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Cyb

The /newstuff Chronicles #109

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Nanami said:

I wanna rant!

I got pretty irritated about a past /newstuff review on one of my levels, but after a long time I figured it wasn't worth it to argue . . . etc etc etc.


Your post made me really curious. What's the wad's name and where can I find it?

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Grazza said:

If scores are to be given to the wads, perhaps it would make sense to award a score (out of 10 or 5, whatever) for gameplay and also a score for aesthetics.


Yeah, but making an individual score for aesthetics would lead to other problems. A level that is designed to run under Vanilla Doom will always look worse than one that takes full advantage of a limitess source port. This could lead to Vanilla Doom levels being disadvantaged because no Vanilla Doom level could ever look as good as say, Vrack 2.

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Hyena said:

Your post made me really curious. What's the wad's name and where can I find it?


Grind2, g-i (or whatever) in the ports section. It doesn't require any specific port, it just needs a port so you can avoid VPO and medusa. Also, Grind2X is the lots-freakin-monster version with a couple extra features (camera).

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Nice. I like this format, too. I especially like the score and recommendation at the end of each wad. If it's a 7 or above, I'm downloading it.

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Holy damn, it's Tormentor667! I remember you from "Perforated Entrails" and "Torment and Torture". Such a pity that perfent only got partially done. :( Anyway, I'm grabbing "Torment and Torture 2" and playing it after I celebrate New Year's and my vacation is over. If I remember correctly, I had a lot of fun trying to survive its prequel.

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Hyena, your reply was so pitiful and immature it made me want to puke. "Can I see a show of hands?" Oh man! I mean, grow up! I know you are just trying to piss me off by openly acting like the dumbass that you are, but I'll spell it out for you any way:

DON'T TAKE YOURSELF SO DAMNED SERIOUSLY. Your reviews suck and nobody really gives a shit about your style. You think you have your shit down, then everybody questions what you are trying to do in your reviews so you obviously aren't doing something right, that's for sure.

Did you get it that time? And I'm done with this threat, so don't bother to respond.

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Virgil said:

I had a lot of fun trying to survive its prequel.

Something's only called it a prequel if it's made AFTER the first one, but set before it ;)

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Phil1984 said:

Yeah, but making an individual score for aesthetics would lead to other problems. A level that is designed to run under Vanilla Doom will always look worse than one that takes full advantage of a limitess source port. This could lead to Vanilla Doom levels being disadvantaged because no Vanilla Doom level could ever look as good as say, Vrack 2.


I don't see it that way, since when someone with criterium is judging he or she looks at the standards at hand, not at anything unrelated or semi-related. Aesthetics is a matter of what the viewer likes, so if he or she likes standard doom maps these can get high "aesthetic" scores quite well. When judging something considering its format (what it was made with and for) is inevitable, and whoever doesn't do that isn't giving an interesting scope of what is being reviewed. People have preferences, but they can always admit seeing skill at work even on something that isn't their preferred subject, as long as they have a clue. Just like Cyb pointed out for scripting and such, the graphic enhancements and lack of limitations of engines do not play a role in how good a WAD looks... you have to take that aside since it's a feature of the engine and not of the WAD. What matters is what's been done with the materials, the rest is what we call "the reviewer's opinion."

But anyway, although I think the aesthetics of a WAD can always be gauged fairly I agree with you that it's better to use just 1 rating and not two, and this because playablity and looks are not only related, but they are also not the only things to take into consideration. You also have other factors, like innovation and suitability, for instance. Also, each reviewer weighs these two things differently, and a single score is much better for the purpose of saying if something is worthy of being downloaded. Nothing stops a reviewer from dividing the 10 possible points in two, if that fits his mindset, of course, but then giving the overall score is best, in my opinion. The specifics of why a map or WAD is cool should be in the review text, since these vary with each WAD.

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UAC PR Dept said:

Hyena, your reply was so pitiful and immature it made me want to puke. "Can I see a show of hands?" Oh man! I mean, grow up! I know you are just trying to piss me off by openly acting like the dumbass that you are, but I'll spell it out for you any way:

DON'T TAKE YOURSELF SO DAMNED SERIOUSLY. Your reviews suck and nobody really gives a shit about your style. You think you have your shit down, then everybody questions what you are trying to do in your reviews so you obviously aren't doing something right, that's for sure.

Did you get it that time? And I'm done with this threat, so don't bother to respond.


Hahahahahahahahahahaha.

You never have changed, have you? Here I thought you were actually becoming a productive member of this community. I'm not going to be goaded into an all-encompassing flame-war so you can have your jollies at my rising blood pressure. In fact, from the sounds of it, you're more pissed off than I am. Or at least acting it to try to get some sort of response out of me.

Bottom line, the way you worded your first sentence is confusing and apparently by thinking it's confusing I have perpetually offended you. Keeping in mind you were making a (not very funny) joke about how my reviewing sucks, it's rather ironic.

As for taking myself seriously, you must have me confused for someone who isn't so easily amused that he would release a really bad wad just to make fun of it.

(Note to everyone: Prequel to G-ONAHD.WAD will be coming in a few weeks)

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There seems to be alot of debate over using a numeric scale for a review on a map but its a scale that people understand and I've always used it. I use a scale of 0 to 10 for a map on 3 different areas, the first being difficulty, the second being playability (unquestionably at least partially a judgement call), the third being level design. All of these really are, of course, judgements in the eye of the reviewer so you have to take that with a grain of salt but I try to do my best. What I find overly difficult may not be to someone who has better skills than I do. Conversely, something I consider to be too easy may be difficult for someone with lesser skills than mine.
For me, level design is all encompassing and includes the use of textures/colors but that is only a portion of it. In the case of tnt2 I thought the design was excellent even if it was a little too Quakish for my taste. I can't fault him for my personal taste in wads.
I'm sure many of you have seen my reviews and I've never really had any complaints. If a map is so bad that I can't come up with anything positive to say about it then I will simply return it to the author without a review or subjecting people who visit my site to wasting their time on even reading the crappy review.
Anyway - the number system is an easily understood method of rating something whether it be a level or a cake. The idea is the same but still subjective depending on the reviewer. I think it works best tho.

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NiGHTMARE said:

Something's only called it a prequel if it's made AFTER the first one, but set before it ;)


/Virgil looks in dictionary
/Virgil slaps forehead for not being bright

Ok, but you know what I meant. Still haven't played Torment and Torture 2 though; away from my main computer...

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Phil1984 said:

Yeah, but making an individual score for aesthetics would lead to other problems. A level that is designed to run under Vanilla Doom will always look worse than one that takes full advantage of a limitess source port. This could lead to Vanilla Doom levels being disadvantaged because no Vanilla Doom level could ever look as good as say, Vrack 2.


Ever look through GothicDM2? It looks 10 times better than Vrack2 and it runs flawlessly on doom2.exe

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Cyb said:

Ever look through GothicDM2? It looks 10 times better than Vrack2 and it runs flawlessly on doom2.exe

Unfortunately the DM gameplay is ass.

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Archvile46 said:

Unfortunately the DM gameplay is ass.

Unfortunately it isn't, except for people who suck at using the controls and therefore can't control their in-game movement properly.

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Well, infact it is. Too cramped, gameplay obstructing detailing and stuff. Theres a few exceptions tho :) Its w/o a doubt one of the best looking level sets ever tho...

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Opulent said:

plays better than Vrack2's dm play though. =P

Damn, I suck at making DM maps :P

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Cyb said:

Ever look through GothicDM2? It looks 10 times better than Vrack2 and it runs flawlessly on doom2.exe


Damn it, I forgot about GothicDM2! I'm still amazed how they managed to pull it off without any HOM or VPO's. Pity it plays like ass.....

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Phil1984 said:

Pity it plays like ass.....

Hmm, isn't is strange how at the time of Gothic DM 1 & 2's release, everyone loved them. Then a couple of months ago a couple of people criticized the gameplay, and now everyone's doing it? The Doom community never used to have sheep, shame it seems to have them now :(

Anyway, could you people please name five multi-level DM wads which are better. And please don't mention a single one of Dwango wads, 'caus if you do I'll just be laughing for weeks.

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Cyb said:

I created this format myself, dude. The old one was andrewb's format as far as I know.

Oh, heh, my bad. I was referring to the way the reviews are short and sweet, much like AndrewB's /newstuff reviews.

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NiGHTMARE said:

Hmm, isn't is strange how at the time of Gothic DM 1 & 2's release, everyone loved them. Then a couple of months ago a couple of people criticized the gameplay, and now everyone's doing it? The Doom community never used to have sheep, shame it seems to have them now :(

Anyway, could you people please name five multi-level DM wads which are better. And please don't mention a single one of Dwango wads, 'caus if you do I'll just be laughing for weeks.

DWANGO5 MAP01

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NiGHTMARE said:

Hmm, isn't is strange how at the time of Gothic DM 1 & 2's release, everyone loved them. Then a couple of months ago a couple of people criticized the gameplay, and now everyone's doing it? The Doom community never used to have sheep, shame it seems to have them now :(

Anyway, could you people please name five multi-level DM wads which are better. And please don't mention a single one of Dwango wads, 'caus if you do I'll just be laughing for weeks.


Dude, I have always thought gothic2 didn't play very well, since the day it was released (which I was around for btw). It's probably the most amazing looking set of maps ever, but the gameplay is slightly lacking.

As for your angst against the dwango maps, well, I understand, and I am getting a bit sick of them, but d5m1 is one of the best playing DM maps I've used, though the rest of d5 is not very good. But off the top of my head, Overload, the Amber series, Danzig 1, Mancerx, and I enjoyed Marc Pullen's ROKS thing when it was released as well.

Of course I make no such claims about Gothic1 which plays pretty well from what I remember.

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I don't think all the gothic maps play bad. Some seem to be fill-ins indeed, looking OK or good and having little purpose as playable maps (some of the smaller, simpler, symmetrical maps aren't very much fun), but others are good. And yes it's true that the dwango series also includes bad maps.

Some maps I recall being fun to play on gothicdm are 09, 11, 16, and 30. I'm not as familiar with gothic2, and as far as I remember the maps from the 1st WAD played better, in general.

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DooMBoy said:

DWANGO5 MAP01

You fail it in three ways: 1) multi-level wads, not individual levels of a multi-level wad; 2) name five, not one; 3) no Dwango!

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Cyb said:

Overload, the Amber series

Heh, very odd - I thought that the two main complaints people had with the Gothic series were that some of the maps were a bit too cramped, and they had details blocking the player's path. But all of the wads you mention, except ROKS, suffer from these problems even moreso than GDM ;)

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Funny, I've always thought GDM played like shit as well. Ever since the first release. I saw it and said "pretty ... but I don't know I could stand playing in it". And that's the truth: It *does* look nice. It *doesn't* lead to good gameplay in DM. Really, if you think about it, many of the DM wads aren't really that exciting for DM. Surge, Overload and the like have been perfecting the rather boring art of "square arena!" idea for a long time - I would hazard a guess that most of the DM level designers payed more attention to making their level look pretty than actual gameplay.

If you take a look at the best DM levels ever made - d5m1, which also was a single level release before it got compiled into dwango, the danzigs, the dweller series - they have a few things in common: they have smooth, simple walls, and they are NOT just a box with weapons. Complicated wall designs are a distraction and will cause movement problems. And these levels play well. About the smallest the levels get can be seen in danzig1 or dweller11: and these are for 2 players! The larger maps still result in furious action, mostly because the weapon placement and architectural design is such that most of the map doesn't see much action. For example, in d5m1, 90% of the real action centers in the courtyard right around the BFG. Really, the rest of the level funnels players in that direction. At the same time, the size of the level means it scales to higher playercounts, something that the box-with-weapons model does not.

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NiGHTMARE said:

Heh, very odd - I thought that the two main complaints people had with the Gothic series were that some of the maps were a bit too cramped, and they had details blocking the player's path. But all of the wads you mention, except ROKS, suffer from these problems even moreso than GDM ;)


Haha, not quite. The problem with GothicDm2, as aur said, is the obstructions on the walls and general junk that gets in your way when you're trying to move about. Those maps I mentioned may be small, but they are all free of sticky spots and thus play very well. They suffer in looks because of that of course, and it is possible to have a happy medium which few maps have achieved, but they still play very well. :)

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Gothic DM 2 is beautiful but it's not so great for DM. Certainly not as good as Gothic DM. Man, that levelset is great, I was playing it for hours on ZDaemon a few weeks ago and wondered why I had never really looked around it before.

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