Plutonia

[Phil1984]

Is it just me or is Plutonia the best megawad available? I was lucky enough just to complete my first (but certainly not my only) play-through on Plutonia and it is just such great fun! It not only has great level design but gameplay that is tough, but not as frustrating as say a Hell Revealed. It also contains my fav map ever, lvl32 "Go to it". So who is with me? Is Plutonia the best megawad going around?

[Technician]

Not the best mega wad available, but a very solid fun one to say the least.

[Kristian Ronge]

Plutonia has always been popular with the speedrunning crowd. It is favoured strongly by many of COMPET-N's legends, such as Anders Johnsen, Adam Hegyi, Yonatan Donner, and Henning Skogsto. The most accomplished COMPET-N player to never touch Plutonia at all is probably Thomas "Panter" Pilger, the author of the first real 30nm. That doesn't mean he didn't like it, though; he said himself in his COMPET-N profile that he didn't "have time to get into [it]".

[Lutrov71]

Phil1984 said:

Is Plutonia the best megawad going around?

I think it is.

[Belial]

I agree with the 1024 guy.

[wildweasel]

It's most certainly the best "official" megawad available, but not quite the best wad ever. I tend to prefer Requiem and Tvr! over Plutonia, but I do come back to Plutonia every so often.

[Vegeta]

For me it is, very solid, and has a solid classic DOOM feel that make it unique. With some new monsters it'd be a perfect (true) DOOM 3.
Requiem it's good and all, but it's very boring and tedious if you play it from start to end, Plutonia in the other hand while I agree that certain maps like Tomb Stone are a bit tedious, overall it's very fun, and has the perfect level of hardness to be a challange more than a frustration. After the years it isn't that hard anyomer but still it's very fun and the classic feels remains.

[-_DLD_-]

Plutonia is an excellent set of maps to be sure. It's also one of (if not the) first "ultra-hard" megawads, which probably inspired great megawads such as Hell Revealed.

I need to sit down and actually play through Plutonia one of these days. I guess my skills are too miniscule to finish it as of now.

With the amazing quality of the maps and sheer amount of thought put into them, it's kind of hard to believe only two guys speedmapped the whole thing (I think they had only 4 months or something to make the entire megawad).

[Siggi]

Phil1984 said:

It also contains my fav map ever, lvl32 "Go to it".

I like your taste in maps.
I think "Go to it" is the map I play most often from plutonia.

[Ezxariarch]

I personally liked plutonia, but thought it was kinda hard. But maybe tahts because I have only played te thing once. I tend to run into a lot f baddies around the corners ang get my arse kicked. Coop however, is particularly fun since you dont have to respawn and do everything over. I still can't beat it, it probably means i'm a bad doom player.

[Vegeta]

Don't worry Ezxariarch I find your Demon Eclipse to be almost if not equal as hard (except that it doesn't have the overuse of chaingunners wich it's a good thing). Hope to see your second episode soon.

[DeumReaper]

Plutonia is sweet cause it feels like a combination of DooM and DooM II-style maps (which indirectly leads to a lot of random themes from both, that's a good thing), while it has a higher difficulty to keep it fresh.
However, I will always favor Evilution over Plutonia, not just because of new textures and music, but also the maps turn out a new style and still feels like classic DooM

[Vile]

I hear the sequel is going to be awesome, BTW when is that coming out? ;)

[Higher Game]

Plutonia is absolutely mediocre. It doesn't have the feel of the original Doom or the gameplay of Evilution. Hell, there are plenty of FREE megawads that own Plutonia, like Alien Vendetta, Scythe 2, Hell Revealed, etc. I should have stuck with my original Doom and Doom II instead of paying $10 for the recent collector's edition.

I guess it was something good for its time that I never got into, but it doesn't stand up to the stuff being put out today.

[Lutrov71]

Higher Game said:

Plutonia is absolutely mediocre. It doesn't have the feel of the original Doom or the gameplay of Evilution.

Gameplay of Evilution? I'm happy it doesn't have the gameplay of Evilution, because Evilution's gameplay is unbalanced and quite frankly, sucks.
And why does it matter that Plutonia doesn't have the feel of the Original Doom? Neither does Scythe 2 but that project still rocks.

[myk]

Phil1984 said:
It not only has great level design but gameplay that is tough, but not as frustrating as say a Hell Revealed. It also contains my fav map ever, lvl32 "Go to it".

Yes, I think it's a very good set. And incidentially it was an inspiration for many tougher wads (like HR.) It was made by a couple of very talented mappers who were keen on making action-packed levels.

[Nautilus]

The legacy of the Casali brothers. I've always really liked the theme in Plutonia, which is rather brown, grassy and rocky.

[DOOM Anomaly]

Plutonia is awesome. :D At first a few years back it was a little hard for me, but over time I've gotten better. Recently I've played it online with other people and that makes it even more fun. :D Some servers have unlimited ammo, so once you get the BFG, you hold down the trigger and don't ever let go. :D Quite funny when the entire team has the BFG. :D Demons don't know what hit them. :D

[Dittohead]

I like Plutonia a fair bit, but I also really enjoy tnt.wad much too. Plutonia may be better overall, but some of the maps in tnt.wad are much more memorable.

[sundar]

At first, I used to hate Plutonia not only because of its difficulty but because of its feel. I just hated it. But now as I've got s lot better, I love Plutonia. Like someone else said, it's really hard to believe only two people made this one.

Though the new textures(if any) aren't very catchy, the level design is absolutely brilliant. Anyone who disagrees with me should play through Map11: Hunted and then decide. Go 2 It is my favourite map from the episode, and though they claim it's the hardest map in the megawad, I seem to be able to beat it easily on Ultra-Violence.

But I'll have to admit though. TNT Evilution is my favourite of the officially released wads. It just has a better feel to it. There's lots of new music, most of which happens to be my favourite. Above all the music selection is great too. The music in TNT Evilution sets the mood for its levels whereas in Plutonia, some of the music doesn't blend well with the maps or just doesn't manage to get the feel in there. Map31: Pharoah really feels like visiting an ancient pyramid. TNT Evilution starts out easy(not too easy) and gets tougher, which feels like you're really progressing.

However, I think the latter half of Evilution is as tough as Plutonia itself and beating each level with a pistol start is really challenging. I just found out today that if you're playing Map26: Ballistyx on ZDoom ,or any port that allows jumping, you can exit the map right away by jumping onto that ledge.

Back when Final Doom was released, I remember people dissing Plutonia for its difficulty and praising TNT Evilution for its new textures, music, map designs. But by today's standards, since those textures and architectural styles have been outdated, people prefer Plutonia since its difficulty hasn't changed over the years and is still challenging. Just my opinion though.

[Balos]

sundar said:

I just found out today that if you're playing Map26: Ballistyx on ZDoom ,or any port that allows jumping, you can exit the map right away by jumping onto that ledge.

I always thought that you're only supposed to use the jump command in those levels, which specifically allow it.

Of course it will ruin a lot of levels that aren't supposed to be played with it.

[ducon]

Phil1984 said:

Is Plutonia the best megawad going around?

Plutonia is not a WAD but an IWAD.

[myk]

ducon said:
Plutonia is not a WAD but an IWAD.

All IWADs are wads, and a megawad is any wad with like 15 to 20 or more maps. Plus one could say Plutonia is an IWADized PWAD (many of the resources come right from DOOM II's wad; it just adds the maps, some textures, and a couple other graphics.)

[Enjay]

Higher Game said:

Plutonia is absolutely mediocre.

I don't even think it's that good. I'm surprised to find so many people praising it. For me it's the dullest official IWAD of the lot. It's the one I play the least. Time and time again I discover new things I don't like in its levels; and the gameplay is, for the most part, absolutely tedious. If it were just an add on megawad, I'd probably have deleted my copy a long time ago.

[sundar]

Enjay said:

I don't even think it's that good. I'm surprised to find so many people praising it. For me it's the dullest official IWAD of the lot. It's the one I play the least. Time and time again I discover new things I don't like in its levels; and the gameplay is, for the most part, absolutely tedious. If it were just an add on megawad, I'd probably have deleted my copy a long time ago.

It really depends on what kind of a player you are and what you're looking for from a WAD. The more Hardcore DOOMers seem to like Plutonia the most. By Hardcore, I mean those who really like playing difficult levels and have really exceptional skills. It's not necessary that if you've been playing the game for over a decade, you are a hardcore player, though I'd say my skills have got a lot better.

BTW, Plutonia isn't as hard as several PWADs like Hell Revealed. Saving your game every now and then should keep you fine. Playing several other challenging single-map PWADs like Cyberarena can help build your skills(especially with strafing). But for me the problem with Plutonia has been its maps. Some maps are just flat out boring and the excessive use of chaingunners(even in TNT Evilution) really annoys me sometimes.

The best way to play Plutonia, I think is to play each map with a pistol start. The difficulty of the levels is random imo.

[Enjay]

It's not so much the difficulty - I've certainly completed it with minimal fuss a number of times (although, yes, I do think they got it wrong as not just UV is hard - it's a pretty pointless wad for the Doomer with limited skills who shelled out cash to have an official product).

I don't like the map layouts. I'm also not that keen on the overall look/theme of most of them. Some of the visual tricks as well as the jumps and puzzles are just annoying to me. I find the gameplay more annoying and tedious than difficult.

[Torn]

Plutonia has some of the best doom styles. Like Map01's (map03, and so on) style is so great, imo. I like that theme.

[Graf Zahl]

Enjay said:

It's not so much the difficulty - I've certainly completed it with minimal fuss a number of times (although, yes, I do think they got it wrong as not just UV is hard - it's a pretty pointless wad for the Doomer with limited skills who shelled out cash to have an official product).

When I bought Final Doom I was precisely that kind of player and I managed to play through Plutonis on HNTR without serious problems (except for Map32 of course ;))

The only place in the entire WAD I still don't like is the area in MAP03 before the blue key. The Pain Elementals there are just nasty if you want to go for 100% kills. The only real option here is to run through as quickly as possible or you might run out of ammo.

[sundar]

Graf Zahl said:

When I bought Final Doom I was precisely that kind of player and I managed to play through Plutonis on HNTR without serious problems (except for Map32 of course ;))

The only place in the entire WAD I still don't like is the area in MAP03 before the blue key. The Pain Elementals there are just nasty if you want to go for 100% kills. The only real option here is to run through as quickly as possible or you might run out of ammo.

I remember that. Pain Elementals always annoy me. But they're my favourites too, so is the Baron. Anyway, the part I hate the most is the two Archviles on Map31:Cyberden which get teleported into those walls and set up you up on flames. I know where they are but I just never have enough ammo and time to kill them before those Hellknights corner me.