The DWmegawad Club plays: 1000 Lines Community Project

[xAn]

MAP03 - Townsquare

UV-Max; Pistol-Start; PrBoomPlus 2.5.1.5

 

No secret hunting this time. Mancubus und Archie joining the set again. And the Baron steps in as well. Archie just went straight into my 4 rockets, without resurrecting anything. Thanks for that...

 

Spoiler

 

 

 

MAP04 - The Stormdrain

UV-Max; Pistol-Start; PrBoomPlus 2.5.1.5

 

Difficulty picks up on this. Some low acrobatic skills are needed to get the shootable, secret switch. Dealing Pinkies, Revs and Lost Souls with only SG and Chaingun was kinda tough.

 

Spoiler

 

 

[Aquila Chrysaetos]

I'm glad so many of you enjoyed 07, it was the first (chronologically) entry to the project and is my favorite of the four I made.
For those who are curious if it was deliberately or accidentally stylized like The Abandoned Mines, it is deliberate, that's one of my favorite maps in all the iwads.

I'm not sure how many of you found it, if any, but the second secret is very helpful if you're short on ammo.

It's accessible from the teleport pad you land on after the blue card fight, if you back up, you'll run into a hidden ammo cache.

[Capellan]

MAP08

Delightfully ugly opening vista; always nice to see a FIRELBU building.  Gameplay seems very laid back on continuous, compared to the last two.  It's pretty easy to SSG your way through everything until the exit arena.  And even that's pretty casual stuff, just circle around the outside occasionally lobbing rockets at AVs until you can mop up once more with ol' Mr Shotty.

 

Fun for all that, and I did like the use of moving walls to encourage movement.

[DJVCardMaster]

MAP07 - "Ground Beneath" - Aquila Chrysaetos (100%K/95%I/50%S):

A map based on Abandoned Mines, one of my favorite Doom II maps, probably the best. The end result is something aesthetically and layout-wise, Romero-esque, but in the gameplay department, it just has that "new-doom" difficulty with I can both like and despise at the same time. I got annoyed by it in this case. Little to no room to hide, specially when the Arch-Vile trap kicks in. At start, it felt fine, but as it got harder instantly, I started getting pretty angry.
The plasma gun here is a must.
The cyberdemon fight at the end is pretty challenging, it took me some time to find a nice place to snipe him.

A pretty cramped map, I've felt choked at times, and annoyed by its difficulty, but I enjoyed its layout.  Not bad but not my favourite.

Deaths: 4 (HMP Playthrough - Chocolate Doom)

Order of preference:

Spoiler

 

MAP04

MAP03
MAP06
MAP07
MAP05

MAP01
MAP02

 

Surprisingly I did not die here, luckly.

[Krenium]

MAP08 - Gateway by NaZa

PrBoom+ / HMP / Continuous

 

Screenshot:

Spoiler

 

Ah, this is just the map to follow the previous two. I like when individual maps pay attention to pacing, but I think it's a concept often forgotten at the wad level. Gateway is chill and allows you to do some exploring. While the texturing felt reminiscent of iwads, the layout felt a bit stranger in a good way: odd angles and non-uniformity abound. I felt this map was quite beautiful in its own way; possibly the most beautiful we've seen so far. It's basically a bunch of buildings plopped down in an area but it doesn't *feel* like a bunch of buildings plopped down in an area, thanks to clever arrangement and elevation changes.

 

I liked the way lava was used here: it not only drives home the episode theme, but it's an interesting way to keep the player away from the edges of the map. This makes the space feel larger than it is and gives you the feeling that you're in a part of something larger.

 

The first part is fairly easy (on HMP at least) and even the ambush here feels like its pulling its punches. But that's okay, since the map makes up for that at the end with an intense dual-archvile showdown. The final arena is visually impressive and the morphing walls give it just the spice it needs to feel like a unique encounter.

 

Map ranking (favorite -> least)

3 8 5 4 1 2 6 7

Edited August 8, 2020 by Krenium

[golbeeze]

3 hours ago, DJVCardMaster said:

MAP07 -

A pretty cramped map, I've felt choked at times, and annoyed by its difficulty, but I enjoyed its layout.  Not bad but not my favourite.

  Reveal hidden contents

 

MAP04

MAP03
MAP06
MAP07
MAP05

MAP01
MAP02

 

 

This is basically how I felt about Map 07. It annoyed me with the cyber, but I still enjoyed it. That one thing irked me so bad it temporarily ruined my experience. However, I definitely do like it.

 

Map 06

This one is probably my favorite now, above map 01. I enjoyed the large, open areas and fights with high numbers of enemies without becoming overwhelming. I may not have been paying enough attention when the two cybers came out the first time... Also, I just learned from comments that the power up I didn't know what it did (because I'm using Combined Arms) was invulnerability. Man, that would have been useful...

 

Map 07

So, as noted above, the cyber influenced my opinion of the level. However, I was definitely feeling the deliberate reference to an original level. I just couldn't place the name, because I'm terrible with names of levels. I knew exactly which one it was in terms of gameplay, though. I would certainly enjoy this one more with foreknowledge. I would say 06 is still my favorite, but I probably enjoyed this one a bit more than 01.

Edited August 8, 2020 by golbeeze

[golbeeze]

Map 08

I wasn't impressed with this one. It felt way too big for such a small number of enemies and relatively low threat enemies. I kept expecting something to happen and it didn't.

 

[Horus]

MAP08 - “Gateway” by NaZa

 

And now on to a map by our host of the DWIronman competition!
This map, the second one of the City/Hell episode, definitely emphasises the hellish elements more than the previous map. Here there is yet again an IWAD influence, but this time it's more E3M6 Mt. Erebus, as evidenced by the FIREBLU buildings. 

 

Combat in the opening area is mostly incidental plus the mini-set piece for each skull key. The berserk fight for the BK is kind of a hindsight trap, if you're reactions aren't quick enough to flee the key area the first time, you can get cornered pretty quickly, on the other hand, with foreknowledge, it's very easy with a quick retreat to the initial area. The YK is a more simple affair, using the SSG on a clump of mostly imps.

 

The non-linearity of the opening area was nice, and I did enjoy the incidental combat there as well. Also interesting is that the BK is technically optional. I say technically because not taking it makes the final fight a LOT harder, after mostly simple combat the ending really suddenly switches things to max gear. The final battle was pretty sweet, the lowering/raising floors added some nuance to the battle and trying to ensure you remained in cover of the archvile attacks.

 

I found one of the secrets, but I must say the computer map secret was pretty obvious to me, I’m not sure it needed to be marked secret.

Overall, I enjoyed the map.

 

@golbeeze though I agree NaZa's map isn't the hardest of the maps so far, your easy experience is in large part due to you playing with a significantly overpowered mod (and playing continuously with this mod). 

Edited August 8, 2020 by Horus

[loveless]

prboom+, no saves, uv pistol starts  
map 8
deaths 2

 

both deaths occured to the YSK room.  a hilarious but mean fight, provided you're using software rendering.  spectres....they'll just shit on your existence in a sufficiently dark room.  the rising/falling walls of the finale were an interesting idea but the provided invul renders the fight completely free.  otherwise, i had a good time!  i do wish there were more pinkies at the BSK and that they weren't blocked in, rendering them impotent. 

 

 

1kcp-8-loveless.7z

[Veinen]

Map07: Ground Beneath

 

I was pleasantly surpised to see zero Dead Simple -isms in a map07 for a change. Not really even an arena map, another common map07 trope, more a collection of set pieces around the central hub. The start is relatively hot again although not really a tough one since you don't have to fight for weapons. The set pieces have some teeth too, namely the double AV ambush and the Cyber duel in tight quarters. Got my first death in the double AV room too, a bit of a good at Doom moment but it was hard to see the Spectre... The Cyber encounter is well designed in that there are a couple of ways to deal with it as proved by the comments and videos here; the fastest and most efficient way is to take him head on, which can be a little bit scary since it's a pretty small room, but you can also cheese it like loveless did or just ignore him completely. Ammo on a UV pistol start was tight, at least in my playthrough, as I killed the exit Archie with literally my last shell. I found both the PG and the hidden stash behind the tele, but maybe I was unusually wasteful in some of the encounters. Visual theme is very obviously Abandoned Mines inspired, which I can appreciate as it is one of my favorite Doom 2 maps as well.

 

Map08: Gateway

 

Fireblu building = immediate Mt Erebus vibes. This one also relies pretty heavily on set piece battles with very mild combat in between. The BSK Pinkie horde is not surprising with this Berserk placement so I was able to back out easily. I would have liked to see the Pinkies be able to chase me around the map rather than being stuck in their little enclosure. Wouldn't really change anything much but limiting monster movement with no apparent reason is something that rubs me the wrong way. The finale was definitely the highlight of the map for me and it is a pretty memorable fight for sure. I only had the SSG so the invulnerability ran out pretty quick and I was left with three AV's alive after it had expired so there was definitely some pressure. The free megasphere allows for mistakes so the fight isn't really that hard in the end but I do really like the idea with the lowering & rising walls and Arhies keeping you constantly moving. I can see how having the PG would change this fight completely though as there seems to be an abundance of cells and the Archies go down with the PG much faster.

 

FDA_1kCP_07-08.zip

[golbeeze]

7 hours ago, Horus said:

MAP08 - “Gateway” by NaZa

.

 

@golbeeze though I agree NaZa's map isn't the hardest of the maps so far, your easy experience is in large part due to you playing with a significantly overpowered mod (and playing continuously with this mod). 

I think the continuous factor is greater than the mod. Combined Arms is not as overpowered as a great deal of other mods as I will soon prove... (Level 11 is...well, if you watch my vid you'll see). Playing continuous is almost always easier than playing from pistol though. I try to consider the mod when I write my feedback. If I didn't, I certainly wouldn't mind replaying it as vanilla to give it a fair shake.

[DuckReconMajor]

MAP08 - “Gateway"

glBoom+ 2.5.1.7um, skill 4, pistol starts with saves, no complevel specified

 

Mt. Airbus pt.2

I liked this one a lot. Got a Berserk Pack early on and was given a ton of great punching fodder.

The final fight was held in a really neat arena and was a well-paced encounter, like much of the rest of the map.

One slight nitpick that annoyed me, the lava area behind the yellow-key building was completely dark! maybe there's a way to get back there and that's a reason to not draw attention to it. But when lava doesn't glow it leaves me to believe it's just a pool of Spaghetti-Os.

The BBQ people pit behind the blue door was really neat.

 

Spoiler

 

 

[Magnusblitz]

MAP06: On the Block

100% kills, 4/4 secrets

 

This one is probably the best looking one so far, taking advantage of some nice city/library textures and a gloomy light setting to help mask how square everything is. As the map goes on, the linedef cap does become more clear, with a lot of fighting taking place in some literal boxes, but I still think it does a nice job. There's a lot of monster meat to chew through, but also a lot of big open spaces and varied monsters so getting them all to infight is an easy solution. The final area behind the yellow door is perhaps a bit too easy in this regard as I quite happily just abused opening/closing the yellow door to get everything to infight. The most difficult part for me was figuring out the progression, as there's one switch (I believe it's in the mancubus' dining hall?) that's a total 'what the hell did that do' switch that I think opens up the AV in the southwest corner of the map, kinda hidden away.

[DFF]

MAP08: Gateway by Naza (97% kills/100% items/50%secrets)

Blind Run|UV|Continuous|ProjectBrutality3.0

 

Whoa, deja vu...

I actually had the pleasure of playing this map back during Infernew as Naza had mentioned. personally I had no idea why this was a rejected map, but I don't want to get too involved with the politics of that project, just seeing this make made me want to replay my own infernew maps, and hopefully those get released someday.

As for the map itself, its a fine affair, combat is tight and not too easy, a good difficulty for map08. I like the non-linear layout of buildings reminiscent of Mt. Erebus, the crazy texture flow of doom 1 is also fun, however I do feel this map feels a bit off having moved away from the full hell design to a "Mt. Erebus meets suburbs". Understandably this was done to probably fit the E1 theme, but I feel the map had stronger identity as its hellish original.

The only concerns I have is the megasphere in the end fight seems redundant on top of a invul sphere, as I was able to leave the map with 200% armor and Health without consequence. On a similar note, I wanted to go back and get the rest of the secrets but once you enter the arena there isn't a way back out. I used to have some maps like this, but overtime i've found the value of having a teleporter back out of arenas, so players that want 100% completion can finish it once the map is complete. This is a spot were I think a return teleporter would have been nice.

Overall, fair and fun map. I think it just needed some slight item tweaking and could have been stronger with the hell scheme, but that may be older bias.
Rankings:

Spoiler

MAP03: Town Square

MAP07: Ground Beneath

Map04: Stormdrain

MAP08: Gateway

MAP01: Ebb

MAP06: On the Block

MAP05: Demolition Zone
MAP02: Flow

 

[Capellan]

MAP09

This is a map where some attention has been spent on maximising amount of play vs line count, with many areas that are revisited from different angles in the course of play, while opening up sub sections to allow new enemies to roam.  It’s clever work, especially given the absence of teleport traps.

 

Gameplay is fairly mellow overall; the few higher-tier monsters aren’t generally too much of a threat given their locations, though I guess the final AVs could get away from you if you’re unlucky or inattentive.

[VanaheimRanger]

 

[DJVCardMaster]

MAP08 - "Gateway" - NaZa (100%K/96%I/0%S):

If I'm not mistaken, this was previously an Infernew submission. As you may recall, this is basically Mt. Erebus with a city re-skin, again with many Sandy influences here. Sweet, compact, little and nice. It's short, the only big spot here is the ending, where you can also die a few times, as it is a pretty big fight with Arch-Viles and little place to hide. 
This map feels like a Doom II outtake for the MAP12/19 slot. It serves its purpose of being a gateway for the next "episode" of hellish-city. Here is where the city becomes corrupted yet again and is up to Doomguy to save it.

Deaths: 5 (HMP Playthrough - Chocolate Doom)

Order of preference:
 

Spoiler

MAP04
MAP08

MAP03
MAP06
MAP07
MAP05

MAP01
MAP02

 

Also FIREBLU.

[Horus]

MAP09 - “Steep Drain” by Breezeep

 

Now for a map with a highly interconnected layout that as Capellan mentioned sees you revisit the same area(s) often. Unfortunately, I didn't really find the layout all that intuitive and spent a lot of time getting lost, many times pressing those switches and waiting for the lifts to lower/raise. 

 

Visually it is certainly cohesive and well detailed taking into account the line limit, even if the textures used aren't exactly my favourite IWAD ones. The 'hell' portion of the 'city/hell' equation seems very tenuous here, seemed more plain city. I found the combat a bit too shotgun-heavy.

[Magnusblitz]

MAP07: Ground Beneath

100% kills, 2/2 secrets

 

As others have said (and the author confirmed), this one is based off Abandoned Mines, same music track and everything, but I think it does a good job of homaging it without feeling like a rip-off. I really enjoy the setup of the opening hub, and one can imagine it fitting in nicely with larger areas behind the key doors as a normal level without the linedef limit. I also really enjoyed the plasma gun secret (clever combo of secret lift and false wall), being a whole area to itself, as well as the blue key fight, where the spectres are really quite dangerous pinning down the player. Unfortunately the rest of the fights in the map were a bit meh, but overall good map. I would've maybe put some block monster lines on the teleports, having all the cacodemons constantly teleport around was kinda annoying.

 

MAP08: Gateway

100% kills, 1/4 secrets

 

Another map with some IWAD vibes, this time Mt. Erebus, though with a lot less lava. The key ambushes are pretty well-telegraphed and not too hard if you're expecting them, the real piece of combat is at the end with some nice raising-lowering walls against archi-viles. Lots of cells in the final arena for a plasma gun I didn't have, but the SSG was enough. Decent little map. Would've liked a way to return to the rest of the map from the final arena to hunt for the rest of the secrets.

[Krenium]

MAP09 - Steep Drain by Breezeep

PrBoom+ / HMP / Continuous

 

Screenshots:

Spoiler

 

Steep Drain is full of similarly-sized, strangely-shaped sectors combined together in a very pleasing way. I love how vertical this map is. There are many times you'll need to drop long distances into pits of specters (which I found to be the most dangerous by far) and other enemies. What little plasma and few rockets I had left over from MAP08 dwindled quickly as it became apparent that this map would only be doling out bullets and shells. Which is absolutely fine. Instead of empowering your better weapons, it opts to throw mid-tier monsters at you combined with hindering terrain to up the difficulty instead.

 

Another aspect of this map I love is how dynamic it is. It features some central elevators that require jumps to get to various places. And I like the way the map opens up to reveal the yellow key. Steep Drain is quite large and easy to get lost in until you've spent a while here. I didn't think any map under 1000 lines could make me feel lost but it was accomplished here, much to my delight. It vaguely reminds me of Anoat City (MAP03) from Dark Forces which is one of my favorites from that game.

 

The only criticism I have for this map is the repeated use of specters in large blind drops. Since some ports have infinite height and some don't, and specters vary the most between ports, this kind of trap can produce a much different experience depending on which port you're using. In my case, I took a lot of unavoidable damage and it didn't feel very fair, but it did make the map much more menacing overall.

 

I have no complaints in the looks department, other than perhaps it could've been a bit more hellish. Amusingly, there's a cute caco texture inside the secret — an in-joke I'm not aware of, perhaps?

 

Overall, I loved this map. Years from now when I look back on this wad, this is going to be one of the two or three maps I remember from it.

 

Map ranking (favorite -> least)

9 3 8 5 4 1 2 6 7

[golbeeze]

21 hours ago, Horus said:

MAP08 - “Gateway” by NaZa

 

...

 

@golbeeze though I agree NaZa's map isn't the hardest of the maps so far, your easy experience is in large part due to you playing with a significantly overpowered mod (and playing continuously with this mod). 

 

I still say the continuous play was more powerful than the Combined Arms mod. Here is a pistol start of map 08, UV

[Summer Deep]

MAP08

 

I initially thought the containing lines in the Berserk Pack area were unnecessary, but if you can pick up the key and squeeze your way out again, you can set up some decent infighting between the pink demons and the imps, which wouldn't be as effective if they were free to break out. Awkward little ambush in the yellow key room as well, but a couple of well directed SSG blasts give you room to manoeuvre.

 

First time I played this was on UV continuous, and the final fight with the AVs and others was no big deal, as I had rockets and plasma. Different matter altogether from a UV pistol start, where I was reliant on the SSG (couldn't work out that plasma gun secret). Initially seemed impossible, but those rising walls do give good cover, and the invuln gives you a decent start. The wimp option of dashing for the end teleporter doesn't work, as it only seems to become active after the AVs have been dispatched. Very pleased to get 100% kills here on two attempts out of three!

 

 

MAP09

 

Hated this one. Seems like a reasonably straightforward, semi-symmetrical map, but I just never managed to figure it out properly, and even on the second playthrough spent almost 45 minutes gradually losing the will to live, much of it making repeat visits to those huge wedge-shaped escalators. Once you find that teleporter, the path to the yellow and blue keys opens up, and it all looks so simple in retrospect....

 

[Endless]

MAP08: Gateway

LZDoom + UV

 

This map perspires vanilla vibes. From the first area we find some really strong Doom 2 visual. I had quite some time of not seeing that bluefire/fireblue. Good times. The visual design is, well, vanilla, it's not bad, but it doesn't stand out at all, it's even a bit exhausting, but the overall design of the map is smarter than it looks. No doubt it's limited to the 1k lines, but at least it offers enough opportunities to either engage in gratifying combat or even evade that combat, except for the last area, which at least gives us invulnerability for the first few seconds of combat, which we'll need. It's a bit of a sad map as seen from the textures, but quite fun in practice. I'm glad to know our boy NaZa has some map skills, now I'm looking forward to trying out more of his creations.

[Biodegradable]

MAP09 - Steep Drain

HMP | Continuous with Saves | GZDoom + Zagemod

 

This one was awesome, I love it. Breezeep presents what is now my top favourite map of the WAD along with Bauul's MAP04. The map's design and layout is interesting and creative, progression's slightly confusing near the end but is otherwise really bloody cool, combat was straightforward but fun and just an fantastic use of verticality and unique approach to the restrictions of the WAD's design theme. I love the map's dynamic progression of raising platforms and draining water, it's a wonderfully consistent design that works from beginning to end. By far the strongest map so far in terms of flow, consistency and design. Definitely a favourite for me. 10/10!

 

Gameplay

Spoiler

 

 

[DJVCardMaster]

MAP09 - "Steep Drain" - Justin "Breezeep" Kelly (100%K/96%I/0%S):

We've just seen a map by Breezeep the past month in Akeldama, MAP26, the wooden one with the weirdly interconnected layout, this is, in terms of layout and visuals, something similar, replacing wooden monotony in textures, with some bricks and yellow concrete walls. There is as I said, too much monotony in the design of this map, but a really nice layout and progression.
Again, this map, as some previous ones, revolves around forcing the player to visit the same rooms more than one time from different angles, as a way to make the map longer. 
Weird thing to jump down the pits at the middle just to go up, one side sends you to the starting quarter, the other one will eventually send you to the next area. The map at the end will open itself a little bit more to facilitate backtracking.
Combat is nothing too surprising, a bunch of mid-tiers here and there. Overall an enjoying experience, up to par with Bauul's MAP04, but I think slightly better.
Again a pretty superior layout, similar in architechture with Akeldama's MAP26.

Deaths: 5 (HMP Playthrough - Chocolate Doom)

Order of preference:
 

Spoiler

 

MAP09
MAP04
MAP08

MAP03
MAP06
MAP07
MAP05

MAP01
MAP02

 

Solid entry, yet again for Breezeep, and we will see him again in a map collab for MAP20.

[Phobus]

Ok, three-day catch-up, so I'll be brief.

 

MAP07: Ground Beneath

Musically and visually, this hints at The Abandoned Mines without going for any direct ripoffs. Secrets were pretty helpful, but tempered by game play making very effective use of tough and dangerous monsters in limited spaces. I skipped the Cyberdemon at the end, and he distracted the final Arch-Vile for me, allowing for a low-health and armour escape. A tough map, even on continuous with such good supplies carries over, but no unfair and not crowded with enemies, so I liked it.

 

MAP08: Gateway

A strange map that comes in two halves. The first part of the map is clearly meant to be berserk-oriented, but as I'd carried over a load of ammo, just felt really easy instead. Chuck in the secret automap and megasphere and the Mt. Erebus layout can't really pose much threat. You then grab an Invulnerability, which seems to use an altered palette from the usual "Everything is white!" one (or GZDoom has a new effect now?) and hop into an arena where you just burn down some Arch-Viles with your plasma as quickly as you can before it wears off, knowing that there's a second megasphere to help you out/top you up once everything is dead. Not great, this one. I did miss two secrets, but I'm not sure where they might be and I don't think I could leave the arena to go back anyway.

 

MAP09: Steep Drain

Breaking away from IWAD music for the first time today, this map would suggest that the abstract MAP26 from Akeldama is very much what Breezeep does, at least within the confines of vanilla, as it's a very similar idea. It also seems to be hoping I'd not have a rocket launcher or plasma rifle, as there's plenty of bullets and shells laying around, and encounters that might seem tough when your most powerful weapon is an SSG. Early on I did get whittled away at by the hit-scanners and surprise Spectres, but as the map wore on I got increasingly comfortable. It's an interesting and surprisingly intuitive map, although I never even got close to guessing where the secret might be, much less attempting to trigger it. One strange thing was that a monster closet with Cacodemons in clearly opened at some point, but they kind of trickled through eventually in ones and twos over the last few minutes of the map, so I must have blown straight by on my way to the next switch.

 

 

I feel like any attempt at a city theme was completely lost in the last few maps, brown and metal texturing being the only real hint at what we're after. Not necessarily a bad thing, but after the first six maps formed a pretty cohesive idea, I feel like it's already gone and presumably won't be back.

[klaymeb]

Fashionably late to the party! First time I've picked up a wad from The Club, and I am itching to get started. I don't know if it's really kosher to do a play-by-play of all the maps so far, when we're a good week into the WAD...? I'll put each level in spoiler boxes, so it doesn't feel like such a massive post; Let me know if it's too much!

 

A short preamble: I'm no seasoned Doom'er, but I'll try to give it a good run. I will die a lot! Sure it gets frustrating at times, but that's part of the challenge.

 

All maps: UV / Pistol start / GZDoom

 

MAP01 - Ebb
 

Spoiler

"Ebb" does a great job of setting the scene. Starting out you're put under pressure by hitscanners and a few pretty tanky monsters. Every fight adds a little more and they never feel cheap. It's map01, so I didn't expect a lot of stuff, but I never felt that I was starving for resources. The one secret on the map was neat and gave an edge in the rest of the map.

 

The level of detail is great, and the industrial theme is cool. The cool overlook from the exit room shows how much you can actually do with 1000 lines, and still have some left over.

 

Really fun first map. I have a feeling that this run is going to be hard-earned! Maybe I'll have to reduce the difficulty, but then again, I'm not in a rush...

 

 

MAP02 - Flow

Spoiler

Going in to "Flow", the loop around to the switch ending with the Mancubus threw me off for a bit. It took a while to get the strat down, and the final fight did burn me to a crisp a few times. I still felt that I could get the fights under control with some work. Resources are tight, but never unmanageable. The only part I got really stuck on was the initial revenant fight, but in the end I managed it without feeling that I'd only managed it by getting lucky.

 

The first secret gives a little help and isn't too hard to find. The placement of the second secret is sort of obvious, but the trigger hunting to get it took a bit. It is a huge help in the final fight, so worth it!

 

The theme continues, and coming into the final room and seeing that it's the same room as the overlook from "Ebb" was really great. I like how they were tied together to make it seem a more like one map in two parts. I actually went back and played them continuously and I think the experience of MAP01 and MAP02 in succession is better than either map alone.

 

MAP03 - Town Square

Spoiler

Tight quarters in this one, and the fact that you're initially limited to the shotgun and the rocket launcher gives some really cool tactical conundrums! You really have to think about your resources, and if you overextend in one fight the next one will be painful.

 

As the name suggests, the level is based around a town square, and you return to it for each key that you find. We're out of the industrial zone, and into something resembling the suburbs of the city. It looks great and is cramped, for better and worse. The fights in the courtyard increase in difficulty every time you return, and it's really interesting. Towards the end, it becomes linear and not super interesting, but it closes of the level nicely. 

 

I had a lot of fun with this one. The first few fights are almost like a puzzle, since resources are scarce, and there's a constant risk of a well-timed (or is it poorly timed?) face-rocket!

 

 

MAP04 - The Stormdrain

Spoiler

Another map centered around a central courtyard. The pressure is on from the start, and the entire map is really compact with lots of enemies. I liked the constant pressure and it never really lets go. There's two traps, the first one is a fun little surprise, and the second one is bloody hard. I died to that one more than anything else in the map. "Oof" as they say.

There's enough ammo in the level to keep it going, but health packs are more scarce. I found the secret green armour, and the secret berserk pack. Both of those were nicely, but not impossibly, concealed. The soul sphere is still mocking me from it's perch atop the waterfall! If anyone knows how to get it, please send me a pm! 

 

The theme of the map is more suburbia, and does what I'd expect it to do - it's a nice wrapper for some chaotic fighting!

 

Other than the final trap, this map was a hell of a lot of fun!

 

 

MAP05 - Demolition Zone

Spoiler

I found the opening of this map to be especially hard. You have to expertly navigate between the hit scanners, the barrels and the arachnotron with very limited resources. Resource management was hard in this one, and I was down to the pistol on some cacodemons... That's probably more my fault than the map's, though. The SSG finally decides to deign us with it's presence in the middle of the map; not a moment too soon, I might add! The secret backpack was a very welcome find.

 

The first area wasn't particularly impressive to look at, but as the level opens up the map design becomes more vertical. Some of the later fights seem very cramped, especially from the yellow key door until the end.

 

Not my favourite map so far. A little too claustrophobic for my tastes, and I felt that the fights didn't really suit their environments too well. 

 

 

MAP06 - On the Block

I've had a few good attempts at this map, but got gibbed in the final fight when the Cyberdemon crashed the party... So this is where I took a break :)

My initial impressions...

Spoiler

... are mixed, but mostly positive. Infighting is the most important weapon in this map, with the rocket launcher (and later plasma gun) coming in second place. I like maps that use infighting like this, and it's fun to maneuver around the area. After the bar and yellow key, it's even more important, and it feels a bit slaughtery. The big boss room is just chaos - I'll do better with that next time! First time around I didn't notice the plasma gun until it was practically too late. 

 

I'm not a big fan of the looks of the level, but the slaughtery nature of the gameplay is fun so far!

 

I'm having a lot of fun with 1000 Lines so far, and I hope to be able to continue writing up some impressions of the later maps! 

 

~Klaymeb

Edited August 9, 2020 by klaymeb

[DuckReconMajor]

MAP09: Steep Drain

glBoom+ 2.5.1.7um, skill 4, pistol starts with saves, no complevel specified

 

Abstract LEGEND of a map. This one looks like something I'd see in a dream then wake up and wish I could put together in doombuilder.

Also reminds me of Marswar MAP28, another map I enjoyed a great deal.

This map was pretty singy on ammo, and expected you to take out some higher-level stuff with nothing higher than SSG.

I was able to deal with this for the most part but when the final wave came out and I ran out of ammo again I nope'd my way to the exit door.

I did get lost a few times in the center area because of the symmetry, but this wasn't enough to spoil my experience.

 

Spoiler

 

 

[DFF]

MAP09: Steep Drain by Breezeep (100% kills/96% items/100%secrets)

Blind Run|UV|Continuous|ProjectBrutality3.0

 

A very interesting map indeed, has a lot of good things going for it. Personally I found the combat and the gameplay to be alright, well done but nothing terribly exciting for me, but with that said this is definitely a well designed map. Good use of verticality, very interesting geometry present, cool gimmicks with accessing the map through manipulating water levels (something i've always liked), interesting layout and overall very nice. The texture assortment was well done, I find the mixture of pure brown and gray base textures with some slight brown brick and metal to be done very well, but is a boring palette for me. Because its nice usage its not anything negative, more my preference.

One thing to note, I think I found a line error, as Linedef 882 (by the yellow key door) has a MIDGRATE texture but is not marked as impassable, letting the player walk through it. I'm assuming its unintentional as it isn't any secret and the rest of the mid textures follow the impassable rule.

Overall, a very good map i'd say, with lots of nifty features to it. Wasn't personally the most exciting to play for me, but still a good map. 
 

Another note, very interesting how the E1 theme seems to really be "water treatement", as 6 of the 9 maps have decent water features, and 2 of them are drains. Unusual but cool mini-theme, if intentional.

Rankings:

Spoiler

MAP03: Town Square

MAP07: Ground Beneath

MAP09: Steep Drain

Map04: Stormdrain

MAP08: Gateway

MAP01: Ebb

MAP06: On the Block

MAP05: Demolition Zone
MAP02: Flow

 

[xAn]

MAP05 - Demolition Zone

UV-Max; Pistol-Start; PrBoomPlus 2.5.1.5

 

This one took me some attempts on a semi-agressive play, especially at the beginning. All that hit-scanners and the Arachnatron in your neck. Ammo is also very tight, you need to manage it well. At least i could spare some rockets for the final area. Oh, and some rip and tear included...

 

Spoiler