Thorium.pk3 - A fun WIP thing for GZDoom! (12-01 - Map03 released!)

[tamara mochaccina]

Hi.

You might recognize me from making some music sometimes maybe.

I uh, I made a wad for GZDoom to practice monster placement, and I think I'm gonna end up making a full little campaign out of it.

Right now it's only some custom music, a single map, and a few minor tweaks to the menus, but I think you guys'll enjoy it a lot!

It's meant to be run in GZDoom with dynamic lighting on, cuz that's the only thing I can test right now, but it might run on Zandronum just as well! (Citation needed)

It supports up to 4 guys shootin demons at once! Not deathmatch tho. Sorry bout that.

Jumping and crouching are literally useless, so uh, do those if you want, I don't mind xp

Anyways here's ya download.

You can get the OST too!

Edited January 12, 2021 by tam : Updated title

[HQDefault]

Bippity Boppity Boop

A reminder to post at least 1 screenshot as well as compatibility & rules on jumping and crouching

[tamara mochaccina]

Just now, HQDefault said:

Bippity Boppity Boop

A reminder to post at least 1 screenshot as well as compatibility & rules on jumping and crouching

Oh yeah I forgot about that, it's been ages since I posted anything "real" hehe

[HQDefault]

Did a quick run through of your map (video may still be processing):

 

Overall as an early map done for practice, it ain't bad. I think it just needs some tweaking to eliminate some of the unfair enemy placement and make the combat feel a little less static.

 

Also please cut the weird hallway of doors that reveal lost souls in front of doors that reveal more lost souls, that really just feels like a waste of time.

[tamara mochaccina]

I see your first point, however the hallway of skulls is just meant to stall you a lot so you can't just run past. Kinda like the long door in that one Sigil map but it requires bullets to open.

[Zylinderkatze]

"Good Luck, Have Fun!" xD

[Zylinderkatze]

25 minutes ago, HQDefault said:

Did a quick run through of your map

Your reaction to the Chaingunners = My reaction to the Chaingunners xD

[Biodegradable]

It's a bit cramped and awfully symmetrical, which made things a little boring and predictable but it's okay for a beginner. Your texture is competent, though I didn't care much for that area with the Revs behind walls as that was just kind of tedious. Music was definitely the best part for me hehe.

 

 

[Zylinderkatze]

2 minutes ago, Biodegradable said:

Music was definitely the best part for me hehe.

 

Love that "ooOOh!" *turns up volume*

[Zylinderkatze]

I actually find the Lost Souls doors more and more funny, the more often I encounter them.

- second door with Lost Souls: hmm. okay?

- third door: what the..

- fourth door: chuckles 

- fifth: laughs in despair

 

Doors like that do break the flow a bit but from what I've gathered, that's intentional. Might be a chance to add some unfair spice by having the third or fourth door also trigger a door some ways behind the player.. with, say, a Demon or Imp that sneaks up on them from behind while they are busy opening cascading LS doors?

Edited January 10, 2021 by Zylinderkatze

[tamara mochaccina]

I might just redesign the map when I get more time, but as of now Imma start working on map02. Ty everyone for your comments hehe

[Clippy]

5 hours ago, tam said:

I might just redesign the map when I get more time, but as of now Imma start working on map02. Ty everyone for your comments hehe

 

Too late for one more?

 

Love when ppl make cool lighted maps keep it up

 

I'm gunna go dream of Lost Souls now:

 

 

[tamara mochaccina]

4 hours ago, Clippy said:

Too late for one more?

I'd say you were too early: Map02 is now live! xp

[Clippy]

1 hour ago, tam said:

I'd say you were too early: Map02 is now live! xp

 

[tamara mochaccina]

Flying skullz everywhurr

[tamara mochaccina]

For those interested, I made the OST available on my SC. I'll update it as the songs are, uh, made. :p

[DynamiteKaitorn]

So I gave this a little waddle through and, yeah it's not good... actually I'd say it's more bland than bad.

 

For one thing, a majority of the enemies are placed in very dumb ways. A good example is the silver door staircase on MAP01, having a door EVERY STEP. This is just tedious and pointless, not to mention there was always 2 lost souls behind each door. Also, why so many archviles without a BFG9000 in sight? The first time you press THAT switch on MAP01, you're ambushed with nowhere to hide by an archvile, 2 chaingunners, pinkies and a pain elemental. Little overkill for the EASY difficulty!

In MAP02, towards the end where you use the red key on the red door, those 2 archviles can very easily gang up on you, res a caco or two and zap you into the slime pit, killing you very quickly.

MAP02 also contains a maze where-in former humans are standing behind an explosive barrel, getting themselves killed easily... why?

Very often if you open up a new door and fire a rocket towards the floor, a good 75% of the time you'll hit/kill an enemy on both sides of the door, due to it being used so frequently.

 

The switch "puzzle" in MAP01 didn't offer any indication I was pressing the switches correctly (or even at all) so I had no idea that I was even making progress and nearly died to the revenants hiding behind some fake walls.

 

Hiding enemies in secrets is generally a bad idea is it punishes players for looking around the map, rather than rewarding them.

 

Lastly, I think there's a bug if you use the blue key exit as it goes to an intermission screen with no text and then stops there.

 

So is there any good points? Yes.

For one, the Hell Knight trap on MAP02 was actually quite cheeky and caught me off guard, since killing it activates script to open up some walls to reveal more enemies. Pretty unique. :3

 

Also the custom lights used throughout the 2 maps did add a nice flare of style. :)

 

[tamara mochaccina]

Aight, I'm seeing a lot of the same critiques, so I'm gonna make a little 'response post.'

 

Let me preface this by saying the following:
None of this is meant to attack or offend the people that said these things, they're all lovely and just wanna help me improve, and I thank them for that!
However, I'm very stubborn, and I'm seeing some criticisms that are there for the wrong reasons, so that's why I'm making this post.
This being said, let's begin!

0.- Doom's a very old game.
Doom came out 27 years ago. Doom 2, as well.
We have had a decade and 3/4s to get good at the videogame.

0,5.- This quote from Dario Casali.
"Plutonia was always meant for people who had finished Doom 2 on hard and were looking for a new challenge."
Same applies here.

1.- The Lost Soul Stairway
 

On 1/10/2021 at 7:24 PM, Clippy said:

I'm gunna go dream of Lost Souls now

 

On 1/9/2021 at 7:00 PM, HQDefault said:

the weird hallway of doors that reveal lost souls in front of doors that reveal more lost souls

 

2 hours ago, DynamiteKaitorn said:

there was always 2 lost souls behind each door.

This one is fun. See, I know that it's annoying, it's meant to be, that's the point.

As I said in a previous reply, it's made that way to prevent people speeding through, like that door in SIGIL that goes very far down. It stalls you so you can't just run past the cacodemons and imps.

It's not even that hard to deal with if you take your time; You just gotta deal with everything outside first.

2.- The Chaingunners behind doors
I establish that there's gonna be hitscanners behind doors in the first room, with the zombiemen.
You should expect that kinda thing when it's shown that early, kinda like a tutorial.

1 hour ago, DynamiteKaitorn said:

Very often if you open up a new door and fire a rocket towards the floor, a good 75% of the time you'll hit/kill an enemy on both sides of the door, due to it being used so frequently.

Congratulations for figuring it out!

3.- Archvile in map 1?
Yes. Deal with it. Congo did it. I even give you full health, armor, a SSG, Rocket Launcher, Plasma Gun and a ton of shotgun ammo in the form of the shotgunners specifically for this fight.

Also, what did you think the switch was gonna do? Open the door that explicitly stated it required a blue key?

1 hour ago, DynamiteKaitorn said:

Also, why so many archviles without a BFG9000 in sight?

Because the BFG would've made the fight easy. It's why I hid it in a secret.

4.- The Revenant Switch Room
Again, I establish that the green switches glow in every room before this one.

Going to an off switch will do... Nothing.

Because it's off.

I also give you full health and super armor.

5.- Hiding enemies in secrets is a bad idea!
Have you ever played Blood?

6.- The maze in MAP02 with the zombiemen and the barrels
Yeah, they're right there so you don't just shoot on first sight and think a little bit so you don't take the splash damage.

7.- Archviles in red key door in MAP02 being hard
Yeah? That's why the boxes are there. So you don't get zapped.

8.-

2 hours ago, DynamiteKaitorn said:

So is there any good points?

Very condescending.

Overall, I hope this clears up some confusion in the why I did these things. I really enjoyed Clippy's playthrough of it! He was just groovin and killin shit with a neat lil sense of humour and that's all I really want!

[tamara mochaccina]

Map03 has just gone live!

[dei_eldren]

Played thru (well, almost) on HNTR!  Really nice maps, love lighting effects - i think these could be made into classics (well, if they're not already), or a more ambitious project.  Died a few times on lvls 1 and 2 before coming up with a strategy in the most difficult places (one of those each), but nothing was unfair, always enough ammo and health around, and on lvl03 didn't die at all (a bit lucky...)  But, i only got all the kills, i wasn't able to finish the level, the last switch...got kind of locked in the last room upstairs, ran around and couldnt get out (ill feel stupid when i see the solution in some video later..)

 

But will definitely play if you make more levels!

 

PS: i have to confess i had seen Clippy's playthrough of lvl01.. so didnt go in completely blind :)

[Clippy]

 

[dei_eldren]

Yeah, now after seeing Clippy's video it's simple: the exit from the room with the iIncubi Mancubes never opened for me, so i couldn't drop down for the final switch.  So i guess whatever triggered that, wsan't triggered by me.

Edited January 14, 2021 by dei_eldren

[tamara mochaccina]

Yeah, if you kill the mancubi before the script triggers it breaks, I'm trying to find a fix but in the meantime it'll just stay in it's goofy broken state @dei_eldren ^^"

[dei_eldren]

5 hours ago, tam said:

Yeah, if you kill the mancubi before the script triggers it breaks, I'm trying to find a fix but in the meantime it'll just stay in it's goofy broken state @dei_eldren ^^"

 

Aargh, denied satisfaction of finishing due to no fault of my own (for once!)  Nah, ok i'll just play the part again haha, thanks!

[Pseudonaut]

Played on the highest difficulty, "The Brut". It's basically the same as the middle difficulty, just with fast monsters (they don't respawn like on Nightmare). Speaking of which, I'm not sure what the difference is between the easy difficulty and the middle difficulty, since the placement of things on all difficulties appears to be the same, at least on the first map.

 

 

These encounters are often deadly if you don't know what's coming, but very easy to deal with when you do, especially if you know all the secrets. Those corner-camping chaingunners on map01, for example, can wreck a player who doesn't know about them (or forgets about them like I did in the video). Map01 is ok overall, but I don't like how peekaboo shooting seems to be the answer to almost everything, and having fast monsters contributes to this problem. That walkway where you're assaulted by hidden revenants is one of the best parts of the map, but even it has the same problem, as killing the revenants practically requires that kind of play. Another highlight of the level is the archvile ambush, even if it is quite easy if you grab the hidden BFG first (which I forgot to do in the video). Map02 is similar, but not as good; the better parts of map01 stand out more. The spectres at the end are needlessly annoying to kill for 100%. Map03 is so short and easy that I beat it in an unrecorded first attempt in about 3 minutes without saves, but the gameplay is better than the previous maps. The standout fight is the red key arena, where the player is threatened from multiple angles on narrow walkways. I haven't checked to see if there's a way back up when you fall down, but I hope there isn't. The secret invulnerability is overkill, and it would've been better to have something that doesn't neuter the fight so much.

[tamara mochaccina]

On 1/15/2021 at 4:35 AM, Pseudonaut said:

I'm not sure what the difference is between the easy difficulty and the middle difficulty, since the placement of things on all difficulties appears to be the same, at least on the first map.

There is none yet, I'm implementing slow monsters into it behind the scenes.

As for the rest of your comment, yeah, I agree. Something I'm surprised nobody has pointed out (or that I figured out myself) is that doing 100% kills is kinda... A thing? lmao, I completely forgot about it, so thanks for reminding me ^^"