Master Levels for Doom II - 25th Anniversary MIDI Pack

[Peter]

I'm left with 3 MIDIs to do from scratch. I've just been working on the MIDIs I had previously considered finished, as using them during testing, they were too short for the levels they were made for.

 

Currently I'd say I'm at 85% completion. So very nearly there!! Sorry about missing my deadline for Friday but I don't want to release it in an unfinished state.

[GratefulName]

Now, it will be cool if we have some MIDIs for No Rest for the Living.

[Demion]

Are you THE Peter from Decino's channel? great job, really looking forward for this!!

[Peter]

3 minutes ago, Demion said:

Are you THE Peter from Decino's channel? great job, really looking forward for this!!

That's me!

[Demion]

I thought so... great hearing from you, Peter Lawrence! I hope we hear from you even more! 

[Faceman2000]

2 hours ago, Peter said:

I'm left with 3 MIDIs to do from scratch. I've just been working on the MIDIs I had previously considered finished, as using them during testing, they were too short for the levels they were made for.

 

Currently I'd say I'm at 85% completion. So very nearly there!! Sorry about missing my deadline for Friday but I don't want to release it in an unfinished state.

Take your time dude! It's better to have a product that you happy with than to rush something out to meet a deadline. Thanks again for doing this, I'm really looking forward to the final product.

[Peter]

ml_midipack_crispydoom.zip

 

This works with Crispy Doom but I haven't used it on anything else.

But yea, all midis are done.

 

Here is the tracklist

 

01_Are We Really Doing This
D_RUNNIN ATTACK.WAD	Attack

02_Guess We Are Then
D_STALKS CANYON.WAD	Canyon

03_Don't Fall Lmao
D_COUNTD CATWALK.WAD	The Catwalk

04_Treasure Hunting
D_BETWEE COMBINE.WAD	The Combine

05_Fist Urethra
D_DOOM	FISTULA.WAD	The Fistula

06_Shepards Tone
D_THE_DA GARRISON.WAD	The Garrison

07_Death by Enriched Bagel (by Willy W)
D_SHAWN	MANOR.WAD	Titan Manor

08_Waltz into Mancubus Fireballs
D_DDTBLU PARADOX.WAD	Paradox

09_Ejipt
D_IN_CIT SUBSPACE.WAD	Subspace

10_Inescapable Pit Time
D_DEAD	SUBTERRA.WAD	Subterra

11_Wank City
D_STLKS2 TTRAP.WAD	Trapped On Titan

12_Locrian Trap MIDI
 D_THEDA2 VIRGIL.WAD	Virgil's Lead

13_Not Club Doom
D_DOOM2	MINOS.WAD	Minos' Judgement

14_Archvile King
D_DDTBL2 BLOODSEA.WAD	Bloodsea Keep

15_Icon Of put this map in the Bin
D_RUNNI2 MEPHISTO.WAD	Mephisto's Maosoleum

16_Slaying at Night
D_DEAD2	NESSUS.WAD	Nessus

17_Catnip Forest (by Bloo)
D_STLKS3 GERYON.WAD	Geryon

18_Invisible Ledge is DUMB
D_ROMERO VESPERAS.WAD	Vesperas

19_Erecting The Black Tower
D_SHAWN2 BLACKTWR.WAD	Black Tower

20_Grinding Teeth
D_MESSAG TEETH.WAD  The Express Elevator To Hell

21_The Tit
D_COUNT2 TEETH.WAD	Bad Dream

22_Arse
D_READ_M Message Text

23_DOODOODOODOO
D_EVIL Ending Screen

00_Palate Cleanser
D_DM2INT Intermission

 

[Gez]

Nerd thing only I care about: the metadata for D_COUNTD says "02_Guess We Are Then" instead of "03_Don't Fall Lmao".

 

Also, is "Enriched Bagel" a joke about Rich Nagel?

Edited January 18, 2021 by Gez

[Xulgonoth]

2 hours ago, Gez said:

Also, is "Enriched Bagel" a joke about Rich Nagel?

Yes. The track uses some of his melodies from Eternal Doom.

EDIT: I originally credited Rich Nagel in the tracknames, but those were renamed for the release. Maybe that little note should be added back in though.

Edited January 18, 2021 by Willy W.

[Bloo]

Pretty cool midi pack I can't wait to try these once my pc is put together. Good work Peter.

[Diabolución]

4 hours ago, Peter said:

[...]

 

You are the fucking killing machine.

 

P.S.: just in case someone needed it: https://www.doomworld.com/forum/topic/111875/

 

[Devalaous]

Neat, guess I'll take a break from A.L.T. tomorrow to play the Master Levels again with these :)

 

[Scuba Steve]

The other day I was thinking how No Rest For The Living would benefit from a custom soundtrack.

 

So...

[BlueThunder]

I'm looking forward to doing a playthrough with the new midis.  

[P41R47]

Good work, Peter and Willy W.!

 

Now this is a good chance to replay those maps ;)

[Xulgonoth]

You know, I'm really curious what @Soundblock thinks about this music pack, given how... eccentric some of the MIDIs for his old maps are.

[Nevander]

I don't mean to be rude or anything, but don't you think some of those track names are a little juvenile? I haven't listened to them though so I can't judge them on that yet.

[Peter]

42 minutes ago, Nevander said:

I don't mean to be rude or anything, but don't you think some of those track names are a little juvenile?

Oh absolutely.

[Jimmy]

Listened through to the whole thing - well, it's not at all what I expected, that's for sure. :D

 

For those tuning in just now, don't go into this expecting Prince-like compositions. These are tracks that could only have been written in the current era - certainly not 1994.

 

I'm in a difficult place trying to judge this one. It's musically competent, that's for sure - in fact there's very much an emphasis on turning a lot of musical norms on their heads. Twisting time signatures, powerful polyrhythms, unstable melodies, and impossible drumlines are plentiful in this. Technically it's hard to really home in on anything that's demonstrably wrong, here. Tracks like Archvile King, Inescapable Pit Time, Locrian Trap MIDI, Grinding Teeth and Catnip Forest are especially sound compositions that I can easily see being used in a Doom context.

 

However... there is a free-wheeling attitude taken for most of the entries here, that comes somewhat out of the blue. Many of these tracks are no ordinary Doom compositions as you know them. Jocular track titles aside (and don't get me wrong, I love a good memey track name), the majority of these pieces seem to eschew a great deal of what has defined Doom music up to this point. It's scattershot and unpredictable, perhaps leaning more on the funk and jazz schools of composition than anything else. There are disarming mood swings, incessant repetitions such as in the overly long Death by Enriched Bagel, ludicrously heavy cluster chords as in Invisible Ledge is DUMB, and moments where a track's direction seems to completely disintegrate, like in the ending to the 22-second-long Icon of put this map in the Bin. (Honestly, the naming of these last two aforementioned tracks in particular leads to me to believe that there was a palpable frustration felt on revisiting these levels by a player with modern sensibilities, which was channeled directly into the composition.)

 

There are also musical Doom community in-jokes aplenty - there's not one, not two, but three pieces here directly inspired by the soundtrack of Mock 2. Seriously!

 

I'm always eager to hear more music from within the community and certainly am happy to see the increasing abundance of specialised MIDI Pack projects. Either way, I will say... good work! I'm just not sure if this pack is a series of jeering in-jokes, or a piece of twisted genius.

[Bloo]

On 1/18/2021 at 7:15 PM, Jimmy said:

Listened through to the whole thing - well, it's not at all what I expected, that's for sure. :D

 

For those tuning in just now, don't go into this expecting Prince-like compositions. These are tracks that could only have been written in the current era - certainly not 1994.

 

I'm in a difficult place trying to judge this one. It's musically competent, that's for sure - in fact there's very much an emphasis on turning a lot of musical norms on their heads. Twisting time signatures, powerful polyrhythms, unstable melodies, and impossible drumlines are plentiful in this. Technically it's hard to really home in on anything that's demonstrably wrong, here. Tracks like Archvile King, Inescapable Pit Time, Locrian Trap MIDI, Grinding Teeth and Catnip Forest are especially sound compositions that I can easily see being used in a Doom context.

 

However... there is a free-wheeling attitude taken for most of the entries here, that comes somewhat out of the blue. Many of these tracks are no ordinary Doom compositions as you know them. Jocular track titles aside (and don't get me wrong, I love a good memey track name), the majority of these pieces seem to eschew a great deal of what has defined Doom music up to this point. It's scattershot and unpredictable, perhaps leaning more on the funk and jazz schools of composition than anything else. There are disarming mood swings, incessant repetitions such as in the overly long Death by Enriched Bagel, ludicrously heavy cluster chords as in Invisible Ledge is DUMB, and moments where a track's direction seems to completely disintegrate, like in the ending to the 22-second-long Icon of put this map in the Bin. (Honestly, the naming of these last two aforementioned tracks in particular leads to me to believe that there was a palpable frustration felt on revisiting these levels by a player with modern sensibilities, which was channeled directly into the composition.)

 

There are also musical Doom community in-jokes aplenty - there's not one, not two, but three pieces here directly inspired by the soundtrack of Mock 2. Seriously!

 

I'm always eager to hear more music from within the community and certainly am happy to see the increasing abundance of specialised MIDI Pack projects. Either way, I will say... good work! I'm just not sure if this pack is a series of jeering in-jokes, or a piece of twisted genius.

Just wanted to say, catnip forest was a midi that I wrote back when I was a teenager and dont remember what the theme was supposed to be, but he was down to two tracks left and I submitted it. Glad to hear you liked it. I'm planning on releasing more midis for the community to enjoy.

[Peter]

On 1/19/2021 at 1:15 AM, Jimmy said:

I'm just not sure if this pack is a series of jeering in-jokes, or a piece of twisted genius.

It's the Master Levels for Doom II. The levels are extremely strange and very questionable. I'm glad I was able to capture the same feeling with the music.

[Diabolución]

On 12/24/2020 at 9:42 PM, Peter said:

looking for people to port this over to other source ports

 

Whilst I am interested in doing this for the official loose files, I would need a proper TITLEPIC graphic. As INTERPIC graphic, I will use this recolour by ptoing:

 

[Doomkid]

If you compile all these midis into one wad, please try to match the PSN version’s order! (Or hell there could really just be multiple versions, I think others have compiled them in a different order as well, but I always use the compiled PSN list)

 

https://doomwiki.org/wiki/Master_Levels_for_Doom_II#Level_progression

[Peter]

2 hours ago, Doomkid said:

If you compile all these midis into one wad, please try to match the PSN version’s order!

All the MIDIs are indeed in 1 wad, and they are matched with the PSNs order as is the default with Crispy Doom.

[Diabolución]

Those loose levels will not suffer anymore from that nasty disease named D_RUNNIN. Just the songs themselves, by now.

 

master_midis.zip

[BoxY]

Amazing pack, and I fully agree that the style of the tracks fits the spirit of the master levels perfectly: filled with of the joy of experimentation, regardless of the whether the ideas are great, terrible, or just outright jank. Magnificent.

[Devalaous]

Some of these midis are great, some of them im not a fan of, but im happy they exist. Gives me an idea for a simple Master Levels upgrade pack that im going to work on tonight.

[Devalaous]

I have looked at @Diabolución's wadfix files and wondered if they had other fixes aside from the midis and found they didn't, so I have added MAPINFO lumps to them all that add the map's names to the automap, display the level's creator on the intermission screen, and made them each loop instead of dumping you into a Doom 2 level (My brother had this idea; the idea is that you replay it with the weapons you earned in the level for a 'new game plus' of sorts, since so many of the levels award you with weaponry you wont use or cant use, the Rocket Launcher at the end of Subspace for example. Was thinking of ending the game after completion,but that messes up Doom Launcher's stat tracking)

 

What these files still need is an INTERPIC and TITLEPIC, and a all-in-one package of fixes for the MASTERLEVELS.wad made by several ports that mimics the PS3 release (Crispy Doom and Doom 3 BFA both do this, I have a copy of the BFA ML wad that im currently writing a MAPINFO for) and patches for other ports, like a Dehacked lump and level name graphics. Can put out a definitive Master Levels upgrade pack for both loose files, and assembled automated collections!

 

I have also added @Peter's midis to the rejected Master Levels so that they too don't suffer from D_RUNNIN;

Paradox's midi -> TMW01 (Both made by Mustaine. I also made this go to Map 14 after completion instead of wrapping around :p Since the map was never named, I have named it 'Master's Den' as an unofficial name, feel free to replace this in the definition if its not to your liking)

Garrison's midi -> The Fury (Both are similar in architecture and theming)

Combine's midi -> The CPU (Both Techbases)

Catwalk's midi -> Device One (Both are bases with a lot of nukage)

Fistula's midi -> The Enemy Inside (Both have to do with 'insides' if you know what a fistula is)

Subspace's midi -> The DMZ (Both are the hilariously easy wads of these sets)

Subterra's midi -> The Hive (Both have vicious segments and are partly underground)

 

See the uploaded file below for the updated fixes with mapinfo support :)

masterlevelsmidifixes.zip

[Doomkid]

I'm sure it could be improved upon, but here's a titlepic I was working on for the master levels - I feel like it just needs a little something extra to make it pop, but it could be a decent basis.

 

 

Edited January 26, 2021 by Doomkid

[ketmar]

20 minutes ago, Doomkid said:

I feel like it just needs a little something extra to make it pop

a ceiling cat!