Surge 3!

[NiGHTMARE]

Yes it's new DM megawad time! But don't go looking at the name and thinking "oh great, another 32 tiny symmetrical one-vs-one DM levels", because this one will be different :)

Don't go [newproject]ing this either, because many of the levels are already available for download!


The features:

Designed exclusively for Skulltag!

Yep, as far as I'm aware this will be the first ever Skulltag-only megawad, and as such will take full advantage of the full range of Skulltag's many features, obviously including those from ZDoom 2.0 as well as the new weapons, power-ups, etc. There may even be a few CTF and Skulltag levels included :)


Around 30 totally unsymmetrical levels designed for four or more players.

Whereas Surge 1 was mostly gothic and Surge 2 was nearly all industrial & tech, Surge 3's levels will cover just about every theme previously seen in Doom (and maybe even some that haven't been!)

Many of these levels will be greatly expanded revamps or even complete remakes of the best Surge 1 & 2 maps, while others will be revamps/remakes of some of my other DM levels, such as Realms of Pain, my two GothicDM 2 maps, MorbidDM 1 & 2, etc. The rest will be brand new!


Literally hundreds of new textures and flats!

I'm going to be making use of my all-in-one texture .wad for this, which combines almost every modified Doom (2) texture and flat I've ever made. What this means for you is that the levels will (hopefully) look both Doomish and relatively unique at the same time :)


Dozens of new decorations

Like the textures, these will be new but still Doom-ish looking; some are modified versions of existing decorations (for example, toppled barrels, different coloured torches and lamps), whilst others are carefully selected from other FPS'. Oh, and they'll be added via the DECORATE lump, so all the originals will still be there too.


New weapons and power-ups!!!

Yes you read that right. Many of the Heretic, Hexen and Weapons and items will be used (with new sprites of course), so expect to see blasters, rifles, flamethrowers, mines, and all sorts of other cool gizmos and gadgets added to Skulltag's already impressive arsenal.

These new additions won't be randomly thrown in, either; they'll all be carefully selected and balanced. In cases where a weapon closely resembles and existing Doom one (Heretic's Dragon Claw is very similar to the Chaingun for instance), the Doom original may very well be modified via DeHackEd into something totally new.


Lots of other great stuff

Of course it goes without saying that there'll be lots of great MIDI music (old and new). There may also be a couple of new skins, and perhaps a few suprises!


Status:

Currently the texture .wad is complete; the new decorations are mostly finished (they basically just need putting into a .wad); and the new weapons graphics have nearly been assembled (though no balancing has taken place yet).

Soon I'm going to go about chosing the best Surge 1, 2, etc levels and chuck them all into a .wad together. Once that's done I can get to the level editing!


Release date:

My hope is to have at least part of the project released by the end of next year. Even if it isn't the entire thing, it'll serve to show everyone what to expect when it is finished! :)


Help:

I'm happy to work on this by myself, but I'm also very open to offers of help.

Level designers don't even have to create new levels, because revamping the selection of previously released maps would assist me greatly. In fact, feel free to submit your own previously released .wads too ;)

In any case, be aware that the level design needs to be of at least the kind of standard of the regular Skulltag levels. In other words, good looks AND good gameplay :)

Anything else (music, sprites, etc) needs to be of a reasonably high standard too.

[Fredrik]

Oh great, another 32 tiny symmetrical one-vs-one DM levels. Way to go, Nick.

[ReX]

NiGHTMARE said:

My hope is to have at least part of the project released by the end of next year.

Holy crap! A one-year timeline for perhaps only a part of the project -- that is an ambitious project, even as a one-man operation. Nevertheless, I wish you the best on this endeavor, Nick. You make good stuff.

[boris]

Revamping maps? I'm in!

[The Ultimate DooMer]

ReX said:

timeline

OMG it's stopped working!!

Anyway, if it has a ton of rebadged Heretic/Hexen weapons in as well as the Skulltag ones, it should be impressive.

[sargebaldy]

[newproj..

aw, damn :(

[zark]

I've got a ZDoom DM map sitting on my hard drive that I never got round to putting the finishing touches to. Granted, it's a symetrical arena map, so it might not be what you're looking for, but it's there if you want it.

[NiGHTMARE]

Well what I'm going to do with the Surge 1/2 maps is expand them in every direction (well besides up/down, heh) but make sure each direction is done differently than the others.

In other words, the centre of the maps will still be more-or-less symmetrical, but the outer parts won't be. So the same could be done with your map :)

BTW anyone got any favourite Surge 1 or 2 levels they'd like to see updated for this?

Oh yeah I hope to have some screenies up soon showing off a couple of the new levels & weapons. Note that I didn't make the weapons graphics myself, so they're all borrowed from other wads. Nearly all the other new graphics (textures, flats, decorations) are by me, though there are some resources by other people I couldn't resist using ;)

[Cyb]

if they're not going to be tiny symetrical maps I think you should change the name, because calling it surge 3 will incite fear in many :P

[prower]

i made a map for surge 2 it was a square

[Fredrik]

prower said:

i made a map for surge 2 it was a square

Yeah but which of them?

[Manc]

Fredrik said:

Oh great, another 32 tiny symmetrical one-vs-one DM levels. Way to go, Nick.

Nightmare said for one of his headings:
Around 30 totally unsymmetrical levels designed for four or more players.

[Szymanski]

Mancubus II quoted:
stuff

it's humour :)

[Linguica]

<Linguica> There once was a Doomer named Nick, who loved to make levels real quick, it's rumored he may, have made Surge 2 in a day, too bad its awfulness made me sick

[Job]

Linguica said:

&lt;Linguica&gt; There once was a Doomer named Nick, who loved to make levels real quick, it's rumored he may, have made Surge 2 in a day, too bad its awfulness made me sick

Nice limerick.

[ReX]

Speaking of squares, here's another:

There was a DooMer named NiGHTMARE,
Whose skills were better than fair.
But he made all these maps,
That created quite a flap.
For he stopped when he’d drawn up a square.

;)

[NiGHTMARE]

I've started work on the first Surge 3 level.

It's no less than SIX Surge 1 maps combined :)