If DOOM was Hell only

You would be a human, who either:
1. sinned, died, and ended up in Hell to suffer forever...
...or even better:
2. got transported into a Hellish dimension during a failed teleportation experiment.
Anyway, you decided to resist and fight your way out. Your goal is to get to a portal/teleporter that will get you home.

There would be no human weapons, except your bare fists. You would use weapons stolen from hellish inhabitants (enemies). Magical staffs, cybernetic enhancements etc. There would be no zombies with human weapons, but there might be melee zombies / devils with pitchforks or something. Hell would use cybernetics (ala monsters like Cyberdemon, Revenant, Mancubus...), but its own strange ones, no human-built technology. And of course, all maps would take place in the realm of Hell.

Do you think Doom would still be an awesome game with the impact it had? Any other ideas for gameplay/story/aesthetics/mechanics of a Hell-only Doom game? Opinions are welcome.

it would be cool if you get to fight from hell to purgatory and all the way to heaven, fighting demons, angel and gods, a sort of doom version of the divine comedy, but you would fight against heaven and purgatory as well

I guess that would resemble a more occult and abstract version of Heretic?

Yeah, somewhat like Heretic/Hexen, but with the Doom palette. Unfortunately Doom was made from the start by assuming an Earth-inspired hell. Making SF/fantasy-themed technologies would mean redoing the plot somewhat from scratch and would require a tremendous effort.

I keep imagining such a game where you get weapons like in Diablo. Your first weapon should be a shovel (with which you can also dig) which you use to hit the enemies on the head.

Still, I don't see the problem with including modern firearms in hell. They're tools of death anyway, much better than medieval ones, and probably cheaper than magic. They fit the hell theme. If you fell in hell you'd surely meet mean bald soldiers with rifles.

Wads made 100% in hell or a similar ambiguous oppressive setting (like Thy Flesh Consumed) exist.

OP that sounds like it would be a little too controversial of a game to be released in the early 1990s.

Conceptually it sounds like a very difficult game to design for. I mean, the art direction would be completely different and too similar throughout.

An awesome thing about Doom are the thematic anachronisms: you're using an old shotgun, a desert eagle, and chainsaw on Mars. In fact, there are only two guns that actually make sense on Phobos: plasma rifle and BFG. The guns are awesome because they are recognizable and perfectly balanced against the monsters you are up against.

I think the game would get boring very quickly if the textures were only portraying Hell. And as an aside: who wants to go to Hell purely to kill bad guys? Hell is full of them, and it's the only afterlife available for bad people. There needs to be some kind of "greater good" you are fighting for, not just to kill a bunch of demons. They need to be threatening humanity in some way.

Urthar said:

I guess that would resemble a more occult ... version of Heretic?

I was thinking along these lines, too. I wouldn't say "more abstract" like you did, because Heretic is very abstract in my view, no less than Doom is. This alternative Doom's setting would be just slightly more oppressive and gory, otherwise it would easily compare to Heretic. I think I'd be comfortable with that - as long as they'd include some enemies with faster projectiles or hitscan-based attacks (not necessarily bullets, rather some hellish magic). The thing I really like about Doom's gameplay is the variety of challenge coming from the monsters, allowing fast paced gameplay. That's why I haven't enjoyed Heretic or Hexen that much, it wasn't their setting as much as the fact that they lacked fast paced challenge comparable with Doom. I'm getting off-topic, I guess.

printz said:

modern firearms in hell ... cheaper than magic. They fit the hell theme. If you fell in hell you'd surely meet mean bald soldiers with rifles.

I don't think so, totally not. Game that depicts a surreal and mostly wild and cruel Hell, but then breaks its own consistency by including human guns, would feel wrong. IMO, it's a different situation than the opposite, actual Doom's one - "demons in the base". Those were cool. Human firearms in pure Hell would be just disruptive. They don't fit the abstract Hell theme.

I'd enjoy it if it didn't primarily use the christmas colors traditional Doom hell levels usually use. Orange hell would be great.

I did dabble in thoughts recently regarding if Doom was about a marine who enters Hell before they invaded Earth. I imagined a Quake like game where the player uses the weapons given to him by the realm.

BlackFish said:

Orange hell would be great.

Valiant E4? :P

Grey (marble) + black (stone) + orange (fire) + occasional brown (soil) would make a nice Hell without Christmas colours, IMO.

I recently had an idea for a blue Hell, though I expect that to execute it well, a custom palette would be needed. The idea behind it being a more extreme take on Hell: Blue-hot is a higher temperature than Red-Hot.

Not that I could actually map something like that. That would be ridiculous =D

scifista42 said:

Grey (marble) + black (stone) + orange (fire) + occasional brown (soil) would make a nice Hell without Christmas colours, IMO.

I always loved Eriance's depiction of hell, but unfortunately his maps didn't have the gameplay or layout to match their cool theme.

AD_79 said:

Valiant E4? :P

Yup. Loved it.

I think a green poisonous-like hell would be great, with acid streams and such.

AD_79 said:

Valiant E4? :P

I couldn't find this on /idgames, where is it?

Woolie Wool said:

I couldn't find this on /idgames, where is it?

It's not on idgames right now, as it's not done yet.

http://www.doomworld.com/vb/wads-mods/71704-valiant-wad-my-32-level-mbf-megawad-rc3-available/

MAP19-24/Episode 4 has a cool orange hell theme.

Awww, what a shame, I was hoping to try Xaser's Eriguns 2 with it but I can't due to the BEX patch.

Realistically, Doom would of still been a hit because of the gameplay and graphics maybe. I don't know, I wasn't born back then.

I can say though, if it was only hell, I wouldn't of been as interested in it as a kid. Kid me knew there was Hell levels later, but I was still in the moonbase.

It gave me incentive.

Hoodie said:

I can say though, if it was only hell, I wouldn't of been as interested in it as a kid. Kid me knew there was Hell levels later, but I was still in the moonbase.

It gave me incentive.

I like what you wrote here. I can relate to that. I think that since my very childhood, science fiction elements (in stories, movies, games, real-life kid games, etc.) fascinated me considerably more than fantasy / magic / surrealism. I'm still like that, I don't care for fantasy genre, and I strongly prefer science fiction (I'm the "technical type" by my nature, I guess, I've never had problems with maths and nowadays I study IT and programming, but that's besides the point). Techbase seems to be my favourite Doom theme, even though I can enjoy any theme, depending on each particular wad. I've first played Doom in my early childhood. Doom probably wouldn't appeal to me so much if it didn't have the tech elements. On the other hand, I cannot be sure what was a cause and what a consequence back in that age - Doom might have inflicted my preferences, rather than being inflicted by them, or both happened at the same time. It doesn't matter anymore, anyway. Even though demons are interesting and non-generic as I've stated before, I'm glad for Doom's technology elements, I have to say.

being the originator of the tech thread (http://www.doomworld.com/vb/doom-general/72385-if-doom-were-base-tech-city-space-only/) i will post my thoughts on the other question:

i do think some tech is nice. i especially like a mix. but i do notice an abundance of levels that use tech and look particularly bland. i'd say i see a lot more "dull" tech maps than "hell maps".

The concept of hell can apply in many cases. A hellish level could be about a bottomless pit. A room with rotting corpses. Spikes. Alternate Dimensions. Even an earth-like element in a hell setting.

In other words, I think it's easier to be creative regarding hell levels than it is for tech levels. It takes something like Map20 or Map21 in CC4 to impress me with regards to tech. Other examples may be Super Sonic DOOM, Daedalus, and RTC-3057.

With regards to scifista42 - I'm also in IT. I enjoy sci-fi.

Here's an idea:

play switcheroom - notice the level in e1 format vs e3 and e4 format. which level atmospheres look better? E1M2 in switcheroom or E4M2 in DOOM?

^ that guy would be part of the game if it would have been pure hell.

I feel hell should have been formed, and not a natural environment when using the original doom engine limits, and its 2.5D problem.

Some doom and doom 2 hell maps made me develop the impulse to smash something out of pure frustration because the levels where just so irritating. stressing the ones attempting to be natural, it destroyed my fun to play trough a gray natural stone maze-like map with cacodemons and shotgun guys in one of the doom games, guess which one this is because i do not remember its name.

Doing the same as in the other thread ;

Atmospheric Caves with short areas in the open, containing rooms and constructions of hellish nature to show hell has a designer and one, or more, intelligent inhabitants.

The outside areas would have to be like enclosed canyons because of the visplane problem, and to maintain the enclosed hellish atmosphere.

Additional hellish weapons, like a rusted degrading shotgun fitted with small metal stumps like on old-school bulldog chains shooting red glowing pellets, perhaps, to justify being in hell for all that time. And that weapon would have to gib like a rocket luncher on every lethal hit.

With good textures and 'made' hell design this might have been worth its while, lol.

Woolie Wool said:

Awww, what a shame, I was hoping to try Xaser's Eriguns 2 with it but I can't due to the BEX patch.

If it makes you feel any better, the new monsters are actually very good.

You can get away with making a small mod that replaces the weapons since they have similar functionality.

Eriguns 2 is only weapons (plus items and powerups in a modification to it I made). It replaces all the weapons with Eriance's hell weapons from the canceled reboot of Demon Eclipse, with the code jazzed up by Xaser.

TheCupboard said:

OP that sounds like it would be a little too controversial of a game to be released in the early 1990s.

http://www.mobygames.com/game/dos/escape-from-hell