Hell Frontier. WIP megawad for Doom 2. [Development thread: Episode 3 progress 7/???] - New MAP30 (update 17.03.2024)

Another update following coversation with @Keyboard_Doomer to fascilitate better multiplayer experience on MAP05

The wad now also contains text screen music borrowed from Strife, but it's a little inconsistent in different ports so I might replace it once again in the future.

Thanks for the fixes.

What was also discussed is that we are going the play the wad on Thursday Night Survival today.

The session starts 3 hours from the time of this post and you can expect it to be fairly active for at least a few hours.

Just so you know, after the survival session I got confident enough to take this wad to idgames. If I did things right, it will soon be there.

The only change from the last beta is removing wrongly placed tag that caused a random piece of ground go down whenever a lift in called on MAP06.

We on id games now. Post had been updated.

The work on episode 2 will commence soon, after I finish some speedmapping obligations (Most likely).

Will probably post maps in batches and not one by one.

Great work on first episode! Good gameplay all around, nice clash of modern and classic styles of Doom maps. I look forward to the other episodes. One thing to note, only 5/7 secrets possible on MAP08 because sectors 305 and 240 aren't reachable.

Oh wow, I was certain I have untagged this. Must've been one of the changes eaten by computer crash.This is what I get for not checking my stats regularly.

So, I'm back to doing this. And this is the early version of MAP12, the first map of the second episode: Avernus Anenna Array (Title is a subject to change)

As with the rest of the wad, this map is in Doom 2 limit-removing format (As in, I didn't bother to make it vanilla compatible, but it might well be)

It's in MAP12 slot, wad includes the new sky, but is not meant to be loaded together with episode 1 (I didn't move the episode 1 sky in).

Hey ViolentBeetle, even though I think I know the answer, I just want to be 110% overly sure: Regarding Episode 1 on idgames, other than occasionally surpassing some old crusty limits like VPOs, are they all pure "vanilla limit removing"? I just want to be sure, this is a really good wad and I'd like to include it in the Big Vanilla Wad Pack if that's alright with you.

1 hour ago, Doomkid said:

Hey ViolentBeetle, even though I think I know the answer, I just want to be 110% overly sure: Regarding Episode 1 on idgames, other than occasionally surpassing some old crusty limits like VPOs, are they all pure "vanilla limit removing"? I just want to be sure, this is a really good wad and I'd like to include it in the Big Vanilla Wad Pack if that's alright with you.

I only used Doom 2 actions, and didn't dehack anything other than texts.

The only possible issue is that I used a single 1024-wide patch for the sky, it works on Crispy and PrBoom but I haven't tried anything else.

And, of course, I'm fine with including it in any pack.

Hey this project is not dead yet. To commemorate the Halloween 2021, I have finally gotten myself together and made MAP18: Wages of Sin. Archive attached contains both it and MAP12 for good measure.

I forgot difficulty levels. Probably will add them tomorrow.

HFRONTE2_DEV.7z

I have replaced the file. Now MAP18 has difficulty, cyberdemon should teleport correctly at the final fight and blood maze doesn't teleport player anymore, because it's annoying.

MAP14: Dis Topia is now in. This is something of a new territory for me, since I consciously avoided ever truly preventing backtracking. The map is also quite large (For me), boasting nearly 300 monsters on UV.

The wad contains slightly updated versions of MAP12 and MAP18 as well. The latter has its already bugged final fight removed entirely and fixed cacodemon leakage to final arena.

Big oopsie, MAP14 had its door lines accidentally reversed making map unplayable. Fixed now along with extra pickups for easy mode.

HFRONTE2_20211125_2.zip

A series of small tweaks for map, uploading because I requested a playthrough, not really necessary to re-download.

HFRONTE2_20211207.zip

Prolly shouldn't have played this before supper haha. I got distracted in vid and made some horrendous mistakes but got er done 

Well constructed and fights planned out well. It was fun figuring out how to solve each fight - made me think & kept me on my toes -- VERY engaging gameplay and at the end I was all ramped up for more before I realized it was over. Gets ya amped up

Hopefully I can focus better next time - looked and played good - good times 

cool map - not as hard as last one I thought but longer - good times - I kept avoiding yellow key area and wish I didn't it was loaded with resources - sky was awesome hey - engaging gameplay  fun fun

3 hours ago, Clippy said:

cool map - not as hard as last one I thought but longer - good times - I kept avoiding yellow key area and wish I didn't it was loaded with resources - sky was awesome hey - engaging gameplay  fun fun

 

 

Thanks for playing. Big oof for the poor window.

There used to be secret on the revenant tower but there's also another secret requiring ledge walk, so I felt it would be redundant.

@ViolentBeetle I wasn't doing too too bad ... then that maze room happened ... yikes - hope vid is helpful lol

15 hours ago, Clippy said:

hope vid is helpful lol

The important takeaway is to add more recovery items to the maze, probably.

Uploading an update for testing's sake, no new maps this week.

HFRONTE2_DEV_20220108.zip

Looks like it's time for a new map. This time it's MAP13: Dead Reckoning.

Don't mind the (relatively) high monster count, it's actually pretty short.

Wasn't my favourite map to make, but it worked well enough in the end. Might be rebalanced in the future.

Difficulty implemented through removal of fraction of monsters.

HFRONTE2_DEV_20220113.zip

Really fun map I had a great time. There was a suspicious revenant in this one 

21 minutes ago, Clippy said:

There was a suspicious revenant in this one 

Yeah, that's mighty weird. I wonder what happened with the last two though. They were supposed to teleport in when you use the blue switch, but they didn't, even though they were fully active. Wonder if it's some weird port issue.

6 minutes ago, ViolentBeetle said:

Yeah, that's mighty weird. I wonder what happened with the last two though. They were supposed to teleport in when you use the blue switch, but they didn't, even though they were fully active. Wonder if it's some weird port issue.

No clue buddy - hope u figure it out 

I thought they were in the missed secret 

That hitscan part was chaos lol 

I like it a lot good times. I'll keep my eye on this place

An update on MAP13. Main changes

• Immortal hell knights are now an immortal mancubus
• Less health behind red door, rewarding player for saving health - soul sphere should be enough to do the fight
• Fixed a pair of revenants not teleporting on gzDoom
• Some changes to lower difficulties

(Obsolete)

Uploading a new version because I want to request another playthrough, there's no major changes but some rebalancing.

HFRONTE2_DEV_20220201.zip

New update, new map!

This time it's MAP17: Brimstown

There may or may not be some polishing in other maps, but nothing major.

HFRONTE2_20220429_2.7z

I screwed up monster closets. I had to re-upload.

Gave it a try but didn't bring my A game. Well crafted map with top notch enemy placement - kicked my butt lol but was fun. Your maps are always awesome. @sandwedge joined me on this one. Good times 

Devious map lol in a good way