Return To Hell. (My first old school megawad)

[Astro]

Ladies, and Gentlemen. Welcome to my first megawad EVER. This wad has maps that look something you would see in the 90's. Some maps are better than others and some maps have the Sandy Petersen's level design. This was tested in only Zandronum, it shouldn't have problems with other engines. Some maps look very similar to the original ones from Doom II. Wad doesn't have custom images, sprites and sounds.. It only has custom music on some maps (map14, map30, map31, map32 I probably missed some.)

I Don't have anything else to say, I want this wad to be popular because I worked hard on it. I Would love to hear your favorite maps from this wad! No Jumping, crouching. Freelook is allowed. This wad was meant to be played on Software Rendering but OpenGL is good too. Here are some screenshots: (Maps shown MAP29 & MAP27)

Good Luck and have fun!!! *fixed yellow key in MAP04 and added more ammo.* http://www.mediafire.com/file/r75acyv8m6o4dyp/RETURN.wad/file

Edited September 10, 2018 by Astro

[Misty]

You need fix your download link. 

Also, where's main information besides screenshots? Refer to this thread and edit your first post to make information more visible
 

 

[Nine Inch Heels]

8 minutes ago, Myst.Haruko said:

You need fix your download link. 

The link works perfectly fine. Mark text, right click, open in new tab, done.
 

8 minutes ago, Myst.Haruko said:

Also, where's main information besides screenshots?

There it is:

2 hours ago, Astro said:

This was tested in only Zandronum, it shouldn't have problems with other engines. Some maps look very similar to the original ones from Doom II. Wad doesn't have custom images, sprites and sounds.. It only has custom music on some maps (map14, map30, map31, map32 I probably missed some.)

This tells me it runs in basically all the ZDoom derivative ports, and it most likely runs in PrBoom+ as well. It also tells me I need no texture packs to go along with it.

8 minutes ago, Myst.Haruko said:

Refer to this thread and edit your first post to make information more visible

Why? It's all there in one compact paragraph.

[Misty]

Because everything is merged in one mess and I only understood main information at third reading. List with main information like used ports, map numbers and so on, make most of reading easier and saves time. 

[galileo31dos01]

I gave this a quick try from maps 02 to 04 continuously, using ZDoom. Simple design for simple combat seemed enjoyable to blast through in a couple minutes, but at least maps 03 and 04 could use some extra ammo since I was constantly bordering 0 bullets and shells, and there isn't much room for infighting. I was also given rockets and cells but no weapons for them, unless they were in secrets. The arachnotron in map 04 was stuck and I saw a few misaligned textures (part of the brown wall over the water pit in map03), also I didn't find a yellow key anywhere so I stopped playing. 

 

So, one question: was this wad designed for continuous? 

[Astro]

2 hours ago, galileo31dos01 said:

I gave this a quick try from maps 02 to 04 continuously, using ZDoom. Simple design for simple combat seemed enjoyable to blast through in a couple minutes, but at least maps 03 and 04 could use some extra ammo since I was constantly bordering 0 bullets and shells, and there isn't much room for infighting. I was also given rockets and cells but no weapons for them, unless they were in secrets. The arachnotron in map 04 was stuck and I saw a few misaligned textures (part of the brown wall over the water pit in map03), also I didn't find a yellow key anywhere so I stopped playing. 

 

So, one question: was this wad designed for continuous? 

Fixed MAP04 yellow key and added more ammo :)

[KVELLER]

On 9/9/2018 at 2:21 PM, Astro said:

I want this wad to be popular because I worked hard on it.

 

I don't think it's a good idea to think that way. There have been a lot of projects throughout history (not all of them Doom-related) that have had years and years of work and effort put into them, just to fail miserably at the end. That said, your work will speak for itself and become popular if it deserves it.

[Bryan T]

I made it to map14 before calling it quits.  It feels too familiar, I got bored pretty easily.  The lift in the corner of map06 wouldn't register unless I ran into it, so I was running all around wondering where to go.  That annoyed the shit out of me.

[HAK3180]

I played through four levels and it does feel pretty much like Doom 2, even like the individual maps are loose tributes to their Doom 2 counterparts. There are some nice touches and ideas, and I didn't notice anything I actively hated. That said, so far it's just a little bit meh - something I wouldn't mind playing but wouldn't exactly be memorable.

 

I suggest you make the maps that you want to make. Polish your style, take advice, improve, etc., but at the end of the day, if you've done what you want to do and it's your best work, that's a success, and popularity should not be the measure of that success.

[Revved]

I thought this was a pretty interesting megawad. Any plans for an idgames release?

[NoWits]

Been playing through this mapset this morning on UV, pretty fun so far. It's sorta like a remix of the original Doom 2 levels, which is very cool. Ammo's a bit tight in some places, and there's one bit in level 4 where you drop down via a lift into a room with a revenant right in front of you, with absolutely no way to back out or escape apart from to wait for the lift to go back up. If the player doesn't have any chaingun ammo left then they're totally fucked, using the shotgun or SSG is just gonna get you punched to death. Also, I discovered a bug on map07: the rear wall of the starting room is set to Impassable, which means you can't go through the corresponding opening during the arachatron battle. I got stuck and died here because of this invisible wall.

Finally I want to echo people above me's concerns that making maps (or really any stuff in general) because you want them to be popular isn't the best way to go about things. In my experience at least, it leaves you too dependent on other people's approval, and you might find yourself feeling the need to cater to current trends, or what you think people would find cool, rather than what you really want to make or what you think is cool. Map for yourself first and foremost, if people like it then consider that an added bonus, and if people don't like it then they'll (hopefully) offer criticism that'll help you make the best versions of the maps you really want to make.

 

Edit: Also, I take it these maps were designed for continuous play. I just began map08 on a pistol start and the sudden cacodemon onslaught combined with narrow passageways makes it practically impossible, essentially a roll of the dice whether you'll escape or not.

[Memerz1]

I just got done playing the wad, so it's time for me to review it. But before I do, there's this HUGE thing that I didn't like about the Wad, more specifically, where it was hosted. I had to go to Media-fire to download it. Media-fire! You know, the unprotected cloud service where you get a pop-up ad when you try to download something, and if you don't click the ad away fast enough, you'll get all kinds of malware and spyware on your computer, thank god I had Malwarebyte's protecting me, but if I was any ordinary person, I'd be fucked. Just a heads up for next time, use Dropbox, or Google Drive. They're much safer and don't require you to take the risk of getting your pc jacked up.

Moving on, since I have a lot of negative stuff to say about the map pack itself, let me start off with something obscure that I liked. There's little to no custom music put in the map pack, meaning that I can suffer through this while listening to my favorite Midi's. So with that being said, let's start off with Map's 01-04. I loved them. From presentation, to how the maps flow, It's really good. Map 04 got a little tricky, with health pickups, but still decent overall, same could be said for Map 05.

Map 06 however, is where shit starts to hit the fan. When I started playing through it, I thought this was where you stopped. It looks like vanilla Doom II to me. But I took a step on the lift and oh shit, this is different. I got to give you credit for subverting my expectation, but why is the spider mastermind in the corner, and why are there this many enemies?! After 15 minutes of picking off all the demons on the ground including the spider mastermind, I look around to find where to go next, and I realize that this map is so big, that I don't know where to go, and that thing in the corner that looks like a lift, actually isn't a lift, and I immediately died from hit-scan soon after. This is a common theme in this wad.

I see that you made this in September of 2018, which is ironic, because that's around when I started making wads myself. Hopefully, you've improved in a span of 5 months. But Map 08 HAS to be easily the worst map here. What were you thinking, when putting a pop-up spider mastermind, in the Blue skull-key room, when you know full well that most players by this point are going to have like 6% health left? Even with every bit of ammunition I had, I still couldn't kill it. This was the turning point, where I stopped having fun playing this wad. For the rest of the levels, I actually got pissed by the amount of bull shit enemy placement, and turned cheats on, the further I progressed into the wad, the worse it got.

Something else I'd like to mention, I really don't like it when people say that their wad is like a actual wad from the 90's, because that feels like a cheap cop-out for it being primitive. And I don't know if there was any custom textures used, but Map 16 has a lot of missing ones. And don't get me started with the Archvile encounters, but I think that goes with poor enemy placement. 

It was map 17 and beyond that all the problems with the wad culminate, and made even bigger problems, or new ones. There's no real sense of direction, and it doesn't feel challenging going up against 18 Arachnotrons and 7 Mancubus's with low health and low ammo, it just feels infuriating. The last thing I have to say about this, is that the Map 30 looks pretty cool, but still, there's too many enemies, and it's virtually impossible to hit the icon of sin, when you're on the ground.

But I'm glad that I got done with this. I saw it all the way through, and to the end. I know most people aren't willing to do that. But please don't think that I'm criticizing you as a person, just your wad. It's like something I would do, that's the level of bad we're talking. But then again, Map 03 was SO god damn good. Perfect level design, right amount of enemies, and ammo pickups, what happened to that? Wow, I really spent all day playing this, but it isn't the destination that matters, but the journey, right?