Switcheroom! Or, what if E1M1 was E3M1? (Release Candidate 3, aiming for whenever)

Updated to RC2-2. Besides adding the updated maps in, I also fixed the Dehacked patch and did some changes to E3M1, just the beginning and the exit. I figure it'll make it feel less like a reskinned E1M1 and more like if it was in Episode 3. (Hopefully it doesn't end up feeling too homage-y) I didn't put in Jaws In Spaces modified versions of the maps yet, since I'm waiting on the authors responses. (Also, since E1M8 kinda needed the chaingun and shotgun, heh.) However, I took the liberty of fixing the errors in E3M5, since Shadesmaster hasn't responded to previous bugfix requests in the past anyways, and none of them were really anything involving changing the layout.

Jaws In Space said:

Also I think it's a bunch of crap to say that we need to have this thing ready in exactly 1 month's time. Sure Death Egg want's it out in time for a Cacoward, but I say that we take our time & guarantee that we actually get one. This definitely has potential to be a winner, but not in it's current form. I thought Death Egg would have learned not to rush a project to completion after the reaction to the Monochrome Mapping Project.

I put it as more of a potential goal than anything. I hope we can reach it, but I myself have my doubts. Still, I want to at least try to get to it.

BaronOfStuff said:
NO. Put them back. Now. Because who wants to fight 12 Demons with a Pistol? Especially when the barrels in one of the rooms don't even do anything?

You don't have to fight 12 demons with a pistol, first shoot the barrels in the RL room, this kills 2 demons & weakens the others kill those 2 with the pistol, next go to one of the ammo supply rooms & kill those 2 demons with the RL & then you have your ammo supply. It's the players choice of what to do from there. If people absolutly want another weapon in the map I would have it be the chainsaw. I could move the barrels around to make the barrels kill all the demons when they explode, but that removes any challenge from the start of the map, & that's what I tried to avoid with the update. Anyways I figure most people will be playing continuously so the start will be really easy for those players.

So, i just thinking to changing completely all my map (but i'll some parts from the one you guys have in the main collection) to made it more resembling both assigned slots, so this will take out a little bit more time....

I had in my mind the levels disposition and how to do them (but still did nothing :P)....

What's exactly the "floor rule violation"?

gothic said:

What's exactly the "floor rule violation"?

I guess it's that when there's a change of texture in two adjacent sectors, there must necessarily be a height difference between them.

Fernito said:

I guess it's that when there's a change of texture in two adjacent sectors, there must necessarily be a height difference between them.

Yeah, that's the "rule" (it's from Romero's list of design principles).

SteveD is quite pathological about it, and it seems like MagnusBlitz is too :)

It is generally a good idea to change elevation if changing floor flat, I think, but there can be times when a designer deliberately chooses not to (Coffee Break had a bunch that I thought worked just fine).

Pretty much; it's because most of the flats in Doom look pretty bad when they meet up. A height difference is needed to make them look good. More recent WADs sometimes use darker flats as borders without changing the height (such as the aforementioned Coffee Break), which can look okay, but it's one of those things that just sticks out like a sore thumb to me. (I'm a bit agnostic on some of Romero's other design rules, like always allowing the player to reach outside areas).

It really depends on the flat. Ones with well-defined edges can often be used up against others without looking bad.

Edit:

Magnusblitz said:

Pretty much; it's because most of the flats in Doom look pretty bad when they meet up. A height difference is needed to make them look good. More recent WADs sometimes use darker flats as borders without changing the height (such as the aforementioned Coffee Break), which can look okay, but it's one of those things that just sticks out like a sore thumb to me. (I'm a bit agnostic on some of Romero's other design rules, like always allowing the player to reach outside areas).

Borders also look like shit in high res software (Eternity excluded) when you stand on their boundary. I'm not a fan of that, but borders can look really good, you just have to do them as custom transition flats, not as thin sectors, to stop them from having issues at their edges.

Capellan said:

Huh. I have to say I disagree entirely about e1m1. I think the layout of e3m1 is pretty clearly and easily discerned in it.

From a top-down view, the shapes are there, but in-game it's radically different.

The problem I have is this: so many elements of e1m1 have been thrown into this that it's no longer "e3m1 in E1 style", it's now simply e1m1 with the major components moved around to vaguely resemble the layout of e3m1. Players will see this map, probably recognize the basics of e3m1, and then notice all the e1m1 stuff plastered on top of it. Then they reach e3-1m1 and see all the same structures, again, and are forced to play through what amounts to essentially the same map.

It's lazy mapping to simply rip off entire rooms and cram them into a space where they feel tacked on, instead of taking some time and putting some thought into incorporating core elements without destroying the layout.

Fernito said:

Which parts, for example?

Looking at it again, I was mistaken. I'm not exactly sure why, but I think what evoked feelings of E2 for me was some of the particular colors in use and the abundance of FLOOR3_3 (which appears in E1 anyway, albeit in smaller doses).

Megalyth said:
From a top-down view, the shapes are there, but in-game it's radically different.

Still don't agree. The progression and flow felt pretty similar to the original e3m1, to me.

Yes, it's obviously a fusion with e1m1, and there might be value in changing some of the architecture to reduce that, but you'll probably have more luck if you identify your specific issues rather than dismissing the whole map as a "complete cluster-fuck".

This is quite the Doom WAD, I must say.

Already at the end of Episode 2, and the Lost Souls are distracting and the arena is too cramped. I've died like 15 times due to Lost Souls blocking my attack.

Capellan said:

identify your specific issues

I thought I was pretty specific about the blatant copies of e1m1 architecture being shoe-horned into a map where they change the layout to this degree. However, my choice of words should have been better, I'm not trying to be a dick. My apologies.

Yeah, I agree with Megalyth completely. The layout is E3M1 but it doesn't feel like that map redone in E1 style at all.

Megalyth said:

It's lazy mapping to simply rip off entire rooms and cram them into a space where they feel tacked on, instead of taking some time and putting some thought into incorporating core elements without destroying the layout.

FWIW, I agree with you on this. It's not just E1M1, either. It's really bad when the same exact room design shows up in multiple maps... and this happens all over the WAD.

For me, the big one that sticks out in E1M1 is the staircase to the green armor at the end. Completely unnecessary add-on, IMO, especially since it comes at the end of the level.

E1M3 update More texture changes, did not remove the teleporting monsters.

E3M9 update Addressed some of the issues Magnusblitz found.

Bah, you people and your baffling reluctance to test so-called 'vanilla compatible' maps inside of actual vanilla environments!

There's a horrendous gamebreaking bug with E3M2: Linedef 221 will cause Chocolate Doom to either crash out with no error message (old versions), or the trigger will not behave as intended; Sector 19's floor will insta-raise to 16 below ceiling height, and Sector 18's floor will slowly raise to meet with it. Vanilla Doom (v1.9) will behave differently again, with Sector 18's floor instantly descending to some ridiculous depth while Sector 19 slowly descends to this depth too. Even Boom, with all its fixes, locks up and forces me to ctrl+alt+del. Shame on whoever tested this.

For Linetype 9 to work properly in Vanilla/Chocolate Doom, the lower sector surrounding the tagged sector (Sector 18 surrounding Sector 19 in this case) can only be next to sectors with equal floor heights, or it invariably bombs out/breaks disgracefully. Check the original E2M2 for reference (and look at this magic fix which isn't really magic).

Update to the E1-3M6

-Fixed everything Magnusblitz said
-Added 2 barons to increase difficult, if people don't like them, i'll remove them
-Blue switch at the yellow skull area now automatically lowers the red pillar to the secret exit

http://www.mediafire.com/?wcuvfc905gs1j00

It occurred to me that instead of just bitching and coming across as a tool, I could have offered to help out, so I played around with e1m1 and came up with an edit. I think I struck a good balance between homages and originality, while still retaining the texture themes and architecture that Doomkid92 had in his version, where appropriate. This doesn't have to be used in the project or anything, I'm just putting it out there to see what you guys think.

There are only decorations in this edit, no monsters or weapons. I moved them aside while I worked on it to make editing easier.

Link

There are already 2 updates to dk92's map posted (by myself). One with small changes the other a bigger remodel.

I know what you guys are saying re: map design and map faults. Unless I am mistaken this project has a few contributors who are just starting out/developing mapping experience etc. not my call but would hope we are mindful of this so as not to trudge right over their efforts. It's a balancing act for sure - unless DeathEgg states quality at all costs. Ultimately the process should be just as fun as output.

Hopefully the original authors of the maps that "need some more dev" are about and willing/available to contribute further.

I didn't realize there were already edits of e1m1, I didn't follow the thread very closely after I submitted my map.

I had no intention of trudging over anyone's efforts, especially newer mappers, I apologize for coming across that way. Regarding the original e1m1, I was too harsh and rude, and I could have been more clear in my opinions of it in my initial breakdown. As far as the visuals, everything looks fine, the textures were used well, and the game-play was okay. Thing placement could use some work. I can tell that it wasn't just slapped together. My complaint was with all the additional areas, as they went pretty far outside the project guidelines.

That said, what I'm aiming for is to offer help where it may be needed. I still really like the idea that started this project, and since I have some time invested in it, I'd like to offer more support beyond simply submitting one map and walking away.

All good Megalyth - my comment was just a general one, not to any individual. Just saying it would be good to work with the original authors if possible to develop the maps further.

Re:e1m1 I agree that the most prominent comment is that it really feels like a reconfigured e1m1 than the layout of e3m1 in e1 attire. I should point out (if its not obvious already :p) that I'm in the camp for doing more than just changing the texture and decorations of the resulting maps ;0). I think that is why e1m1 feels different to some of the other maps in the set so far.

Jaws In Space said:
E1M1
-First off I'm going to say that I think that this map was the lesser of the 2 that were submitted for this slot, I always thought that Traversed version based off of E4M1 was a better map & I still stand firmly to the belief that we should have used his map instead of Doomkids.

-Now as for this map itself, right away I'm going to complain about the use of non E1 textures here, so far E1M2, E1M3, E1M5, & E1M7 are the only maps strictly using only E1 textures, it really needs to be all of the E1 maps doing this, not just half of them.

Good point, I can fix this no problem - A few retextures are in order.

Jaws In Space said:
-Also speaking of non E1 things, how about those trees everywhere right at the start they really should be removed.

That's a good idea, although it leaves the area very plain, though I suppose that's much like the real E3M1 in that regard. Perhaps something else that's still E1 themed can be placed there so it at least doesn't feel totally barren.

Jaws In Space said:
-Next thing I have to complain about is the 2nd green armor, even on UV difficulty I found it to be completely useless, if it's absolutely necessary for an armor to be there it should be a blue armor, but that causes problems because blue armor should only be found in a secret area. So then I might make the suggestion to remove the first green armor, but then it would make it less like E1M1 where you get the green armor right away. A possible solution is to make the second green armor a blue one & just make that whole room a secret area.

That's a good idea, I think I'll do just that.

Jaws In Space said:
-Speaking of secret areas, I found that the secret lift with the box of ammo & shotgun shells was not well marked at all, in fact I only found it because I've played E1M1 before & that wall has a switch texture on it.

This is a secret only for people who know Ultimate Doom :) Shareware players won't even know it's there - Just a tiny tidbit I think I'll keep for the novelty.

Jaws In Space said:
-Then there is the secret area containing the backpack, this one is not marked at all, I only knew about this one because I have played older versions of this map. Also why is there even a backpack on this map this is E1M1.

Hmm, there ISN'T a backpack in E1M1 after all.. I'll have to remove that one.

Jaws In Space said:
-Since were talking about that area I should mention that I think the room beyond the Exit door it unnecessary, why not just make the room with the secret backpack the Exit instead of having 2 rooms of the same shape right after one another, besides the 2nd exit room just looks pretty ugly with that overhang.

Just done for the resemblance to E3M1, as you said, probably best to condense the 2 rooms into just one.

Jaws In Space said:
-Over all I felt that there was an overabundance of Shotgun ammo & health in the latter half of the map.

To be fair, I pretty much always exit E1M1 with tons of shells.

I'll have an update uploaded in 2 days tops, been too damn busy lately. I really had fun designing this one and mixing the two maps, I hope you guys end up deciding to keep it around :)

EDIT: Just thouroughly read through all critiques and feedback. Hehe, I wasn't trying to be 'cheap' be recreating e1m1 areas, just still trying to fully realise the concept of "fusion" between two maps. Seems easy at first, but it's quite a process! I think I'll change the "stairs to the armor" room and probably alter the "big blue computer alcove thingy" as well, to where they feel like E1, but don't feel like clones of areas we all played through years ago.

Keep in mind that changes to E1M1 will need to be reflected in E2M9, so leave time for that.

Magnusblitz said:

Keep in mind that changes to E1M1 will need to be reflected in E2M9, so leave time for that.

Indeed.

Seeing Magnusblitz's post in this topic reminded me that I still needed to find a more fitting name for E4M6, so after ten or fifteen minutes of searching, I've settled with "And Death Shall Flee". I think it sounds suitably foreboding.

I should maybe rename my maps, too, as I had invented all the names in one minute. Compared to the others, they're quite cheap and not that fitting, don't ya think?

(E2M7 "Hell is coming", E3M7 "New Limbo", E4M3 "Beast Factory")

If so, I'll do it after I finish my update of E3M7.

Since others are coming up with better names for their E4 maps, I might as well. I'd like to go with "They That Dwell Within", from Psalms 84:4. Taken out of the original context, it works well for a Doom level.

Hey guys, I'll have my update posted soon. It's like every time I sit down to deathmatch or do some mapping, another thing comes up! Also have my fiancee home for the first time in over a month tonight.. Going to try and bash out the map fixes beforehand!

I've tried to correct texture misalignments in my E3M7, but it turned out to be not as easy as you thought, Magnusblitz. The problem is, in most cases it'd lead to another texture misalignment elsewhere, since the windows all have two sides + borders with all different ceiling heights. I think I've run into the very same problem when I created the map back in March and decided to let it be for the good. I'm gonna let it again now, although I've corrected some.

Also please, does anyone else have objections against the rising floor traps in E3M7? Does it incomply with E3 design?

If you can't easily fix it with auto-align or unpegging on the window ledges, I wouldn't worry too much about it.