The DWmegawad Club plays: Super Mayhem 17

[Magnusblitz]

MAP11: Aztec Ruins

98% kills, 7/8 secrets

 

This one is a very sharp upswing in difficulty that will likely catch a lot of players by surprise. Combat-wise, the level is designed around dangerous encounters in cramped settings, such as berserk fists against two AVs with only thin columns for cover, a locked-in fight against a revenant swarm on a small platform with no cover, and a tango with a vile and cyberdemon with only one column cover. There's also a fair amount of puzzling and secret-hunting, some of which is necessary for the regular progression, but find enough secrets and you'll get access to the second half of the map, which includes another tough small-platform/slight cover battle, and then some full-on BFG slaughter at the end to round it out. I do wish there had been some more cells at the end, I ended up having to squeeze past the last two cybers after I ran out of ammo. I certainly enjoyed the secret hunting, and the combat is a good test of skill (but boy am I glad to be playing with saves, I would not want to try and full-run the map over and over especially for the secret lava chamber fight)... but I kinda wonder if this maybe should've been in the secret map slot given it's design (though maybe the actual secret maps are even weirder/different). I suppose we'll see what others make of it.

 

(A quick run through HMP shows to me not much difference - you get the super shotgun a room earlier, some cacos are imps, no AV in the cyber duel and there's a few less revs in the lava chamber fight, but that's about it).

[Poncho]

7 hours ago, Salt-Man Z said:

I've been playing on and off, just haven't been doing the write-ups. Let's fix that (or at least get started)...

 

MAP04: Marina Moonlight

14:10 | 98% Kills | 100% Items | 100% Secrets

Kind of a frenetic start. Then we have the cool pirate ship cave and the climb to the key, whereupon revvies and mancs and spiders fill the place up. At this point I was starting run dangerously low on ammo (hadn't actually visited the ship yet, whose plasma gun would have come in handy.) Then I ventured onto the central island, which I had yet to attempt, and lo my ammo issues were solved. The BFG just sitting there was kinda odd (with two ways to get it?) as was the mastermind that showed up just to get blasted with it. The highlight of the level was (of course) those giant purple whales, who took me way too long to recognize, but I grinned when I did. The animated tails were amazing. I missed a couple of kills who appeared to be stuck in their teleporter closets.

 

MAP05: Painfully and Elitely Rusted

6:38 | 97% Kills | 100% Items | 100% Secrets

Woof, thank goodness for continuous play! Thanks to being loaded up already, this wasn't very difficult. Except for the viles: they'd surprise me every time, and then one would knock me into the lava, and I teleport out and wind up facing completely the wrong way and get obliterated. The only kill I missed was the cyber at the end, and only because I accidentally stepped on the exit while in the process of BFGing him. But I wasn't gonna reload just for him.

 

MAP06: Airship of Doom

10:58 | 100% Everything

Love the airship theme here, just perfect. Not sure about the gameplay, here; it wasn't bad, but after clearing out the main deck, having to run back to the mast to open a new pipe, and then having to run forward and then awkwardly up the deck to the pipe, and then having to do that twice was mildly irritating. The interior holds weren't particularly impressive, either, but I can't say I didn't have fun.

LOL. Concerning the end of Map05, I did the exact same thing.

[TheOrganGrinder]

MAP11: Aztec Ruins

 

If there's a particular "high concept" that defines this level, I guess it's the idea of creating a deliberate and vast gulf between max and not-max?  The map offers two exits, one of which can be reached with maybe one-third of the map's monster population slain and the other of which (as I understand it, based on my playthrough) demands that the player find all of the map's first seven secrets in order to unlock the eighth, plunging the player into a couple of daunting arena battles on the heels of the ferocious encounters already overcome during the exploration of the map's non-secret progression.  I'm in two minds of the way mandatory secrets are used here; on the one hand it is made obvious, early in the level's running time, that the player is expected to find certain secret-tagged areas in order to progress, and on the other hand this means that some secret flags function essentially as congratulations to the player for paying the expected and necessary amount of attention to detail, while others actually are secrets in earnest, either for the value of their own provided resources or the progress they offer toward the secret exit, and in a perfect world it would be possible to differentiate the mandatory from the optional.  I'm generally not a fan of slaughter gameplay so I appreciate that the final arena, thick with revenants, Cyberdemons, and perched arch-viles, is optional content; there's a real sense here that the map is only as tough and gruelling as the player wishes it to be, though an escape route from the lava room back toward the start (perhaps one exists, but I didn't find it) might help further with this, since, as it stands, the player is locked into progressing through the arena fight as soon as they jump down the waterfall into the lava room, long before they're aware of just what they've committed to with that leap.

[NuMetalManiak]

MAP11 Aztec Ruins

 

That an Equinox track? Oh wow, how many times do you hear that outside of the wad itself? We should play it with some other 13-map megawad sometime.

 

Have to be honest though, the puzzle aspect can only go too far before we reach cryptic territories like this one. The blue key being in a secret is all I needed to know to not like it. Also 8 secrets, so we've got quite a few more than at least one required one. Many of them are climb the hill secrets, but one does have a secret red key needed for a major secret later on. The level itself, barring the secrets, is very short, and a bit on the easy side, lots of imps and revenants, the arch-vile in the blue key area, and one arena fight at the yellow key, plus the exit room...oh HERE'S where the secret hunting pays off. Need one red key for a teleporter, there's two secrets to get there. And all those health bonus secrets (three of them) pay off for another one close to the starting point. And this one leads to something I was probably gonna see eventually, a slaughter arena. Time to invoke the powers of BFG vs. revenant horde and the triple squirt gang. And that's not a secret exit, it's just sort of there. I guess that redeems this map a bit, but I'm still not feeling well.

[cannonball]

MAP11 - “Aztec Ruins” by Killer5

 

Well I found all the secrets technically, I just didn't decide to play secret number 8 for my own sanity.

So the silver key I found to be horrific, there is probably a reliable way of beating this, but for me I found it pretty hard with the archviles tending to be unpredictable along with the damage any punching did to them, for instance I died once because an imp took 5 shots with a beserk fist (now that is horrific rng). The go,d key however and the rest of the fights were fine in the most part. You need a little luck to get the archvile distracted at the end but this can be manipulated easily enough. This map is what it is, no point expressing agro if the difficulty is a little beyond me for the secret fights. A case of I didn't really enjoy it, but I know others would.

[Catpho]

MAP11 - “Aztec Ruins” by Killer5

That name doesnt go with the mario theme at all :P (AZTEC??????)

A devilish map this one was. Like many others have recognized, there are 2 ways to play this: walk on a straight line of linearity, and eventually reaching the exit in record time, with a few hazardous traps along the way (that blue key encounter is the trickiest, the others were all right). The other way is secret hunting like a good uv max player, and not like these secrets are hard to find anyway, as they mostly require attention to the surrounding environment. They all lead to a big bfg bonaza, which i feel is a decent payoff (but i wish there was something more). The music and detailing really lent to the mood, especially the water usage, makes for a mysterious feel, like the map's core concept.

It was an alright map i think. 

Some screenies:

[tmorrow]

map12: cool cool shotgun, by A.Gamma
zdoom2.8.1, uvmax, pistol start, no saves, first time played

Oh no! They didn't! Yes they did! They implemented slippery floors and of course A.Gamma had to make full use of them to produce an excellent map. It turns out slippery floors are not used that often throughout the wad, the 4 maps using them are map12-14 and map22.

Cool, cool shotgun? A mysterious title since you won't get far with only the shotgun on this map. You'll be in for a world of hurt. Rocket, plasma and bfg are key to success on this map, that with some fancy footwork along the way to avoid being splat to death as you slide off into the void.

The map commences in a beautiful alpine region, snow covered trees on the high mountains, beautiful gleaming ice caves. The only downer is that everything that moves is trying to kill you!

Try to pick up both secrets on this map, they aren't hard to locate and you will pick up a megasphere, bfg and oodles of energy cells that makes the map a whole lot easier.

The early berserk pickup helps take out most of enemies on your level while the shotgun or rocket launcher can mete out justice for the buggers up on the cliffs and ledges.

Visit the southeast ice caverns early on and enjoy your first taste of sliding down the stairs toward the blue key, and trying to take out the hellknight that spawns behind you without sliding to an icy grave.

Another early visit is the building on the west side to pick up an easy plasma rifle as well as a megasphere and cells via a secret. This sets you up to tackle the trip from the north west, down the western edge of the map, trying not to slide over the side as make your way to a pswitch. Reaching the pswitch is bad enough but the return trip is diabolical as 2 archviles, a pain elemental and other enemies try to blast you to oblivion.

The next part is the platforming section to get over to cybies domain. There's a pswitch to hit that raises some ice platforms for just enough time for you get across if you don't dawdle or fall off. The trick is to notice that the ice platforms behave like normal platforms, you can stop on them, turn and run forward and stop again etc. Literally one zig and one zag with stops in between and you are across just in time for the most dangerous fight on the map. While some might be able to survive outside on the plateau as cybie, 2 archviles, barons, hellknights, revenants and chaingunners party hard, I found it much easier to race past cybie, open the door and run into the building and down to stairs and cower in the corner and not to return until I had scored the bfg secret.

The final area of the map leading to the exit is not overly difficult once you know what to expect. Getting past the crushers is simply timing and as long as you push against the wall opposite the edge you won't be in danger of falling off. While several archviles appear with some other mid tier enemies, they have limited movement and you have several obstacles to hide behind and hopefully several bfg shots to hit them in the face with before you dive down the pipe to the exit area.

[rehelekretep]

map11 fda

uv / pistol start / no saves / glboom+

i ''completed'' this - as in reached the exit a while back (with some difficulty i might add) but didnt know how to access the rest of it until yesterdays uv-max post by Killer5. the gimmick puts me in two minds: i like it in principle, but when its more than half the map you almost feel obligated to complete it, whereas when a fight is optional in the sense of being 25% or 10% or 5% of a map you dont feel as bad when you dont go for it. the double-vile encounter and the revs/cacos on the platform are inconsistent enough for me to not have been able to complete it yet and ive run out of time today so here's the review for now. i may or may not keep trying for a full-run but cant promise anything.

[Poncho]

(Okay, so I've got up to Map32, still a continuous run).

 

Map11: Aztec Ruins

Aztec and Mario? Huh? Anyway, this map - made by Killer5 - is, simply put, brutal. The secrets aren't too shit to find, and all the way up to the Arch-Vile/Cyberdemon combo (with the "normal" exit) isn't too awful. However... trying to 100% this mother is mental. The pillar fight - involving a group of Revenants, a couple of Hell Knights and an overlooking Arch-Vile - is a bit frustrating, which is made even worse by the fact that there's no teleporter back up should you fall (well, maybe there is, but I didn't feel like looking around). Then, the final room... oh my goodness. Something like 10 Cyberdemons, 4 Arch-Viles and a shitload of Revenants, all in a little-to-no-cover environment. Yeah, okay, there are 4 Megaspheres, but they don't even help a whole lot. This could've been improved by adding more monsters - and thus more ammo - but ALSO adding a single Invulnerability. That's would've made it bearable. But alas, it's not like that. Also, I had to mid-level save not once, but twice! Most frustrating map so far.

 

Map12: Cool Cool Shotgun

Jesus Christ, from torture to... torture again. This map introduces the ice gimmick and, I really must say, I hate it. It makes physically moving a pain in the arse. Not to mention the use of the enemies is bullshit beyond belief. There are two wind sections (that, obviously, try to push you into the instant-death pit) in conjunction with these ice physics. Fighting enemies with the ice is bad enough, but throwing in the wind is just the mark of being a prick. There's one wind/ice section, the one to the west, where once you do what you're meant to do, you're ambushed by a few Arch-Viles and Pain Elementals and Revenants AT THE SAME TIME. There's also this platforming on the ice blocks which turn into non-ice physic blocks (okay, better than having the physics, but still inconsistent). By the time I got to the front of the fort, I just decided to mid-level save. And good thing I did, since the Cyberdemon trap involves Revs, Barons, Hell Knights and an Arch-Vile in the open. Yeah, really fair. A few crushers, Arachnotrons, Arch-Viles reviving Mancubi and Revenant teleports later, the level finally finishes. Better than Map11, but only be a tiny margin.

Edited April 12, 2018 by Poncho

[Pirx]

MAP09 - “Curse of the Mummy’s Sister’s Something-Or-Other” by Impie

 

kind of ancient egypt in plain daylight, so it's rather bright and yellow. it's centered around a central courtyard where all 3 keys (real keys here) have to lowered from their pedestals in order to gain access to the final corridor. there's also a room with shootable switches that open the corresponding doors. my problem here was finding out what switch did what, because instead of a recognizable doom door opening sound for example i got some whistling or squeaking, and also wasn't sure where it came from. the opposition is mostly low and mid-tiers, especially fitting imps and skeletons, nothing a quick ssg can't take care of. the rocket launcher was needed only against the final archvile, whose teleporting shenanigans are rather cute.

 

 

 

MAP10 - “Shifting Sands” by Crunchynut44

 

another egyptian map, and a beautiful one with fitting music. lots has been said about its layout and progression, and i'm quite pleased with it, it has an interesting yet clear progression. just the part until i got up to the ssg would have been faster if i somehow knew about the ssg being up there, so i killed lots of hellspawn with the shotty instead of trying to run past them to the ssg first. the good part about it was that i stirred much infighting for lack of a better weapon, which saved me the need for ammo others wrote about. the final ambush was a bit more bones than i expected, so i had to kill the final manc with bullets, but anyway, nice map.

 

 

 

MAP11 - “Aztec Ruins” by Killer5

 

ok. this looks like EMP (Eternal Mario Party).

 

i need some sleep now.

[Demon of the Well]

Map 10 -- Shifting Sands - 100% Kills / 66% Secrets - FDA

An unabashed linear (looping) action-corridor, this. Supposedly a very common type of map according to certain (sub)cultural commentators, though worth noting that it is the first of its kind in Mayhem '17, at least. Nothing particularly mind-blowing, it's true, but it functions quite smoothly within its familiar style, making a nice mid-set counterpart to the earlier maps, with simple progression but a much more bracing pace. Also, I can see again! Huzzah! The rather lo-fi 'sand-pixel' texture dominates here, as one might expect from the name, but lighting is much mellower (a combination of a few directional shadows and some decidedly chunky gradients) and there are some nice dark stony textures and a running brook or two to break things up (and a rather quirky inclusion of some traditional Doom MARBFACE). While not realistically likely to be noticed by most, there is what I'd call a fairly severe failure of perspective from the yellow key's perch looking over towards the exit enclosure (i.e. said room appears not to exist where it plainly should from that vantage), but at this point I'm just happy to visit a nice reasonable-looking map that doesn't leave me squinting. The desert tomb/temple theme is normally one of my favorites, after all!

 

Progression in this map is "run forward, shoot stuff, repeat." Navigation is a non-issue, as apart from one brief possible dead-end with a chaingun and some red bars in it early on the track is entirely linear, though this is neatly disguised by a healthy commitment to height variation throughout the proceedings, with the track winding up around a small number of areas rather than being basically a long spaghetti-strand. The main strategic wrinkle, such as it is, is that the ammo balance (from pistol-start) plainly assumes at least something of an idealized 'modern' playstyle in order to function smoothly; throughout the first half of the level, there are quite a few creatures perched over the track as snipers, and the intention seems to be that they will be largely ignored at first, as the player runs through the track under fire, shunting foes out of his/her direct path and accruing resources for a later, more efficient/intimate confrontation. Played this way it works out nicely enough, though I suspect players who insist on shooting everything, high or low, as they first see it will hit a rather nasty ammo drought beginning around the first height interchange and culminating in the little cliffside RK pool, though this could probably be remedied by simply running away from some of the meatier foes there (hell nobles, mainly) once the exit opens.

 

Placed in the midst of a selection of more conceptual maps as it is, this map stands as a simple, solid run-n-gun piece, nothing more, but also nothing less.

[gaspe]

MAP07: This was very nice, the teleport system with the doors in the caves was weird. I liked how it was plenty of coins all around.

 

MAP08: This vaguely gave me some Skillsaw vibes, it's good overall where the standout moment is the YK encounter. The palms made with animated grass are cool.

[cannonball]

MAP12 - “Cool Cool Shotgun” by A.Gamma

This one would be extremely aggravating, but luckily there are enough recovery items for the huge amount of pain that will be handed to you because of the load of gimmicks on offer here. First we have slippery floors which make movement very hard in places, we also have the wind effect on offer and quite offer is used with the floors. Also there are chaingunners everywhere on ledges in the openning areas. Otherwise the map is really well made and in general the monster usage is pretty good. I would say it is a shame about the gimmicks but the author has put enough health, armour and ammo to handle the extra grief this map gives you so overall this one gets away with the gimmick.

[gaspe]

MAP09: The concept is very cool, and it could be used to make a hard puzzle map but here the things stay relatively simple. A shame for the lighting that is lacking, and I gave up to understand how to get that soulsphere.

 

MAP10: It's linear but it was very fun and it's the best looking level so far.

[NaZa]

Oh my God, I fell behind by quite some margin. Oh well, time to play catch-up and play two maps per day.

 

MAP06: Airship of Doom (Gothic)

 

GENERAL THOUGHTS

This map's theme was, obviously, an airship. I've never played Super Mario except for those online flash games (Super Mario Flash Bros anyone? That game pretty much sums it up very well) so I don't know too much about the authentic Mushroom Kingdom, but what I do know is that there are airships. And this is a well done representation. It looks absolutely stunning, and I'm not sure how the propellers work, but it's really striking. Maybe a bit too bare, but it's an airship, not a rococo household, so it's all good. Maybe the layout is a bit disappointing - after you kill the enemies on the upper level, you go to the mast, unlock keyed stuff on the other side of the boat, and just go there. That's a bit filler and it screams encounters, but whatever. The inside was maybe a bit more disappointing, but it works well and I could believe that it's the engine room or something. Then the end comes and it's a pretty big difficulty spike in one level, so that's interesting.

 

CONTINUOUS

K/I/S: 132/132 0/0 0/1   TIME: 8:32

Fun map. I think the monster placement at the start can be pretty tough, but it's not too difficult. I think that the inside sections aren't too difficult. The carryover RL, PG and BFG can help quite a lot and make most of the map trivial. There was nice amount of health and ammo, I even had full bullets and shells at one point. It's alright, and then there's the end bit which is quite a massive jump in difficulty as there's an arch-vile with some other pretty difficult monsters that can really hurt you. Even continuously, it wasn't easy. I had to neutralize the arch-vile which wasn't as easy as it seems. After that, it wasn't too difficult. But pistol starting...

 

PISTOL START

K/I/S: 132/132 0/0 0/1   TIME: 7:46

Time improved because I didn't miss the blue key jump 50 times this time so that's good. The beginning, with only the shotgun and the chaingun, is noticeably more difficult and the revenants become a more serious threat than the chaingunner. The rest of the map followed suit and was more difficult than playing continuously, I had 10 HP at one point, after the red pipe I think, when the pain-in-the-ass elemental showed up and some revenants from behind made sure I was petrified. The end section was brutal without the OP weapons and I was forced to hide in the exit and kill off the revenants from inside there. I got lucky with pain-chancing the arch-vile (finally) but I did die a few times. Nevertheless, it's a good map. 

[TheOrganGrinder]

MAP12: Cool Cool Shotgun

 

This is a map that (unless my memory of the earlier levels is already playing tricks on me) introduces ice and snow to the WAD's repertoire, but if not for the environmental gimmicks that accompany those textures, might not be all that memorable; unfortunately, because those gimmicks, namely strong winds and slippery floors, are present, I feel as though, if this level sticks in my memory it will be for all the wrong and most aggravating reasons.  The bridge of icy pillars that builds aross the central valley, necessitating some agile scrambling across slippery surfaces, only for one of the map's fiercest combat encounters to break out once the player reaches the far side?  Likewise, that's a series of elements that annoyed more than entertain me.

 

On the plus side, the map does a lot with its snowy mountain/ice cavern aesthetic, and compared to the relatively constrained progression and environments of the preceding few maps, the large playing field and open air of this level is rather welcome and invigorating, and the relatively generous provision of power-up and recovery items helps to reduce the sense of annoyance that comes from taking hits due to fumbles and staggers induced by the weird environmental effects.  Overall I'm left with a sense of being treated to a bit too much, a bit too soon; there's not a lot of a learning curve allowed here.

[gaspe]

MAP11: Ugh this gameplay, I liked the mysterious feel of the map, and that's it. I was able to find the red key but I just went for the normal (I suppose) exit, I don't care to see the fights that I missed tbh.

 

MAP12: Mixed feelings, gameplay it's very annoying with all those high chaingunners but once you overcome the first part it gets better, at least you are well supplied, maybe too much near the end and from when you reach the cyberdemon battle the maps gets trivial tbh. I no-clipped to pass the slippery tiny pillars, but other boom gimmick like the wind and the megasphere secret were nice.

[NuMetalManiak]

MAP12 Cool, Cool Shotgun

 

This, holy fuck.

 

This is not a fun level. Ice levels can only be so fun, but I didn't have any thanks to the encounters, and the gimmicks involved. So this is the one with the instant death pits? I bet 90% of players will love it for the reasons I hate it. I'm the only normal Doomer left, it seems. Or maybe I'm the only actually insane Doomer here. It cannot be both.

 

So besides the ice and the instakills, what do we have? Are those chaingunners? Yep. Nonlinearity is gonna be a thing, not too bad, but this is the biggest map so far. Obviously, you don't want to fall off the edges of this map, but you get close and the music goes from Jolly Ol' Forest Maze to some wind (I'm pretty sure that's the Death Peak "music" from Chrono Trigger, VERY FITTING given the terror that could unfold for careless players). This is for the blue key as well as the P switch in the northwest. There's also ice pillar crossing (mercifully these pillars are not slippery) and a decent cyber fight that followed. The area combining Thwomp crushers with the instadeath pits and the enemies around didn't even have a music change. Using the final P switch makes matters so much worse. I think this is why I really hate it, these arch-viles are always gonna resurrect these enemies, and there's this annoying opening and an ice block that goes up and down making it way too frustrating. I like how it's all green and pasturized at the end, with a third music track signifying that, except that the next map is cold as ice too.

[Catpho]

Is that all from the desert episode? No glorious battle with the sun? What a disappointment!

[tmorrow]

map13: koopa anomaly, by rf`
zdoom2.8.1, uvmax, pistol start, no saves, first time played

You start in the snow, near an ice pond, looking at a building complex made of ice and bricks. But there's lava pouring down the building and there's a large pool of lava over toward the door into the building. This place does not look stable. The map is called koopa anomaly and that is certainly strange since I rarely see koopa's wandering around in normal doom nor are they wandering around on this map either. The denizens of hell are there instead, what a surprise!

You are attacked from the start, you'll probably notice the enemies up on the ledges seem to take a fiendish delight in lobbing homing missiles and the like at you as run the gauntlet to pick up what you can, hit the iced over pswitch and dive into the nearest available pipe before being flayed alive.

Ammo is carefully balanced so you need to make sure you don't accidentally pick up too much before you need it and/or find the secret backpack.

The yellow key gets you into the building complex, but wouldn't you know it there is a welcoming committee and you'll have to blast through some revenants and arachnotrons before the place is habitable.

Next you get to journey from the northwest across the top of the map through lava and find a way to get up to the plasma rifle area. Then you take a trip outside through the snowy mountains and down yet another pipe. All this to find that you have returned back to where you started but have somehow managed to raise the bars to the blue key. Good job.

The last leg of the journey is the most difficult and where you meet the tougher monsters. You make your way down to an icy basement, and then take a lift up to the final battle. It's worth finding the invulnerability secret since the last battle consists of 2 cybies, 2 archviles and a host of other vermin.

[Magnusblitz]

MAP12: Cool Cool Shotgun

100% kills, 2/2 secrets

 

Yeah, I can definitely see why people find this map aggravating. The worst to me is probably the large amount of chaingunner snipers at the beginning, coupled with no armor and no good weapon to take them out with (chaingun). I ended up getting lucky killing one chaingunner close to the edge and having his weapon fall down to me below, so I could snipe some from afar and clear them out. And that's probably a port setting so some might even call it cheating. There's also slippery ice floors and pushing winds, the former of which was just annoying (though it did make the ice cavern fight a bit more interesting I suppose) and the latter actually used well IMO as a gameplay mechanic. Amazing how dangerous one hell knight can be when coupled with some wind. I'm less keen on throwing a huge insta-pop ambush at the player (including a cyberdemon right in the face) after the platforming run though. The BFG secret at the end comes a bit too late to be valuable, especially since most of the encounters at the end are only 1-2 mid-tier enemies at a time. I'd have gladly traded some of the berserk packs at the end for a green armor vest at the start.

[bioshockfan90]

MAP11: Aztec Ruins, by Killer5|29% kills (lol)|50% secrets|

 

Yeah yeah, I know there's probably a secret path that shows you the rest of the level etc etc but when I saw the Cyb i panicked and hit what I thought was another fake exit and... surprise surprise it actually exited the level. Sorry Killer5, I'm sure the rest was just as brutal if not more!

 

This is really an oddball map, its progression is entirely based on secrets and devious encounters, specifically the hell that is getting the BK. Fun fact: I actually didn't know there was a SSG in the first room for my first few tries. You can imagine how that went. The YK trap is waaaay more lenient, so it's just surprising that the hard stuff was put before something easier. Ammo's tight as hell too. The only reasonable way I found to take out the viles safely without 'zerking 'em was to waste up pistol ammo at the start. 

 

There's also some really weird secrets with microsectors and health bonuses that probably lead to the hidden path ala Sunlust, but whatever, I'm far too exhausted and not in the mood for more pain at the moment. Maybe after the month's up I'll come back to finish this out entirely and see what I was missing, but based on everyone else's reactions, I can only assume more suffering.

 

 

[Salt-Man Z]

MAP07: Groovy Hills

18:09 | 100% Everything

I thought this was a blast right off the bat, as I jumped down from my perch and start mowing dudes down with my carryover chaingun. Fun music, wide open spaces, lots of low-tier baddies to kill, and then... the rest of the level. Inescapable death pits I can forgive (that's what freelook is for.) And the insta-vines are maybe fine in theory, but in practice were really jarring--when they worked, which wasn't always. And then the progression, which consisted entirely of "find all the little teleporter doors and make sure you go into all of them". The exit itself felt like a mandatory secret (I found it immediately, so I won't complain) and the southwestern area above the waterfall sure looked like you were supposed to be able to get up there, but alas.

 

MAP08: The Oasis

9:08 | 100% Everything

Ah, Desk Lamp is such a fantastic song. And this map is pretty fun, too. Looks great, love those blue pipes (though the platforming upon said pipes? not so much.) And the vista at the exit flagpole is fantastic. The pyramid interior is kind of mystifying, like what's the point? And oddly, "EXIT" is carved into the ceiling above the exit door, but upside down so you can't read it properly; it might have been legible from the automap, but its lines don't show up! Maybe the only misstep in an otherwise-great level. I should also note that the conveyor-ed B-wing was pretty awesome, too.

[baja blast rd.]

Now that Minidido is in its RC1 stage, I can follow this month's DWMC a bit more. Anyway, I'll just jump in for a few maps here and there. 

 

Map 13: "Koopa Anomaly" by rf’

 

This one seemed suitable for a short fast-paced casual max. This is not the full maximally aggressive max route, in which one would rush the penultimate area too, just what I felt would be suitably fun to try. 

 

[edit: never mind, turn smoothing is apparently on which I find quite ugly, might reupload without] 

 

Pluses: 

 

1) Fun to move around in (minus the awful friction parts of course). I'm generally fond of maps I can SR40 perpetually in. If I'm grazing against walls, 9/10 times I'm not enjoying myself. Awkward movement tilts me. Ribbiks is basically the only mapper in the world who can do it well. This is one thing I also think Crunchynut's map was especially strong at -- lots of jumps, open spaces. Enjoyable. 

 

2) It has cliff imps, but you can use the SSG on them! I think it's a good choice that the SSG is available so early (many maps would place it after the yellow key somewhere), and there is even a secret that is mostly pointless but lets you get the ledge snipers nearby faster. More of a 'I normally hate this but it doesn't suck here' than a full plus, but that still counts for a lot because it makes the map replayable for me. In fact the single shotgun has basically no real use as a weapon. You can shoot a single imp with it en route to the SSG. It's still a good and very important thing that it's the first weapon you get, just to avoid a worthless autoswitch upon walking over a shotgunner's corpse later. 

3) It is a conventional run 'n' gun map with scattered monsters, BUT the monster count is fairly low. It seems to me that the predominant style of monster placement in modern days is to randomly scatter monsters everywhere but also avoid slaughter encounters or even just dense packs here and there, so basically everything is spread out literally everywhere and the map is just one big cleanup from start to finish with no satisfying slaughter hordes to empty rockets and cells into. I'm pretty tired of that. 93 monsters is a good count for a map of this size. Granted, it still could have even fewer, given that none of the encounters are threatening, but 93 isn't bad. I think the average map of this style would use closer to 200 and still manage to place them so ineffectually that the map is still the same difficulty, but just with lots of added tedium. Doubling or tripling the amount of existing cliff imps where possible, adding more cliff imps where none exist, rev snipers that won't ever hit you but are just a pain to snipe down, a few pain elementals out in open air whose souls will never hit you and never threaten your ammo given the infinitude of shells and bullets. Gross stuff. This map mostly avoids all of that. Well, enough Memfising for me. :) 

 

4) The flow is pretty awesome, I have to say. Effortless loops, returning to previously visited areas, transformation of previously visited areas. 

 

5) The possibility of infinite height 'cheesing' the invul secret. Otherwise it would be an either obnoxious or pointless secret, depending on whether you tried to get it immediately with monsters still alive that can reliably block the lift, or later after killing stuff after which its DPS-maximizing utility is mostly gone anyway -- the only benefit is allowing you to focus on kiling the cybs quickly while the cybs' rockets kill everything else.
 

Minuses: 

1) Monster conveyors in this map are pretty fucking awful. Unnecessarily spacious, and enough space behind the teleport lines that stuff can wander around for a while before teleporting. 

 

Spoiler

 

 

 

 

 

2) Random imprecisions: Infinitely tall blocking objects adjacent to jumps -- namely, the first secret and the jump off on the other side. Easy to avoid, but still feels like sloppy design anyway. That teleport line at the bottom of the circular descent should be W1 (monster only) rather than just W1. I managed to use it to teleport lol. 

 

3) Inconsequential friction floors. They just make movement more annoying, don't do anything else. 

 

4) Some monster placement: Those 'pit cacos' after the plasma rifle are a head scratcher. Pretty annoying when they cluster near the bottom of the jump and can't be shot. Also I'm not sure what the point behind the circular descent fight is. In my first playthrough of course I ran up the stairs with plasma rifle in hand and eluded everything entirely, including the slowly warping arachnotrons that ineffectually block the path. Then with foreknowledge, the fight goes down easy but this time the monsters blocking the stairs are also pointless. And in the last fight, the cybs should also be able to follow you to the back, and there need to be more viles. Also the teleport closets are pretty gross here too (NSFW). 

Spoiler

 

PR vs. two cybs in an open area is borderline tedious too, might as well put a BFG somewhere, even if it requires some risk to get.

 

Anyway, overall a positive map, because it mostly avoids the pitfalls of most maps of its ilk and thus doesn't outstay its welcome. :P 

 

Edited April 13, 2018 by rdwpa

[TheOrganGrinder]

MAP13: Koopa Anomaly

 

This one feels to me like a pretty conventional Doom map over which the Super Mario veneer is painted somewhat more thinly than in many of the preceding levels; this isn't necessarily a weakness from a gameplay perspective, and actually coming on the heels of the ferociously unconventional MAP11 and the environmental hazards of MAP12 it's pretty welcome to have some straightforward castle-crawling and monster-gunning to get my teeth into.  Overall it's an enjoyable layout, built around a great hall to which the player repeatedly returns via various loops; it's a good use of space and the stage for three separate battles over the course of the level.  The secret that stumped me for the longest time was the backpack, where I spent ages looking for a secret switch to lower it, a one-unit-wide stairway to scramble my way up, or a teleporter leading to the clifftops, before I got around to just walking up and pressing the damn thing to wach it lower.

[Crusader No Regret]

Map 6: completed without saves   0/1 secrets, 100/100 health/armor

 

  It's a Mario 3 airship in Doom.  The textures and music make it very noticeable.  The deck makes for a frantic battleground that can be approached multiple ways.  I went for grabbing some starting gear then making my way over to the two locked pipes.  Danced with the revenant there while baiting infights.  A more aggressive approach is viable for the less patient.  The interior sections aren't very threatening though the exit chamber has a higher danger level than the others.  This can still be welcome if one is in the mood for something breezy.  Survive the deck brawl and you're likely to finish the map.  Challenge seekers will be left wanting.  This map seems mostly about the setting.  I got enjoyment out of it though would admit it would not make a favorable impression with stock textures.  Didn't find any secrets; this mapset has been humbling in regards to tracking down secrets.

Edited April 14, 2018 by Crusader No Regret : edited when more awake than asleep

[NuMetalManiak]

MAP13 Koopa Anomaly

 

See? We still cold as ice, but got some lava pits too. A very Doomish level here like Grinder says, got some switches to find, tough secrets, a crusher area that is better running straight through it, and...a triforce. Okay then. Can get quite tricky at times, but otherwise a pretty average level. There's a pretty hard invulnerability secret which may help against a cyberdemon here.

[Catpho]

MAP12 - “Cool Cool Shotgun” by A.Gamma

Oh my, that map name and opening music track is deceptive.

This map will bound to have some players cursing its name, as its theme is to take away the player's biggest advantage: their movement. We got far ranged chaingunners, friction from the ice, platforming, and winds from the magic of conveyor belts. Ok, i think the chaingunners are kinda cheap (worst offender was the beginning with the lack of armor), but the other gimmicks are done fairly well and they are actually interesting, especially the wind sections (music change use was nice too). The challenge is surmountable if you think and try hard enough. The mountain environment, the caverns with the scrolling ice themed bricks (unique!) and the castle creates a distinguishable look for the map, works well with the icy friction. Cool ending.

This is a stand out map, for its many weird qualities.

Some screenies:

.... i dunno, sounds like something @Nine Inch Heels would play?

[Tristan]

heh, if you guys find MAP12 annoying, I can't wait for the MAP22 reviews :P

[Nine Inch Heels]

54 minutes ago, Catpho said:

i dunno, sounds like something @Nine Inch Heels would play

Not for one thousand dollars cash. I fucking hate scanfests with shit scattered all about.

 

EDIT: Had a look out of morbid curiosity. No. Not in a million years.

EDIT II: For the sake of "having played the map", here's a FDA I just now recorded. mhm17_12_NIH_FDA.zip

 

Only stuff I looked at before recording was how the map started out, and that was extremely annoying, imo.

 

On the subject of annoying things, the platforming starts off with a slippery platform, and then it goes back to "normal", which kinda made it "untrustworthy" for me.

 

Some of the later fights were more on the ambushy side of things (Almost died due to getting caught in a blast from a cybie rocket), but it wasn't too annoying once the opening was over.

 

The map also does deliberate fuckery with berserk pickups in an attempt to temporarily disarm players, which is a trope that I can enjoy at times, but in this map it seems things are just meant to be dickish overall, and eventually it was overdoing it for me personally.

 

Also the "wind" is inconsistent. At first you get dragged towards a cliff (twice actually), and then you get dragged under a crusher instead of the direction that would be expected by most people (which would be the cliff), so the map kinda goes out of its way and betrays its own trope.

 

Also, that "lift" that helps you get back to the cybie plateau, it would have been nice if it was an actual lift instead of a slow moving pillar.

 

I have mixed feelings about this one, overall I didn't enjoy it a great deal, but it wasn't too bad either. It's certain inconsistencies and inconveniences that left a bad taste in my mouth.

Edited April 13, 2018 by Nine Inch Heels