archvile on the elevator rising up to the teleporter maze. At least it wasn't a gray level (for awhile, there is one gray section as well as the moving gray "sea"). Main problem is that it's not exactly monochrome with the torches as well as the gray (not to mention the bloody HOMs in places). Gameplay seems more puzzle-oriented. Almost all of the switches here are those cross things, and there are a few gimmicks to be seen here, like hitting one of the crosses and running across the rocks over the gray sea to the teleporter to get one of the keys. There's an interesting teleporter maze in the northwest, where you have to weave through not touching the gray squares on the ground, lest having to be teleported back to the beginning. All the keys to be grabbed are on pedestals in one area, as well as a BFG. I managed to get everything there. The area after the three-key-teleporter where the exit is has a spiderdemon and a cyberdemon as well as walls that can be lowered with ammo on them (forming the word CLICK, I think?) As for the secrets, I only managed six of them, and all but one of them were difficult for me to figure out. Overall, a crazy-ass puzzle-style level not necessarily in monochrome with both tan and gray with odd combat and puzzle scenarios. Final Time 5:39.

Share this post


Link to post

I've had a few pints of cider before posting this entry, so I don't feel like doing an overly lengthy description of this alright level. Hopefully the video will be more detailed in what I felt about this level. Sorry Jaws In Space/MMP mappers if you feel this affects feedback!

Map 11: Outpost Gamma (UV/Pistol start. 96% Kills, 100% Items, 80% Secrets).

http://youtu.be/8LuePmBVCj0 = my playthrough of Outpost Gamma.

Jaws In Space's fourth MMP contribution reminds me of Support Storage with silver textures. And I'd like to know why you did TWO maps with silver colours only!

The entire level has a similar feel to that of Support Storage, although perhaps not quite as open-ended. Going past the dead marine corpse at the start reveals the chainsaw past some decent if not predictable window lighting, although in my run I ignored this until the end.
The other passageway shows off the EXACT same start as Control Center! Two pistol zombies, a toxic pillar and then a chaingunner hidden behind said pillar! Why have you copy-pasted your openings Jaws In Space?!?!!
After that the level twists and turns in various Support Storage-esque ways with some interesting "switch doors" around the level, with a variety of monsters to deal with at various points. Ammo seems to be in short supply initially here, forcing the use of fists/chainsaw in the early going. (there is a berseker pack in the room with the Revenants and Mancubi, by running across the pillars from the switch activation of the lowered wall past them)
There's a Healthsphere amidst a "secret" via an obvious teleporter in the Revenant/Mancubi room.

The blue keycard room has a bit of an odd moment. You could probably ignore the switches around the pillar after getting the blue key, but they lower Cacodemons guarding armor and the backpack nearby. Atop said pillar spawns several Archviles and Revenants one by one as you kill them off.....which could be easily ignored. (I don't, but they could be if you just want to leave the room with the blue keycard!) Jaws In Space seems to have "odd" moments in his maps sometimes. The runup to this room was alright, with the plasma gun being acquired along the way. (part of this room reminded me of a map in coopbuilddm.wad)

Through the blue keycard switch door is more variety of monsters in various decent setups, including a room full of platforms with Imps atop them, alongside other mid-tier monsters. Past another larger toxic pillar later on is a nicely setup Spider Mastermind encounter, with a looming corridor to surpass before getting close to it with Spectres and hitscanners pouring out of it.....too bad in a prior room the BFG is acquired via some platform running, which makes this final encounter all too easy! A Megasphere is hidden within the toxic pillar.

Overall, this level reminded me of a more challenging and better gameplay flowing 'Support Storage'. The visuals were lacklustre but the gameplay flow remained interesting throughout, with just enough ammo to get on by keeping players on their toes throughout the level. Some of the 'secrets' didn't feel like secrets. The nice mixture of encounters also kept things interesting. For me, this is Jaws In Space's second best contribution to the MMP thus far behind Brown Room!
I believe I missed out on some kind of "Cyberdemon secret", would loved to have seen that!

Share this post


Link to post

Map 14 -- Shortwave - 100% Kills / No Secrets
I certainly liked this one. It's definitely the best of Membrain's three submissions, and I reckon also my favorite map in the whole set up to this point. It accomplishes this by succeeding foremost on the gameplay/layout front, as opposed to by doing something really striking or outlandish with the overarching monochrome theme.

I say that because it again returns to the papery white/leaden black demi-texture theme, which at this point has lost most of its novelty value. I don't mean to give the impression that it's a dull-looking map, though--quite the contrary, in fact. While the aesthetic veneer has by this point in the mapset already been done in a more striking way (e.g. map 05), the structure and shape of the setting itself are aesthetically pleasing, rife with broad, winding staircases, tall towers, and many series of overlapping terraces. Membrain has again used the paper-white texture as his base building material, using the black texture mainly for support structures. I think it works out better here than it did in Abstraction Complex, which I'd attribute largely to the pronounced verticality of the map, which invites structural detailing such as the tall, narrow colonnaded windowbanks, or the central black stair-tower with the master switch at the top. While it can be easy to miss at first, the 'sky' is visible a lot more often in this map as well, its anonymous off-grey providing a subtle but significant color contrast between the cotton-white and the chalkboard black of the map proper.

The architecture is not only interesting to look at, but a blast to run around in, as well. Because it's so vertically-inclined, as the player makes progress (which is done by fighting one's way towards a series of switches in each of the side areas, each of which removes a stairblock from the central tower, ultimately allowing access to the next higher tier of the map) the layout develops more and more scope for all kinds of flashy jumps and drops and other parkour-esque shortcuts. I really enjoy seeing maps that take full advantage of the 2.5D gameworld like this, both because it makes almost any map feel more like a distinct place, and because it affords all manner of potential variety and unpredictability in the combat (especially if one plays with infinite-tallness nixed). Indeed, if you have the time or inclination, I heartily recommend playing this map in a very loose, rambunctious style--don't peck every monster to death when you first see them. Run by them, fight from different angles, jump over them, ignore them until later! It's fun! Not to say that there's any shortage of them to burn through, mind you--while this is similar to Membrain's other maps in that no one encounter really distinguishes itself from the rest, in this map the monster density is high enough (and the layout open and flexible enough) that the whole thing feels like one bloody, running gunbattle, especially in the main area where (mostly small) monsters fire down from several different distinct heights.

'Shortwave' is a good posterchild for a point I've been harping on for most of the club's playthrough of the DWMMP thus far. It is a quite successful little map, despite not excelling as an outlandish interpretation of the monochrome aesthetic; it does this through the strength of its layout and gameplay, which would be engaging no matter how the map was textured. It is in this regard that many of the project's other maps fail, despite being more aesthetically or conceptually adventurous than this map is, and very few of these have been able to stand on the strength of that sort of novelty value alone. While aesthetically understated, Shortwave succeeds in the goal that the whole project originally set out with--its barren, hyper-minimalist visual style accentuates the skeleton and gameplay flow of the layout, underscoring the point that these are the things that really make a fundamentally sound map.

Share this post


Link to post

Map 12: Abstraction Complex (UV/Pistol start. 100% Kills, 45% Items, 50% Secrets.)

http://youtu.be/F0VhLyB2GjQ = my playthrough of Abstraction Complex.

Membrain's second contribution makes me go "meh" a little bit here.

The level starts out with two pistol zombies and two shotgunners facing their backs to you. There's an "entrance" behind you (with that effect I can't describe where you make the area seem to go on endlessly) and a few more hitscanners come around the corner alongside an Imp. Shotgun + chaingun will be acquired from fallen enemies once again also. The level has the EXACT same feel and visual appearance of Coagulation, making me wonder if this was intentional as some kind of continuation thing, or whether Membrain has only one idea in terms of visual texture use for this project. At least this level has blue 'doors' to add a splash of colour to the proceedings! Through the right door is a nice staircase and a mixture of enemies, with some red colour lighting right above the door to indicate the red key is needed to proceed through it. At the top is another door and a run you need to make to the other side by activating a red 'switch' button down below in the pain sector (which lifts up the platform slightly to enable the run) that's coloured/lit the same way as in Coagulation.
The door on the other side leads down to the red keycard (secret #1 by pressing against the grey wall on the way down, revealing bullet ammo and health), which is guarded by several hitscanners that pop into play above. This would have been more of a problem for hastier Doom players here, but I spot this early and avoid taking too much damage as I pick them off.

Through the red door I go! A yellow lit door to my right indicates more keys will be needed. The room ahead to the left has some armor and another decent mixture of enemies both high and low, including a Cacodemon. Through the next door is a more darker lit/grey pain sector reveal that has health potions on it....which I guess need to be picked off carefully lest the trip be a waste of health! Twin doors up some steps, with a blue lit door on the right indicating a blue key needed. Ahead is a large pain sector divide (I quite like the effect/feel of this pain sector dividing this part of the level up a bit....would be nice for an "earthquake" style effect) and more monsters to fight. You have to go up the stairs near the blue door though to proceed around the other side of the large pain sector, as down below is yet another pain sector that you need to flick the switch above to lower a wall with the blue keycard on it and a Hell Knight to emerge. Another room on the way to this is guarded by a Mancubus. Seems like running across pain sectors to progress is a small quirk of this level, which some people won't be the biggest fans of.

The blue door decides to fling three Revenants at me. This proves surprisingly easy for me to handle, and I flick the switch behind them. A bit of backtracking is now required, as in a previous room three walls have lowered; one revealing a whole bunch of monsters, one to the side wih a shotgunner around the corner, and the third with the lift down to progress. A nice reveal, but not too hard to take care of! Especially since this reveal gives you the Super Shotgun also. Down the lift is an area with another Mancubus and some other pests residing near another square shaped pain sector, then you get the yellow keycard. Through the yellow door is the grand finale of.....a shotgunner and a Baron of Hell. Gaaaaah, too easy! Level ends through an "exit" that looks the same as the "entrance" to this place.

Overall, Membrain did a good job in making this level look like a complex with some nice visual details in places. Other than that, this map is basically a more linear Coagulation without the cool technical trickery of the switches. In my opinion, this made the level feel a bit dull and uninspired since I'd already seen this style before in Coagulation (and Mono Asbest!) and was hoping for something a bit different (FractalXX did 3 levels that all played/felt different, even if they all had his 'pressure pad' switches!) this time around. Gameplay was meh for me also, with no real challenge present. Ammo and health was nicely placed throughout. The lack of music also hurts this level. I hope that Membrain has something more impressive to showcase in his final contribution.

Share this post


Link to post

Monochrome
MAP12: Membrain’s second effort is a respectable one, swapping out the large open arena for room-by-room skirmishes. Most of them, however, are somewhat toothless since all the monsters lie ahead of you and you’re granted plenty of cover. The best part of the map in my opinion is the stingy ammo amount, always forcing the player to scavenge around just for a handful more of shells to waste upon the face of another demon. I think with a stronger monster placement the level would’ve stood well above the others, but as it stands, it was just an pleasant experience in the end.

One little thing I liked was the five vials in the damaging sector, an obvious trap unless the player doesn't realize what the yellow light indicates. Also, the sky for this map is dope.

MAP13: Well this was uh… a thing. Definitely has an acquired taste to it as there’s no real pacing or challenge besides the AV elevator, and most of the map is spent wandering around wondering what to do to get the keys. About 10 minutes in I just noclipped to the blue key since this map wasn’t really enticing me to scour around for a linedef I hadn’t spacebar’d yet, and the finale, while potentially interesting, is easily avoided until the exit is at ground level. This would definitely be a one-word review from Capellan if he played it :P

Share this post


Link to post

MAP14 - Shortwave by Membrain
Really good map this one. Offers a bit more of a threat than the other entries due to the sheer monster density at times.
The maps strength here is definitely it's layout. Looping around, connecting various areas together and excellent height variation. Layout wise this is by far the most superior map to date. This aids with the visuals too, the map looks good despite the lack of texture variation and helps to engage the player throughout.
There are still issues, most notably the lack of surprise ambushes and threat once you get the ssg. This has been an issue in all membrain's maps. They succeed for the project goal but perhaps more time could have been spent making better and more engaging encounters. Still this only results in the gameplay being a little too simple for many peoples tastes.
whilst all membrain's maps have had rather boring gameplay at times, I will take that over the many crippling flaws other maps have had in this set and you do always get an easy to navigate map with no ridiculous and annoying moments and has so far been superior to the other maps except map05. So well done Membrain :)

Share this post


Link to post

MMP MAP14 Shortwave

Well, Membrain gives us yet another B/W set here. Gameplay here was better than MAP12 and MAP09 and I'd also say it's one of the better maps of the set. Again, another SSG/Chaingun fest, but with a few more bigger monsters, usually Hell Knights and Cacodemons. At one point I ran out of chaingun ammo though, so ammo kinda was a problem. I managed to get a Mancubus to infight with the Hell Knights in the north part of the map, that was pretty cool and a standout encounter there. The layout is pretty badass. I loved how you had to construct a staircase to the switch revealing the exit by pressing other switches around the level. Overall, good level. Final Time 5:43.

Share this post


Link to post

MAP11: Outpost Gamma

Well, definitely a Jaws in Space map... reminds me of MAP03 with a less offensive texture choice. Lots of long 64-wide corridors and a horrendous ammo shortage forcing the player to avoid certain fights. Thankfully it's not as bad as MAP03 since the fights are spread out a bit more and the monsters often can't come get the player, so he can explore. Still, this map layout doesn't work for an ammo-starvation gameplay.

The blue key room in particular was incredibly annoying, after having the third Arch-Vile teleport in after killing the first one, I gave up and grabbed the key. Hitting the switches didn't seem to do anything except open monster closets, so I just hightailed it out of there instead of staying to figure out how to kill everything with a chainsaw, 40 bullets and 6 shells. Definitely skipped the Cyberdemon (though I was happy to take his rockets/cells), and blitzed the Spiderdemon at the end to 1-BFG-shot her and slap the exit switch. Too much for me.

MAP12: Abstraction Complex

Feels a lot like a weaker version of MAP09, and not just because of the textures. It's not bad, and it shares a lot of the same good design cues (height variation, good use of angles) but nothing exciting, and it lacks the charm of the large outdoors design. Also like MAP09, fighting is pretty easy for the most part - just shotgun/chaingun against nothing bigger than a demon or chaingunner until near the very end, and even then, it's only 1 Baron or 1 Mancubus.

MAP13: Tan Temple

Hmm. This definitely feels like a bit of an experiment, lots of moving floors and strange design bits. It's not all bad - the AV on the elevator with the RL was good, and I actually kinda liked approaching the lone revenant across the gorge with just a shotgun, trying to dodge rockets. The start had a nice little Hexen vibe. Aside from that though... the Baron part was frustrating since the maze wanted to teleport me from gaps that felt like I should be able to run through, and I hated having the teleport exit so close to the maze since I often got teleported straight into a baron fireball. Ended up just killing them from long range despite the lack of ammo.

Feels buggy too. I was able to grab the blue key from the three-key door (good thing too, not sure where I was supposed to go to get the "real" blue key), and there's some pretty ugly sky bleed/thin walls from the red key column. The blue armor crusher as well... am I supposed to be able to walk through it and get the armor?

And is that last room supposed to say cliche? Because it certainly is. :P

Share this post


Link to post

Map 15 -- Whiteroom - 100% Kills / 100% Secrets
Hmmmm.....I'm sort of up in the air about this, neither ecstatic nor disgusted.

The way in which it's built is somehow redolent of the more reasonable segment of very old-fashioned PWADs: it sprawls out in a number of directions without being particularly interconnected (although there is some degree of this in a few places), like the author improvised most of the map as he went along, but ran into a few dead ends along the way (most openly evinced by the room that self-avowedly 'has no purpose at this time). Similarly, the various rooms and corridors tend to be spacious but also often feel a little empty, and they have a variety of non-standard shapes, rather than being clean and precise in their geometry (which is not a bad thing). Height variation is minimal, but not completely absent--it more often makes an impact on map traversal, and only seldom on the combat setups. The earlier parts of the level are tied neatly together, but about 1/3 or so of the map is entirely optional. This is also not necessarily a bad thing, although the non-required parts of the map aren't particularly rewarding (materially or otherwise) or loaded with tourist attractions, which adds to the impression that the whole is a bit piecemeal.

Aesthetically this is, as the name may or may not suggest, another newsprint map, with an emphasis on the color white. The shared texture scheme makes it resemble Membrain's maps to some degree, although Whiteroom is, as aforesaid, much more simplistic and minimalistic in its approach to construction. It's not really hard on the eyes, or anything, but as I write this I can only remember what a couple of the rooms really looked like. To its credit, it does vary the light levels between areas more than the majority of the maps in the WAD have, with a few that are dim or dark. It also leans on the power of ZDooM in an attempt to overcome the monochrome limitation in a couple of places, as in the 'outdoor' yard with the abstract pools and simulated lightning, which also showcases the standard black texture used as a scrolling sky, vaguely suggestive of a fast-moving storm front.

It has a fairly high monster count, about on par with 'Shortwave' before it, though in practice it feels a lot less action-intensive, as the monsters are for the most part thinly and evenly spread out over Whiteroom's relatively expansive terrain. Some attempts have been made to keep it from becoming just another corridor slog, most notably in the hall full of heavily-telegraphed monster closets (their doors are plain to see and flash briefly when they are about to open) that forms something of a hub for a few parts of the map. The thought and effort is appreciated, but in sum total the map still suffers from a lack of interesting combat, largely as a result of its relatively flat, open spaces and guileless monster placement. What more nuanced parts there are save the map from becoming aggressively boring, but both the layout and choreography need more focus to create a lasting impression.

As a monochrome piece and as a playable map, I think this is neither a remarkable success nor an abject failure in either regard. I see some good things in the author's style here (e.g. the room shapes that are freeform without entering the realm of random absurdity), but I suspect the whole thing would've been quite a bit better both aesthetically and in terms of gameplay if it had followed more of a plan, I suspect.

Share this post


Link to post

Map 13: Tan Temple

Strange, experimental map this one. The driving force in this map is solving a few puzzles to get the keys. Or if you don't feel like doing all that you can just grab all the keys from the door markings and be done with it :p Yeah, that should really be fixed. Visually it's pretty boring, the tanned rock texture that is used doesn't look particularly great but those ashflows I did like. Offers a nice contrast too. There are also some minor visual flaws to be found, like others have pointed out. Gameplay is average at best, the only interesting part is the elevator ride. The teleporter maze was mildly annoying and the third key expedition was so memorable that I already forgot it. I did play the map yesterday but still. Secret-hunting might have added to the experience as I only found three or four of them but I didn't bother to linger in this map that long. Very meh map overall.

Map 14: Shortwave

Now this map, on the other hand, is excellent. Again, it follows the same design and visual style as the other two Membrain maps but I felt this was the best of the bunch in both aspects. The layout is basically a big central valley-like area which splits into multiple "caves" where the switches are located. Pressing those switches will open up a spiraling staircase to the top of a (very sexy looking) tower where the final switch is located. Everything looks just as good as in the previous two efforts by the author. There's even more height variation than in those two maps which makes the visual style stand out even better in my opinion.

Gameplay is very action-packed and enjoyable as well. The monsters are once again mostly hitscanners and imps with a couple of HK's, Cacos and such sprinkled in between. However, the enemies come at you in large numbers and usually they are firing from multiple directions. I especially liked the frantic opening battles in the first room and the valley area. When you manage to thin out the enemy lines a little things settle down a bit. Those hitscanners firing from above can be very deadly if you don't watch out. The SSG is a bit redundant though since it's given so late in the map and you could manage after that point in the map with just the shotgun perfectly fine.

Overall a very good map, fulfills the projects goals to a t. Gameplay and flow in this map are definitely the highpoints of this wad so far.

Share this post


Link to post

MAP15 - WhiteRoom by schwerpunk
Wheres the health tolllolol :P
Yeah most of this map was very health light and ammo was also rather tight. The visuals were rather bland compared to others. Though the switches were done well I guess.
Gameplay wise was hit and miss, along with the architecture and layout. It was a bit sloppy and didn't have the appeal of the previous map in particular which really embraced the monchrome aspect.
Some nice bits, some boring parts and at times frustrating lack of health. It's an ok map.

Share this post


Link to post

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now

×