How do you like your Doom?

[Hobbs]

K so as I was driving a thread off topic curiousity bit me in the ass and I just have to know, what do you people prefer in your doom gameplay? Do you like it oldschool, newschool, a bit of both? TCish, sticking to dooms gameplay, the so called "hell revealed" style, innovation but still in doom? Source ports with tons of featres, vanilla linedefs, maybe just limit removing? Hard boiled, soft boiled, scrambled, sunny side up? K well scratch the last question, thats eggs anyway.

For my own preference I feel pretty safe labeling myself a purist. I would rather play a random map from the 90's than a random map from the 2000's because I enjoy encountering the tricks and magic that the old wads contained. I can count about 75% of my wads as vanilla, with only a precious few being port specific at all, and most of those are for Boom. I definetly enjoy hell revealed wads, mostly because I always know a halfway decent one really focuses on gameplay. And my favorite port is PrBoom/PrBoom+ (I have difficuly sticking to one or the other lately), but I still use vanilla quite a lot. And I'm done boring you.

[Use]

you will like me megawad...

I am oldskool, I love playing old levels and reveling in my old maps. My fav engine is prBoom and vanilla, I hope one day to finish my vanilla megawad, nilla doom, as well as my limit removing but totaly classic styled megawad, doom beyond. doom.

[Belial]

I'll play anything once, but obviously my preference is OS, HR style slaughter. Maps that are well balanced, challenging and (not necessarily) non-linear are great too. Anything that has multiple route possibilities for UV Max demo recording gets bonus points.

If a port-specific (I'm focusing on ZDoom here for the most part) wad doesn't use the available features to their fullest extent (like LWM's wads, Operation Overlord, etc.), I rarely bother to play it again, because if it's just a regular map I'd rather not have to deal with the port's quirks. There are some exceptions of course.

Edit: Nilla Doom <3

Edit2: And it's certainly no accident that I didn't use the words 'detail' or 'looks'.

[caco_killer]

*STUPID JOKE ALERT*

How do I like my Doom? Shaken, not stirred. :P

Ok, now I'll answer the question. Thanks to Zdoom, I want my Doom to be a different experience with cool weapons, new monsters, and detailed levels. I've played the living hell out of the "oldschool" Doom and I want to play Doom in whole new ways now.

[Graf Zahl]

As long as it is fun to play and doesn't look too bad I really don't care whether it's oldschool or heavily scripted.

I quite like maps that try to do something different with the Doom engine (e.g. Enjay's Operation Overlord)

Things I don't enjoy are HR-style slaughtermaps and WADs that only feature some complex scripting without any real gameplay in between (a good example for this would be TeiTenga.)

But since I strongly react to visual design bland and boring looking maps (e.g. Southern Cross first release) don't do much for me, even though they might play well.

[ReX]

Hobbs, you probably already know where I stand. To reiterate, I like both vanilla maps as well as those that require ports, so long as they incorporate elements that hold my interest:

1. Challenging (but not insane) gameplay
2. Good weapons/ammo/health/armor balance (I guess some would consider this a subset of gameplay)
3. Good map design - varying heights, seeing areas that I get to visit later, sometimes having to backtrack, alternative paths, both indoor and outdoor areas
4. Visual appeal - good/appropriate lighting, corners and angled walls, proper texturing and alignment, pleasing architecture
5. Cleverly hidden secrets that provide some clue to finding them
6. Properly used (not overused) traps

[Vegeta]

I like DOOM in all it's glory, all kind of wads, single and multi player modes. I don't play all the wads out there, but there isn't any special type that I like the most. I can have good time playing a random map from Maximum DOOM (these who have it sure know what to expect about that), but also playing a sophisticated post 2003 wad.

[printz]

I definitely like old school Doom because it's not influenced by any other games. So 1994, 1995 and 1996 there.

[LexiMax]

I like my doom with oldschool implimentations of things and newschool interfaces. So far, no port has given me exactly what I desire, though ZDoom 1.22 and Eternity both come really really fucking close.

[Th0r]

I prefer a classical feel with a few new things, like i said in my other post, slopes, deep water, colored sectors, bridges, transluctent lines etc are all cool and when used right, make a good map even better.

[Sporku]

I don't care either way. :D

[Grazza]

Above all, I appreciate maps that force (or at least allow) creative play. That is, where the player needs to think - not about how to solve puzzles, but about how to tackle the challenge that lies before him. What route to take, how to use resources, when to stand and fight, and when to run - that kind of thing. I also greatly appreciate it when a map allows some possibilities for fancy manoeuvres and shortcut tricks, as this rewards both understanding of the workings on the engine and good movement skills.

Attractive design is a significant factor in all this, as it helps the player navigate around the map (by creating a greater emotional response in each part of the map), and can also (if some thought has been put into making it fit logically together) provide some clues for how the player should proceed.

[ReX]

Grazza said:

Above all, I appreciate maps that force (or at least allow) creative play. That is, where the player needs to think - not about how to solve puzzles, but about how to tackle the challenge that lies before him. What route to take, how to use resources, when to stand and fight, and when to run - that kind of thing. I also greatly appreciate it when a map allows some possibilities for fancy manoeuvres and shortcut tricks, as this rewards both understanding of the workings on the engine and good movement skills.

Attractive design is a significant factor in all this, as it helps the player navigate around the map (by creating a greater emotional response in each part of the map), and can also (if some thought has been put into making it fit logically together) provide some clues for how the player should proceed.

Agreed. Some, perhaps many, players may not appreciate the fact that a map's author may have designed it to be won in a specific way, and it's up to the player to discover what that way is. In such maps, players who expect to blaze through a map at UV skill level in a single pass without save-games may be setting themselves up for failure (which then may cause them to label a map as shitty). I believe that a good map is one that requires the player to discover the optimum balance between risk and reward, sometimes by trial and error. The player can then look forward to playing the map again and being truly challenged by avoiding save-games or by recording a demo.

[wildweasel]

I prefer maps with a more controlled pace, with a relatively low number of monsters. I can't stand HR-style maps. That doesn't mean that I don't like a good challenge - I just prefer that my challenges actually depend on skill and not being so lucky as to somehow miraculously dodge about 500 hitscan bullets.

[myk]

Grazza said:
Above all, I appreciate maps that force (or at least allow) creative play. That is, where the player needs to think - not about how to solve puzzles, but about how to tackle the challenge that lies before him.

I'd say any fleshed out set of maps should include at least a couple such maps; an example in DOOM II itself being Map24: The Chasm, where the player has to hit a series of switches and navigate narrow catwalks while under attack. But its also stuff that should be used with discretion, and forcing it on maps can break them; after all such quirks come out by themselves (look at AV's Map25: Demonic Hordes). Of course a knowledgeable mapper will have to make decisions about these tricks when they show up and are detected, particularly while the map's in development, judging whether he'll remove the quirk, expand upon it, or leave it as is.

What route to take, how to use resources, when to stand and fight, and when to run - that kind of thing.

I would call that "game balance" on a smaller scale within the map, as opposed to an overall balance where the maps relate to each other (when talking about an episode or megawad).

Attractive design is a significant factor in all this, as it helps the player navigate around the map (by creating a greater emotional response in each part of the map),

The way I see it, what it does is inspire you to try it, or go on with it, and helps one remember the map (how could one forget SID, even if he were to think it doesn't have the best available gameplay overall?) And if the map is real shitty it could drive one away before fully experiencing the map's possibilities (like those with garish textures and jarring music), and heh, may also help keep the level in our memory.

and can also (if some thought has been put into making it fit logically together) provide some clues for how the player should proceed.

Additionally, and perhaps more clearly, it will inspire the designer, giving him a pretext from where to experiment with gameplay devices. One will try to create a setting, discarding and transforming what one is working on as one goes. One needs an arbitrary board to start specifically molding what will turn out to be a challenging or entertaining gameplay scenario, and aesthetic (including general creativity, influences from fiction and artwork, "real world" mimicry, plot backgrounds, etc, according to the nature of the design) considerations are very helpful in this regard, because what we do with "aesthetic" things is play around (in a childish way, even) allowing us to mix and arrange materials (game mechanics and resources) in intuitive and intelligent ways.

[sidarmas]

tons of demons, powerful weapons, and a crapton of gore. Not to challenging, I still like using all 3 keys, as long as the puzzle isn't too out of the box-ish.

[Phobos]

Action packed, Enjoyable, some Exploring, some challenges. Think AV, Eternal, Simplicity etc.

[Phil1984]

I'm an oldschool kind of guy. I do enjoy vanilla style maps although I don't care if they have more visplanes in view at once than the doom.exe could handle. Boom I don't mind because it seems to me that it is a logical extension of Doom. Zdoom/GZdoom however I really don't have much time for these days as I completley disagree with where the coders of those projects feel Doom should be going. That doesn't mean I don't enjoy the occasional zdoom map but i consider it just that, a zdoom map not a doom map.

As far as style of gameplay goes I'm very tempted to say Hell Revealed style of gameplay but at the end of the day, i do get frustrated more often than not because i'm not quite good enough to beat those styles of levels without dying 25 times (I don't save). Normally by the 20th death i'm getting pretty fed up with the level. So I'm going to say I pefer the Plutonia style of gameplay (Plutonia is my favourite megawad/iwad) since they are nice and challenging without being to over the top.

[Captain Red]

I'm going to defy the trend of this thread and say that I like my zdoom, I like my mouse look and I like my modern map features. I've finished doom multiple time, on multiple engines. I've have my fill of vanilla. Having said that, I think that modern mapping features should be used conservatively. While slopes, sideways opening doors, new monster/weapon and non-intrusive scripted sequences are great, I'm not crazy about cut-scenes, objectives, or other staples of post 2000 FPS.

I don't mind the odd Episode 1 wad, but I love to see interesting new things done with the doom engine. I get a kick out of seeing realistic places in a doom wad.

as far as gameplay goes, I like medium battles with medium level monsters. just for god sake, give me cover! oh, and I love seeing an interesting new boss monster that takes a bit of strategy to defeat.

[188DarkRevived]

I collect & play WADs which are for any of the following:

1.) vanilla game versions
2.) PrBOOM ported game versions
3.) ZDOOM ported game versions
4.) JDOOM/Doomsday Engine ported game versions

When I say 'game versions' this applies to:

1.) Ultimate DOOM
2.) DOOM2
3.) Heretic - Shadow Of The Serpent Riders
4.) Hexen

And I love WADs which incorporate borrowed textures and borrowed music from other sibling games....
For instance, a DOOM2 WAD which borrows music and textures from Heretic. Or a Heretic WAD which borrows music and textures from Hexen.

Yes, that's what I love. Two or more games blended into one WAD in a very random yet very balanced and careful way.
All such WADs are belong to my laptop's harddrive and a DVD!
:)

The size of the maps and the monster quantity isn't all that important to me. The decorative/ornamental Things are more important. I like it when the layout is neat and tidy, and when the map has been carefully tested to be beaten without using any God mode or Give Ammo cheats.

[TonicBH]

I'll play any mod that doesn't put you fighting 25 archviles with a pistol or has the level structure of a Wolfenstein 3D level (unless it's BASED off a Wolf3D level, then that's okay).

[deathz0r]

I like my deathmatch maps to be interesting and with adequate defensive points/areas for intense battles.

I like my single player maps to be interesting enough to play more than once. Cyberdreams falls under that category.

[Adam3]

I like level design and some scripting too with a side of French fries
and a medium drink...coca cola or pepsi...?

[LexiMax]

I like my single player maps to have interesting monster battles. ACTION if you will.

As for deathmatch, the more 'tokeish' the better.

And CTF? The more open for strategy and interesting to play, the better, and I also lean more on offensive maps than defensive maps, a single player should not be able to hold a wave of 4 players at bay.

[Ganymede]

The truth is as soon as anyone messes with the gameplay, I begin to lose interest in the wad. We all should be advanced players of DooM and the levels should reflect that - and test us.

I find ZDoom levels with scripting and a storyline seriously depressing!

[myk]

DarkJedi188 said:
And I love WADs which incorporate borrowed textures and borrowed music from other sibling games....
For instance, a DOOM2 WAD which borrows music and textures from Heretic. Or a Heretic WAD which borrows music and textures from Hexen.

Yes, that's what I love. Two or more games blended into one WAD in a very random yet very balanced and careful way.

Yeah, but it's mostly copyright infringement, or (more importantly) at least as disrespecful as using resources or levels from a PWAD that the author hasn't granted permission to use. And in my opinion that's how many of the gaudy and mish-mashed wads with no taste (in either looks or gameplay, if not both) are made. That reminds me of a recently helled piece of thread. Kristus for president; he knows what he's talking about! Authors should stick to what they are good at (maps, coding, textures, etc.), and when depending on others, should always do so with respect.

[Stealthy Ivan]

Any good Doom2/Zdoom megawad or TC that is actually done well...
But I still have love for vanilla doom levels as long as there done right! :)

[CactuarCatcher]

I just straight up love doom, but it irritates me when people can't make doors right. I dunno, when it comes to SP I want it to look better then my levels, good monster placement, jump right into it, and ya, working doors.

With DM I Just want tons of space.

[rebdoomin]

me? i love it all violent to the point where you just kill and never finish the level.

[ellmo]

...shaken, not stirred