Getting into making Doom levels

[Aseph]

I've previously had several failed attempts at Wad making, but now I've decided to give it a shot agian. I was wondering if anyone has some good tips for a semi-beginner, like which Doom level editors are the best, or the easiest to use, etc.

Thanks.

[Negatronica]

I suggest using DCK, that is, if you use DOS. You can make a room in about 1 second, its just click and drag, no making vertices and then joining them together to make walls and then joining the walls to make sectors. Its very automated.

[Aseph]

Well I don't use dos, but thanks anyway.

[The Ultimate DooMer]

WadAuthor and DeePsea are the best and most popular, they seem to be the choice for beginners these days.

[Reisal]

Doom Builder by Gherkin looks very promising, he released an alpha/preview version a few days ago. It's most likely (when it exits alpha stage) to be better than DeeP minus all the WAD management/import/export crap, just a pure level creator. You can create sectors (ala DCK) with lines OR vertices (ala DEU or DETH).

[Grogglogobofink]

i highly recommend you try the new editor on the block, doom builder. unlike deepsea, it's not cluttered as hell, and unlike wadauthor, it allows you to draw vertices, linedefs, and sectors. it's certainly the most normal of the three, and also has a very user-friendly interface. it lacks zdoom support, and many other features at the moment, but it is of course only an alpha, and you're probably better off starting with vanilla mapping anyway.

[FireBastard]

Umm, I found that DeePsea has ALL the stuff you need for serious level building. I found it a snap to use when I started (kickass tutorial) and a godsend when it came to adding new resources to my beginning levels.

Adding and messing with textures, sounds and all is a MUST have and hardly "crap" unless of course you consider Wintex, NWT and XWE crap because that's also what they do. I used to use them, but no longer.

From what I see, there is no DEU type drawing, except you can add vertices and then connect them. Not too useful. Once you learn line drawing as in DeePsea (and in DB) there's no going back to that vertex junk.

Doombuilder is a fine start (seems to be a copy of a lot of DeePsea stuff and WA type texture selection - very clumsy for selecting textures and types), but maybe when it gets more stuff can be a serious level design tool. For now it's too simple and awkward from what I got used to. Btw, what is going to happen when Hexen support is added?

[DooMBoy]

Aside from all the above editor babblements, take heed to this:
if you do a map, and think it's crap, don't give up. This is important. If you make a bad map, or one you think might be bad, then you'll never get off the ground with your wad creating. Keep at it, look at other maps, play them a lot, and take note of their designs in your editor of choice and notice what "makes them good" - the map's actual layout, choice of textures, amount of enemies/ammo/weapons, etc, etc, etc.
Most importantly, and I hate to sound redundant: do NOT give up. My first couple attempts at wad creating were awful, but I perservered and I can actually make a good looking, playable map if I really try.

[Grogglogobofink]

of course you can do basically whatever in deepsea (except the ability to add verts and connect them, doomcad-style), but that's also not a free editor. it's also trickier to use, even if you did manage it without problems. i know how to work it as well, although it took me months whereas doom builder took me 15 minutes. deepsea is everything you need, and 90% more you don't.

DooMBoy said:

Most importantly, and I hate to sound redundant: do NOT give up. My first couple attempts at wad creating were awful, but I perservered and I can actually make a good looking, playable map if I really try.

well said. i think everyone started off making crappy maps. i mean, just look at cyb and doomjr.

[netnomad312]

As previously stated, WadAuthor and DeePsea are the two most popular. But it all depends on how YOU want to build, as these two are racidally different; in DeepSea you usually draw lines yourself to make a new sector, whereas in WadAuthor you place a sector and THEN screw around with it. WadAuthor is definitely easier.

MY first couple of tries were in DeePsea, and I happened to fail spectacularly. But, I found WadAuthor last December and I'm currently making a full megawad with it (18 levels complete so far).

[FireBastard]

When I read the above are you sure you guys really used DeePsea? For one thing it CAN do exactly the same thing as WA with the prefab tools. To me that's for people who have no clue (or are too lazy) to figure out details.

As far as "drawing", it's exactly the same as DB and then some -- so I have no idea how you guys figure one is easy and the other is hard when they are the same when it comes to line drawing. Well not really, but you'd have to do more to see what I mean here.

No matter what you end up using, I too agree that you can't give up. I admit it took me a bit of time to learn the ropes, but once I did everything became pretty damn easy.

[netnomad312]

*Ahem* I did say usually. Yes, DeePsea has prefab tools. But I couldn't even get two sectors to hook up, heh.

[ReX]

Aseph said:

I was wondering if anyone has some good tips for a semi-beginner, like which Doom level editors are the best, or the easiest to use, etc.

Read the Tutorials section at DooM Nexus.

[Cyb]

Grogglogobofink said:

i mean, just look at cyb and doomjr.

I'm better now I swear! look!

http://cyb.vect.org:8080/pics/DOOM0057.png

also I've been putzing with XWE a lot recently, trying to get away from wintex, and so far it's been quite nice, and a lot less of a hassle than wintex ever was. for instance it's obscenly easy to add a texture, right click on the patch in the listing (or the sprite or graphic if you desire) and then click 'add to texture' and tada! instant texture! also amazing you can actually delete textures, something I have yet to figure out in wintex even after years of use. indeed, xwe is quite nice, without an intimidating (or confusing) UI, it gets the cyb stamp of approval!

[Grogglogobofink]

yeah, i've been heading the XWE route myself, it's an excellent tool, although suffers from having no organization. if csabo adds in a way to sort stuff, and a few other little touches (like an option to make saves manual and not automatic), i'll probably drop wintex completely.

[Doom_Dude]

Cyb said:

I'm better now I swear! look!

http://cyb.vect.org:8080/pics/DOOM0057.png

also I've been putzing with XWE a lot recently, trying to get away from wintex, and so far it's been quite nice, and a lot less of a hassle than wintex ever was. for instance it's obscenly easy to add a texture, right click on the patch in the listing (or the sprite or graphic if you desire) and then click 'add to texture' and tada! instant texture! also amazing you can actually delete textures, something I have yet to figure out in wintex even after years of use. indeed, xwe is quite nice, without an intimidating (or confusing) UI, it gets the cyb stamp of approval!

Absolutely! If it wasn't for XWE id be totally screwed as Wintex was always too alien to me. It takes only a few sec to get a new texture into a wad and then have it checked out in-game. Gotta like it.

[Grogglogobofink]

heh, i never got how anyone couldn't understand wintex. it's interface is a lot like XWE except it has everything sorted out.

[geekmarine]

heh, i never got how anyone couldn't understand wintex. it's interface is a lot like XWE except it has everything sorted out.

LOL great description. Personally, I wanted to use XWE, but I didn't get it, so I've stuck with Wintex. I like Wadauthor, myself. It's nice; it reminds me in a way of playing with legos, just get a new sector and connect it to your creation. BTW Cyb that's nice. I think you should do a follow up on Helm's Deep, maybe Moria or something, because that is one of my favorite levels ever. Sure, the framerate craps out a couple of times, but when it doesn't, it's really fun to fight off hordes of imps and then when dawn comes and the plasma guys show up, that's just so cool.

[Cadman]

I use Deepsea exclusively for all my editing needs, I find it very easy to use, but again that's me...:) I just upgraded up to version 11.81 and it is great! I have everything I need right in front of me.

Remember, like it's been said, stick with it! You will make bad maps no matter what editor you use but they will get better with time, hang in there!

Cadman - Member TeamTNT

[deathz0r]

Cyb said:

also amazing you can actually delete textures, something I have yet to figure out in wintex even after years of use.

You have to rename it to another texture and put those patches in it. I can't exactly remember if the top texture (in the list) or the bottom texture is the one that replaces it though...

[Sporku]

deleting textures in WinTex is practically impossible.. If I delete the texture, it deletes some other texture in stead, or deletes multiple textures. I can add hundreds of textures in as little as 30 seconds with DeepSea. I sometimes use XWE to add textures on, too.

[Grogglogobofink]

yeah, i use wintex most of the time still, usually only switching to XWE when it's necessary. that works very well for me.

[Szymanski]

I went from WinDEU --> Wadauthor --> Deepsea. I found no real difficulties getting used to each UI. Deepsea provided the least buggy editing experience. Try as many as possible.

Using the editor is the simple part, learning the process is the most difficult part. I only learned texture offsets and how to make true pillars on my second map (previously i'd just set ceiling height = floor height for pillars). Linedefs and sidedefs had me stumped for a few days.

There are some good tutorials on editing, I think they are linked in Doomworlds editing pages.

[Grogglogobofink]

yeah, trying numerous editors is a good idea. i wouldn't recommend trying wadauthor first as it's one of a kind, and if you get used to it, you'll have trouble switching to anything else. i've been using doomcad since '96, and i can use pretty much anything BUT wadauthor, although i much prefer using something with a vertice base, which is part of why i'm orgasming over doom builder right now :)

[netnomad312]

Cyb said:

also amazing you can actually delete textures, something I have yet to figure out in wintex even after years of use.

Heh. That's a bug, really. There's no "delete texture" option, no. But you just press Del and it gets deleted - even though it still looks like it's there. Just quit the texture editor and go back in - and it's no longer there.

[NiGHTMARE]

Grogglogobofink said:

unlike deepsea, it's not cluttered as hell

Uh, MORE of the screen is taken up with toolbars and stuff in Doom Builder than in DeePSea. For one thing, DB might have less menus, but the menu bar still takes up exactly the same amount of space as it does in DS. Not only that, but DB has huge and annoying icons underneath the menu bar which take up valuable vertical space.

Also, DS's properties panel only takes up a tiny portion of the screen (and IIRC it's possible to move it around if you want to), whereas DB's equivalent panel takes up the entire bottom of the screen!

If you ask me, Doom Builder just seems like an old version of DeePSea's predecessor, DeeP.

Cyb said:

also amazing you can actually delete textures, something I have yet to figure out in wintex even after years of use.

It's possible, but a bit of a hassle. I usually rename all my unwanted textures to A, quit the texture editing and then go back into it. Now I'm just left with only one unwanted texture, which I rename to a texture I'm keeping (preferrably one with only one patch), and then make it identical to that texture.

[Cyb]

NiGHTMARE said:

I usually rename all my unwanted textures to A, quit the texture editing and then go back into it. Now I'm just left with only one unwanted texture, which I rename to a texture I'm keeping (preferrably one with only one patch), and then make it identical to that texture.

that's bollocks, could it be a little more complex please? XWE: go to the texture lump, click on a texture name. hit alt+delete. fucking done.

stupid shitty VB apps

[NiGHTMARE]

I did say it's a bit of a hassle :)

[Grogglogobofink]

NiGHTMARE said:

Uh, MORE of the screen is taken up with toolbars and stuff in Doom Builder than in DeePSea. For one thing, DB might have less menus, but the menu bar still takes up exactly the same amount of space as it does in DS. Not only that, but DB has huge and annoying icons underneath the menu bar which take up valuable vertical space.

i don't mean the space on the screen. i mean the fact that deepsea's menus are so grossly far away from organized you can only understand what's going on if you've memorized the program, whereas DB doesn't have options like 'add prefab arc line' that have probably never been used, and even if DB did, it would be something you could configure and bind to a key and not something plaguing the menus. in short, i don't mean the screen is cluttered, i meant the menu organization is.

NiGHTMARE said:

If you ask me, Doom Builder just seems like an old version of DeePSea's predecessor, DeeP.

eh, i used the original deep, like twice, like 5 years ago, but never could stand the thing. and no version of deep* afaik allows you to insert vertices seperate from linedefs, or even create unfinished sectors (at least without an annoying nag screen), which are both very useful to me. doombuilder is nice because it allows people like me who prefer a vertice-based editor to have that as an option, while still retaining its powers as a linedef-based editor. deep arrogantly decided that he feels vertice editing is more tedious and thus refuses to add it, meaning people have fewer ways to try to learn editing.

at the same time DB has a very nice, easy-to-read interface, and organized menus. it allows bindable keys as well, which allows for much more customizability than deepsea. i'm proficient in both, and was actually using deepsea for a few weeks up until doombuilder's release. i was only just getting the hang of deepsea; doombuilder took me about 5 minutes to figure out. certainly i don't see your argument that deepsea is a better beginner editor than DB, even if you prefer it after years of use.

[NiGHTMARE]

Grogglogobofink said:

i mean the fact that deepsea's menus are so grossly far away from organized you can only understand what's going on if you've memorized the program.

The menu organisation makes perfect sense to me. File options are under 'file', mode selection under 'modes', help screens under 'help', etc.

whereas DB doesn't have options like 'add prefab arc line' that have probably never been used, and even if DB did, it would be something you could configure and bind to a key and not something plaguing the menus

DeePSea has no such option either. If you're talking about prefabs in general, that's kinda ironic since IIRC the only reason they're there is because people were bugging the author to add them :) Besides, they already do have hotkeys assigned to them, and they have a menu all to themselves so it's not as if they're getting in the way of options you do need or anything.

no version of deep* afaik allows you to insert vertices seperate from linedefs

I never saw the point in that myself, and clearly deep (the guy) doesn't either :)

or even create unfinished sectors (at least without an annoying nag screen)

You've been able to get rid of this message (in 'Set Error Checking Options') since the days of DOS DeeP ;)

deep arrogantly decided that he feels vertice editing is more tedious and thus refuses to add it, meaning people have fewer ways to try to learn editing.

Wouldn't that mean the authors of editors which only support vertice editing are being even more arrogant, since more people prefer linedef editing than vertice editing? Personally I don't see it as being arrogant to do something the way you like it when it's your own program.

It's not as if DeeP's the only editor available. Clearly deep just thought that instead of him spending ages coding something he didn't even see the point of and relatively few people would use, level designers should simply use an editor that does let them do what they want.

certainly i don't see your argument that deepsea is a better beginner editor than DB.

I don't remember saying that :) Although as a matter of fact, DeePSea does have pretty good tutorials...