Most detailed/visually stunning PWAD of all times?

[Vile]

Void was a real treat to look at, all around... very colorful. I would have liked to see Erik's idea for Scythe2's map30 come to fruition (think the dimensional rift from Final Fantasy 5, where all the different themes came together).

[Afterglow]

See Malcolm Sailor's Chord series for what can be done using only doom2.exe. Cyb will agree with its greatness.

[Scuba Steve]

Hell yes, Batman Doom. I consider that mod to be the unquestion, most detailed and gorgeous mod ever made for Doom.

[Csonicgo]

shotgunmasacre2 said:

Despite the fact that I hate it I will post it anyway
Gothic 99
Yeah, I think its just TO MUCH DETAIL.

Kinda offtopic, but,
I've come to the conclusion that excessive detailing in doom maps is overlooked and by playing the map, the brain tends to filter out the detail from the main paths. "Good detail" means placing detail where it makes sense, like Suspended in dusk. the details actually caught my eye, unlike gothic99 map01, which is just mind-numbing. Throwing detail up all over the place like "some Zdoom community project that I cannot name" is never a good idea. it only makes the experience less enjoyable. Besides, doom is about the gameplay, excessive detail doesn't matter when you run into a room with guns blazing. In fact, I would consider it to be a distraction. I don't remember anyone commenting about the "flat sectoring" or other nonsense while trying to fight his way through badly placed monsters.

[Negatronica]

Csonicgo said:

Kinda offtopic, but,
I've come to the conclusion that excessive detailing in doom maps is overlooked and by playing the map, the brain tends to filter out the detail from the main paths. "Good detail" means placing detail where it makes sense, like Suspended in dusk. the details actually caught my eye, unlike gothic99 map01, which is just mind-numbing. Throwing detail up all over the place like "some Zdoom community project that I cannot name" is never a good idea. it only makes the experience less enjoyable. Besides, doom is about the gameplay, excessive detail doesn't matter when you run into a room with guns blazing. In fact, I would consider it to be a distraction. I don't remember anyone commenting about the "flat sectoring" or other nonsense while trying to fight his way through badly placed monsters.

Thats a good point. Now that theres ports that remove original doom's limits and easy to use editors it can be very easy to add too much detail. I have to constantly remind myself from doing that when mapping or gameplay will turn to crap. Theres a few maps I've made that fall into that category.

[Scuba Steve]

I disagree, because otherwise this will be a big ass grabbing yes fest. I notice all the detail put into maps, and I like to see the "insane" ammount of detail... especially if it makes a place look real. The only time I think it's excessive is when it gets in the way of gameplay otherwise it's just candy for my eyes. Like this "unnamed ZDoom mapset of knees" which is unammed of course, which I happen to find quite visually appealing, despite having a bajillion sectors. If the textures flow nicely, and the environment isn't impeding my ability to run around, then I say it's an improvement.

Expound that I'm a graphics whore and a visual slut all you like, I happen to be quite a minimalist when it comes to design, but I like the way these mapsets look.

[Hobbs]

You are a graphics whore and visual slut. I have nothing to expound though :(

[myk]

Scuba Steve said:
The only time I think it's excessive is when it gets in the way of gameplay otherwise it's just candy for my eyes.

In a way; it can also be excessive if its plain ugly, although that should not be as important as when it's a hinderance to the game. Flimsy and hacky effects that aren't used carefully, applied in order to obtain realism or other visual effects can well sodden the appeal of maps.

[Doom Marine]

There is such a thing as too much details.

This can stem from lack of art direction and/or the inability to view the larger picture.

Two things that look good themselves can compete for the viewer's attention when put in the same room. In which case, two different marbfaces randomly placed next to each other will not be twice as good as one in the same room (if at all); that is bad art direction. Gothic99 is a good example of how precise, good-looking details are randomly thrown together and became a mess.

The best-looking maps are often the ones have their details synchronized in such a way that the whole is greater than their sum. Chord3 is a good example of this: with its wooden library area and hell... it's a library infested by hell! The details come together to describe a scene, not to temporarily pacificy the eye-candy whores as they trudge through the level.

There is also such a thing as ugly detailing.

Some details should not be created at all for the sake of cleanliness. The list include: 1-pixel wide powercords (which looks muddy from far away), twenty sectors to form gothic arches (half this amount is enough), soda cans less than 3 pixels across, 1-pixel-wide sectors used to make slopes, etc etc etc. Trying to force-make something that the Doom engine isn't comfortable with displaying is like wearing shoulder pads to make yourself bigger: it's ridiculous and disgenuous.

Even if the small details by themselves look good, the Doom engine will render them into dirty little pixels from far away, and that's why it's generally not a good idea to create things under the 8-pixel scale unless the map is Chord-small, but even then I'd think twice about it. Detail as microscopically as you want, but keep in mind how the Doom engine displays it.

With the Doom engine, it's often better aestheticwise to have the grand sweep of the architecture than to be conflicted by grinding dime-and-nickel-pixel details. AV Map20 does this beautifully.

[Fredrik]

A good rule of thumb is to never go lower than the 8 unit grid and only rarely go lower than 16. Most architecture can be built with the 32 unit grid.

[Doom Marine]

True for maps that rely on orthogonal architecture, but I simply turn off the grid altogether when working on hell maps with organic features. In any case, architectural details below the 32-pixel scale rarely add much to the greater scene of the level.

[Maes]

Lüt said:

A bunch of short hyper-detailed maps I began over 3 years ago which I thought I would finish in a matter of weeks by imposing a 48-hour-limit per map. I'm keeping with the limit, though it ends up that I'm only putting in a few hours a year. I've kept them mostly to myself, although I did post a few screenshots (1 2 3) when somebody asked for pump room shots.

OMG I think that would win by far and wide the title of most detailed PWAD ever, beating even Gothic 99 :-o

Were those made within vanilla limits?

[Linguica]

I think Deus Vult is still the most "visually stunning" Doom level ever, it's so friggin huge and epic.

[mustafa saed]

Seems like the doomworld community has a questionable tast in what makes a good detailed wad or they have been used to all the shit wads with badly placed detail and 50,000 monsters to turn your brain to mush.Deus Vault is the type of wad where the detail looks thrown together unevenly to make it look 'busy' and doesnt look professional.If this is the doom community standards of a 5 star wad, then this place has hit a new low if you can amagine that.

[Dr. Zin]

Learn to spell and use proper capitalization and grammar.

[mustafa saed]

Dr. Zin said:

Learn to spell and use proper capitalization and grammar.

Whateva BIATCH

[Linguica]

mustafa saed said:

Seems like the doomworld community has a questionable tast in what makes a good detailed wad or they have been used to all the shit wads with badly placed detail and 50,000 monsters to turn your brain to mush.Deus Vault is the type of wad where the detail looks thrown together unevenly to make it look 'busy' and doesnt look professional.If this is the doom community standards of a 5 star wad, then this place has hit a new low if you can amagine that.

OK you're on my list now buddy

[Doom Marine]

Linguica said:

I think Deus Vult is still the most "visually stunning" Doom level ever, it's so friggin huge and epic.

I disagree. Deus Vult II rips Deus Vult to shreds.

[zap610]

mustafa saed said:

Deus Vault is the type of wad where the detail looks thrown together unevenly to make it look 'busy' and doesnt look professional.If this is the doom community standards of a 5 star wad, then this place has hit a new low if you can amagine that.

Way to follow your own logic!

http://www.doomworld.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=39023

[insertwackynamehere]

Lüt said:

A bunch of short hyper-detailed maps I began over 3 years ago which I thought I would finish in a matter of weeks by imposing a 48-hour-limit per map. I'm keeping with the limit, though it ends up that I'm only putting in a few hours a year. I've kept them mostly to myself, although I did post a few screenshots (1 2 3) when somebody asked for pump room shots. That's from my first one about 3 years ago. Floor is obviously incomplete, but it's a start. I was going to do one map per theme. That one is basically done, next one with a brown base theme is half done, green stone castle map is 1/4 done (SoM said it gave him an idea to code a thing placement utility called "spew" when I showed him an overhead fly-by looking down at all the torches... I wasn't exactly sure how to take that), and uh... I know I started a sky map but I don't know where it went. Also laid out a bit of hell and I think there were 3 other themes I had to do. Er, actually iirc I did start a silver starbase. Heh, I have yet to put in this year's hours. I should catch up on it soon.

I remember seeing those screenshots a long time ago. A long time ago. [/obiwan]

[Raziel]

what's the best looking vanilla doom wad and the best looking 2.0.63a and on zdoom pwads?

[sargebaldy]

Suspended in Dusk comes in at the top of my list. Brotherhood of Ruin is next.

[Fletcher`]

Anything by Espi.

Like Suspended in Duck.

[Tormentor667]

I think the most interesting thing in this thread right now seems to be the fact that "most detailed/visually stunning" is very different for each of us. All the mentioned wads look very different frokm each other, some of you agree, others disagree... so is there really a standard concerning this?

[jobro]

I made a map called Skyline that was completely a city built in 3d with streets, sidewalks, some houses you could get into, and alot of troops ontop of the ceilings that could host things. The city messured 240 x 210 gridsquares at 64 pixels each. Unreleased, and the unfinnished wad was lost in a system crash 8 years ago.

[myk]

Tormentor667 said:
so is there really a standard concerning this?

Well, the title of the thread is misleading, containing two different things, the first of which is more easily quantifiable (though you still have to agree on what to measure exactly) but isn't tied to the second, and more relevant consideration (at least in regard to jugding "aesthetic value"). In some cases more detail can detract from visual impression; especially when economy of design or simplicity are valued.