Hellcinerator (Definitive Edition) - Large MBF21 Map

[Arsinikk]

 

“Corruption has started to seep its way into earth facilities, and it's your job to search out the source and root it out for good."

 

Hellcinerator (Definitive Edition) is a remastered version of a large singleplayer / multiplayer map that was a teaser for the MBF21 megawad Corruption by @NinjaDelphox and friends. The map is meant to be a showcase many of the exclusive MBF21 / DEHEXTRA (and even some fancy Boom) features that can be used in Doom Mapping. 

 

The Definitive Edition fixes some minor bugs and streamlines some of the progression from the original version. In addition, the visual and audio resources have been updated to correspond with the latest version of Corruption, since it is featured in the Megawad as MAP15.

 

This is my first ever BOOM map, and I can say that I have pushed some of BOOM’s mechanics pretty far. The map has more than 1000 sector tags with more than 600 voodoo dolls, and so it would be amiss to say that this map isn’t but complex. Unfortunately, some of the map’s effects may lag older computers, and so I suggest DSDA Doom for the smoothest experience.
 

The map itself should take around 30-90 minutes to finish, depending if you are going for the secret exit or not. It includes some slaughter-ish fights, but I don’t think I would call the entire map full-on slaughter. All difficulties have been implemented on every map including UV Plus that includes multiplayer monsters and items for those who want an extra challenge. It is NOT recommended to play this new difficulty on an initial playthrough.

 

A much older version of this map was originally submitted to decino's Round 4 submissions. And so this map has some references made for decino.

 

 

Just play the final version of the map in Corruption (MAP15)

 

Outdated Links:

Spoiler

Definitive Edition: Download Now

Original Version: Download Now

 

Files:

• hellcinerator.wad
• hellcinerator_ws.wad (widescreen assets)
• hellcinerator.txt (includes full credits)
• hellcinerator_zandronum_patch.wad (allows for the wad to be played in Zandronum and older ZDoom ports)

 

Loading the new patch is not recommended when playing in GZDoom, but it won't break the map either. You'll just get some extra error messages.

 

Old Changelog:

Spoiler

RC 2.3

• It no longer matters when hellcinerator_zandronum_patch.wad is in the load order

RC 2.2

• Fixed a minor DEHACKED error

RC 2.1

• Made it so you can't skip stepping on the pressure switches before hitting the switch in the beginning of the map

RC 2

• New patch added to support Zandronum and old ZDoom ports (NOT ZDaemon)

• Added shortcut in the Courtyard to ease map traversal and make progression more clear

• Yellow keycard switch made way more obvious after beating the maze

• Fixed “NPC” to work better in GZDoom and ZDoom ports

• Minor tweak to progression in the blue maze

• Minor texture tweaks in the green maze

• Fixed more automap lines that were supposed to be hidden

RC 1.2

• fixed some lines on the automap that were meant to be hidden.

RC 1.1

• In GZDoom, ghost monster kills weren't counted as they should.

• some switches in the maze section were modified to avoid being pressed early.

 

 

 

Hellcinerator will only work on ports that support MBF21 (complevel 21) and DEHEXTRA:

• DSDA Doom
• GZDoom (4.7.0 or later)
• Eternity Engine (Dev Build ONLY)
• Woof
• Zandronum (ONLY original edition with Patch)
• ZDoom (ONLY original edition with Patch)
• Doom Retro (Partial)
• Odamex (Not working without crashing... Talking with developers)

 

IMPORTANT:

Mouselook is strongly discouraged. I have not forced it off in GZDoom, because I know players like to use it... But in this map there are fights and sequences that have been specifically designed around Doom's autoaim in mind.

 

 

Open the spoiler below to read about specific features this map offers:
 

Spoiler

The reason why this map is so large was because of its multiplayer focus. The idea was that at certain points of the map, multiple players could enter different sections and complete them at the same time. This required extensive testing on making sure that doing things in a certain order didn’t break the map.

 

This is especially evident on a certain coloured maze section of the map, which includes four different sections, that each had to be designed to be done forwards and backwards. With how many moving sectors that are in that section, let’s just say it took months to get it all working correctly.

 

Unfortunately, this multiplayer focus may have bloated the map a bit for singleplayer playthroughs. This was essentially my second ever map, and I can say that I have learned quite a bit while working on this map… And while I think this map is a technical achievement, the overall length can be a bit taxing to play singleplayer in one sitting. I encourage players to take some breaks while playing this in singleplayer.

 

Since I do not play multiplayer, nor do I really have friends that do multiplayer, I haven’t been able to test it extensively, so I would appreciate feedback on this front.

 

Being a MAP15, this map of course also includes a secret exit. The secret exit was meant to be a treasure hunt, having the player find hidden switches around the map.

 

If you don’t find exploration or puzzles fun or just want to shoot shit, I can’t really suggest you go for the secret exit. However, I have included many hints that show up in areas after the player has beaten them and have even included a secret room that shows all the switch locations, to help guide the player in the right direction. (you can also look at a comprehensive guide section at the end of this post)

 

There are a few secret fights and a worthwhile payoff for finding the secret exit.

 

This map includes DehackEd ghost monsters. If you don’t know, it is originally a Vanilla bug that made crushed monsters resurrected by Archviles invulnerable to all of the player's weapons… Except the rocket launcher’s splash damage.

 

For this map, I have artificially created ghost monsters via DehackEd for a couple fights, with the monsters being translucent for a quick tell. There is a tutorial diagram in the map showing how to deal with them before they are encountered.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hellcinerator actually features two new music tracks which were composed by me specifically for this map:

 

 

 

Because of how complicated this map is, I have included a guide of sorts to help with some of the more puzzely aspects of the map:

View Walkthrough Guide

 

 

This is my first non-vanilla map, and so I thought I’d focus on some of what I went through while working on this map that took me 9 months to finalise.

Keep in mind some of this information may spoil your first playthrough of the map, so I implore you to play the map first and then come back.

View Development Diary

 

 

• In DSDA Doom, if you have mouselook on and are running in OpenGL mode, in places where there are multiple different skies, the skies will glitch back and forth between multiple skies. If you turn off mouselook, the sky glitching goes away.
• GZDoom Hardware and true colour rendering modes ignores the custom colourmap in the library section (software works correctly).
• There is a part of the map where a ceiling raises which will lag GZDoom heavily in Hardware mode for around 5-10 seconds (and I have a good graphics card). A quick fix is to temporarily switch to the software/true colour renderer until the ceiling has finished raising or look away from the centre of the arena  [ be sure to watch out ;) ]

 

 

Edited November 10, 2023 by Arsinikk : Definitive Edition Update

[Arsinikk]

In GZDoom, ghost monster kills weren't counted as they should.

Also some switches in the maze section were modified to avoid being pressed early.

 

This hotfix remedies these issues (OP also updated):

Hellcinerator RC 2.2

Edited August 25, 2022 by Arsinikk

[LuciferSam86]

Oh, this is a good one.

Just arrived at the maze section, and I love it.

 

Just finished the level in 40 minutes. I really enjoyed it.

If the difficulty in the full wad stays around what I experienced here, I'll play it for sure.

 

Cannot wait for the full release of the wad.

Edited August 5, 2022 by LuciferSam86

[Arsinikk]

12 hours ago, LuciferSam86 said:

 Just finished the level in 40 minutes. I really enjoyed it.

I'm very glad you were able to beat the map and enjoyed it as well!

 

Believe it or not, the playtesting for this map was a bit rough... So seeing people actually being able to finish the map is quite the relief!

 

12 hours ago, LuciferSam86 said:

If the difficulty in the full wad stays around what I experienced here, I'll play it for sure.

You won't be disappointed then. This map gives a good idea of how difficult the megawad will eventually be.

 

I would say that this particular map may be a bit more slaughter-y in it's fights, but the difficulty of the other maps will still match up.

[Dusty_Rhodes]

Mind blowing. Those visual effects are amazing and that's always something I've been fascinated with and it seems you squeezed the most out of Boom / MBF21 as possible.

[LuciferSam86]

9 hours ago, Arsinikk said:

I would say that this particular map may be a bit more slaughter-y in it's fights, but the difficulty of the other maps will still match up.

 

Oh sweet. Well, I played on "I'm too young to die." and I found the map very enjoyable.

[Arsinikk]

3 hours ago, LuciferSam86 said:

Oh sweet. Well, I played on "I'm too young to die." and I found the map very enjoyable.

Actually this is super cool to hear! I take difficulty levels very seriously, and I don't think I had anyone (but me) test on the lowest skill!

 

Also anyone who has / is interested in the reading the Dev Diary portion of the post, I have added the section "The Scroll Floor Dilemma" describing an interesting Boom bug I ran into while making this map.

[Arsinikk]

Updated main post to be less "wall-of-text" and also updated the WAD to RC 1.2.

This update fixes some lines on the automap that were meant to be hidden.

 

I am currently working on trying to get the WAD to work with Zandronum and older ZDoom ports via DECORATE.

[sandwedge]

Played this on my stream on HMP and had a great time!  Huge map with tons of interesting, varied visuals and MBF changes.  I was really surprised with the amount of variety here, with so many different themed areas and gameplay styles, including some absolutely crazy puzzles lol.  I knew with your first map Purple Rain you were great at pushing the engine to its limits and you absolutely did it again here!  I definitely recommend HMP for many players as it was hard enough for me there without getting too out of hand.  I will say there's enough in this one map to make up several maps, but as a sort of episode closer in your upcoming megawad this would do well.  Definitely looking forward to what you can pull off in the full megawad release!

 

 

[Arsinikk]

I have a big update for the map - RC 2.

 

This includes some minor tweaks to the map to aid in progression, fixes some bugs with GZDoom, and includes a new patch allowing for the WAD to be played in Zandronum and ZDoom!

 

Download Hellcinerator (RC 2.2)

 

Loading the new patch is not recommended when playing in GZDoom, but it won't break the map either. You'll just get some extra error messages.

 

RC2 Changelog:

Spoiler

• New patch added to support Zandronum and old ZDoom ports (NOT ZDaemon)
• Added shortcut in the Courtyard to ease map traversal and make progression more clear
• Yellow keycard switch made way more obvious after beating the maze
• Fixed “NPC” to work better in GZDoom and ZDoom ports
• Minor tweak to progression in the blue maze
• Minor texture tweaks in the green maze
• Fixed more automap lines that were supposed to be hidden

 

Also, I've learned that even though Odamex supports MBF21, this map is currently super incompatible with the port and crashes less than a minute into the map. I'm reaching out to the Odamex devs to see if I can find a solution.

Edited August 25, 2022 by Arsinikk

[Red Recluse]

Funny massacre walkhtrough on 4 difficult.

[Bri0che]

Decino is haunting my nights now

[Arsinikk]

Here's a minor update to the map!

Download Hellcinerator (RC 2.2)

 

Apparently you could break the very first sequence in the map... You could actually hit a switch before stepping on some pressure switches. I've fixed it right up, so you can no longer do that. Amazing!

Edited August 25, 2022 by Arsinikk

[General Rainbow Bacon]

I'm getting this error in Gzdoom 4.8.2 upon startup: "Script error, "Hellcinerator.wad:DECORATE" line 56:
Parent type 'NewDemon' not found in NewSpectre"

[Arsinikk]

21 minutes ago, General Rainbow Bacon said:

I'm getting this error in Gzdoom 4.8.2 upon startup: "Script error, "Hellcinerator.wad:DECORATE" line 56:
 Parent type 'NewDemon' not found in NewSpectre"

My bad. You are correct.

 

I've fixed it now:
Download Hellcinerator (RC 2.2)
 

I've updated the link and the main post.

Thanks for letting me know! :)

Edited August 25, 2022 by Arsinikk

[Degree23]

I tried to open in Zandronum 3.1 and I got this error:

 

Script error, "hellcinerator_zandronum_patch.wad:DECORATE" line 1:
Parent type 'GhostCaco' not found in ZanGhostCaco
Script error, "hellcinerator_zandronum_patch.wad:DECORATE" line 5:
Parent type 'decinoMastermind' not found in ZandecinoMastermind

[Arsinikk]

6 hours ago, Degree23 said:

I tried to open in Zandronum 3.1 and I got this error:

 

Script error, "hellcinerator_zandronum_patch.wad:DECORATE" line 1:
Parent type 'GhostCaco' not found in ZanGhostCaco
Script error, "hellcinerator_zandronum_patch.wad:DECORATE" line 5:
Parent type 'decinoMastermind' not found in ZandecinoMastermind

You are receiving this error because you tried to load the hellcinerator_zandronum_patch.wad before loading hellcinerator.wad.

 

hellcinerator_zandronum_patch.wad directly references code from hellcinerator.wad, so it makes sense why you would get this error.

 

Regardless, I've updated the patch file so it no longer matters when it's loaded in the load order now:

Download Hellcinerator (RC 2.3)

[Arsinikk]

I've released a minor update for the WAD that fixes an ACS library bug that can happen.

Also I've submitted the WAD to /idgames, so I'll let everyone know when it's up there!

 

For now, here's the final release (crosses fingers):

Download Hellcinerator (Final Release)

Edited September 5, 2022 by Arsinikk

[Arsinikk]

Hellcinerator is now on /idgames! Yay!

 

Download now!

 

Thanks to everyone for their bug reporting and support!

[Redneckerz]

After seeing this:

 

 

i need to know how this was achieved.

 

In general, i love effects porn and this map has tons of it. An excellent tech demo and a good map to boot!

[Firedust]

It would be a real shame if this map gets slotted as a bonus contribution towards the megawad, it's too good for that.

[Arsinikk]

Hellcinerator now has a new Definitive Edition! [not yet on /idgames] - Debating whether to upload it as a separate release or just update the old one.

 

As some of you may know, the Megawad Corruption that the map Hellcinerator was made for has been released to the public. The version of Hellcinerator that was released standalone had some old visual/audio resources and DehackEd from Corruption. Therefore, I thought it would be appropriate to update the standalone map to better represent how it is in the final megawad.

 

Download Definitive Edition!

 

Here are some of the list of changes for the Definitive Edition:

• Sprites, sound effects, and DehackEd have all been updated to match Corruption.
• Some enemies such as the Revenant, Imp, and Hell Knights now have "rage modes". When they fall under a certain amount of health, they become more aggressive and/or shoot more damaging projectiles.
• Some minor texture offsets and game-breaking bugs have been fixed (i.e. the red keycard not teleporting in is now fixed)
• Some of the map's progression has been overhauled to avoid confusion (i.e. shortcuts open in the brown building automatically now, and the blue keycard puzzle has been redesigned for simplicity sake)
• The map now features a Deathmatch arena for multiplayer.

 

Note that the Definitive Edition does not yet have a Zandronum / legacy ZDoom patch yet. A patch is currently in the works, but the added MBF21 DehackEd is quite difficult to get working in old ZDoom ports. If you'd like to play the map in Zandronum, please download the original edition since a patch is included there.

[dsda-dev]

The issue with the custom colormap in indexed light mode in dsda-doom has finally been fixed in dev builds and pending the next official release (probably ~mid-late May).

[TheShep]

hot. downloaded and will play eventually.