Plutonia 2 - How good do you think it is?

[TimeOfDeath]

I think just saying in the txt file that the wad is intended to be played without jumping/crouch is enough, but that's just me.

And poor Gusta, 10/97 voters thought the wad was less than good (minus 3 obvious troll votes who voted for the worst). A wad with a 4.5/5 rating on /idgames out of 84 votes. A wad that many people have recorded demos on. Poor Gusta. :P ;) :D

[Snarboo]

I played through a few levels a few months ago and was very impressed. It captured the feel of Plutonia while being fresh and original. In fact, I think I like it more than the original.

[myk]

peach freak said:
And for the Plutonia developers that posted here, is it true that an update is in the works?

There has been a hiatus, but I think there will be a second release. It's the idea. AV had like a year between releases so there's still time to do the same :p

There are at least two solutions for this: Could it be updated to be ZDaemon friendly, perhaps?

Yeah, I think that'll be the case in a second release, as long as the changes needed are only to MAPINFO. The way the music is named shouldn't change. I agree with TimeOfDeath that it's unnecessary to block stuff like jumping. It's not blocked in a million other Doom and Boom WADs and if you wanted to make the ports behave "as intended" one would have to disable many other things, as well. Especially so if it'll cause these issues.

Also, my other solution is what I've been working on, but never finished: create a WAD with Plutonia 2's music and load that onto a server.

That's a good idea for the time being. Don't upload it to idgames, though. See this post for info on how to make such a WAD. The process should be slightly different for you, as you're not making an IWAD, like in that case, but it should give you the idea.

Mike.Reiner said:
The purpose of mapinfo I suppose is disable both jumping and crouching,

That was a second-thought addition.

but it also appears to set the music and map names for each level. I don't see what the point of that is, considering it was already taken care of by the dehacked...

While music names changes in DeHackEd are supported by some engines (obviously Chocolate Doom, as well as Boom and off-shoots) some ZDoom-based ports don't read that part of DeHackEd patches. Versions of ZDoom and GZDoom have been able to do it since after the release of Plutonia 2. (The topic came up in a PL2 thread and Graf decided to add that capability because a few other existing WADs also made music name changes through DeHackEd.) MAPINFO was added specifically to make the music work in those engines.

[Vegeta]

Gusta said:

Hehe ... "cramped" :-D
This "new" pl2 is full of opened unlinear maps and provides you pretty much of space for improvisation and chance to play the maps in many many ways and strategies.

Perhaps they are in comparison with the initial maps, but not if you compare them with Plutonia (which I took as reference). Look at map01 of boths wads as a sample.
Then again, our opinions may differ of course.

[Snakes]

Being a huge fan of the original, I thought this kind of captured the chaotic feel that made plutonia so enjoyable for me. I've only just played through the first six maps, but they've all been really uniquely put together. Some of the maps are really... colorful, I guess. Eye-catching. I'll keep playing, but for now it's excellent.

[Guest DILDOMASTER666]

Brandon D. Lade said:

Who gave this "Worst thing I've ever played"? Was that just being silly?

I don't find massive overuse of revenants and archviles with no cover to be considered "excellent". Plutonia sucked, and when you take a turd as the work-base to start something new, you are likely to end up with another turd.

[myk]

It definitely isn't for people who need more trivial play and can't handle more than a few of the more insidious monsters unless they are placed in areas that make them safer to the player. If you don't play tough DOOM II levels that much, Plutonia 2 may indeed be somewhat to quite frustrating. I'll admit I find it rather brutal in some areas, although I tend to put that on myself rather than on the levels. A level isn't bad when it kills me repeatedly on UV, especially when I can see other people can more easily wade through those areas.

And then there's skill levels, of course. Anyone complaining about getting raped only has a point if he's really tried the lower ones. If those are also too tough or otherwise not balanced (sometimes mappers put more attention on UV than other skill levels) then they have something to say.

PS: It's strange that someone who didn't like Plutonia even tried this WAD, which explicitly aimed to work along Plutonia's style in regard to design and play, even taking it a step further.

[peach freak]

See this post for info on how to make such a WAD. The process should be slightly different for you, as you're not making an IWAD, like in that case, but it should give you the idea.

I'm not making an IWAD or anything, just a WAD that contains the Plutonia 2 music and nothing else, loaded in standard Doom 2 format (D_RUNNIN for example).

If I have any other feedback regarding this WAD, I won't hesitate to post it here.

[Pirx]

just wondering, since the plutonia 2 demo thread hasn't had an update in weeks... is everyone waiting for the second release, or have people stopped playing pl2 despite all praise?

[Gusta]

TimeOfDeath said:

And poor Gusta, 10/97 voters thought the wad was less than good (minus 3 obvious troll votes who voted for the worst). A wad with a 4.5/5 rating on /idgames out of 84 votes. A wad that many people have recorded demos on. Poor Gusta. :P ;) :D

hehe...it seems that after few beers I wrote some good piece of craps again :-D

[dew]

Torr Samaho said:

just wondering, since the plutonia 2 demo thread hasn't had an update in weeks... is everyone waiting for the second release, or have people stopped playing pl2 despite all praise?

i guess maxers do wait for the final release. speed table is almost full (just 26 and the bugged maps missing), nm is probably too much bother. and i got fucking tired of map07 pacifist attempts. :)

[chischis]

I barely even lurk here, but I thought I had to say something...

Plutonia 2 is one of the very very finest map-packs I've played for Doom, full stop. Another particular favourite of mine is Super Sonic Doom for sheer inventiveness, but as "old-school" packs go, Plutonia 2 is full of fantastically memorable levels.

Map 29, what can I say? They were obviously trying to lead up to that. One complaint: backtracking and not knowing where to go after hitting some switches rather dimmed my enthusiasm. But it was still a hugely memorable and stunningly-made level.

Someone commented on iD Games that the level design in this pack make modern FPSs look sad. Well, I'm tempted to say similar. I had more fun playing Plutonia 2 than MANY commercial FPSs, recent or otherwise. (FEAR 2 may have excellent combat, but yeah, the levels are so linear...) But I'm one of these nutcases that would consider Doom mapping an art.

I'm tempted to do an overview on my blog, we'll see. I'd have to collate some screenshots of choice levels. Problem is there are many!

Bravo, Plutonia 2 team. Thankyou for some priceless gaming hours. :)

Edit: And I'm pleased to say the whole thing was quite feasible on UV -fast, even the final boss map, and MANY mappers fall foul of making MAP30 nearly impossible and unplayable on UV -fast.

Edit 2: Thought I'd add this: I've been playing Doom since about '94, and I've gone through all the major megaWAD releases. Curiously though I never could really get far into Alien Vendetta, didn't find it much fun...

[Uncle 80]

Easily the best megawad following AV and KSUTRA. Definitely in my all-time top 10.

[peach freak]

I need to re-visit here because I need some feedback from the development team.

When I try to run Plutonia 2 and its Dehacked under Doomsday (1.9.0 beta-6.7), the story texts are not replaced for me, even when I load the WAD and the dehacked file separately or load the Plutonia 2 zip file. I don't know if it's me, because DaniJ says it's replacing the story texts for him. I looked at the Plutonia 2 Dehacked file and it appears the stories were written in normal caps, as opposed to all caps. Could that be a problem?

[Gez]

peach freak said:

I looked at the Plutonia 2 Dehacked file and it appears the stories were written in normal caps, as opposed to all caps. Could that be a problem?

It really shouldn't.

[DaniJ]

No, the capitalization of those strings won't make any difference.

Plutonia 2 story text in Doomsday 1.9.0-beta6.7: http://img26.imageshack.us/img26/2330/doom2plut000.jpg

[Vermil]

DaniJ said:

No, the capitalization of those strings won't make any difference.

Plutonia 2 story text in Doomsday 1.9.0-beta6.7: http://img26.imageshack.us/img26/2330/doom2plut000.jpg

Erm... that's Plutonia 1's story text using the Plutonia 2 font.

[DaniJ]

Oh. Clearly there is a problem then ROFL

[darkreaver]

Never been a huge fan of Plutonia, but I think I need to check out P2 again soon. Give it another shot. The maps and the gameplay are no doubt good, but I dont know...there is just something that doesnt click with me.

We`ll see.

[DaniJ]

peach freak said:

When I try to run Plutonia 2 and its Dehacked under Doomsday (1.9.0 beta-6.7), the story texts are not replaced for me, even when I load the WAD and the dehacked file separately or load the Plutonia 2 zip file.

This issue has been fixed for the upcoming Doomsday 1.9.0-beta6.8 release.

[Archy]

It is quite good, feel it is a little over rated but still quite good.
I gave it 4/5... and that was a nice Easter egg to make a level 33!

[Enjay]

For me, it's just OK. I'm not a huge fan of Plutonia and PL2 doesn't really row my boat either. Nothing really wrong with it per se, just not my cup of Darjeeling.

[gravitar]

I'm up to map 15 now (yes already), and while it's a good blast, i'm not overly enthusiastic. Some of the early maps are cramped, and there are quite a few crude parts.

Some maps have also too luck based final battles for my taste (or maybe I just suck that hard); the archvile map 11 for example: slogging through the confusing layout, it's quite an achievement in itself to arrive at the exit and then bam! like 10 or so archviles spawning in...
Or map 15: imo it would have been sufficient to reach the secret exit with the blast from a single archvile, anything else is pure luck.
EDIT: just watched the uv max demo, it IS possible with just one archvile jump. Weird, I couldn't do it no matter what.

The classic hard wads like hr/av were milder on the player's sanity in that the real hard parts were mostly near start, the rest was keeping up the pace.
Anyway, I voted "good" and look forward to play the rest.

[myk]

gravitar said:
Some maps have also too luck based final battles for my taste (or maybe I just suck that hard); the archvile map 11 for example: slogging through the confusing layout, it's quite an achievement in itself to arrive at the exit and then bam! like 10 or so archviles spawning in...

That isn't a good example of a luck based finale. The very end of level 11 is probably the most invariable in the PWAD, as once you reach the last room, the sector type doesn't let your hit points reach 0 and exits once you hit the floor with less than 10. The intermission text goes with that, and the start of level 12 is relatively easy, as it assumes you're in poor health.

Edit: Ah, never mind, you mean the fight while the bar is lowering. That is a tough fight, although you should have the BFG, and there's lots of plasma energy and a megasphere in that area, and columns to hide behind.

Plutonia's level 11 is gentle in this respect, although other Plutonia levels do have brutal finales, especially the later maps (see the cyb shooting at you on a ledge in Map24.) AV and HR mostly have an even difficulty thought their levels, and like them (especially HR) PL2 has its share of "oh shit I'm surrounded" starts. Compare them from pistol starts. PL211 is kind of tough at the start, itself, then sustains the difficulty, perhaps being a bit less deadly that the initial point most of the time, and ends with a tough fight.

The end of Map11 is more or less a boss-fight deal, at the end of the first episode. The original PL11 didn't need such a finale because the hunt itself is the "boss fight." PL211 doesn't focus a confusing maze-hunt, it's more of a daunting puzzle maze topped of by a menacing fight. Two different ways of topping of an episode following a similar idea in general. In one you're hunted more dynamically, in the other, trapped more strategically.

By the way, as for "crude parts" this is a vanilla set. The screen shot you showed already has a bunch of details or complexities.

[Darkman 4]

I'm up to the start of MAP 18, and so far I have to admit this is a really good megawad.

I like how Maps 14 and 15 are short compared to the other maps in the set. They're a nice break after Map 13 and are "relaxing", especially if you intend on going to the secret levels.

Map 31 is a complete improvement on Plutonia's Map 31. The battles between the Cyberdemons are challenging enough to be fun, unlike in Plutonia's where you blew away a pathetic one or two enemies between Cyberdemons. The actual Cyberdemon battles are a lot funner thanks to there being two of them at once. The battles themselves are still easy because of all the room you have to maneuver around in, but having two Cybs launching rockets at me at once kept me on my toes.

Map 32...holy shit. At first I thought it was going to be as simple as Plutonia's MAP 32 (let the monsters infight themselves, then finish off the surviving Cyberdemon/other monsters, repeat), but things got really fucked up once the Archviles started coming in, along with other enemies to serve as body guards. Trying to hide from an Archie while trying to make the others infight was too time-consuming for me, so I ran in and tried to BFG the Archie before he could revive too many enemies. While a bit more dangerous than letting them infight or running past them, it was more thrilling. I also decided to kill all of the Cyberdemons in the map, which is really fun and challenging. The ending...well, everybody else has explained how amazing yet difficult it is.

Map 16's start was pretty tense, especially since I was pretty beaten up from the end of Map 32. Once you manage to get past the rough start, its difficulty curves down a bit, but that's a good thing. I managed to get some use out of the regular Shotgun in this map, mostly for dealing with faraway Imps and Shotgun guys, though I did use it to finish off the Cyberdemon after pumping a lot of Plasma into it. My only real problem with the map's design is how easy it can be to miss the blue key if you're the type that doesn't explore what look like side routes, but I managed to find it easily because I do tend to explore side passages and the like.

My least favorite map so far is Map 17. While the detailing is good, the map is too nonlinear. I spent a majority of my time in the map wandering around, wondering where the hell I should go because the map kept sending me around in circles. I had no idea what the yellow key switches were there for, and the other switches' uses were almost as cryptic. It was pretty silly how a lot of the good stuff in the map was booby trapped, even if there were enemies around an item before you grabbed it. The battles themselves were fun, but the amount of bobby trapped items got annoying after a while. Despite there being quite a few Chaingunners on ledges in this map, their hiding spots are easy to find, so they weren't that much of a threat.

[Archfile]

It is good playing if you are bored. there is good challenges
(MAP 32) it has good textures and a very good boss.

[Young Cyberdemon]

Well, from what i've seen of it i'd say excellent. I want to buy it, though i can't find where. Damn that annoys me.

[myk]

Young Cyberdemon said:
I want to buy it, though i can't find where.

If you mean Final DOOM, which includes Plutonia, that is needed to run Plutonia 2, you can get it off Valve's Steam and at the id Software site.

[Zetta]

Excellent detail, dreadful game play.

[dew]

I FUCKING HATE IT! WORST WAD EVER!

/returns to slaving on ep3 tas