Endless Random /idgames WAD Adventures #042

[Thelokk]

51 minutes ago, AD_79 said:

 

Strange take. If I remember correctly, creators in the 90s would do this if there were no actual secrets to find in a map. This would prevent the secret tally from displaying "0%" at the end, as it would do that if there weren't any secrets. Even if this wasn't the case, outright refusing to play a map because it does this doesn't make sense to me.

 

It does to me. It's a lazy workaround that shows a lack of imagination and creativity. It guarantees a map not worth playing, and I cannot think of one single instance that even approached changing my mind to this regard.

[ZeMystic]

19 minutes ago, Thelokk said:

 

It does to me. It's a lazy workaround that shows a lack of imagination and creativity. It guarantees a map not worth playing, and I cannot think of one single instance that even approached changing my mind to this regard.

 

hmmm I don't think I find a lack of secrets in a map as a lazy and uncreative cop-out. Secrets aren't really essential to doom's gameplay as much as combat and level design is. You can have a map with a big ass beautiful encounter that's fun and also not have any secrets.

[Tarnsman]

Above and Below by Rob Berkowitz (1999)

Eternity / UV / 100% kills / 100% items / 100% secrets

 

The layout is a series of square rooms with an upper level and a lower level. The texturing is mostly monotonous marble alternating between two different variations. There is some lighting variation which keeps the map from looking absolutely hideous. While I thought the gameplay would be extremely boring due to the layout, the start of the map was actually quite fun. The limited armaments as well as the use of beefy monsters on the lower levels such as hell knights, barons, and demons actually made for some interesting pressure gameplay as you are encouraged to run away from one room into another due to the bulk, only to find you've woken up more high threat monsters like chaingunners or pain elementals as well as more bulk to push you around.

 

The gameplay becomes less enjoyable once you get through the initial pressure and the map turns into a series of pushing switches to raise various walkways and clean up. The walkway section does still contain gameplay and has several ambushes that if you were confined to the walkways (via something like the lower level being damaging floor or some such thing) would be engaging uses of barons, revenants and an archvile but sadly are not as the moment the monsters pose a threat you can drop down to the lower level to engage them from a better position.

 

As this is a map from 99 there is plenty of 90s design jank. The walkways being lifts is not conveyed as they use the same textures as everything else around them, the keys are hidden in "secrets" due to the choice of door texture for their rooms as well as the light levels said doors are located within. There is some platforming over inescapable pits. You know the drill.

 

Overall it was a fun little 10 minute side adventure and I am glad that I played it if nothing to experience that 90s charm.

[GarrettChan]

Honestly, it's not uncommon there's no secret in a 90s map. Some of the Master Levels also do this. I'm not saying who this is something important, but if a mapset is aiming for vanilla compatible, I do give comments about there's 0/0 secret because it seems this is one good way to "emulate" 90s feeling, heh.

[Walter confetti]

Lost Sanctum by @EANB - Limit removing ports, Doom, SP, 2013, played with Eternity "forseti" 4.0.2

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A really impressive map based upon a modern take of original episode 4 maps (E4M1, E4M2, E4M3, and E4M8 in a way) all mixed in one lethal and awesome looking  map both in detail and gameplay department, maybe too hard in some parts for my tastes but still... a very great experience! Best from this session!

 

StoneHenj by William Green - Vanilla Heretic, DM, 1998, played with Zandronum 3.1 with bots

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A large and pretty square-ish arena with a basic design in the layout expect for the Stonehenge structure, it reminded me of a more raw E2M8. As boss arena and as deathmatch level is pretty much ok. I didn't hear the new music the author said that he put in this wad hearing only the default track, where is it? I have to open this on slade3.

 

BRUJO'S ARENA by Ric San Nicholas (a.k.a. brujo a.k.a. rooster) - Vanilla Doom 2, DM, 1996, played with Zandronum 3.1 with bots

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A level that at first i will gave it nothing by first looking, but instead is a pretty fun map! Not a good map by many standards, but a pretty fun map.

The layout is extremely simplistic, just a arena drowned in the dark with a central spot in the lower section with a toxic floor and BFG, the weapon placement is too overpowered for me and the SP placement is thought. Overall, a simple and fun map.

 

Ring Of Doom by Joe Sola [DaeDoLoN] - Vanilla Hexen, DM, 1995, played with Zandronum 3.1 with bots

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Did i just playing a deathmatch map for every ID Tech 1 game this evening? It's missing only Doom (well, for that I've played Lost Sanctum at first choice), Strife and HACX (maybe Chex Quest? There's any chex quest map in the archives?) for completing the ride! Anyway, a circular arena in the middle of a very deep that it will be better to play with human players instead of the kamikaze bots. Meh.

 

ALAIN.WAD by Alain ARRAULT - Vanilla Doom, SP, 1994 but uploaded in 2004, played with Eternity "forseti" 4.0.2

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Last map of this evening and returning on square one with a Doom map! I think to have already seen this name been taken by another reviewer in a previous adventure, this is a 1994 abstract and with some trippy design choices (like strobing lights, weird cage triangular maze and other weird design choices) with the only strong points in the starting area and the map layout, based upon the Star of David and other Hebrew esoteric symbols (?), i saw a similar layout only on Return of Castle Wolfestein E1M9 (no, not the 2000s game, the 1994 Doom partial conversion episode), i like it! For all the rest, just a pretty generic map.

[Misty]

Hell's Revenge by George Fiffy(1999)

 

I'm quite familiar with George's mapping stuff, I played his entries before, this one wasn't exception. It targets boom compatible port, fairly new port and format back to those days. It uses some boom features like deep water and there's more detailing - like arches that increases sector count compared to vanilla. There's big starvation of health, but if you play carefully there won't be any problem. Oh, it also comes with infopack - worth addition to check out, I can consider this a lost art of doom making. 

 

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[Shanoa]

Station Alpha Omega by Giac Veltri, released in 2000. Played with PrBoom+ on UV, it replaces MAP01 in DOOM 2.

Status: Completed

 

As the name implies, this map is set in a station. A dehacked file is also included which changes the door sounds, add part of the arch-vile attack sound effect to the flame barrel, a couple of textures and occasionally an ambient sound in a part of the level. There is no new music, instead the creator muted D_RUNNIN, so the map has no music whatsoever which adds to the atmosphere, so that was neat!

Unfortunately, my praise end there. Despite the lil extras here and there it's hard for me to call this a good map. It's not horrible by any mean but it's just "ok" at best.

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One of the earliest room with a neat little view into space.

 

The map is like 95% symmetrical, now I can "sorta" excuse it. While I know excessive symmetry isn't always a good thing this is not the reason why i'd call the map "ok". My problem is the symmetry extend also to encounters and sometimes even with ammo placement. Often though it's like copy/pasting except a texture will be on the north wall rather than the south wall.

Some examples:

 

- In the first screenshot, you fight 1 or 2 chaingunners and some sergeant with 2 extra chaingunners and 4 extra sergeants on higher ground and some nuke barrel  to the north. That room is connected to a storage room with a few more enemies and access to the ammos of the those aformentionned enemies on higher ground. That room comes back again later, same enemies, same storage room with maybe 1 or 2 crates moved, the nukage barrels are now south. (also one of the sergeant drop the yellow keycard, thats neat)

 

- There's a room with 4 sergeants and 1 mancubus, which is copy pasted, except the baron replace the mancubus.

 

- you go under the station, there's 3 doors. Left one has a caco with some imps, middle one is caco with ammos, right one is caco with same amount of imps. Both the left and right room lead into a room with 2 barons and 1 switch, except the switch is on the right wall in a room and on the left in the other.

Spoiler

The underground area, I guess it's the maintenance area.

 

Rinse and repeat, and that's the map. Again, I'll accept a symmetrical map but when you mirror your encounters too is when i'm like "ok, more effort needed to be put there". It's cool it has some extra graphics, new sounds, a titlescreen and whatnot but do put more care in monsters placement, I shouldn't be able to guess what i'll fight after checking out one side of a room in each new areas. You could check it out if you wanna see that symmetry in action but it's not worth it.

Edited September 30, 2022 by Shanoa

[Thelokk]

Let's see if I manage not to get dogpiled on by half of DW this time around.

 

Xenus:Lost Base by Alterworldruler (2006)

GZDoom / UV / 100% kills / 100% secrets

 

Endless STARTAN or variations thereof hallways, chock full of hitscanners and no armor in sight? check. Keyed doors containing a single 64X64 room with the next key inside? check. Forced pistoling for more than half the map? check. 

Yup, we're in deep 90s territory, except this is supposed to be 2006. It's one of those 1024 maps, the perennial gimmick that can make a level as easily as ruin it. The secret is not to overdo it, and this map clearly fails at it. With such little real estate, does it really make sense to have all three keys? No wonder most rooms are literally stamp sized. Combat is typical UD fare, a bunch of stuff in a line in front of you with the occasional (and unpegged) lowering wall revealing more stuff in a line, usually hitscanners. Oh, and you get to shotgun a baron at the very end. 

Some interesting ligthing work, but too little and way too late. 

 

 

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[Andromeda]

18 hours ago, Tarnsman said:

Above and Below by Rob Berkowitz (1999)

 

As this is a map from 99 there is plenty of 90s design jank.

This level first appeared as MAP26 of the fairly well known Realm of Chaos, which according to the wiki saw its first release in 1996. DocBob released his levels for that wad standalone with no changes three years later for some reason.

[LadyMistDragon]

Doomworld Speedmapping Compliation #18 (2001) by Various (Eternity)

 

Yet another speedmapping collection featuring at least a person or two who may not have mapped too much to begin with. Participants once again had 90 minutes to make a map. But this time, maps need a space station theme! Unfortunately, the vast majority of these maps are dull and not necessarily worth talking about, other than to say that they each have a certain uniqueness to them.

 

One might think Fredrik Johansson would turn out a map not much below the quality of his map for #16 but maybe he just had less time because he just takes a standard VRACK environment and copypastes this giant light source decoration everywhere while making combat that essentially is like something of a super-easy NoReason map. It's almost forward-looking in a way, but it's also really dumb.

 

BlackTerror actually improves on the other hand, although "improves" should really be considered a relative term, since the main room's shape is nonsensically sharp (shoutout to the the October Ironman!). The player start is a laughably-sloppy corner placing. SHAWN seems like the only texture used here and while the computer wall banks are kind of nice, you can cheese the enemies here. It would be really fun to speedrun still, especially if you wanted a UV max.

 

The fourth map then is probably the best one easily. The nonsensical fence at the beginning doesn't make sense, but then we get narrow space-station-esque corridors with brown linings, a maintenance tunnel, and most gloriously, masses of enemies around some more self-contained fences, along with a heliped to end the map. Although you probably wont' realize it until said exit is reached that the monsters past the helipad are 'window dressing.'

 

Opulent seems to have been a long-time veteran, but while his multiple-structure map is adequate (and cool 'opulent' helipad), it doesn't stand out and doesn't feel more enjoyable. Lastly, Sgt. Crispy's map could've been also great, with the sense of verticality and scale at the beginning. Unfortunately, the last bit degenerates into Sam Woodman-esque baron shotgunning that could be worst, but still should be noted.

 

5/10

 

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[Sena]

GATUY: https://www.doomworld.com/idgames/levels/doom2/g-i/gatuy

 

As it's a 1996 release, this might be one of the earliest depictions of doomcute, which appears in the form of sinks and toilets, which mappers have been strangely obsessed with ever since. Regardless, this is a well-crafted level, clearly a product of 90s mapping as even if it makes for a more convincing city than what id software created, Doom 2's influence is still apparent through elements of its visual design. Secondarily, there's the point that it's a product of 90s mapping on account of the fact the yellow key is hidden behind a cryptic secret in a nondescript wall that provides no indication to the player that they're meant to open it. Still, with that one point aside, it's smooth sailing from there on out, and its gameplay manages to be pretty varied and challenging for the time, with a heavy reliance on mancubi and revenants, and I can never say no to a map that knows how to use mancubi. It might be a little outdated in some aspects, but this is a fine level that's definitely worth your time. 7/10.

[Walter confetti]

Friggin Frags by David Tiemroth - Vanilla Doom 2, DM, 1996, played with Zandronum 3.1 with bots

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A large (way too large) and almost empty arena with a not great thing placement with too many chainsaws on spawning spots. A very bland DM map.

 

HEXEN FRAG_YOU by David Davidson (aka DRILLER) - Vanilla Hexen, DM, 1996, played with Zandronum 3.1 with bots

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A much more smaller map sets in this sewer structure, but unluckily is too cramped in spaces to be fully appreciable for my tastes.

[Roofi]

On 9/30/2022 at 11:59 PM, Walter confetti said:

 

ALAIN.WAD by Alain ARRAULT - Vanilla Doom, SP, 1994 but uploaded in 2004, played with Eternity "forseti" 4.0.2

  Reveal hidden contents

Last map of this evening and returning on square one with a Doom map! I think to have already seen this name been taken by another reviewer in a previous adventure, this is a 1994 abstract and with some trippy design choices (like strobing lights, weird cage triangular maze and other weird design choices) with the only strong points in the starting area and the map layout, based upon the Star of David and other Hebrew esoteric symbols (?), i saw a similar layout only on Return of Castle Wolfestein E1M9 (no, not the 2000s game, the 1994 Doom partial conversion episode), i like it! For all the rest, just a pretty generic map.

 

I already stumbled on Alain.wad, I really like to name your map with your real name.

 

Month 12 Day 16

 

I play until I die or intentionally stop. I don't comment the wad where I died/stopped.

 

[1] GAK1.WAD by GAK (1995)

 

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As my 1st attempt, very simple design... but fun nonetheless.

 

Pure garbage stuff where randomly textured rooms are linked with large featureless tunnels filled with harmless nukage. Gaz contains some cheesy sounds and I like the one when doomguy takes damage. It's a feminine voice who says "Internal damage" as if the doomguy wears a hi-tech suit as Gordon Freeman does.

 

[2] TiC's WAD Reviews #1-#20 by The Innocent Crew (1995)

 

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Here they are! The first 20 reviews of Doom, Doom 2 and Heretic WADs. All were posted to alt.games.doom and rec.games.computer.doom.playing, now you can download them here too.

Btw. there will be a WebSite with my reviews soon!

 

It's an unique file I got during month 03 day 01. I played some of wads they reviewed but from what I read, their comments tend to be too laconic and the lack of screenshots don't help imagining how the wads could look like.

 

[3] THEME17 for DCK v1.3 -- DCK.TS file by Ian Merrithew (1995)

 

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This file is the sprites file needed by DCK to display the things when in graphical display mode (hit 'T' when editing things). Putting this into your DCK directory (back up your original!) will save you the trouble of having to make it yourself by merging the THEME17.WAD file into your DOOM.WAD.

 

Totaly useless.

 

[4] I See You by Doug Carrigan (1995)

 

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Run and shoot with shotguns, or go for the big guns (no bfg). Problem is, everywhere you find a big gun there is a secret "one-way" wall. They can see you going for the gun, but you can't see them. You better be fast.

 

A sewers-themed deathmatch map I already visited during Month 9 day 31, I don't want to see you anymore.

 

[5] Hit it! Shoot it! Saw it! FRAG IT! by Michiel Rutting (1995)

 

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Deathmatch level designed for 3-4 players, but some testplayers thought it was also playable with only 2 players. Is it good? Well, we sure had fun testing it! The first test game lasted quite a while (2 of the 4 players over 100 frags). Textures etc. are aligned (this level is not one of those that consists of 4 rooms glued together with random textures on the walls). Furthermore: You won't find a plasma or BFG in here, my friends and I prefer conventional weapons. :) The rest of the weapons are available as well as a soul sphere, an armor and some extra ammo and goodies. My recommendation is that this level be played at alt-death (respawning weapons) because the amount and placement of weapons comes out best in that mode. If you have any comment or find any bugs please send mail to the e-mail adress above. If you like it tell me! if you don't, also tell me, but be sure to mention what you don't like and why, so I can use the feedback in my later trials at wad-editing. Have a blast!

 

A monotextured brown base which doesn't look so bad thanks to some incorporated architecture elements. You can recognize the triangular staircase from Doom map 01 for instance. I also like the curvy ones located indoors. You can explore nukage-filled canals in the lower parts of the map because liquid doesn't deal damage.

 

[6] RunDown.WAD by Stewart Presley (1994)

 

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This was going to be one of those abondoned run down buildings in the middle of nowhere scenarios...but I decided not to do that. This level plays well as a small and challenging single player level and wonderful as a DeathMatch Level with sniper points and the like. It's still a building in the middle of nowhere but...lets just say it's owners still live there and enjoy sacrificing to their Gods.

 

A strangely to not say uglily built mansion populated by 29 monsters and haunted by lots of lost souls. The authors used strange materials : the outdoor walls are made of brown rocks , while the indoors have crampy wooden corridors and rooms made of bricks. It's not the kind of house I want to live in.

 

About the gameplay, I strongly advice you to enter in the building as soon as possible because most of the supplies are stored inside. If you try to kill the enemies located at outdoors first, you're likely to waste your ammo and not be able to defeat the teleporting lost souls.

 

Not a sensational map , but I always enjoy "myhouse" kind of wads. Also, Rundown is both designed for deathmatch and singleplayer mode.

 

Grade : C (From a singleplayer perspective)

 

[7] DETHMZE2.WAD BY Brian Jackey (1994)

 

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THIS IS A *MINOR* BUG-FIX FOR DETHMAZE.WAD Welcome to the future of combat training: The Holodome. Since long before the colozination of planetary moons, Earth's finest military have been trained here. With the ability to create any environment, situation, dream, or battle, the Holodome has tested every Marine currently on earth. The failure of this final test is much worse than non-admittance to the ranks of marines: failure inevitably means death. Today is your chance to graduate from simple grunt forces to acceptance as a full marine. Your Test: Journey through the dethmaze in search of the Blue keycard, which grants you the only door from the Holodome... But beware! With luck, you will only be up against computer-generated aliens, souls, ect. But if Lady Luck has thrown you to the wolves, you'll find your selflocked in a maze with only one other,a thinking, fighting grunt like yourself, aimed on destroying anyone or anything in his path to becoming a marine! Your only hope of surviving this is the destruction of your counterpart! You stand at the edge of the pit to the Holodome with a shotgun found in your current room. with a box of shells. Now only YOU control your fate, my friend!

 

It's quite impressing how 90's mappers managed to write a story on a bland map which consists of a flat maze made of bricks. 

 

Despite being designed for deathmatch, DETHMZE2 can be played in singleplayer mode. Indeed, your mission is to penetrate a huge mazy dungeon populated by demons and a cyber which guards the blue key. He's stuck in its room and therefore he can't chase you. It's disappointing, it could have been a good cat and mouse scenario.

 

This map doesn't pose any problem if you keep your ammo for the cyberdemon, otherwise you'll have to bypass him and it's easier said than done.

 

Grade : C-

 

I stop here for today.

[Thelokk]

PAROXISM by Jeffrey J. Martin from the land of the free and the and the home of the brave (1997)

GZDoom / UV / 100% kills / 100% secrets

 

A mapset from 1997, with a custom palette, custom sounds, some extra textures and a whole lot of 90s jank. Still better than the average at that time - some of the maps graze TNT quality, while falling slightly short. Definitely worth a play. 

 

MAP01 - GREYTALL-centric techbase. Short and to the point, with some very interesting secrets usage: no item rewards, but extra kills and shortcuts. What worked: the overall flow was nice, the enemy placement was mostly 90s but with a few interesting ambushes. Custom textures are a nice touch. What didn't work: the sound replacements. I swear, you have to hear the HK wake up shrill for yourself. Either the shotgunners or the revs ( I couldn't tell) have this very annoying searching sound that resembles Romero's wake up but even sillier. 

MAP02 - marble castle with brick. A bit longer, a bit more boring. What worked: the sound replacements: if you thought the AVs couldn't sound any more meancing, think again - until you realize it's actually pinkies. What didn't work: the map in general, less creative in its texture usage, and for some reason all doors are actually elevators. 

MAP03 - COMP techbase. Nifty 'lights-out' effect, author went a bit too crazy with the custom textures in my opinion. Genuinely one of the coolest rooms I've seen in any wad - sound and raising / lowering floors to create a sort of 'damned getting crushed' effect. Very hard to explain, you kinda have to see it for yourself. 

MAP04 - City (?) map. I don't know man, I think that's not how textures, or cities, work. A mess, weakest map so far. The lost soul sound replacement is atrocious.

MAP05 - another techbase, but at least it leans a bit more to the atmospheric, after the hot mess that the previous map was. This is, until you reach the BRICK section, which is just terrible. Misplaced midtextures, boring layout that exposes you to a cadre of unfairly placed chaingunners, and cacodemons whose dying sound is... the player's. Oh, and a dark maze that ports you right in the middle of a pack of imps. Great. 

MAP06 - the final one, MARBLE hell. One of the weakest maps, if not the weakest. Lots of very annoying timed doors, actually a bit of a problem in the mapset overall. Very monotone, uninteresting. Also the largest map, but you can tell the mapper had lost steam by now, and was just plotting by the numbers. 

 

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[LadyMistDragon]

Deathmatch in an Art Gallery (1994) by Thomas Spaulding (Eternity)

 

I think I might know this name. But at any rate, this has quite a charming 94 naivete about it. Textures that couldn't tell you a think about alignment, messages by the creator written in certain locations, large red arrows on the ground and certain rooms far larger than they need to be. The COMPBLU room is kind of nice, but in the end, it's probably more charming than fun. Oh, this does have a fair deal of monsters, but you probably aren't playing for them 4/10

 

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Phobos Reloaded E1M1 (2007) by DJShrimpy (Eternity)

 

Hey I know you! Combat-wise it's just a beefed-up E1M1, so no surprises there. Otherwise, this is sort of Fullbright extensions with greater detail of the hangar we've come to know and love. The room with the stairs leading to the armor now have blue carpet, the outdoor megaarmor is now located next to a tank, and the secret passageways leading it from the exit end are now the sort of mine tunnels you might have seen in map 3 of Knee Deep in ZDoom. And the ending room has been completely overhauled to the point it doesn't even resemble the original! Chainsaw here might be kind of useless at this point though, but it might be a tiny homage to another map, like the "STARTAN e1m3 corridor". And you need all three keys just because now I guess. But there are also no secrets, which sort of makes sense. 6/10, not necessarily exciting except for hitscan damage, I guess.

 

 

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[Walter confetti]

1 hour ago, LadyMistDragon said:

Deathmatch in an Art Gallery (1994) by Thomas Spaulding (Eternity)

Looks like a Glassyman map but with better texturing.

[Shanoa]

Deployment Base by Scott Sutherland, released in 1996 but uploaded to the archive in 2012. Played with DSDA DOOM on UV, this map replaces MAP01 in DOOM II.

Status: Completed

 

The map takes place in a strictly marble textured base. In fact, marble and some of it's variants are all you'll be seeing, save for a texture or two. This could easily be an Ultimate DOOM map because of the 141 monsters available, a single Pain Elemental and 2 Mancubus are the only ones from DOOM II. The rest are your standard Imps, Pinkies, etc.

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The starting room after the initial skirmish.

 

While my previous review wasn't the most positive, the map at least had proper doors. This one? Not so much as it suffers, mostly, of doors-not-doors syndrome. Like one of the review on the archive mentioned, do get the automap near the start. The only thing I'll give to this map versus the previous one is at least the encounters weren't mirrored from one room to the next. While the monsters placement is your usual 90's map schtick, at least I couldn't predict what would await me at the end of a corridor.

 

There's not much else to say, the map progression is mostly small corridors with little to no height/lighting variations as you'll just mow down Imps and Shotgunners on the way to the next objective, an overabundance of ammos, cells pack especially, and an easy boss fight trivialized by an Invulnerability Sphere. Do note that the yellow keycard room contains an unmarked elevator right beside said key. On progression: at least it's not cryptic but it's fairly unremarkable as it consists mainly of:

 

- Follow the path to your next objective

- Clear room of enemies

- Unsure with what else there is to do you backtrack

- See new path opened

- Rinse and repeat with the occasional keycard

 

It's an "ok" map, your usual 90's level except at least this one didn't assault my eyes with bad textures alignment (it's surprisingly ok here) and again, the encounters weren't just copy/pasted which saves it from being "bad". Play it if you want.

 

Bonus picture:

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Although all three paths open eventually...take a WILD guess which one is the first door for normal progression..

 

[Thelokk]

JAIL11.WAD by Roland Sander (1994)

GZDoom / UV /100% kills / 100% secrets

 

Always a good day when I get to play a myfirstmap.wad from way back in '94. I can almost see the fifteen to twenty, super-excited nerd jumping up and down in their bedroom, overwhelmed with joy that they managed to make a STARTAN wall in an editor that doesn't even let you see the texture you just applied. It's a long gone feeling (akin to when I made my first Warcraft 2 custom map) that no experience today really recaptures.

 

I am, therefore, more than willing to overlook the objective fact that this map is crap. I am all for cryptic progression, but isn't hiding a key behind a secret wall activated by an untextured switch a bit overkill? You are given a radsuit, I guess, but when it's placed on the opposite side of the switch it doesn't really make for a good clue. 

Things don't get much better inside. I hold the hot take that some of these early throwaway maps are actually as hard, if not harder of those we today call 'challenge maps' just because their architecture and things placement is so nonsensical, it defies conventional strategies. What do you do when a drop sandwiches you right behind three barrels, with 100hp but zero armor? you spray and pray. Oh wait, there is actually a lift! which is, of course, textured the same as the wall around it. This leads me to a cramped, tree infested open area that at least lets me enjoy the E1 sky, my favorite IWAD sky. 

 

Another hidden teleporter, another STARTAN room, and... six invulns. Cybie time? nope, just more imps and nonsensical progression. Pictured in the below is the red key door. 

 

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I know the trims are butt ugly, but still...

The 'exit' room is a silly ambush and way too late computer map-giver, with a troll teleporter that takes you back to the beginning of the map and triggers another imp ambush. Then you can amble your way back in glorious backtracing, and finally exit this hot mess of a room.

All glory to DEU if stuff like this exists. Actually, DEU had been out for barely a few months when this was made, so I should probably respect my elders a bit more. Nah, never been one to respect my elders, so my final verdict is: big fat nope, no matter how much fun that kid had in his bedroom back in '94. 

 

 

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[ICID]

Great adventure, guys! Shoutout to Thelokk for officially breaking into the top 10 (with Shanoa not far behind) and to Walter Confetti for playing a truly demented, almost Roofi-esque number of maps this week. Holy mackeral.

The new thread is here for your random wadding pleasure: 

 

[Shanoa]

6 minutes ago, ICID said:

Great adventure, guys! Shoutout to Thelokk for officially breaking into the top 10 (with Shanoa not far behind) and to Walter Confetti for playing a truly demented, almost Roofi-esque number of maps this week. Holy mackeral.

The new thread is here for your random wadding pleasure: 

 

Those adventures been gaining lot of tractions lately, it's great to see 3-4 pages worth of reviews.

[Snaxalotl]

Found a George Fiffy map from the 90's (A user here who goes by King REoL, though he got banned all the way back in 2003.)

Other than some points of vague progression this map is quite enjoyable for the time, and lacks a lot of the features that drag down ancient maps.

The beginning starts out as a long stretch of areas filled with hitscanners, eventually leading to a chasm inspired set of rooms filled with cacos where each room's platforms are tighter than the last. The health so far is sparse at best, which really clashes with the amount of hitscanners present in the level.

The next notable area is a massive room of various metal textures similar to the part of refueling base with hitscanners tucked in every closet, now with seemingly random teleport lines that scatter low tiers throughout the expansive halls. Here the map peaks when two archviles are let loose, and teleports unpredictably bring in reinforcements which made for a great moment of frantic combat... Unfortunately after this the map tapers off. While nothing was fundamentally wrong everything failed to compare with the previous fight and felt like the map had ended but I still had to slowly grind through weaker encounters for another 20 minutes.

Compared to what I normally get from random idgames this map was a real treat though, it leans on the more forgettable side by todays standards but back in the day I can picture this being a solid and enjoyable experience.

(Played on UV with Woof!)