The DWmegawad Club plays: Cydonia & Arrival

[LadyMistDragon]

Map 17: Cesspool

 

Deaths: 2

Brown fort where you start facing some grunts which are facing away from you for some reason. I think this is supposed to be a port facility, because this sure looks like you're facing a dock with an entrance-like structure facing you, and it would certainly explain the water here.

Combat and progression here actually has a modern-ish Ozonia feel, even if the visuals are vanilla Plutonia. Traps here are some of the nastiest so far, with multiple chaingunners and Revenants revealed in each one, and you should probably assume there's a archv-ile around every corner, even though there's not really that many. I don't really know how comfortable I am with killing a Cyberdemon that exists just to sit in the middle of some brackish water, to be honest. How much do the Cacos that appear when you approach this ledge from the YK hallway actually hurt 'im. Well, doesn't matter too much. The final arena is the most fiendish this wad has offered so far, a pack of fat angry bald men backed up by a pair of Arch-viles along with healthy amounts of Mancubi on the side ledges can absolutely wreck your day if you're not careful. The success mainly came from a lucky BFG shot, but if you haven't bothered with the secret Supercharge, surviving is a rather questionable prospect. If you evade the Arch-viles, Mancubi fireballs can still easily finish you off and Arch-viles moving as much as they do, hunting them down is just an invitation to doom if the chaingunners aren't dead.

 

 

lmd_cydonia17.zip

Edited September 22, 2022 by LadyMistDragon

[tmorrow]

Arrival map03

 

A large tech base with some relaxed and laid back game play. Plenty of monsters to kill but no mean traps and only a handful of archviles and a spider mastermind. guarding the blue key. I had a lot of fun exploring the tech base.

 

Note the following non official secrets to pick up the bfg.
 

Spoiler

In the room to the west of the bfg, climb the stairs and as you head south across the walkway, turn toward the bfg. You will see a switch revealed behind it. Shoot it to raise 3 pillars to the bfg. Go back out and climb up to collect the bfg.

 

[NiGHTS108]

- Arrival -

 

MAP01: Waste Abandonment

Kills: 100%

Items: 70%

Secrets: 0%

Time: 11:15

 

Dude Waste Abandonment fuckin RULES. This is one of my favourite openers I've ever played, hands down, and honestly I almost don't know how to describe why. A part of it is honestly just this map feels super nice to actually be in, it's kind of got that same magic as really good TNT: Evilution maps to me, where I can enjoy just walking around a tech base. Another part of it is because, uh, oh yeah, the combat is really good. Dude this map and in turn this whole wad uses Arch-Viles to phenomenal effect. They're pretty simple but I find them really really effective, the main highlight obviously being the blue key fight. I really really like how it stages this huge hitscanner and Imp brawl and then drops in Arch-Viles on both sides. Very evil foreshadowing. The visuals and architecture also really stand out to me, Pavera paints a beautiful image with (I think?) only vanilla textures in this map, further boosted by his amazing lighting. There's a surprising amount of variety here, from the grungy sewer area to the caverns connecting to the exit. As a whole, this is just a map I consistently love to replay, it's exciting, AD_79's MIDI compliments the atmosphere, and visually it looks brilliant. Truly, hits on all fronts. What an opener.

 

Grade: A+

Difficulty: C+

 

 

[General Roasterock]

Map 19: Purgatory

 

  I have been playing this whole set over the course of weeks, and I am still somehow fatigued from the design. I am fatigued from the constant dripfeed of group of a half dozen enemies that can all go down in a singular SSG blast, and fatigued from fixing fights with a singular rewind. Thankfully, Purgatory does enough to solve the fatigue in more ways than one. I really liked the Yellow Skull fight, how it kept building as interaction with that layout was constant, even if the entire thing was just mirrored. I did find the secret invulnerability that nullified the Red Skull fight with the barrels. I also felt that the environmental progression was great too, having to climb back out of the pits once you collected all three keys to return to the surface you started on. That’s something I don’t see a lot of maps doing. On the other hand, not bringing extra rocket into the Blue Skull fight is suicide, as that fight is essentially monster spam that begs for gibbing, and two Arch-Viles that can not be effectively taken out without bigger munitions. The Red Skull fight for some reason involves teleport pads that will teleport you into explosive barrels if you step on them, arbitrarily limiting mobility, which, why? The invulnerability essentially breaks that fight in that manner since you can just teleport straight up and not worry about damage. I’m glad that there is finally a full blooded hell level, that’s something I feel Plutonia really dropped the ball on. 

 

Map 20: Reaper

 

  I don’t even know what I’m complaining about anymore, I think I just have been administered a fine grain of brain damage. This map is several magnitudes harder than Get On It, thank God, solely because it’s basically one room with a bunch of columns. Every wave of enemies has access to you from one route or another, and they far outnumber any kind of recovery you have. Any action has an equal and opposite reaction as Newton’s Law says, grabbing the BFG brings out a Cyberdemon and Arch-Vile, hitting any switch will release a small squad of Revenants, opening the unmarked Yellow Door puts you in view of a Spider Mastermind, and every other movement will drop either Pain Elementals or Hell Knights into your line of sight with nowhere to go but straight into you. Even with both secrets this is one of the hardest maps I have played in a while, which really says something. The very end pops up one last wave of sniping ledge Chaingunners, as if to wave it in your face, “what did you expect, this is Plutonia mapping, eat up”. The aesthetics were nice, I’ve always loved a good distorted building that I can scale, and maps with lava are normally better than maps with nukage on average. I’m just tired at this point.

 

Map 21: Fin

 

  I feel like not enough people talk about maps without exits that end off a set. A lot of them can have a kind hearted appreciation for the player for finishing all the levels, or a moody backdrop to allow for retrospection, or simply lead to some more explorable area. Fin does absolutely none of these, instead opting to place one dead marine, a bunch of rocks, and an amount of blood that could comfortable fit into a dumpster be cut off by an encroaching skybox. Are you kidding me, that’s it? It’s not like custom textures are not available in this set, the “give up” text in Night Terrors is custom. It’s such a barebones vista, I honestly wonder why it’s even here. I think a sold example for something like this is Ancient Aliens, where the ending map not only has some kind of acknowledgment of the player, but also allows for some beautiful expanses, and even leads to a funny gag in the form of the secret. The map after Soria Moria in Magnolia is a reflection on the previous area, showing all those voodoo dolls that you moved around have all succumbed to something, leaving you alone in the dark wastes. The list goes on. At the very least this map could have spared to make the skybox bigger, give me the sense that I am in somewhere that isn’t just a Doom map. It’s disappointing.

 

Summary

 

  I applaud AD and Scotty for being able to so rigorously and religiously stick to the constraints of making an entire megawad on Plutonia's time, but it is the weakest point of the set for me. It is so strictly meant for the crowd that not only enjoyed Plutonia, but could replay the damn thing infinitely as if nothing was holding it back. It's so well done, so seamlessly blends into the original set, that I feel I could take anyone who had never played the original IWAD and tell them these levels were what composed it. It is truly seamless, and I don't think I'll ever be able to truly appreciate it on that regard. Congrats to everyone who got through, there's a lot to love here that I can identify, but not relate with. 

 

Power Rankings

Spoiler

1. Night Terrors
2. Hopeless
3. The Cesspools
4. Fraughtification
5. Hatchet
6. Purgatory (I misspelled this on so many fucking posts it's not worth it)
7. Venomous
8. Volcanic
9. Reaper
10. Sasquatch
11. Chimera
12. Amazon
13. Neurotoxin
14. Deadlock
15. Quetzalcoatl
16. Backlash
17. Carcinogen
18. Aggrandizement
19. Ritual
20. Viper
21. Get On It
22. Siege

 

[Monsieur E]

Alright, time for Arrival. Same criteria as before, aiming to get most kills and pistol starting.

Map01- Waste Abandonment 
100% kills

Arrival kicks off by offering you a bunch of fodder with conveniently placed barrels to gib them with. The combat here is straightforward and satisfying, the relatively simple combat never gets boring simply due to the large amount of enemies placed throughout. Perhaps the key encounter in the level would be the archviles crashing the party, there are several on them determined to light the party up again. However, I think the large amount of plasma provided alongside the fact that most of the enemies to be resurrected the archviles can be easily demolished, make the party much less threatening than it seems. Infact, despite the double digit of archviles present, they're not really too much of a threat and are dismantled rather easily.

What I like the most about Map01 instead are the visuals, they have a appealing yet humble feeling to them, working pretty well with the vanilla limits and looking pretty. I also like the custom palette, it looks really nice. The abandoned techbase and the caverns don't clash against each other but flow pretty well into each other. It's a pretty solid opener. 

Map02- Saltstone Sanctuary
99% kills

As you face the chasm you are about to scale, your opposition makes itself known, firing projectiles at you as a bunch of cacodemons flock towards you. This level could've been extremely obnoxious however I think it's not due to the openness and large scale of the chasm alongside the fact that most of the initial opposition is just imps, plus you get enough of your artillery to cut through them, including a rocket launcher to deal with the heavier threats. I get the purpose of sprinkling down health+armor bonuses as a trail but placing the rockets felt a bit annoying since you could miss some and that'd lead to a problem later on, plus gathering them all feels a bit more time consuming, not a major complaint though.

I found the archvile trio on the chasm to be the only difficult fight, mostly because I was running low on rockets. However, I feel as if having so much of the map and its opposition laid out early for you to take out made the level become much less engaging as it progresses, combat wise. Once you got your arsenal setup, I found that nothing in the level really challenges your pace. I was very disappointed when I stumbled upon the large megasphere area full of goodies when I had only 3 enemies left and the only opposition I faced was the lone cyberdemon. 

While I ended up finding the combat alright but a bit disappointing, what sells this level for me are once again, the aesthetics and visuals. This large chasm despite using only vanilla textures looks really good, and the brown areas look really good and feel clearly manmade, in stark contrast to the natural formations around it (well technically, they're all man-made :P). The deliberation of the design feels like the cavern was carved out to build these buildings, and the area inside feel a bit cozy despite being abstract and not too specific. What ties all of these together to me atleast, was the skybox texture with its grey providing a rather "laidback" feeling to it and matching the cavern textures. Cool stuff.

[brick]

MAP02 - “Saltstone Sanctuary”
Climbing out of a valley onto rocky outcroppings and exploring caves and buildings that seem carved into the rock is pretty exciting. I liked the map layout a lot, some of the optional areas are quite involved and have good rewards. The map often teases you with views of a later area, or puts you above one you've already explored, it makes everything very connected. I did not like the claustrophobic ambushes with the HKs or the AVs, but did enjoy the rest of the combat. The start is a bit hairy with the cacos and all the imps on the higher ledges but getting a foothold established is fun. The wad continues to be beautiful with its use of the stock assets.

[finnks13]

MAP02 - Saltstone Sanctuary:

10:51/2 Deaths
This map starts fantastically, you're running through a canyon made of a combination of SP_ROCK and ZIMMER in a way I've never seen before to create these ethereal light grey cliffs and I think it looks excellent. You start off at the bottom of the canyon with arachnotrons, imps, mancubi and revenants on the high ground, peppering you with fireballs from pretty much every angle. Thankfully, a rocket launcher and a ton of rockets are available right from the start, so the fight is much less one-sided than it may initially seem. Once you get further up the cliffs, you've got a few options on where to go and you'll get a different reward from each of them - a megasphere, plasma gun or yellow key depending on your choice.

 

There's some great fights here, the triple archvile ambush at the top of the cliffs, next to a second rocket launcher, caught me completely off guard the first time since they don't teleport in or make an obvious wakeup sound - they just take a while to run over to you and will naturally appear when you're least prepared. My other death was to a claustrophobic fight before the blue key, I was not expecting the hell knights to teleport closer to me and paid the price with a face rocket. It's slightly odd that you can kill almost all the enemies before getting a single key, since the map kind of sputters out after you get it and the lone cyberdemon guarding the exit is lame and an ammo sponge. A weak ending doesn't detract from how solid the rest of the map is, however.

[Pseudonaut]

Arrival

Map01 (1 death):

Miraculously survived the big archvile wave. Probably would've been easier if I retreated further.

 

Map02: (3 deaths):

I was aggressive and experimental with the start here, and it paid off. Fun map.
 

Demos:

arr01-02.zip

[erzboesewicht]

Arrival

 

I was momentaneously doubting if I should play Arrival, but the first map already made me addicted, so I'll probably complete the club's official schedule. :) Even if Arrival hasn't to do much with Plutonia, I'll keep using the same "Plutonic" difficulty scale as for Cydonia as I feel this will also be a set with roughly Plutonic difficulty.

 

MAP01: Waste Abandonment

 

A big techbase with an outdoor extension, with lots of cannon fodder to kill. The chaingun was the most pleasant weapon to mow down more than 200 zombiemen, imps and shotgunners, with a bit less than 100 mid-tiers and chaingunners completing the enemy roster. Two main ambushes stand out from the mainly relaxing combat: a surprisingly dangerous small group of revenants at the red key, greatly helped by the slightly awkward geometry of the room (it is however perfectly possible to retreat), and of course "the" big trap at the blue key, where a horde of archviles will like to resurrect everything you mowed down previously. But don't worry, there will be enough ammo to mow down everything again. I got stuck once at the blue key because it's possible to grab it from below before opening the northern part of the map (with the plasma rifle). This way, you could simply skip the AV ambush, but it didn't feel right, so I continued to search the area until I found that small switch ... The map was much bigger than everything I played in Cydonia, but even if we take into acount my wandering around at the BK, at least the techbase part was over relatively fast. I think the cavern part was a nice addition but at the end it started to drag, with another (very telegraphed) AV ambush.

 

A fun map - it reminded me a bit of the monster placement of Gene Bird in Community Chest (which is better than most think, Bird's weak point are the visuals; in Arrival in contrast we have a nice interesting concept with stock textures combined with an alternative color palette). I liked also that the wad starts without a stereotypical MAP01.

 

Rating: 7,5/10
Difficulty: 4/10

 

MAP02: Saltstone Sanctuary

 

We continue outdoors in a gorge surrounded by some small indoor sections which seem to have built inside of caves, a really nice setting. It is again a fun romp from start to end, with a rocket laucher handed out at the beginning, and it was fun to make the cacos infight with spiders, imps and mancs. The map makes you think momentaneously that it's nonlinear, as a big part of it is open, and it has also several optional areas (not marked as secrets) with lots of goodies, up to a megasphere. But the key sequence is strictly linear: yellow - red - blue. I actually found the area with the SSG last, so I shotgunned and chaingunned down several revenants when my rockets ran out. The map is substantially easier than MAP01. There are some significant fights, like a small revenant army, an archvile trio, and then another indoor archvile duo, but due to much space and cover they mostly are not so threatening, although I had some "good at doom" moments and thus also some deaths. Many of the encounters also could in theory be cheesed jumping or falling back into the gorge, which kills the fun a bit so I tried to avoid it. I liked this map a tiny bit more than MAP01, mostly due to the cool layout and visual concept.

 

Rating: 8/10
Difficulty: 3/10

(prboom+, UV, pistol start, sometimes with saves between fights. Difficulty scale roughly: 1-2 - easier than all of Plutonia, 3 - Congo, 5 - Genesis, 7 - Abattoire, 8 - Twilight/Go 2 It, 9-10 - harder than Plutonia.)

Edited September 23, 2022 by erzboesewicht

[Book Lord]

MAP 03 – Water Putrefier

DSDA-Doom v0.24.3, UV, Continuous, blind run w/saves

 

The Day 1 of Arrival ended with a large and labyrinthine tech-base, curiously serving as a Water Putrefier. Whoever conceived this facility, assuming for the sake of argument that it was not @Pavera, surely wanted the crew to stay fit and take long walks all day long. Getting from point A to point B required unbelievably long treks, traversing paths and rooms exposed to enemy crossfire and some teleport ambushes. Thankfully, the gameplay proposed in the crucial parts of the level was entertaining, and it compensated for the long time spent walking through infinite hallways and mowing down large groups of fodder.

Spoiler

From the start, there were several directions to take. On the first play, one might be tempted to clear the annoying Commandos beyond the river, and his likely destiny will be triggering a whole lot of enemies before even reaching the rocket launcher, which might be necessary to take down the Arch-Vile & Co. The exploration of the northern area revealed the exit behind the blue door, the only secret with a Combat Armour, a trapped plasma rifle, and halted in a dead end with a useful Computer Area Map. Crossing the bridge to the eastern section was the only way to progress, and after a never-ending series of stairs, ledges, and corridors, it brought me to the YK basin.

Spoiler

That tall staircase was one of the strangest props I have ever seen in a non-corrupted tech-base. Picking up the key caused the structure to partially sink, and fresh water turned into filthy sludge. Getting out of the trap demanded a fight with a trio of Arch-Viles, but it was not clear what to do with the key. I dropped down a one-way hole that I ignored before, and I finally found the yellow door after ignoring the numerous invitations to return to the other side of the bridge. I raised the bars and continued to follow the river, defeating a group of Pinkies with an Arch-Vile in the middle, and passing through a crusher, another fantasy rendition of a Water Putrefier device. There was a shiny BFG on sight, but the procedure to obtain it remained a mystery, unveiled later by Doom Builder.

Spoiler

The following section was a crowded staircase wrapping around a lava pool with the RK. I usually prefer lower monster counts and in a position where they pose a real threat, but the final Revenant ambush was ok. On the other hand, I could not understand the teleport shortcut behind the red door. It sent me to the YK room I must have visited to get this far and forced me to backtrack through empty areas. The BK fight with the Spider Mastermind killed me once, as I reacted by pressing on and ended up riddled with bullets and trapped by Revenants in front of a switch. Knowing what was in store, I retreated to the stuck door and repelled the assailants with some plasma. Pavera got my skin there, so kudos on this ambush setup. As for MAP03, it was a nice tech-base to lose yourself into, but certain parts were long for the sake of being long and could benefit from some trimming. I expressed the same criticism on MAP01, so I can only iterate my hope that Day 2 will change the routine.

[FistMarine]

Hello everyone! Due to my hard disk dying at the beginning of the month (and not managing to recover my data just yet, still trying to find someone who can recover my data! this applies to what I had on my PC, as what I had saved on USB stick and laptop, such as IWADS, are fine, no worries!), I didn't feel like participating for a while and I also missed the previous month's event, due to being busy with other wads. So, I eventually decided to give this month a go, finishing Cydonia a couple of days ago.

 

I mostly heard of Arrival which was released last year and became an official addon a couple months ago, while I only heard of Cydonia during last year's Cacowards, so it seems like an interesting Plutonia-inspired mapset. I haven't played Plutonia in about a decade (funnily enough, I still have two PLUTONIA folders installed on my laptop since two years ago, one is the initial release from June 1996 and the other is the updated id anthology version from November 1996) but I should still be familiar with the style, traps, etc.

 

Played with PrBoom+ 2.6.2 (UMAPINFO fork), UV skill, continuous, 100% everything with frequent saves. In case of Cydonia, I obviously used PLUTONIA.WAD as the IWAD and Complevel 4 (Final Doom). The only weird thing I noticed is that the first demo (from MAP17) desyncs halfway but the second and third work fine.

 

I will not talk too much about the levels themselves, to not repeat what others said. I will say for now that I like the new green skin for the Chaingunners, giving them a Plutonia-like look (heh). I wouldn't have minded if the Revenants were also colored to green (as in wearing green pants instead of red). Oh and the new music is also very nice! Now for the maps (I copied their names directly from Doomwiki):

Spoiler

MAP01: Quetzalcoatl
A nice opener. It is similar to the original Plutonia MAP01 and not too difficult overall (though a bit tricky at times). While I didn't die (thankfully), I did suffer massive damage twice. One early on when a revenant sneaked behind me and hit me with a 60 dmg missile. And later on I somehow fired a rocket in the corner of those planks (when I was trying to snipe mancubi far away), leaving me with very low health.

I am happy that at that point I found the green armor (the only armor present in the map) and had nearly 100% health before doing that or else I wouldn't have survived. Thankfully after that, I didn't take any more damage and I had to look up for medkits around the map. After a while, things started better. Traps were mostly easy to find and secrets are also easy to find. Two of them contain Rocket Launcher and rockets (be careful with the archvile in the room with crates!) and another is a temporary lowered window (where a revenant was standing earlier, which contains a BACKPACK and MEDKIT!), the latter is accessed with hitting the blue switch in the next room and going back quickly. Other than that, not much to say compared to what has been said.

 

MAP02: Amazon
Another nice, short map. The fights are once again relatively straightforward. You might want to visit the pit at the beginning to get the SSG and Blue Armor (be careful with the two revenants and two mancubi!) because after you get past the red door, there is NO WAY BACK! I was inspired enough to check that pit first before leaving this room. Having the blue armor also paid off because I took quite a bit of damage at times but the last couple of enemies didn't pose that much of a problem if you were careful in handling them (like the Hell Knights that appeared from ground and the second archvile in the exit room).

There is a soulsphere secret in this last part, you go behind the door where you fought a revenant and pressed a big switch. Go behind the switch (this sector counts as the secret!), then it lowers the pillar that had the soulsphere. You should have 200% health (and whatever blue armor you have left, in my case 159%) for the next level (assuming continuous). Looking forward to the next map!

 

MAP03: Ritual
Interesting map, though somewhat flawed. Mostly that damaging pit that took a while to figure out how to get from it because one lift wouldn't activated but thankfully I found the other lift in time before it was too late.

Unfortunately, while I avoided most of the monsters/traps just fine, I did lose quite a bit of health/armor from the surprise ambush behind the blue door and I actually died once in the room with the backpack where the two mancubi teleported in my face. Even though I had around 120 health and 80 armor, I took a bunch of fireballs to the face until my last 5% health when I escaped...only to get killed by the fucking fireballs that passed through the walls! Yeah, I had massive bad luck here and I can say this trap got me really good. Load game and try again, this time I was prepared and knew in advance. While I couldn't save 200% health for next level (due to having to cross the damaging pit), I am ok because 186% health coupled with 200% armor is more than enough. Oh yeah and that blue armor secret took a bit to find, I had to consult the Doomwiki to find it because I didn't think to press on that different looking wall. Which also contained the revenant (last enemy in the map!).

Despite the unfortunate events, the map was still fine overall. Such a shame that all it takes is getting careless in two rooms in order to lose all that health and armor (a bit similar to how I took lots of damage in first map, partially because of my own mistakes), despite avoiding damage from the majority of the monsters in the map. Oh well, hope that I get luckier in next map and make up for that stupid early death. :P

 

MAP04: Carcinogen
Not bad! I handled the map fine, even difficult encounters like fighting two archviles at the same time (yellow key trap). Feels good to not take damage during difficult times. I didn't take much damage in this map, despite the more open ended nature, being careful at all times paid off, especially when coupled with quick decision and knowing when to use the Plasma gun for example (due to limited amount of cells, best to use them against archviles and certain traps).

The only thing I find weird is that I feel like the yellow keycard could have been a yellow skull key (since you need it and the blue skull key to access the red key! red key could have also been switched for red skull key but that's just me). Just to have a bit of consistency, though I imagine it's due to even the original Plutonia having a few inconsistencies, like some acid floors not being damaging but instead the water and mud are damaging...

Which reminds me, I forgot to mention there are situations where you need to cross some damaging floors but you wouldn't know in advance which ones are safe and which aren't until you try. :P

Getting the soulsphere secret had me thinking for a while until I realized you need to simply run into that window and that's it. Oh and there's some more clever ambushes after the last door, though thankfully I had the plasma selected. There may be teleporting revenants behind me but I never got caught by surprise. These traps are easy to predict by being careful at all times, so you don't get caught by surprise (though it's impossible to predict every trap, you can still avoid a lot of damage by just taking it slowly and not rushing it blindly). The map was nice overall. Let's see how the next map compares.

 

MAP05: Hopeless
While the map was fine in general (it's also the first map with more than just 50 or so enemies, in fact it contains exactly 100 enemies!), it has a few things that I want to mention, even if they may have been mentioned.

First, I want to point that later in the map, there is no backtracking. I didn't grab the soulsphere (which turned out to be TWO in same place!) early on because I had around 180 health and armor. I didn't know the map was generous with soulspheres because there are FOUR of them (and one green armor). I assumed that I can leave it for later because I certainly don't need it right now. Unfortunately, after a certain point, you can't return to this map, so no 100% items. You can get all kills and then look for the two secrets (a shootable switch that unlocks a room containing Plasma + Cells, as well as a Soulsphere behind the waterfall near the place where you find another soulsphere!). Sure it still counts as UV-Max but I gotta have true 100% completion. The only time I don't get 100% everything is if a monster/item/secret is bugged, then I don't bother with getting it. But in this case, I don't know, it left me disappointed. I went ahead and replayed the map (and made sure to grab the soulspheres early on) but this time I loaded the save at two points (when hit by a surprise chaingunner that did a bit of damage and one unexpected blast from an archvile even when behind cover), to undo some damage I took because I still had 160% armor when I beat the map first time, so I figured I might want to conserve the blue armor for the next level. I ended up with 184% armor the second run through the map, so I guess it worked out better. Though this time I was familiar with the map and was able to breeze through it faster.

Which reminds me, the health distribution is just weird in this map. The only health source comes in form of the four soulspheres that are placed in two locations and in both cases, they are near each other. This is a strange design choice, I would have preferred if maybe the soulspheres were placed all apart from each other, though again I played continuously, so starting the level with 200 h/a made the map much easier but on a pistol start I imagine it will be quite tricky.
And as pointed out by pretty much everyone, the exit room when you step, the water lowers into the sky. Intended or not? Find out soon! Also, I really liked the song in this level. It was very moody.

 

MAP06: Viper
This map is shown in the second intro demo. It is another interesting map and quite action packed at times! It is recommended to find the secret soulsphere early on (though I got it at end along with the other secret that I will mention later, as I still had 124% health by the time I finished the map) because it will greatly help when you have no armor (mostly for pistol starters) until you get it. You will need to get past the trickiest part of the map (after the teleporter) where you've got ambushes in form of chaingunners around you. It caught me and reduced me to around 120% health and armor while I was trying to get closer to fire rockets to the revs and mancubi at far away because the autoaim wouldn't work at such distance. Then quickly after I realized, I rushed to the teleporter, sniping chaingunners, then carefully taking everything out, then proceeding. This next part has a few interesting ambushes as well, when you get the red skull key. You need to act fast, which is where the Plasma Rifle comes handy. Then there's a few more ambushes at the end and that's it! The easy part of Cydonia is now done!

If you are wondering about the second secret, it's in the big room with the chaingunners ambush. You need to climb on those rocks, where you see that different looking wall. Then get near it, press the revealed switch and it will unlock the MEGASPHERE secret! Pistol starters may want to grab this item early but Continuous players want to grab it at the end of the level, to save it for the next map! A great "finale" to this part of Cydonia!

Oh and the wiki mentions a Spider Mastermind somewhere in the map but there is no Spider Mastermind in this map at all? Unless there was meant to be one in middle of that arena and got replaced by those chaingunners on ledges? Or maybe there is one in coop mode? Doomwiki mentions there's one (as well as two cybers) in coop mode, so maybe that's why the wiki mentions that. Anyway, moving on to next map...

 

MAP07: Fraughtification
This map starts you under attack, so be quick in grabbing the stuff you need and fight back against the odds while paying attention at the nearby Cyberdemon! Don't worry, you get to telefrag him later and hope you saved the megasphere from the previous level (if playing continuous) as it will prove VERY USEFUL! Sometimes I had to tank damage from mancubus fireballs and even revenant fireballs (when taking cover from an archvile attack) but in latter case they did low damage, thankfully. Sometimes I have a habit to tank damage from other enemies while taking cover from archvile and hope they don't do much damage. Otherwise I don't see what else you can do in this situation. :P

Before dropping to the last pit (point of no return), you might want to grab the stuff like the soulsphere and the blue armor secret. The secret can be gotten by touching the starting sector and running to a nearby teleporter (wall marked by blood splats), then you will teleport to the sector that contains the blue armor.
At the final part, you just need to be wary of the four chaingunners that teleport and that's it, the level is done! Overall, this is an interesting level that marks the beginning of the second part of Cydonia, so be prepared at what awaits next!

 

MAP08: Aggrandizement
Another interesting level that focuses a lot more on verticality this time around, this map has a couple challenging parts but I mostly found myself taking damage from having to cross the damaging floors, even if they only do 5% damage, that damage did add up over time. As such, the blue armor didn't make it into the next level (since this level lacks one) but thankfully it was a great help during the level (the last revenant did an 80 dmg homing missile in a narrow corridor!), so the soulsphere secret and a fresh green armor helped to keep company for the next map! ;)

The only thing I don't understand is what that switch did that I shot from far away. I explored at the end to find the three secrets (with help of Doomwiki) and found a switch that I shot from the opposite side but no idea if it opened one of the secrets or an Easter Egg or something? Anyway, if this map wasn't very difficult, then the next one surely is!

 

MAP09: Neurotoxin
Oh boy. Things started to heat up a bit. Though thankfully I managed to survive all these traps but this map was quite a tricky one, not gonna lie. Even the two soulspheres got exhausted and there is another point of no return later on. Before that, it's important to note that the chaingunners at the beginning can't be killed (at least not all of them) since some get resurrected by hidden archviles (a dirty Plutonia trick!) but later on they probably get killed by a crusher or something, allowing you to kill the chaingunners for real. The traps are definitely trickier at times and the RNG early on wasn't favorable, not to mention after I took the elevator, I missed an early area and I immediately went to acid, then took on the next areas. The green armor was a great help because it was all used by the time I found another one and then had a few close calls like when an archie teleported (I didn't even get to grab the key and got ambushed while fighting a hell knight) at the blue skull key trap, although I got to hide three times behind the pillars before the last attack finally hit me but it sure was tricky to deal with when trying to pay attention to a leftover cacodemon or revenant or whatever was behind me, while also making sure to take cover from the chaingunners. Thankfully I survived all that with 15% health and was desperate to find some health/medkits/stimpacks, which came very handy at this time.

The other points of interest include that area that had the shotgun and a radiation suit (that I failed to explore earlier) alongside a couple enemies, a secret area containing a plasma with cells, grabbing the second green armor even though I still had my previous 60% green armor (since there is no way back) and then preparing before dropping down.

What awaits in the final area will be some more tricky fights. Two archviles guarding a soulsphere and then on two other sides, you've got revenants and cacodemons! Good luck! I barely survived this one and the soulsphere was great to save myself from death, then the four stimpacks to refill my health back to 100%.

 

MAP10: Siege
This map is shown in the third demo. At the beginning, you have to choose between Rocket Launcher and Plasma Rifle. The answer is already obvious what you need to choose. Not to mention I already had 100 rockets and the Plasma cells are very scarce, so I would take any day the Plasma over RL on a pistol start. Plus the fact Plasma is safer to use at close range, though there are times the RL also truly shines.

This map has all kinds of traps, ranging from surprise archviles teleporting (as well as chaingunners and revenants), to a Cyberdemon battle (he was great help to get infight with some other enemies, though a pesky revenant managed to get two good homing rockets on me while taking cover from Cyber's rockets)

The secrets are easy to find for the most part, as the three pillars (soulsphere, blue armor, backpack) are the secrets in this map and they are visible in front of you. To lower them, one requires pressing on the wooden plank, another requires finding a secret teleporter (in a room where to get ambushed by various monsters) and another lowers when lowering the lift. They are all great rewards and highly recommended! The blue armor is the only armor in the map, so continuous players who still have around 30% armor from the previous map, decide between grabbing it early on waiting a bit longer before grabbing. It wasn't an easy choice to make but eventually I grabbed it because without armor, it's too risky to get exposed to enemy fire. Especially those chaingunners on pillars that require the player to get closer to hit them but at same time one or more chaingunners will fire at the player and can deal considerable damage. Thankfully the medkits seem to be plentiful and it is possible to backtrack in the whole map. Most of the extra health and a third of the blue armor still survived for the next map, at least.

 

MAP11: Volcanic
Thankfully it's not an Archvile maze inspired map. Instead, it's a typical Plutonia inspired map, including a Cyberdemon encounter to boot (near end of map). While the map wasn't as difficult as some of the previous maps, I had two deaths which I will explain shortly. First one was caused by my stupidity to assume that the door leads to an earlier part of the map where the armor was present on the bridge (I had 85% health and no armor left at that point), instead I ended up running into a room that contained a revenant and an archvile (the blue key room). Needless to say, it didn't end up well.

The second death was caused by the cramped Cyber fight. I was able to make the Cyber infight with the barons (though one of them was still going after me, after an accidental SSG shot before quickly realizing to make them infight) but then I got stuck in the back of the room with supplies by a baron fighting with the Cyber and his rocket splash damage took us both out. Next time, I survived barely. The splash damage isn't a joke in this cramped room. You need to be very careful here to not eat a rocket!

At least the other traps (like the red key trap) aren't difficult to deal with and I managed to save the soulsphere for the next map, so I have something extra to start with, besides the 30% armor. And for the secret, the backpack secret in lava (in the last area) is easy to find. Definitely a great end to the first episode of Cydonia (the second part overall) and I am looking forward to the next episode!

 

MAP12: Venomous
Interesting start of the "episode", this map has a couple nasty traps but also it is filled with toxic acid. You are given two radiation suits to explore and find two of the secrets, which will prove to be very useful. The invulnerability secret is guarded by an archvile and a bunch of revenants. I went to hide from the blast but mistimed it and got blasted while running to the invulnerability (since the revenants started to surround me) and I didn't get much usage of the invulnerability, unfortunately. Though at least the traps weren't too bad to deal with, in general. Some traps can be avoided by running when approaching some areas or hitting a switch. The starting area can be easily cleared on a continuous run with the rocket launcher.

The only annoying thing is "avoiding" the armor pickups when near the entrance of those hallways. There is one green armor and one blue armor, both placed in such a way that may be accidentally picked up and sometimes you might run into them when running from traps. I had to reload the game when accidentally picked up the blue armor early on, though I didn't mind grabbing a new green armor early on when I only had 39% armor remaining from the previous map.
Definitely a solid map.

 

MAP13: Chimera
This was quite a brutal map, since the enemies often attacked from multiple sides and there were some vicious traps too, like grabbing the BFG that unleashes a few nasties. Though there were a few traps that didn't pose too much of a threat (such as the Plasma one).

I died three times (one of them was a gib death!) and all came from the Cyberdemon, as you may have expected (I knew something bad was going to happen when I looked at those dead marines on the floor). Even when it was obvious what I had to do, I'm not that good at handling a cyber in close quarters (though sometimes I seem to handle them just fine) and even when the Cyber got stuck between two barons and hoping he would die, he somehow retaliated and squashed those barons, then surprise killed me with a rocket I couldn't dodge. The other two barons from far away I couldn't get them infight, so I took out the Cyber myself and then the barons. Then after this part, the rest of the map wasn't too bad. It was certainly an interesting challenging map and looking forward to the next one!

 

MAP14: Deadlock
An interesting map that I found easier than the previous one, although it had a few tricks up its sleeve. After you get past the starting area where monsters are carefully positioned (on a continuous run, you can just pick them off one by one by just sniping with chaingun or a combination of SSG/rockets), you should have an easier time with this map. Most traps can be avoided by being careful, saving you precious health/armor for later fights. The last part demands fast reflexes, since you must use the radiation suit to cross the acid safely. You have only two suits, so use them wisely! I was lucky to spot the spectres lurking in the acid, so I didn't fall for this rocket trick, I just quickly switched to the SSG and blasted them, then fired 1-2 rockets at those chaingunners on ledges. The next ambush was quickly cleared with Plasma/BFG.

As soon as you reach the last platform, look out for a few more ambushes (revs and archies) and after that, the map is complete! I also appreciate being offered to backtrack and grab the blue armor (from first secret), though due to using both suits, I had to cross the acid unprotected and I saved 190% armor at least. The soulsphere (second secret) is found right at the end by shooting at the wall (this probably happened when killing those chaingunners behind torches). They will be very useful for the next map! Another solid map.

 

MAP15: Hatchet
Another interesting and challenging level, this one has some nasty ambushes that almost killed me at times (I mostly refer to the one where you grab the rocket launcher). Though I found more annoying having to cross the toxic blood, I swear most of the time I crossed it, it damaged me, even during one particular ambush that almost got me, though the nearby green armor saved the day when I was without any armor left. Yes I know there is also a blue armor at the start of the map but that one gets saved for the end, not to mention there's two soulspheres present, one which gets used during the map and one saved for later. You can guess why I am saving one soulsphere and blue armor for the end. :P

The beginning chaotic parts I found easy to deal by running from one side to another while using SSG/Rockets, this way I avoided most damage. The Cyberdemon was a bit tricky to handle (I got him to infight with a couple enemies while going back to the previous area and thinking how to handle this) and since I had no other way to kill him due to being outside my range, I decided to Plasma him while dodging rockets on the middle platform, the autoaim was able to work at this range and ended up being victorious. To get the secret exit, you need all 3 skull keys. That's all the information I can offer at this point. Doomwiki as always proved very reliable in finding secrets and stuff. But will it be worth the effort to get to the secret level(s)? Let's find out!

 

MAP31: Night Terrors
I didn't enjoy this one to be honest. I didn't expect to play a puzzle map in a Plutonia-inspired mapset. I had my first three deaths by just falling off the platform and ended up in an inescapable pit because I had trouble stepping on the platforms or simply sliding off and falling. I then realized the first secret is to the left of the starting area (behind a fake wall) and the other secret requires an AV jump, which I realized after I killed the archie. Oh wait, you first need to AV jump to reach the switch and THEN another AV jump (using same archie) for reaching a secret with berserk pack. Then you are safe to kill this archie and advance the map. You have the possibility of leaving the map if you screw up, which sends you to MAP16.

On the second half, you have to trick the archviles, one into getting trapped and another into getting teleported. They are the key to reach the secret exit. The other monsters you have to take care of, including resurrected ones. I had to watch those videos a few times to understand the exact procedure here.
Later, you need to do a rocket "jump" which turned out problematic at only 60% health (though still had some green armor left). Either I would dodge too early (fall into pit), dodge too late (die from explosion) or eventually, surviving with 15% health and making it to the blue key. Then eventually opened the blue key, killed a few monsters, grab the megasphere and prepare for another headache-inducing part!

 

You need to do more archvile jumps! While you can probably time it right, you need to be quick on this part to collect all the health bonuses before getting blasted again (a quicksave turned out to be handy but risky in this situation, as there would be times I missed one bonus or got them and also thrown in a different direction), eventually making it to the next platform on third try or so. Grab the health bonuses, kill the cacos and the one pain elemental (this took two attempts because first time they spread too much and it was too late from taking too much damage that I wouldn't survive the next blast), kill the revenant that teleported on previous platform and the archvile from far away with rockets. Save and prepare for next part. Press the switch and prepare for the last AV jump.

 

You will get sent to the final room. The zombieman can be killed if you want but then the third/last archvile will teleport here, so be quick. This took two attempts as the archvile got too close (so I had to switch weapons to avoid rocketing myself but wasn't fast enough to react), got blasted outside this place, thrown into pit and died. Second try, survived and luckily two medkits were offered to get back to full health. It was a very painful map overall and probably costed me about 13 deaths in total. I'm glad to see I'm not the only one who dislikes this map (and also not the only one who uses "fuck" and "shit" in some saved games when angry), at least. Let's hope the next map is better.

 

MAP32: Get On It
Now that's more like it! A proper "slaughter" type map that is similar to PLUTONIA MAP32: Go 2 It. Most people should be right at home with this map and while it has a few nasty ambushes, the map isn't that difficult. I admit I died once (after I cleared the pinky horde at beginning, the two spiders and a few more enemies) because I rushed to grab BFG and it caused many enemies to spawn, I started running from one side to another but keep getting surrounded and hit hard multiple times, I ended up barely surviving with 9% health and armor but then ran into toxic blood and died (lol).

However, I can safely say that it was the only death in this map, as going back to my careful approaching of the map ended up being the right way to complete this map. It looks like it's another one of those maps that can be completed without much trouble if you take it easily.

Aside from the THREE Spider Masterminds, you get to fight TEN Cyberdemons as well! Though in most cases it's usually one cyber in an area, rarely you get to fight two or more at once (you will know what I mean when I get to that last part in a short time). The generous amounts of supplies means that you shouldn't really struggle with the health, armor and ammo. As such, there are SEVEN megaspheres and copious amounts of ammo packs for you! And if you know how to handle the encounters, you should be good! Though note that the lack of separate armor pickups means that you need to grab a megasphere to also get a blue armor!

Because of the generous amount of supplies, this map should turn out much easier. Just because it has 10 cyberdemons, doesn't mean it's impossible! The lone cyberdemons can be killed with just Plasma, since most of them are stationary. Sometimes with SSG as well if you are patient, I mean the roaming ones at least, since spraying Plasma won't always hit them, compared to stationary ones. The ones at end you should kill with the BFG, you will see why below.

You need to collect the three skull keys to reach the exit. And because I am a resourceful player, I ended up with FIVE spare Megaspheres by the time I reached the last room! At this point, looking at the automap, there were still about 30 monsters remaining. Seeing the megasphere at the end of the last room, made me think what was going to happen next. I ended up backtracking to collect a spare megasphere just to be on the safe side instead of going with the 111% health and armor I had at that point.

Now comes the fun part. The door locks behind you and it unleashes many barons and also 4 (or 5?) cybers! The solution is obvious but the barons won't last long, so better prepare the BFG and dodge all those rockets! I was lucky I had around 80% health and armor left by the time I killed the last Cybie (which also made the door open again, possibly perfect timing) and made me very happy to have handled such a fight in one go! At that point I grabbed the megasphere, ammo and backtracking to grab the leftover megaspheres just to have 100% everything. I am surprised I ended up in such a good state, considering that certain slaughtermaps (talking in general, from various slaughtermaps I played up to this day) aren't generous with resources even when they give you supplies to survive, you feel like you wish there were more supplies (health/armor/ammo). But this one (Cydonia MAP32) was perfectly balanced. And the bullets that I spent earlier to snipe lost souls spawned by pain elementals, were replenished from dead chaingunners (some resurrected by an archvile), so I ended up the map with everything at maximum, which is something I've been waiting for since some time!

Overall, this was definitely a GREAT map! Slaughtermaps can be great as long as they give you the tools you need, sometimes even more than you need! And luckily, this map falls into the good slaughter territory! Challenging and fun! :)

 

MAP16: Sasquatch
Another interesting map focusing on verticality at times (much like MAP08), this one isn't as difficult as some previous maps (not talking about the secret levels), even the traps didn't pose that much of a threat. Though as is the case with many maps so far, a sneaky unavoidable homing revenant missile manages to hit me for high damage, probably to compensate for the fact I rarely take damage.

I don't have much to say about this one, it was fine overall. Though I also asked myself the exact way to get that backpack secret, I just ended up strafing (or just running without strafing?) into it which took a few attempts to reach as I would just fall down otherwise. The other secrets weren't too difficult to find but I think I ended up with the two blue armors unused (one was surrounded by slime if I'm not mistaken) because the one from the previous map still lasted until the end of the map and the megasphere secret already took care of both maximum health and armor, which was interesting that some maps contain multiple powerups in them.

Also the comparison noted earlier with D2TWID MAP28 is interesting because I had that map in mind when playing this one, as I also beat D2TWID a few months ago (Chocolate Doom 3.0.1 for the 32 main maps, PrBoom+ 2.5.1.4 for the bonus MAP33) and I still remembered a couple of its maps. Too bad I missed the DWMC's D2TWID event many years ago, so I won't be able to share my feelings about that one, which is why I'm hoping from now on to participate into each event. ;)

Anyway, looking forward to the next map!

 

MAP17: The Cesspools
This map is shown in the first demo, which desyncs halfway for some reason, as I specified in the opening post. The map itself isn't that difficult, as the ambushes didn't turn out to be that bad, on a continuous run at least. Some parts were a bit tricky but thankfully the map is generous with the supplies too. You get two soulspheres (one secret) and a blue armor, which turned out to reveal the 10 chaingunners upon approaching the armor.

The Cyber can be easily killed with Plasma from a safe place, giving you a relaxing time to focus on the other enemies for the rest of the map. By the time I cleared the last area, I was looking for the last 10 enemies, expecting maybe another ambush at the end, instead turning to be those 10 chaingunners revealed from the blue armor. I was relived because they didn't turn out too bad. But yeah with the extra soulsphere and blue armor I got back to 200% both, without them I would still have around 130% (before grabbing the secret soulsphere to prepare for those last 10 enemies, just in case), meaning the map turned out much easier than I expected. Maybe I should have pistol started most of these maps. :P

 

The map was fine overall and now on to the next map.

 

MAP18: Backlash
Another interesting and tricky map. The ambushes early on aren't that bad but what follows later can end you quickly if not prepared. The ones earlier can be tricked, by just running before the door closes. But later ones require you to be quick or else you suffer massive damage (or even die). I will try to explain some highlights of this map.

When you clear that first real ambush, you are given two radsuits (and one soulsphere secret nearby, can be saved for later if you want) which should be used wisely, as the acid does 10 damage. You will need them for the next couple rooms, so don't grab them both right now! Grab one and go the acid path in front of you to eventually grab the yellow skull key (you will get ambushed by a few chaingunners), then you must return to this point and go the other acid path to open yellow skull key. If at this point your radiation suit runs out, you need to grab the other one and be quick! You will notice a megasphere and other stuff around. This is a sign of what's about to happen. This trap is tricky to deal with and must be dealt quickly because once the suit runs out, you will have to endure acid damage and if you didn't kill the monsters quickly, well then hope you had saved before the battle!

Once you clear this part, you need to get to the next room with Mancubi and Arachnotrons. Most likely your radiation suit has run out, so be quick in killing the monsters in this room, find a safe spot and think about what's going to happen next. You will notice another radiation suit that's accessed by a secret. For now concentrate on another ambush, return to the beginning, kill two more archviles and save. Open the blue door and look at the soulsphere and blue armor you are offered in front of the teleporter (well not really in front, so you can grab them later if you feel confident you have enough health and armor to survive the last room). I went to grab the soulsphere secret from earlier and kept my current 100+ blue armor for this. Turns out I did the right thing because I managed to survive the last room with 90% health left (very nice). It's hard to explain what's going on in that room, you should try to prioritize targets and take cover, while not falling into pit. Then kill the last two archviles and that's it, the level is complete! You can backtrack to collect some goodies earlier if you want or a potential missed secret, etc.

Definitely an interesting map, even if I dislike the high amount of damaging floors, the map was thankfully generous with providing the minimum two radiation suits (and the third secret one), so I never got caught in a bad spot and even if I had to endure some acid damage, there was plenty of health and armor pickups to make it through. Then again, starting the map with 200 h/a also helped a lot.

 

MAP19: Purgatory
Another interesting map with some deadly ambushes. Most won't cause any trouble but I admit I died once (somewhat unexpected) to the yellow skull key ambush. Although initially I did fine and didn't take as much damage as I could have taken upon clearing the main room, when I opened one door to unleash an archvile and some other demons, didn't expect to get ambushed by chaingunners behind. I had 30% health left, pulled my BFG and hide in that room, then as soon as I launch my second BFG blast to clear the remaining hell knight and chaingunner, the chaingunner takes me out in same moment the BFG blast takes him out. That was just disappointing and wish I had saved the invulnerability secret for this room, as the health/armor I lost earlier would have been saved for later rooms. No I didn't want to grab that blue armor in the room, considering I rather save it for the end. There were two other green armors that were great use when the current armor ran out.

At least the invulnerability got a bit of use on the blue key switch trap and the exit trap with an archvile and two revenants but that's pretty much it.
I could have also saved the invulnerability for the red skull key room but then I realized I handled the ambush just fine since I only lost like 30% health overall. I think pressing the switch earlier helped a lot because I read about the barrels detonating upon teleporting to the red key ledge. And speaking of the barrels, they helped a bit in taking out a few nearby monsters. Quite creative setup, I must say.

There was another trap that almost killed me at one point (after the floor lowers and more dangerous monsters get unleashed, not the initial batch of weak enemies) because of stupidly picking up the green armor by ACCIDENT when my current blue armor was just below 100% and it almost got me killed, since the screen turned red from taking so much damage continuously that I couldn't tell wtf was going on until I somehow escaped/retreated with my last 15% health (and 3% armor), grab two medkits, kill the last hell knight and revenant. I was annoyed at the accidental green armor pickup as it almost got me killed (on top of wasting this armor pickup as well) and this is exactly why I don't grab green armor if I still wear a blue one UNLESS it is low enough (example less than 30%) or I am at the end of a level and if no blue armors are left, then I can grab a green one if my blue one is below 100%. But other than that, AVOID PICKING UP GREEN ARMOR WHEN YOU STILL HAVE PLENTY OF BLUE ARMOR LEFT! Or else you will suffer as I did!

Sorry, had to say it loud, so other players also understand the effectiveness of the armor pickups (although I assume everyone understands how Doom armor system works anyway), since green is obviously better than nothing but shouldn't take priority over a blue one in still decent condition! So yeah after that ambush, had to look up another armor pickup (green), though it didn't get much use, so at the end of the level I grabbed the earlier blue armor, as well as a soulsphere (there's actually 3 present in the map!).

Not much else to say, other than one disappointing death and almost suffering a second death due to accidental green armor grab, the ambushes were pretty interesting overall and the secrets were found with the help of automap (since the secret sectors are already parked with pink on PrBoom+, even when you didn't find them) as well as Doomwiki.
Now for the final map!

 

MAP20: Reaper
A challenging finale that never stops messing around! You've got various foes to eliminate, including a surprise Cyberdemon that I didn't spot initially but dodged his rockets in time until I turned around and saw those projectiles flying were rockets.

I don't want to spoil too much other than things were quite chaotic at one time and there is also a Spider Mastermind you have to defeat in the last room and another ambush (somewhat unexpected) right at the end that actually got me once (I mostly refer to those chaingunners on ledges) that led to another unexpected death, which makes my total death count for this mapset equal to the amount of maps it contains (on average, this would mean one death for each map). I hadn't figured how to get that secret megasphere at that point, so I ended up working with what I had, even if I decided to grab another medkit to have 100% health at least, those chaingunners from far away still managed to get me with their nearly perfect accuracy, though on second time I was surprised to find that pressing a switch also spawns a revenant and an archvile. And after clearing all that, I went for the both secrets I've missed, so I can complete the entire megawad 100% in every category! Very nice!

A great finale to a great megawad!

 

MAP21: Fin
The End.

Cydonia Total Deaths: 22 (MAP03, MAP11, MAP13, MAP31, MAP32, MAP19, MAP20)

 

Screenshots:

Spoiler

Overall Thoughts: Cydonia is definitely a great Plutonia inspired wad. I have read that people are considering it the real successor to Plutonia, though I would argue that Plutonia 2 and Plutonia Revisited (aka the real Plutonia 3, not the shitty joke wad Going to Surface) are also true successors to Plutonia, so I could say that Cydonia is Plutonia 4 (or maybe Plutonia 5, since Plutonia Revisited 2 got released a while ago). :P

Since I haven't played the original Plutonia Experiment in a decade or so (and don't remember playing its sequels at all, maybe only the first 10 maps of Plutonia 2 in GZDoom many years ago? Or maybe a couple random Plutonia 2 maps on Skulltag servers back in 2009-2010?), I didn't have anything in mind to compare the maps (besides the infamous MAP11 with the Arch-Vile maze and the infamous MAP32: Go 2 It), I was expecting the wad to be much harder. But somehow it turned out much easier, partially due to playing continuous and that helped me even the odds.

While I enjoyed most maps, the only map I really disliked was MAP31: Night Terrors. I know it was a puzzle inspired map and I really liked how ingenious were the puzzles but I didn't enjoy it at all in terms of gameplay. The inescapable pits and the effort required to 100% this map (I had to watch two UV-Max videos of this map on YouTube to understand it) were a bit too much for me and had to stop playing Cydonia for that day after having finished that map, leaving MAP32 (which I wanted to do immediately after MAP31) and the rest maps for the next day. I wonder if it's worth to suffer to reach MAP32: Get On It (one of the best maps in Cydonia) or choose the Give Up normal exit and go to MAP16 on a continuous playthrough? Either way, I'm happy to have played it and have properly finished the megawad 100% everything in a single playthrough, taking me around 8 hours and half in total game time (according to level 20 intermission).

Additionally, I felt that the puzzles presented in Night Terrors would have worked much better as some sort of separate map release of AV Jump or Rocket Jump or Jumpmaze type of map for Skulltag/Zandronum, due to those wads requiring jumping and those source ports having different jumping/air control physics where it's much easier to control the player compared to vanilla Doom physics where it is often difficult to time the AV jump correctly without falling off. I know that this is a weird reason to criticize the map but I imagine it would have been a lot more fun if it was made for a different port/game mode and released separately. The map was otherwise too out of place from a Plutonia-inspired mapset and it really doesn't go well with the vanilla Doom physics.

 

I will start playing Arrival soon (most likely next week), either in Eternity Engine 4.02.00 or still using PrBoom+ 2.6.2 UMAPINFO fork. I have never played Arrival before but I am still interested in checking it out and I am disappointed I don't actually have the Unity port since I only own the Doom games on physical media (id anthology CDs), so that means no unity port for me. Regardless of the port used, I hope to finish Arrival in time the next week, as judging by recent posts, the levels are pretty lengthy, so there is the possibility I may not finish Arrival in time, either posting for maps I will finish until next Friday or posting sometime in early October. Either way, I will look forward to what gets chosen for the next month!

 

Have a nice weekend everyone!

Edited September 23, 2022 by FistMarine

[RHhe82]

MAP03: Water Putrefier. DSDA v0.24, UV, PS. 290/290 K, 1/1 S, 305/309 I. Completion time 35:46.

 

I believe Water Putrefier is the longest map so far, but strangely it is also the easiest. After surviving the map start it's mostly just going through the motions. At one point I was actually thinking about Evilution, not in the most positive way. I guess it's not that exciting. After the aforemention map start, the hardest and the most exciting parts are the YK and RK ambushes. In the first one you are ambushed by three archviles, easily dispatched by rockets. The latter was the harder one for me, but it's still just a "plutonia" of revenants. I guess the the one good ambush would be the one you face when approaching the blue key, but I feel like the SMM is wasted there.

 

Don't get me wrong, Water Putrefier is a good map, but it has a distinct feel of filler after the first two maps.
 

[LadyMistDragon]

Map 18: Backlash

3 deaths

 

Hey, it's an oval-shaped area of slime! Sure looks like the Omen! Transparent similarities inside, this is probably harder than the last map. It also goes quite hard on the jungle texturing, to the point that we don't initially spot the chaingunners here until their bullets are chewing into our flesh. The Revenant pair just beyond go down easier for some reason. Also, there's a backpack secret hidden in a chaingunner closet I've no idea you can possibly find without an automap - like seriously! Coming out into the central room, you can find a plasma rifle to your left, but here is revealed a truly deadly trap! It's the sort of thing that made me dread the rocket launcher trap in Congo so much, but at least there's a plasma rifle here. On the downside, the higher proportions of rockets also mean more opportunities to get hit.

 

Down an open hallway lies an Arachnotron with a red key at the end, which is a rather strange place to say the least. The Arch-vile trap wasn't so strange, on the other hand. Due to my death in the next section, I ran over here before killing all the Arch-viles the second time around.

 

But anyway, press the little red door to lower a platform with the rocket launcher, open the other red door and head into a courtyard with a sacrifice on an altar of metal for some odd reason and a trio of Revenants, along with a scary amount of rockets. Press the switch here and Arachnotrons and Cacodemons appear on the ledge surrounding this place! But worst is the now-open ledge facing inward with the Chaingunners and Arch-vile, which caused the only death recorded here, I believe. There's certainly some room to hide but prioritizing here can be really tricky! Up on the ledge with enemies is an obvious secret sector with a Supercharge inside, as well as a couple of rad suits, one which you'll need to dive in the moat that has lowered.

 

At some point, we pick up the YK on a ledge we saw earlier near the red key door. After lowering the BFG, we're greeted with a truly nasty ambush of chaingunners and Arch-viles, more in line with what Plutonia's all about! And there might be Pain Elementals here too? Or was that near the blue key?

 

We then pick up the other rad suit (or we didn't, but that's what everyone else should do) head into the lowered moat, open the YK door, rocket some chaingunners in a tower, do the same to Arch-viles on each side of the bend, then likely find yourself running out of rad suit energy before you discover an obvious torch secret which allows you to access a rad suit on place here. It's nice and snug, but what isn't is the Revenant/Pinky ambush, somewhat easily handled with the BFG. At least the blue key is here. I remember thinking this was almost obligatory at first, before it became clear that we were headed back outside....

 

...to be confronted by chaigunners and Arch-viles once again! Not as bad as the Final Frontier-esque room behind the blue door though, an Arch-vile on each pillar, a pair of a Hell Knights and Mancubus firing from each nook, and that fucking chaingunner wall. Yeah, BFGing it might be a bit of a bad idea, but unfortunately, it's also extremly difficult to avoid, especially if you had literally zero rockets in your reserves like we do. There's more rockets here, of course, but that's a little bit besides the point, especially when an Arch-vile pair come in to put an end to your meddling.

 

It's funny. So there haven't been so many AD_79 maps so far, but things are stepping up so much that it almost doesn't matter. Even the cool little jungle music playing here isn't needed here necessarily, just as long as it isn't "Fire Hive" again, dear god. Still, it'll be a good thing to finally a get a map from someone else. The first half was arguably saved in large part by Brayden's contributions. Let's hope the next map isn't no hopeless. *ba dum tiss*

lmd_cydonia18.zip

[Soll]

Oh man, I was procrastinating hard this week playing Scythe, that MAP22 gave me a real beating (was hoping I can review this wad for the club but then I checked and it was already done 8 years ago, oh well). Got a lot of catching up to do so I suppose I'll have to write as I go along then.

 

MAP01: Waste Abandonment

Departing from the hellish jungles of Cydonia, we arrive in a techbase with heavy demonic presence. It's the first map, and the body count is already higher than that of any map in Cydonia. Despite the large population, this map is as spacious as a can of sardines. All personnel have been corrupted by the demons' influence, meaning you'll see many former humans in this map. If TNT's "Sadistic" was playing, the first section of this map would fit right in Stronghold, with an army of hitscanners coming for you from all directions, and barrels in abundant numbers. That being said, the music for this map is astounding. I can't quite put it in words, but the music is just perfect for the map. I actually have it on my phone, fantastic for a night drive in the city. The traps and ambushes are rather brutal, which conveys clearly the message that this wad will not be gentle on you. The fight that sticks in my mind the most, and I assume is true for most people, is the archvile wave that teleports in after you grab the blue key. They spawn all across the way out, disallowing you to just run away. A fair few of my attempts died here. There are also plenty of nukage-filled pools and corridors, so remember to ration your radsuits. Going through the blue door, you'll come to a rocky area, which seems to be a transition to the next map. The fights here are not that scary, just beware of potshotters and you should make it out alive.

Quite a strong first impression for Arrival. Definitely not beginner-friendly, but with some Doom experience under your belt, you should be able to tackle this one. The texturing is wonderful compared to Cydonia's mostly utilitarian texturing. A very fine opener. 

[cannonball]

MAP03 - “Water Putrefier”

 

The recurring thought through this map was passing a green armour and thinking "I will save that for later" and then never actually needing it..

A large and stately map set in a water treatment plant (Or untreatment plant). Thehardest element is getting a foothold and frankly the initial scrap for weapons and armour is the best part of the map. Once weapons are obtain, this is a very easy map, in a way it is too easy and just feels like going through the motions. There are good fights in here, the yellow key reveal is neat, the fight beyond the yellow door is pretty clever too. I wasn't too keen on the other key fights, the build up to the red key is far better than the fight for the key (Which can be solved by simply walking through the unlocked door and blowing the revenants away safely, the blue key is a reasonable attempt at a mastermind fight, but I must have partially triggered the fight because I suspect the other monsters were supposed to arrive with the mastermind, which would have placed the player under some sort of pressure.

Overall this was fine, but not the most exciting of maps. In the end the environment probably isn't the best for portraying a large adventure, though that might just be me. At least the action was constant from start to finish this time.

[narrowtomato]

I had a vastly different experience with Arrival maps 2-4 and the rest of the maps.  This may have been due to my own sleep deprivation during the first session, but I found those specific maps to be a lot harder.  The rest were a fun romp with mid-tier difficulty but enough space and ammo to never feel unfair or constricted.  When I died too much I was able to approach it from a different angle or backtrack for ammo or fighting space.

 

Full playthrough in 3 sessions below, it's pretty obvious that I was struggling mentally during the first session, you can see my play improve drastically during the final two.

 

 

 

 

[Book Lord]

MAP 04 – Free Press

DSDA-Doom v0.24.3, UV, Continuous, blind run w/saves

 

Knowing that Doom levels usually do not handle political topics such as freedom in journalism, I expected Free Press to have crusher gimmicks going on. The pun was nice though, and the same could be said for how the map elaborated on the subject. We reached Day 2 of the journey, and the passage from sleek tech-bases to wood & metal facilities with twisted purposes was well choreographed. A pistol starter received quite a bit of resources at the start, including a plasma gun and a Blue Armour if he was so daring to loot the terrace under the sight of two Cyberdemons.

Spoiler

I did not even notice the bosses on my first run, as I killed the Sergeants and went straight through the series of crushers with their Wolf3D lookalike secrets. The lava room at the other side had good use of height and niches filled with enemies in sniper attitude, so it required a careful approach. After a good streak of incidental combat and small ambushes, I arrived to the eastern side of the Cyberdemon courtyard. They dominated the empty area, and I could spot the RK on their platform, but there was nothing I could do besides dodging their rockets and pressing the skull switch. The room underwent some changes and enemies started to appear everywhere, making rocket dodging even harder. I died here while trying to escape, but at the second attempt I was quicker. Still, killing the two bosses manually felt totally wrong, as a pistol starter could not have enough ammunition for the job. I casually picked up the Soul Sphere and it started a fast-damaging crusher above their heads. Not a very intuitive design for this encounter.

Spoiler

Behind the red door, I immediately gained the BK, as well as the showcased Megasphere (another Wolf3D-ish design for a secret). I only needed to get back to the exit door, near the start, but the journey back there was longer and bloodier than expected. After crossing a lava room and a blue door, an army of hitscanners with supporting Arch-Viles gave me a warm welcome. @Pavera adores these arrangements and Arrival is full of them; this one was particularly silly and nonthreatening, though fun in a campy way. Finding the secret Invulnerability and an exaggerate ammo stash rewarded me with another pair of Cyberdemons, and more surprise teleports spiced up the backtracking to the four crushers and to the exit. Free Press was a creative level with some memorable stuff, it had a light-hearted tone if compared to the rest of the megaWAD and was a welcome short diversion after the lengthy MAP03. Excellent for the slot, and a very good map in general.

[finnks13]

MAP03 - Water Putrefier:

19:50/1 Death
Water Putrefier is a larger map than the others so far, with a sprawling layout that got me lost and turned around more than I'd like. You've got a load of areas open right from the get-go and while the actual progression is very linear, you could spend 10 minutes before finding it or 2 depending on the path through the base you take. I, for example, managed to not find both the plasma gun and super shotgun for the first half of my playthrough which made my first few runs around the map both tense, and a bit tedious. While the majority of the monsters in the map are fodder, there's a lot of revenants and mancubi in your way too and being stuck with few rockets, and a chaingun wasn't particularly fun.

 

After finding the yellow key and SSG, the map improved a lot - the yellow key fight is tense and fun (in general, I'd say the archvile usage here is much more creative than in the first two maps) and while it took me a while to find the yellow door, the pinky swarm with an archvile for backup that was behind it was a very fun combat set-piece. The large red key room is the toughest part of the map, after a surprise archvile and cacocloud - you have to make a leap of faith onto the red key platform and trigger a horde of revenants which dealt me my only death. The final fight is against a small group of monsters and a spider mastermind, and it's alright though probably a bit too easily dealt with by running away and dealing with the imps, chaingunners and revnants from a convenient slime pit, out of sight from the mastermind. Overall, Water Putrefier is a solid ending to Day 1 of Arrival.

[tmorrow]

Arrival map04

 

A facility with lava and twin cybies! Eek! The map is called "Free Press" like it's a good thing. In this case it assuredly is not. The player has to ignore the cybies and first and make way through a map full of crushers. Half way through he ends up at the cybies again, this time with more weapons and ammo and a showdown. Doomguy needs their red key. There are 2 ways to take the tag team pair out. You can kill them first and then use the switch to spawn more enemies or you can use the switch right away and try to survive the chaos. The switch starts up a crusher above the duo and spawns mobs and so is less costly on ammo but more expensive on doomguys health. Either way, the red key is now his.

 

The blue key is a quick pickup after the red one and leads in through the blue door for some good time rocket spam on a bunch of hitscanners, revs and some archviles. There's a second pair of cybies to battle against here but it is a hidden fight, requiring you to find the invulnerability secret. After that it's time for doomguy to negotiate some previous crushers back to the start for an incidental skirmish and the exit.

[erzboesewicht]

MAP03: Water Putrefier

 

We return to techbases, and what a techbase it is! An enormous complex with lots of small rooms, stairs and corridors, flooded partially with water, slime (putrefied water?) and in some parts even lava. The general layout and gameplay reminded me a lot of BTSX E1, only with stock textures. Again, a lot of fodder is here waiting to pleasantly being mowed down by Doomguy's chaingun and shotgun. The SSG is this time intentionally delayed until you get the yellow key, but you get rocket launcher and plasma (almost for free!) early. Once the SSG/YK ambush is survived, you'll feel drastically overpowered and often swimming in ammo, above all if you find the switch to unlock the BFG (requires awareness of the heights of different ledges nearby, which is nicely made) which will come handy for the last ambushes and almost trivializes them. Gameplay-wise the ambush which stood out for me was the archvile-pinky combination in the water after the yellow door, which requires rapid reactions and awareness of the surrounding terrain. The last fight with the spiderdemon and the teleport ambush was, in contrast, a bit underwhelming, even if I only used the BFG for big spidie itself. Visually I liked the area with the morphing stairs at the yellow key most. Another good one, but still easy in the combat department (I even would say it's easier than MAP02).

 

Rating: 7/10
Difficulty: 3/10

MAP04: Free Press

 

Lol. I was about to write how challenging and punchy this map was. Something in the style of "warm up time has ended". But actually I totally oversaw the plasma/megaarmor at the start, so I shotgunned and chaingunned lots of revenants and archviles until the rocket launcher was handed out, then again it became the "typical Arrival fun romp". There is no SSG this time, at least I didn't find one. Anyway, I think that map was quite cool. It is a bit smaller than the predecessors, but hosts a similar population with about 280 monsters. A big part of them are concentrated in a single, absolutely ridiculous (but super-easy!) ambush behind the blue door, where with some foreknowledge you could even get most of them smashed in Pacifist style with the help of two brown friends (and an invul). Crushers are the main element that characterizes the map, which will serve alternatively as obstacles or as helping hands. I like crushers, so for me that's a plus. Visually the map is mostly composed of wood and metal, nothing really outstanding but it creates a nice atmosphere. The only point I would criticize is the long time the crushers need to take out the first two cyberdemons, and you need them to be dead because otherwise you don't get the red key. You get some resources to help the machines, but most players I think will do like me and simply wait, yawn.

 

Rating: 8,5/10
Difficulty: 5/10 if you played like my dumb self, but I guess 3/10 if you do it the right way :)

(prboom+, UV, pistol start, sometimes with saves between fights. Difficulty scale roughly: 1-2 - easier than all of Plutonia, 3 - Congo, 5 - Genesis, 7 - Abattoire, 8 - Twilight/Go 2 It, 9-10 - harder than Plutonia.)

[brick]

MAP03 - “Water Putrefier”
Another enjoyable map, generous with health and armour by putting lots and lots of bonuses everywhere. Like the first map enemy count is high but there's an excellent balance between combat and exploration, with a very smooth sense of progression as you hunt switches and keys and unlock the various sections of the level. The teleport ambushes are predictable but dealing with them is still fun. The Spider took me by surprise but then I remembered its presence is telegraphed at the beginning. The not-secret BFG is pretty clever, it took me a while to figure it out but getting my hands on it was very satisfying.

[RHhe82]

MAP04: Free Press. DSDA v0.24, UV, PS. 282/282 K, 4/4 S, 167/167 I. Comp. time 23:48.

 

This map has more personality than MAP03. It'd be easy to go wrong with all the crushers, but I think Free Press makes them work great. I especially liked that Pavera had the decency to have the two early cyberdemons be crushed by the ceiling, sparing the player from busywork after cybies have run out of their use. I disapprove of not providing the player with a SSG (or did I just miss it somehow?). You can do without, but fun factor would have been increased.

 

Speaking of fun factor, I really really liked the encounter with half of the enemy count, the one with the numerous archviles getting busy resurrecting stuff. A little bit later that same area left a slightly sour taste when archviles emerging later on resurrected some crushed enemies. Ghost imps I could deal with, but the ghost mancubus proved troublesome. Luckily my rockets sufficed just barely.

 

Good map, I liked it.

[General Roasterock]

Arrival

 

  I have been exposed to this mapset through Jimmy's video on it, but I feel that it didn't show enough to the point where the experience means nothing. All that I know on this set is that every map has been essentially maxed out in what it can offer, filled to the brim with unpackable fights and routes. It's hard to believe that I've yet to play a Pavera map outside of Total Exposure (and also the Adventures of Square contributions), so I can't have any prior knowledge taint what I'm about to do here. 

 

Map 01: Waste Abandonment

 

  I couldn't imagine a more stellar introduction to both the WAD, and to Pavera's goals as a mapper. This is probably the best use of barrels I've seen in a map before. Normally my attempts to shoot barrels in order to kill groups of monsters end in complete failure due to either RNG for my damage rolls, RNG in the monster movement, or the cosmic being that is ever so persistent at preventing me from succeeding at fucking anything to do with the decoration. Here, due to the formation of the barrels, it feels great to use them to your advantage, and the monster balancing makes them cinematic whenever they go off, wiping out handfuls of lower tier monsters in one fell swoop. 

  The architecture is uniquely sublime, every line feels purposeful and load bearing. For only being made up of vanilla Doom II textures, the setting that is created here is staggering, adjacent to techbases that we are all so familiar with, but still bleeding so much personality. The title brings out the pain floors, giving the map a feeling of purpose. There are just enough radsuits to move quickly through the nukage, just enough to quickly push your way through the monsters. I feel that the wonderous magic of the exit sign was used fantastically here, as there is a feeling of winding down when you emerge to the cliffside section. I could go on and on about the importance of that singular texture for flow, but I feel like the progression of Waste Abandonment speaks for itself.
  I fully expected the legendary Arch-Vile fight to burn me a lot more than it did, but I found that it's actually rather merciful with allowing you to backtrack to a chokepoint and funnel down the half dozen viles. It's honestly the nicest that the WAD has been with Arch-Viles in this map, as the rest of them are placed strategically behind hordes of hitscanners and other human/demon shields they can make use of. One point I did take away from Jimmy's overview is how mean the viles get in this set, so I am fully prepared for the worst. All and all, this is a tremendous first impression that borders on embarrassing me for not playing this sooner.

 

Map 02: Saltstone Sanctuary

 

  AAAAAND there's the 180.

  My playthrough of Saltstone Sanctuary lured me into a false sense of security that my strategy was at all viable to handle the platitudes that confront you. The vast majority of my time in the map was spent clearing out the central caldera to have a foothold as I went on to explore the branching paths. This strategy left me living rocket to rocket, struggling to manage my ammo, needing to make several return trips to the ascending stairs to pick up individual rockets I had missed due to their spacing. Going through one door would've given me the Super Shotgun, or the Plasma Rifle, or any other weapon I could expend with the supply I was building up. It's something I had no way to plan for on my first time through, and my questioning of balance only came about when three Arch-Viles ran up on me and my six rockets. 

  I'm definitely starting to feel the squeeze, monsters are becoming a lot more purposeful in their usage. The cornering with the Revenants and Zombiemen was a notable example, as the latter managed to do a lot more damage than I could have expected from a situation like that. On the other hand, the singular, nearly arbitrary Cyberdemon at the end had no real advantage from its use, and I had more than enough plasma ammo to tear through it. I suppose I should be thankful for the mercy while it lasts, but it's odd after seeing so much intricate carnage to have to waggle back and forth as a cyber stands several dozen meters away. I can't say I'm a fan here, the brown brick Doom II library aesthetic never wowed me in anyway, and I had too many hiccups in the fights to get into a groove.

 

Map 03: Water Putrefier

 

  While it's still in the front of my mind, I need to comment on how well the specific points of replay navigation are set up. Figuring out that I could press the switch that lowered the Red Key, and then jump from the platform to the key, and then to the light labeled gap on the other side was revolutionary, and made me feel like I had finally cracked the code of progression that the set was going for. My only issue with these pieces of navigation is that they usually require foresight to make use of them fully. I ended up recognizing the Yellow Key back tracking with the bridge raising skull switch before I ever had to Yellow Key, and my first two minutes in this map were whittling away at Revenants and hitscan hordes with Berserk because I went right instead of left and missed the Rocket Launcher at first. As much as I would love to go through these maps a second time to fully evaluate how smart they're put together, not only do I feel that this arrangement of discussion is not as well aligned for that kind of replayability, but I also just don't have the time. I also have much stronger opinions on hos a map shouldn't need to be revolutionarily different on a second time through to be a quality experience, but it applies less here with how my approach is.

  Water Putrefier is one more point into the strength of techbases for this set. Every element feels in sync with one another, from the lines of metal support texturing, to the gentle steering of the flow of water, to the hordes of Chaingunners that are somehow more significant here than they were in the Plutonia set. Perhaps that can be attributed to the restriction of resources, but I feel that there is a major weight being lifted from the shoulders of the set solely due to the fact that there has only been six Hell Knights or Barons in the entire set, all localized within Saltstone Sanctuary. Being free from such a boring enemy allowed the combat to blossom in such unique ways. That Pinky rush with Arch-Vile support was downright exhilarating, and didn't at any point feel overwhelming or overbearing. I could only imagine a similar encounter being composed of Knights being one of the most boring things imaginable. I do wish that I wasn't teased so much with cell packs long before I ever get my hands on a Plasma Rifle, but I would be lying if I never said that uncorking the thing once I finally picked up the weapon is made all the sweeter because of the down time. 

 

Power Rankings

Spoiler

1. Waste Abandonment
2. Water Putrefier
3. Saltstone Sanctuary

 

[Pseudonaut]

Map03 (No deaths):

Trying out a new mouse + lower sensitivity, still getting used to it. It wasn't a problem on this map, though. It seemed threatening at the start, but most of the action was a little weak. I wondered at one point if I was really on UV. Kinda slow too; I killed a lot of mid-tiers with the shotgun or chaingun in the first half. It wasn't unpleasant to play, though, and at least I didn't die 30 minutes into a near-successful blind run. I did like the bit before the red key, right after the only pain elemental on the map, when there was a sudden influx of enemies and I felt like I wasn't totally in control for the first time in 15 minutes.

 

Demo:

arrival03FDA.zip

[pavera]

It's been a lotta fun reading these write-ups on the first few maps of Arrival thus far. It honestly seems like the kind of mapset that you either really vibe with, or kinda go "yeah that was fine". Both opinions are totally valid, cause I think it's really by design, and I tended to lean heavily into mapping tropes that some people (i.e. myself) love and others just don't find very entertaining or important. For instance, I DID spend a LOT of time on texturing, architecture, the general feel of the areas, etc. And I also setup most of the combat scenarios to feel breezy and relatively effortless, but loud, however often times this just came at the expense of the general 'balance' of the gameplay. IF you are the sort of Doomer who loves finely tuned combat scenarios with high challenge and ammo/health management, you're going to be likely disappointed here. It's true that a lot of Arrival is going to feel oddly easy to get through despite the high monster counts, that is by design. I wanted it to be all about the spectacle and the vibe, really.

 

I hope those of you who aren't vibing with the early maps find something to like in the second half, but if not, thank you for playing anyway!!

[cannonball]

MAP04 - “Free Press”

 

Whilst the map doesn't exactly stick the landing, I absolutely respect Pavera for committing to a map like this. It is shorter and far more to the point than the last map and the big set pieces are really fun to push through. The only complaint comes from the Red key fight due to the very slow process of the cybers being crushed, I think this could have been handled better because I was sitting around for quite a long period of time before the crushers finally finished the two cybers off. This could have come from extending the fight with a long period with other monsters trickling in, or providing a more efficient method of killing the cybers. Other than that the rest of the map was really fun and the crushers add to the experience, rather than be a detriment.

This is my favourite map so far.

[LadyMistDragon]

Map 19: Purgatory

by Brayden "The Hit Man" Hart

 

I'll mostly dispense with description here, save to say that despite the presence of some of those lighter-brown lines Plutonia brick walls, this is a departure from the main visual themes presented thus far in Cydonia, although red rock is particularly prominent here. There's nothing all that striking visually other than the odd collection of barrels around metal pillars that just, exists. Ok, if you step on one of the teleporters here, you'll be transported to a set of barrels on top of a ledge that will kill you instantly (twice for me) if you don't spot a teleporter that allows access to a nearby ledge or otherwise discover an Invulnerability and hurry up, giving no mind to the monster bollocks that are probably the main reason for it.

 

Combat just blends together for reason that aren't really its fault, but trying to split one spicy Arch-vile and chaingunner encounter from another is too difficult for me to bother with something like this. While map design doesn't necessarily follow strictly Plutonian standards, maybe it just gets a little old at times. Although the tiny little closet with Barons, Revenants, Chaingunners and two fucking Arch-viles with few rockets left was quite nasty and I wasn't about to restart at that point, so it took a few good tries to get through that one.

 

Overall, I liked "Hopeless" better than this, I think. It's hard to say this would be worst than another Scotty map, as this actually holds up well with the rest of the last 4th. But the departure in aesthetics doesn't really benefit it, and the backtracking from the blue key doesn't exactly help matters either.

 

 

lmd_cydonia19.zip

[finnks13]

MAP04 - Free Press:

11:35/4 Deaths
Fittingly, Free Press is filled to the brim with crushers that will do their best to get in the way and catch you by surprise. Despite all the crushers however, the most dangerous part of the map were the two cyberdemons on the red key platform, that dealt me all my deaths - you'll have to run past them at the start to grab a much needed blue armour and plasma gun and they have a starring role in the red key fight. The start of the map is pretty slow-paced, there's no SSG and because of the crushers and the monsters' advantageous positions over you, you have to take it very carefully in order to not get peppered with bullets. 

 

After a few rooms of dodging crushers and zombies, we get to the red key fight which is the weakest part of the map - the other monsters that are with the cyberdemon spawn in too quickly and the ensuing wait for the cyberdemons to get crushed to death is quite boring (I died three times trying to speed it up and eventually decided to just wait in a corner). Behind the red door is a massive horde of zombies backed up by a few archviles, and tearing through them with rockets is incredibly satisfying. The arachnotrons that appear after the horde is dead do a good job of forcing you towards the crushers too and the two archviles that appear at the end of the fight could get out of hand if they're not dealt with quickly and start creating ghost monsters. Overall, this is a great little map that uses it's gimmick very well.

[brick]

MAP04 - “Free Press”
The beginning is an interesting setup: you want to hide from the distant Cyberdemon ASAP, but braving his rockets nets you a lot of supplies that will make the early level so much easier. Lots of crushers to navigate around while dodging revenants and dealing with lots of hitscanners. I admit the crushers were starting to get on my nerves by the end (and I admit I didn't get the pun until I came to post here and saw others commenting on it). The blue door is odd, as there's an army of hitscanners behind it but they're all dispatched quite easily. Secret hunting was fun, and the Megasphere one was very welcome.

[baja blast rd.]

map04: Free Press

 

Don't think I've revisited this one more than once so felt like playing it here.

 

 

 

This one is tightly concept-oriented. It's neat how the set is willing to mix in both free, concept-light gameplay and maps like this.

 

I like how the map just makes the PR and blue armor (and 'zerk) optional and easy to miss. It fits the map's theme/tone. 

 

The crusher cyb part is really fun because you can run past the cybs (pretty consistently too, by accepting that you might eat one crush cycle). Didn't mind it in first play that much either because in theory I could just spend the time looking for the secret. There are chaingunners guarding the RK door which is a devious combo with the cybs behind you. If not for the next area this would probably be my favorite area in the map. 

Next area's appeal is really obvious lol. It's not just the fodder horde, but the sheer spectacle of it, coupled with happening at a good moment for pacing.