Feeling really not great about my Doom mapping attempts.

[Not Jabba]

5 hours ago, 129thVisplane said:

Fucking hell I just want to be loved by the community for colorful and fun projects but i can't do both, I can only make texture/sprite edits and funky palettes for my projects but the projects never go anywhere cuz there's never any fucking useful maps for them

 

2 hours ago, 129thVisplane said:

I honestly think i'm just gonna stick to the graphical sidelines and stop trying to force myself on mapping. I did think about it and realized that Kevin Cloud probably didn't make any maps either, and that made me feel a bit better about myself as well.

 

Mapping is complex and has to be learned one piece at a time, so I think it's totally reasonable to focus on another thing that you're good at and enjoy, and have mapmaking be something that you tinker with on the side.

Your texture work is excellent, and I always look forward to seeing what you post in the texture jam threads. I've been wanting to invite you into a project as a texture designer -- if you're interested in doing more Heretic/Hexen-style stuff, feel free to PM me and jumpstart that, or else I'll bug you in a few months :)

[leodoom85]

4 minutes ago, 129thVisplane said:

Thanks for y'all's insights, support, and suggestions honestly, I've been reading em but I'm out of brain power to reply to specific ones rn. I did however realize that i've been stuck in a loop of "everyone's gonna fuckin loathe whatever i do" based on my own mind constantly reminding me of a comment taken out of context and the reviews on my first released wad. Maybe after I take a nap I'll come back to GZDB and try to make something that I enjoy playing even if the warped version of a generic idgames reviewer in my head doesn't.

The worst judge is ourselves. And, it's not bad to take a break from the map editor and BOOM, you got inspiration again. Happened to me and most people...

[Fonze]

This is sad to read; I enjoy your contributions to our community! Have you ever tried doing a collab with a more gameplay-focused mapper? I find them to be fun (taking the stress of doing everything yourself off your shoulders) and a great way to learn other approaches to doing stuff.

 

Speaking of learning stuff, that brings me to a good point wrt creativity as it is for me: it seems to be much harder to come up with something great from nothing than to tweak something ok into something fun. On that note, sometimes a good thing to try is drawing anything and let go of the result; getting something down lets you see the direction the level wants to go in as it fits your vision and puts you in the stage of tweaking the design to better fit what you want rather than trying to wrap your head around every facet of mapping with nothing to look at, while detaching yourself from your work is liberating in a sense and will help you feel ok with making mistakes, which you can then learn from.

 

Also wrt bad reviews/criticism: it's easy to just say "dont beat yourself up over it," but I know how hard that can be to actually do, especially when you spend time on and put care into making some art and sharing it with others and wind up with reviews like:

 

Quote

How to make your speedmap feel like a real map? Create a small room and fill it with revenants. Pointless.

 

or even the straight up "fuck you Fonze's" I've gotten several times from a few people. Like i just want us to all have fun and be happy what happened? It can be tough to shrug that to the side, and my examples are fairly tame compared to what some others have gone through when releasing their wads. That all said, you do need to find some way to get past these types of comments, either through looking into what contributed to this player having this reaction, through detaching yourself from your work and using it as a learning experience, or through just solace in the inevitably that you can't please everyone and this map was clearly not for that person, which is okay; that's life. In these cases I think it's good to take stock of what you did right equally as much as what fell flat.

Edited May 19, 2020 by Fonze

[Jayextee]

19 minutes ago, 129thVisplane said:

I did however realize that i've been stuck in a loop of "everyone's gonna fuckin loathe whatever i do" based on my own mind constantly reminding me of a comment taken out of context and the reviews on my first released wad.

 

Just wanna drop in here to tell something; a fair portion of the reviews of The Becoming cited the E2M8 boss battle as their least-favourite part of the WAD. To be honest, what I set out to do (make a solo cyberdemon battle actually challenging) I so completely succeeded at, the negative comments on it don't even matter and are validating as hell to me. I actually don't mind that people loathed that one part of my episode, because actually it's tied very closely to the vision I had for it; a literally unforgiving boss battle demanding awareness and precision on many fronts simultaneously. The exact antithesis of the now too-familiar Tower of Babel boss fight, despie having a largely-similar composition.

Sometimes you gotta, though. Dig your heels in and not sway, because you did the thing you meant to do. I mean, criticism about it is often valuable; and if your vision turned out not to be a good one after all was said and done, perhaps don't make the same mistake again. We learn this way, from mistakes, of course.

 

But this is what I meant earlier by "map for you". Because, honestly, a guy like you is already your biggest critic and you don't need everyone else piling-on alongside. Do what makes you feel good. :)

[Misty]

I actually feel the same at some days - nothing feels right starting from texture selections, placement, sector shapes and ending with really small, barely visible things. But once I'm done and give someone test my map and they come up with mostly good feedback - I get motivational boost to continue further. Of course, I try have fun with mapping - coming up with general theme, texturing, placement was always the part I loved. Just look at this simple way - you have nothing to lose and you can always improve parts you dislike about your own maps. We are the worst critics of our own work, most of players won't see or feel the difference, unless they are really skilled ones.  

[yakfak]

i think it'd be good if all the one and two star reviews of wads were just deleted lol
i never understood the point

[Major Arlene]

26 minutes ago, yakfak said:

i think it'd be good if all the one and two star reviews of wads were just deleted lol
i never understood the point

If they offer constructive criticism they have  a point. not everyone will like your work. (take it from someone subject to a lot of those for a justifiably horrible map deserving of those reviews)

[Phobus]

To be fair, I made a Christmas map and one of the reviews didn't so much question my sexuality as a result as decide it was definitive proof that I was gay. The anonymous /idgames reviews may have been a lot more plentiful than what we have now, but they were very low quality for the most part.

[Not Jabba]

30 minutes ago, Major Arlene said:

If they offer constructive criticism they have  a point. not everyone will like your work. (take it from someone subject to a lot of those for a justifiably horrible map deserving of those reviews)

True, but 90% of reviews that give 1- and 2-star ratings are rants or hot takes (usually over matters of pure stylistic taste) rather than actual criticism.

[Nine Inch Heels]

8 hours ago, 129thVisplane said:

even thinking about gameplay is hard. 

Here's something that might work:

Place monsters before drawing geometry, and place them in such a way that you determine what's a turreted monster, what's a monster in a cubby that opens, what's a monster that threatens the player's immediate surrounding.... And then draw the geometry that you think supports what the monsters are supposed to be doing. If you're not sure about how to size up the geometry, better make it a bit larger than you normally would, because it's easy to "shrink" something, but it's really hard to "extend" something in a nearly finished map.

 

If you have troubles visualizing how something plays while you're in the builder, think of monsters as "functions": This monster is good at these things, but bad at others, so use it in a position where it doesn't need to something it isn't good at. Now jump into the game, and see if that part serves it's purpose. If it does: Add something that serves a different purpose and add that in a way that you think makes sense. Test again, see if it works. Yes, it's tedious at first, but it helps you learn how to use monsters, so you're not gonna be doing that forever, it's just to get started.

 

Oh yeah, and don't bother detailing anything until you're satisfied with how the area in question plays.

 

Quote

I want to participate in this community, I want to make cool maps that people enjoy playing, but I just can't. I just can't get my head around making enjoyable gameplay, when I try it just ends up the same boring corridor shooting in front of the player through pretty but ultimately nonfunctional geometry.

 

Think of the player as the "centre of gravity". Every monster that is awake will want to somehow get as close to the player as possible. The purpose of geometry is to determine where the centre of gravity can be at any given time, and how monsters can travel towards that centre of gravity or not. That will give you at least a vague idea how fights can "unfold". When you have some geometry in place that appears to be doing its job, think how you can make it such that players don't get to chill in one place, and see if you can "push them around" somehow... Turrets, tanky monsters, a pack of demons, anything that works is fair game.

 

Quote

The fact that I can barely play Doom without dying every 5 seconds doesn't help either.

 

Not something anybody can help you with. Sit down and play like the rest of us. If you want to make progress on that end without having to dig around for new stuff to play, check this one out:

 

Quote

Fucking hell I just want to be loved by the community for colorful and fun projects but i can't do both, I can only make texture/sprite edits and funky palettes for my projects but the projects never go anywhere cuz there's never any fucking useful maps for them, and i cant release the resources because the context of the projects is important, and im about ready to fuckin end my miserable ass because my stupid brain is keeping me from being a meaningful part of the community for my favorite game and i don't know what to do.

 

Believe it or not, fun is very subjective. I've made several maps in the past that were called "bullshit" or "bad" by more than one person, while these maps were also appreciated by somebody else. You can't please everybody, so don't even try. Knowing who your audience is is much more important than trying to somehow live up to somebody else's "standards". Ask 100 people on DoomWorld, and you'll get dozens of fundamentally different answers as to what a map should or shouldn't do, what "good design" is or isn't, and what "your objective as a mapper" is meant to be.

 

Do not concern yourself with people who want to want to push their ideals onto your spare-time activity, and instead look for those who are actively looking to discuss your ideas with you and how these ideas could be made to work better.

Edited May 19, 2020 by Nine Inch Heels

[Roofi]

I'm not sure what to advise, but I could express my current state:

 

If you're lost right now, try to hold on to a style you love. For example, if you love Ultimate Doom maps, look at the maps on the doombuilder as much as possible and try to follow the style.

 

At the moment, I'm crazy about making maps strongly inspired by HR2. I consider myself a pretty good and experienced mapper but I know I exist thanks to other mappers. I know I've seen a lot of good ideas in maps. I take them back, remix them, combine them... I know I'll be satisfied !

 

 

 

[Jimmy]

@129thVisplane I would spend some time healing. There's no shame in taking a break from stuff that's stressing you out.

 

Creativity simply isn't a thing you can force. It's important to distance yourself from as much trauma as you can until your head is a little clearer. I love your graphical work so hopefully I can help you out.

 

I'd like to invite you to the Joy of Mapping discord server if you're keen to hang out with a community of people who might be starting off various pursuits and are there to help each other. No pressure though!

[Smite of Disrespect]

6 minutes ago, Jimmy said:

Joy of Mapping discord server

Mind if I lurk there? :D I always wanted to get into mapping but didn't know where to start. What better way than to learn from The Man himself?

[Gokuma]

@129thVisplane, you posted some great textures on the Post-Your-Textures topic which I put a couple to good use (or at least I'd like to think) and of course credited you for them.   I see plenty of good advice posted here so I hope you're feeling better.   I've made stuff since ages ago and I'm only starting to feel like I'm contributing worthwhile finished stuff for the Singe Player scene, or standard deathmatch for that matter.   It can really take time to get experienced at mapping.   Years ago I used to just try to do so many new things or some cool looking things without too much concern or awareness for keeping the gameplay or flow good.    It may sound contradictory but when/if you do make an effort in mapping again, try to not take it too seriously, but at the same time you surely want to improve so take note of many different ways people have said to approach it and try different ways until something works better.   Of the different components that make map experiment with their priority in what order of planning to see what works: Enemy placement & ambushes, flow, room to evade, or sometimes more difficult situations as long as the player isn't totally boxed in, visuals, a center piece, or cool architecture, with room to plan around them, etc.   A major thing (in life altogether) is just don't let what people say bother you so much, but at the same time use criticism to improve.

[Dark Pulse]

As someone who likes to create things, I can definitely feel where @129thVisplane is coming from.

 

I'll put it this way: The second-hardest thing you do, creatively, is actually create the thing. The actually hardest thing you do is to present it to the world.

 

I've dabbled in a lot of stuff.

• I've been a part of mapping projects before - those of you who played UT2004, if you played the CTF4 mod, most of those conversions were done by me, and I did a few for the Unreal Tournament Revolution mod as well.
• Doom, I've fooled around for years, and while I feel highly confident in tinkering with and modding maps (see my contributions for the PSX Doom Master Edition - all four of them with a fifth coming when I can figure out how I'll cut the damn level down), I've been less confident in producing original work.
• Music? I made some pretty nice re-instrumentings of MIDIs of various game music over the years (I did some songs from Doom, too!), but I haven't tried doing original music sequencing (mostly because I feel like I'd need a MIDI keyboard of some sort to do it "proper").
• Writing is a hobby of mine; I've produced some long-ass fanfic in the past (on the order of hundreds of thousands of words - no joke), though I've yet to do an original story. (Though I've got ones I'd like to do... but I'd like an artist as I lie in the Visual Novel direction, which means I'd need a musician as well, and that's a whole different story.)

But you know what? Every so often, I still pick it up and try. And I feel like it will be worth it. I feel like I could make a competent Doom map for what it's worth. (The PSX GEC project will probably actually be my first try at it, if we really do go with having the converters create an exclusive set of maps.) In my case it's less of an issue of confidence as opposed to not finding "that thing" that really hooks me and makes me want to make it so badly.

 

For you, it's a crippling fear of the fuckwads out there on the internet that anonymity can provide.

 

 

There's plenty of loud assholes out there on the internet. Yes, a whole bunch of people who'll go "ROFL LOL DIS MAP SUX." Fuck 'em. Those aren't the people you want to listen to. Tune them out and don't think twice about the crap they said. If it can be summarized that simply, it simply ain't worth reading.

 

The key to getting over this, and gaining the confidence you need, is to learn to separate just plain useless commentary like that, from constructive criticism as to how you improve. Anyone can tell you what they liked, but it takes someone who's actually got some interest in your stuff to tell you what they didn't. Don't be crushed by the people who actually take the time to tell you what they didn't like - learn from them! Anyone who will tell you what they liked is commonplace, but the people who sit there and tell you what they felt were flaws, mistakes, or issues they had in the map are absolutely worth their weight in gold.

 

These people are secretly your biggest supporters - they just don't know it yet. They want you to do better. This is how they think you can do it. While you obviously shouldn't just cater to every single whim, it's absolutely rock-solid worth thinking about their suggestions and seeing if you agree with them. If you don't, then okay, but if you do, maybe it will open your eyes, and teach you a new way to do something.

 

Don't be afraid to fail. Instead, do the opposite - fail early, and fail often. You HAVE to fail in order to succeed. It's literally part of the process. You didn't learn how to run before you walked, you didn't learn how to walk before you crawled, you didn't learn how to crawl before you balanced on your hands and knees, and you didn't learn how to balance on your hands and knees before you rocked yourself onto your stomach. Nobody who was successful just magically appeared at the top one day - they worked their way there.

 

It can be tough to put something out there for others to pick apart, to feel like nobody will ever like it, to wonder what the hell you're doing. But bit by bit, try by try, you'll get better and better. And soon enough you'll have that confidence to just make something, and put it out there, and not worry about if others will think it sucks or not.

 

All you have to do is get in that zone of pure creation and let your mind work its magic. You've got this.

[Tango]

I think the thing that's helped me grow as a mapper the most the last few years has been to give myself a safe space to map freely and experiment. by "safe space,", I mean both mentally, and on my hard drive.

 

you could, for example try something like establishing a thread for yourself where you can freely post all your playable mapping endeavors, much like how folks in the Resources section of the ZDoom forums create threads dedicated to their own resource edits. so this would go something like this:

 

• make your thread, and maybe upload one playable map to start
  • you'd be basically declaring the following up front: here's my mapping dump, these are all experiments, play at your own risk, constructive feedback welcome
• do a bunch of very small scale mapping attempts and experiments
  • want to experiment with using monsters on turrets to make interesting gameplay? cool, make a small map in 30 mins that's just a single room/fight with turret monsters and an exit switch somewhere
  • want to experiment with incidental combat? cool, spend 30 minutes drawing some random blocky outdoor shapes using only green ZIMMER and fill it with monsters (maybe give some of em the ambush flag) and add an exit, then see how it plays
  • want to learn how to use cyberdemons better? cool, spend 30 minutes drawing a COMPBLU box and fill it with a cyberdemon along with a small horde of imps or hell knights and an exit switch, and see how it plays
• upload each experiment as you go and post it to the thread (maybe with a screenshot per map to entice players)
• repeat

 

of course you could work on Cool Megawad Project Idea #55 or whatever more "serious" project you have simultaneously, but I think doing something like this would give you a safe space to "fail" and get feedback and address your fear of posting maps head on. failing fast = getting better fast, and setting appropriate expectations for yourself ("this is just an experiment") can help you just have a good time going through the motions.

 

I don't have my own mapping dump thread, but what I described above is pretty similar to how I structure my mapping folder. I've got folders for every major project I'm hoping to complete someday, but then also just a "scrap" folder where I have scrap01.wad, scrap02.wad, scrap03.wad, etc. to dump any little random thing I want to make or experiment with, totally divorced from my other lofty projects

[Maximum Matt]

Just play some Maximum Doom if you wanna feel better about your mapping skills.

[129thVisplane]

Coming back to the thread with a clear head, I've decided that I'm definitely gonna fight my demons first. My head has become a nasty place over the months of isolation and I'm sorry that I've let some of it out in here. That said I'm not gonna give up on mapping forever, I'm just gonna step back and go slow, and not let the echoes of unpleasant reviews deter me from doing my thing. Thanks y'all <3

 

12 hours ago, Not Jabba said:

Your texture work is excellent, and I always look forward to seeing what you post in the texture jam threads. I've been wanting to invite you into a project as a texture designer -- if you're interested in doing more Heretic/Hexen-style stuff, feel free to PM me and jumpstart that, or else I'll bug you in a few months :)

That sounds fun actually, I'd be up for that. I'll send ya a dm once I'm a bit more awake.

 

10 hours ago, Jimmy said:

I'd like to invite you to the Joy of Mapping discord server if you're keen to hang out with a community of people who might be starting off various pursuits and are there to help each other. No pressure though!

Sure, I'd love to hang out. Not just for mapping but in general.

[P41R47]

On 5/20/2020 at 4:26 AM, 129thVisplane said:

Coming back to the thread with a clear head, I've decided that I'm definitely gonna fight my demons first. My head has become a nasty place over the months of isolation and I'm sorry that I've let some of it out in here. That said I'm not gonna give up on mapping forever, I'm just gonna step back and go slow, and not let the echoes of unpleasant reviews deter me from doing my thing. Thanks y'all <3

 

Glad to know you feeling better, pal!

Just take it easy and everything will be fine :)

[DuckReconMajor]

On 5/19/2020 at 9:06 AM, 129thVisplane said:

because apparently in my head asking for anything on Doomworld gets you laughed out of the wads/mods subforum and newprojected to hell unless you're an established user.

 

This is the big sore thumb sentence to me. I get what you mean.

Those comments are deserved sometimes though, in cases where a new user pops in saying "i have great ideas, who wants to map for me I'll pay you $3"

In your case though where you have great aesthetics to show off in your work, if you are good at making map areas that look good I say just do that!

I think if you made a thread like "here's a map with my new textures and whatnot" people are going to be too impressed looking at the screenshots and seeing stuff in your map to care too much about gameplay. Of course there will be people pointing out gameplay issues, but they have different needs and wants and it's just good advice to have, provided you can avoid internalizing it and taking it as a personal attack.

Especially in your case if you suggest you're open to working with others on a project with your custom resources.

 

Aside from the above quote, my response to threads like this is "why everybody gotta map?"

Especially in your case. The answer I usually get is that the barrier to entry is lower but we get threads like this one where people torment themselves over this and I am confused again.

From the stuff I've seen of your art I'd take your skills over a great mapper's skills any day. I'm not just saying that and I don't mean that as an offense to the incredible maps and mappers, it's just my personal preference.

 

I think when you have mediocre maps with great custom assets vs great gameplay maps with no custom assets a lot of the hardcore doomers will prefer the latter.

But more casual folks like me secretly prefer the former.

 

And another thing to consider is that often you'll get a wall of feedback, not because your stuff is trash, but because they see something good that could be great with a few tweaks. If it were honestly terrible (and not in a funny or cute way) then no one would comment.