The /newstuff Chronicles #418

[Phml]

It's possible for a "gameplay-oriented" wad to have a proper sense of aesthetics, as well.

Well, obviously - and so the other way around is just as true. Yet, at least from my perspective, there are many more wads with decent looks and no gameplay to speak of than wads with great gameplay and nothing worth looking at.

Perhaps due to that one could make the point for most people aesthetics are more important in Doom wads than gameplay, because the baseline Doom gameplay is good enough you can throw monsters haphazardly, or because some people don't even care about gameplay and just want to press fire and see stuff blow up*, but there's nothing wrong with different things every once in a while.

To review a fork as garbage because you can't eat soup with it is missing the point, it wasn't supposed to be a spoon. It's not too hard for any doomer who's been playing enough PWADs to estimate within minutes what's the genre of a particular map or what specific goals the mapper was going for. Honestly, I feel I can tell that stuff by the name and textfile often enough and find myself right most of the time, and I'd wager I'm not alone in that. So, when someone who's been around here for a long time and has done this for a while manages to apparently misread everything about a wad? I'm not seeing a baby trying to put a triangle in the square box, I'm seeing a teen being a prick.

Kind of tangential, but ideally, aesthetics should serve gameplay. Unfortunately, many mappers, regardless of where they sit, don't seem to care for that. If we're talking about hypothetical perfect wads, I can agree single-texture maps are just as disappointing as layouts built entirely before adding any monsters.


*just because there's bound to be someone who reads this as me badmouthing such attitudes: I play Torchlight 2 on Casual. I play Saints Row 3 on Casual. I play MMOs.

[myk]

Bloodshedder said:
What else do wads have besides gameplay?

Art. Gameplay mostly refers to sport-like qualities. At least in what DOOM can generally do. I mean, other types of games, like RPGs and sandbox games, can deviate from sport-like play radically... and making a DOOM level is also a form of sandbox game, especially with speed mapping and other activities which involve design rules!

Xaser said:
This, IMO, is why level-by-level accounts have no place in t/nc.* There's not enough space to give adequate detail to each map, making it read like "this map is a castle; this next map is a techbase; etc.", and I usually find that the overall-wad review portion is lacking or nonexistent as a result (since the level breakdown tends to absorb all of the time & effort).

In many cases that may hold true, but it's cool to have reviews like the one by HumanBones here. It's almost as long as MajorRawne's CC4 review, but it goes to the point, highlights playability instead of rambling along and should be very useful when selecting maps for the map list on a server.

[gggmork]

The "newstuff chronicles" are like giving a megaphone to one arbitrary reviewer out many potential reviewers. Instead of thinking of it as the ONLY review that is crystalized in time on your permanent record, ignore the authority of the megaphone. Its like a microcosm of the main stream media with the main purpose directing and controlling sheep. People who have made doom a hobby/play it religiously have already learned to mostly follow a particular network of mappers of their favored niche who have consistently made maps they like in the past, rather than be swayed by the "official" review of some guy's bull-horned opinion. But the real beauty of newstuff reviews comes from the entertaining resulting infighting/trolling/flamewars, so that said MajorRawne is pretty good at generating them so he's ok in my book! I know if I made "official" reviews I would tend toward trolling because that's more fun for everyone amirite? But every time I've clicked the link to review there is some technical problem that didn't let me do it (just clicked now and it said I have to click something that re-logs me in automatically or something, which I'm probably too lazy to do).

[j4rio]

you're so negative

[TimeOfDeath]

mork, did you try deleting all your cookies and then logging back in? I had that problem a few days ago when submitting a review, but maybe that's a different problem.

[Herculine]

IMHO reviews of a Doom wad really are no different than reviews of a box-office movie. There are always going to be people who will say that it's good and there are always going to be people who will say that it's bad. In the end you just have to wait for it to hit the half-price theater or get released on DVD and then check it out for yourself.

[Doomguy 2000]

Well I played Expired License just to find out that it sucked. After the second level of the final exam was when I started to get frustrated by it. At least I can admire the effort put into an original idea, shame that this only appeals to the Doomgods and not casual players.

[Krispy]

I only really failed the final exam.

[j4rio]

Doomguy 2000 said:

Well I played Expired License just to find out that it sucked. After the second level of the final exam was when I started to get frustrated by it. At least I can admire the effort put into an original idea, shame that this only appeals to the Doomgods and not casual players.

If you can't beat something, it doesn't automatically mean that it sucks. It does however mean that you suck. ;p

[Herculine]

j4rio said:

If you can't beat something, it doesn't automatically mean that it sucks. It does however mean that you suck. ;p

I agree wholeheartedly, though I probably would have said something more like: "Not every game modification can be expected to be appropriate for every player's skill level or sense of aesthetics."

EDIT: I tried to type the 24th and the 4th letters of the English alphabet together at the end of that sentence but each turned into an asterisk. **

[dew]

ecksdee is the sign of the beast speaking through a 13yo girl. the high priests of doomworld have forbidden such heresy thousands of years ago.

[Acid]

j4rio said:

If you can't beat something, it doesn't automatically mean that it sucks. It does however mean that you suck. ;p

Sucks in their opinion at least :P

Oh well, not the first time there's a case of newstuff drama for ToD's maps.

[MajorRawne]

Or my reviews. So I suppose we've all learned something, perhaps not quite what we wanted to learn, but that's the /Newstuff!

I'll try to make sure any future reviews are less contentious. Remember, the next /Newstuff will contain reviews written before this debate, so please excuse any embarrassments. ;)

[ReX]

MajorRawne said:

I'll try to make sure any future reviews are less contentious.

I don't think you should do that at all. If you feel you've done your best to examine a wad from all the important angles, then all that remains is for you to give your honest opinion after that. If it turns out that your opinion creates discussion (or, indeed, argument), then so be it.

Now, there's no reason for you to be less entertaining in the process. Without being outright disrespectful, of course.

[Doomguy 2000]

j4rio said:

If you can't beat something, it doesn't automatically mean that it sucks. It does however mean that you suck. ;p

So if I hate something that you like automatically means I suck at the game? Sure makes logical sense when there's probably other people that will agree with me.

[MajorRawne]

j4rio said:

If you can't beat something, it doesn't automatically mean that it sucks. It does however mean that you suck. ;p

See, this is why I can't respect his opinion. We can't all play Doom on Nightmare or finish every level below the par time. Do we suck? Or do we devote more time to other things?

If something is too hard, and it's a level on a computer game, some of us have better things to do. Fair play to those who stay and master it - but you cannot speak down to people just because they were turned off by something. I agree with Doomguy 2000 here.

Myk said:

In many cases that may hold true, but it's cool to have reviews like the one by HumanBones here.It's almost as long as MajorRawne's CC4 review, but it goes to the point, highlights playability instead of rambling along and should be very useful when selecting maps for the map list on a server.

Then without malice, I'd say read his reviews instead. There is no disclaimer in the /Newstuff that says "All reviews must be submitted in the style of HumanBones". I respect what you're saying, Myk, but not everyone cares about what works on the server.

Rex said:

Now, there's no reason for you to be less entertaining in the process. Without being outright disrespectful, of course.

To be honest, I feel more disrespect has come from a number of posters in this thread than I dished out in the reviews. It's weird to know that some people will always be dead-set against others, but A) if nobody dislikes you, you never stood up for anything, and B) I don't care.

[ReX]

MajorRawne said:

To be honest, I feel more disrespect has come from a number of posters in this thread than I dished out in the reviews.

To some degree I concur with your assessment. However, as you may have inferred, I was not implying that you showed disrespect in your reviews. In my post, I was merely pointing out that one's reviews can be entertaining without being belittling.

Ultimately, if an opinion is presented in a well-reasoned manner, it will likely be considered fairly by an intelligent and unbiased reader/listener.

[Vorpal]

*shrugs*
I'm not familiar with the personalities and histories involved here but I thought the reviews were fine. The basic question "Are these things I want to download?" were answered via text and via screenshots.

[Herculine]

Doomguy 2000 said:

So if I hate something that you like automatically means I suck at the game? Sure makes logical sense when there's probably other people that will agree with me.

That's not what was said; the comment was clearly in regard to difficulty. The archive file comments are full of whining about things being too difficult, but IMHO such complaints are not valid as reviews since everyone's skills are different. What's too difficult for you might very well be a fun challenge for someone else.

[Acid]

Vorpal said:

*shrugs*
I'm not familiar with the personalities and histories involved here but I thought the reviews were fine. The basic question "Are these things I want to download?" were answered via text and via screenshots.

The opposing arguments boiled down to the reviewer's lack of insight/thoroughness when examining a specific wad. Therefore the question of "do I want to download this" isn't truely answered since a huge section of said wad wasn't mentioned.

[j4rio]

MajorRawne said:

See, this is why I can't respect his opinion.

The only thing I said which was aimed at you is that you chocked up one review pretty big time. I honestly don't give a frack about absolutely anything else regarding your existence.

Doomguy 2000 said:

So if I hate something that you like automatically means I suck at the game? Sure makes logical sense when there's probably other people that will agree with me.

Nope. If you hate something because you can't beat it, it doesn't imply that what you played was automatically considerable as something that sucks. And I'm not talking about extreme cases of wads (like your wads, f.e.), which suck whether you can beat them or not.

[myk]

MajorRawne said:
Or do we devote more time to other things?

Possibly, thus sucking at what we don't devote much time to, like being able to play a challenging WAD without cheats and undue frustration. It's not always just a matter of time, though. I've played a lot of DOOM, yet some guys played the same amount or less and are clearly better players. If I play deathmatch and someone beats me 50-5 and says "you suck" I don't think I'd be too entitled to refute that I suck compared to him or her, and if I extend the expression beyond the game, I may need to grow up a bit or see an analyst to boost my self-respect.

Fair play to those who stay and master it - but you cannot speak down to people just because they were turned off by something.

I don't care much for advanced port stuff and, at least for single player, stick to vanilla WADs. Should I fill my posts with comments about how GZDoom or JDoom WADs are pieces of shit? I don't even have that attitude because I'm not such a loser. I just leave them aside, knowing those who like them do enjoy them, thanking DOOM for the variety it offers and knowing the right to one choice allows for the right to another. Now reread Doomguy 2000's comment. It starts saying the WAD sucks and ends saying it again, because he can't beat it and it's made for skilled people, interposing some asinine bullshit about "admiring the effort" to get the insult through more easily. Is that not the perfect place for j4rio's comment, which is nothing you should have felt offended by?

[ArmouredBlood]

Well this is interesting. How about all of you review 4 wads and then we'll see how you all match up, and whoever does the worst can just not review wads anymore. Crowd-sourcing doom reviews.

[Phobus]

Clearly we just need me to start doing reviews again! :P

[MajorRawne]

ArmouredBlood said:

Well this is interesting. How about all of you review 4 wads and then we'll see how you all match up, and whoever does the worst can just not review wads anymore. Crowd-sourcing doom reviews.

In whose opinion? What possible right would people have to prevent one or more genuine, hard-working Doomworld members from making a contribution, when the overwhelming majority of readers have never written a review themselves? What about favouritism, which occasionally rears its head (albeit mostly in Post Hell)? What about personal preferences: those readers who read views simply for the facts, and those who want to be entertained? What if... and so on.

I don't mean this harshly, it might work in an unbiased world, but passions run more deeply here than any forum I've been on (for some reason). I doubt there could be a fair consensus.

EDIT: And before people say I'm scared I'll lose, I wouldn't care, I'd just do something else instead. But I won't vote against another reviewer. Even the worst of them have more balls than some people and that should be respected.

Myk: I wasn't offended as such, I simply don't agree with it although we start getting into semantics here. The poster's attitude in some (not all) of what he said made me disinclined to hear the rest of it in an unbiased way - which furthers my point about a review contest.

As for your points about people "sucking" at Doom, you're right to say people suck compared to some people, but this is different to sucking full stop. This is where the semantics come in.

[Sergeant_Mark_IV]

These discussions and all the senseless drama are actually much more interesting than the reviews.

[ArmouredBlood]

MajorRawne said:

In whose opinion?

We have mods. If Bloodshedder and a few other guys like fraggle, manc, and essel decided to get in on it we could have a decent test review board. That might be quite a bit of work though, depending how they do it.

[Doomguy 2000]

myk said:

Now reread Doomguy 2000's comment. It starts saying the WAD sucks and ends saying it again, because he can't beat it and it's made for skilled people, interposing some asinine bullshit about "admiring the effort" to get the insult through more easily. Is that not the perfect place for j4rio's comment, which is nothing you should have felt offended by?

I tried to be nice with my opinions on Expired License as far as the hard work is concerned but, the way I look at things it seems like something that caters more to the Doomgods (Salughterfest people), than the casual players. If I were reviewing the wad, my opinion would not be much different than Major Rawne's. Sure I would check out the final exam portion and tell people how I feel about them.

My overall thoughts would be me telling people to skip it, since it's only made for a certain kind of people. I'm sorry if people here can't handle my opinions when that's how I felt on one particular wad. If you look back on the flamewars back in #411 you can see people getting butthurt over someone else's opinion on Slaughterfest2011. If Expired License had the same popularity as Slaughterfest2011, then that ratings would be the same rating which is 2-2.5 as seen with the first Slughterfest.

[j4rio]

The sf debate got completely out of hand, with people bringing up absurd junk that had nothing to do with review and wad whatsoever, just ranting for the pure hell of it. Majority of those associated with sf abandoned that debate long before it was over. Some incomprehensible vordakk crapperie come to mind.

[Krispy]

It doesn't matter if a wad is geared toward "doomgods" or not, the archive isn't for you alone. You should review something else if you don't prefer that style. It seems to me like you have a very scoped view of what wads should be like. Let's see:

• Easy
  
• Vanilla
  
• Detailed but not too detailed
  
• In the style of Doom (Run around and shoot, rather than anything extra that can be accomplished with ZDoom)