The New Oldstuff Chronicles #7

[DooMer 4ever]

Not many reviews this time, but I didn't want to review more this time because I finally got through folder v-z! And the wads were so good this time that I didn't want to ruin the good looking average of the ratings :P So, only 8 reviews this time.

Villamex Richard J. Sham 55 %

Heh, when I played this level it reminded me a lot from a wad I had reviewed earlier. After playing the level I checked which wad it was: it was yourdead from Oldstuff Chronicles 2, made by Richard J. Sham! Well, It looks a lot like yourdead, there are many quite big rooms with many different kind of monster, sometimes it is again best to let the monsters kill each other. There was much same also in the texturing. This one is a little better because the rooms aren't that big and it's a little more detailed too. I couldn't find the way though and finally gave up.

Villa Michael Reed 78 %

I remember playing this level not a long time ago and later played it again. I didn't feel like playing it third time now :) I really like this level, the architecture is interesting and it's not hard to find a way. It's not very hard level but not too easy either, the monster placement is mostly good but in some spots i felt like there was too many monsters. For example in one room there are like 30 shotgun guys. It's not hard and it doesn't look good. The ending could be better too, just room with boxes looks boring to me...

Verada Paul Cofiatis 80 %

If you're the kind of Doom player that loves nearly impossibly hard levels, then UV mode of this wad is for you. The others should play it on HMP. I managed to get to the exit door by running past nearly all the monsters (there seemed to be far too little ammo to kill them) but then I realized I would need to go back... So I ended up trying to kill dozens of monsters with 20 shotgun shells and berserk fist. And yes, there were archviles among those. I played the level again on HMP and it was much better then. Ammo and health were well balanced and it was still quite challenging. The level isn't very well detailed, but look good anyways.

Venom Ola Bjorling 83 %

The author of this level has something to do with Talosian and The Darkening so I expected a good level. It is good, especially the first half of the level was exellent. Lots of traps, good detail and light effects, exellent monster, ammo and health placement too. I didn't like the other half that much though: the final arena was a bit boring and the room after that was annoying because there wasn't enough room to tactically fight with the monsters.

Vectra Paul Cofiatis 5 %

Another Level from Paul and It's really hard to believe it's from the same author. There are just four hell knights, John Romero's head and lots of Keens in this level. And LOTS of ammo. Someone please tell me this is made by some newbie that stole the name of another author.

Vats Vlad The Implaler (Jay Cook) 35 %

Lots of nukage and tight tunnels in this wad, so it's not my favourite type of level. The texturing looks often quite ugly but health, ammo and monster placement is tought actually well. I wouldn't recommend this level to anyone though because it's just too annoying and boring.

Valley slaytan 70 %

This level looks really good, unfortunately it has one major problem: it's too easy. There is so much healt and ammo that the level doesn't feel dangerous at all. I don't think my health ever went below 100 and there was too much ammo, especially for pulse rifle. It is still unique looking level that is worth playing.

Valhalla Dylan Barber 70 %

This level looks great, though larger variety of textures could have been used. It isn't too easy either and ammo and healt is well balanced. The bad part about this level is the usual one: it's hard to find the way. I couldn't figure out what to do after getting the blue key. I enjoyed the use of switches in this wad. There weren't many swithes that you couldn't know what has happened after pressing them.

The TNOC award goes to Venom by Ola Bjorling.

[Little Faith]

Paul Corfiatis is one of those excellent (he was the moving force behind 2002ado and lone author of two megawads) wadmakers that occasionally get their kicks out of making deliberately bad levels (try mad.wad).

Given that both Verada and Vectra are car brands I guess he was trying to communicate what he thought of them.

(I know he is a big Verada fan).

[Grazza]

The text-file for vectra.wad does look as if it was a piss-take map. I was going to mention that there is a dramatic difference between Paul's early work (e.g. Twilight Zone: just about worth playing once) and his later work (TW2 and DT good; DT2 and 2002ADO well worth playing several times). However, vectra and verada have very similar dates.

So what's next? /ports/v-z (some good stuff in there, and I see no reason to skip it) or /s-u ?

[DooMer 4ever]

Grazza said:

So what's next? /ports/v-z (some good stuff in there, and I see no reason to skip it) or /s-u ?

Hmm, I could review the wads in /ports/v-z next but it didn't come to my mind earlier. I've downloaded hundreds of wads in school from the folders not in /ports folder and burned them on cd, so I'll possibly skip the /ports. I could download them too but it takes so damn much time: try to repeat RIGHT CLICK -> SAVE TARGET AS > C:/SOMETHING/ ->OK million times and you know :)

EDIT: btw, someone make demo for verada.wad on UV and I'll be amazed :)

[Nanami]

I'm waiting to see what horrible review I get for uac3.wad ;)

[magikal]

See my lmp pages for a UVMax Legacy demo of Verada. It's a real nice play.;)

[DooMer 4ever]

magikal said:

See my lmp pages for a UVMax Legacy demo of Verada. It's a real nice play.;)

Wow, I'm definitely going to watch that!