[MBF] 𝚃𝚑𝚎 𝙼𝚊𝚐𝚎𝚗𝚝𝚊 𝚂𝚙𝚒𝚛𝚎 - Now on idGames !!

[Clippy]

This was epic and beyond. A lot of work was put into it and it shows. My feeble mind could not even begin to comprehend the size and scope and navigation of this map I'm so glad you were there bud. Absolute kudos man this is so unique and interesting ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

 

 

 

[princetontiger]

I'm having a blast playing through this map set.

 

What's the intention or message with map01? I'm trying to understand it. It's just a few large rooms with a flying imp.

[thelamp]

2 minutes ago, princetontiger said:

I'm having a blast playing through this map set.

 

What's the intention or message with map01? I'm trying to understand it. It's just a few large rooms with a flying imp.

It's just meant as an intro map. The lights going out is like the base's condition getting worse--the friendlies are trying to repair things. It also shows off the dead pain elemental and what it does. The whole map is actually a copy of map04 which is a more infested version of the same map

[princetontiger]

Ok, thanks! Nice work man.

[ZenGun]

Oh, the Magenta Spire. I love it so much.

Before i start with my review, i must say: I'm relatively new to Doom scene. I played original IWADs, and some levels from Final Doom, but it never left a huge impact on me. I knew that Doom is the most modded game of all time, but had zero interest in it outside officilly released games.
After MyHouse.wad blew up in may, i knew about whole other universe of modding, which now fascinates me to no end, and i didn't play any games, other then Doom, since then.

In this time, i beat  timeless classic Alien Vendetta, BTSX1, JPCP, Scythe, and a few other less famous megawads
But Magenta Spire is, no doubt, the most memorable of all wads that i played, even including the MyHouse.wad itself.

I'm not saying this is the best wad - it has its flaws - but it is the only wad who made me think of itself outside the playtime. I thought about Magenta Spire at work, looked through doomwiki and streams during my trips in underground trying to figure out something about the lore. Even more so - i think, that Magenta Spire is the only game which legit gave me nightmares after playthrough.

So what is it in Magenta Spire that impressed me so much? A few things:

- Oppressive gamedesign.

There is something crazy about MS's action, which i can't quite put my finger on. Most of the other wads i played, even the hard ones, don't have that. Yes, they give you a challenge and sometimes this challenge may seem frustrating and over the top. But many of MS's fights feel not just challeging - they feel like a psychological attack on the player.

Maybe it's abundance of damaging floors, maybe it's a cramped spaces without clear indication where to go (E1M4), maybe it's both (same E1M4), maybe it's sudden attacks from unexpected angles (beginning of E2M1). But quite often i felt on the edge, like a confused prey with a very grim chances of survival. 

Some fights are straitght up uncoformotable or even horrifying. For example, endless stream of zombiemen in E2M1 after getting a red card - they can't really do harm if you hold a chaingun, but damn it is uncomfortable to shoot so many of them, and they keep on and on and on... Final fight on the same E2M1- what a cruel geometry it has! And the fact that it is foreshadowed in a shape of small saircase just before it makes it even more sinister. 
 

Efflivium is the prime example of this design and, to me, is the high point of all adventure.
Very disoreinting start and frantic escape through damaging floors god knows where; hordes of hitscanners, cramped in a small hallways; glorious final fight in a giant pit of unnaturaly colourful pit of decaying flesh, WUTH HUMAN SKULLS LOOKING LIKE FLOWERS AS BARRIERS (how many people should these demons kill to make these fences?) This fight orhestrated brilliantly, but i couldn't made myself to play MS for three days straight, because i felt that i wasn't prepared for it mentally :)

 

Don't get me wrong - it is very captivating and engaging gamedesign. Maybe because Magenta Spire attacks you with such a brutal force, it is so interesting to play. Every fight is something special and keeping you on edge, and every moment you are intrigued, what encounter waits you behind a corner.
And this leads us to...

- Visual design and environmental storytelling.

I'll start with this - Magenta Spire's visuals are ugly, but it is good kind of ugly. Like, John Carpenter good kind of ugly. In the end, unthinkable alien invasion from a different universe shouldn't be an eye candy. Pink and blue rotten flesh, barfed on the ground and mixed with blood, guts and giant decaying plants sprawling all over broken and abandoned technical equipment is a perfect way to go.
We saw hell so many times, that it feels like home, but reality which demons brought in this time is truly alien - and this is what so unnerving. The fact that now they choose magenta, which is usually associated with something girly and magical, is right on so many levels, maybe because it goes heavily against preconceptions and confuses further. It feels only natutal to have this colour for some ultimate alien evil.
 

And maps of this wad clearly tell some story. I figured that Magenta Spire doesn't have a developed lore - but looking at it, i had a strong feeling that it does. Everything that's going on provoke all kinds of questions. What does Magenta Spire does? Why even explosions from my RPG became of magenta colour? Why this planet's satellite shaped like an egg, which is impossible for celestial bodies? What are we witnessing in a secret map - is this a memories of a first contact with aliens, is it happened on some other planet? Where were we between E1M5 and E1M6, did we've been on a secret map for so long, that everything covered in vines and spider webs? Why is the BFG9000 is now cursed, and will it curse ever affect the protagonist? And so on, and so on.

Magenta Spire resonated with me, and i couldn't stop thinking about it for days. This wad is truly special - maybe because you managed to visualize and create your own world, which, as i think, is the most important thing about art. It feels like you had a vision that you committed yourself to. Everything - gamedesign, aesthetics and even a dehacked changes that you made work together so well, and carries a lot of integrity.
 

Thank you for this unforgettable journey, and hope to see more of your works in a future, if you wish to continue. 
Thank you.

[Bozzy]

I can't for the life of me figure out map 7 and also can't find any videos of anyone who's played it so can anyone help me? Done the first fight but can't get across the water where you can see the mega armor on the other side how do I progress??

[TJG1289]

4 hours ago, Bozzy said:

I can't for the life of me figure out map 7 and also can't find any videos of anyone who's played it so can anyone help me? Done the first fight but can't get across the water where you can see the mega armor on the other side how do I progress??

A few of us had that issue a few pages ago. The typical Dead Simple tags weren't working correctly. This hot fix below should work.

 

On 12/17/2022 at 2:21 AM, thelamp said:

this solved the problem! thanks! hotfix

 

[Bozzy]

On 9/10/2023 at 1:37 AM, TJG1289 said:

A few of us had that issue a few pages ago. The typical Dead Simple tags weren't working correctly. This hot fix below should work.

 

 

Thank You and sorry for asking something that had already been asked. im not a pistol starter so im glad that if it had to happen on any level its one that forces me to pistol start anyway so i don't mind having to start the level from scratch lol

[Bozzy]

Another possible bug? map 9 or E2M1 im stuck behind the blue skull key door with the 2 archviles i got the secret BFG but cant find a blue key or any other way to go. am i blind or is it a bug and something else should have happened? i killed the enemies that teleported/came in from opening walls after the soulsphere pickup but nowhere new to go and no visible switches

[thelamp]

@BozzyThere's a blue key on a window sill in the area with the blue carpet :)

 

Spoiler

 

[Bozzy]

Not for me there isnt. Hmm

[thelamp]

Very strange somehow that key became unflagged on medium difficulty, only affects the hotfix version mentioned earlier (I'm disabling that link as it is no longer needed). In the current idgames version the key is not bugged. I also checked the map07 triggers for the current idgames version and they work as well

[Bozzy]

55 minutes ago, thelamp said:

Very strange somehow that key became unflagged on medium difficulty, only affects the hotfix version mentioned earlier (I'm disabling that link as it is no longer needed). In the current idgames version the key is not bugged. I also checked the map07 triggers for the current idgames version and they work as well

yeah im playing on an rog ally and im not so great with controllers so i set this one to HMP lol ill cheat the blue key and then start from the map after with the idgames version thanks :)

[Bozzy]

Starting to think im too dumb for your WAD lmao on map 12 i've explored everywhere thats accessible on the secret computer area map i picked up and cant go anywhere. there is 3 key locked doors and the only key i found is the yellow one shown here though i dont know how to reach it either. what do? (playing the WAD from idgames now)

[brick]

@thelamp I complained about this in my mini-review for ER/IWA but I thought I should mention it here too. Unless I missed something even after looking in an editor, it is impossible to get the Red Keycard on MAP15 on ITYTD/HNTR. You have to take a series of teleports through the archvile "plllboxes", but I got stuck in one with no way forward (or any way back out) because the teleport landing thing #6777 does not appear on the easy difficulty, and it doesn't look like there's an alternative path. Fixing this should not require nodebuilding and so should not affect demos, but since it's already on idgames I understand if you decide not to fix it. Please let me know if that's the case though, because I can then submit a compatibility fix on the ZDoom forum so the wad will work as is in the next GZDoom release.

[thelamp]

3 hours ago, brick said:

the teleport landing thing #6777 does not appear on the easy difficulty

I'm honestly not sure how this even happened but you're right that teleport exit mistakenly doesn't have the easy flag set. I will be reuploading to idgames to fix that, thanks for playing!

 

@Bozzy

Spoiler

these four pillars (located in the northern structure) raise when you interact with them. it also raises the doors to give access to the 'yellow' key

 

[Clippy]

Every time it's a wacky zany time lol

 

creative unique stuff bud

 

 

[Bozzy]

20 hours ago, thelamp said:

 

 

@Bozzy

  Hide contents

these four pillars (located in the northern structure) raise when you interact with them. it also raises the doors to give access to the 'yellow' key

 

i didnt expect progression to be hidden in a secret area. I now have the yellow key but its not working on the yellow door it says i need the yellow key

Edited October 15, 2023 by Bozzy

[thelamp]

6 hours ago, Bozzy said:

i didnt expect progression to be hidden in a secret area. I now have the yellow key but its not working on the yellow door it says i need the yellow key

It's not a secret area? Anyway the key you're calling yellow isn't actually yellow it counts as the red key, same as on previous levels with the same key

[FEDEX]

Is the google drive file up to date?

[Bozzy]

On 10/15/2023 at 10:14 PM, thelamp said:

It's not a secret area? Anyway the key you're calling yellow isn't actually yellow it counts as the red key, same as on previous levels with the same key

im dumb sorry i thought it was yellow. also i could have sworn i got a secret when i entered it i must have misremembered

[Clippy]

This was fun and my longest gameplay vid in a while haha - I was blown away to see I played for this long cause it did not feel like it at all - such a unique experience it kept me entertained bro

 

this was an adventure and a half!

 

 

[Clippy]

Fun time with Lamp and friends 

 

It's always a serial experience to enter this world. Sorry, it took me over a week to air this crazy busy times. And I had to get a new phone lol 

 

Will totally be back for more buddy 

 

 

Edited November 14, 2023 by Clippy