I made a hell level

[Guest Unregistered account]

I broke out of my mapmaking slumber and made a level! I tried to tone back on my obsessive detailing/neatness to make a level reminiscent of the time when it was cool for me to just be able to make my own levels, when every Imp and trap was something exciting. I made sure each difficulty setting was different in almost every place - my dad still died on Hurt Me Plenty twice when he played it though! Oops.

 

It's loosely inspired by the GBA (technically Saturn) version of E3M1, Hell Gate, which I played when I was younger. You can choose which path you take! Or take both. I'm thinking of expanding this into a full Inferno episode with this level being the first.

Pretty short, has two secrets.

 

 

 



 


 

 

Name: Flipping Heck

Game: Doom (1)

Format: Vanilla

Level slot: E3M1

Difficulty levels implemented

 

[Download]

[Nymbus_Hustle]

Playthroughs: ~7

Difficulty: UV
Secrets: 1/2

 

Definitely expand this, expand everything about this!

I didn't read that you said it had two paths and was pleasantly surprised about that. I think the blue path was a little bit easier because you didn't have to push a button to get out like the red path. I like that you used red and blue torches at the beginning to show where the two paths will be inside.

I couldn't find the second secret, and I searched everywhere, other than that my only gripe was that it was a little too easy, I didn't actually kill any of the cacos until the seventh playthrough. I do like that, unlike the vanilla E3M1, you didn't make us pistol fight cacos and gave a shotgun at the beginning of the map. 

Very good overall, and I'd like to see more maps like this or an expansion of this map's idea.

 

[Spie812]

I did an FDA (38/38 kills, 1/2 secrets):

spie812_flipheck_fda.zip

 

The level would make a pretty good opening to an episode. I like the one key required exit, but I do feel like the level is a bit too short for it to be realized to its fullest potential. Other than that, I think this level was fantastic. It looks great and combat is pretty fun as well.

 

As for any errors, the whole level could use a serious texture alignment pass. The cavern area in particular suffers from this, but you can find small misalignments all over the place.

 

Edited June 12, 2019 by Spie812

[Guest Unregistered account]

Thanks so much guys!! I really wasn't expecting that level of praise or that anyone would even play it! I particularly enjoyed your demo @Spie812. I guess I thought leaving misalignments was in the spirit of Vanilla but I was just being lazy... will definitely iron it out if it becomes a full episode!

 

As for the second secret... I didn't mark it very well, I just used a different texture to the surrounding walls but it's very similar and in an extremely dark area.

 

Also @Nymbus_Hustle, bloody hell! I certainly didn't expect anyone to sit through it seven times! Thanks for that!

[Guest Unregistered account]

Currently known issues:

-I forgot to add multiplayer starts, even though I made a second eye switch appear to open the permanently closing start doors to prevent players getting trapped outside in co-op(!!)

-It's possible to lock yourself outside the red key area by quickly running back before the bars close. This isn't too much of a problem however, since the blue key area is always open. Phew.

-Texture misalignments. I'm also not a fan of how the red key area looks, too many instances of texture changes without proper transition.

-One secret is too hard to notice

-Some of the key door bars don't open when interacted with

-I feel like something's missing from the blue key area. Also I didn't think shotgunning a bunch of Cacodemons would be fun but no one's complained about that so I guess it's alright. Probably because OG E3M1 is remembered for pistolling them instead... but oh well. I might take out one or two Cacos. I would use more enemies but I want to limit myself and introduce more monsters gradually like in the original game, and I want to set myself the challenge of using no human enemies... because Hell.

 

These will probably be addressed in a potential episode expansion rather than an update to this WAD :)

Edited June 12, 2019 by Unregistered account

[CorianderCastor]

Played with EE devbuild on HMP:

 

Short and sweet, I like it. Good concept, good difficulty, and inspired by, but not derivative of, a good map. I had some trouble opening the blue bars to the blue armor, but I confirmed it is functional. I don't think it needs to be longer, but longer maps in this style would not go unappreciated. And a whole episode would be great, yes, even a shorter episode of less than eight plus one levels. Or a longer one; if it floats your boat. Would still have been good if both keys were required, but like I said, option of either key is a good idea.

 

edit:

Quote

-Some of the key door bars don't open when interacted with

Oh, that's what was happening

 

Quote

 Also I didn't think shotgunning a bunch of Cacodemons would be fun

Cacos are fun, Baron are tedious? Maybe that's just me.

[Guest Unregistered account]

 @PaquoCastor Thanks for playing! And thanks for the extra motivation. A whole episode is surely coming!

 

Edit: also, I'm not sure what's causing the issue with the key bars, I can confirm I've experienced it too. The problematic bars are joined sectors, so maybe they ought to be separate? I'll test it out.

Edit 2: I tried it, and the problem persisted. Bizarrely, the problem seems to be the angle you face the bars at. Looking at the blue bars straight on tends to mean they won't open, whereas if you're at a 45 degree angle they seem to open 100% of the time. Does anyone have any ideas or knowledge on this issue?

Edited June 12, 2019 by Unregistered account

[Xyzzу]

I have played your map! Loved it so much I made a bonus 100% secrets demo on Nightmare! :D

flipheck_xyzFDA.zip

 

About those red and blue bars guarding the megaarmor, the blue bars are simply too close to the red ones. One thing you can do to remedy this issue is to move the two sets of bars far enough apart so that there's space for Doomguy to go past the first few, like this: [ B] <--< [ R] where the arrow is Doomguy :) Pressing "use" on a switch or something only activates the closest line in front of the player's face/hitbox, which is why it is a bit difficult to open the blue bars behind the red ones. Hope this helps!

[beast]

I liked it! I made a first and second attempt, completed both times and only found one secret. The flow of moving around feels good. I was expecting a monster to jump out when I picked up that mega armour, it feels a bit empty getting a big reward when everything in the map is dead or dying. Overall a fun play.

beast_flipheck_plays.zip

[Guest Unregistered account]

22 hours ago, Xyzzy01 said:

I have played your map! Loved it so much I made a bonus 100% secrets demo on Nightmare! :D

flipheck_xyzFDA.zip

 

About those red and blue bars guarding the megaarmor, the blue bars are simply too close to the red ones. One thing you can do to remedy this issue is to move the two sets of bars far enough apart so that there's space for Doomguy to go past the first few, like this: [ B] <--< [ R] where the arrow is Doomguy :) Pressing "use" on a switch or something only activates the closest line in front of the player's face/hitbox, which is why it is a bit difficult to open the blue bars behind the red ones. Hope this helps!

 

21 hours ago, beast said:

I liked it! I made a first and second attempt, completed both times and only found one secret. The flow of moving around feels good. I was expecting a monster to jump out when I picked up that mega armour, it feels a bit empty getting a big reward when everything in the map is dead or dying. Overall a fun play.

beast_flipheck_plays.zip

Thanks so much guys, that means a lot! And thanks for the tip Xyzzy, though I already fixed it in the next version by placing the differently coloured bars next to each other.

Unfortunately I'm a complete cretin when it comes to demos and couldn't get them to play properly! I played them in both PrBoom-plus and Chocolate Doom and all of them seem to desync.

 

Quote

Loved it so much I made a bonus 100% secrets demo on Nightmare!

:D

O-oh my... I'm flattered? Bloody good work! I just need to find a way to watch it :P

[Xyzzу]

Hmm, I played the map in the latest PrBoom+ (2.5.1.5), if that helps. Not sure why it would desync then. Oh, and you're welcome!

[Suitepee]

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/439084561

 

I play this at 2:11:02 into this playtest livestream.

[MAN_WITH_GUN]

NM-Speed in 0:19

 

PrBoom+_2019.06.15_16.37.58_doom.flipheck.lmp.zip

[beast]

On 6/14/2019 at 11:07 PM, Kapanyo said:

Unfortunately I'm a complete cretin when it comes to demos and couldn't get them to play properly! I played them in both PrBoom-plus and Chocolate Doom and all of them seem to desync.

 

I believe I am the cretin in this case - I discovered I had Romero's SIGIL wad configured in my prboom config, which probably did not help my demo recording. To rectify this I made vid dumps of my lmp's. Sorry about that.

 

1. beast_flipheck_hmp_fda_H264.mkv, 38MB [download link]
2. beast_flipheck_uv_sda_H264.mkv, 88MB [download link]