E2M5's secret exit

Does anyone else feel the secret exit in E2M5 is barely a secret at all?

In the other three episodes, the secret exits are fairly well hidden. For E1M3, you have to figure out how to access an otherwise optional portion of the map. For E3M6, you have to master an otherwise rarely used technique (officially, anyway) and then apply it to a portion of the map you possibly may not have had any reason to go to. For E4M2, you have to figure out that doing an action in one portion of the map affects another portion of the map within a few seconds.

But with E2M5, it's always bothered me. The room that leads to the secret exit (with the fireplaces) has to be passed through at least once. And even a novice player is likely going to explore the connected, smaller rooms. One of them has the not-to-hidden switch, you hear an audible noise, go back to the room you came from, and it's nearly impossible to miss those stairs that rose. I dunno, I just feel like this secret exit was so obvious that it was actually harder to find the real exit. Maybe the switch that rose the stairs could have been located farther away, like where you get the plasma gun, something like that.

Minor complaint, I know, but anyone else feel this way?

i don't feel this way

I always managed to find the secret exit before the regular exit.

Marnetmar said:

I always managed to find the secret exit before the regular exit.

Same here.

Given the number of rooms/doors in E2M5, perhaps the intent was to induce a general sense of disorientation in the player, so they'd flip a switch and then get lost through the fairly droning level.

I definitely would have redone accessing the secret, though. I see I'm not alone in finding the secret exit before the regular exit, which always seemed to violate a principle of vanilla Doom's level design to me.

Not necessarily too easy. On my first playthroughs I would repeatedly miss that stair, especially when I had no sound blaster to help me.

Even if it's too easy, so what? E2M9 is like a trap anyway. It doesn't even have the secret level music. It's almost like you're supposed to regret getting there so easily. Not that it's a bad level in any way, but as a newbie on ITYTD, getting surrounded by 4 barons while having no combat knowledge whatsoever was like the end of me.

Well, I don't really view it as a design problem per se, but I too found the secret exit well before reaching the normal one the very first time I played the map, and so as a result I probably played through the game a fair few times before I actually saw that last part of the level, a shame since it's one of the best parts, particularly that lights-out demon stampede.

Mixed opinion on it really. It is the easiest-to-discover secret exit by far, but at the same time it's also incredibly easy to overlook that one switch.

You open a door, and there's nothing but a pack of Demons in there (which are admittedly (and metaphorically) toothless since they can't even escape said room to attack you). Doesn't exactly scream "you should probably investigate further, this tiny room which had only a load of meatshields within must be important!" to me.

There's a secret exit there?

On the PSX version that secret exit isn't even there (it's in Spawning Vats instead), and I still found it before the normal exit when I first played the map on PC.

Eris Falling said:

On the PSX version that secret exit isn't even there (it's in Spawning Vats instead), and I still found it before the normal exit when I first played the map on PC.

Yup, the console versions of Doom moved the secret exits around. I think the Saturn version put the E2 secret exit in M3, near where you can find the soul sphere in the nukage.

it took me a long time to find that secret exit (i.e. stumble upon it accidentally)

I remember I first found it when playing co-op with my brothers, and we were just fucking around killing each other and what not, so when I found it I was like HOOOOLLLLY SHIIIIIT.

I guess it is pretty dumb.

I sort of agree. E2M5's secret exit was the only one I managed to easily find on my own. In fact I was surprised by the fact that it was "just there" compared to E1 and E3's secret exits.

E2M5's secret exit was a tad lacklustre, especially in comparison to the other two episodes (not so much E4). E1 was almost like a big reveal, seeing that bridge in that nukage pit at the start that finally gave you access to that room you knew was there but you had no idea how to reach. It was just such a "Woah, what's going on!" moment, it was so well executed.

E3M6's secret exit was genius, so much so that i never figured it out on my own back in the day. I had to resort to a guide and even after reading up on how to access it, it boggled my mind that rocket jumping was the result, let alone even a 'thing' it was crazy.

But yeah, E2M5... Not a whole lot can be said. It was neat knowing i could enter the fireplace but it wasn't a memorable moment. More or less it was just a "Huh... Ok cool".

What I liked about the E2M5 secret exit was that the lost souls behind the teleporter all looked like torches. It was a bit freaky to see them come to life and turn into angry lost souls.