The /newstuff Chronicles #373

[Philnemba]

Call me weird but I actually liked Garden of Delight :P

Also Jodwin's Dathzor deathmatch map set has inspired me to make my own(which I'm currently doing right now).

[joedotts]

ok im new here. but been playing doom and making levels since it came out in 93 when i was 9. lets get this new stuff up to date. i will for sure review. do one review a week and it will be up to pace in no time

[Vordakk]

Tom Hall and John Romero's E1M4 is an amazing example of non-linearity in a level. To this day I have yet to play a level that uses a non-linear model to such a great effect. Fantastic map.

[Jodwin]

Philnemba said:

Also Jodwin's Dathzor deathmatch map set has inspired me to make my own(which I'm currently doing right now).

Haha, I'm amazed anyone else is getting anything good out of it. :D I haven't even played it myself in a couple of years.

[andrewj]

Like 40oz, I'm also keen to understand what "nonlinear" means, and while the above posts are helpful, I don't think the concept have been really nailed down into a nutshell.

Personally I think the design of a map is flawed if you can stumble upon a key (etc) without having any idea what door it will open. That means you've found the solution without knowing what the problem was. If non-linearity means that is inevitable, then I guess I don't like non-linearity. Often it seems when you get to a true branch (two or more choices where to go) then there is a right way and a wrong way, the wrong way means you end up coming all the way back to pick the way the mapper intended, and that's just annoying.

One concept that has been mentioned are doors (etc) which require more than one key or switch to fully open -- and hence a real choice in which to go. Quake has some maps with these, where you must press multiple switches and you get the "two more to go" messages so you know what's happening. I think this concept is good and easy to understand, though I doubt you couldn't use it more than once or twice in each level.

[kristus]

On the topic of linear/non-linear. I find it often that people claim maps to be linear when they have a quite open architecture with lots of possible routes though is having a set of objectives/switches/doors that need to be progressed in a linear order.

The terms linear and non-linear are too black and white to encompass all maps and there's a huge range of gray shades in between the two.

[Jodwin]

andrewj said:

Personally I think the design of a map is flawed if you can stumble upon a key (etc) without having any idea what door it will open. That means you've found the solution without knowing what the problem was. If non-linearity means that is inevitable, then I guess I don't like non-linearity.

No, that's not what non-linearity must mean (and I agree, it's bad design if a map is made in a manner where you can't physically reach a locked door before finding its key). Of course it can be possible that a map is made in a way where you might find a key before finding its door, but that's where the human factors enter the picture.

Putting non-linearity into a nutshell isn't exactly easy, but I guess you could say it means "having a map where the player is given choices to make, and the choices he makes effect how the gameplay will progress."

Of course, this only raises more questions. Take the map model where you a beginning room, with X number of off-shoot areas which you need to go through in a free order to open an exit in the starting room. Now, lets say the map starts off giving you a megasphere, full ammo and all weapons, and in the end of all off-shoot areas you again get a megasphere and full ammo before being teleported back to the beginning. Would this map really be non-linear? On one hand it would be, because you are free to choose the order of completion. On the other hand, regardless of the order of completion you'd always enter each off-shoot area with full health and ammo and all weapons, meaning that these areas would always play exactly the same. So in that sense, the choices the player makes would actually have no effect in how the gameplay would progress.

[Glass Rook]

In my opinion, I've always felt that a "linear" map is one where I've felt throughout that the mapper has led me every step of the way and I haven't had to do much thinking or searching for anything. There's only one way to go, it's obvious, and I go. Seems this usually applies to smaller starter maps.

I'd call a map "non-linear" if it has optional areas or routes, possibly secrets, where the extra ammo and power-ups are, but the exit could be found without visiting these areas. The optional areas and routes would make the map easier by the end but are not essential to reaching the end.

But these are just simplified black and white definitions, and as has been said above, there's a huge world of gray full of everything else we can imagine.

[NaturalTvventy]

So maybe we should go a bit further and not only try to define non-linear play but also why exactly it's desirable in a map. I think the greatest benefit to non-linear design is replayability. At the risk of blatantly self-promoting, I think the nonlinear gameplay of Awakening and similar levels extends the enjoyment of the DOOM experience. In Awakening the player eventually finds he has 5 different paths to choose from, and each has it's own benefits and drawbacks. Some provide ammo, some armor, some new weapons, some health, etc. Each time a player plays through the level he can choose a different order to play through and experience each with different amounts of ammo, health, and firepower. It's fun to try to figure out the 'best' order to complete the five sections, or challenge oneself on the tougher areas with less firepower.

With linear levels everything feels planned and once you've done it once, that's it. No need to go back. You may have missed some secrets, or a side room, but if you survived the level it doesn't feel all that important to search out more.

Linear can still have it's place (such as final levels, as one example), but in the end I most certainly prefer non-linear to keep a level interesting over time.

NT

[darkreaver]

NaturalTvventy said:

With linear levels everything feels planned and once you've done it once, that's it. No need to go back. You may have missed some secrets, or a side room, but if you survived the level it doesn't feel all that important to search out more.

Linear can still have it's place (such as final levels, as one example), but in the end I most certainly prefer non-linear to keep a level interesting over time.

NT

While I agree, I also do not agree :P

I am one of those (guess there arent that many) who dont really care (well yes I car, but I dont CARE CARE) about "playing Doom". This is kinda hard to explain, but...I almost never play Doom as intended hehe. I start up a WAD I`ve just downloaded, and I start playing. If it gets too difficult (I do try several times mind you) I have no qualms about entering and exiting god-mode just to get 100% health again. If the map is really tedious (or I get bored) I have no qualms about playing through the level in godmode. I just want to have a look at the maps, and check out the gameplay/tricks/traps/atmosphere etc etc. I dont care if I cheat sometimes, because I dont "play". I`m no gamer :P hehe...well that sounded weird.

I sometimes load up some of my favorite maps and play through them, just because I like how they feel, not because how they play different "every time" and I want to try another route or get a better finishing time.

What a fucking long rant.

In short: Yes, I go back and replay linear levels.

ps: I do play alot (all known megawads, several times each) in co-op. No cheats there, hehe :)

[NaturalTvventy]

darkreaver said:

If the map is really tedious (or I get bored) I have no qualms about playing through the level in godmode. I just want to have a look at the maps, and check out the gameplay/tricks/traps/atmosphere etc etc. I dont care if I cheat sometimes, because I dont "play". I`m no gamer :P hehe...well that sounded weird.

I do the same thing. probably more people then you think do. if I'm not enjoying a level, i pretty quickly decide to cheat my way through it. this is just so i can see if there's anything redeeming about it, or anything i hadn't seen before, so i can rip it off and replicate it in my own levels, only better :)

but these wads are not good levels. do you do this with ALL the WADs you download? I do it with 90%, but there are those few that are very well made and balanced enough that cheating most certainly detracts from the enjoyment of the WAD. They are the reason I do it all in the first place. Without them, I wouldn't play custom DOOM WADs at all, and probably wouldn't be inspired to make my own.

NT

[40oz]

I replay nonlinear levels too. I love playing my own maps every once in a while, even though there's nothing new to learn from them. I always avoid cheats with the exception of IDCHOPPERS in maps that have very little ammo though. The first impression is very important to me as a doomer though. If a map doesn't play very well my first couple tries I may not even give the whole map a chance before I decide the map is just torturing me and I'm not getting any entertainment out of it.

Making a non-linear map is so dangerous. There's something that seems really "amateur" about just throwing some crazy layout together, a bunch of monsters, some weapons and ammo and expecting the player to fend for himself. Gameplay kinda needs to have some planning involved. The player needs to be provided with ammo, have access to weapons that don't completely suck, have barrels to shoot that are near armies of monsters, etc. Otherwise a map can be quickly swayed off as not having good gameplay if the mapper chooses not to provide it to the player without the player needing to figure out how to play it correctly.

I'm not trying to bash non-linear maps because I certainly do enjoy them, but as a mapper, i'm still having a hard time grasping a concept that calls for making good gameplay but not having it readily presented the player without making him have to search for it.

[Nuxius]

40oz said:

Making a non-linear map is so dangerous too difficult for me.

Fixed that for you. :p

The difficulty in making a good non-linear map is precisely what draws me towards them; then again, it's also my Achilles' hill, as I hardly ever finish anything, so I digress.

(on a side note, my personal definition of non-linear is pretty much the same as dew's, FYI)

40oz said:

There's something that seems really "amateur" about just throwing some crazy layout together, a bunch of monsters, some weapons and ammo and expecting the player to fend for himself. Gameplay kinda needs to have some planning involved. The player needs to be provided with ammo, have access to weapons that don't completely suck, have barrels to shoot that are near armies of monsters, etc. Otherwise a map can be quickly swayed off as not having good gameplay if the mapper chooses not to provide it to the player without the player needing to figure out how to play it correctly.

This applies to any Doom map, linear or non-linear, so I'm not sure what point you're trying to make here exactly.

[The Ultimate DooMer]

Nuxius said:

Fixed that for you. :p

Yeah, after all it's so difficult to think when playing Doom maps as opposed to following the only available path. God forbid we have to actually search for weapons, ammo, keys etc. instead of them being put in front of us as we follow said path. Let alone having to grapple with the immense complexities of new weapons, monsters and items instead of having the same guns and enemies every time.

Kinda like modern games really...I thought Doomers were supposed to hate those.

[dew]

40oz said:

Making a non-linear map is so dangerous.

this is true. you have to playtest thoroughly every route you provide, or you risk creating an exploit, no-threat route that breaks your map with zero player effort. also placing an item to balance one route might throw off the other ones - it's a way more delicate job, but the prize is sweet if everything works right. in other words - if you want the player to have to think, you'll have to do it thrice as much. :)

The Ultimate DooMer
Let alone having to grapple with the immense complexities of new weapons, monsters and items instead of having the same guns and enemies every time.

well, 99% of custom monsters are either simple recolours that perhaps change the attack rate or hit point count, or suck in terms of fitting in and finding a niche that isn't already occupied by the stock monsters. not everyone is erik alm to be able to create a witty, multipurpose opponent that'd be popular enough to get it's own nickname ("OMFG WHY MORE PLASMADICKS?!"). also 101% of custom weapons suck. the added percentage is for people failing to understand how to set up railgun damage/recharge. the sky may be is an exception to both of my statements.

[Nuxius]

The Ultimate DooMer said:

Yeah, after all it's so difficult to think when playing Doom maps as opposed to following the only available path. God forbid we have to actually search for weapons, ammo, keys etc. instead of them being put in front of us as we follow said path.

Amen brother, amen. Agreed 100%.

dew said:

also placing an item to balance one route might throw off the other ones

Yeah, this is definitely one of the hardest aspects to get right while making a non-linear map.

Of course, you can always cheap out and just give the player all the weapons at the start like Kaiser did for "Forbidden Deeper" in the Doom 64 TC (regardless, this is still one of my most favorite Doom maps of all time).

dew said:

it's a way more delicate job, but the prize is sweet if everything works right.

Agreed 100%. :)

[NaturalTvventy]

I really don't think making non-linear maps is particularly difficult. it's a pretty simple concept really. make multiple paths, each with different benefits. one path, a RL. one path, a soulsphere. one path, lots of shotty ammo. there ya go. that didn't hurt my brain too much. does having an RL 'break' other paths because now you have a more powerful weapon? nah, I don't think so. the balance of the DOOM weapons is so divinely put together that, while having an RL is nice in some situations, if you don't have it in those same situations it's not going to be game over. take fighting a baron for example. the RL is mighty nice to have, but chaingun and shotgun still get the job done.

NT

[40oz]

Nuxius said:

Fixed that for you. :p

http://www.doomworld.com/idgames/index.php?search=1&field=author&word=Nuxius&sort=time&order=asc&page=1

Hm. Only map I see here is a remake of E1M1. I suppose it's too hard for you too.

In your defense, the E1M1 remake is very accurate, but certainly non nonlinear.

[Phml]

Making a non-linear map is so dangerous. There's something that seems really "amateur" about just throwing some crazy layout together, a bunch of monsters, some weapons and ammo and expecting the player to fend for himself. Gameplay kinda needs to have some planning involved. The player needs to be provided with ammo, have access to weapons that don't completely suck, have barrels to shoot that are near armies of monsters, etc. Otherwise a map can be quickly swayed off as not having good gameplay if the mapper chooses not to provide it to the player without the player needing to figure out how to play it correctly.

Not sure what the first sentence in this paragraph had to do with anything else, really.

Well, ok, my comment is just passive-aggressive bullshit ; I actually read the whole thing as "nonlinear maps are likely to be like that". To which I have to say : no way, a good nonlinear map is - has to be ! - more carefully planned and balanced than a comparably good linear map, simply because you have to account for an exponential number of choices the player might make rather than just one route.

If there's only one correct way to play a map, then that map isn't nonlinear. There will always be one path that will work better than the others, even if by a ridiculously tiny margin, but it shouldn't outshine all the other options so badly to make other routes pointless in normal play (speedrunning is another thing).

[40oz]

By dangerous I just mean it's prone to give someone a bad experience if they don't figure out what to do, or find out how the map is supposed to work. At least in linearity, you never stand around trying to figure out where to go next, and my attempts to break up the linearity by including a few optional places to go or switches that aren't directly next to the object it effects, but apparently to little avail.

I guess in the case of these birthday maps, since they are, in fact, all single player maps that I intentionally made easy so that they could be played in one straight shot without pissing anyone off, the linearity is kinda intended (in addition to being by accident)

In my own interpretation of nonlinearity, I think of deathmatch maps. How you can quickly get in and out of areas because every room has like 3 or more ways in and out of them, and I'm not really sure how I can design a single player map like that and not make it so it will be completed in 30 seconds.

Also Knee-Deep in the Dead has been brought up. What specific qualities do some of the maps have that make them non-linear instead of linear? Not to say that I can't locate any by myself, but I'd like to know whether or not we are on the same page in out definitions of linear and nonlinear.

[Snakes]

Well, here's my view on the nonlinearity of Episode 1

E1M1 - Switch to enter the outdoors gives a player two options of how to go about the level. Straight-forward, with enemies mostly being directly in the front, or going into the middle and having them all exposed from the start? Nice little option to have.

E1M2 - The completely optional maze. Are the rewards worth the risk? Of course, these days, what risk? But back then... also important for the atmosphere.

E1M3 - Fairly linear, actually. Although when the area that leads to secret exit switch/soulsphere is opened, the player can decide to forge straight ahead, or go through it on the way back... and yeah, again, it's completely optional. So is it worth it?

E1M4 - This whole map is pure non-linearity. With the exception of the maze, you can go almost anywhere from the start. In that way, it's possible to kill monsters before you even wake them up via sniping, etc.

E1M5 - More linear, but connectivity gives a great illusion of nonlinearity.

...

Okay, this is getting too long, but frankly, the ability to enter a room from more than one angle causes different things to happen, the way it all unfolds is more unpredictable. The ability to explore different areas early on means the player can have a new experience every time. I've never really been able to nail this down, myself. I've made a couple of conscious efforts, but most of the time I just wind up turning the locking out the second path and turning it into its own area.

I don't mind either style of mapping. They both can be done well and turned into something incredibly fun. Hence, I liked UAC Ultra and WOS as well as Knee-Deep, Plutonia, and Memento Mori.

[printz]

Personally I find E1M7 quite linear, despite being so popular. There are side secrets to go to, but the way you have to go to reach the exit is always the same.

[Alfonzo]

Might as well post here, seeing as I was sort of the one who inadvertently instigated this topic.

Most of what needs to be said with regards to non-linearity has already been washed, dried and thoroughly ironed out, and I think that Jodwin has managed to pin the tail on the donkey best of all. However, I will comment by saying that there seems to be a perplexingly great deal of negativity toward linearity that, in my eyes - and this is merely speculation - could only possibly have come about from the modernization of gaming and its crossover into the Doom universe. And while it is true that having to...

search for weapons, ammo, keys etc. instead of them being put in front of us as we follow said path.

is the preferable way to go (for me at least), maps like those from 40oz's Birthday series almost benefit from being largely linear because it contributes to that refined sort of feel that I mentioned in the review.

printz said:

Personally I find E1M7 quite linear, despite being so popular. There are side secrets to go to, but the way you have to go to reach the exit is always the same.

Yus. I agree. Maps such as e1m4, e3m3, e2m6, e3m5 and possibly e3m6, however, really impress upon me their non-linearity, although... and I think this is an extremely important point; most all of id's maps are at the very least perceivably non-linear to the player the first run through, with excpetions going to maps such as e3m1, e2m9, so on so forth...

[Xaser]

Hmm, nonlinearity? The key, as usual, is balance -- making a super open-ended map with tons of paths everywhere is tough as hell to pull off right since it's easy to let the player get lost, but constricting the map flow to a single path can stifle the player's freedom. Doom's maps managed to strike a balance here by giving multiple paths through a level (and optional side-areas, too) without being too confusing.

[Nuxius]

40oz said:

http://www.doomworld.com/idgames/index.php?search=1&field=author&word=Nuxius&sort=time&order=asc&page=1

Hm. Only map I see here is a remake of E1M1. I suppose it's too hard for you too.

In your defense, the E1M1 remake is very accurate, but certainly non nonlinear.

Most of my maps are for community based projects (32in24 DM/CTF maps and the like), so you won't find them by doing a author search.

Try this:

Newdoom Community Project
http://www.doomworld.com/idgames/index.php?id=14102
(MAP09)

I will warn you in advance that the level aesthetics range from bland to rather ugly (or extremely ugly as the case for the yellow key room...). In my defense, most of it was made in 2005 when I came back to the Doom community after a 8 year hiatus, and I hadn't played many of the new maps at the time yet.

One of these days I'll finish this map and have something that is both non-linear and not ugly as fuck.

[Joshy]

Nuxius' Bale Confines in NDCP is certainly a great example of 'non-linear'. Far from ugly too! :-)

I don't think making a non-linear map is dangerous as it is 'tedious' or really time-consuming. It took me hell of a time to finish 'the Grotto' for Christoph, he intended for it to be quite non-linear and that's putting it lightly (the damnest non-linearist map I've worked on and played!). The biggest puzzle is determining the paths (especially when you put in an obstacle on one path but it can be surpassed with the other adjacent paths) and ensuring the health and ammo is placed in certain ways that one outcome does not dramatically influence the other. Otherwise, it would be deemed as actually linear if one path was too easy or the other, too hard although this case would be limited to non-linear maps that have little paths to choose. Might've parroted what others said, but just putting in my two cents.

[darkreaver]

I just came to think of an prime example in linearity: HR2 map29. I love that map.

[jukenukem4d]

Non-linear maps suck. This is Doom. It's not like you get special powerups that allow you to reach areas within areas you were before that you couldn't previously reach, or you get separate missions within one map. Non-linearness is pointless.

[The Ultimate DooMer]

jukenukem4d said:

It's not like you get special powerups that allow you to reach areas within areas you were before that you couldn't previously reach

They're called "keys".

[Abyssalstudios1]

jukenukem4d said:

Non-linear maps suck. This is Doom. It's not like you get special powerups that allow you to reach areas within areas you were before that you couldn't previously reach, or you get separate missions within one map. Non-linearness is pointless.

...trolling? I really can't tell anymore.