[alpha] Trypophobia (myfirstmap, Freedoom IWAD)

[erzboesewicht]

Do you fear holes? Try Trypophobia for a cure by exposition!

 

IWAD: freedoom2.wad (tested with 0.12 and git trunk). Will NOT run properly with doom2.wad!* I highly recommend the Git version as it has some nice new monster sprites.

 

Download automated build from soulsphere.org

Download Freedoom IWAD 0.12.1 (doesn't have the new monsters)

Port: Limit-removing (tested with prboom-plus)

Size and layout: Mid to large. Classic "horseshoe" with mostly linear progression and exploratory-adventure style.

Gameplay style: More setpieces than incidental combat, with freewheeling slaughter-lite encounters towards the end. Some progression puzzles, but nothing really obscure, all mechanisms are well known.

Difficulty: Punchy but not hardcore. Slightly above Plutonia, close to late Valiant/Alien Vendetta. About 400 monsters on Extreme-Carnage (UV). Difficulty settings are rudimentarily implemented and tested. Extreme-Carnage (UV/hard) is meant to be a bit challenging and sometimes even a bit dickish. Bring On The Pain (HMP/normal) has some of the difficulty spikes flattened and a bit more health and ammo, and Will it hurt? (HNTR/easy) is a bit more casual - recommended for those not liking slaughter that much.

Music: One of my favorite Freedoom tracks, "Dreamcatcher", from Freedoom2 MAP27. (Unfortunately I don't know who composed it, so I may have to add all the Freedoom credits to the final zip file ...). I may add an original midi but that's still not decided.

Coop: Should work, not tested.

What's left: Some lighting and texture alignment. Gameplay should be mostly "final", at least ready for playtesting.

 

*If you really, really want to run it with the Doom2 iwad, you can probably make it run with the freedoom-textures pwad from Freedoom 0.8. Completely untested!

 

Description:

 

The idea was to create an atmospheric environment for the Freedoom monsters to "feel like home". Most of them are earthly or waterly alien-creatures inspired by invertebrates like jellyfish or worms, or reptiles like lizards, so a mostly natural map with cave/hellish theme would fit. They look also like monsters that could emerge from holes, so the Trypophobia idea was born. An inspiration for the intended atmosphere (with very different layout) was Valiant's Candlecove. This is my first publicly shared map (with the exception of a joke map you can find here: https://www.doomworld.com/forum/post/2258691).

 

Download:

trypophobia-0.1.zip

 

Screenshots:

 

 

Known problems/bugs:

 

Spoiler

 

Of course this is a beginner's map, so it for sure has lots of flaws. The passage and mechanism to access the second area (after the berserk in the excavation hole) is pretty weird. Suggestions are welcome to improve that area. I've thought about a "turn off the light" walkover here but I actually liked the dark shadow in this area and it also covers the flaws of the mechanism a bit.

 

Some monsters of the eastern trilobite (caco) cloud get stuck (after several modifications with monster blocking lines and teleporting some of them into the center of the big hole, I was able to minimize the problem to affect less than 10 cacos, but still ...). They always seem to have a tendency to fly northwards towards the trees where they get trapped, I've no idea why, maybe their pathfinding mechanism gets confused by the lines of the excavation hole?

 

 

Other notes (includes spoilers!):

 

Spoiler

There are several AV jumps to have fun with. One allows to get in the ending fight earlier, and one even actually makes the map completely nonlinear (only feasible with secrets!). I "approved" these routes and made sure that you'll reach the mandatory red key. The "nonlinear" route is longer and really difficult on UV due to another vile close to the jump, and thus speedrunners won't benefit from it, but it can be fun to try.

 

Edited April 11, 2023 by erzboesewicht : uploaded fix

[reaction]

Nice opening shot! The door behind the p1 start isn't flush with the floor. You can see the zombiemen's feet in the screenshot below.

 

Spoiler

 

There are also some texture alignment issues in the starting room, if you unpeg lower and upper sides on a window it'll be aligned correctly.

 

Spoiler

 

I was gonna complain about the lack of shotgun in the opening fight but it's actually fine. The zombies go down so easily with the pistol and the lost souls spice up the fight. Good work on making zombiemen actually dangerous!

 

I like the look of the first outdoor area, I find it tricky to get outdoors to look good and yours does. I've got a very small suggestion, you could slightly vary the height of the sectors the trees are on so they aren't so uniform (i.e can make a sector around each tree and move it up or down a few units)

 

Spoiler

 

Why am I dying every time I go into this tunnel (it's not monsters). It happens in other areas too. Is it damaging sectors used to block areas off?

 

Spoiler

 

Ohhhh, map title makes a lot of sense when you open the automap, nice! Dang, the FreeDoom trees look great. There's a lot of ambient snarls from unseen monsters all over the map, it considerably adds to the atmosphere.

After jumping in the hole I can lower 1 wall but the one after it doesn't lower and I'm stuck (complevel 2). I've humped all the walls and nada, no lift or door. I just checked the map in UDB and I think the WR line to lower sector 20 doesn't work in Nugget cl 2 or Crispy. If you change the line actions to 82 the sector will lower as expected.

 

Spoiler

 

I'll post this now in case you want to post a fix. I'll edit this post with the rest of map after I play.

[erzboesewicht]

Thank you for your suggestions, much appreciated! I'll try to post a fix of the things your mentioned in the first rooms + the sector problem in the passage between outdoor and indoor area, and will look if I can improve the trees like you wrote (later today or tomorrow). You're totally right that the lack of a shotgun is intended in the zombiemen fight, and it should be spicy :)

 

9 hours ago, reaction said:

Why am I dying every time I go into this tunnel (it's not monsters). It happens in other areas too. Is it damaging sectors used to block areas off?

 

Yep, this is a quite unconventional design decision - most "dark holes", tunnels etc. will damage/kill you in this map, either by damaging floors when you enter them or by other means hidden in them :) I was thinking at first how to signpost this, but I think it should become clear after the player has tried to enter the first two tunnels.

 

Edit: I've looked at the linedef problem in the passage and the issue is that linedef action 82 (or 38, as W1 would be even better) are not fast enough, while 98 was perfect and it seems the only vanilla floor down action with /fast. I may have to reconsider the gameplay in that area, maybe activating two or three monsters earlier so the player doesn't get bored until the floor lowers. Will bump the thread when the fix is published.

Edited April 11, 2023 by erzboesewicht

[erzboesewicht]

First fix published: trypophobia-0.1.zip

 

- Texture misalignments in the starting room should now be solved, I had to add some elements to hide the lower part of the wall below the window, due to the difference in brick "thickness" from outside and inside which made alignment in this section a pain :(.

- The mechanism of the passage after the "jump into the hole"/berserk section which did not work in some ports has been changed. Linedef action is now 38. The floors now lower slower, but I changed the monster lineup so some of them will teleport in already while they're lowering.

- More variation for the trees in the woods in the big outdoor area.

- Linedef 1625 texture fix (lift up to the balcony in the northwest was inconsistent)

- An bug in the first big indoor area of the hellish part was fixed (was a byproduct of a last minute change probably).

- Basic text file added.