House of Dead Skin [single map, -cl21]

[ivymagnapinna]

Large, abstract and extremely beige single map set in an abstract beige facility built into abstract beige caves. The map is meant to be pretty nonlinear/explorable and large chunks of it are hidden in secrets and/or optional to the non-completionist. Texture theme/visuals and combat setups take a lot from Stardate 20X6 and The 10X10 Project (though I don't think it's quite as hard as those wads.) Features TITLEPIC/INTERPIC graphics by @Insane_Gazebo (edited by me) and a status bar by @Ludi.

- For DOOM2 IWAD, uses MBF21+UMAPINFO

- Tested with DSDA-Doom and GZDoom, targeted at the former

- Difficulty settings implemented

- Big thanks to @taviow, I_G and Ludi for playtesting!

 

Download (final, I think):https://drive.google.com/file/d/1fwxyZFdk-ibBLfMOGYsqk0sBqhkUi-5Y/view?usp=sharing

 

Music+additional credits below the cut:

Spoiler

Title midi-----------------------------egypt.mid by Ribbiks

Intermission midi---------------------Save Room theme from Resident Evil

MAP01: House of Dead Skin----------"Satyr's Ear (Extended)" by Ribbiks

MAP02: SKINSKINSKINSKINSKIN-----depths.mid by Ribbiks

 

custom textures from cc4-tex/32in24-15-tex_v2, plus black sludge textures from Stardate 20X7

 

Edited September 13 by ivymagnapinna : fix title

[taviow]

Straight up one of the best maps I've had the pleasure of playing this year. Thanks @ivymagnapinna for inviting me to playtest :)

[Ludi]

Congrats on the drop!

 

I knew I_G was onto something when he asked me if I was interested in working on this :D

[Mr. Alexander]

Hell yeah, this is really striking. Love "Satyr's Ear." Looking forward to playing this!

 

Decided to record a short FDA in HNTR, not aiming for completion, to see how the lower difficulties had been implemented. Recorded in DSDA-Doom 0.28.1 with an extended HUD.

deadskin01fda-mralexander.zip

[ivymagnapinna]

31 minutes ago, Mr. Alexander said:

Hell yeah, this is really striking. Love "Satyr's Ear." Looking forward to playing this!

 

Decided to record a short FDA in HNTR, not aiming for completion, to see how the lower difficulties had been implemented. Recorded in DSDA-Doom 0.28.1 with an extended HUD.

deadskin01fda-mralexander.zip

thanks!! (I admittedly didn't test the lower difficulties a ton, so if you have any feedback on them that would be appreciated.)

[Gifty]

Some really gorgeous vanilla tex usage here, great work! Bring on the Brown

[Maribo]

Spoiler

 

Tourniquet In Brown (complimentary). Inspiring inter-connective construction, tooth-y without crossing the line into bone-breaking territory, playful, and glazed over with SP_FACE scrollers. Typical meat/flesh themes rely on the combination of pink and red, and thus feel... gooey, living, and sometimes pulsing. This WAD is a bit like one of those maps, but takes place after the living essence of the map has died, rotted away, and left only dust and waste behind. The shed skin of a snake, if you will.

 

demos - Casual UV -dsdademo playthrough on v0.28.1

edit: ^ I've added the RC1 version of the WAD to the zip.

[KeaganDunn]

Just finished this, an amazing nonlinear map that makes expert use of brown vanilla textures. We meet again, STARTAN. There's a lot of dependency on chaingunners and pain elementals, but it makes for a super entertaining experience the whole way through, with nothing that's too overwhelming.

By finding utterly zero secrets due to my own blind autopiloting dumbassery, I had to work with only the SSG, chaingun, and rocket launcher. It proved to be a tough but rewarding experience. Nothing seemed too difficult, I got through most of the setpieces with a few attempts. The only two fights that were sketchy without a cell weapon were the YK caco/arach fight and the fight with perched revs, a single archvile, a row of five chaingunners, and a lot of pain elementals (...a LOT). Came out of those by the skin of my teeth.

 

I will absolutely recommend this to anyone that wants to learn how to contend to pain elementals and lost souls with the rocket launcher. There's a lot to be discovered and so many paths to take - will definitely be replaying this one!

 

 

[ivymagnapinna]

37 minutes ago, Maribo said:

  Reveal hidden contents

 

Spoiler

 

Tourniquet In Brown (complimentary). Inspiring inter-connective construction, tooth-y without crossing the line into bone-breaking territory, playful, and glazed over with SP_FACE scrollers. Typical meat/flesh themes rely on the combination of pink and red, and thus feel... gooey, living, and sometimes pulsing. This WAD is a bit like one of those maps, but takes place after the living essence of the map has died, rotted away, and left only dust and waste behind. The shed skin of a snake, if you will.

 

hods-maribo.zip - Casual UV -dsdademo playthrough on v0.28.1

 

 

Very glad you liked it! Having people write nice things about my maps is the most rewarding thing about making them:3
 

13 minutes ago, KeaganDunn said:

Spoiler

 

Just finished this, an amazing nonlinear map that makes expert use of brown vanilla textures. We meet again, STARTAN. There's a lot of dependency on chaingunners and pain elementals, but it makes for a super entertaining experience the whole way through, with nothing that's too overwhelming.

By finding utterly zero secrets due to my own blind autopiloting dumbassery, I had to work with only the SSG, chaingun, and rocket launcher. It proved to be a tough but rewarding experience. Nothing seemed too difficult, I got through most of the setpieces with a few attempts. The only two fights that were sketchy without a cell weapon were the YK caco/arach fight and the fight with perched revs, a single archvile, a row of five chaingunners, and a lot of pain elementals (...a LOT). Came out of those by the skin of my teeth.

 

I will absolutely recommend this to anyone that wants to learn how to contend to pain elementals and lost souls with the rocket launcher. There's a lot to be discovered and so many paths to take - will definitely be replaying this one!

 

 

You probably wouldn't be surprised that the pain elemental is my favourite monster, and it's good to know even the worst parts are still doable without any extra help from the secrets, tysm!

[dashlet]

Finished playing this. Really fun and complex non linear map. Lots of really cool detailing ideas, a nice texture scheme and overall very engaging combat thats not very hard. This may be the perfect contender for those searching for a bit of doom dosis this weekend. Thank you for sharing.

 

Some rambles and notes i took while playing:

Spoiler

- I liked the first section of the map a lot. Lots of space reusage for different small fights and overall a nice introduction to the map theme.

 

- I was a bit worried that this map would be heavy on set piece encounters, but to my surprise it wasnt. There's a lot of incidental combat and challenging traps that don't necessary lock the player. I think these were my favorite things about this map. 

 

- Talking about set pieces, this was my favorite one by far. I just like damaging floor fights in general, forces you to move around in interesting ways. I do think that the arachnos helped a lot on this fight, but that doesn't mean is not fun.

 

- There was also a lot of really well place turret monsters, as well as some nasty ambushers. They are combined very well with the previously mentioned traps. 

 

- Theres a lot of really interesting detailing going on using boom effects, like mid textures you wouldnt usually see transparent or weird scrolling walls. Really cool to look at. The same goes with how you used flats to create complex floor patterns.

 

- Even though the beige theme is cool, i did have some moments where i just couldnt remember where things were because some parts of the map started to look too similar. It may be a personal problem for not paying much attention. As consequence i spent some time wandering around without really knowing what to do or where to go, even though i wasnt searching for optional stuff.

 

- On this fight, these stalagmites are a bit annoying. I got stuck on them many times while running around. 

 

 

- I got this blue armor secret by doing an strafe50 from here. Not sure if thats intended. It was very useful thought :P

 

 

- On this area i spent like 9 minutes walking around until i figured that this was a lift. I think it should be textured differently or make it stand out a bit more because it kinda blends a lot in the environment.

 

 

Edited September 7 by dashlet

[ivymagnapinna]

2 hours ago, dashlet said:

Finished playing this. Really fun and complex non linear map. Lots of really cool detailing ideas, a nice texture scheme and overall very engaging combat thats not very hard. This may be the perfect contender for those searching for a bit of doom dosis this weekend. Thank you for sharing.

 

Some rambles and notes i took while playing:

  Reveal hidden contents

- I liked the first section of the map a lot. Lots of space reusage for different small fights and overall a nice introduction to the map theme.

 

- I was a bit worried that this map would be heavy on set piece encounters, but to my surprise it wasnt. There's a lot of incidental combat and challenging traps that don't necessary lock the player. I think these were my favorite things about this map. 

 

- Talking about set pieces, this was my favorite one by far. I just like damaging floor fights in general, forces you to move around in interesting ways. I do think that the arachnos helped a lot on this fight, but that doesn't mean is not fun.

 

- There was also a lot of really well place turret monsters, as well as some nasty ambushers. They are combined very well with the previously mentioned traps. 

 

- Theres a lot of really interesting detailing going on using boom effects, like mid textures you wouldnt usually see transparent or weird scrolling walls. Really cool to look at. The same goes with how you used flats to create complex floor patterns.

 

- Even though the beige theme is cool, i did have some moments where i just couldnt remember where things were because some parts of the map started to look too similar. It may be a personal problem for not paying much attention. As consequence i spent some time wandering around without really knowing what to do or where to go, even though i wasnt searching for optional stuff.

 

- On this fight, these stalagmites are a bit annoying. I got stuck on them many times while running around. 

 

 

- I got this blue armor secret by doing an strafe50 from here. Not sure if thats intended. It was very useful thought :P

 

 

- On this area i spent like 9 minutes walking around until i figured that this was a lift. I think it should be textured differently or make it stand out a bit more because it kinda blends a lot in the environment.

 

 

Glad you liked it:3

Spoiler

SR50 to the blue armor wasn't intended, but perfectly fine way of getting that secret.

Retextured that lift (and some others that have similar functions) to have blue lights to stand out more.

 

Updated the download to RC2 with a few minor changes based on this and other feedback I've gotten today, plus no more going to the stock O of Destruction demos on the title screen.

[knifeworld]

Spoiler

Damn, I should've checked Doomworld before playing so I could sink my teeth into RC2 instead of RC1.

Absolutely gorgeous sprawling map!!! I love how it unfolds the more you progress. I still have half of the secrets and some enemies to uncover after reaching the exit, but I need to sleep lol. The first couple of rooms were frustrating and didn't have much room for error but it doesn't last too long like that and opens up a lot after.


Noticed a couple of things:
This switch can be hit from below allowing you to skip a lot of the map: (didn't see anyone mention this and not sure if you caught it in RC2)

Spoiler

This fight can be fairly easily cheesed by running back into the room with the hanging leg and green armor where you came in:

Spoiler

Some prime infighting moments!

Spoiler

 

[ivymagnapinna]

14 hours ago, knifeworld said:

  Reveal hidden contents

Damn, I should've checked Doomworld before playing so I could sink my teeth into RC2 instead of RC1.

Absolutely gorgeous sprawling map!!! I love how it unfolds the more you progress. I still have half of the secrets and some enemies to uncover after reaching the exit, but I need to sleep lol. The first couple of rooms were frustrating and didn't have much room for error but it doesn't last too long like that and opens up a lot after.


Noticed a couple of things:
This switch can be hit from below allowing you to skip a lot of the map: (didn't see anyone mention this and not sure if you caught it in RC2)

  Reveal hidden contents

This fight can be fairly easily cheesed by running back into the room with the hanging leg and green armor where you came in:

  Reveal hidden contents

Some prime infighting moments!

  Reveal hidden contents

 

tysm!! Didn't catch either of these things in the RC2, actually, thanks for bringing them up.

Spoiler

Unless I'm remembering wrong hitting that switch early would only skip a few incidental fights nearby, so I might just leave it in.

I'd wanna watch a demo/recording of that fight cheese first to see how I might wanna fix it, or if I wanna change it lol.

 

[knifeworld]

On 9/8/2024 at 9:21 PM, ivymagnapinna said:

tysm!! Didn't catch either of these things in the RC2, actually, thanks for bringing them up.

NP! Glad to help. Even if nothing needs tweaking I hope the feedback is somehow useful or that the demo is entertaining to watch.
 

Spoiler

It felt like the path that switch opens up once you get one of the keys led to much more on the first run through, but maybe I just found areas I hadn't been to yet (that I could already get to from elsewhere?) when exploring the new stuff beyond the platforms.

 

 

Here's one gigantic demo! Feel free to hyper speed through any boring parts. I somehow managed to play everything back-to-front and kept getting lost and forgetting how to get to places I found before, so apologies for the aimless wandering! especially between 74 and 89 mins.

DeadSkinRC2_dsdademo.zip

At least this time I found everything I couldn't find before

 

Spoiler

(except for one enemy and one secret, whoever it was they must be more lost than me!)

I have no idea how to record or output a specific portion of a demo or record a demo from loading a savegame. So the time where I reach that

Spoiler

cyber + baron + av

fight is roughly around 32 mins, use -skipsec 2120!?

I had to figure out the usage of skipsec, and the timing of where to skip to by trial and error, literally googling how many seconds in ~33 mins xD.
Yet using -skipsec is off by like 1 or 2 minutes, and it takes 5 minutes or more for it to reach that point and the screen is completely black while waiting. So, idk what I'm doing wrong.

Command I used:
Maybe I have to add a different command or perameter for it to skip instantly??

Or maybe my computer is just really too old lmao.
 

dsda-doom -file deadskin_rc2 -playdemo deadskinrc2_dsdademo -skipsec 2120

[Treehouseminis]

This was a great experience.  Exploring this giant place and didnt even notice the time go by.  Didnt find everything but I was satisfied with my secret hunting abilities.

 

Once again very Ribbiks-y but a lot more approachable even on UV.  Love this stuff. 

 

It only says 100% kills because of viles, I think I got like 11xx ish I didnt remember exact number.

 

Also best part of the map ;)

Spoiler

[Gothic Box]

When I saw the WIP screenshots in The Entryway discord I wasn't expecting a something so gargantuan, and I certainly wasn't expecting another masterpiece ~2.5 months after Stone Flower.

 

82:17 on UV, missed 9 enemies and 4 secrets (looked in the editor for the BFG secret, sue me :P) Total playtime w/ saves was closer to 2 hours. Really lovely fights (both the big set-pieces and small skirmishes) with insanely good detailing and visuals. I'd say it's a bit easier than I expected but still top notch stuff. 9.5/10

[ivymagnapinna]

19 hours ago, knifeworld said:

Here's one gigantic demo! Feel free to hyper speed through any boring parts. I somehow managed to play everything back-to-front and kept getting lost and forgetting how to get to places I found before, so apologies for the aimless wandering! especially between 74 and 89 mins.

DeadSkinRC2_dsdademo.zip

Thanks for going to all the trouble to record that! The fight cheese isn't so bad compared to how I planned for the fight to go down tbh, I added a set of bars in front of the computer corridor to prevent the player from hiding in there while the fight is active. I'll probably wait a little before updating to RC3 just in case anyone catches anything else.

[aJynks]

I couldn't get past the start, even on the 2nd lowest difficulty : ( . I'd collect the starting items at the top and then jump down.... that is about as far as I could get. At one attempt I was able to get to a little bit of bit of a breather, basically the opening dudes sorta killed each other, still took a few rockets in the face... but then I was snipped by a wall dropping behind me while I thought about what to do next!! The level seems like it could be fun, but it is for a player of a skill level that is way above me. I think I managed in one attempt to kill about 10 things. After the bazillionth try I never attempted the lowest difficulty, as I was to frustrated.

[aJynks]

On 9/10/2024 at 3:05 PM, knifeworld said:

Here's one gigantic demo! Feel free to hyper speed through any boring parts. I somehow managed to play everything back-to-front and kept getting lost and forgetting how to get to places I found before, so apologies for the aimless wandering! especially between 74 and 89 mins.

DeadSkinRC2_dsdademo.zip

 

How do I play this? I have dsda-doom?

 

EDIT : I found this launcher that seems to run it fine. Maybe I can learn some tricks!

Edited September 11 by aJynks

[knifeworld]

17 hours ago, ivymagnapinna said:

Thanks for going to all the trouble to record that! The fight cheese isn't so bad compared to how I planned for the fight to go down tbh, I added a set of bars in front of the computer corridor to prevent the player from hiding in there while the fight is active. I'll probably wait a little before updating to RC3 just in case anyone catches anything else.

No problemo! It was cool to run through the map again and still end up on an adventure uncovering different ways to get into old areas. Also, sorry for the abysmal performance on the

Spoiler

SMM + HK

fight. I did perfectly fine on the first play and beat it in 5 attempts, maybe I approached it at the wrong time or from the wrong point of entry, lmao.

[knifeworld]

10 hours ago, aJynks said:

-snip-

Sorry for the double post, I shoulda mutli-quoted.

Definitely worth another shot on lower difficulty! And nice to see you got the demo to run with a launcher or whatever.

[ivymagnapinna]

Updated the download to what I think I'm gonna leave as the final version, will submit it to idgames sometime soon maybe.

[Zahid]

great map 

very big and bit complex at times 

i personally dont like non obvious damaging floors on this scale of map coz it make maps no-fun to explore on blind tries

gameplay is balance so far 

i only able to discover 33 percent of map so far and died 

here is my failed fda will try again soon

prboom cl9 uv used popi9.zip  

[ryiron]

Fucking wow. An absolute ton of work has gone into this masterpiece of a map. There are some obvious influences (notably Ribbiks), but I think you manage to find your own voice. The subdued, pale decayed skin, sepia tones and clever use of vanilla textures give the map a unique feel. The music is perfect, kinda of ethereal lullaby and I was still enjoying listening to it by the end of my (long) play-through.

 

I really enjoyed the secret hunting in this. Some tricky to find, but all were well hinted at and rewarded a keen eye. I especially like the secrets that make use of a large spaces, giving the player a sense of being out-of-bounds before find the secret item tucked in the corner. The only one which confused me a bit was the gate to the bfg. I had all three keys when I found it, so wasn't sure what I needed to do to open it. After having found all the other secrets, and not being able to see anything obvious I hadn't visited on the automap I was about to go back to see if it had opened, but did check the map editor.

 

The combat is very fun. Good mix of incidental combat and larger set pieces. It did very very pain-elemental heavy in places. Maybe just because they are much harder to deal with in numbers without the plasma/bfg, which I didn't find until quite late. A few fights remind me of some Ribbiks fights, especially from Stardate. In particular a reference to the teleporter fight in sd02, and the finale reminds me of sd03's ending. In general the combat isn't too tough. I few of the fights gave me a bit of trouble, but none of it feels unfair. The map also has a Torniquet-esque layout, with a few of the fights approachable from different sides and with different equipment. I'd have had much less trouble with the damage floor, spiders/flying enemies fight had I worked out I could grab a radsuit and drop down from above for example. I think it might be intentional, but the secret bfg fight is one of the easiest in the map. I basically did it pacifist, so was left with an abundance of cell ammo and megaspheres. Having the bfg also takes most of the bite out of the final fight, which is mostly difficult because the floor viles can be jerks. 

 

Thanks for making this. I had a heap of fun exploring its bizarre, twisty, dead world, finding secrets and blasting demons. Here's is a long-ass demo, recorded over multiple sessions. Hopefully plays back with -dsdademo (v0.28.1). I had some weird issues playing it back to at 10k gamespeed where it appears to desync an hour or so in, but hitting end to skip to the demo end the analysis.txt file says its 100% kills+secrets: deadskin-ryiron.zip

[KevvyLava]

This map is as meticulously designed as any I've ever seen.  Clearly an expert performance!  Any criticism I could muster would be more personal preferences of mine.  In fact, it's so well done that in my mind, I developed a 'wish list' of things I'd liked to have seen in a similar map.  In short, well done.  I'd be interested to see what else you can put together.

[mancubian_candidate]

Phenomenal map, well done. Took me 90 minutes to find everything and was always fun 😄

[Flyxolydian]

 

Didn't even bother trying to route this one, it's far too open. Loved the mix of fights, there's a little bit of everything, made it super fun to run!

[DisgruntledPorcupine]

Shameless propaganda by the Pain Elemental corporation to sell more Pain Elementals. And I fell for it like a sucker. Truly a great map, very meticulous and I had a lot of fun.

[slowfade]

On 9/7/2024 at 10:20 PM, ivymagnapinna said:

You probably wouldn't be surprised that the pain elemental is my favourite monster

Interesting. Why is that?

 

Anyway, it's an incredible map! I noticed it when it was released but couldn't play until recently. It's almost ridiculous how it just goes on and on in every direction with cool ideas and self-coherent texturing everywhere. I finished the map but still had half of the monsters left, hidden away somewhere. So I'll need to revisit it some day.

 

I also feel unwell reading this took about 2 months while I've used twice that time for a couple of thousand linedefs of relatively bad looking rooms.

[ivymagnapinna]

3 hours ago, slowfade said:

Interesting. Why is that? 

I like them as a threat that takes up more and more space, and gets more and more angles to attack you with via lost souls, the longer they're left alive, so you have to prioritize them very hard. They also make the rocket launcher dangerous to use (close groups of revs/pinkies/barons can as well, but you need a lot more of them) so you can build more interesting fights around it. (also, their design is very cute, they're not scaring anyone with that goofy grin and stubby little arms lol.)