Community Project concepts that you would like to see?

[DoctorNuriel]

Throughout the years, there have been Doom community projects with all kinds of interesting gimmicks, themes and restrictions - and the Doom community, with its boundless creativity, will likely keep creating these until the heat death of the universe. However, an idea is one thing, but not everyone has the time, know-how, motivation or life situation to organize such a project... so here's the place to voice and discuss your ideas for CPs, no matter how wild, that you would love to see one day.

 

Here's three of mine:

 

A Modernist/brutalist project that seeks to leverage Doom's inherent chunkiness for striking architectural design. Gameplay is secondary to aesthetics.

 

A project themed after Tricks & Traps' hub-and-spoke design. Complete unique and creative challenge rooms connected by a single hub room per map.

 

Bit of an abstract one: a Negative Space (or "crawlspace" project, where each map takes one or more "empty space" shapes from between the sectors of its original Doom 2 counterpart, and uses them as a blueprint for new layouts (sized up, if needed, to prevent overly cramped maps - just the shape has to be the same). In other words, where Congestion 1024 restricts map size, this theme would restrict map shape.

I.e. the void spaces highlighted in Refueling Base here:

Edited February 9 by DoctorNuriel

[General Rainbow Bacon]

Your #3 is interesting.  Would we include negative space on the outside too? Just the inner negative spaces would make maps pretty small.

 

Here's another one: A mapset with an inverse relationship between monster count and difficulty.  The first maps would have a lot of monsters, but be very easy, and each subsequent entry would be harder and fewer monsters.  The final maps being nearly void of monsters, but somehow get incredibly difficult.

[DoctorNuriel]

3 hours ago, General Rainbow Bacon said:

Your #3 is interesting.  Would we include negative space on the outside too? Just the inner negative spaces would make maps pretty small.

 

Here's another one: A mapset with an inverse relationship between monster count and difficulty.  The first maps would have a lot of monsters, but be very easy, and each subsequent entry would be harder and fewer monsters.  The final maps being nearly void of monsters, but somehow get incredibly difficult.

Interesting idea! I'm picturing it starts with fodder slaughter and ends in extremely Plutonian maps.

 

And yeah, working with the outer edges of a map would work too! And/or possibly stitching bits of negative space together to create new shapes from the voids of the original maps.

[General Rainbow Bacon]

^I was also thinking that maybe map size could be another relationship examined.  Maybe making the early maps with a lot of monsters small, and the later maps large with little combat, but a lot of puzzles, exploration, and environmental challenges adding to the challenge rather than actual combat.  

[Jayextee]

32 Icon of Sin maps, that'd be a hoot.

[LadyMistDragon]

I always thought we could use more community projects with unique themes, like the DBP partly became known for. Although I get the impression that throwing the textures together like they do in the former case quickly isn't really the sort of thing that's attractive to project leaders and its easier to use preexisting sets like PUSS did with Rowdy Rudy or Mapping at Warpspeed.

[Novaseer]

23 minutes ago, Jayextee said:

32 Icon of Sin maps, that'd be a hoot.

I actually tried to do this back in 2018, but not enough people were interested (to a point including myself as I stopped being active not too long after).

If I can figure out how to DECOHACK spawn cubes, it might be worth a revival in a format people actually use.

[Li'l devil]

The Community Project Community Project, where each participant must make their own community project.

(I wanted to make a joke thread for this for years, but I know that the mods won't exactly pat my head for this one).

[xScavengerWolfx]

More Theme centered community projects like the one i was in called Theme GAWAD. Had a great time and got to learn more about mapping when i was just starting out.

 

Or another one would be surreal / horror eqse mega wads. Like Wormwood or what ever the other one is.

[Walter confetti]

12 hours ago, General Rainbow Bacon said:

A mapset with an inverse relationship between monster count and difficulty.  The first maps would have a lot of monsters, but be very easy, and each subsequent entry would be harder and fewer monsters.  The final maps being nearly void of monsters, but somehow get incredibly difficult.

This Is genuinely a very clever idea!

[ViolentBeetle]

I had an idea that probably won't come into fruition any time soon.

10x10 like project, but each map has 6 textures and 6 flats pre-selected (Plus certain utility textures) and on each map one pair of texture and flat is out and new one is in. So as you progress, you can see gradual shifting on themes.

 

I went as far as to try and create texture schedule, but went mad trying to organize it correctly.

[Doomy__Doom]

2024 could be a good time for a dsda-udmf grab-bag style CP. Without twists and strict theme/genre, probably just a well-known texture pack with vanilla or slightly expanded mbf21 roster. To give anyone who wants to try the format an outlet without the pressure of making a multi-level wad or sinking into the abyss of page 2+ with 0 feedback.

[BeachThunder]

I've been thinking about starting a community project, but I'm also kinda anxious about starting it, and also, organising things is hard. The idea is a single level exquisite corpse-esque speedmap thing. The project would start out as an empty STARTAN room with just a player start and an exit; each person has a 10 minute limit to make whatever additions/changes they like to the level, until (hopefully) eventually it turns into something cool.

[NuMetalManiak]

Making maps that have design aspects of each Doom 2, TNT, and Plutonia map for each mapslot was something I thought of a while back. Like a MAP01 would have aspects of Entryway, System Control, and Congo into one map and so forth.

 

MAP07 of Speed of Doom did something just like that for its MAP07 slot, being designed as a combination of Dead Simple, Prison, and Caughtyard, all the MAP07s of those IWADs.

[Gothic]

A megawad made only by Doomworld members that have usernames with the words "doom", "doomer" or "doomguy".

[ObserverOfTime]

I'd like to see a community project where people go and create sort of minigame in doom map formats. It would be fun to see what sort of creative shenanigans people could come up with. It should be entirely possible to approximate space invaders or Pacman as a doom map, for example.

[NiGHTMARE]

I'd love to see a revisitation of Doom the Way id Did, only with the concept applied to resources in addition to levels.

 

Enemies would probably need to be borrowed from elsewhere due to the amount of work that would be involved (nmn and Amuscaria possibly have enough original sprites between them), but brand new sets of textures, decorations, music, and possibly weapons all seem feasible.

 

The new resources could lean into id's known inspirations, e.g. Alien, Evil Dead, D&D, and the Cthulu mythos, and certain textures and sprites could be based on photos just like Doom's gargoyle heads, tech textures, sp_rock, shotgun, plasma gun, etc are.

Edited February 11 by NiGHTMARE

[Walter confetti]

On 2/10/2024 at 2:47 PM, NuMetalManiak said:

Making maps that have design aspects of each Doom 2, TNT, and Plutonia map for each mapslot was something I thought of a while back. Like a MAP01 would have aspects of Entryway, System Control, and Congo into one map and so forth.

 

MAP07 of Speed of Doom did something just like that for its MAP07 slot, being designed as a combination of Dead Simple, Prison, and Caughtyard, all the MAP07s of those IWADs.

So, like amalgoom but with final doom maps in the mix?

On 2/10/2024 at 1:30 PM, Doomy__Doom said:

2024 could be a good time for a dsda-udmf grab-bag style CP. Without twists and strict theme/genre, probably just a well-known texture pack with vanilla or slightly expanded mbf21 roster. To give anyone who wants to try the format an outlet without the pressure of making a multi-level wad or sinking into the abyss of page 2+ with 0 feedback.

Mmm.. it could be a interesting concept. Well, people can do such a things for Maximum Project as well, but it's a cool thing to have another UDMF mapsets.

14 hours ago, ObserverOfTime said:

I'd like to see a community project where people go and create sort of minigame in doom map formats. It would be fun to see what sort of creative shenanigans people could come up with. It should be entirely possible to approximate space invaders or Pacman as a doom map, for example.

 

On 2/10/2024 at 11:31 AM, ViolentBeetle said:

I had an idea that probably won't come into fruition any time soon.

10x10 like project, but each map has 6 textures and 6 flats pre-selected (Plus certain utility textures) and on each map one pair of texture and flat is out and new one is in. So as you progress, you can see gradual shifting on themes.

 

I went as far as to try and create texture schedule, but went mad trying to organize it correctly.

Interesting concepts as well!

 

I idea that i want to do as a solo release, but i don't know if i can't to do it: a megawad crossing every year of modding until today, starting with 1994 style map and then finishing with a map sets in a MyHouse.pk3 style setting, including the various alternative realities level crossing in the level, all based upon the original Doom 2 levels remake in their associated year style (at least that's my idea)

[Devalaous]

This has been in my head for years, but I want to see Switcheroom taken to a new level and swapping entire games.

 

Imagine Knee Deep in the Dead, turned into City of the Damned from Heretic and vice versa, with each game's unique systems in play (E6M3 would have the *easiest* conversion :p)

 

Imagine Doom 2's 'episodes', turned into Hexen hubs, with Hexen's hubs turned into regular Doom 2 starport/city/hell levels without the fancy hub system and full of demons

 

Chex Quest and KDitD swapped!

[Plerb]

A community project where each map can only use a limited number of textures and flats (something like 5 textures and 2 flats), and the textures you have available are picked with a random number generator. There would be 32 pre-set random texture palettes in the OP that people can claim. Also, no texture would appear in more than one map (except maybe F_SKY1, keydoor identifiers, etc).

[Deadwing]

Community project based on other pwads resources, such as Struggle or 1000k lines 3 for example

[Stabbey]

I've got an idea kicking around for one called "I Choose the Stairs," where the gimmick is that all levels must exit at least 256 units higher than the start, but there can be no lifts, raising floors, or teleports which contribute to progress, you can only ascend no more than 24 units at a time. A hard ban seems excessive, as long as you can't progress upwards with those. The maps will also have a restriction for playable size - the entire playable area of the map has to fit within a certain square footage.

 

The intermission music would obviously be Lee Jackson's "I Choose the Stairs" MIDI from Rise of the Triad, but to be proper intermission music, the first 7-8 seconds or so would need to be shifted to the end so it starts with the drumroll at about 8 seconds. The first 7-8 seconds of buildup feels too long in the context of an intermission screen. I don't know what the MIDI soundfont used is and so don't know how to make that change myself.

 

Quote

 

A project themed after Tricks & Traps' hub-and-spoke design. Complete unique and creative challenge rooms connected by a single hub room per map. 
 

 

 

I'm ahead of the game with that one. (Sort-of. It's only one level.)

 

 

Edited February 11 by Stabbey : added quote

[MFG38]

On 2/10/2024 at 4:03 AM, Li'l devil said:

The Community Project Community Project, where each participant must make their own community project.

 

I actually had an idea for something like this myself at one point. The concept was going to be a community project that anyone who wanted to host their own version of it could "fork" - a reference to Git forking - with possibly a theme given in advance and the details being up to each "forker's" discretion. Ultimately, that idea never came to fruition because I was worried about the logistical side of second-hand managing a possibly overwhelming number of sub-projects.

[Devalaous]

Another one for Heretic: Fate's Path being completed as a 9-map DM episode with singleplayer gameplay. E6M3 would have its exit restored from its previous incarnation as idmap01, and the remaining 6 maps would all be deathmatch-oriented arenas and short maps, that have singleplayer content much like the existing 3 maps. It could potentially also be backported to the original Heretic.

[Roofi]

"INSERT THE NAME OF THE WAD" in name only

[Ravendesk]

7 minutes ago, Roofi said:

"INSERT THE NAME OF THE WAD" in name only

Mock 2 in name only

[General Rainbow Bacon]

^we also need TNT and Plutonia "in name only"

[Vanilla+Unicorn]

Levels with night skybox, preferably in city / techbase setting, always loved this type of maps.

[erzboesewicht]

I'd like to see a Jim Flynn tribute project.

There was some discussion about that when he passed away, but afaik it didn't materialize. I still think his maps are among the best of the 90s and would love to see his ideas reinterpreted by modern mappers. I could contribute a map and music too.

 

I also love General Rainbow Bacon's idea of a megawad with decreasing numbers of monsters and increased difficulty. The later maps would be really a challenge for the mappers (if they're not super-cramped like Swift Death for example) but when playing wads like Cydonia I saw some maps which had extreme monster placement efficiency, so I imagine this to be possible and interesting :) I had a similar shower thought some day to reduce map size with increasing level count, but reduce monster count, while allowing larger levels, is even better.

 

Bonus points (in such a project) for maps where the whole weapon arsenal is available at the end (so simple Tyson maps wouldn't count) and enemy HP is also decreasing.

[Vanilla+Unicorn]

Maybe Sandy Petersen Tribute CP?..