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Cell

Most either over- or irritatningly misused external source music in maps

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What I mean by "external source music" is "outside of the four major IWADs", which, if we consider music, is rather only three of them, because Plutonia doesn't have any new music originally implemented. So the music mustn't be originated from either UD, D2 or TNT, but the definition does include Heretic, Hexen, Strife and other id products.

My list:

1. "Gut Wrencher" from Duke Nukem 3D (E2L3: Warp Factor).
Related to how dull and repetitive this composition is - my second least favourite from the entire game -, I'm quite surprised that it comes upon me quite often if I frequently play random mapsets from average to brilliant, including Plutonia 2 (MAP28). I did indeed stumble upon it in Nightmares of Loki as well (E3M6), but that doesn't count that much I guess.

2. Music from Heretic E1M9 - The Graveyard.
Okay, I personally don't hate this that much. The thing I hate is that the track barely exceeds one minute, yet quite a few mappers do combine it with maps that take the world and 2 more days to finish, e.g. CC4 MAP14 or AV MAP32.

3. "You Suck" from Rise of the Triad.
The same as above. AV MAP25, to mention one, isn't a 2-minute cakewalk. 'Nuff said.

Before anyone mentions, I do get that I should mute the game instead of whining, thanks.

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I've always found classical music to be particularly weird in WADs. Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D Minor comes to mind particularly, I guess it was popular to use because of its association with Dracula and horror stuff.

Also, no thank you to anything from Chrono Trigger, Super Metroid, or Castlevania OSTs. I associate all those too strongly with their original games and they just sound weird and out of place anywhere else.

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Just here to point out that AV MAP19 has the music from Heretic E1M1. E1M9's music is used as the intermission music.

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Obsidian said:

Just here to point out that AV MAP19 has the music from Heretic E1M1. E1M9's music is used as the intermission music.


and MAP32.

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ETTiNGRiNDER said:

I've always found classical music to be particularly weird in WADs. Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D Minor comes to mind particularly, I guess it was popular to use because of its association with Dracula and horror stuff.


Yeah, I used it in my Cathedral level, largely because it was an easy to use slap on piece of music that I can be sure comes in creative commons licence.

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Absolutely agreed about Gut Wrencher. To me that midi sounds like it was intentionally made dull and annoying. I'm also getting really tired of Duke3D e2m1 song even though I loved it when I first heard it.

To me, most Heretic and Hexen tracks feel very out of place in Doom but I'm okay with the one used in Kama Sutra MAP21, it's fun. Heretic E1M9 is okay for me too but E1M1 is oh my god please no, only E1M4 is worse.

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Head Like a Hole is (was) retardedly overused in many, many maps - Even I am guilty of this, but at least it suits the Doom mood well. What's weird, I vividly remember that midi playing back perfectly on rigs of yesteryear, but Windows 7 fucks up the drum track completely. Anyone know what gives? I've made a fixed version of the midi for modern OS, but whats caused it to mess up in the first place? (easy place to hear this is d5m2)

Heretic/Duke music is generally way overused in maps as well. Other than these few offenders, I can't think of any others I'm tired of hearing, though I also feel snes/genesis music feels out of place at times, but sometimes it works perfectly. The tracks from "Comix Zone" for example blend very well with Doom maps.

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Yeah, not a fan of Gut Wrencher at all and overusing Heretic tracks everywhere gets... I wouldn't say annoying. More like fillerish and I don't care about it either way.

Cell said:

3. "You Suck" from Rise of the Triad.

Uwotmate? Im gonna fite u irl. Say goodbys to ur dear 1s im takin u down.

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Obsidian said:

Just here to point out that AV MAP19 has the music from Heretic E1M1. E1M9's music is used as the intermission music.

Oh. I always mix them up for some reason. Anyways, I'm more like fond of the E1M1 one, since it is at least about 2 minutes long if I'm not mistaken, but regardless it is still overused as well.

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Gut Wrencher is boring, and The Graveyard is annoying. You Suck is awesome though IMO.

For me I guess the annoying external source is MIDI renditions of songs. Usually because the author has done a bad job, the song just doesn't suit MIDI, or it's just a shit song anyway. joe-ilya maps spring to mind, because the MIDI selection in those maps seemed to always fit all three of those descriptions...

It's not always the case though, and if it's good as a MIDI, then it should fit into a map just as well as a MIDI from some other game, if not maybe better, to the point where I wouldn't have guessed it was a real song. One of Rayzik's Slaughterfest 3 maps springs to mind, where he used a Lamb of God MIDI. When I heard the actual song, I didn't even like it but my god the MIDI version was fantastic.
Similarly, there's a map in Chillax with a pretty good rendition of a DragonForce song, so MIDI-fied real songs are not always a bad source of music, it just takes some hunting for those rare ones that aren't shit.

EDIT: Jenesis MAP09, just for another example of good MIDI conversion.

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Eris Falling said:

Gut Wrencher is boring, and The Graveyard is annoying. You Suck is awesome though IMO.

You Suck isn't bad I admit, but the constant repetitive on AV MAP25 nearly drove me insane I also admit.


For me I guess the annoying external source is MIDI renditions of songs. Usually because the author has done a bad job, the song just doesn't suit MIDI, or it's just a shit song anyway. joe-ilya maps spring to mind, because the MIDI selection in those maps seemed to always fit all three of those descriptions...

That might be true, but somehow I still dug Lost Maps' MAP02 music.


(...)One of Rayzik's Slaughterfest 3 maps springs to mind, where he used a Lamb of God MIDI. When I heard the actual song, I didn't even like it but my god the MIDI version was fantastic.(...)

Strangely enough, I fckn felt the same with WOOO MAP29's (first) music. I didn't even like halfway the original Boys Boys Boys/Summertime Love by Sabrina.

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I guess this makes me the only one that rather likes "Gut Wrencher", then? I can't attest to whether or not it's overused in Doom maps, though.

I must confess I've been looking into the soundtracks of other games to see what might be suitable stage music. Taken a shine to Abuse and The Elder Scrolls: Arena/Daggerfall's soundtracks, although the latter would be better suited to more medieval-themed stages (I mean, that only makes sense given the source material).

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Cell said:

Strangely enough, I fckn felt the same with WOOO MAP29's (first) music. I didn't even like halfway the original Boys Boys Boys/Summertime Love by Sabrina.


I guess 1monster MAP05 might be worth mentioning as well. That's a shit song, but the MIDI rendition was...alright. It did sound terrible in Microsoft's synth, but it wasn't too bad in my usual setup of SGM + Giant Drums.

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The way folks here feel about Gut Wrencher is how I feel about "Infinite" from TNT (MAP10/MAP18 music). Suck that fong.

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Any short songs (3 or less minutes) on longer levels gets very grindy and repetitive. Many Hell Revealed and some Hell Revealed 2 levels are notorious for this.

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I'm a weird guy, because I like Gut Wrencher. Though I don't recall ever playing a Doom map which used it as music.

Regarding annoying songs: TNT music tends to be a bit grating, but AimShootKill, Sadistic and Soldier of Chaos feel the most overused and the most annoying in my opinion. Rise of the Triad songs are beginning to get on my nerves as well, as it's yet another overtly excavated music mine for Doom mappers.

Duke Nukem 3D songs are a little risky to use, since their style is usually just enough subtly different from Doom to feel odd.

In general, MIDIs from DOS first-person shooters are a "no-brainer" - since they were composed for games similar to Doom, they pretty much guarantee that you'll be able to find a song which will more or less fit your level. Using music from other games or from non-game sources takes a lot of work and judgment, but it can really pay off when your players don't find themselves stuck musically in the 3D Realms/Raven Software prison again.

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