Endless Random /idgames WAD Adventures #1 [A WAD diving, exploration & review adventure for everyone!]

Day 3 | Peppermint Cookie | 2020 |Timothy Brown aka @mArt1And00m3r11339 | Played on LZDoom + ITYTD

Holy fuck a slaughtermap, and this one is absolutely nuts.

By the end of the map there is an insane (and ridiculous) totality of 9000+ enemies on a large square map designed perfectly to become the largest massacre arena I've ever played. Many probably know that I'm not a fan of slaughterwads and their gameplay, but I can appreciate the (violent) charisma they convey. What we have here is a map with huge ambitions but not so great executions. On the one hand, my biggest problem with this map is the simple fact that my potato PC can't run it properly for the first 5 minutes. There are too many enemies, too much combat and an insane amount of Pain Elementals spitting out Losts Souls per second. Seriously. For every 10 demons I managed to kill with the BFG, another 10 Lost Souls would take their place. The kill counter kept growing and the action wouldn't let you rest for a single second.

This is a 2020 map, finally something modern in /idgames Random File feature; on the other hand it's just not my style, but I won't let prejudice completely ruin my rating of this. On the one hand, it's a simple map, simple in terms of its red and white design. It's supposed to be a sort of Christmas present for doomers who love to bust their heads against 9000+ demons at the same time. On the other hand, the type of combat we find here is nothing more and nothing less than pure BFG spam. It's not complicated, but it's damn difficult and victory will depend more on our patience and how well we know how to do circle-strafing. If you love unlimited violence on a gigantic map where everything, absolutely everything, is filled with enemies as grotesque as they are varied, then you'll have more than enough to keep you entertained for a good, good while. Success is not guaranteed, but pain is. The MIDI is a good match for the ridiculous style and constant frenzy of this massacre, as well as the simplicity of the color scheme that creates a perfect backdrop for painting it red. Blood red.

Unfortunately I wasn't able to complete the map properly because 1) I don't enjoy slaughter most of the time. Sorry. 2) My FPS went to 5 FPS at its worst and about 20 FPS for most of the game, which killed any fun I could had. I wasn't even capable of taking a decent picture because I needed to downscale my resolution to 0.50 to play it. Not the mappers fault, but my shitty PC fault.

Maybe some masochists out there enjoy this absolute monster. Fucking hard, but completeable.

What a good idea!

Not sure I'll be able to do this regularly, but that random link on ID Games is cool so I'll have a crack periodically.

Anyhoo... I got https://www.doomworld.com/idgames/levels/doom2/p-r/rocker1. A medium sized map from 1996. Design is certainly old-school. Decent progression though. The last encounter suggests more than actually happens - there was a redundant invulnerability sphere...

EDIT: Forgot:

GZDoom, UV, no saves, freelook, no jumping

Not too bad  overall - I had fun.

Anyway:

2 minutes ago, smeghammer said:

What a good idea!

 

Not sure I'll be able to do this regularly, but that random link on ID Games is cool so I'll have a crack periodically.

 

Anyhoo... I got https://www.doomworld.com/idgames/levels/doom2/p-r/rocker1. A medium sized map from 1996. Design is certainly old-school. Decent progression though. The last encounter suggests more than actually happens - there was a redundant invulnerability sphere...

 

Not too bad  overall - I had fun.

 

Anyway:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Welcome to the event! A random WAD a day keeps madness away... or maybe the contrary. On the other hand, is always a fun gamble and there's chances you'll find something super fun or super funny.

Day 2 - Battlefield and Chambers of Death I, II and III (1995). Played in GZDoom, UV difficulty.

First of all, the zip file contains 4 wads.

Second of all, Battlefield was my best choice for a good reason and that's because the other three wads, the Chamber of Death group has a short and repeatable layout, which in turn makes it too boring...so, I ended up discarding them and won't play them. Battlefield has larger maps.

Third of all, the wad itself. All the maps has this...snake-shaped layout that serves for one simple objective: Reach the exit. Simple, right?

The tricky part comes in the contents of each map. Like the name of the wad says, it's a battlefield...face hordes of hungry monsters. And that's where the bad part comes.....

Simply put, the player can easily dodge them, depending of which group of monsters it's facing. The most dangerous groups of monsters are the shotgunners, masterminds and cyberdemons (if you don't have enough space), which you are forced to kill them, especially the hitscanner type.

The other major issue is the ammo/health/map balance. While you encounter maps that are incredibly generous of ammo and health, other maps are so unfair (like having damaging floors with no health and full equipped with cyberdemons) that the player is forced immediately to cheat....and that's not how the map should work. There's also one map that has the wrong key lock, preventing you to progress and that's something that the player won't like it at all. Definitely a LOT of minus points for this wad and, I bet that the other 3 wads took that same direction.

Overall, this set from '95 was the opposite direction from Day 1, which I found two good maps. This one? easily forgettable and definitely expect to face some high levels of annoyance. Also, up to the player to cheat...I made it in a way that's fair to complete the set. Not a fan of this set......

Day 3 is waiting for me...

Sorry, but i will not play peppermint cookie, at least for now. Map looks way too hard for my tastes.

Instead, i'll tell you about my random file choice and it is...

3 Steps From The Hell - Foxysen (Skulltag - played on zandronum 3.1 alpha and skulltag_actors.pk3, 7 maps, 2010)

Uhm, the name of the author makes me ring a bell, i've already heard this name before, just like Jerry Lehr, author of the previous Chambers of Death mapsets.

Anyway, is a series of short/medium hellish-like adventure that starts in a sort of cave, you get out of the cave to reach a hellish temple / cemetery with it, you reach the last open tomb hall (with a lot of healthy goodies!) and move to the next zone of hell that it could be a little castle, another caves and at last a earthly city that is the "hardest" map of the set, with its 104 monsters, but the monsters usage is never really that hard (the hardset monsters used here is the mancubus and a arachnotron used in the most inoffensive way possible in MAP03), the real challenge here is the fact that this mapset is almost a "Reality/No Health" gameplay with it's really scarce usage of health expect for the ending room, the tomb hall that the author copied and pasted for the exit room. In addiction, there's also a search of special "Hell Key" that will be needed at the end of your adventure in MAP07 for opening the portal that takes you out from hell.

Layout is basic but is also nice looking, including some little doomcute sections in it. Overall, not a completely horrible wad like the idgames reviews will may you think about this. Maybe more health in it will make the map more enjoyable.

2 minutes ago, Walter confetti said:

Sorry, but i will not play peppermint cookie, at least for now. Map looks way too hard for my tastes.

Instead, i'll tell you about my random file choice and it is...

3 Steps From The Hell - Foxysen (Skulltag - played on zandronum 3.1 alpha and skulltag actors, 7 maps, 2010)

  Hide contents

Uhm, the name of the author makes me ring a bell, i've already heard this name before, just like Jerry Lehr, author of the previous Chambers of Death mapsets.

 

Anyway, is a series of short/medium hellish-like adventure that starts in a sort of cave, you get out of the cave to reach a hellish temple / cemetery with it, you reach the last open tomb hall (with a lot of healthy goodies!) and move to the next zone of hell that it could be a little castle, another caves and at last a earthly city that is the "hardest" map of the set, with its 104 monsters, but the monsters usage is never really that hard (the hardset monsters used here is the mancubus and a arachnotron used in the most inoffensive way possible in MAP03), the real challenge here is the fact that this mapset is almost a "Reality/No Health" gameplay with it's really scarce usage of health expect for the ending room, the tomb hall that the author copied and pasted for the exit room. In addiction, there's also a search of special "Hell Key" that will be needed at the end of your adventure in MAP07 for opening the portal that takes you out from hell.

 

Layout is basic but is also nice looking, including some little doomcute sections in it. Overall, not a completely horrible wad like the idgames reviews will may you think about this. Maybe more health in it will make the map more enjoyable. Also, the author said in the textfile that there is only 3 maps, but the levels actually are 7.

A very decent find there, mate! Nice screenshots too btw, makes me want to play it. :P

Day 3 - The Abandoned Base (2000). Played in GZDoom, UV difficulty.

Day 3 has changed....for the better? or for the worse?

The answer is...for the better. Leaving behind the disastrous second day, this map from 2000 features something that some wads have it present. Doors that can be opened with switches. 

That feature is barely seen in a map which, the switch is right beside the door. Can be used to open-close a door or, have 2 switches with a different action (one to open, another to close). 

About the map itself, you are greeted with a Duke Nukem midi, which fits nicely and, the map has some decent detail, especially for the floor/ceiling areas. As usual, techbase maps have this square/rectangular shape that's unmistakably seen in many, many, many other maps of that kind, proper of old school era and, it's still predominant today.

The map is not hard and, you'll find minor resistance in the form of pinkies, imps and zombies. Some mid-tier monsters are also found but it's nothing to be afraid of. Basically, this map works well as a starting map if it was inside of a megawad.

The chainsaw is obviously a game changer due of ammo saving but, I was an idiot to not using it that much.

So, since this map was quite short, there's not much to be said other than that you should give a try to kill some minutes. 

Day 4 will follow the same pattern in terms of decent gameplay...

I play until I die or intentionally stop. I don't comment the wad where I die/stop.

Wad 1 : kohe 15 by Ruba (2007)

Cool classic vanilla map with tech and hell textures. You have to explore three different small parts to activate a switch in a defined order. I just love those silver/red structures located outside, near the end of the level. This map uses the music from the first map of TNT Evilution.

Wad 2) 2014 by Vincenzo VTM

2014 is a very large limit-removing exploration map which acts as a hub-style level. Despite being aesthetically very classic, this level oozes a deep atmosphere thanks to its creepy midi and its mysterious city landscape lost in the sky. You explore many areas : secret blue nazi tech bases, wooden libraries, brick town, E1-styled tech base... I took 1h to beat it. It's a very easy level which could please all kind of players.

Wad 3) CRESCENT.wad by Doug Ryerson

Very  interesting 1994 which takes place in a kind of crescent-shaped gray spaceship which features some new textures , a custom hudbar and a new music. I really digged the outdoors pathway as well as the big corridor to cross thanks to raising bridges near the end. This level has a great sense of verticality compared to many 94 maps.

19 minutes ago, Roofi said:

I play until I die or intentionally stop. I don't comment the wad where I die/stop.

 

Wad 1 : kohe 15 by Ruba (2007)

 

  Hide contents

 

Cool classic vanilla map with tech and hell textures. You have to explore three different small parts to activate a switch in a defined order. I just love those silver/red structures located outside, near the end of the level. This map uses the music from the first map of TNT Evilution.

 

Wad 2) 2014 by Vincenzo VTM

 

  Reveal hidden contents

 

2014 is a very large limit-removing exploration map which acts as a hub-style level. Despite being aesthetically very classic, this level oozes a deep atmosphere thanks to its creepy midi and its mysterious city landscape lost in the sky. You explore many areas : secret blue nazi tech bases, wooden libraries, brick town, E1-styled tech base... I took 1h to beat it. It's a very easy level which could please all kind of players.

 

Wad 3) CRESCENT.wad by Doug Ryerson

 

  Hide contents

 

Very  interesting 1994 which takes place in a kind of crescent-shaped gray spaceship which features some new textures , a custom hudbar and a new music. I really digged the outdoors pathway as well as the big corridor to cross thanks to raising bridges near the end. This level has a great sense of verticality compared to many 94 maps.

 

 

Some very decent/solid finds there, Roofi. The Random button blessed you! Kinda. Crescent and 2014 look quite interesting, and even Kohe 15 looks solid.

The trial. (Hypersoft inc. - Vanilla exe, played on original doom2 1.9 on dosbox, 1 map)

The textfile is liying at us since there's only one map instead of five (and why it has been wrote with the Doom numeration from E1M1 to E1M5?), but when i was in the mid of playing, i was thinking: "damn, if the other maps are long like this one, it will be a long night (and day)!". But then i just found that this map is just a medium/large techbase with some brick sections and the obligatory library section (even a little SKSPINE2 in a room, for don't waste nothing!), is a pretty episode 2 style of Doom 2 map, it could be perfectly a McGee map, with the tricky puzzles and the somehow challenging selection of monsters. The level flows good, with the expections of some obscure puzzles and a not really intuitive progression bar, some of the keys can be taken out of the room boundaries, sometimes the level is dragging for too long and the maze section is kinda pointless and annoying imo. But overall, this is not a bad level.

Ah yes, the executable in the zip are pointless. STUFFBUF.EXE i'm not even sure what the hell did and TRIAL.BAT crashes. You have to edit the folders source to your doom 2 folder in the bat file, but i really didn't want to do it now, sorry...

I’ll do one, why not?

Random gave me Dark World I back from 1995, sick!

The coolest thing about this map is that it’s made by Stephen, age 10. This was his first map. His dad helped with textures and playtesting. His dad has notes in the text file too, to say ‘the kid did this all by himself, I only helped debug! It’s really cool to have so much in common with a son’. It truly is, that’s a very touching story, and that’s how we’re going to approach this ancient map, made with an ancient editor, from before anyone knew what they were doing, more or less. It’s not just kid gloves, it’s also the context of the era and means available to little Stephen.
 

So, as you can see this starts off feeling like a Wolfenstein level, pure corridor, few textures, no height changes. 15 seconds in we get very loudly signaled progression with blue and yellow doors, so we know that’s where we’ll be ending up, right where we started. The corridors are peppered with largely nonthreatening low tier, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. I suspect a Tyson UV would be a fun challenge since we’re not 10 years old, but also just bypassing everything and going for speedrun exit could be a thing.

1:13 we run out of progression. This means it’s time to wallhug. Stephen is kind to us and gives us a secret door in the corridor right next to the room where we ran out of progression. And what sort of a secret! This is where Stephen does a brilliant thing, in my opinion. As we find this unmarked wall secret, inside there’s a computer map pickup. This signals to us that there’s going to be a lot of unmarked wall secrets, so we should consult our map, and indeed he shows us where all the secret doors are. This is where you, experienced doom mapper and/or player would go ‘what’s the point of all the secret doors if you know where every one is, then?’ and where I would counter with more than just ‘don’t pick on Stephen or his dad will have a word’. With the computer map the secrets are not hard to find, but that just gives a different mood and theme to the level. The story becomes one of unearthing nooks and crannies in the level after doing cool computer bleepy scans with high-tech equipment. It doesn’t have to be a challenge, it just has to be consistent. And Stephen honors his word throughout the level’s design. He was 10 years old and he had a map concept and he made it happen without worrying so much about perfectly balancing cost and effect, just caring about the fantasy of it all, and that makes the level memorable.

2:14 There’s a very sharp corner wall. That’s all. It’s just sharp and made of brick texture, imagine those bricks. You could kill yourself running into that sharp corner no problem.

2:24 We realize that poor Stephen just realized the flats aren’t necessarily aligned with where he placed his teleporter. I know how it feels, Stephen. And I wholeheartedly applaud you for not fixing this shit, just let it be, this is a hell dimension, a pentagram doesn’t have to make sense.

2:37 We can see the most gruesome room and corridor in this map. I would hope dad is to blame for this and he didn’t subject poor Stephen’s imagination to this cavalcade of rotting flesh. I was shocked to find this room in this, honestly. It’s such a strong shift from the brick layout of the rest of the level, it’s sordid. I’ve played doom since 1994 and how cursed doom can look out of the blue still gets me.

2:52 There’s a height change here, a pit, in fact. After the room of rotting flesh this ups the intensity of our 1995 sojourn significantly. Things are getting more dreadful and more exciting. Also, worth noting that you could land in toxic waste immediately after that dead fall and you’d have to quickly get your bearings to fight the imp. But there’s armor for your trouble in the goo. This is a good encounter, I’d say! To make things even better there’s a little nook you can poke your head in if you want to brave the damaging floor at 3:00 for an unmarked secret. I just love how cramped this little crawlspace is compared to the rest of the level, it really shows a childlike imagination ‘I’m just going to put this hidey hole here’. This child imagination is what we all tap into if we’re still playing doom in 2021, it doesn’t matter if you’re playing this or Sunlust or w/e. We’re being kids all together, and this is a kid that made this map for us and uploaded for posterity.

3:55 I must admit I was frustrated by this dead end, and doubly so when I fall for it a second time on my way back. You got me, Stephen!

4:08 This table with stuff on it is clearly for later after I’ve triggered something. So, I know I should either find a trigger nearby or return here later. The false wall next to the table doesn’t drop when used, so that tells me when the table goes down, the wall will go down with it. Again, much better foreshadowing than a lot of other stuff by adults I’ve played in my time.

4:43 I run around on the automap like a demented little pacman with a shotgun and I’m sure Stephen did just the same testing this. The automap layout is hilarious.

4:52 Check out this staircase with health potions and 1995 texture alignment. Perfection.

5:43 This water flat hurts me. I guess Stephen wasn’t the biggest fan of baths. There is, however a hidden switch in the pre-teleport room that opens up a hidden cache post-teleport which I liked a lot. Made me go through the hurty water twice!

6:49 Stephen placed arbitrary blockmonster linedefs to keep his monsters in the shadows. You can’t stop him. His dad couldn’t stop him. Therefore you can do that as well and you don’t have to explain yourself to anyone. Check out those night-vision goggles behind the enemy lines there to tempt you to run into those shadowy pinkies. Well done, Stephen!

7:37 Missed an imp there. He’ll stay trapped in 1995 forever.

After a tomato behind the last door we get the last key. It is superfluous but I totally understand the appeal of 3 keys, 3 doors. And exit.

My final verdict: there’s maps in Doom 2 that are far worse than this. I hope Stephen made more.

Well, I got this heretic level today. It's E1M2. Quite excited as I'm building a Heretic level...

Starts well enough, though pretty flat and uniform lighting. Corridors behind and to one side blocked by pillars with goodies on top. The open way leads first to a room with golems on a raised edge, which is fine:

 The raised edge lowers on entering. Lots of ethereal arrows. Excellent... On to the next rooms...

First play attempt I got softlocked in the room below (other side of that far wall, which rises on pressing the wrong switch). So, I restarted and ran back out as the wall rises. 

So far, so good...

The problem which stopped me from completing this map was twofold - some HOMs after teleporting to here - the steps keep raising and lowering and the HOM at the bottom here was really ugly:

But mainly, it just  got repetitive - endless square rooms with the same light level and no height variation. The difficulty/monster progression, though, seemed OK until I gave up.

Summary:

bland, softlock with no warning and a couple of build errors.

Played with GZDoom 4, freelook, no jumping and UV.

Day 4 | The Trial. | 1999 | HyperSoft Inc. | Played on LZDoom + UV

A 1999 WAD that in its textfile claims to have 5 maps but is actually only 1. While at first that sounds like bad publicity, this map is surprisingly decent and with palpable ambition. I think it's one of the few times I've seen a WAD authored by a company, in this case HyperSoft Inc, something I've never heard of before and probably didn't get to release too many quality WADs. On the other hand, concentrating on this particular example we have a map that, in spite of having certain design misfortunes, has a decent quality that concentrates the efforts in its exploration and dungeon design.

With over 200 enemies and a multitude of scenarios and areas, The Trial is an example of a map that puts exploration before any other aspect, giving a few touches of visual narrative and placing a multitude of areas that vary in terms of presentation and layout. Secrets and mazes are something that stand out quite a bit here, as well as tight corridors and a variety of texture usage, albeit somewhat misused.

The Trial is a WAD that, by modern standards, is bad, but placing ourselves in the era in which it came out, it's not so bad. A light adventure with fun overtones.

I just love the idea, it even made play again on GZDooM on my PC after a long time. I'm not good at reviewing things, so bear with me please...

Okay, after clicking on the random link, I was hoping some crappy map but I got a limit removing map called "Shoot!". 

Here is the Title screen

And the starting room:

This is a nice and detaied map, with some classic gameplay some fights on tight spaces. The monster count and fights were pretty nice, with plenty of surprizes (some of them made me jump on my chair lol), ammo count was good too, oh and the background music really fits with the action there. This map was pretty fun overall, a really nice find.

Here is my end of level screen:

Played the map with GZDoom, HMP difficulty, DooM (Strict) compat mode (I'd reccomend to turn off infinite height actors though) and freelook. Note that the hud isnt part of the wad.

To finish, Here is a random pic of the map:

As I said, I love the the idea of this thread. If I get some free time later, I'll try this again!

Day 2

My adventure ends if I stop or I die. I don't review the wad where I die/quit.

Wad 1) Antisaedist's Decomposing effect by Antisaedist (1996)

Not a wad but a dehacked file which is suppose to "makes dead bodies and guts decompose in seconds". It looks cool but it doesn't to work on modern ports. I can't bring screens for this.

Wad 2) SIRDOOM by Sirius Software, Inc (1996)

Not a wad as well but I'm just pushing the random file button so excuse me. :)

It's a software which allow you to "Play DOOM with up to four players via modem. SIRDOOM has a built in terminal that will allow you to call your favorite Major BBS system running the multi-player version of Game Connection (V1.45 or higher) and play DOOM, DOOM II, Heretic, or Hexen against a group of friends or acquaintances. While there, check out the other games that are playable via Game Connection."

I'm single so I can't test this and it looks too old anyway.

Wad 3) Half-Life Blood Effects by SonicHD87 (2015)

Very small gzdoom mod which adds Blood Effects from Half-Life (no seriously?) . This little mod will make your game a bit more gory. However, the effect is very generic and unimpressive. Opt for Brutal Doom if you want to see a lot of blood.

Wad 4) Harmful Hospital by Jacek 'Illdo' Dobrzyniecki (2015)

You are a strange patient who has beensent to a hospital after listening too much to D_RUNNIN on random maps of idgames. More seriously, despite being releasesz in 2005, Harmful Hospital looks like a pure map from 1995 with some few new textures which help you to distinguish between a regular base and a "hospital".

However , I like this map. It looks like the mapper to decided to make a myhospital.wad instead of a traditional myhouse.wad. You explore some areas like an asylum , a surgery room , outdoors areas , a church (wut?)... It's basic but pretty fun.

Wad 5) Paul's Deathmatches by Paul Hruby (2005)

This is a set of 4 Deatmatch maps for Doom 1. I can't say anything about the multiplayer gameplay. Maybe the last two maps are too big.

However, the layouts are interesting and varied, good visual gimmicks such as scroll blue skull textures to mark the exit each time. I think it would have been better if they were maps made for the single player rather than DM maps that no one will  play.

Wad 6) The Chasm by Steven Doornbos (2004)

Another DM map for Ultimate Doom (E3M1).

Although released on idgames in 2004, the map was made in 1994. The funny thing is that it was made before the famous map 24 of Doom 2 but uses the same concept with small paths to navigate over a large hole filled with dangerous liquid (lava here). Reaching the exit in singleplayer is impossible.

Wad 7) skin athena (KOF 2002-2003) by LUISDooMer (2009)

A small gzdoom mod created by a spanish doomer which allow to change your skin to Athena from King of Fighters 2002-2003. Very uninteresting except if Athena is your secret waifu.

Wad 8) Nine anomaly's bug free edition by Hardcore_gamer (2009)

It's a hell-themed small episode of 8 maps designed for gzdoom. Actually , it's gzdoom-compatible only because of some zdoom effects (scrolling lava floors) and custom monsters in the  last map. I enjoyed it , despite I found some maps quite boring (map 06 , 08). Map 03 "Demon Factory " is my personal favourite thanks to the weird industrial theme with red custom textures. The last map was so much fun. You're in an arena and you must destroy all teleporting ennemies , nothing more simple.

Although it is a Doom 2 wad , most of the maps have a very Ultimate Doom style gameplay which use mostly or exclusively the first doom bestiary. You can sometimes meet some chaingunners , mancubus... but they are not as common as a classic doom 2 wad. 

Some maps clearly do tribute to some iwads maps. The first map is a kind of a remastered of E3M1 , the second map has a section which resemble a lot to the main section of Doom 2's map 11...

So... I didn't die today but I stop here because I'm tired.

I'm joining too for today, because I'm bored and preparations for midterm tests are tiresome. My random pick for today is Doom Commando by icecreamsoldier - 7 maps long journey through a various places and destinations. Supposedly, it's vanilla vanilla compatible, but it might be limit-removing. Text file tells that original maps were created in 2005 and with some editions released in 2007-2008. Text file also contains neat story of each map explaining context of each map you're playing. I used Eternity Engine, because why not. What I noticed is that monster count is really low, doesn't go above hundred. Even if monster count is low, you can be caught by surprise at some levels. There plenty of hitscanners in each level to make your playthrough a bit annoying, but everything is compensated with health and powerups. Pistol starting is supported, playing it continuously will make levels really easy. 
Design wise maps are relatively basic, some early maps are mono-textured, here's minimal detailing, keeping thing clean looking. Layout tends to loop, here's some backtrack. Grey sky and software mode crispiness made levels really moody to look at. Sadly or maybe good, but here's no music replaced, so I had listen default tunes I heard many times before. I'm going to post some screenshots from each map, because images speak better than words:

Map 01:

Map02:

Map03:

Map04:

Map05:

Map06:

Map07:

Maps I liked - 01, 02, 04 and 07
Maps I disliked - 03
Map 05 and map 06 were alright.

Would I recommend this to others? Well, I would do if they want some quick action and feel that they are in control... It's alright for what it does, your casual doomy set. 

2 hours ago, LUISDooM said:

I just love the idea, it even made play again on GZDooM on my PC after a long time. I'm not good at reviewing things, so bear with me please...

 

Okay, after clicking on the random link, I was hoping some crappy map but I got a limit removing map called "Shoot!". 

 

Here is the Title screen

  Reveal hidden contents

And the starting room:

  Reveal hidden contents

 

This is a nice and detaied map, with some classic gameplay some fights on tight spaces. The monster count and fights were pretty nice, with plenty of surprizes (some of them made me jump on my chair lol), ammo count was good too, oh and the background music really fits with the action there. This map was pretty fun overall, a really nice find.

 

Here is my end of level screen:

  Reveal hidden contents

 

I suck when looking for secrets, but at least killed all stuff XD

 

Played the map with GZDoom, HMP difficulty, DooM (Strict) compat mode (I'd reccomend to turn off infinite height actors though) and freelook. Note that the hud isnt part of the wad.

 

To finish, Here is a random pic of the map:

  Hide contents

 

As I said, I love the the idea of this thread. If I get some free time later, I'll try this again!

Welcome to the club. You're free to join in and leave whenever you wish :D Hope you had fun.

1 hour ago, Roofi said:

Day 2

 

My adventure ends if I stop or I die. I don't review the wad where I die/quit.

 

Wad 1) Antisaedist's Decomposing effect by Antisaedist (1996)

 

Not a wad but a dehacked file which is suppose to "makes dead bodies and guts decompose in seconds". It looks cool but it doesn't to work on modern ports. I can't bring screens for this.

 

Wad 2) SIRDOOM by Sirius Software, Inc (1996)

 

Not a wad as well but I'm just pushing the random file button so excuse me. :)

 

It's a software which allow you to "Play DOOM with up to four players via modem. SIRDOOM has a built in terminal that will allow you to call your favorite Major BBS system running the multi-player version of Game Connection (V1.45 or higher) and play DOOM, DOOM II, Heretic, or Hexen against a group of friends or acquaintances. While there, check out the other games that are playable via Game Connection."

 

I'm single so I can't test this and it looks too old anyway.

 

Wad 3) Half-Life Blood Effects by SonicHD87 (2015)

 

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Very small gzdoom mod which adds Blood Effects from Half-Life (no seriously?) . This little mod will make your game a bit more gory. However, the effect is very generic and unimpressive. Opt for Brutal Doom if you want to see a lot of blood.

 

Wad 4) Harmful Hospital by Jacek 'Illdo' Dobrzyniecki (2015)

 

 

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You are a strange patient who has beensent to a hospital after listening too much to D_RUNNIN on random maps of idgames. More seriously, despite being releasesz in 2005, Harmful Hospital looks like a pure map from 1995 with some few new textures which help you to distinguish between a regular base and a "hospital".

 

However , I like this map. It looks like the mapper to decided to make a myhospital.wad instead of a traditional myhouse.wad. You explore some areas like an asylum , a surgery room , outdoors areas , a church (wut?)... It's basic but pretty fun.

 

Wad 5) Paul's Deathmatches by Paul Hruby (2005)

 

 

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This is a set of 4 Deatmatch maps for Doom 1. I can't say anything about the multiplayer gameplay. Maybe the last two maps are too big.

 

However, the layouts are interesting and varied, good visual gimmicks such as scroll blue skull textures to mark the exit each time. I think it would have been better if they were maps made for the single player rather than DM maps that no one will  play.

 

Wad 6) The Chasm by Steven Doornbos (2004)

 

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Another DM map for Ultimate Doom (E3M1).

 

Although released on idgames in 2004, the map was made in 1994. The funny thing is that it was made before the famous map 24 of Doom 2 but uses the same concept with small paths to navigate over a large hole filled with dangerous liquid (lava here). Reaching the exit in singleplayer is impossible.

 

Wad 7) skin athena (KOF 2002-2003) by LUISDooMer (2009)

 

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A small gzdoom mod created by a spanish doomer which allow to change your skin to Athena from King of Fighters 2002-2003. Very uninteresting except if Athena is your secret waifu.

 

Wad 8) Nine anomaly's bug free edition by Hardcore_gamer (2009)

 

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It's a hell-themed small episode of 8 maps designed for gzdoom. Actually , it's gzdoom-compatible only because of some zdoom effects (scrolling lava floors) and custom monsters in the  last map. I enjoyed it , despite I found some maps quite boring (map 06 , 08). Map 03 "Demon Factory " is my personal favourite thanks to the weird industrial theme with red custom textures. The last map was so much fun. You're in an arena and you must destroy all teleporting ennemies , nothing more simple.

 

Although it is a Doom 2 wad , most of the maps have a very Ultimate Doom style gameplay which use mostly or exclusively the first doom bestiary. You can sometimes meet some chaingunners , mancubus... but they are not as common as a classic doom 2 wad. 

 

Some maps clearly do tribute to some iwads maps. The first map is a kind of a remastered of E3M1 , the second map has a section which resemble a lot to the main section of Doom 2's map 11...

 

 

So... I didn't die today but I stop here because I'm tired.

Holy hell Roofi, you're killing it! Lots of WADs in a single day. Congrats mate.

29 minutes ago, Misty said:

I'm joining too for today, because I'm bored and preparations for midterm tests are tiresome. My random pick for today is Doom Commando by icecreamsoldier - 7 maps long journey through a various places and destinations. Supposedly, it's vanilla vanilla compatible, but it might be limit-removing. Text file tells that original maps were created in 2005 and with some editions released in 2007-2008. Text file also contains neat story of each map explaining context of each map you're playing. I used Eternity Engine, because why not. What I noticed is that monster count is really low, doesn't go above hundred. Even if monster count is low, you can be caught by surprise at some levels. There plenty of hitscanners in each level to make your playthrough a bit annoying, but everything is compensated with health and powerups. Pistol starting is supported, playing it continuously will make levels really easy. 
Design wise maps are relatively basic, some early maps are mono-textured, here's minimal detailing, keeping thing clean looking. Layout tends to loop, here's some backtrack. Grey sky and software mode crispiness made levels really moody to look at. Sadly or maybe good, but here's no music replaced, so I had listen default tunes I heard many times before. I'm going to post some screenshots from each map, because images speak better than words:

Map 01:

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Map02:

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Map03:

 

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Map04:

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Map05:

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Map06:

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Map07:

 

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Maps I liked - 01, 02, 04 and 07
Maps I disliked - 03
Map 05 and map 06 were alright.

Would I recommend this to others? Well, I would do if they want some quick action and feel that they are in control... It's alright for what it does, your casual doomy set. 

Not a bad set, Misty. Decent find!

the abandoned base (John Cartwrigth, 2000, Boom - played on woof 3.1.0)

A pretty wide techbase with a counterpart of a pretty easy fights, the texture usage is pretty cool and new textures used give a plus point to the experience, especially i found the new sky pretty rad. Layout is simple and effective and the map is fun. From the text file description of the map i've expceted a shorter journey, but it was a good run in this way too.

old one I found from 95

https://www.doomworld.com/idgames/levels/doom2/p-r/rjanim2

Whooooo finally getting around to this.  My entry for this volume is...

***TELE-DIRECT ATLANTIC DOOM***

by Lawrence Harrison, 10/16/1997

Replaces Doom II MAP01

What is it?  It's somebody's office, made into a Doom level.  Now if you go to the /idgames listing there you'll notice some fellow reviewed it a few years back stating

This person is wrong though, I think that this is one of the better ones, at least that I've seen.  The problem being that most myoffice.wad maps suck.  They tend to be flat, aimless affairs consisting of wandering around a labyrinth of hallways and doors leading to mostly empty rooms that all look the same, with no real sense of progression or direction throughout.  This map is exactly the same sort of thing, unfortunately, and honestly the only thing that saves it is that there is some custom artwork to liven the place up a bit (although why the textures are spread out across multiple WADs is a mystery to me).

The best thing about the map is the imp replacement, an actually pretty well-animated and cute-looking sprite of the gumby-esque company mascot, Telly, who trundles about throwing fireballs and mostly not posing a threat.  The artwork is all very cartoony but admittedly gives what would otherwise be an impossibly dull map a little bit of personality.

The map is not very difficult, as long as you're mindful of office windows and cautious when opening doors, since most rooms have hitscanners in them.  The zombieman, shottyman and Telly are the only three enemies you see, and the only real challenge comes from a lack of health in the better part of the map.  For some reason the author saw fit to make it impossible to beat the map without finding all three secrets (although they're easy to find) and by the end you'll have a massive arsenal that you won't really have anything to kill with.

Overall I'm sure the author got a good lol from his co-workers at Tele-Direct Atlantic (EDIT: which was/is apparently a Canadian company that publishes directories and is part-owned by Yellow Pages), but for the rest of us there's not much to recommend this, or a lot else for me to say about it other than Telly is cool and I might need to borrow it for use in a weird future project of some sort.

SCREEN'S SHOT

Day 3

My adventure ends if I stop or I die. I don't review the wad where I die/quit.

No review for today , I died in the first wad , in a very unexpected cyber trap : Below by Sonny Wasinger (2006)

Today's odyssey into Doom random maps gave me MAD 2, from 1997 by Mark Davis.

The reviews were either 1 star or 5 stars, so no help there...

Anyway, it turned out to be not bad at all, barring a couple of irritations. 

A number of the doors were not visible because textures were the same as the wall, and there was one that was just a traversable midtex. Once I got used to the thinking behind these tropes, progression became logical - though I did need to IDBEHOLDA at one point.

Not bad at all for its time. I was engaged with it certainly.

Completed with GZDoom 4, on UV, with no saves
 

I'm probably not going to be able to partake in this that frequently given what little time I get off most days after work is poured into the DWmegaWAD club and my own playtesting shenanigans, but it'll be fun to pop in here now and then to either play something Endless has found or share something I found myself on the archive. I honestly haven't done a lot of digging in there so far and have played mostly newer releases, so this'll encourage me to really start exploring idgames to see what oddities I can find.

Anyways I had a go at The Abandoned Base, or as I personally named it Imp City. Seriously, the blighters are fucking E V E R Y W H E  R E in this quite wide, yet short map. There's only 127 Demons but yeah, most of them are indeed Imps with small smatterings of Zombies and Pinkies. The design/layout of the map is rather flat for the most part with the only height variations really lending themselves to subtle detailings in the roof and walls here and there. Besides those subtle details though, it's rather drab and boring to look at as the majority of the map consists of one specific metal wall texture. I wish I could say it's one of those WADs that makes up for its boring visuals with solid combat, but despite the ridiculous amount of Imps lumbering about, the combat is nothing special with pretty humdrum encounters. One thing I did notice though is that a large portion of the map consists of wide open windows spread across the place, which means you'll be dodging a relentless barrage of Imp fireballs from every angle while trying to scrounge up ammo from the few zombies shambling about (ammo pickups are a tad scarce) among the horde of spikey prats. But that excitement wears off rather quickly once you've made some significant progress. The rest of the map is pretty plain and its progression is nothing special.

Suffice to say, aside from some interesting little bits of detailing and the odd choice of having two switches on either side of every single door, The Abandoned Base is pretty unremarkable. It has some tiny hints of creativity, but it feels like the mapper could've spent a lot more time on it to make better use of the large amount of space by making more dynamic rooms/landmarks/details and spice up the combat more. 

I have a double wad today, one for the Ultimate DooM and another for Doom 2, both are Vanilla. 

The first one is a single map from 1996 called Space Station by Jason Edgin. It replaces E1M3 of the Ultimate Doom, so you'll have to IDCLEV your way to it. 

Well, if I were to describe this shortly, it would be something like a "almost enpty big grey maze" with very narrow halls and some enemy encounters here and there.

Here is the starting area

This one looks like some first attempts at mapping, this is evident since there aren't almost any floor height variations at all and some simmetrical architecture not mentioning you get that grey wall texture EVERYWHERE

I can't complain about ammo/weapons because there are a lot of it. Given the amount of low tier monsters and how scattered the fights are, the ammo is too much, especially when finding the place what I call "the goodies room"

There is also a "Boss Room" before the exit, where you fight a...

The exit is just back him, so you could just go and exit without fighting. (but what's DooM without killing everyhing? XD)

Here are my EOL stats and the full automap

Here are some random pics of the map...

I have to say I had some fun on this map, even if the maze parts were a bit annoying and two long passages with damaging floors (there were some radsuits before them, but not on the other side) that killed me several times...

The second one is a (VERY) small map from 2000 called PRESSURE by XXLFragger. Replaces MAP01 of DooM 2.

There isn't too much to say about this one, it's a big warehouse(?) surrounded a lava lake.

You go the back, kill some monsters, get the red key, open the door just to fight...

Inside the empty warehouse, there are some rocket ammo, shotgunner and the exit. You just can avoid the Cyberdemon and go straight to it... That's all...

Here is the full map if you are interested and other random pics

The only fun thing about this map was killing the Cyberdemon, otherwise, this one was very short.

Okay that's it for today,  hope to get some good ones (or even better, some bad ones) for next time! XD

16 hours ago, Endless said:

Welcome to the club. You're free to join in and leave whenever you wish :D Hope you had fun.

Thank you! It was very fun. I wonder what this random adventure will bring us next...

Day 4 - The Trial (1999). Played in GZDoom, UV difficulty

Day 4 is continuing decently well from day 3 with this map from 1999, called The Trial. What does it has? 

The map is fairly long with a lot of areas to explore but, it has a couple of bad points regarding about the map layout. One, some switches can be activated earlier without visiting that area by foot and two, some areas are so optional that, by progressing the map quickly thanks to the first explained point, that it's not necessary to explore such areas and stay forgotten. That's probably not what the mapper wanted and allows the players to finish the map quickly instead of doing the map properly.

Another thing to have in consideration are the amount of secrets in the map. 15 secrets are too much. For such a large map, 4 or 5 secrets are enough for the map. The thing is, some "important" items or powerups needed to make the map easier are inside the secrets. At least, those secrets aren't mandatory and completely optional.

The map itself, in terms of difficulty is not hard. The layout has a degree of backtracking because, you start with a yellow door and a red key waiting already in the beginning......I think that near the '00 year, maps uses that kind of gameplay to point an objective right away, so that the player has that thing in mind. 

Anyway, the map is fine. Decent gameplay, ammo and health was fine too but the two points that I explained eclipses the map, which it's kinda bad, I'm afraid.

Day 5.........................................................prepare for lots of meat!!!

So here is my contribution.The wad i got was a castle ruins and it was made 1996.It says in the descpition that it was made only for deatmach but it has singleplayer support.The theme is some buldings surounded by big walls.For 1996 standards it was really funhttps://www.doomworld.com/idgames/levels/doom2/deathmatch/a-c/ctlruins

This seems fun, i'll bite.

Following maps either played with GZDoom (on strict compatibility settings) or Eternity Engine, pistol starts, Ultra-violence.

Day 1

EXTRAMAP Finished - 2019

tl;dr: Not exactly terrible but definitely boring and not noteworthy in the slightest.

STONEHENGE - 2012

Don't even bother with this one. Trash.

The Chamber of Chaos - 2005

Maybe decent for 2005 standards?? A lot of effort put into it but still not very fun.

Judas Priest shooting all of them!! - 2003

Actually fun, go play it if you've got 10 minutes to spare and like maps comparable in difficulty to the first half of Scythe.

Interception - 2013

MAP01:

Pretty fun first map to a megawad, i really liked the exit in particular.

MAP02:

Barons made fun, 10/10.

MAP03:

Unmemorable but fun.

Aaaaand i think that's it for me today. This was surprisingly fun (even for the weirder first few i've played) and i'll be looking forward to doing it again today. I might finish Interception someday, i just don't have much patience for megawads nowadays...

Day 5 - Peppermint Cookie (2020). Played in GZDoom, UV - later changed to ITYTD difficulty.

And here we are with the carnage of day 5. At the christmas of 2020, a hellspawn was born, in the shape of a peppermint cookie. 

Unfortunately, the cookie wasn't sweet. No. It has a strong, sour meat flavor that never ends. 

The map starts with a "calm before the storm" moment where the keys are scattered around the map. Then........death appears before your eyes. More than 500 monsters surrounds you and, the numbers increases rapidly due of the lethal, agitated revenant army. You only have a BFG to counter this monstruosity of army and three switches at each corner of the square-shaped map to progress. The strategy is simple. Reduce the amount of monsters as much as possible to get those switches activated and get the hell out of that map.

The strategy to avoid damage is not that simple. The archviles are the ones that makes things MUCH harder due of their attacks and their resurrection ability. Make sure to kill them first. Pain elemental are just that....a pain in the ass to keep them alive while they keep spitting lost souls and make the map suffer with low framerate, bit by bit.

So yeah, this slaughter map is pretty straightforward that I can recommend to players that play in the lowest difficulty if you wanna have a chance. If you wanna try it in harder difficulties, go ahead. It has the same amount of monsters, no matter the difficulty and it might be almost impossible to beat it. Gonna keep looking for something random to day 6......................

Day 4

My adventure ends if I stop or I die. I don't review the wad where I die/quit.

Wad 1) chgcol11.zip by gerry browne (1995)

Little graphic mod which may be a bit useful for purist deathmatchers. I copy-paste the description.

"With two player deathmatches one of the players is green and the other grey. On most WADs this gives the grey player and advantage because grey is harder to see. This archive contains recolored player sprites to make all the players appear the same colour. I have only used it on two player modem games but three and four player games will have the same effect."

Wad 2) Forgotten Place by Christopher Emirzian (Udderdude) (2007)

Well, this is a really long level. I took 47 minutes to complete it but I had a good time.

You have to explore a large brown fortress lost in a sort of forest of dead trees.We are introduced to this dark universe from the beginning, starting outside in areas without monsters.

However, contrary to its appearance, the level is full of monsters. I could say that the gameplay is similar to a HR2 or Alien Vendetta map, with lots of narrow spaces full of monsters and where the SSG is our main weapon.

There are plenty of rooms to explore and the close-quarters combats were fun for me, although ammo tends to be a bit scarce at times. My main complaint about this map is that the progression relies a lot on switch-hunt with metal bars to lower. It gets confusing in the long run and it's sometimes hard to know what you've activated.

The level contains some new textures and sounds that are discreetly inserted into the map. This map uses the music of Doom' E1M3. I like this track and it definitely adds a suspenseful mood. However I would like to hear something more mystic.

Wad 3) SLUGFEST.WAD by Shamus Young (1995)

Funny anecdote, yesterday while watching the DSDA twitch channel, I saw a demo of memfis on map 02 of this wad and strangely enough I came across this one while doing random file!

In any case it's a good find. Indeed, Slugfest is an episode of 10 maps which have the particularity to be small and compact, but non-linear. Most of them consist in finding three keys in a non-established order.

The levels have a fantastic gameplay and layout. Aesthetically, it is above average compared to other wads released at the time. I absolutely love the blue sky and the mix of textures is particularly interesting in some places such as the fairly heavy use of beige brick in some levels. 

If I could compare this wad to wads of today, they would be levels made by James Paddock.

However, expect an array of cheesy sounds and facing the mapper's head as the final boss! The 90's oblige.

Wad 4) WinDEU for Beginners: A Pictorial Guide (Microsoft Word Document) by John W. Anderson (aka Dr Sleep) (2004)

The famous mapper Dr Sleep wrote a very detailed guide to learn you how to make doom maps with WinDEU. Very useful guide except if you are a healthy-minded who uses GZdoombuilder.

All kidding aside, the guide contains mapping tips that can be applied to all software, such as explanations of the types of actions for linedefs. Keep it in a corner.

I got crushed in the beginner mapset Don't care, make one up for yourself :) map 05.

Here's another one. It's called Ratzepimmel's World, it's from 1996, the author is 'Jan "Ratzepimmel" Mehler' and apparently it comes from the subsection of early doom efforts centered around slotting in pornographic content into maps. Modding a game was not only a novelty in itself in 1996, putting custom content in a 3d engine was double novel -- a powerful tool for materializing and immersing oneself in one's desires. As Frankie would put it, a Pleasuredome, heh.

We can look at Second Life or VR Chat for the continuation of this tangent of expressing sexuality and lust through immersive 3d experience, and it has been a continuous tangent, historically. 3d immersive space, first person embodiment and sensuality. This wad in particular may be gross and sophomoric but I think I'll resist the moralizing and just look at it like a little bit of cyberpunk-anthropology. How did this happen and what does it mean? 

OBVIOUSLY NOT SAFE FOR WORK YOUTUBE LINK BELOW
 

The map itself is bare-bones to the point where there's no exit at all, and most of the encounters are just there to complicate a deathmatch setup. However it'd be a mistake to assume that the author (a 16 year old punk rock kid by his own admission in the text file) didn't care about their map, as said text file also reads:

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*          This is a new version of my Porndoom-file                  *
*  It containes one new graphik (the coolest I have got) and   *
*  I changed a little bit the map (mainly allignment-repairs)    *

So the clearly German-speaking author cared enough to find his 'coolest graphik' and update his map and do 'allignment-repairs'.

The fairly random encounters in the map serve only to delay reaching the porn, in essence. Furthermore pay attention to the weird central midtexture teleporter maze room that I theorize was what the author started doing before they decided to devolve the map into a smut gallery. The combination of these vestigial little teleporter puzzles and semi-constructed fights all serve the function of a strange sort of 'pleasure delay' for the person that downloads this hoping to see 3d textures of pornography. There is a different version of any such porn wad where you load it up and immediately are in a room full of smut, is what I'm saying. This is why I decided to post these thoughts about this one, because of the interesting (and probably unintentional) transitional quality of this map from a deathmatch arena by a 16 year old to a "I'm gonna shock my friends on irc with porn in doom" ambition that probably arose from the frustration of actually completing a competent deathmatch arena. This transitional quality is interesting to me because it is very revealing of the psychology of the doom player and mapper of that age, of that time and internet circumstance. 

At 0:00 we see two textured signs welcoming us Ratz's world, and his well wishes for a painful death. At this point I am sure the author wasn't intending to make a pornowad. But how revealing is it that we do, indeed, step into his 16 year old libidinal reality, anyway? This isn't the sort of thing you would ever get to experience playing any commercial game, fps or otherwise. The uncensored creativity of a young person, no matter how unplayable or gross the result, is there, on the idgames archive, preserved for posterity 25 years later. Also, welcome to a painful death? Eros, thanatos, a release all the same. Oh, well.

00:35 German punk rock band 'Germ Attack', formed in 1992, is blessed with making an appearance in this 1995 pornowad. Angry red ms paint anarchy alphas line the walls. A purely decorative chainsaw in the corner. Already we are veering out of the space of 'deathmatch arena' and more into the 'hi, welcome to my cyberden' realm of early internet self expression through architecture, arrangement of symbolic elements, etc. A space that would be colonized thoroughly, later, by a plethora of games selling you virtual couches to put in your virtual room online and have other people come visit. 

This opening room has a very punk rock feeling not just because of the germ attack and anarchy alphas. The central teleporter jail, the burning barrels, the texture selection, I think Ratz was actually expressing himself, here, fairly successfully, in the context of age, means and technology available. 

2:13 I'm not sure I'm supposed to jump over the burning barrel (in 1996, no less) but I see no other path forward, plus fuck the rules, this is punk rock 

2:24 We break out in a symmetrical deathmatch arena kind of room with Nightmare on Elm Street and Hellraiser posters up on the wall. The amalgamation of "some of my favorite things" and deathmatch arena continues. I wonder through such rooms and think, did kids that are now 50 years old zoom around with rocket launchers in this virtual space, really? I'm doing some haunted archeology in this long-abandoned deathmatch playroom, but also in a long-abandoned virtual home for an edgy teenager from 1996. 

2:45 This room with loads of enemies in it just looks like an early mapper experiment more than anything functional or relative to the deathmatch concept. It does have, however, the curious effect of feeling like a stacked waiting room before you get to the porn. Certain things line up by accident if you're a human making human things, it doesn't have to be by intention, it is because of libidinal volition. We are about to experience a drastic shift of focus from "check out my favorite horror movie posters and my music collection" to "check out this crusty porno mag I found in the woods". As odd as it may appear, if we leave aside the moralization or cringe element of this, we are basically hanging out with this Ratz kid, back in 1996. The invitation is eternal.

3:08 We HAVE to get invulnerability before we go into the room with the bonemen and the cyber, and now this is where I have to note this cascade of events leads us to a cramped cyberdemon fight with a lady frozen masturbating right on the periphery of our vision in a room that could only be described as menstrual bloodfalls. I find it so curious and fascinating that to get to this Ratz gave us invulnerability, as if to hype us up for the moment? To make sure we are bounced around by the cyber harmlessly as we're trying to look at the smut? To make us feel literally invincible and superheroic before we are about to in a virtual sense get sexual with a lady? To immunize us from the lady cooties? There's many ways to read this libidinal sequence, and it's also quite fascinating that to get to this room you stumble through fake walls while chaingunners pepper you futilely. It is a confused, dangerous, exhilarating, stumbling mess of a transition. Much, I would imagine as Ratz's conception of what sexual experience at that age.

3:16 I enter the vulva. Of course there's a fuckin' archvile in the porn room. 

The smut on the walls we will discuss a bit later. The interesting experience worth talking about here is how it feels to be surrounded by pieces of pornography you barely have any time to look at while a cyberdemon steps in this 'room of shame' to hound you. This is not a guilt-free room, for Ratz, otherwise there wouldn't be an archie and a cyber to reprimand you for your vices. Not as punk rock as Ratz thought he'd be when it comes right down to it. I am thinking of a german 16 yeard old punk kid with his tiny red mohawk blushing as I actually do look at the crusty porno mag he found in the woods.

4:02 I will forever be haunted by this emergent collage of lady plus dog plus cyberdemon. A curse is cast upon me upon death. Ratz had his way with my vulnerable psyche, in the end. All I can do to fight the curse is >resurrect and return to my defense-as-analysis of this cultural artifact, thank you very much.

4:38 To exit the porn room you have to steadfastly enter the bestiality image. Ratz wants you to embrace the sordid element of his presentation, not even just to acknowledge it. Surrounding that image are much more tame depictions of nudity, closeups of genitals, lesbian love, oral sex etc. The bestiality picture (which I presume is one Ratz added to this in his  exciting update of this work) sticks out from the rest as on both a different realm of perversion/legality: the centerpiece of the shock value of the map. This is why I think this map has no exit, because all you can do is loop back from the bestiality picture to Ratz's living room with the horror movie posters. The juvenile equivalent of seeing something too terrible in the porno mag, closing it to avoid psyche damage (futilely) and having a laugh with your friend before putting on the Black Sabbath again or going downstairs to watch a movie. Only to later, sneak back up and burn your retinas, again on this media transgression you found. So, these things exist in the world as well. People do this. How do I feel about this? Let's put it in a doom wad and find out through how other people feel about it.

You can stop watching the video at this point nothing much of interest happens until I select a picture and pull out my phallic rocket launcher and explode myself all over it (apropos to everything) to end the video. 


Final thoughts: 

There is a layer of discomfort here beyond the obvious cringe of a teenaged boy showing us his virtual porno mag in doom. I think it has to do with that you're killing and fighting and shooting guns all around the depictions of flesh and sex. I noticed (though, obviously, a GZDoom artifact) the burnt marks on the walls from the plasma rifle over genitalia and it gave me pause. Even back in 1996 without any decals of the like, I am sure the concept is to shoot at these images with your penile paraphernalia. In any case, as uncomfortable as all this is to look at straight-on, it is also an interesting and definitely existent part of the culture of modding, of being boys on the internet, of doom in particular. 

The community has moved to more constructive pursuits as the median age of a mapper has crossed well into the third decade, and I am sure a lot of people look at the gradual minimization of this sort of lurid juvenelia  as a welcome relief, but to understand ourselves and our culture and history it's good to remember all of our aspects and sides, not just the favorable ones. And this was definitely a kind of thing you saw for a while in the doom sphere. There is certainly something visceral about first person experience in doom, and visceral experience and lasciviousness ultimately meet. If there is something to take forward from thinking about an old, haunted wad from 1996 isn't that this stuff has no place in a game, but that if it inevitably will manifest, we should be brave and honest about what it means and how it can be used. The current that continues from the then to the new is the 'boy energy' that doom mapping, to this day is mostly about, and for. It may not be smut, but it's quite hardcore punishing challenge maps for the brave hero to overcome against all odds, etc the other side of the power fantasy that is embarassingly revealed in wads like this one. I would wander how this 1996 wad would look if a queer kid wanted to use the space to express their manifesting desires, or how it would look if *ghasp* a woman made it. Would it still have closeups of genitalia to shoot at with your rocket launcher? 

Anyway, this was Ratzepimmel's World! The next one just a doom level to kill some monsters in and have fun, I swear.