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Katamori

What are you playing now?

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kmxexii said:

Pre-Titan Flynn maps: INTZONE was great, much better than even I was expecting. There's some clear Flynn style stuff, especially the opening "maintenance" area, but the whole library section blew me away, especially that revenant at the front desk that pops out of his seat when you walk in. I laughed my ass off. The puzzles are kind of tough but they're all very rewarding when you figure them out.

Yeah, Jim Flynn's Titan Maps are what got me into his style in the first place. His Enigma episode is pretty cool; not the best detailed, but his Titan maps are the ones that amazed me. His Eternal Doom levels I feel he's just outdone himself in extreme complexity (much like Bob Evans' levels in Eternal Doom, but he's a little more difficult to solve). Anyway, Flynn is the reason I enjoy puzzle maps.

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Being lazy on Plutonia, currently on MAP23: Tombstone, using my mod.

I'm going to have check out Revisited sometime. I've only played through the whole of PL2 on cooperative however, which might I add was a fun ass experience.

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Just got done playing through the KZDoom series by Kurt Kesler using the Real Reload Weapon Mod r2. A fun set of single level releases.

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Nice find! I'll have to check that out.

Currently going through The Ultimate Doom on HMP via Doom95, did the original three episodes in a row and have Thy Flesh Consumed left. Will be doing the rest of the IWADs on HMP.

Then it's pistol starting all the maps on UV.

I'll be uh, busy.

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Finished E4 on my HMP run. Now I've completed E1 on UV via pistol starts. Onto the other three episodes.

EDIT: Oooooh man...

I just completed Doom II on HMP in one session, didn't exit the program or even leave the chair to take a break. Too bad Doom95 doesn't show the total time overall like some other ports do.

Now if you excuse me.

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valkiriforce said:

Yeah, Jim Flynn's Titan Maps are what got me into his style in the first place. His Enigma episode is pretty cool; not the best detailed, but his Titan maps are the ones that amazed me. His Eternal Doom levels I feel he's just outdone himself in extreme complexity (much like Bob Evans' levels in Eternal Doom, but he's a little more difficult to solve). Anyway, Flynn is the reason I enjoy puzzle maps.


On that note, I just finished the Titan series of maps. I really enjoy Flynn's approach to map making. Titan Manor is the best example of a Doom puzzle map I've played so far. Fighting outside of the map can be tough (until you hit the lights) but the real challenge is inside the map. Trapped on Titan is a nice contrast, still some puzzles but much more combat oriented with a glut of monsters to blast. I also enjoy its clearly winged approach.

The non-commercial entries strike me as just as impressive. Mines is absolutely huge with some decent firefights, but the real highlight is its emphasis on exploration, making the map a great adventure. Anomaly in contrast has a much tighter design, with a smaller area and much bigger, dangerous fights (particularly the eastern and western sides of the map). Farside is a very compact map, with some neat effects, a nice breather between Anomaly and Trouble. Trouble feels to me like Flynn's solo opus, about as complicated as Titan Manor and much, much larger, with equally testing combat to be had. The opening bit will pretty much make or break this map for any potential players. All in all, I greatly enjoyed Flynn's stuff, especially as I actually felt challenged puzzle-wise.

Shoutout to Valkiriforce's videos of Titan playthroughs, which clued me into two details I'd missed in Mines and Trouble, without which I would probably have gone insane as I had already glazed over the true solutions (exit gate and blue key pillar respectively). Remember that unless Flynn gave you a hint indicating otherwise (Oracle), the solution to the puzzle you're stuck on is very likely nearby.

Cleansing my pallete with some Egyptian style maps before tackling Sverre Kvernmo's solo collection (I, Anubis; Osiris; and Chosen, which I've actually played, but need to replay for a more substantive review).

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Currently playing Heroes for The Ultimate Doom. The levels may not be all that pretty, but the gameplay is certainly there. As long as the levels are fun I don't mind; especially considering it's from 1995.

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valkiriforce said:

Currently playing Heroes for The Ultimate Doom. The levels may not be all that pretty, but the gameplay is certainly there. As long as the levels are fun I don't mind; especially considering it's from 1995.


There are few maps I'd call stinkers and Dewey managed to bang out some bizarre original contributions, minus his first map in the wad, which is both ugly and boring.

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i'm currently re-playing the original iwads, just finished e3 this morning and started doom 2,i m at map 10 so far.

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PRIMEVAL said:

Finally finished Whispers of Satan on HMP. All 32 levels. Epic. Now to find a new PWAD...


What about the "other" secret levels?

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I, Anubis / Osiris: Osiris is a partial conversion that improves on I, Anubis in pretty much every way imaginable. Weapon sprites look better, monster sprites have been cleaned up, and the maps from I, Anubis have seen some improvements in detailing, architecture and layout. Most of the monsters haven't been messed with too terribly much but the new archvile is a nice departure from the original while still being pretty nasty. I like how it mixes in some more Stargate Command maps in between more Egyptian stuff.

A few dislikes... It ends on a whimper. Considering the finale is called "The Last Pharaoh" I was expecting something to actually kill. The new plasma sound is even worse than the original. The only loss monsterwise is a phantasm that would unleash this unearthly scream upon waking up and then spam the player with arachnotron plasma. It was kind of freaky, but didn't help gameplay out that much so I'm not sad that they decided to axe it. Regardless, I heartily recommend Osiris to anyone, especially those who like to vary up their Doom a bit.

Chosen: Still a great-looking TC in spite of the 3d rendered sprites. I wish it was longer but it's a nice diversion with some excellent music and puzzles/traps. It wasn't until I replayed it that I made the connection that Very Hard is basically Chosen's version of Nightmare mode so I have only myself to blame for soldiering through bullet hell and fliers that turn you from full to zero health in about a second (or less). The shorter boss encounters are nice arcade-style fights, though the first time I played through the Uraeusis fights (the 2nd encounter) I got hopelessly stuck as the solution to the first encounter could have some better positive feedback. Even so, I recommend it to anyone looking for a FPS experience that's pretty unDoom.

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Just finished Heroes - definitely an enjoyable 90's experience (at least for me it is). [EDIT] But I really hated the new sounds (I always hate it when there are new sounds) so I just removed them before playing the megawad. The only megawad I can think of where I actually liked the sounds and they actually fit was with Eternal Doom.

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I've been out of the loop with DOOM over the course of the past few months, as I was busy discovering Descent for the first time (yes, it's taken me this long), and finally realizing that Duke 3D isn't so bad.

But now, I'm back. My first order of business was to finally play Suspended in Dusk. It's not only a technological marvel that showcases what vanilla is truly capable of if you're willing to work around its limitations (and don't mind savegame buffer overflows), it's just a plain solid set of levels, using cramped environments, good enemy placement, and excellent health/ammo management to create legitimate tension. Not very often that vanilla levels can get me so twitchy and jumpy anymore, so bravo to it.

My only complaint is that Map03 kind of drags (took me over an hour to beat without restarts) and probably should've been split into two smaller maps. That aside, totally quality work and definitely recommended.

After my usual dabbling in school-themed maps (I really wish I'd known Doom UHS was DM-only and didn't have an exit before I started playing it. Cool fake room-over-room effects, though) and other various selections (The Hall is a pretty solid choice if you're interested in E2-style/`96 maps), I finally sat down with Doomworld's own 1994 Tune-up Community Project.

I had no idea this mapset was even finished yet, and being such a sucker for `94 maps as I am (for reasons I still don't quite understand), I was giddy with excitement.

I'm currently in the process of playing both the original WADs (which were so conveniently included in the ZIP) and the remakes, doing the original first, then a pistol-start run of the remake. I've played the first five maps so far.

Map01 certainly does a nice job of overhauling the detail-less original map, and makes switches actually visible now instead of just being blank wall textures, and thank goodness you can't get perma-stuck anymore! But it feels very empty compared to the original, and the hordes of baddies are one of the only highlights of the original, so it doesn't feel terribly faithful.

Map02 is a nice visual update, and I like how the chaingun is now acquired from zombies instead of just being handed to you. But the original map wasn't very noteworthy and neither is the remake (and adding unavoidable damage sectors isn't exactly an improvement).

Map03 is a really beautiful visual update of the original (the chainsaw room is quite an attractive little arena now, and I like the soul sphere tower with the nice shadows) and fixes the game flow so that you can't just run right to the exit anymore. However, the increased size actually makes it seem a bit easier, despite the increased monster count.

Map04, as another poster mentioned, is hardly updated at all. It looks a bit more detailed, of course, and it's a tiny bit harder, and I like how a previously-inaccessible outdoor area can now be entered. But the overall layout is practically unchanged. I think we need a 1994 Tune-up Tune-up here. :)

Map05 is a HUGE improvement. The original map had way too many hitscanners and was too dark in spots, resulting in a lot of cheap hits, and there was almost no health whatsoever. The remake brightens everything up, actually gives you some health, and it makes the green armor secret (basically required to beat the map in the original) much more obvious now. Only problem is, if the Doomworld /idgames page for it is correct, this is actually a 1995 map. Oops. :)

Really looking forward to the rest of this one, especially SUBWAY21, WOODHAL2, and ORIGWAD, since I've played those before.

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kmxexii said:

I can't check from work but what's the timestamp of the WAD in the zip?


1/12/1980, i.e., useless.

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Too bad (id)bsp doesn't embed a build timestamp, eh? Btw, all the bsc0* files on /idgames are shown as "Mar 20 1995", so that date is probably wrong too.

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hex11 said:

Too bad (id)bsp doesn't embed a build timestamp, eh? Btw, all the bsc0* files on /idgames are shown as "Mar 20 1995", so that date is probably wrong too.


From what I can tell from the .txt, they uploaded the whole schmear at the same time much like kvernmo did when he uploaded his cabal series, so I wouldn't go off the upload date.

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Fear is the Key - A fantastic and well designed Doom 2 styled city map. If you enjoy city maps like I do, then this is a must. It starts off a bit slow though.
http://doomworld.com/idgames/index.php?id=13697

Darkening - Great little mapset, I'd even go as far as to say that it is a masterpiece.

(Halfway through) Darkening 2 - This one is a little bit more professional but it's still a lot of fun to play through.

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Currently playing the Heroes 2 megawad - first level was an awesome kick start on the difficulty. I loved how there were a dozen cyberdemons on far ledges that get telefragged by a dozen player 1 dummies.

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Still playing `94 Tune-Up.

Map06 had a surprisingly good level as a base already. The remake is a little more involved, barring you access to certain areas that were readily available to you before, making you jump through a few more hoops to get to them, which is not necessarily a bad idea. Ammo's quite tight at first and I actually had to just run past a few cacos. However, it's possible to get perma-stuck, and I occasionally found myself bouncing off the cramped, angled architecture in a few spots. Also weird how "leftovers" of some of those old, removed passages remain, with a door opening to a dead-end, impassible flame wall being the oddest one.

Map07 was actually kind of unfortunate. The detail is undeniably fantastic, with a cool, high-ceiling, almost church-like theme, and the final battle really had me on edge. But the first big battle is in way too big of an arena. You have plenty of cover to work with, so you spend a lot of time just standing around behind it, and there's TONS of mancs to blast through, so the whole thing kind of drags while you slowly whittle down the health of the chubby hordes.

Furthermore, this map has almost nothing at all to do with the map it's based on. Not even the basic theme is right. The original map, while not necessarily great and rather "experimental," was really unique, and perhaps one of the earliest examples of "survival horror" in DOOM. Way before Ghoul's Forest, there was Execute. The remake being a brightly-lit, loud slaughtermap completely misses the spirit of its source material, and leaves me wondering what point there was of even using Execute as a base when it was basically just thrown away.

Map08 was a nice update of the original, taking a lot of those secret passages (of which there were so many) and actually incorporating them into the normal progression of the level, instead of tucking them behind walls where many players would never see them. The fighting around the yellow key was frantic and fun, with lots of little bits of cover to dance around through with when things got tough.

Map09 was as far as I got today. Xeno11.WAD was already shockingly good for its age, so I expected something suitably awesome for its remake. The results were...a bit mixed, but not bad. It sometimes feels more like an homage than a true remake, with only a few recognizable areas, and much more focus on the outdoor portion than the large indoor segment that the original sported. However, this gave you more incentive to actually be outside, as the outdoor area was mostly empty in the original. I like how open the level is, letting you approach it from many different angles (and with how tough it is, you'll probably need to try several of them before you find a "sweet spot"). Use of the original sky texture was cool, too. And it's really just a bit mind-boggling to see how MUCH there all is of everything. This isn't just detail, but just crazy amounts of area to run-and-gun through, which is cool.

However, the level's a tad irritating, with lots of hitscanners sniping you from nowhere in the limited cover of the outdoors, and a seemingly endless supply of cacodemons. After all that, I was pretty much exhausted by the final battles, and was happy to see the exit.

I have no idea if anyone's even reading these play-by-play breakdowns, but I'm compelled to write them anyway. :)

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Megamur said:

I have no idea if anyone's even reading these play-by-play breakdowns, but I'm compelled to write them anyway. :)


Don't worry, I find the interesting. :)

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Megamur said:

I have no idea if anyone's even reading these play-by-play breakdowns, but I'm compelled to write them anyway. :)


As one of the mappers I'm following them with interest - in particular I'm obviously looking forwards to seeing what you make of MAP16.

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Awesome! I'm only too happy to provide feedback. I just apologize if I'm a little harsh sometimes. :)

Only had time to play two maps today.

Map10, I believe, really defines what I wanted this `94 Tune-up project to be. All the major landmarks from the original map are there, and the basic, overall shape is the same, but everything is improved. Instead of spectres just standing around in front of an item, they teleport in in a sneak attack; instead of just a firefight where you get a few items out of it, the nukage room becomes an actual trap that's required to progress. When I was playing the original map, I was legitimately a bit surprised by the cacodemon ambush after you leave the blue key room. I felt it was a real high point of the map. The remake takes this idea and just runs with it.

Heck, if you notice, the original map gets notably more Hell-themed in the final area, whereas the remake gradually becomes more Hell-themed as you progress, with hellish rooms and symbols popping out from behind the walls. This is a map that lovingly recreates the original, studying everything that made it significant, and enhancing all of those things to elevate it to its true level of potential.

I'd say my only qualms are that the soul sphere secret is actually easier to get now, since the lift is much closer and far easier to hear. And some of the dummy sectors near the blue key are too close to the map, and you can hear the door opening and closing, spoiling the trap.

Map11, sadly, is on the exact opposite of the spectrum. What happened here? It's a good thing Elements was such a good level back in its day (practically IWAD material. Expertly done), because this basically is the original Elements. There's some gradient lighting added, some deep water effects, an added skylight or two, and that whole room with the red lines running across it (the "TRON room," I like to call it), but otherwise, almost nothing is changed from the original. The only significant improvements are the modified arachnotron trap, and the fact that required secret doors are now obvious. All in all, though, this is the weakest of the remakes so far. It's so barely modified, STARTAN2 is still plastered all over the upper/lower texture slots of most of the walls--an error held over from the original ELEMENT.WAD. Wow.

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