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Mordeth

The /newstuff Chronicles #242

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Grettings Ladies and Gentlemen! It is I, Kaiser, who will be your host for this weeks Newstuff! There are quite a few interesting wads, a few 1994 wads, and a few borked wads! So sit back and enjoy this weeks newstuff. Btw, my grammar sucks. Sue me >:(

  • ABATTOIR - Zen Psychosis (Wayne Conner)
    doom2.exe - Deathmatch - 8.49kbs - (img) (img)
    First wad I come across is a simple deathmatch wad for Doom2. Since this is a 1994 wad, I figure that this isn't going to be a masterpiece, but I figured that it can't be that bad.Well, I was wrong..this is pretty bad. For a deathmatch map, you figured that there would be at least some room to dodge your opponent. Just about every room is extremly dark and cramped, making it frustrating to navigate, not to mention there's a un-escapable nukage pit that you can easily fall into.There are lots of barrels and other obsticles that will get in your way as well as funky texture placement. There is really not much you can do in this map, there are four hallways all linked into one small pitt filled with barons and other monsters. This map would make a good warmup map for dm'ers but with all the blocking things in the way and annoying dark corridors, this dm map is almost unplayable..

  • Altar of Evil - Dutch Devil
    ZDoom - Solo Play - 2.89mb - (img) (img) (img) (img) (img)
    This map is huge...VERY huge. There are lots of cool effects and other Zdoom gimmicks used in this map as well as new textures. I really love the design of this map, lots of detail and lots of lighting makes this a very atmospheric map. There isn't that much variance in the height level (no monsters on high pillars or ledges etc) and the map is very straightfoward with lots of switches that you must find to progress further.This is really a great looking map, however there are some flaws. This map has a lot of new enemies to fight with, and almost all of them shoot extremly fast projectiles, which requires very fast reflexes. Because of the odds to avoid them are pretty bad, this means that you will be needing health frequently..which is another thing, there is hardly any around. There are about 600+ monsters in this map, and there are no difficulty setting either, so you'll face the same amount of monsters on all skills. Another issue was the lack of ammo, I kept running out of ammo..a lot. Even when I was being accurate, I still found myself being forced to use the fist and chainsaw and at one point I was in a cramped room being forced to take on ten enemies at once and all I had was my fist (as shown in the last screenshot). I really recomend playing this on a easy-medium skill setting. This is a very well designed map with a good setting and atmosphere but it has questionable gameplay.

  • Phobos Control Center - DooMBoy
    doom.exe - Solo Play - 61.7 - (img) (img) (img)
    Another nice map by Doomboy ^_^This is a e1-ish map based on E1M9 and I must say that its quite enjoyable. Detail is on par with the E1 design and the layout is pretty straightfoward. At the beginning I started to have a problem with ammo (maybe I just suck..) but after picking up the yellow key, ammo wasn't a problem. There are a few secrets here and there and the difficulty is pretty average, not too hard and not too easy. For those who love E1 designed maps, I really recomend to give this one a try. This is also a good map for speedrun demos too.

  • Digital Deceit - Rory Habich "Roerei"
    Limit Removing - Solo Play - 231kb - (img) (img) (img) (img) (img)
    A tech base themed map for Doom1 e4m1 with lots of large and open areas. The design is really great and is very non-linear (you'll be using the automap frequently) and the health and ammo balance is very well done. But there are two things that completly spolied the map: very noticable mis-aligned textures and a SR lift with no tag. Because of this, I had to noclip my way past that part. There are WAY too many misaligned textures (mostly on computer panels) and most of them could easily been spotted during testing.. but it kinda seems like this map was made in a hurry.After the noclip part I enjoyed the map from there, there are a lot of large outside areas with enemies attacking from all heights. This map will really keep you moving, but with badly misaligned textures and a broken lift/door this map needs improvment. I hope there will be an update to this map soon but other than these issues, this is a really good map.. not perfect but good.

  • AMANDA.WAD and AMANDA2.WAD - Chris Davais of Moon Man Software
    doom.exe - Solo Play - 56kb - (img) (img) (img) (img) (img)
    O_o

  • Demon House: Lost Warpgate - Ioan Chera
    doom.exe - Solo Play - 125kb - (img) (img) (img)
    This is the author's first ever released wad. Well, for a first wad it looked good, until I got slammed by a group of demons with no ammo whatsoever. By the time you get to the end, you only have your fists and three dehacked modified shotgun guys that shoot rockets. Not much I can say about this one, this map only lasts for a few minutes and the gameplay is really frustrating. But aren't all first time wads like that? Play with caution....

  • Confruntation with Otto - Ioan Chera
    doom.exe - Solo Play - 14.7 - (img) (img) (img)
    Another short and somewhat sweet map by the same author of e_dhouse. The design and texturing has really improved since e_dhouse and battles are much more balanced this time, but still a little difficult. This map won't last no more than 5 minutes and in the end, you face the spider mastermind with only a shotgun. This is a okay map, but nothing special...

  • Harmful Hospital - Jacek Illdo Dobrzyniecki
    doom2.exe - Solo Play - 39.2 - (img)
    I wanted to try out this map but it keeps crashing Eternity and Prboom due to a bad patch in a couple of textures.. bleh.

  • EGA Doom II - CheapAlert
    doom.exe - Solo Play - 1.98kb - (img)
    Uh.. its Doom with an EGA palette...Ouch..my eyes.

  • Insanely small - I'm me
    ZDoom - Solo Play - 11kb - (img) (img)
    Uh, if this is suppose to be a joke wad, then it fails at being funny. You start off in a super small room with a arachnotron, a mastermind and a romero head. Thats it. Avoid this at all cost.

  • Mean Mines - Jacek 'Illdo' Dobrzyniecki
    doom2.exe - Solo Play - 20.7 - (img) (img) (img)
    Brought to you by the same author of hospital.wad comes Mines3.wad. This is a nice little time waster with fast paced action. Though again very short, its actually kinda fun this time. Set in a mine with huge cavern areas and a outside area at the end. There's a few bugs here and there but nothing extremly awful. At least give this one a try.

  • Nuclear River - Unknown
    doom.exe - Deathmatch - 13.9
    A small dm map with lots of small rooms and a few big ones as well. Everything is surrounded by barrels and most of the floors are nukage. Something you would play for a minute then move on to something...No screenshot is included, the description pretty much describes it all..

  • OMG Weapons! (and Monsters) - Dean 'deathz0r' Joseph
    ZDoom - n/a - 410kb - (img) (img) (img) (img) (img) (img) (img)
    Its the moment we all been waiting for, omgwpns.wad is here! For those who don't know what the hell I am talking about, omgwpns.wad is a weapons mod.. but not like any other weapons mod.. This takes full advantage of Zdoom's declorate system, which means the weapons are 100% oringinal and customized. You get a total of 29 weapons (including the oringinal) all feature different attacks. One of my favorite weapons in omgwpn is FastFist and the MegaProtonCannon, I had a blast double-punching those imps to a pulp, and the MegaProtonCannon is more entertaining to watch than firing a BFG at a crowd of monsters. Included are monsters modifcations with numerous attacks (watch out for those damn rocket launching zombies!) including a massive Cacodemon that fires five fireballs. This is a great add-on for single player, cooperative, or even deathmatch and its highly recomended. This is a great addition to keep Doom more entertaining than ever.

  • Robocop weapons - Carlos Guariglia
    cDoom - n/a - 1.22mb
    This weapon modifcation is based on the moive, Robocop. This requires Cdoom 2.05, which I had problems getting the sound to work (stupid win2k). From what I saw it looks pretty interesting. The weapon sprites looks a bit awful and functions very similar to doom and most of the enemies are poorly modified. If you can run dos without a problem, give this a try.

  • Truax - SS-Bowen
    ZDoom - Solo Play - 5.35mb - (img) (img) (img) (img) (img) (img) (img)
    Truax is a map thats suppose to be for the Community Chest 3 project, but is now a stand alone wad. Set in a hellish temple with the Icon of Sin at the end, this map will really keep you on your toes. This is a very challanging map with lots to see including huge outdoor areas and lots of enemies to shoot at. Since this map is made for map30, I am guessing the author expects the player to be already beaten the previous maps in the CC3 project because right at the start, you're facing against a lot of strong enemies like Barons and Hell knights with just a mere pistol and shotgun. At the beginning it gets really difficult and monsters continues to pour though but becomes more easier once you start picking up more weapons. I really love the TNT map30 puzzle reference and the archvile room was really interesting and wicked. At the end you come across the Icon of Sin, from there you are slammed with a lot of demons and with one little slip up, you'll die instantly.. very challanging.Another good feature is the design, very large and open areas, giving you enough room to move around and dodge the demons. I really recomend starting on a medium skill, then play on Ultra Violence once you get familar with the map. This would of been a very nice 'final' map if the CC3 project is still kicking....

  • Underrated Angel v1.2 - Danimetal
    Legacy - Deathmatch - 181kb - (img) (img) (img)
    This is a nice small dm map with excellent connectivity. There are many hallways all connected to one large arena with various heights and pillars for cover. Weapon placement is pretty evenly spread as well as ammo. I am not much of a DM fan so there's nothing more to say about this. But its I recomend this for dm'ers.

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FP!

Dark Deceit is looking really good, so does Altar of Evil. Some nice weapons there from Deathz0r (behavior good, don't like the graphics, just me).

Good week, certainly better than last one.

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I feel quite attracted to play the Weapons and Monsters wad. Other than that, Truax seems and Altar of Evil will be the first wads I´ll play this week, the rest of them will come later.
Good reviews, nice screenshots and fairly long texts. Also, good that my wad good reviewed after getting lost last week.

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Nice to seem some effort put into the reviews for once.

I'd agree with Kaiser's review of Altar of Evil. I didn't run out of ammo until towards the end, when I had to run past a number of monsters. But i think a bit more ammo and health would have made it a little more enjoyable. I also don't think those overused decorate monsters add anything to the map either, and think it would have been much better if they had been used more sparingly. And why anybody would use stealth monsters is beyond me...

I personally wouldn't bother with Mean Mines, and I didn't think Phobos Control Centre was anything to get excited about. Digital Deceit was probably tested in Zdoom. I don't think I remember having any problems with a lift, and I don't recall any serious texture screw-ups in Zdoom. Thought the map was ok, I got a bit bored being stuck with the weaker weapons for so long, and the layout could have been a little less confusing (getting the blue key in particular).

Think I'll take a look at that CC3 map.

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Crap I suck at gameplay, gotta work on that skill a bit more.
Making an wad run smoothly isn't as easy as it seems, well for me that is :)
I know that the health and ammo ammount is a bit low, I tried to make this one harder than my last one.
Maybe I did used those decorate monsters too often, but I used no stealth monsters only translucent ones.
Or are these qualified as stealthy's also, good reviews and an good week also.

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Kaiser said:

Digital Deceit ... a SR lift with no tag. Because of this, I had to noclip my way past that part.

Ah, you must have the compatibility option "Linedef effects work with sector tag = 0" set to No. If it is set to Yes, then opening this door has the effect of lowering many sectors all over the map, opening up some interesting shortcut possibilities (you can get the blue key very quickly, for instance :p ). It's a nasty map bug either way of course, but much funnier this way.

Anyway, good reviews I thought. I'd still suggest having the reviews of rereleases/reuploads in their own section though.

dutch devill: If you want to toughen up the higher difficulty settings, I'd suggest more/bigger monsters, bigger battles and/or nastier ambushes. Starving the player of health or ammo isn't a good solution, even if there are some masochists among us who enjoy non-berserking demons (etc.) once in a while.

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OMG /KaiserStuff! Nice reviews. :D

Now I'll have some maps to play while I'm cooped up here in a hotel room.

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I love OMGWEAP.Wad but I do encounter problems with keys.

I tested the wad with Truax.wad and other than the fact I had to clip through the doors (due to ZDoom 2.0.96 x-2 key problems), this is one of my favorite map 30's. The Icon's face is a little weird though.

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There's also 2 doors in the Phobos Control Center that needs tags, but both are using 0 tags... Agh... Luckily that was in the end of the map, so I didn't miss much.

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Awesome reviews Kasier. Kick ass week, something that hasn't happened in a long time.

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Grazza said:

dutch devill: If you want to toughen up the higher difficulty settings, I'd suggest more/bigger monsters, bigger battles and/or nastier ambushes. Starving the player of health or ammo isn't a good solution, even if there are some masochists among us who enjoy non-berserking demons (etc.) once in a while.


I guess that'd be me. :p

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Jimi said:

There's also 2 doors in the Phobos Control Center that needs tags, but both are using 0 tags... Agh... Luckily that was in the end of the map, so I didn't miss much.

Uh oh....Oh well, I'm pretty sure it doesn't affect the map much since it's near the end. Thanks for letting me know :)

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Nmn said:

Some nice weapons there from Deathz0r (behavior good, don't like the graphics, just me).

The text file states:

OMG Weapons! started off as a little idea I had of creating those
Quake-style mods. You know, those mods that have like hundreds
of weapons but they use the same model over and over again?


But thanks for the comment on the behaviour regardless. =D

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It has been awhile since I played DM, Danimetals' map was a good way to get me back into it. Nice map (bot's played fairly well on it too).

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I love the concept of OMG Weapons!, and I have it on reasonably good authority that someone is planning to work on something similar, only with graphics that aren't just re-coloured versions of the originals... (and said someone had the idea before he learned of deathz0r's mod ;)).

This mod may even include new power-ups in the mix...

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NiGHTMARE said:

This mod may even include new power-ups in the mix...

The only problem I can see about that is that ZDoom only contains powerups that are available in each IWAD. Making a new powerup from scratch won't be particularly easy.

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Thanks Planky. I´m glad the map got you into DM, since it´s something I don´t map much. I was afraid bots were crazy with the 3d section, but seems it worked :).

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#


# Harmful Hospital - Jacek Illdo Dobrzyniecki
doom2.exe - Solo Play - 39.2 - (img)
I wanted to try out this map but it keeps crashing Eternity and Prboom due to a bad patch in a couple of textures.. bleh.


Then try something else, like Boom or ZDoom... bleh.

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jjjjjjjjjjjjjjjj said:
Then try something else, like Boom or ZDoom... bleh.

I've always wondered why those engines terminate the game if patches are missing... I don't see how harmful that bug can be; Doom2 just lists the missing patches and starts the game.

In the wad's text file Illdo says:
Advanced engine needed : Limit-removing (visplane overflow!)

Really? The only thing I could think might possibly produce one is the row of blocks near the end, if you open a door, maybe... I didn't get any, of course. And the wad is über simple; as blocky as a standard '94 production.

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myk said:

I've always wondered why those engines terminate the game if patches are missing... I don't see how harmful that bug can be; Doom2 just lists the missing patches and starts the game.


These engines just copy the behavior of the released Doom source. It only knows one type of error: The fatal kind that even aborts the game for the most minor things.

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deathz0r said:

The only problem I can see about that is that ZDoom only contains powerups that are available in each IWAD. Making a new powerup from scratch won't be particularly easy.

This is more along the lines of Doomish versions of certain Hexen and Strife power-ups, which can be done by inheriting. For example, Boots of Speed = Turbo Booster, and Disc of Repulsion = Energy Shield.

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DooMBoy said:
Uh oh....Oh well, I'm pretty sure it doesn't affect the map much since it's near the end.

It doesn't let you finish it, at least using Doom (some other engines might deal differently with missing or misplaced tags.) If you try to activate any of the two doors after the blue door near the entrance, the map gets borked, the Player being locked out in the room that has become a door that tries to close on him.

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the omgwpns mod crashes zdoom .96x.

opened with 2.0.96:

"ZDoom fatal error"
Script error, "DECORATE" Line 8:
Invalid state parameter

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Read the text file. It requires the unofficial build that can be found in the ZDoom forum.

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Thanks Mr. Zahl.

I guess now I'll give my opinions on what i've played so far. Traux, I thought, was shit. I'll admit I didn't really give it a fair chance, but about 3 minutes into it I began to get really disappointed and shut 'er down. On a side note, the wad contains over 5mb of wasted space. Go figure.

Alter of Evil isn't BAD...
But it's not good either; the gameplay is really bad. Like Kaiser said, you'll be running around with no ammo whatsoever facing some pretty big monsters. Oh, and this is the first map in which I've killed a revenant with my bare fists. It felt good.

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Heh, I like the Vortex Launcher the most, but I guess that's mostly because it's similar to my own weapons.

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Shame it has a low rating because the zdoom community expects OGM HI QUALITY SW/REDNECK GAME RIP ART

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