Map Theory Thread (id)

Also interesting and related to discussing individual mappers, is to discuss map theory. With the DTWID project underway, it is very useful to gain a better understanding of id's approach to those maps. What insights and observations can be made?

A big difference between id's maps and many third party maps that I have noticed is that they are much more non-linear and open ended. Too many wads I have played in recent times remind me of games like Metal Slug: progress to the next area and then a new wave of enemies comes.

Some of these you can call "forced encounters". There are a lot of monsters in id's maps that you could just ignore or avoid if you wanted to. This isn't really the case these days.

I can point fingers at wads ranging from Scythe 2 to Whispers of Satan. I think both of these are very good wads, but there are too many forced encounters in them for my liking.

I suppose mappers want to ensure that they squeeze as much out of their efforts as possible, so they make sure you absolutely have to see everything they put in the map. For them, the idea that you might have passed something up makes them feel bad.

Also, id was for the most part pretty good about including a lot of secrets in their maps.

Forced encounters in Scythe 2? Apparently we haven't been playing the same wad, as most maps can be completed quickly while skipping most if not all monsters.

I don't think id had much theory in mind when they made Doom. Besides the fact they rejected a guidebook full of it, they were working on a totally new engine, had to hire someone to do the work, and experimented a lot with the textures and objects in order to create something playable and compact.

I wrote a small article on rome.ro about how all doom alpha maps were built with the grid in mind, and conform to an external shape, or bounding box. All areas can be reached from more than one way. There are no true dead ends, not at the end of the map, anyway.

Phml said:

Forced encounters in Scythe 2? Apparently we haven't been playing the same wad, as most maps can be completed quickly while skipping most if not all monsters.

In this case I'm targetting a lot of the Jungle/Hell levels.

I think Doom 2 has a lot of forced encounters. There are quite a few of them in The Courtyard. Not all the time though. I was recently playing some Doom 2 and really enjoyed it more than my last experience with it. One thing I noticed was pretty prominent is that you really have to scan out most of the maps. Tiptoeing into them will always fuck you up. You usually never have enough resources to take on the first monsters you encounter and so you need to flee from them until you find the weapons and ammo. This allows monsters to chase you and back you into corners and surround you making the gameplay much more frantic than in Doom 1 or many other wads I've played.

Doom 1 had more of a plot and storyline and most of the gameplay was relatively safe. Doom 2 really speaks for itself with its "Hell on Earth" subtitle, in which you need to run like hell to find out where the weapons are, and ignore monsters you don't yet have the resources to fight. It really conveys a feeling of insurmountable odds, unlike in Doom 1 where monsters are usually handled in small groups at a time and you usually are provided the weapons, health, and ammo to deal with them ahead of time. Doom 2 calls for much more improvisation.