looking for recording suggestions

[cycloid]

maybe there could be a pinned thread with suggested maps/megawads etc. i looked through the fragport thing and none of it really appealed to me, what else is there for an ameteur runner like myself to toy with? i remember quite enjoying the h2p challenge (though i did foolishly choose the longest map to run, dohh!). the problem is that ther are about 1 million custom levels/megawads and no way of knowing which ones are demo worthy aside from the ones that are maxed out already by turbo doom nutters.

[DEMOn]

There are LOTS of good levels that do not have demos... and you don't have to be at Radek's quality to submit something. Everyone is very welcome here and at all the demosites.(Compet-N has rules though)
I have like 40 wads on my demo 'to do' list.... but I haven't the time to spend atm.
If you are really driven, I suggest combing through the DSDA ( http://www.doomworld.com/sda/doom_sda.htm ) for wads by respected authors that don't have demos yet.... or look at the 'best of' lists that have been released recently (Doomworld's 10year wad list or Swedish Fish or C-cooper or Doom Underground or or or) and choose a wad that has good quality (choosing a good quality wad ensures that others people will be interested in watching).
overall, I would simply look at wads that YOU like and go from there. Choose something that you like to play... say Mock2 or Chris Lutz' goodness or TNT's latest releases....
I look forward to seeing what you come up with. :)

[Kristian Ronge]

A few suggestions...

*2002: A Doom Odyssey (Several demos at the SDA already)
*Number One Kill The Next Generation (1killtng.wad) seems to have many okay maps.
*Any WAD you've played, and enjoyed. :-)

.. And why not make a demo for Fragport? It would keep the ball rolling (or, more like keep the moss off the still-standing ball).

[Grazza]

Good idea for a thread. When I'm back home (Sunday), I'll give it some thought and come up with a few suggestions. But I agree with Kristian: why not record on one of the Fragport maps? Maybe one of those arenas towards the end.

[cycloid]

yeah, i'll have another run through FP tonight to see what i fancy, the only wads i play are the newstuff each week as it comes in and in the past couple of months there's been nothing that had the right combination of elements to light my fire, which is part of the reason i made cyc-b (/plug :-)

[Searcher]

There are also a number of "lost maps" in the archives that may be old or just never had much exposure. The new oldstuff lists have a handful of the decent maps each time a new one is posted. Many of those, mostly older maps, would never have exposure if not for doomer4ever's effort.

Granted most of them are crappy wads but if you try the ones that he gives, say, better than 75% score you might find some real diamonds in the rough.

[Grazza]

That last post reminds me: all the Blind Alley maps are demo-friendly. Of course, by the time they appear there are already good Max demos by Rich and Gene himself in most cases, so perhaps Speed or Fast could be tried instead (or NM or Tyson in some cases).

[DooMer 4ever]

True, there are a lot of wads that would deserve some demos. I've been thinking about starting an invasion2 demopack someday (I don't think there's any), but at the moment I don't have any time for that because of my mapping project.

And besides, I'm awfully stuck on playing with zdoom nowadays so I don't think I could make good demos with prboom :(

[Opulent]

the DSDA and this forum welcomes zdoom single-player demos.

[DooMer 4ever]

Sure you CAN record record zdoom demos but unfortunately they won't be compatible with the next zdoom version. That has already happened with my h2h-xmas demopack for zdoom. You'd need the older version to watch them :( This is why I hope new stable version for Zdoom will soon be released so that it could be used to record demos.

Btw, I recorded mines of titan speed demo as well as mock2 map 14 pacifist demo before the h2h-xmas pack with zdoom beta 53 I think. If someone still has that version of zdoom and would like to see those demos, just ask. The mines of titan demo is quite good IMO. IIRC the time was 2:45 which is 45 seconds better than my previos time. And that mock2 demo is just absurdly lucky :)

[Kristian Ronge]

If you want to record demos in ZDooM you should probably either use versions 1.17(?) or 1.22 (the last "non-beta" releases) or wait for the next "non-beta" release.

Unless the map *requires* a recent version of ZDooM, that is.

[DEMOn]

I'm completely with Kristian on this: the recent betas are just that betas. I understand that there are 100's or amazing enhancements to the mod since 1.22, but making maps for an under-development mod version will always be shaky.
Doomer4ever, I'd like those demos.... but I'm so behind, I don't know when I'd get around to watching them. =/

[Grazza]

Zdoom 2.0.53 is available here, and I'm sure a lot of people have a copy anyway (the same goes for many other Zdoom 2.0 betas), so you might as well send the demos.

Oh, and before someone points out that Randy isn't calling them betas any more: yes, that's true, but it's clearly what they are. Or maybe they're gammas or deltas, or something. :)

[DooMer 4ever]

DEMOn said:

Doomer4ever, I'd like those demos.... but I'm so behind, I don't know when I'd get around to watching them. =/

Ok, I'll send them to you possibly tomorrow, if I still have them on my hard-drive that is.

[Szymanski]

I haven't seen any demos for the kzdoom series or fava_beans.

[Grazza]

Szymanski said:

I haven't seen any demos for the kzdoom series or fava_beans.

There are plenty of Fava Beans demos.

[Szymanski]

whoops :) I looked under F on the SDA and missed it

Anyway I suppose there's Endgame, maps 1, 4 and 7 aren't being changed AFAIK.

[DEMOn]

Endgame is at the top of my list... closely followed by HR2.
kzdoomX wads have been on my list for years. :)
Kesler's maps are pretty big, so they are something of a commitment to make a good demo from... but it is a great choice.

[Grazza]

OK, I promised a few suggestions. Just a handful, but hopefully interesting ones:

LOH2: maps 08, 09 and 10 are still in need of demos.

Pretty much any of Shitbag's maps: this or the SP wads listed on this page. Or this (really fun).

There are some gaps in the Real World table (IMO the most fun wad of 2003). UV -fast should be especially interesting.

Kill! Zone 1 and Kill! Zone 2. 14 stonking maps to blast through. Max demos won't be too quick, but they won't be at all boring. :)

[cycloid]

ooh, me likes the look of those loh2 maps. though it took me a million attempts to get through map08 the first time (second area with lots of revenants,barons and general hitscan nastyness, until i accidentally fell out of the window and ooh soulsphere!) i reckon it's about my level of demo-ness.. though i was gutted once i opened it up in the level editor and found the bfg lurking in the darkness!

[Searcher]

Grazza said:

That last post reminds me: all the Blind Alley maps are demo-friendly. Of course, by the time they appear there are already good Max demos by Rich and Gene himself in most cases, so perhaps Speed or Fast could be tried instead (or NM or Tyson in some cases).

Grazza, Thanks for the Blind Alley plug ;)

You're right they are demo friendly and there are very few speed runs, NM or tysons of them. I'm not sure all are do-able in max tyson. They should all be do-able in Fast, speed or NM runs.

NM on a couple of them would be pretty astounding.

Donatas, among others, has posted in this forum, several excellent demos, including a TAS NM speed run on BAT, possibly the hardest of all the maps in the series. Highly recommended if anyone missed them. Of course, BAE comes pretty close as hardest.

When you warp into BAE and you hear a couple of rev's scream BEHIND you it is a bit un-nerving, you know you are in trouble. That opening still scares me, and it's my level.

Most of the BA maps should also be do-able in the SSG only category.

My personal focus is on max runs but I love all the demos I have on my maps.

It might be a good time to thank again, all the people that have sent me or posted demos of my Blind Alley maps. I have been very fortunate to have a number of excellent players send me demos. Thanks again to all. I still watch them.

I try hard to make them all demo friendly, and fun.

Shameless plug:
The next Blind Alley map is about two weeks away. BAY, "Dissolution" promises to uphold the Blind Alley tradition.

[The Ultimate DooMer]

DooMer 4ever said:

Sure you CAN record record zdoom demos but unfortunately they won't be compatible with the next zdoom version. That has already happened with my h2h-xmas demopack for zdoom. You'd need the older version to watch them :( This is why I hope new stable version for Zdoom will soon be released so that it could be used to record demos.

Kristian Ronge said:

If you want to record demos in ZDooM you should probably either use versions 1.17(?) or 1.22 (the last "non-beta" releases) or wait for the next "non-beta" release.

Unless the map *requires* a recent version of ZDooM, that is.

It might also be a good idea to use 47 or 47i, as they're still available in http://zdoom.org/lars. And look likely to be, given that they're the last of the older versions before massive fundamental changes were made. (and they're pretty stable, too)

There are also (surprisingly) still not that many maps being released for newer versions, so most ZDoom maps will work on 47/47i.
(maybe all the wads using the newer versions are big projects like mine)

[VinceDSS]

pls dont use zdoom to record demos :(
At least dont until they add a compatibility with older demos.

I really hate to have to install different versions of a port in order to watch some demos.

Use prboom instead it has ideal vertical compatibility, and I guess Legacy has too.

[Grazza]

VinceDSS said:

Use prboom instead it has ideal vertical compatibility, and I guess Legacy has too.

You can't always be sure that a Legacy demo will play back OK with a newer version, although from my experience they are quite likely to in most cases.

[Grazza]

Another suggestion: Henry.

[myk]

Kristian Ronge said:
If you want to record demos in ZDooM you should probably either use versions 1.17(?) or 1.22 (the last "non-beta" releases) or wait for the next "non-beta" release.

Except that, those versions, unlike later ones, have the sticky monsters bug, where if a flying monster is next to another and one of the two becomes dormant after killing an opponent, they end up stuck together and totally helpless. Also, if I'm not mistaken, newer versions have an infinitely tall things option, which is fitting for maps made with Doom or Boom in mind.

[cycloid]

Grazza said:

Another suggestion: Henry.

w00t b33r!

[DooMer 4ever]

Grazza said:

Another suggestion: Henry.

Heh, that site has Wheel Of Time Doom too. I played that wad a LONG time ago and when my brother saw the wadname (wotdoom) he asked "what are you playing? Waste of time doom?" Well, anyway, I once tried to find that wad again but all the links were broken, seems like this one isn't.

Another wads that would require demos would be Mike Reeds levels found on his homepage here:
http://home.att.net/~m.reed/doom2/d2levs.htm

Two of those, the rabbit hole and the core aren't on the archives as far as I know. Someone should really upload them, I've had that in mind but haven't had time to do it.

And yes, Blind alley series should be exellent for demo recording.

[Searcher]

I think Rich might have posted a rabbit hole demo at DSDA, but no clue about The Core.

Rabbit hole is a fairly challenging map.

I can't recall ever seeing a core demo.

[Grazza]

Searcher said:

I think Rich might have posted a rabbit hole demo at DSDA

Yes, he did.

After a bit of poking around, I found the homepage of the author of Henry.wad, Premysl 'Vincenzo' Jedlicka (there should be a couple of accents on that). He doesn't offer any beer though, just a "testimonial of honor".