[Release] The Ultimate Torment & Torture (v1.02 Final)

[The Flange Peddler]

I finished playing through everything except the lost episode, and I’d consider it more of a KDIZDified TNT than anything else. I think it’s a pretty good overall, though I’d agree with Kristus about the general map design, with too many corridors, square rooms and a general lack of interconnectivity. TNT2 in particular drags on a bit. I still think one of your best map designs I’ve seen is your map for CC3. I’m also not keen on the voice acting, to me it seems like it’s trying too hard to emulate Duke3d, and I don’t see the point in all the new enemies. I don’t see why you need all the KDIZD sprites just because they exist. Plus stuff form Heretic. And Hexen. And Duke3d. And whatever other game I didn’t notice. To me all the different styles just clash together horribly (just like in KDIZD). In particular those brown gun-tooting demons that leave mines on the last level look pretty bad in comparison to everything else, and I’ve never liked those annoying things with shields. Not to mention that baron/lost soul monstrosity. Those altered Revenant sprites on the last map are pretty cool though. I think fewer would have been better, and would have given an overall more polished feel to the project.

I did like the last map quite a lot. Technically it’s just a linear walk up a mountain, but I think that sort of design works very well for a final boss encounter. It was challenging, with times where I just had to leg it for cover. I did groan when I saw yet more ripped sprites for the end bosses, but the final boss battle itself I think was very well conceived and executed. A fair challenge but quite doable, I can imagine it being quite a bit more difficult if you don’t have enough ammo to knock out the spawning bosses at a fairly fast rate. Much better than the KDIZD end boss battle.

There has obviously been a look of work put into this, and I think overall it’s good. I really do think less (resources) would equal more for your wads in the future though.

[BoldEnglishman]

@Naan: When I played this, I was very cautious about not picking up ammo that I did not immediately need. Playing on HMP, I had absolutely zip after fighting the Cyber/Barons on the 1st level. But I just thought that was intentional, and made it to the first boss encounter with fists alone :) (well I had to lure the Hell Knights out)

@The Flange Peddler: This is obviously down to preference, but I think more enemies = good thing. It's more diversity, it adds to the challenge and requires the player to think of perhaps new strategies to take down new foes. I don't know about you, but having JUST doom 2 enemies would be just like (almost) every other WAD out there.

I don't recall seeing anything specifically from Heretic, or Hexen, or Duke 3D. If it was just rock textures used from these games I woudln't notice 'cos its all rock textures to me, but otherwise I don't see your point.

However, I do agree about the 'brown gun-tooting demons that leave mines on the last level' which, for future reference, are called "Catharsi" (not sure about plural spelling). They are quite out of place.

[Tormentor667]

First at all, thx Flange Peddler for your feedback about UTNT, it gives me a good in-sight view of what you think about my work in this case. So let me explain a few things:

Large variety of monsters
It's a matter of taste I think and it's not that I just put all the monsters in just "to have em" or "to have a huge amount of different monsters", you know. I mostly put monsters into UTNT that were different from all the original Doom monsters in beating them and how they are a treat to you. Sure, some Doomers - like me - like such a variety, others do not as it seems a bit confusing.

Interconnectivity?
The more often I hear that word, the more I start to think that I have no idea what this actually is. I always thought that TNT02 was quite "interconnected" as you do visit places twice or even thrice while playing them, obviously I am wrong :P Nevertheless, UTNT was supposed to give a quite linear feeling while you play it. It's supposed to be the Doomguys last great trip, his last big adventure where he has to travel through several places, getting closer and closer to the final "Source" so I had to add a certain direction to the maps. You were supposed to have the feeling that you (the player) pass a good and large direction, just like in Unreal. Making maps small and non-linear with revisiting places quite often wouldn't have worked that well.

KDiZD Sprites for the sake of having them
You said there was no point in adding the KDiZD sprites for some of the new monsters. In my eyes there was as personally I do think that the new KDiZD sprites by Vader look much better than the originals from TNT2/3 and Skulltag and so I added them and I think one could understand that ;) They look amazing ;)

Heretic / Hexen / Duke 3D Stuff
As far as I know, the only Heretic thing is the behaviour of the TNT3 boss that still is based on the Maulotaur from Heretic. But there is nothing from Hexen or anything else from Heretic as far as I can recall correctly. Conc. the Duke Nukem 3D bosses, one for TNTLE and one sub-boss for Episode 4... well, it's a hard thing actually to get some decent looking sprites that fit in the world of Doom today. For TNTLE I wanted to have a nice endboss that didn't take much extra work for me, so I put together some DECORATE code, used these alien sprites from Duke3D and "voila", the Boss battle was done. In the case of Episode 4, this was kinda different as the duke 3d sprites here were my "emergency solution". First at all, Vader planned to do unique boss sprites for the guardians in TNT4 but unfortunately, real life got more important because of several occasions and he hadn't enough time and motivation to do that anymore. That's why I coded my own monster and used Duke3D sprites again, that fit best for what I had in mind.

That's it so far ;)

[BoldEnglishman]

I just played TNTLE, and I noticed some sort of visual glitch.

When you find the OTHER secret area in the canyon above ground (not the Arch-Viles guarding it one, but the secret hidden switch), when you enter the area that is revealed, if you go towards the un-openable door and look right, part of the sky is missing and you see 'through' to the cave :S

and the previously mentioned HOM concerning the lift in TNT02 is still there...

[Gez]

Tormentor667 said:

Heh, make sure to take a closer look at other maps as well, especially the final boss map of Episode 3, the one with the spiders ;)

It's one of the secrets which I've found (on the map) without finding how to open them. Very frustrating.

Especially when you figure out it must be some sort of E1M1 secret (get to the exit room, then go back and it's open) because with your maps, usually, it's "get to the exit room and you can't go back anymore".

Speaking of going back, connectivity could be improved by adding more shortcuts. The Armory is especially egregious in this regard, a couple of issues that annoyed me about it:

The green trajectory is impossible. Now, at first it's okay because you have to go through other places and fight monsters to grab keys and stuff, it's part of the game. But once you've got the key and killed all the monsters, it simply gets tiresome to always do the red or the blue path because the green path is impossible. Once you've been of both sides of the bars in the red rectangles, they should open. Once you've been on the catwalk and in the warehouse, you should get a shorter path between both.

There's also a lot of "you can't go back" and "you can't open it from this side (even though you've already opened it from the other side)" going on, and it's a bit annoying after a while.

[Patrick]

after 6 hours of searching for a wi-fi to steal, i got this wad.
I have a few criticisms. First of all, the music, while it does fit the environment, i recognized a good deal of it,(namely the UT stuff and the matix) and it sort of took away from the experience a little. The visuals were very nice, but it was too much for my computer to handle. And the duke3d style voice/comments, really don't add to the game any. Otherwise, this was an excellent wad, well worth playing, and certainly a good inspiration...

[Deeforce]

Havoc map 01 is the best level I've ever seen. I wished there were more of those fights with allied forces. Nice graphic details too, well done!

[Jodwin]

Deeforce said:

Havoc map 01 is the best level I've ever seen.

That map had pretty crappy ammo balance. Or alternatively, too many revenants on the walls. Either one.

[BoldEnglishman]

I think one of the Revenants is stuck in one of the collapsed castle turrets. I kept hearing a Revenant about but couldn't see it anywhere. I couldn't jump to see if it was inside the collapsed turret, but that's probably where it was :P

[Tormentor667]

Final #1 Release, v1.02
Same Link, same Download, different File!

[BoldEnglishman]

Small question. I was mucking around with an Icon on Map 32, and it spawned a demon. As the cube went and tele-fragged the demon, it exploded (and all the little chunks came out). I'm guessing there is a demon-gibbed sprite, but it was buried under piles of bodies so I couldn't see it specifically. Is this something new in UTNT, or can demons always be gibbed, even in the original games?

If so, then wow, that must be the biggest thing I have not noticed in Doom, gibbing demons.

[deldelda]

Looove the mapset ... spent 4+ hours getting from the start to where I am now, wonderful detail and balance, like nothing I can ever dream of putting in one of my crappy unreleased maps =)

But am I the only one having trouble beating the boss on that mountain level? I get to the inside of the mountain and see the big column of light or whatever and the guards start teleporting in ... but no matter what I shoot or how many I kill, the boss health stays at 100%. I'm obviously missing something ...

[Aleaver]

Tormentor667 said:

Final #1 Release, v1.02
Same Link, same Download, different File!

Mirror updated!

[BoldEnglishman]

deldelda said:

Looove the mapset ... spent 4+ hours getting from the start to where I am now, wonderful detail and balance, like nothing I can ever dream of putting in one of my crappy unreleased maps =)

But am I the only one having trouble beating the boss on that mountain level? I get to the inside of the mountain and see the big column of light or whatever and the guards start teleporting in ... but no matter what I shoot or how many I kill, the boss health stays at 100%. I'm obviously missing something ...

SPOILER: (for obvious reasons)

When you kill one of those guard things, SHOOT the pillar of light. It has an invulnerable shield that goes down temporarily after killing one of the guards.

[deldelda]

Heh ... that would do it.

[entryway]

I think, that a position of a skull in the "Choose Class" sub-menu is wrong

Right:
http://prboom-plus.sourceforge.net/main_menu.png

Wrong:
http://prboom-plus.sourceforge.net/choose_class.png

[Tormentor667]

entryway said:

I think, that a position of a skull in the "Choose Class" sub-menu is wrong

ZDoom bug, not my fault as the skull is aligned correctly.

[Tormentor667]

By the way, can anyone with a better connection than mine upload the tutnt.zip version 1.02 to the /idgames archive?

[negke]

Great work.
I definitely enjoyed this episode, even though it was almost a tad too hard for my taste (played on Normal). At least I died a lot and had to quickload dozens of times in each map. Of course, challenging gameplay is ok, even appreciated, but here it got somewhat annoying at times. Though maybe I just suck at Doom.. :P Next time, more (or larger) medkits please. Unfortunately, I didn't manage to beat the boss fights without god mode. Bringing it down to 50% was ok, but then I always failed. Respawning ammo would have been good here.

I liked the large amount of custom monsters - made it feel more varied and fresh. The SeriousSam suicide bombers made me chuckle each time. Also, the use of all those Quake textures (and I was pleased to even see IKbase? and Ogro) added to the uniqueness of the theme. Nice secrets and easter eggs too.

"Beyond the Dark Portal" and the first "Beginning and End" map were a bit laggy in places. In "Cursed Peak" I got stuck in the chapel area with the ghosts as the door wouldn't open so I had to noclip out, though maybe I missed something. Pressing the fire key while being in intermission mode still drains ammo btw.

Anyway, thanks for this enjoyable release.

[caco_killer]

neg!ke said:

Pressing the fire key while being in intermission mode still drains ammo btw.

Doesn't that happen in every Zdoom wad?

[Tormentor667]

neg!ke said:

Next time, more (or larger) medkits please.

If it is too hard, play it in ITYTD ;)

[Larzuk]

Whats new in 1.02? I got halfway through 1.0 before the 1.01 came out and I had to start over. So whats new in 1.02 to see if its really worth starting over again.

[Tormentor667]

1.01 is perfectly playable, 1.02 just includes several minor bugfixes and subtitles for the ingame voice acting, thats all. It's worth downloading, but not if you only are equipped with 56K and you don't want to wait yet another 2 hours :P It's up to you.

[YMB]

Tormentor667 said:

1.01 is perfectly playable, 1.02 just includes several minor bugfixes and subtitles for the ingame voice acting, thats all. It's worth downloading, but not if you only are equipped with 56K and you don't want to wait yet another 2 hours :P It's up to you.

Ahh, it's times like these where cable is oh-so-sweet.

[BoldEnglishman]

Yeah all I had to do was go downstairs, fetch a can, come back up and the download is finito ;)

[Patrick]

Tormentor667 said:

but not if you only are equipped with 56K and you don't want to wait yet another 2 hours :P It's up to you.

actually, try 6 hours. :D

[YMB]

Janitor said:

actually, try 6 hours. :D

Ouch. A wad is never worth that, ever, no matter what.

[kristus]

Back in the day, I spent 3 hours downloading Eternal Doom, it was worth it. I could easily have gone 6 hours for that wad.

Even worse, before that. I had to download and copy Aliens TC to floppies a number of times before I managed to get a working copy home to my internetless computer. Took me several weeks before I could get it "smuggled" from the horribly slow and shoddy computers from the school library. Again, well worth it.

[Tormentor667]

kristus said:

Even worse, before that. I had to download and copy Aliens TC to floppies a number of times before I managed to get a working copy home to my internetless computer. Took me several weeks before I could get it "smuggled" from the horribly slow and shoddy computers from the school library. Again, well worth it.

Hehe, this reminds me of Batman Doom :P I also "smuggled" it through our crappy 56K school network but I had to do this two times as the first time, the packed 1,44MB floppy zips (packed with PKUNZIP) were corrupted :P That was really worth all the stress of getting picked up while undercover online ;)

[The Lag]

i remember being able to fit "my favorite wads" onto 1 floppy. heh.