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The Ultimate DooMer

The /newstuff Chronicles #133

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It seems like ages since I last did this (which is probably because it's true). I've come back at the right time though, as there's a half-century (!) of maps, including old, new, big, small, easy, hard, Heretic and JDoom. Oh, and that community megawad that took 8 months and spawned the biggest ever thread (not to mention 1200+ posts) has decided to hit the cyber-streets. So, without further ado, open the chest and enjoy the treasure...

  • SargeBaldy's Speedmapping Compilation #9 by Various Artists
    225kb - doom2.exe - SP - (img) (img) (img)
    This appeared last week but was not (properly) reviewed, so here it is in full. The theme was to build a map taking place somewhere in the trashiest part of a town. This could be something like a junkyard, an abandoned run-down factory, somewhere with a lot of alleyways, etc. 5 maps to show for it, and they're the best speedmaps I've seen yet. Map 01 isn't up to too much, but map 02 is impressive - it even has a 3D bridge in it! Map 03 is also good looking, map 04 is made up of city blocks and map 05 is authentically dingy as well as detailed. There's also some good gameplay on offer too - while the first map is fairly straightforward, the next two are a bit tougher, map 04 plays like a dream (quite literally a speedmap) and map 05 also plays well. However, you'll need to be pretty good and tactically aware to clear the last two with 100% kills. These maps are fun, and well worth the 100 minutes work that went into each one.

  • Dis 2000 by pagb666
    125kb - doom2.exe - SP - (img)
    This also appeared last week but was not reviewed at all, so here it is now. This was meant to be map 24 of the dead/alive/maybe/not Hell Revealed 2 - cue monster tonnage, insane fights and all the usual challenges (see screenie). While not as extreme as some of the HR maps, it certainly packs a challenge right from the word go. You'll need to be quick and agile as well as accurate, given the ammo and health are balanced pretty finely until the final fight. If you're a HR fan, you'll enjoy this, if not, you'll probably not (unless you cheat).

  • The Crypts by Robert Eckhardt (Ichor) and DoomBoy
    255kb - heretic.exe - SP - (img)
    OMG, a Heretic map! This is a remake of E1M7, and is somewhat larger than the original. The detail is in the classic Heretic style, and is quite good despite the fact it was built to vanilla limits. The addition of a few Hexen 2 textures adds to it as well. Gameplay wise, there's certainly plenty of monsters to magic to death, with a good ammo balance and E1 weapons only to keep it authentic. There is plenty of health, but don't get complacent as some areas of the map are fairly challenging, despite the presence of E1 monsters only. If you're a Heretic fan then definitely play this, if not then play it anyway - you never know, you might become one. Source port required if you want to save game (tested with ZDoom 2.0 v47).

  • Poetic Doom by Andrew Hunt (TeamKill)
    6200kb - JDoom - SP - (img) (img)
    OMG a JDoom map! More precisely, a group of maps, replacing E1M1-3. Although I don't really understand the point of these maps, as they're tiny and have no monsters whatsoever. Supposedly a form of poetry (see text file), but you'd have to be into art and poetry (or studying them at school/college) to understand. Weirdest idea for a map ever, though.

  • The Wicked and the Damned by Rex Claussen
    120kb - doom2.exe - SP - (img)
    An industrial/tech map with an interesting concept - there's no monsters around to begin with. Instead you wander through the base until you find the power switch - and then the monsters appear. And then more appear as you complete each puzzle, until you reach the exit. The map is impressively detailed, and there's enough ammo and health to go round, but IMO this map is a bit easy. The neat concept has been somewhat under-used by a low monster count of 83 (most of which are weak monsters) - at least 2 times below what would have made the idea reach it's potential, given the deathmatch-friendly layout and the potential battles possible. A good map, but IMO more (and tougher) monsters would have made it better.

  • Perdition's Gate by Alex Mayberry
    665kb - doom2.exe - SP/DM - (img) (img) (img)
    Another one of those old legal/illegal/commercial/freeware wads that appears in the archives, this is a 6 map wad with some decidedly offbeat music. The maps are medium/large, have seemingly random themes/texturing and aren't that detailed, although there are some neat features and lighting effects here and there. There's a fair spread of monsters, but with too much ammo and particularly invincibility powerups (this is a fine example of how not to place them). This is a mid-90's wad though, so (like the Lost Episodes) it appears to be aimed at lesser skilled Doomers (hence the excess ammo and invincibilities), despite some of the tougher battles. Nostalgia hunters will enjoy this, but on the whole it's nothing special.

  • The big, bad 'n' ugly one by Dennis Meuwissen (Exl)
    62kb - doom2.exe - DM - (img)
    A big, bad 'n' ugly deathmatch map. Well, it's not that ugly, as some parts of this map look quite nice - in fact there's only one area which is a bit bare. The theme is gothic, but there's a fair variety of texturing for this theme, and overall it's not bad in the looks department. Weaponry is limited to chainsaws, supers and rockets, with plenty of blue armour, a supercharge, a few meds and a small string of potions to keep you alive. Given that the areas are in general quite open, expect a high-speed battle with plenty of wild aiming and dancing (and fragging). Good map.

  • Community Chest by Various Artists
    4360kb - Boom/ZDoom - SP/CO/DM - (img) (img) (img) (img) (img) (img)
    Well, here it is - the Doomworld community megawad, headed up by Cadman of TeamTNT. 17 mappers (including myself) have made maps for this project (many of whom are up-and-coming mappers), and the quality shows throughout. There's something for everyone here - early/mid/late id, industrial, tech, city, gothic, hellish etc. but no particular theme dominates. All of the maps are good looking, some impressively so (and map 29 is an extraordinary feat of Doom engineering). The gameplay is hard - only a handful of maps are easy, so skill 4 is only recommended for the skilled Doomer. The health balance varies from map to map, but the big surprise is that, for a megawad of this kind, the ammo balance is extremely good - not too much and not too little (despite the varying ammo balances in each map), although get your chainsaw practice in for the later maps, and the more ammo you conserve throughout, the more chance you will have in map 29 (which, if you haven't guessed, is a huge challenge). The only possible downers are that some of the maps may be familiar, some might seem out of position (theme-wise) and certain maps may seem impossible to some Doomers (note: if using ZDoom, turn wall running on for map 29). But aside from that, this is a must-have, as it's an impressive, diverse and challenging collection of maps that should be the wad of the year so far.

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FP!

The Wicked and the Damned was definetely something else. The atmosphere was great, especially since none of the switches work at first. One of the best single-level wads I've played in a while. Too bad it's so short.

Edit: I still cant figure out how map29 of community chest is even remotely beatable. Also, was map10 inspired by Doom64?

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...and props to all logged in trolls!

thanks for rereviewing speedmapping, that last version was pretty weak. and why is perdition's gate filesize listed as 665k, when it's actually 666k?

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The Ultimate DooMer said:

Perdition's Gate ... Another one of those old legal/illegal/commercial/freeware wads

I don't understand this comment, unless you're confusing it with the (later) commercial megawad of the same name. This is just a standard pwad that was made available originally at CompuServe, but not the cdrom.com archive.

I think it's pretty good. Those invulnerabilities help a lot if you play it on Nightmare, BTW.

One interesting point: the author, Alex Mayberry is now a fairly big noise in the gaming industry.

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zdoom 2.0 can play back demos from previous versions (I believe demo playback problems were fixed back around version 36 (up to 47 now), so if you have a version newer than 45 it can play the demo included in the wicked and the damned zip :)

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Grogglogobofink said:

why is perdition's gate filesize listed as 665k, when it's actually 666k?

Presumably he's rounded it down: it's 665.98 k.

Or maybe Fredrik would point out that it is really 665.98 kibibytes, or 681.97 kilobytes.

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Assmaster said:

Edit: I still cant figure out how map29 of community chest is even remotely beatable. Also, was map10 inspired by Doom64?

Most likely, since Kaiser (Deathman) designed it and he's a big Doom64 fan. At least, he's a big part of the Doom64 TC that they're making.

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Is it just me or am I the only one who thought that Pagb666 had disappeared!? I had no idea he still made levels... Well, it's cool if he's back, and I'm not cool if he was never away! I remember Pagbspd2 as being one awesome zDoom level from waaay back...

BTW:

for(int i = 1; i > 0; i++)
{
System.out.println("I suck!");
}

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Didn't Alex Mayberry do a lot of work with Eternal Doom?

Oh, and Perdition's Gate - someone finished the megawad and then released it as Doom3.wad. The same person, I believe, did a second megawad called Doom4.wad. Both of them are very, very hard to find, and although I once had both of them, somehow they were deleted and now it's impossible to find them because of the real Doom 3 alpha. It's a shame, since illegal though they were, they were both very good megawads.

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eternal.txt says
Map01 Genesis Alex Mayberry
Map06 Pathos Alex Mayberry
Producer, Assistant Graphic Artist, Play-tester, Level Designer

community chest is pretty damn good. there are some pretty wild ideas and some great gameplay in there. Map 29 is just crazy.

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Grogglogobofink said:

...and props to all logged in trolls!

thanks for rereviewing speedmapping, that last version was pretty weak. and why is perdition's gate filesize listed as 665k, when it's actually 666k?


I'm getting the filesizes off my PC, rather than off the archives. (and it says 665)

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Archvile46 said:

Oh, and Perdition's Gate - someone finished the megawad and then released it as Doom3.wad. The same person, I believe, did a second megawad called Doom4.wad.

There are two Perdition's Gates. One is the 6-level wad by Alex Mayberry. The other is a commercial megawad by Wraith Software, and completely separate. A 11-level demo version can be found here. Wraith Corporation themselves completed it - the 32-level wad was commercially available, and now is indeed hard to find.

I haven't seen these files Doom3.wad and Doom4.wad, but understand from other people (myk, IIRC) that they were warez copies of Perdition's Gate (the 32-level one, not the one in this week's newstuff) and Hell2Pay (another 32-level megawad by Wraith Corporation) that this guy passed off as (at least in part) his own creation.

BTW, this "Doom3.wad" should not be confused with the one that is part of Legacy, nor a pwad by Tom "Timon" Grieve from 1995 called Doom3 (I've got a copy of that with the filename doom3v1b).

Regarding the "offbeat" music in Mayberry's Perdition's Gate, 5 of the tunes were by Bob Reganess - I think he made them originally for a wad of his own called Aboocean (a fairly cutesie affair, set on a tropical island, with seagulls, former humans wearing shorts, etc.), for which the music seemed a bit more appropriate.

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Was dis2000 not reviewed before? Can't remember it but I did have it already on my hd. Couldn't run it with prboom(grouplines:groupsector part of a no sector) or legacy. Zdoom (2) could run it.

This appeared last week but was not (properly) reviewed, so here it is in full.

and

Well, here it is - the Doomworld community megawad, headed up by Cadman of TeamTNT. 17 mappers (including myself) have made maps for this project (many of whom are up-and-coming mappers), and the quality shows throughout

Long live Pandora, Fuck the rules!


But I'm supposed to be gratefull and with reviews like yours that ain't hard.

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Heh, I didn't dissappear, I visit this place often, but don't build stuff anymore. I just decided to release the map when I saw it looking for another stuff with windows file search, as it was almost done. I might release some other stuff... maybe, but it would require some real work :) pagbspd2 is my favourite map, I'm happy your liked it, a lot of effort was put into it.

Yes, I don't know what happened to the map, the original thing worked fine with any port, even vanilla doom2, but this one messes up every source port except zdoom. I think it was wadauthor when it gave an 'out of memory' error while building its nodes (how ironic... I have 1024 ram). I'll try to fix it, my first attempt with bsp30 turned out to 'Vertex in linedef 1 is out of range', any suggestions? Try it with ZDooM, it runs fine.

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"This appeared last week but was not (properly) reviewed"

"This also appeared last week but was not reviewed at all, so here it is now."

Strangely, I get this faint impression every week like you're trying to insult the last reviewer.
Anyway, I really liked your reviews this week. Keep up the great work.

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One of the best Speedmapping compilations so far I think. Perhaps not in size, but in quality and lack of pure, dripping mockery.

Community Chest is also fantastic, but I have yet to play through all of it. I've been sorta skipping around the maps, since it's possible to technically play them from a pistol start, or so I've heard.

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c-cooper said:

for(int i = 0; i > 0; i++)
{
System.out.println("I suck!);
}


syntax error! (you forgot to close quotes)

also that'll never execute since initially i is 0, which is not greater than 0, so it'll just entirely skip the loop :P

if you want infinite looping it's easier to just to do:

while(1) cout << "I suck!\n";

(excuse my C++ hehe)

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Whoops! Well, it's because I suck, I guess.... I'll admit it, i = 0 should have been i = 1 and forgetting the " is just plain stupid! I suck so much! ....at programming!

Edit: Now I don't suck any more! I fixed it!! Heh!! .....wait....ehhh...

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Assmaster said:

FP!

Also, was map10 inspired by Doom64?



Actually that map was inspired by Evilution map18

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Seemed like a bit more doom64 than ev18 with the starting area, but I see the similarities... the red key barriers being designed similarly to the ev18 yellow key. The room structure after the blue door also seemed like a direct inspiration of the 64 map..

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I enjoyed the Wicked and the Damned. Good map, nice original feel. I cooped a large chunk of the Community Chest wad with Lüt and found it good visually, but only average for gameplay, at least in coop.

Assmaster's cookie;

cookie2.gif

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Hyena said:

Strangely, I get this faint impression every week like you're trying to insult the last reviewer.


Nope - I reviewed those 2 wads because deathz0r didn't review the speedmaps properly, giving the excuse that he gets too many of them (in other words he didn't want to review it), which not a good reason not to review it, and dis2000 had just been released onto the archives (despite it's age), so he was wrong not to review that.

There's a difference between old wads getting updates/rereleases (which I would only review if I'd not played it before, otherwise I'd give it a quick mention and a link to the original review if possible) and old wads that have just been uploaded to the archives for the first time (even if they've been released elsewhere first).

After all, aren't the reviews based on what is uploaded to the archives?

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pritch said:

Assmaster's cookie;

See? If you don't give props you only get a small cookie.

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pagb said:

Heh, I didn't dissappear, I visit this place often, but don't build stuff anymore. I just decided to release the map when I saw it looking for another stuff with windows file search, as it was almost done. I might release some other stuff... maybe, but it would require some real work :) pagbspd2 is my favourite map, I'm happy your liked it, a lot of effort was put into it.


Ahh, I see. Well, I am glad you're still around, and I believe I did a review of Pagbspd2 back when I started The DooMer's RecesS... I think that's why I remember it so good.

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I really liked Wicked_6, loved the unique progression where you start at the exit, walk through most of the level and then play "backwards" from there :) Great job, ReX!

IMO, the number of monsters in the level is just right, any more would have cluttered up the map and spoiled the more moodier atmosphere. The Doom 2 "City" sky suits the level very well also, not many maps I've played use it specifically (but I think the Wicked_* maps all do?).

Just after I downloaded the map I was a bit disappointed that I couldn't watch the included demo (I think I went directly from ZDoom 2.0 b43 to 46, then to 47), but after reading Cyb's post I'm off to watch it. Thanks Cyb :)

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pritch said:

I cooped a large chunk of the Community Chest wad with Lüt and found it good visually, but only average for gameplay, at least in coop.

Heh, that's because we had no idea what we were doing. I think it would be fun going over the maps a few more times now that we have most of them figured out.

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Great reviews this week, much better than the pile of crap (the review, not the WADs) that was last week's /newstuff.
Favorite is definitely the Community Chest Project. Glad to see that got released. Good work.

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