The /newstuff Chronicles #273

deathz0r said:
One thing I like about Skulltag's community is that they can pull together high quality community releases in an incredible period of time.

This comment kind of confused me since the wad took 8 months to make... I'm not sure if this is sarcastic or if he didn't read that part of the .txt file. Regardless it took a long time! hehe

I'm a bit disapointed by your opinion of map04 - most of the community loves it - partially for the detail, but mostly for the diabolical dice room. :) You should read the log files of what people say when they're playing that map. It's hilarious. You're entitled to your opinion though.

Aabra said:

I'm a bit disapointed by your opinion of map04 - most of the community loves it - partially for the detail, but mostly for the diabolical dice room. :) You should read the log files of what people say when they're playing that map. It's hilarious. You're entitled to your opinion though.

That doesn't matter if the layout is bad. And saying that most of the community loved it is pretty bad defence. Most people in the community is easily distracted by a few bells and wistles and forget what really matters in a multiplayer map such as this.

I haven't played the map myself yet though, so I can't say what I think about it.

Aabra said:

This comment kind of confused me since the wad took 8 months to make...

True, but wasn't there a period of inactivity that went for a couple of months?

Not really... I was always working on it. A couple people came and went throughout it but there was always at least 1 person working. MAP01 and MAP04 didn't make themselves overnight! :) They are extremely large and detailed maps designed for *large* games. (The FNF release party was *insane*) Something which IMO the Doom Multiplayer community is seriously lacking. Most maps seem to be designed for no more than 6 people. The ones that are designed for a lot of people are typically crap.

Kristus - play it with a bunch of people. (The good domination games usually get going during the weekend when more people are playing) It's domination so it plays differently than your typical DM map. The layout looks strange to most people but it's intentional and plays really well. The gameplay is very different because it's domination so the long hallways are kinda intentional. 90% of the fighting occurs around the domination points. IMO it's really hard to judge the gameplay/layout of the maps unless you play them in a minimum of 4v4.

Something I'm surprised wasn't mentionned however was the weapon placement on a couple of the maps. That's been the #1 criticism so far. MAP08 could probably also use a bit more ammo. We're going to try to remedy these minor problems when we release version 2.

Caligari_87 said:

So, I mandated that every WAD submitted had to have brightness levels above 160. Obvioulsy, Phobus took this to a little bit of an extreme, but his idea was the essence of the contest: Don't make the player struggle to see what's going on! Look at some of the screenshots in the ZDoom forums thread; The point of this is to create levels that can frighten, entertain, or simply make people go "wow" without using darkness to cover it up. Shouldn't this, by default, produce more interesting levels because there isn't a crutch?

Ah, alright, at first I didn't know exactly what the point of having the maps bright was. Now it makes a bit more sense...

deathz0r said:

Only problem is that your maps generally don't suck, but RMUD is a bit out of the league of your other maps.

Thanks for reminding me--I still need to reupload a fix for that.

kristus said:

Most people in the community is easily distracted by a few bells and wistles and forget what really matters in a multiplayer map such as this.

If they had fun in the map, then there's not a whole lot to complain about.

sometimes i think the doom community has forgotten what "fun" is.

Caligari_87 said:

So, I mandated that every WAD submitted had to have brightness levels above 160. Obvioulsy, Phobus took this to a little bit of an extreme, but his idea was the essence of the contest: Don't make the player struggle to see what's going on! Look at some of the screenshots in the ZDoom forums thread; The point of this is to create levels that can frighten, entertain, or simply make people go "wow" without using darkness to cover it up. Shouldn't this, by default, produce more interesting levels because there isn't a crutch?

Darkness isn't a crutch for creating scary wads, it is in fact a nessecary tool. Darkness gives a feeling of the unknown, the handicap of not knowing what lies in the shadows is what keeps the player alert! It adds suspense because the player can't tell whether that silouete in the darkness is a soul sphere, or a lost soul. Without that darkness, the surprise is lost, the terror is gone, and the unknown is made known.

dethtoll said:

sometimes i think the doom community has forgotten what "fun" is.

Not all have, they're just too busy having it to be posting ill-advised rants on internet forums :)

Craigs said:

the player can't tell whether that silouete in the darkness is a soul sphere, or a lost soul.

You couldn't have picked two worse examples. Both of those sprites are always drawn at full brightness!!

Anyway pedantry aside, it's still possible to make scary maps with a high brightness level. For example, sudden loud noises, monsters appearing right next to the player when he's not expecting it, etc. It's harder to inspire dread, but nasty surprises work at any light level.

RjY said:

You couldn't have picked two worse examples. Both of those sprites are always drawn at full brightness!!

ROFL That's the first thing I thought too, but I get his point. =D

RjY said:

Anyway pedantry aside, it's still possible to make scary maps with a high brightness level. For example, sudden loud noises, monsters appearing right next to the player when he's not expecting it, etc. It's harder to inspire dread, but nasty surprises work at any light level.

There was a map by someone on the ZDoom forums, based off the Aliens TC, that only had one alien, a huge base, and most of the sectors completely bright. I think it was Enjay.

However, even though I could see nearly the entire map at all times, that bugger scared the hell out of me, and having to finally go into a slightly darker area (where I found the alien) nearly made me piss myself. It's not about total darkness, it's about contrast and atmosphere.

Again, check out the screenshots in the thread I linked. Some of them look fscking awesome.

when I played paul's wad I thought I was fighting ray romano until I read the text.

RjY said:

Anyway pedantry aside, it's still possible to make scary maps with a high brightness level.

That revenant trap in Fun666 scared the crap outta me pretty badly, so I agree with you.

Hell yes deathZor (spelling error?) is getting soft! Why, if it wasn't for him ripping my few levels that I posted on the archives (stay away, stay away...), then I'd have never gotten as good as I am now! Hehe, me project is getting goooooood ^_^

Thanks Man!
-Black Void-

Edit: Aww fudge, that first reviewed map really does bite a bit, eh? Here I am, spending time in reality again that I've forgotten the rather obnoxious 'new enemie' just gettin' all up in ma' grill. Shoot people, work with what you have... yeesh... new enemies...ever since day 1... *grumble*

Doom2 comes with a fine stable of steeds for the slaying. Do not give in to trying to put HERETIC fireballs while I'm using my shotgun. That REALLY needs to end, 'been goin' on too long! /rant

deathz0r said:

And I thought I was pissed off with Project Dark Zone back in #271.

Don't like the download size? Then don't download it, simple as that. Project dark Zone was 11mb in size because of the large sector count and the 4 mp3 files at 64kb per second, each one ~ 2mb. I used mp3's for the immersion, midi's wouldn't cut it for that environment.

If he's reviewing it he obviously has to to download it...

Way to miss the point.

Who really cares about file size anyway? The filesize comes out to what it comes out after the author puts whatever he wants in his mod. I'm NOT going to limit features in my mod to stop deathz0r complaining about 11 massive megabytes, thats HIS problem.

Actually it´s a nice week in terms of time you can spend playing the wads. I personally found Rylayeh very interesting when I playtested it, fairly long and adequate for playing it during a few days but also agree with those who think that it takes its time to get started... Anyway, once it gets started the action and puzzles on these maps have a great flow so this wad becomes sort of addictive. I also thought it was long enough to keep you hooked but not too long so you can lose interest on it.

About Rf1024, it never ceases to amaze me the quantity of things you can put into a small map. In terms of gameplay it takes almost the same time than a classic Doom level takes to finish, but in a much smaller space.

Finally, Hell's Twisted Influence wasn´t that bad for me. I approached the map from a neutral point of view and had my fun during half an hour or so. It´s true that the difficulty is unbalanced, as you can run through almost the whole level without dying and then you can get easily killed in the last battle and also that the battles could use more planning instead of frontally throwing monsters at you but overall I found this map to be fun. My biggest complain is also personal and it´s nothing related with the size of the file: during my play and from the beginning of the map I thought that the TNT series has a much too big influence on this wad and that gives it a "rip-off" feeling that I find inadequate.

Homer: I do agree with you on that and think it is a good thing to make what you want to make, for your own satisfaction.

why the hell does the intro for HTI not stop? the camera just keeps going.

Homer said:

Who really cares about file size anyway?

People with dialup. Those kind of people still exist today.

deathz0r said:

People with dialup. Those kind of people still exist today.

Although that is true, some things are definitely worth the download time. Take RTC3057 for example. If I were using dial-up, I would say it's definitely worth the wait to download something as good as RTC.
It just doesn't seem right to limit yourself just so that someone doesn't have to wait as long for the download. Remember, quality is always better than quantity (most of the time =P).

Tango said:
Although that is true, some things are definitely worth the download time.

Indeed, though in deathz0r's defense, in the review above this was about it being big in relation to not being very good. I'd more likely download a potentially mediocre file if it's small (it takes but a sec and my HDD doesn't even feel it) than if it's big. Had it been an awesome wad I gather he'd have said "it's worth every byte of disk space/bandwidth."

Yeah, you're definitely right. In this case, and even though I like HTI2 a bit more than most others, I don't think the download time was fully worth it. Well, I guess I didn't have anything better to do at the time either.

It would make sense in such cases to have the large music files as a separate optional download, perhaps available from the author's own webspace, rather than using up space in the archive (whose rules it presumably doesn't adhere to in any case, given that it is apparently ripped music in mp3 format).

zap610 said:

Homer: I do agree with you on that and think it is a good thing to make what you want to make, for your own satisfaction.

Sorry for the mis-understanding.

People with dialup. Those kind of people still exist today.

well, then this applies:

Then don't download it, simple as that.

It would make sense in such cases to have the large music files as a separate optional download, perhaps available from the author's own webspace, rather than using up space in the archive (whose rules it presumably doesn't adhere to in any case, given that it is apparently ripped music in mp3 format).

I'm not going to lower the standard of the wad for some people who have a tight budget or aren't in a convienient location.

As for the ripped mp3s, the archive accepted it, so thats beyond me.

Well, if you think about it, downloading a file with a size similar to HTI2 isn't all that bad. If you have a good connection, which most of us do (heh I think), the file won't take more than what, like 5 minutes? 5 minutes. That's it. It really isn't that long of a wait, it's just 20 times more than downloading a usual Wad file is. My point is that although it may seem like a long time for most of us, it really isn't such a terribly long wait.
Maybe HD space is something to complain about, though you can always delete a Wad if you don't like it or if you've already played it.
Oh and uh, please don't take my post as an argument against anyone, it was just my thoughts.

Homer said:
As for the ripped mp3s, the archive accepted it, so thats beyond me.

Probably because the admin doesn't have the time to check everything about every upload, and no one else reported it to him.

deathz0r said:

People with dialup. Those kind of people still exist today.

No they don't. At least nobody worth mentioning. :)

Aabra said:

No they don't. At least nobody worth mentioning. :)

So if someone lives out in the counryside were the are no digital lines then they aren't worth mentioning?

Arrogant cunt !!