EnrichedUranium Posted May 5, 2022 Ah yes Omelet.wad Spoiler So unfortunately, there were no eggs involved in this wad. It was a fun little romp. Those curved staircases were hard for me to see in the beginning. I did actually find all the secrets. Even if that demo shows me failing in basic platforming way too much. The end sequence with a zillion rockets had me expecting Cyberdemon or Spider Mastermind behind one of the descending walls and I was correct. I got impatient and decided to just end the map instead of rocketing the spider mastermind down with 200/200 and a megasphere leftover, but it wouldn't have been a very hard UV Max. I think I liked this one more than BEN.WAD since it was far less sprawling. omelet.lmp.zip 1 Share this post Link to post
LadyMistDragon Posted May 5, 2022 (edited) It's so funny. I was really worried I'd hardly have time for this and it turns out this wasn't even posted until today! Well, I still don't have tons of time so this'll be a short one, right? Right? Omelet Wait, this is an early Malcolm Sailor map? I guess that explains a few things, though it's not exactly Chord, as you'll soon realize. This is like, an early M<I admit I was expecting complete junk, but what's here instead is shockingly good! Starting you in a Living End-styled starter lift facing away from the exit for some reason, you then proceed into a tanned cavern with a blood floor that thankfully does NOT damage you. Though there are touches of amateurishness in this opening room, it almost doesn't feel like shovelware. Climbing a ledge with a hell knight and yellow key door at the end, a closet will open up with a Cacodemon! You'll have to jump over here if you want to acquire the yellow key. The secrets are all on ledges that I'm pretty sure you collect one after the other, but I couldn't be bothered to find the anonymous wall granting access here. Eventually, you'll come into the series of lava caverns that gives the map its name. Some nice things are done with pillars in the last room, but the author basically runs out of combat ideas at this point, because you rocket some Arachnotrons, pick up a Megasphere, slay a Spider Mastermind, then rinse and repeat after a bit. I do like the little Arch-vile attacks though, not particularly impressive but shockingly well-timed and not just thrown in your path just because. DDS1 is still probably better, even if you completely discount the last area, but this is up there. Progression is cool and there is some very light puzzle-solving and there's some honestly good design here. lmd_pandora_omelet.zip 1 Share this post Link to post
brick Posted May 6, 2022 (edited) Omelet.wad (GZDoom, UV, 100% kills, 2/3 secrets) Hah, I didn't expect Malcolm Sailor. He's mostly famous for his Chord series and Talosian Incident, as well as other wads he contributed to and that also made it to the Top 100, but we're still a few years away here, as this is one of his earliest maps in his first year. It kinda shows. Reading the txt is pretty funny: "A great wad", "the best one I've seen other than iD's", and best of all, "doom II episode 3 sucks". Bold words, considering the opener rips off The Living End with about as much flair as you might expect. Settings comparisons aside, the map's actually not bad. You have nothing but the pistol and a chainsaw at first, with knights and cacos and assorted delights coming for you, but you get the SSG very quickly, before you really have to deal with them. There's a nice variety in enemies despite the low count. Once you go through the yellow door you open up the second half of the map, which is very different. At this point you have the rocket launcher, and the map becomes a linear romp through Spirit World inspired passages against successive groups of arachnotrons, with the occasional surprises in the form of archviles and Spider Masterminds. You get a lot of rockets though, and 2 Megaspheres along the way, which really help. I found the 2 secrets that get you the blue armour but I have no idea where that last one was. Honestly there was already much better stuff at the time, but it's still a really fun map and it's always fun playing a big name's early-career wads. 3 Share this post Link to post
sandwedge Posted May 6, 2022 (edited) Had fun with this, and a bit of a longer write up here since I felt like it: (Played in GZdoom on Doom (strict), on Ultraviolence and I noticed a BIG difference to the starting area on UV.) Omelet.wad, full canonical name being omelet face "because that's what it'll turn you into." I read that and was not looking forward to what I was going to see. Actually I have a lot of fun reading through the text file in the video, since it was something of a different time for the internet and poor Malcolm Sailor was around 12 at the time. I found out he actually had quite a bit of output and some well known wads like the Chord series. I saw many people in this thread already knew him which is cool, I'm a relative newcomer to the history of the Doom community so I wasn't aware but this was cool to discover on a shovelware disc then. While the text file scared me a bit, the reviews of his 3 pack wad including this map were decent, and I can see why. Omelet starts off with a pretty good first room, probably a great first room at the time, which may have actually backed up his claim that this was the greatest hell map ever made since Id (also Id sucked too apparently.) Now, part of the difficulty of the first area is that going in blind I had no idea if the blood floor was gonna hurt me, so trying to stay up top and quickly chainsaw through a couple enemies to get to the SSG while avoiding several caco and shotgunner projectiles was a bit of an issue. They got me once or twice. That stairway is also super thin and annoying. Of course, I probably got hit by a projectile while in the blood so I figured it was a damaging floor, but once I discover the truth the beginning becomes a LOT easier. I still get killed by a hellknight trying to get into the secret tower, foolishly thinking it was going up fast enough to dodge the ball. So once I figured out that first area it was pretty smooth sailing. I gotta say though, that's also where the level kind of peaks. Visually it looks good and has a lot of little combat areas packed into it, along the ledges of the side. It's a little cramped on the right side and I get hung up on the walls a bit. There's the secret mega armour of the secret tower which helps a lot, and I assume the rocket box is also a secret which I missed. Once you get to through the first room, it becomes clear that the author spent most of their time and effort at the beginning because we come to nice copy paste hallway of red hell textures and spiders. Funnily I miss the first megasphere as I didn't need yet and thought there would be a stair back up, so that was a funny thing that sort of trolled me, but I also trolled myself really. The megasphere really isn't that necessary, though. I mean, this part of the level seems predicated on the idea that arachnotrons in a hallway are peak Doom combat. And maybe if you were playing on a keyboard it was, especially when trying to aim with the rocket launcher. Well, nowadays it's not hard or very interesting. Some of it is still awkward, and I take some splash damage, but again Malcolm is quite generous with the megaspheres and rockets. Then, since these appear to be spider caverns, we have to face a couple Spider Masterminds with rockets. Unfortunately, spiderdemons kind of suck and require a lot of care to work well, so the first one is just kind of... trapped in a room. She's way too thicc. Not a problem. The second one is like, slightly more interesting? At least Ms. Spider can move around a bit more, and the darn rocket splash damage keeps whittling me down with her giant hitbox, while I try to avoid autoaiming into the pillars. But there's another megasphere there, so again, it's rather anticlimatic. Of course we have the mapping favourite, the final room with an archvile, which again isn't an issue if you have any health remaining, plus there's cover back there and no bodies to rez. So yeah, if only the quality of the first room had continued I would have been quite happy with this. As it stands, like I say in the video, it's like eating the first part of a great omelet and finding the chef spit in the middle. It also was stated this would take an hour to beat, which is hard to believe unless you played keyboard only without allowing yourself to run at all. And you were drunk. But perhaps that's the Canadian hoser way. ;-) Edited May 6, 2022 by sandwedge 2 Share this post Link to post
Luleta Posted May 7, 2022 (edited) butting in... OMELET.WAD Spoiler quite enjoyable lil map, i liked some of the tight encounters, i first died to the "final area" because i assumed the blood was hurtfloor so i skipped the yellow key without knowing, and with that the rocket launcher :((((( it was upsetting seeing so many rockets without having a launching device for them. eventually i figured out blood didn't hurt and got the rocket launcher tho :D didn't get any of the secrets and i got hit by a nasty damage roll by a hell knight discouraging me from killing two baddies. it was kinda upsetting to exit without killing the two jerks i left behind, but there was no way to get back xP the lava part was kinda cool? but it being mostly arachnotrons and mommy spiders it got kinda dull rocketing them to death. here's a lil fda :D omelet01fda.zip id love to join the discord if you get the invites figured out c: 2 Share this post Link to post
Gibbon Posted May 7, 2022 26 minutes ago, Luleta said: butting in... OMELET.WAD Reveal hidden contents quite enjoyable lil map, i liked some of the tight encounters, i first died to the "final area" because i assumed the blood was hurtfloor so i skipped the yellow key without knowing, and with that the rocket launcher :((((( it was upsetting seeing so many rockets without having a launching device for them. eventually i figured out blood didn't hurt and got the rocket launcher tho :D didn't get any of the secrets and i got hit by a nasty damage roll by a hell knight discouraging me from killing two baddies. it was kinda upsetting to exit without killing the two jerks i left behind, but there was no way to get back xP the lava part was kinda cool? but it being mostly arachnotrons and mommy spiders it got kinda dull rocketing them to death. here's a lil fda :D omelet01fda.zip id love to join the discord if you get the invites figured out c: I have updated the discord server invite link and it…. Never expires! Hooray! 3 Share this post Link to post
Pegleg Posted May 9, 2022 @Gibbon It looks like the votes for the next week's shovelware installment are taken on the Discord server. For those not on Discord (for whatever reason), what do you think about posting the nominees on this thread for people to vote, and then adding that to the Discord vote? Something like (for however many nominees there are): Nominees for Shovelware Society #xx (please vote by <DATE 3 DAYS FROM POSTING DATE>): awesome.wad -- 2 Hell-themed maps in slots Map 29 and 30 rockstar.wad -- 1 long corrupted techbase map in slot Map 07, lots of rockets midtier.wad -- 3 maps with no coherent theme, but based around teleporting from place to place, mid-tier monsters only 0 Share this post Link to post
LadyMistDragon Posted May 9, 2022 32 minutes ago, Pegleg said: @Gibbon It looks like the votes for the next week's shovelware installment are taken on the Discord server. For those not on Discord (for whatever reason), what do you think about posting the nominees on this thread for people to vote, and then adding that to the Discord vote? Something like (for however many nominees there are): Nominees for Shovelware Society #xx (please vote by <DATE 3 DAYS FROM POSTING DATE>): awesome.wad -- 2 Hell-themed maps in slots Map 29 and 30 rockstar.wad -- 1 long corrupted techbase map in slot Map 07, lots of rockets midtier.wad -- 3 maps with no coherent theme, but based around teleporting from place to place, mid-tier monsters only Basically, someone will choose some random WADS and then post them here to be voted on. 1 Share this post Link to post
Castr_Tricks2 Posted May 13, 2022 Omelet.wad Welcome to the Living End 2, enjoy. Your main weapons are SSG and rockets. SSG first half, rockets second. Ughhhhhhhhh, that second half is just that one room with arachnotrons and invulns in The Spirit World, except no invulns, LOTS of rockets, and it's repeated. A lot. Oh and you can't forget the dick archie in the room with the exit switch that prevents you from running past the 3rd, I think giant enemy spider in this map. Surprised it was half decent, however. (Although it is really hard to follow up Ben.wad, what with it all being 90's era shovelware) 2 Share this post Link to post
Deleted Account Posted May 15, 2022 (edited) Here are my 4 wads Hellish.wad (Doom 1) Megasphere Luckout.wad (Doom 1) Invuln Mc_Shock.wad (Doom 1 E2M1) Soul Nitro1.wad (Doom 1 E2M2) Invis Hellish is my fav Edited May 15, 2022 by Puncher_Sponge 5 Share this post Link to post
EnrichedUranium Posted May 15, 2022 I've been appreciating some WCW Nitro recently, so Nitro1 works for me. Though MC_Shock sounds cool too. I dread what luckout is. Anything with luck in the name scares me and I'm expecting like 3 cyberdemons in a tiny room at the start. 2 Share this post Link to post
LadyMistDragon Posted May 16, 2022 Ok, looks like the winner is MC...Shock! Get those demos and videos recorded guys and we'll be back with some more wads to vote for....probably this weekend (just trying to give more people the chance to vote out of fairness). Also, tagging @Gibbon to update this post:) 3 Share this post Link to post
Gibbon Posted May 17, 2022 (edited) 17 hours ago, LadyMistDragon said: Ok, looks like the winner is MC...Shock! Get those demos and videos recorded guys and we'll be back with some more wads to vote for....probably this weekend (just trying to give more people the chance to vote out of fairness). Also, tagging @Gibbon to update this post:) This is on D!Zone Gold? I've just done a mass search in my 20,000 wads and I don't have an MC_SHOCK.WAD at all. Edit: Hellish.wad also isn't on D!Zone Gold. Instead I found it in my DoomHeaven2ForDoom2 CD.. We may have to restart the voting as it is strictly for D!Zone Gold content only. Edited May 17, 2022 by Gibbon 0 Share this post Link to post
LadyMistDragon Posted May 17, 2022 (edited) 6 hours ago, Gibbon said: This is on D!Zone Gold? I've just done a mass search in my 20,000 wads and I don't have an MC_SHOCK.WAD at all. Edit: Hellish.wad also isn't on D!Zone Gold. Instead I found it in my DoomHeaven2ForDoom2 CD.. We may have to restart the voting as it is strictly for D!Zone Gold content only. That's what I get for pinging random people....I did say to pick from D!Zone Gold . Although I threw that fact in the middle of the sentence where I mentioned it, but still Edited May 17, 2022 by LadyMistDragon 1 Share this post Link to post
Gibbon Posted May 17, 2022 15 minutes ago, LadyMistDragon said: That's what I get for pinging random people....I did say to pick from D!Zone Gold . Although I threw that fact in the middle of the sentence where I mentioned it, but still The force of the shovel is strong, too strong for some to wield the power of the Shovelus Infinitum. 0 Share this post Link to post
sandwedge Posted May 17, 2022 Ok here goes. Hope I did this right lol, if not I will try again don't worry! All for Doom 2: WATER.wad - soulsphere WAX.wad - megasphere THOR.wad - invincibility TEKRKBRN.wad - invisibility (another malcolm sailor join btw, post omelet) Was kinda tricky here so I only chose stuff with text files since there was a lot of deathmatch. 6 Share this post Link to post
LadyMistDragon Posted May 18, 2022 Wax has won, overwhelmingly! Have at it everyone! 3 Share this post Link to post
EnrichedUranium Posted May 19, 2022 So I think I found the right Wax on the D!Zone cd, but there are no monsters, at all. Wax2 does appear to have some though. 0 Share this post Link to post
sandwedge Posted May 19, 2022 3 minutes ago, EnrichedUranium said: So I think I found the right Wax on the D!Zone cd, but there are no monsters, at all. Wax2 does appear to have some though. Wtf I swear I looked at all the dang text files to make sure it wasnt deathmatch. Just do wax 2 if that's the case then. Sorry about that. It's actually quite tricky because there is so much deathmatch, and so many levels without text files. Not sure if you wanna just stick to text files or actually sample them before I pick. 0 Share this post Link to post
EnrichedUranium Posted May 19, 2022 (edited) After much waiting, Week 18 - Wax 2.wad. I did attach it to this post for easier access for ya'll. According to the text file, its the sequel we have been asking for (despite the original being a deathmatch only map). There's supposed to be some custom weapon deh, but that's way too much effort for me. Lets see if it is that sequel we always wanted. So the review Spoiler I don't think I was in the right mood to play this, since I honestly hated my time playing. But its far more mediocre than some trainwreck. This is a map with plenty of dark rooms, doors that are a bit too narrow and a dark sewer section. There are plenty of yellow bars that don't require yellow keys, much like wax.wad had red doors that didn't need keys (cause its a deathmatch map). Ammo and health seem VERY scarce. Had to re-do this run a couple of times because I took one big hit and died to chip damage, or got blasted by the archvile since I was trying to be cute. I didn't UV-Max this since I couldn't be assed to run around in a sewer to look for more specters and I was just done when I somehow opened the exit door, which I'm still not sure exactly why it triggered that way. WAX2.zip wax2-demo.zip 2 Share this post Link to post
brick Posted May 19, 2022 For those who don't want to miss anything the idgames upload of wax2 does include the deh file. 2 Share this post Link to post
Gibbon Posted May 20, 2022 This level kicked my arse sideways.. oh well, it was pretty fun but that Pain Elemental was a cheap tactic! *shakes fist* Video of my getting my butt kicked: Spoiler 3 Share this post Link to post
sandwedge Posted May 20, 2022 What a trainwreck. YT desc: Played in GZDoom blind on Ultraviolence, along with my buddies Clippy and a cameo halfway thru with Bio . This is Wax 2, a sequel to the acclaimed (?!) Wax 1 which was a deathmatch map. I suppose they should have stuck with deathmatch because this map is absolutely atrocious. Most of it can be skipped by running to a switch which opens the exit door, Habitat style. There's the hideous lack of ammo. The yellow key bars that don't need a yellow key (which doesn't exist). The random dead ends that take more resources to get to than you receive. The random archvile jump (I think??) that gets you a rocket launcher and backpack with almost no ammo. I mean, once you figure out this absolute mess it might have JUST enough ammo to kill everything, but you can hardly blame me for not trying. However, thanks to my buddies I had some fun seeing just how bad this got! 2 Share this post Link to post
Luleta Posted May 20, 2022 wax2 sux Spoiler died like 3 times exploring the underground area which IMO had the coolest stuff in it? its like an abandoned metro spookyyy ooo. i like the train tracks and the trains :D after 2 more deaths trying to get the rocket on the altar that has a lowering bridge i found myself slowly dying from 5 dmg floor without any exit and said to myself "why am i even bothering to pick this up?". so this time i simply ignored the underground and pressed a texture that isnt a switch to open the exit... neat. this level could be alright if there was any freaking reason to visit the underground, it shouldn't be too hard to put a key there u need or SOMETHING. i felt like a moron when i discovered it wasn't even necessary. gotta love the ssg behind yellow bars that requires no key tho. ammo was quite tight too ;_; in short, wax sux here is my fda, try not to die of boredom if u watch it lol wax2fda.zip 2 Share this post Link to post
LadyMistDragon Posted May 22, 2022 (edited) Wax 2 by Kyle ver Steeg The sequel to the lauded deathmatch wad Wax (something I wish I could afford, btw), this map shares many characteristics with it. Such as, key bars which don;t require keys, little passages which lead nowhere, and a tech-y layout with some interesting structures. Though I will say grabbing that rocket launcher on that collection of blood in the middle is not worth the effort by any means. Do you have to use that Arch-vile in the station somehow? I was sort of tempted to run around the Mancubi to pick up the BFG in the sewers, but this was such a painful experience, it's hard to justify spending much more time with it. The cream of the shovelware crop, perhaps, more so than Fred 2 if you can believe that. As if to reinforce the point, the Pain Elemental in the room that probably opens the exit was able to spit a lost soul at me, despite being completely backed up against the wall. Having monitoring stations (or whatever) combined with an exit was about as puzzling as all the other design choices made. Although they could also be infuriating, like having the platform to the monitoring tech area lower into the inescapable slime as soon as you step onto it Wish I had a little more time I guess, but I think I found basically everything Edit: I checked out the subway/sewers later and found I wasn't really missing much. lmd_pandora_wax2w.zip Edited May 23, 2022 by LadyMistDragon 2 Share this post Link to post
Luleta Posted May 24, 2022 (edited) ok, i have been given the HONOR to pick four wads from D!Zone Gold to vote on, react to this post with the specified powerup to vote: CORE.WAD - soulsphere URMEAT2.WAD - megasphere ARCHIE.WAD - godmode VACATION.WAD - blursphere these are all doom2 levels because i don't trust 90's mappers to not make me shotgun 40 barons in a row. 5 Share this post Link to post
EnrichedUranium Posted May 24, 2022 I have a feeling this is gonna be a another runaway, but I gotta vote for URMEAT2 0 Share this post Link to post
Luleta Posted May 24, 2022 (edited) Just now, EnrichedUranium said: URMEAT2 aren't we all just meat 2 in the end? 1 Share this post Link to post