The DWmegawad Club plays: Disjunction & Scythe X & Counterattack

[Spectre01]

Scythe X: Maps 06-10

The Long Range Teleport takes you to a station floating through space. This episode continues to explore the "space-base" theme of E1, only now you're traversing platforms and bridges floating in the blue void. This type of theme has been done elsewhere, but it's rare and unique enough compared to something like red caves that's been beaten to death. The coolest example is the large solar panel array outside the playable area in map08. Erik Alm's fetish for Revenants is completely absent here, with frequent Mancs replacing the bony encounters of the last two Scythes. The Encounter in map10 takes on a different theme, starting with a dark and moody base interior, with a tight Cyberdemon fight, and concluding on a green, alien-looking asteroid chunk which introduces some new enemies. The dark Imp and green PE are both interesting, as they summon ghosts from their projectiles which can quickly flood the area. It's a shame we'll never see what further plans Erik had for these enemies in future episodes.

 

Overall score: 5/5, legendary wad etc.

Standout maps: 03, 07, 08, 10

[Catpho]

Just now, Spectre01 said:

 

Overall score: 5/5, legendary wad etc.

Now this is a cultured person.

[riderr3]

+++ Exomoon, +++ Plutonium Winds
That can fill september.

P.S. Hope someday we play Master Levels.

[floatRand]

Map08 - "Foundry" - UV, 100% kills, 100% secrets.

 

Oh dear. Some people really didn't like this one. 

And I can kinda see it. It is exhausting, bit scarce in resources and it is bit dull in theme - visually very brown, just highlighted with some orange lights and molten slag. Brutal, with sharp shapes, metal... I do think I had some good combat encounters in it. 

The YK encounter had idea of having to sorta slalom between the crushers while managing the revenants and imps teleporting in, but I think you have enough time to kill the revenants with rocket launcher, which kinda cheeses the whole encounter. Doing the encounter as intended has its own problems, too, with crushers slowing when starting to crush a monster. RK is probably the worse encounter, considering that the crusher that kills the cybie is probably not communicated to player mayhaps. Plus it is kinda designed in way that player who is not careful can get splattered by cyberdemon rocket going through windows. The maze before that has gotten some flak, but I think how it transforms is kinda neat. I was kinda running low on steam, so I decided to settle on it. 

The finale is probably one of my favourites, in which player controls progression through stages of the encounter.

 

I should have probably scrapped lot of the fat with Foundry, but I guess it is part of its identity now. 

 

The conveyor and crusher at start was pulled from one of my very first maps I worked on. It was flesh/skin-textured in that one. 

Music is from Donkey Kong Country 3.

 

Secrets: 

Spoiler

1. In the starting area, the wall next to the door to the room with chaingunners/sergeants and green armour can be lowered, revealing a map!

2. On the balcony viewing the large room with gates/doors, panel left to the door can be opened, containing some ammo.

3. In the small room with the switch that activates ambush in the maze, you can find a shootable switch - which opens a door later in the maze, allowing access into small room with blue armour and medikit. 

4. In the storage-room after RK-area, you can find a small switch sandwiched between one of the metal things and wall. This opens a timed door above, which leads to a small room with ammo and a soulsphere. You need to activate lift before pressing the switch, though - or try to press switch from above, because waiting the lift is too slow to reach the door in time.

5. In the 2nd part of the finale in the room with BFG, you can find a shootable switch behind the switch. This reveals a switch in the bigger room with revenants/arachnotron, which in turn lowers one of walls cornering right balcony. Your reward is a soulsphere. 

 

[Pirx]

18 hours ago, rehelekretep said:

yeah i think i was guilty of focusing on the gameplay in my (brief) writings but the design and aesthetics of these maps is excellent

 

Seconded.  Tbh this gameplay isn't really my thing but I definitely enjoy the skin tech hell. Iirc i also praised skillsaw's orange tech hell when we played valiant and wanted more in this style.

 

I just didn't have time to properly finish the map yet, or to recover from getting my butt kicked at it.

[Pirx]

Btw, thanks @floatRand for your comments and explanations on your work! It's always cool to see the "author's notes" or "making of".

[gaspe]

+++ Heroes' Tales

[rehelekretep]

onto Counterattack - glboom+, uv, pistol starts, using saves :)

 

holy mackerel these are some big maps!

map01 fda

a few thoughts on this

+ this is a map01 blown up in scale. the encounters are generally easy, just inflated numbers, but your arsenal is inflated too

+ love maps that give you the pg and the rl and hold off or dont give the ssg and bfg. its a nice change of pace

+ even though this is sprawling, i didnt really get lost or have trouble working out what i was meant to be doing

- while i do appreciate the scale and the detailing, i think i prefer texturing as seen in - for example - TimeOfDeath's vanilla maps. i found this a bit of a mish-mash and some of it was quite jarring and not in a good way!

 

map02 fda

bit more dangerous now! still heavily encouraged to make use of the rl. dont really know why the pg is kept away from the player until the finale, as the final fights dont really benefit or need the pg. this is more conventional of a map, with a central hub and spokes. the crusher room can be cheesed a bit too easily from the edges; the vile actually got stuck on my 2nd attempt, and my first attempt only ended because a revenant literally rocket punched me as i came round a corner (saves me right for trying to save the megasphere.

couldnt for the life of me work out most of the secrets; especially the bfg/sewerage one that was taunting me >.<

edit: forget to add this earlier but i preferred the texturing in this one to map01

Edited August 26, 2018 by rehelekretep

[Magnusblitz]

Oh yeah, that reminds me, what is supposed to be the indicator for the correct skull switch to push for the BFG? I couldn't figure out the clue and just ended up save-scumming it until I pulled the right one.

[rehelekretep]

are you talking about map02?

[Magnusblitz]

Yeah, MAP02. If we're talking about the BFG in the north-eastern part (brown brick, green sludge) then you

Shoot

this panel in the nearby stairway which reveals a bunch of skull switches in this corridor that leads to the BFG. Pushing the wrong one will spawn some monsters in the stairway and lock the other switches, pushing the right one opens up the door to the BFG. I thought it might be something like a differently blinking light or something but they all seem to be different and the 'correct' switch doesn't leap out in any way I could discern.

 

Also in doing re-loading my save I realized I never actually hit the yellow switch in the central hub (which just opens a monster closet) but still was able to complete the rest of the level... hmm.

 

[Mechadon]

I've been lurking this thread a bit, hope you guys enjoy Counterattack :).  If I had better timing I could have had a bugfixed version out for you guys, but its probably not a big deal.  If you come across a secret lift in MAP03 that doesn't want to lower again after a few presses, that's a bug (just noclip past it).  Also the entertext leading to MAP32 is borked - it plays at the normal exit of MAP31.  So yea, just ignore that please :P

 

8 hours ago, Magnusblitz said:

Oh yeah, that reminds me, what is supposed to be the indicator for the correct skull switch to push for the BFG? I couldn't figure out the clue and just ended up save-scumming it until I pulled the right one.

Spoiler

The hint is the glowing lights.  Find the switch that glows at the same rate as the light at the end of the corridor (the same light that lowers to reveal the second switch).  That's the switch you want to press.  You can brute-force it too though, all the other switches do is spawn some enemies as punishment.

 

Quote

Also in doing re-loading my save I realized I never actually hit the yellow switch in the central hub (which just opens a monster closet) but still was able to complete the rest of the level... hmm.

You don't need all keys to exit the map actually.  That's a conscious design decision throughout most of the project; I wanted there to be an array of paths and options leading to the exits of each map (to increase the replayability factor).  You can skip the blue key and go for the yellow key and complete the map that way too.

Edited August 26, 2018 by Mechadon

[Catpho]

7 minutes ago, Mechadon said:

 If I had better timing I could have had a bugfixed version out for you guys

 

Thats the Mechadon I know :D

[Memfis]

+++ Heroes' Tales

[Grain of Salt]

@Mechadon don't bugfix counterattack, you'll desync rd's maxdemo :V

[rehelekretep]

map03 fda

really enjoyed this one. the only bad spot came when i had been outside into the blood arena/courtyard and couldnt work out where to go; turned out i had completely missed a switch right at the start of the map (leading to the ssg) - because of that im not sure how 'normal' my actual playthrough was.

the texturing was on point - lots of blood falls and pools, very menacing, helped by the midi. i felt there couldve been more viles and/or cybers but i guess its early in the set and the difficulty has room to ramp up

[Scotty]

MAP01 - "Aggilus"

 

Immediately the scale of maps you are about to embark upon is made clear to you with this fantastic structure. The midi and sky choice, allied to some fantastic lighting, creates real atmosphere and sense of place. I appreciated the RL/Chainsaw combat early on, a pretty unique and satisfying combo to gib and butcher enemies with. Despite a massive monster count the map moves at a pretty decent pace and really isn't actually all that big, it's just that the sheer intricacy of the mapping and layout which provide so much dimension to the given space. I like that Mechadon isn't afraid to embrace the slaughter and just throw sheer numbers of low tier enemies at you right from the off, particularly in traps and set-pieces, as it puts pressure on you to fight back and retain space to move around in. Cleverly/dickishly placed (depending on your perspective) Chaingunners in numerous spots add the majority of lethality to the map and ensure that you keep on paying attention.

 

I wanna point out that this map uses the translucent texture feature really nicely, in particular this clever floor trick which i haven't seen anywhere else in a Boom wad.

[Mechadon]

On 8/26/2018 at 11:34 AM, Grain of Salt said:

@Mechadon don't bugfix counterattack, you'll desync rd's maxdemo :V

I definitely don't want to break demos!  If I do a bugfix release, it won't include anything that would break them.  I made a changelog of the potential update a few days ago, and dew mentioned that MAP04 might be the only one that could cause issues (MAP01 on the lower difficulties would too, but I don't think anyone has recorded demos on those).

 

Sorry for going off-topic by the way.

[galileo31dos01]

+++ Heroes' Tales so I can read what others have to say about map21 (:

[rehelekretep]

map04 fda

a behemoth! i have mixed feelings about this one. it has a grand scope, and lovely texturing and lighting. some of the encounters are exercises in circle-cheesing, but there are some good ones - like the RSK fight. i think fundamentally there's too much of a hesitation in the early part of the map to dole out the fun stuff ie rockets, and the map is too large and flat for its own good. however there does seem to be quite a bit of non-linear freedom so perhaps i went all the wrong ways >.<

im always happy to see the av20 midi. overall enjoyable but felt flabby for want of a better term

[dobu gabu maru]

Hey folks, plz vote if you haven't (but still intend on playing), because everything is sitting at like 2/3 votes.

[Grain of Salt]

++ ESP 2

[Pirx]

It's pretty much heroe's  tales vs Capellan 's combo at this moment? 

I 

[Capellan]

7 minutes ago, Pirx said:

It's pretty much heroe's  tales vs Capellan 's combo at this moment? 

 

Heroes' Tales vs Exomoon (+ something), I think, with my combo in 3rd.  Depends how dobu is counting the votes.

[FrancisT218]

I maintain my previous vote (for now):

+++Exomoon & Dawn of the Dead OR Earth OR Classic Episode

[Catpho]

Does my August 24th vote still count? 

[rehelekretep]

+++ ESP 2

[antares031]

+++ Exomoon & Earth

[riderr3]

13 hours ago, Catpho said:

Does my August 24th vote still count? 

Haha wanna change your vote? =)

[Catpho]

@riderr3 yea,  looks like avactor isn't getting any votes, and would be confusing for Dobu to pick from a bunch of Exomoon Parings. So,  I'm gonna formally change my vote. 

+++ Heroes' Tales