Thinking about not continuing my megawad.

[AtticTelephone]

I was working on this megawad called Station 13, but I notice my levels are pretty bad, and I'm getting tired of working on all these levels, maybe I should try focusing effort on a single good level rather than a tiring 32. Should I stop working on the megawad and instead try making a single good level?

[ElPadrecitoCholo]

Well, that would depend in a certain way, first of all, you should see how much progress you have made in your maps, then know the time you have invested in your creations throughout the days, and then understand why you say that your levels you consider bad just like that, mate.

[Michael Jensen]

You could take some breaks in between and make single-levels in the meantime.

Limiting the number of levels is a good idea but you don't need to go from 32 to 1. Maybe an episode, 6 maps for Doom 2, would be a nice start.

[Misty]

Well, I'd release those 13 or more maps, get feedback, take what's the best from it and use feedback for new levels and improvements. Not everything must be 32 level megawad, shorter sets are easier to play. 

[AtticTelephone]

Just now, Misty said:

Well, I'd release those 13 maps, get feedback, take what's the best from it and use feedback for new levels and improvements. Not everything must be 32 level megawad, shorter sets are easier to play. 

It's 15, and most of them are unfinished.

[Misty]

Then pack those you finished and release them. All steps mentioned still apply. 

[AtticTelephone]

1 minute ago, Misty said:

Then pack those you finished and release them. All steps mentioned still apply. 

I did, but got no response.

[Misty]

Have you posted them in feedback threads like this one:

They do good job playing maps and giving feedback for those who need it. 

[AtticTelephone]

8 minutes ago, Misty said:

Have you posted them in feedback threads like this one:

They do good job playing maps and giving feedback for those who need it. 

Nah, I posted there before, with this awful megawad I made called Waves of the Undead, now I sort of have a reputation amongst them...

[ElPadrecitoCholo]

2 minutes ago, AtticTelephone said:

Nah, I posted there before, with this awful megawad I made called Waves of the Undead, now I sort of have a reputation amongst them...

 

Wow mate, that's tough, even for you...

[AtticTelephone]

1 minute ago, ElPadrecitoCholo said:

Wow mate, that's tough, even for you...

What do you mean by even for me?

[ElPadrecitoCholo]

2 minutes ago, AtticTelephone said:

What do you mean by even for me?

 

I mean, the fact that you feel that you have gained a certain reputation with those people thanks to the Megawad you made, I thought you were belittling yourself in that respect, although I apologize if I misinterpret the comment in any way.

[AtticTelephone]

2 minutes ago, ElPadrecitoCholo said:

 

I mean, the fact that you feel that you have gained a certain reputation with those people thanks to the Megawad you made, I thought you were belittling yourself in that respect, although I apologize if I misinterpret the comment in any way.

I mean, I made WotU when I was completely new to mapping, and it was baaaaaaaaaad, lemme tell you.

[TheNoob_Gamer]

Some advices to your improvement in mapping quality in general:

 

Get more inspirations. Play other games. Read game design documents. Listen to some music you like. Plan your levels accordingly. Take your time. Attempt to make more mods other than maps. 

 

Then practice mixing more level height and visual variety. That way, you can get your unique ideas across (wave of the undead was a wasted attempt of gimmicky maps - it has potential but unfortunately doesn't reach an acceptable quality).

 

Your continuous posts of maps with seemingly no changes in overall quality (and your attitude towards some people trying out your works) lead to some people's assumptions (including myself, frankly speaking) that anything you release is bad. But not really - what.bex was an interesting attempt of making glitchy visuals with Dehacked (RNG?) alone. Then Doom -1, which despite being lightning in a bottle went together well. So, keep experimenting and try to make maps with convincing visuals. I'm sure creativity is very welcome in Doom mapping, you just need to ultilize it properly.

Edited November 13, 2020 by TheNoob_Gamer

[ElPadrecitoCholo]

59 minutes ago, AtticTelephone said:

I mean, I made WotU when I was completely new to mapping, and it was baaaaaaaaaad, lemme tell you.

 

Oh, i understand now dude...

[pcorf]

Take a break, a deep breath, regroup and take it step by step and you'll enjoy creating maps again. Study the basics of mapping, the more you study, the better you get.

[Delisk]

Rather than making 32 maps, you may simply want to work on improving the one you got. Get some feedback and use it to improve you maps.

 

Also often the best 32 level megawad and not the work of a single individual but a few mappers working together each doing a limited amount of maps.

[Kyukon]

Remember one group of people's preferences may be different from that of another's.  So, you may want to think about what kind of map do you want to do, like what is the purpose or theme? 

 

Maybe try picking one of these styles to start:

-Classic iD Style

-Gimmicky or Quirky Puzzle Maps 

-Slaughter Maps

-Small Monster Count, But effective/strong Monster Placement

-Something that has nice set pieces, and an overall strong environment detail

 

These are just a few, but keeping stuff like this in mind might help you make something coherent.  Whichever you chose, make sure it's something you can have fun playing, yourself first and foremost, then maybe try to iron out the obscurities afterward.

However, this is all just a suggestion, you can throw this all out the window if you want.  Either way, hope I could help.

[CBM]

I have reached a point Where I do levels how I personally want them and do the levels that 'want to be done'.

 

Do Enough levels like that and suddently you end up with 32 levels

 

I am sure though that the playtesters would still try your maps if you post them.  I am also not particular good at mapping and I Know how you feel

 

I have Also gotten a Lot of feedback About Stuff the playtesters didnt like About my levels

[SilverMiner]

3 hours ago, AtticTelephone said:

Should I stop working on the megawad and instead try making a single good level?

Try better making many single good levels of one style and then you could bring them to: community projects, your own megawads and other places.

 

 

[wallabra]

Maybe try replacing those vain worries with more silly ones. Like, is this as fun when played with Hideous Destructor?, or how about, did I put enough chaingunner swiss-cheesing devices in the courtyard?, or even the classic, how do I hide an arch-vile while still allowing it to zap the player, or infight enemies?

 

Heck, I just thought of an idea! You could have a map with a Cyberdemon where you're supposed to have it shoot into four "zapping towers" (where arch-viles reside behind middle-textured gaps), then a passage that was blocked by the Cybie's fat guts can be traversed to get munitions and enter said towers to kill the arch-viles and get the exit key.

[AtticTelephone]

3 minutes ago, Gustavo6046 said:

Heck, I just thought of an idea! You could have a map with a Cyberdemon where you're supposed to have it shoot into four "zapping towers" (where arch-viles reside behind middle-textured gaps), then a passage that was blocked by the Cybie's fat guts can be traversed to get munitions and enter said towers to kill the arch-viles and get the exit key.

Well, I uh, replaced the Cyberdemon with a boss who only appears in MAP30.

[wallabra]

Ooh! Custom enemies! Sounds fun!

[GarrettChan]

Shooting for a MegaWAD at the beginning is not a good idea.

[Phobus]

Honestly, If you've made a bunch of maps that you're not happy with, but have resources that you are happy with, you can take the lessons learned and condense the ideas down into one large map. It's an ambitious goal, still, but more realistic and much easier to test and polish.

 

My first released project was a megaWAD (released 15 years ago yesterday, in fact!) and not only was it not very good, but you could see an evolution in mapping from MAP01 to the final map (MAP21, as I didn't go for the full 32, after noticing as much). That evolution carried on for years afterward. Whilst you're honing your craft, quicker, smaller projects offer more opportunities to learn and get useful feedback. So, from my perspective, cancelling a WIP project and taking the lessons away for the future is just as valuable as finishing something and releasing it.

[DSC]

Literally my first ever advice on Doomworld was NOT to work on a full megawad if you're new to mapping.

[TheMagicMushroomMan]

Try making one good, polished map before attempting a megawad. I would rather play a single polished and inspired map with a good vision and goal than a megawad full of mediocre-average maps. If you make a 32 map megawad with dull or unpolished maps, people are likely just going to call it quits early on and they won't even see half of what you have to offer them. Plus, it's more fulfilling to be able to look at something you made, even if it's just one map, and say to yourself "wow, I never thought I was capable of this". Creating a bunch of run of the mill maps just to fill out 32 slots probably isn't going to give you that feeling.

[Scorpinax]

Not every map needs to be amazing. Also, they dont have to be 20 minutes long either: theres absolutely nothing wrong with smaller maps, you can focus more detail that way. And generally speaking making your maps shorter makes them a lot more palatable. I'm way more likely to play more maps, even if they're not great, if they're short ones.

Edited November 13, 2020 by Scorpinax

[HAK3180]

The biggest problem with Waves of the Undead was that it was 32 maps. You emerged with a full megawad, and it was pretty clear that you were the only one who had ever tested it. So instead of being one map of poor quality, it was two hours of poor quality. All the time you spent making Maps 02-32 could have been spent improving. So I would strongly suggest you release maps as you make them. You don't necessarily need to do that publicly, but at least have some playtesters so that you improve more frequently than once every 32 maps. 

 

For the record, I had forgotten entirely about the megawad until I looked it up, so at the very least, by sheer lack of memory you were not on any sort of blacklist. But if I see another request from you, I would certainly hope it would be "Here's a short episode of 5 maps" or "Here's the first three of a megawad I'm working on."

 

When you have been mapping for a long time and are confident in your skills and there isn't a massive difference between the quality of what you did last year and last week, then you can think about out of the blue megawad unveilings.