Shadows Den [Complete]

[AveryMaurice]

Well, I finished this map FINALLY, if you all recalled I started it in June, then forgot about it for months. I finally found the file again, finished it, polished the old stuff and packaged it.

Its called Shadows Den, dedicated to my friends deceased cat who was very amusing (you could throw damn piece of tuna off a bridge and he would follow it.) and unfortunately he died recently.

The map is pretty detailed, not superb at all compared to some of the stuff I've seen on here. I've designed it to be hard to complete in a speed run but easy to play through if you take your time.

This also marks the first WAD I've been confident enough to release, and I was hoping for some feedback. I know its not as good as everything you all have seen, but please tell me what you like and what should be improved.

I did get a bunch of screenshots, but they dissapeared for some reason once I quit Skulltag. I'll post some here soon.

PLAY THIS IN A ZDOOM BASED SOURCE PORT!

http://wadhost.fathax.com/files/SHADOWSDEN.zip

Also, I BEG YOU to post some demos of your speed runs PLEASE. I would love to see peoples times at trying to beat it.

[Mivalekan]

Enjoyable. Short but not very difficult.

My only real beef was the choice in music. ;\

[Super Mighty G]

Not sure why you said ZDoom should be used. I didn't see anything out of the ordinary. Anyway, it was pretty simple even for me (I'm not a great speed runner).

Here are the basic issues I noticed:
-texture misalignment
-repetitive architecture
-predictable fights

In short, it's ordinary. Sorry to have to sound negative. FYI, I got through it in about 1:30 when I did a speedrun.

[AveryMaurice]

U.O.D. said:

about 1:30 when I did a speedrun.

What difficulty is this? Demo please.

Texture allignment was hard though because I would match the bottom half of a switch and the upper texture moved as well, so I just kinda gave up on it after alligning the lowers.

[ArmouredBlood]

Have a first demo attempt(prboom plus 2.5.0.5, no problems afaik). About 6 minutes on the second try.

Generally the layout was a little boxy but worked ok, and although there were some misalignments that could easily be fixed with a lower/upper unpegged it didn't draw that much from the map's gameplay. That turned out to be pretty good, the only problem I had was in the beginning I was lazy and didn't take out the hitscanners fast enough the first time, then both arch-viles had some bad layout for their fights. The first one had some pretty randomly placed torches that were extremely easy to get stuck on and cramped the area behind the pillars even without considering the other monsters, and the second was completely wide open with plenty of hitscanners in the next room. I'd suggest moving the torches into alcoves in the wall or the pillars themselves, and make a large pillar in the center of the bridges on the second arch-vile fight, so it goes like this

_____|  |______
|  ________   |
|  |  ___  |  |
|  | |   | |  |
|  | |___| |  |
|  |_______|  |
|  ________   |
|  |       |  |

Also why bother with the copy/paste rooms between those two arch-vile fights? Little unnecessary, especially from a UV-max approach.

[AveryMaurice]

ArmouredBlood said:

Generally the layout was a little boxy but worked ok, and although there were some misalignments that could easily be fixed with a lower/upper unpegged it didn't draw that much from the map's gameplay.

So THATS how you do it. (I fail)

ArmouredBlood said:

Also why bother with the copy/paste rooms between those two arch-vile fights? Little unnecessary, especially from a UV-max approach.

I have an obsession with symmetry. >.<

[ArmouredBlood]

avery1555 said:

So THATS how you do it. (I fail)

Yer

I have an obsession with symmetry. >.<

Heh.

Anyway here's a UV speed in 1:19. Think I could've gone a bit faster on the end bit, needed to kill more demons and just blast through whatever hitscanners are blocking me getting to the switch. Might not've survived the arch-vile if I had though, hard to say.

[AveryMaurice]

ArmouredBlood said:

Anyway here's a UV speed in 1:19. Think I could've gone a bit faster on the end bit, needed to kill more demons and just blast through whatever hitscanners are blocking me getting to the switch. Might not've survived the arch-vile if I had though, hard to say.

Thanks for the demos I watched them both :). You missed a secret on your first playthrough, the dead body hanging off the wall to the left in the chamber with two FS and two Imps DOES open up, I think you werent close enough to it though.

I will take this and try to improve on the parts you flew through and make it way harder, thanks!

[Use]

avery1555 said:

I have an obsession with symmetry. >.<

You're gonna want to ditch that quick if you intend to keep mapping.

[AveryMaurice]

Use3D said:

You're gonna want to ditch that quick if you intend to keep mapping.

Not necessarily, as long as its used well and at the right times, and not over used. As everything, its a type of art, you can have a symmetrical map and a non-symmetrical map and they may be equally as good if used correctly, I just made a poor choice here. But I see where you are coming from.

Other then that, what are you thoughts on the map, Use3d?

U.O.D. said:

Not sure why you said ZDoom should be used. I didn't see anything out of the ordinary.

The memorial secret areas texture sometimes appears unaligned in ports like EDGE for some reason.

[Use]

It's okay, not much to say about it. Boring lighting, use some y offsets on the gstone steps to vary them a little, way too much health.

[AveryMaurice]

Use3D said:

It's okay, not much to say about it. Boring lighting, use some y offsets on the gstone steps to vary them a little, way too much health.

Yeah, I figured its WAY too easy now, and I actually fully forgot about lighting. I'm not completely unhappy since its my first map, but I should have done better. I'm working on a second project now, I'll try to fix the issues.

[darkreaver]

Hmm, weird map :P

Super linear, but I dont mind that. As the others said, some texture misalignment, and pretty easy fights (with too much health and armor!)