"Those Before Me" map needs testing [map02 beta july 2nd]

I've been holding on to a complete map here for like 2 months, too afraid to let it out there, but enough is enough! I'm looking for people to play, report bugs, try to break it, and just give opinions on it, so that I can put up a permanent version somewhere (perhaps in a week or so, depending on the extent of reported problems).

Whoever helps out will get credited as a playtester, though "Cool!" and "Sucks!" won't help ;-P

Also I have a thing about crediting nicknames (since people change them) I'll want a meatspace name in order to attribute you props.

So yeah, beta version is up at:
http://webpages.charter.net/bgspencer/design/spence01.html

edit: As of 3/19 I've "finalized" the map at the above link. Thanks for all the input!

edit2: please see this post if interested in map02

Engine required/suggested to run it?

Atmospheric. Not the kind of Doom map I enjoy so I can't comment further, but it seemed good. I liked the faster pistol, makes the weapon actually fun to use.

Megamur - Text file says PrBoom+ or Zdoom, but not Boom ; it worked with PrBoom+ 2.5.0.6 for me.

I liked the new palette, as it fit the graveyard theme nicely. The map itself also looked pretty nice (I was particularly fond of the little tombs), but I just used noclip to zoom through it, so I can't say much more than that, either.

Great news, another Brad Spencer map! :)

I'll definitely try it out tomorrow. Although your AV maps took a bit of getting used to, they became very fun and a series of nice solid challenges once I started getting better at DooM...

Very well done, good sir! Played it from start to finish and enjoyed it immensely. The atmosphere was perfect. The balance was perfect. The difficulty was perfect. Hell, I even loved the DeHackEd tweaks and the REJECT effect at the end.

The detail job and clever use of eyecandy made it seem as if I was wandering through a scene from Thief. Good job sir, and make some more!

I do have one question though, the "bridge" near the broken arch (past which lies the red skull), was it supposed to rise up so far enough for me to walk across? I had to SR40 from the left side of the arch to get inside there after hitting the switch. Intentional?

Thanks all for the quick comments :-D

EarthQuake said:

...the REJECT effect at the end.

Actually I haven't even passed this map through a reject builder, I forgot really what that can even accomplish! So now I'm curious what you are referring ;-)

EarthQuake said:

I do have one question though, the "bridge" near the broken arch (past which lies the red skull), was it supposed to rise up so far enough for me to walk across? I had to SR40 from the left side of the arch to get inside there after hitting the switch. Intentional?

The bridge is certainly meant to rise high enough to get you in to the red key area. What engine did you test it with? It uses a "voodoo doll" and I'm not sure if all engines support that boom-ish behavior.

I just played it for a couple minutes, and it seemed way too dark to be enjoyable. also, scattered monsters, large areas, extra-tight ammo and health, meant you were running around a great deal and getting lost. detailing and style are awesome, one of the best I've seen. Too bad it's so hard to see.

NT

Very fun, good-looking, and rewarding map with a powerful, grim atmosphere. It seems like it would have good replay value as well, I imagine it is a very different map playing through a second time. I also love the secrets in this map even though I didn't find them until I backtracked from the exit.

Edit: The bridge worked for me though, just thought I would add that. I played in prboom-plus 2.5.0.8

Vorpal said:

Actually I haven't even passed this map through a reject builder, I forgot really what that can even accomplish! So now I'm curious what you are referring ;-)

OH.

NoobBait said:

Ditto. I thought it was a bit underwhelming - the architecture is nice, but you don't really do anything with it - I couldn't really hear any music ambient or otherwise, and the monsters are all vanilla and not even the most creepy ones are used. I also didn't like how the ammo is almost exactly the right amount to kill everything with maybe 3 or 4 misses. Taking away the pistol at the start isn't a big deal cause you just punch a former human and start shooting again, and putting the ammo back in would leave enough to make it feel tight but still able to kill everything. Might want some more opinions on that point though. My fda (prboom+2.5.0.9test -complevel 9).

Ah, sorry all for the difficulties in finding the bridge-switch. A few months back the area it accesses was optional, so the switch was meant to be hard to see. However, now that I've made it a required area, I need to go in and brighten the sector up in which it lies. Thanks to all though for alerting me to this problem!

Earthquake: I tried 5 or so ports now and still can't replicate your bridge problem nor the "monster won't attack" problem...

ArmouredBlood: I watched your whole demo, thanks for taking the time to record and post it. Even though you disliked the gameplay, it was fun for me to watch, as I was able to see you change tactics a bit. If you ever play again I'd recommend HMP over UV, it's less "Resident Evil save every bullet" and more "Yeah, this is Doom, kill it" gameplay.

I, too, went to the effort to make a straferun jump from the Arachnotron platform, only finding the switch afterward. In all fairness, though, I was specifically trying to see if the platform could be reached earlier than you're supposed to. You told us to try to break it. :)

The architecture was quite good, indeed. I liked the sort of collapsed arch you had going around the Arachnotron area, the fountains were neat, and the buildings gave the place a "lived-in" feel, like these used to be homes before the demons cleared the place out. The speed increase for the pistol actually made it semi-useful, for once, and I enjoyed the sped up pinkies, too, since they're usually so non-threatening.

I do worry a bit about difficulty balance, however. As ArmouredBlood said, the supplies are so tight on UV that you can't afford to make many mistakes. It was interesting and challenging, making even a couple of Lost Souls seem dangerous, but I do worry about it turning off people who are hoping for something a bit less "strict" in style. This wouldn't be as much of an issue, since you say people can just play HMP if they want to murder things, but there are far too few monsters on that skill, making it rather dull to play. You end up mostly wandering around in the dark, finding little of interest; the exploration is better on UV, since you're scouring every nook and cranny in a desperate search for supplies, but on HMP, finding a room with nothing but a couple of health bonuses in the corner doesn't offer the same thrill. I'm thinking maybe HMP should have more monsters and more action, and UV be the "survival mode" with fewer monsters and supplies, but that's wholly my opinion.

From a purely technical standpoint, I didn't find any bugs. Cacodemons/Lost Souls can simply float through the bars bordering sectors 444 and 1437, if they're high enough off the ground, but it's a minor thing. It's also possible, with ZDoom's increased melee range, to simply punch the pinky in sector 394 from sector 425, and it cannot retaliate. (I liked that area, though, how you're, like, stepping from one window to another over a channel of water. It reminded me of Venice or something.)

Overall, I had fun playing it. It looks great, with the detail, darkness and ambient music coming together to make it rather immersive and atmospheric, I liked how it was fairly non-linear and let the player decide which route to take, and I enjoyed playing a DOOM map that put the player in a real difficult spot without throwing hundreds of monsters at them. However, I do worry about the difficulty balance turning off some people, wished the exploration element was a bit more rewarding (seriously, almost the whole east edge of the map is nearly completely empty, and it's little more than a bunch of dark tunnels. Exploration loses its flair when there's nothing to see or collect), and thought there were many missed opportunities to scare the player (though that might not have been the style you were going for).

Thanks for giving us something to play and test! :)

That was awesome!

This is some spooky stuff! For a moment I thought I saw arch-vile floating in the sky! :o :)

I managed to beat this map on UV after few deaths. Very tough on ammo, but great fun. Here is the demo: http://www.doomworld.com/vb/post/955140

My only complaint is that sometimes, I think when the music restarts, you can hear some weird high-pitched sound.

Megamur: Thanks for trying it out on HMP. I think based on your feedback then, that I will put some of the monsters back in on that difficulty as well as significant ammo increases.

Regarding your comments on exploration, yes that was my main intent with the level, but I didn't want to *always* reward the player with something for exploring. That's actually something that bothers me about modern games, where every nook has some reward in it, so getting rewards becomes the player's only interest. At least this is what happens to me in Assassin's Creed, I just start ignoring the awesome visuals and only looking for little flashy collectables.

Regarding the difficulty, I agree that it is offputting to most people and probably annoying to have to ration off ammo. However based on the two demos posted so far, I am very pleased with how they managed, so I think the UV balance is mostly set in stone.

Regarding "missed oppurtunities to scare the player", that's OK with me as I wasn't trying to scare the player. I was shooting for "creepy but not terrifying" if that makes sense. Sortof like Hexen where most of my resources were ripped, there's a general atmosphere of uncomfortability, but not horror.

Memfis: Loved the demo, you seemed to embrace the best (IMO) method for winning (rather than clean every room, grab what you need and return later when you are better equipped to finish the job). I think that squeal with the music loops might be a prboom+ problem, as it happened with a different mp3 I had in there in the past, and zdoom plays it without the squeal (I think..). Or maybe I did some booboo during compression? I'm rubbish at audio tech.

Changes so far:
*Bridge switch should now be much more noticeable
*final red-key door is now openable across the whole length, instead of just at the "lion's head"
*Removed that ineffectual pinky by the coffins, who was too scared to cross over the water-gap. Also moved the shotgun guy to where the pinky was (so he won't wake up and start sniping from the windows, that was maybe too difficult).

Unresolved issues:
*Earthquake's bridge raise problem + monster not attack problem (not sure what the problem is yet, if it's just a port issue or what).
*weird squeal when song loops

I'm curious about two potential changes to the map...

Add a chaingun to that little tomb at the far north end, but lock it with a key. The downside is that room would thus no longer a "safe room" available to the player at the beginning.

Slimetrails can be mostly removed with zdbsp extended nodes. I guess it's just prboom+, eternity, and zdoom derivatives that recognize such nodes though. Will that break the map for other engines though? I don't know what ports are used/maintained these days to be able to test it out. If it does render the map unplayable on other engines, then I'll just stick to normal nodebuilding.

Any thoughts?

I thought the map was well-balanced with the current weapons/ammo. Although you needed more care with your shots, it never seemed unreasonable at any point. Also the faster pistol was great, I don't think a chaingun is necessary.

Vorpal said:

Megamur: Thanks for trying it out on HMP. I think based on your feedback then, that I will put some of the monsters back in on that difficulty as well as significant ammo increases.

Huh. Well, that's cool. :)

Regarding your comments on exploration, yes that was my main intent with the level, but I didn't want to *always* reward the player with something for exploring. That's actually something that bothers me about modern games, where every nook has some reward in it, so getting rewards becomes the player's only interest. At least this is what happens to me in Assassin's Creed, I just start ignoring the awesome visuals and only looking for little flashy collectables.

Well, that's fine, but like I said, there's nothing really to see over in the east portion either, just lots of darkness and rock. I doubt it's really something you want to bother trying to alter, but I thought I'd point it out anyway.

I think that squeal with the music loops might be a prboom+ problem, as it happened with a different mp3 I had in there in the past, and zdoom plays it without the squeal (I think..). Or maybe I did some booboo during compression? I'm rubbish at audio tech.

Indeed, it loops fine in ZDoom, but it briefly makes a funny noise when it restarts in PrB+. I doubt there's much you can do about that.

Really glad I could help. :)

I wanted to understand what was going on with the problems I experienced before posting again. I used ZDaemon for playing your map (which has partial voodoo doll support atm), so sometimes a voodoo doll script may work, while other times it doesn't. Nothing to worry about here, your bridge just doesn't work in ZDaemon yet.

The REJECT issue is something you might worry about. ZDoom's ZDBSP introduced an option to compile the map with a zero-length REJECT, which apparently can cause some source ports to appear to have some line-of-sight problems. I'm told ZDoom and later versions of PrBoom handles these correctly, but you should probably rebuild your nodes with ZDBSP's "Fast Build" which fills the REJECT lump with zeros, instead of the "Normal Build" which creates a zero-length REJECT. (Or I guess you could actually build a real REJECT with ZenNode or something.)

It's funny if you think about it. The sector with the baron was the only spot in the map exhibiting any bugs because of this. No wonder I thought it was intentional. :p

This is a really nicely detailed and great playing level. I have to be honest though, and I hate to be a nitpicker, but that tint that you put the pallette through is hideous. In software in Zdoom it makes the textures look like vomit and unnatural. Which is a real pity, because everything else about this level kicks so much ass.

Alright a finalized version is up on my page now
http://webpages.charter.net/bgspencer/design/spence01.html

In addition to the changes listed a few posts up; the mp3 should no longer squeal in prboom+ (though it still stutters in that engine, as do all mp3s). I also ran the map through RMB so that final sector stops behaving weird in zdaemon, also ran it through zdbsp for extended nodes (slimetrail elimination). Hurt Me Plenty now has more ammo, and almost the same enemies as UV.

Huge thanks for giving me this feedback guys. Nobody gave me their names so I just went ahead and credited your forum nicks (but if you want your real name in there I am more than willing to go in and change it).

A very fun map, love the ambient music. Do you have plans for more of these?

Yeah, two more small/medium-ish maps in the same sort of theme.

Got a second map near completion, sortof. As an experiment I built 80% of the geometry with the grid off. Once I finally added gameplay elements I found out how bad Doom's collision detection is with non-90-degree walls. Thus, this is an abortion. I'm going to finish what's there, but it won't be as fleshed out as I originally imagined.

Geometry is 100% done, texture alignment is nearly 0%, but I can hammer that out in a weekend once all other aspects of the map are done. Gameplay is implemented, but not done, that is where I would like some assistance from testers:

1) I don't really know how easy/medium difficulty settings should "feel" as I am used to being very manly and choosing UV. So if the lower settings are too easy or too hard I am very interested. UV is about balanced for what I intended, but still interested in input on that skill level too.

2) Secrets. The map was not built with secrets in mind, unlike the previous one. I added one just to have it there, though. Is it too obvious, too obscure? Is it lame? Should I add more (and where)?

3) Awkward monster behavior. I think I got rid of most areas where enemies would get stuck, or congregate in big piles, or just not be able to pass. If you notice any areas where monsters don't flow well, I'm interested!

4) Also regarding difficulty, my intention here was to have a quick and easy house-to-house extermination map. Meant to be played in series with the previous, and to hook the player up with some ammo and the rocket launcher for the next map. So if things piss you off about it being too hard, please let me know, I do not want it to be hard.

Any other input is also valued as well. I don't have the willpower to do major geometry changes at this point, though (minor ones yes). I want to get going on the next and final map in this series; a small/medium sized mansion or town hall thingy. Also I'm scrubbing the title of the previous map, it's too depressing IMO. Ideas for titles welcome :-)

The nighttime palette removed since the concept on this one was to take place at dawn. Does boom support changing of palettes based on map##? If not, think I'll just totally axe the palette concept.

Highly beta version link (map02 by the way):
http://webpages.charter.net/bgspencer/design/spence02.zip

This is quite a nice map man. It has a cool theme and architecture which kinda reminds me of Av, I liked the "collect ammo while holding the monsters off" gameplay... but at the same time I hope that not every map plays like this and that on some of the later maps has your old school straight forward "kill em all" Brad Spencer type of gameplay. :)

I'm not sure whether boom supports the palette changes based on map number though, if it doesn't you could always adjust the brightness accordingly I guess.

Thanks for checking it out Devo! But hmm sounds like I should make the store-houses contain bigger stashes of ammo, it is *supposed* to be a straight forward slugfest in the city, so I suspect I've made it much too tight on ammo.

A few screenshots to perhaps rope in some more interested folks:

screenshot 1
screenshot 2
screenshot 3
screenshot 4

My fda. I wouldn't say it's not enough ammo but finding the ammo caches that makes it challenging. There are some pretty cool buildings in the map, I especially liked the tower with the broken spiral stair, and many of them have the ammo you need. Just takes a bit of planning to go cache to cache. I didn't kill everything though, I found the exit early and thought it would at least need a key ;p I'd suggest putting the chainsaw a little closer to the start, it'd be helpful for taking out the 10 demons and specters throughout the map that just soak up shotty and pistol rounds. Not too close that they'd find it before a shotgun though ... hmm.

Ah, insightful demo, thanks ArmouredBlood. I think I need to make the "EXIT" sign more visible there somehow, without it looking silly. Will award the player the chainsaw earlier, as well as some additional ammo, and adjust some geometry on areas where monsters were having trouble in your demo.

Much appreciated!

Great map. Very atmospheric and provides a good survival challenge. My FDA - http://www.mediafire.com/?ovu5htvuktbelif