Yet Another Techbase

My second short (2048x2048 too) map. Nothing too special and it's pretty generic and it's somewhat unfinished/unpolished but I decided to release it anyway just because I worked on it for a considerable amount of time.

Made for GZDoom in UDMF but should work on ZDoom as well.

Screenies: http://imgur.com/haHKVkE,dre4fNA#0 (note that it uses Smooth Doom in screenshots).

DL link: http://rghost.ru/57552805

Had a quick look: could definitely use more detail and it's very hallway-centric, which doesn't lend itself to scintillating gameplay that much. Try work with the height variation a little. Also I was playing in ZDoom and I found this:


That Former Sergeant didn't fire at me and I couldn't pass that doorway. Is there supposed to be some fancy transparent door effect that only works in GZDoom or did you do that on purpose for some reason?

Obsidian said:

Is there supposed to be some fancy transparent door effect that only works in GZDoom or did you do that on purpose for some reason?

There should be sloped 3D floors. Didn't know it won't work in ZDoom.

xnv said:

There should be sloped 3D floors. Didn't know it won't work in ZDoom.

Sloped 3D floors just end up invisible in ZDoom, although they still function correctly. Regular 3D floors work fine though.

I played it and got lost because I couldn't figure out where to use the rest of my keys. Is it possible to exit the map? This was pretty fun until I got stuck. I don't mind a small map with lots of corridors. If it was a big map the corridors would get boring.

I like all the love you've given to lighting. Of course I think this just gives me license to be very, very picky about the lighting, but first let's pick apart the gameplay!

Script 8 needs to remove the red key from the player's inventory. Since the door never closes, activating it again just causes the door to recede far into the floor and ceiling.

Your secrets are delightfully nasty! A green armour you can only pick up by letting the chaingunner open the door, the plasma pack you can't replace if you take it by mistake, etc. I'm not sure these are very fair, considering normal expectations for a DOOM map. When a player screws up the plasma secret it feels like an unsolvable puzzle, and if he gets it right the first time it just feels like he's always supposed to get the rifle. Perhaps adding a script so you can activate the "charger" and put cells into it would be appropriate.

The right with the revenant by the plasma rifle doesn't work because hitscan weapons can shoot through the windows while missiles can't. The elegant way to fix this is probably by filling the windows with translucent 3D floors instead of translucent 2-sided linedefs.

The map is currently filled with doors that go nowhere and switches that do nothing. The problem with this is either they don't give any indication of their state or they print the same message as the ones that will eventually work through some other means. Have some fun making them broken, sparking, etc.

Speaking of indicators, rather than have messages for every single door that opens later, why not have a sound that plays? You could do both too, but given how much reverb your map uses, sounds might be more immersive.

While I'm thinking of reverb, it needs a bit of polish. The room with the plasma rifle is the worst offender. The echo is far too long for a room that size. It gives a sense of space that doesn't exist. Some of the other rooms feel like they could use a little more or less echo too. I should probably go play with that feature for a while until I have a better idea what I'm talking about.

I mentioned I like the lighting. It's mostly pretty nice. The gradients are nice in the brown corridors and in the room where you activate the plasma secret. The light from the window when you open the door to the revenant is a nice touch too. That brings me to the one thing that really, really bothers me about the light: the other windows in the area don't look that good! The second screenshot you posted shows one of the offending windows. Clearly the window frame should be casting a shadow above and below. Shaping the bright sector like in the room with the switch instead of having it touch the window will polish this up nicely.

I'll say two other things about the light. The first is the gray corridor leading into the room with the freight lift looks flat. It's ok to have it brightly lit like that, but then it needs some lights. There are none in there. The second is the area in the exploded wall just past the freight lift should probably be a bit darker. It's far away from the lights in the room.

Aliotroph?,
I forgot to put exit switch in the last room but basically room opposite to red key area is the final one.
I don't know why you can shoot through the windows where revenant is. I use latest GZDoom GIT build and I can't shoot through them at all.
Reverb in the plasma room was chosen because I wanted to make that room more "funky" (resembling secret area in The Catacombs (MAP22 in Doom 2)). And to be honest I don't have a sense for "sound design" anyway though I wanted to add some ambient sounds.
To be fair I didn't work with lighting that much and it could be a few times smoother but the more sectors you do the more irritating working with it gets. Also, I'm still not sure how I should do it anyway, i.e light gets dimmer while going "forward" but should it go dimmer "sideways"?

Thanks for playing and giving thorough commentary about this map!

Turns out the BLOCKHITSCAN flag only works in the latest development version. Best to specify the version to use when you distribute your maps. Even better to put that information in one of the standard text files you see packaged with most maps.