Looking for Opinions on my first map

Hi all, I'm relatively new to building maps, but I have one and half maps in the below link (One full map, one i'm currently building but is able to be partially explored) that I would REALLY appreciate people to test and tell me what they think.

- For best results, these maps should be played with Gzdoom. I have designed them to use Dynamic Lighting in order to light up areas, however all maps will be tested with both Gzdoom and Zdoom to ensure they are playable on both. Please note 3d floors and Slopes are used, I am unsure if any other source ports support these features, but if they do please feel free to test and report any bugs you find!
-I am looking for critique in all aspects, it is my first map,, so I would appreciate any advice on how I can improve and make things better.
-The texture allignments should be fine, there might be a few little issues here and there, I can fix them when they're found.
-Uses the Doom 2 IWAD.
-MAP02 IS NOT COMPLETE. It is currently being worked on, apologies!

http://www.mediafire.com/file/4rvq923qa65a30r/Tekbase1.wad

UPDATE 01/12/2016: Download Link Updated. (Thank you to TheOrganGrinder and Everennui for all bugfixes and Changes in this update!)

Bugfixes
-ALL Sky HoMs have been fixed (This bug only applied to Zdoom, they worked fine in Gzdoom in the first place.)
-Linedef 2137 Has been properly alligned.
-Linedefs 1656 and 2065 have been fixed.
-Various Objects and Monsters that were intended for all difficulties but were incorrectly tagged to only spawn on UV have been fixed to spawn on all difficulties once again (This includes a Chaingun for all difficulties.)
- Sector 72 has been marked as a secret.
- The secret in Sector 553 has been completely reworked. the reward and positioning is still the same, however it is now impossible to get the item without triggering the secret. (Requires further testing?)
-Door with Unpegged sides and incorrect textures has been fixed near Red Key Switch. (Was not picked up in testing.)

Changes
-Two crates added near Sector 553 secret to force entering secret to obtain item.
-Hurt Me Plenty difficulty has been tweaked to increase the challenge slightly. (Testing would be appreciated.)
-Several secrets have been removed. (The 'secrets' are still there, they simply aren't marked as Secrets due to being unnessecary.
-Exit Sign added to Exit to make it clearer. (Please let me know if the current placement is still a bit too obscure.)
Any opinions are appreciated, good or bad!

(Wad name is temporary.)

Testing in ZDoom 2.8pre-1701-gd786148.

First thing I noticed was that there are a lot of Hall of Mirrors errors where the sky isn't built correctly. I am not familiar with how these should be built in ZDoom - this is perhaps what the Line Action 9 (line to horizon) effect is intended to achieve? But the screenshots below indicate what I'm seeing in the first and second outdoor areas of MAP01.

Linedef 2137 is horizontally misaligned; it's a switch texture so the misalignment is pretty glaring.

Linedef 1656, both sides are vertically misaligned causing the transparent middle texture to 'bleed' into the ground. Consider using lower unpeg rather than a vertical offset for this section of fence (though even if you did this, linedef 2065 would still need a vertical offset, albeit a smaller one).

The ending of this level really caught me by surprise; consider exit signage.

Overall I was left with a sense of pushing a lot of switches without a clear sense of what each of them activated. This isn't massively problematic in such a compact level but it causes the player's actions to feel less purposeful; your player is just pressing each switch because it's there.

MAP02, I got stuck in this closet; the door is one-sided and one of its tracks (linedef 897) is missing a middle texture, I was attempting to screenshot this when the door closed and neither it nor the lift texture were functional.

It's a pretty solid map. I noticed that the texture for the switch behind the boxes after the yellow door is not aligned correctly. I played on HMP and found it really easy. I tried to take screenshots, but I have no idea where Zandronum is saving them. :/

First up, Hi TheOrganGrinder, thanks for all your feedback!

As to the sky HoM's, i'm not entirely sure whats causing those! In all my testing those issues never popped up, so I'm going to have to try to figure out whats causing those. I tested in Gzdoom, so perhaps its a zdoom issue, but its still an issue i will have to work on fixing, and I will do so as soon as I figure out whats going on.

I know the switch texture you are talking about, I went back and looked at it after your post and realized what i'd done, that's fixed now and will not be an issue in the next update.

As to the switches, I can completely understand. The switch in the box area does seem rather pointless, I built it, and then realized I wasn't entirely sure how I'd continue the progression. With me still being new to mapping, thats something I definitely need to look at.

The exit for the level will be updated immediately, thats a massive flaw that you've found and I will address it at once.

As for Linedef 1656, I'm unsure what causes this but I will test using your advice.

Map02, I do apologise but the reason theres a lot of bugs with it is because its not complete. I uploaded the wad with both maps, but i'm currently working on Map02 as we speak so theres a lot of issues with it, it was there mainly for just a peek.

Next, Hi Everennui! The switch texture has been fixed, that wont happen again. As for the difficulty being too easy, I appreciate that report, I test on Ultra violence but clearly I need to test on the lower difficulties as well! HMP will be tweaked to be much more balanced in terms of difficulty. Thank you so much!

(If anyone is able to give me advice on how to fix those Terrible sky HoM's, i'd really appreciate it. I really am unsure whats causing them and with me being new to mapping haven't the first clue on how to even start.)

Update: An update so soon! I have definitely found whats causing the Homs in TheOrganGrinders pictures. Its definitely a zdoom issue, as I use gzdoombuilder, and in gzdoom builder it looked fine. This was a mistake on my part by saying zdoom would work, when it clearly wont, however, I will be fixing the map so it WILL work in zdoom. The Homs are definitely an easy fix, and as you said TheOrganGrinder, it is definitely what I need Line Horizon for.

Another thing your screenshots actually revealed to me, is that its quite dark! Once again this was a mistake on my part, I relied on Dynamic lighting in gzdoom to provide light on my maps, but as this will not work in zdoom, I need to figure out a work around. I will be working on that too, I believe I will just lighten up the areas to make it a bit easier to see without impacting on the atmosphere.

If anyone can give me suggestions on how to best fix these issues, I would appreciate it so much. I really am enjoying making these maps, and want to make them bug free.

Phade102 said:

Another thing your screenshots actually revealed to me, is that its quite dark! Once again this was a mistake on my part, I relied on Dynamic lighting in gzdoom to provide light on my maps, but as this will not work in zdoom, I need to figure out a work around. I will be working on that too, I believe I will just lighten up the areas to make it a bit easier to see without impacting on the atmosphere.

If anyone can give me suggestions on how to best fix these issues, I would appreciate it so much. I really am enjoying making these maps, and want to make them bug free.

I'd just specify in your OP that the map is tested and designed for GZDoom. If you like the lighting, there's no reason to bog down your standards.

Edit: I didn't look at the map in GZDB, but the first thing you should check - as far as the sky homs are concerned - is that your sky is all at the same height.

everennui said:

I'd just specify in your OP that the map is tested and designed for GZDoom. If you like the lighting, there's no reason to bog down your standards.

Edit: I didn't look at the map in GZDB, but the first thing you should check - as far as the sky homs are concerned - is that your sky is all at the same height.

I have checked that, however with gzdoom you can leave the outer walls with no texture in order to cause a sky texture. I believe with Zdoom that same effect simply grabs the closest texture, applies it to the empty textures and has the unfortunate effect of causing a HoM. I will keep working on it, I want the map to work properly and for people to enjoy it, even if its not the best in terms of map flow.

Phade102 said:

As for Linedef 1656, I'm unsure what causes this but I will test using your advice.

Textures are normally drawn from the top down, and the vertical offset of -208 on this set of lines tells the engine "start drawing the texture 208 units below the ceiling." Most of the outdoor area through which the fence passes is 336 units high, so your -208 offset means that a 128-high texture (MIDBARS1, which you've used) will be drawn so that its bottom edge just meets the floor. Linedef 1656, however, is a short line right next to the building; there's some 48-high 'trim' around the top of the building's wall that reduces the height of that outdoor sector to 288, so your -208 offset instead causes the texture to be drawn with 80 pixels above the level of the floor and 48 pixels below the level of the floor. This causes a rendering error when the sectors on both sides of the line have the same textures, light levels, etc. causing the engine to render the full height of the texture, even those portions below the level of the floor.

Solutions are probably:

• Set the lower unpeg flag and remove the vertical offset so that the texture is drawn from the bottom up;
  
• Or change the vertical offset to -160.

TheOrganGrinder said:

Textures are normally drawn from the top down, and the vertical offset of -208 on this set of lines tells the engine "start drawing the texture 208 units below the ceiling." Most of the outdoor area through which the fence passes is 336 units high, so your -208 offset means that a 128-high texture (MIDBARS1, which you've used) will be drawn so that its bottom edge just meets the floor. Linedef 1656, however, is a short line right next to the building; there's some 48-high 'trim' around the top of the building's wall that reduces the height of that outdoor sector to 288, so your -208 offset instead causes the texture to be drawn with 80 pixels above the level of the floor and 48 pixels below the level of the floor. This causes a rendering error when the sectors on both sides of the line have the same textures, light levels, etc. causing the engine to render the full height of the texture, even those portions below the level of the floor.

Solutions are probably:

• Set the lower unpeg flag and remove the vertical offset so that the texture is drawn from the bottom up;
  
• Or change the vertical offset to -160.

Thank you, this will definitely help. Also, I apologise for the sky textures again, They dont occur in GZdoom, which means I need to start testing with zdoom as well since Zdoom is far more commonly used. If you felt like it, and you can run Gzdoom, would you be able to confirm/deny that the sky errors still happen in gzdoom as well?

The sky renders correctly in GZDoom g1.8.2. :)

TheOrganGrinder said:

The sky renders correctly in GZDoom g1.8.2. :)

Thank you very much for that, that lets me know that the bug is isolated to Zdoom. it is however something I will fix, I assure you. I really want to be a good map designer, I really love making maps, though admittedly map01 was made over 6 months ago, i've been practicing a lot since then, which is why I believe map 2 will have a bit more detail (And new monsters!)

One thing I would like your personal opinion on TheOrganGrinder (if you look back at this thread) Do you believe that if I were to replace the switch in the yellow key area with say...a red key in one of the crates, that it would be a better style map?

As a matter of purely personal taste, I'm not sure that would make any difference to me, since that switch at least is located close enough to its activated doors that you can hear things happening when you push it.

Other notes:

• There's a chaingun set to appear only on difficulty 4+ along with various monsters and decorative items on the cliff ledge to the south of the exit; are the difficulty settings for this cluster of Things intentional? It seems a bit odd that you'd have the decorative items spawn only on the harder difficulties. Also, unless the player triggers linedef 1814 (over by the switch in the crate yard south of the yellow door) this is the only chaingun on the map; it's very possible for a player not to cross this short line and not spawn the two chaingunners on top of a nearby crate, in which case, on difficulties 3 and below, the player is given an abundant supply of bullets and nothing but a pistol to put them through.
  
• Given the standards for secrets set elsewhere in the map, I'd suggest marking sector 72 as secret since its opening mechanism is non-obvious, especially relative to secret sectors 224, 355, and 553, where bonus items are in plain sight. Alternatively, consider not tagging some or all of these three sectors as secret.
  
• Sector 553 in particular is a somewhat small triangular sector that can only be entered by stepping rather carefully around a nearby crate; the player can more easily grab the soulsphere in this sector from the water below, which gets them the item but doesn't trigger the completion/collection of the secret; it may not even be apparent that there's a secret sector there. I'd suggest enlarging the secret sector and repositioning the soulsphere such that the player has to edge around into the secret sector to get it.

TheOrganGrinder said:

As a matter of purely personal taste, I'm not sure that would make any difference to me, since that switch at least is located close enough to its activated doors that you can hear things happening when you push it.

Other notes:

• There's a chaingun set to appear only on difficulty 4+ along with various monsters and decorative items on the cliff ledge to the south of the exit; are the difficulty settings for this cluster of Things intentional? It seems a bit odd that you'd have the decorative items spawn only on the harder difficulties. Also, unless the player triggers linedef 1814 (over by the switch in the crate yard south of the yellow door) this is the only chaingun on the map; it's very possible for a player not to cross this short line and not spawn the two chaingunners on top of a nearby crate, in which case, on difficulties 3 and below, the player is given an abundant supply of bullets and nothing but a pistol to put them through.
  
• Given the standards for secrets set elsewhere in the map, I'd suggest marking sector 72 as secret since its opening mechanism is non-obvious, especially relative to secret sectors 224, 355, and 553, where bonus items are in plain sight. Alternatively, consider not tagging some or all of these three sectors as secret.
  
• Sector 553 in particular is a somewhat small triangular sector that can only be entered by stepping rather carefully around a nearby crate; the player can more easily grab the soulsphere in this sector from the water below, which gets them the item but doesn't trigger the completion/collection of the secret; it may not even be apparent that there's a secret sector there. I'd suggest enlarging the secret sector and repositioning the soulsphere such that the player has to edge around into the secret sector to get it.

Thank you for catching that chaingun spawning. that is most definitely NOT intentional, it should be there on all difficulties. Unfortunately when I place multiple things one after the other they keep the previous things properties. I' will fix that. The chaingun was placed in that position in order to deal with the mass amount of enemies that spawn in in that area.

I will definitely also fix sector 72, thats something I had actually planned to do but I forgot to do so at the time, and I've figured out a way to make that soulsphere secret more accessible, thank you for that.

Map has been updated to fix all reported issues. If possible, I would appreciate it if someone could test it again to make sure everything is fixed. Thank you!

I recorded an FDA on UV for you. My thoughts so far:

• Movement among the crates in the fenced area is very inconvenient, they get in the way all the time. I shouldn't have failed so much at platforming though (replayed that bit later, got it on the first try). That light down below is placed very badly because it gets in the way when you jump to the switch platform (might be just config issue, I used the same GZDOOM config for all PWADs before I discovered PrBoom+, and I think I might have infinitely tall things enabled).
  
• Walls also got in the way in some other places (mostly around stairs).
  
• Secrets are rather obvious. Especially the one with the minimap - why is it even a secret? Soulsphere is hardly a secret too. RL one is good though. Also, shell box chamber in the nested ledge secret could actually use being marked as one - it's one of the less obvious ones.
  
• Gameplay is kinda slow (in my opinion). It felt like mostly standing there leisurely stepping aside from fireballs occasionally. I didn't feel threatened anywhere (except that unexpected map 2 thing, but that was more like "whoa, what the hell is that??"). I mostly play hard WADs though. This seems about as difficult as vanilla Doom 2 so far (first two maps of it).
  
• Several missing textures, should be very obvious in the demo. Also missing floor texture on a corner ledge with a shotgunner on map 1.
  
• I only noticed path to chaingun on map 1 by accident.
  
• I have no idea what that switch in the dark cave did (and I only found it looking at automap).
  
• YK door has its YKness bars missing on one side.
  
• RK door needs a bigger hint that it's locked, the current one is too easy to miss.
  
• Maybe move the actual exit trigger further into the cave? Someone might notice the sign too late to react and exit the level by accident (before they found that RL secret, for example).
  

I liked the visuals, and it reminded me of TNT a little (furniture). The hallway with diagonal walls that leads to the huge arena is pretty cool.
All and all, I think this is pretty good for a first map.

I played using GZDoom 2.1.1 and have included my config in the archive in case the demo desyncs with default settings.

Rathori said:

I recorded an FDA on UV for you. My thoughts so far:

• Movement among the crates in the fenced area is very inconvenient, they get in the way all the time. I shouldn't have failed so much at platforming though (replayed that bit later, got it on the first try). That light down below is place very badly because it gets in the way (might be just config issue, I used the same GZDOOM config for all PWADs before I discovered PrBoom+, and I think I might have infinitely tall things enabled).
  
• Walls also got in the way in some other places (mostly around stairs).
  
• Secrets are rather obvious. Especially the one with the minimap - why is it even a secret? Soulsphere is harly a secret too. RL one is good though. Also, shell box chamber in the nested ledge secret could actually use being marked as one - it's one of the less obvious ones.
  
• Gameplay is kinda slow (my opinion). It felt like mostly standing there leisurely stepping aside from fireballs occasionally. I didn't feel threatened anywhere (except that unexpected map 2 thing, but that was more like "whoa, what the hell is that??"). I mostly play hard WADs though. This seems about as difficult as vanilla Doom 2 so far (first two maps of it).
  
• Several missing textures, should be very obvious in the demo. Also missing floor texture on a corner ledge with a shotgunner on map 1.
  
• I only noticed path to chaingun on map 1 by accident.
  
• I have no idea what that switch in the dark cave did (and I only found it looking at automap).
  
• YK door has its YKness bars missing on one side.
  
• RK door needs a bigger hint that it's locked, the current one is too easy to miss.
  
• Maybe move the actual exit trigger further into the cave? Someone might notice the sign too late to react and exit the level by accident (before they found that RL secret, for example).
  

I liked the visuals, and it reminded me of TNT a little (furniture). The hallway with diagonal walls that leads to the huge arena is pretty cool.
All and all, I think this is pretty good for a first map.

I played using GZDoom 2.1.1 and have included my config in the archive in case the demo desyncs with default settings.

First off let me just thank you for that in depth review. I really appreciate it!

-The 'crate maze' is terrible. I'll openly admit that, I did it very poorly and its something I really do dislike. Its difficult to change in its current form, so I may just make it simpler to remove all the hassle, simply make the extra ammo and the beserk pack the only reason to jump around on it.

-I apologise about the walls getting in the way. This was my very first map, and it was done a while ago.

-The secrets I agree could have been done better. The minimap secret though I felt was pretty good, especially since you can only get it if you jump down from that ledge; it doesn't open otherwise. The shotgun shells one is actually going to be removed, since it makes the map a bit too easy to get so many shotgun shells that early on.

-I understand what you mean about slow gameplay. I played it myself while I was testing it and I found it to be rather slow. With the way i'm designing the maps, I want them to ramp up in difficulty rather quickly, so while map one is rather slow, map02 (Which you've seen from the nasty surprise) will be more difficult. I also wanted to stagger the monster appearances, I didnt want all the monsters to appear in the first map, so I'm going to be adding them in more slowly. Map02 for example will introduce the hell knights and the Cacodemons.

-I will address those missing textures and make sure I fix them all for the next update. My apologies for that, I honestly didnt notice them.

-Thank you for the report about the chaingun being difficult to notice. Its rather crucial to the flow of the map, so I will address that and make it more obvious its there.

-The switch in the dark cave is actually required to access the rocket launcher. It raises a cliff up (I know its impractical, but still) I actually did it like that because of Map01 of the original doom 2. I didn't know how to legit access the rocket launcher on that map for YEARS. and I mean over 10 years. So I wanted to make a somewhat difficult to access rocket launcher secret, kind of like a homage to it. I"m not sure if it worked too well, but I like it.

-YK, RK and Exit trigger will all be fixed. Thats a flow and gameplay issue and it takes priority for me.

Once again Rathori, I want to thank you immensely for your detailed review. I appreciate it and I'm glad that the map brought you enjoyment, even if it was a little bit. Map02 will be done soon, and hopefully it will play a lot better (I've learnt a lot since map01)

Phade102 said:

First off let me just thank you for that in depth review. I really appreciate it!

-The 'crate maze' is terrible. I'll openly admit that, I did it very poorly and its something I really do dislike. Its difficult to change in its current form, so I may just make it simpler to remove all the hassle, simply make the extra ammo and the beserk pack the only reason to jump around on it.

You are welcome!

Platforming actually wasn't too bad, it's the light post that blocks the jump from the final crate that's the frustrating bit.

Phade102 said:

The minimap secret though I felt was pretty good, especially since you can only get it if you jump down from that ledge; it doesn't open otherwise.

Oh, I see. I must have went the same route both times and I assumed it was opened all the time.

Anyway, I hope to see what's next on map 2 some time soon :)

Rathori said:

You are welcome!

Platforming actually wasn't too bad, it's the light post that blocks the jump from the final crate that's the frustrating bit.

Oh, I see. I must have went the same route both times and I assumed it was opened all the time.

Anyway, I hope to see what's next on map 2 some time soon :)

Yeah, I'm going to remove that light post. its actually from a past idea I had. originally you were going to have to walk around the crate maze, it was going to be optional. but the light will be removed.

and No, you can't actually go the same way both times unless you jumped up, theres a ledge you fall off to open that.

Map02 should be done soon, I'm going a bit bigger this time around, it will need a lot more testing for map flow and such.

Thank you again =)