The DWmegawad Club plays: Speed of Doom

[baja blast rd.]

MAP33: Descent to Nowhere

 

I'm surprised this one was cut. It's a solid map, with a good mix of chill encounters and hectic ones, and better overall imo than a bunch of the regular-slot maps. The pistol combat at the beginning is not to my tastes, but the map breaks out the SSG early, good. The last fight is oddly timed, even just a basic plasma rifle fight with the cyber would kill it long before the rest of the hordes arrive. I guess suspense was the goal. I like that fight a lot because it's pretty rare for the plasma rifle to be a dominant weapon when the player has a BFG and ample cells of all things! It's not even a niche weapon here, either -- it's basically the go-to weapon for most of the fight. The most dangerous part of the map is probably the close-quarters HK/chaingunner trap at the SSG/CG very early, and the second most dangerous is the RK trap. (Regarding appearances in a run: the SSG/CG trap will usually kill you if it goes wrong and not look so harsh otherwise, whereas the RK trap will always look messy but rarely outright kill you, as long as you have decent health to spare.) The BK trap can also be dangerous if you get there low on health but isn't really so bad. The rest is pretty straightforward. 

 

 

[Paul977]

8 hours ago, rdwpa said:

 

 

 

Cool run. I replayed the map again yesterday (final time 11:xx) and yes using more plasma rifle was the way to do the lift fight instead of ssg/bfg in all my many (failed) attempts

[Cynical]

On ‎4‎/‎27‎/‎2017 at 11:31 PM, dobu gabu maru said:

MAP22: Yo real talk—”Sign of Evil” is a bad track. Every time I hear it I roll my eyes. It’s not fit to be anything more than intermission text music. You want something spooky, use “Suspense” or “Demons on the Prey”.

Nope.  Sign of Evil is great.

 

It's not meant to be spooky.  It's meant to be mournful.

 

 

[Varis Alpha]

i have to confirm that Sign of Evil is great, and if you don't like it, you are weird and strange. everyone you know who plays Doom likes Sign of Evil.

[dobu gabu maru]

Good to know so many of you enjoy the Nickelback of Doom songs. You know if Bobby Prince shits in your coffee you don't have to say you like it, right?

[Cynical]

There's lame Doom songs (all of the ones based on Panterrible, as well as The Healer Stalks...), but Sign of Evil isn't one of them.

[Spectre01]

Sign of Evil is a classic and memorable track. One of the best in UDoom. Also, the Pantera haters need to walk on home!

[Cynical]

I'm already at home, no walking needed.

 

Which is lucky, because it means I don't have to hear the shittiest guitar riff ever that wasn't on "Far Beyond Driven".

[NecrumWarrior]

I like Sign of Evil but I can see why some people wouldn't. Far as I'm concerned it's really only a song that works well in the level it was designed for, which is a slower foreboding part of Doom. 

[rehelekretep]

map28 fda

this map im sure is a blast for speedrunners but as a scrub i found it quite dull as you can circle-strafe for most of the map.

i was also constantly on edge waiting for the 50 AVs to spawn in and destroy me but theyre used very sparingly.

in fact i wish there were a lot fewer PEs and more AVs. the PEs dont really add any fun to the gameplay; they exist to dodge my rockets and occasionally make me scared that im going to run into one, get stuck, and eat a cyber rocket.

finally, there are random ledges in the main arena that are suddenly slightly too high to climb up. as the body count rises it becomes harder and harder to tell which are suddenly beyond Doomguy's geriatric jumping abilities; if one of these steps had blocked me into a rocket i would have been as salty as Wieliczka

edit: oh! before i forget, i did really like the surprise 2 cybers in the tower area off to the side of the main arena, you can see me 'oh shit!' with my mouse as they appear.

Edited May 9, 2017 by rehelekretep

[Spectre01]

1 hour ago, rehelekretep said:

they exist to dodge my rockets

Using rockets in a map where the BFG is the only intended weapon eh? :O

[rehelekretep]

i only realised quite late that i was unlikely to run out of BFG ammo >.<

[galileo31dos01]

36 minutes ago, Spectre01 said:

Using rockets in a map where the BFG is the only intended weapon eh? :O

Well the other weapons are provided in the map too, even though the BFG is the main "star"

[Nine Inch Heels]

3 hours ago, Spectre01 said:

Using rockets in a map where the BFG is the only intended weapon eh? :O

Funnily enough, I found the RL to be quite useful when storming the fort on one side of the map. There's one plateau full of HKs, and having the RL can spare you a trip to some ammo storage, so it's not entirely useless, as in: There's one place I liked to use it, personally. Can't say what's faster though, but I don't like backtracking for ammo by way of principle.

[rehelekretep]

oh god that plateau up the steps? that was really tedious >.<

[Nine Inch Heels]

I find it almost hilariously ironic that the entire map you just blaze away, killing several hundred enemies in a minute, and that plateau there just "plateaus" your kill/time ratio like that... It's not even that there isn't enough ammo available... It's more that the ammo isn't where you need it, and that makes it feel annoying, especially in that otherwise too long for its own good map.

[rehelekretep]

its weird because the other similar structures in the map are a lot less onerous to clear. almost like Darkwave did the isolated one first, then realised he needed to change the others (they are revs and PEs if i remember correctly?) but then forgot to go back and spice up the original

[rehelekretep]

map29 fda

wow. this demo is a real shit show. it's a shame i decided to become even worse at doom than usual throughout trying to complete this map, because it's actually a lot of fun: lots of different scenarios, 2x invulvns (very useful and fun!), a cool key concept, some nice architecture etc.

the MIDI is a bit repetitive (well maybe if you play it for an hour or two >.> ) but its a really well-put together, fun map.

the only thing that was a bit weird was the exit door (to the void exit) didnt seem to want to open until i stepped on one of the 2 exit 'teleporters' again and then it decided to...

i also had to save a the beginning of my final attempt due to my takeaway arriving; i didnt need to use the save (thank god!) but that's why it's there.

Edited May 9, 2017 by rehelekretep

[Demon of the Well]

I need to wrap up here, as well. Still have NEIS to work on!

 

Map 29 -- The Ruins of Kalnik - 101% Kills / 100% Secrets

IMO, this is Joshy's best map in SoD. Also probably the game's hardest level to 'session', I'd say, though in terms of pure death counts Pyramid of Doom probably tops it. Perhaps slightly larger than many of his others here, nevertheless if we speak purely in terms of physical stature I think this still soundly qualifies as a 'small' map. What appeals to me so much here, I think, is that excepting a couple of side areas which exist more or less in isolation (mainly the back half of the initial cave and the BSK's keep, and holy shit I totally forgot that this tiramisu-marble texture set was in SoD!), a ton of gameplay content is wrung out of so much of the real estate, whether that be by regular reuse of it for a number of different battles or for the many possible ways in which different parts of it can interact with each other, or occasionally both. The result is a small map that plays more like a medium-sized one mostly without feeling padded out, which is often a recipe for something that's really epic/bloody in those rare cases when an author can pull it off. 

 

In a sense this begins much like many of the other SoD Joshymaps, in that the level opens with a hot start demanding you immediately get your butt in gear or else by embarrassingly stampeded to death in a flood of pigs/goats. In contrast to many of those other levels, where the setup is founded on nearby areas of the map all being subject to withering levels of overwatch/attrition from the moment you arrive (i.e. "Poison Ivy II"), "Ruins" uses staged/triggered arrivals of further enemies allowing the opening bits to be handled at varying levels of speed, with the slower fight-by-fight approach requiring more careful use of space and supplies (i.e. you likely need to use the 'zerk fist as a weapon for once) and the quicker, turn-it-all-loose-at-once approach being more efficient but also more unpredictable and prone to unexpected disasters (mostly involving the pair of viles in the little hollowed-out rock in the center of the first cave, what with their rather ornate web of potential sightlines). Fairly minor, but for a WAD with as many repeated staging devices as this one has (instapops and the like), I feel it meet to give J-man some credit for continuing to find different ways of creating the same basic type of mapstart, all the way up to the end of the game.

 

Anyway, the real festivities begin when the cave opens on your first sight of cursed Kalnik, though good luck getting a clear look at it through the Woodstock-level throngs of howling damned initially blanketing the landscape. There's a strange element of 'where the fuck do I go? at first' wholly beyond dealing with the hordes of creatures, in that you need to do a little bit of parkour-spotting to get into the central structure and hit a switch which might've easily been flagged 'secret' in some of the other levels--weird as hell, really, though it's an interesting quirk. Progression from this point unfolds into a short CYOA quest requiring you to find and return all three skulls to the pedestals in the blasted-out marble ruin in the center of the map, each key being protected by its own heartwarming clusterfuck or small gauntlet (and occasionally both), and most also triggering fresh waves of monsters to appear in or around the central ruins, ranging from a relatively minor cacoswarm to a potentially rather nasty cluster of medic-viles in the central structure.

 

There are many different ways this can all play out depending on your route, which can lead to markedly different experiences from game to game: the RK guardians can be retreated from and eventually dragged as another army into the main area for rolling chaos (especially if the bridges to/from the center have appeared), the reinforcement cacoswarm can eventually siege any side area, etc. To some extent this is predicated on aggressive/informed play, of course; on a blind play this likely takes the form of something slower paced as you deal with each threat as it appears in order to avoid being overwhelmed, but even in this light I think it performs fairly well, something like a smallscale ZoI-type engagement with the big tactical wrinkle being that so many of your resources are found in the central structure, which is purpose-planned to be occupied by hostile forces at pivotal moments, and that enemies from around the keys are not necessarily content to just wait in their areas once you've stirred them up (the BSK keep is something of an exception here, again, though it has its place in the greater balance by dint of being a secondary supply depot if you clear it early enough, which is not the easiest thing to do). Come what may, no matter how you play the level is packed with bloodletting from beginning to end, and has a carefully conducted sense of escalation and chaos on the verge of losing control, and so makes for a fine penultimate challenge, IMO.

 

Dig the odd little bit of cinema at the exit, too. And those incredibly distinctive cut-through sectors on the central ruins, which simultaneously look cool and create some unpredictable sightline/projectile pathings, surprised we don't see those more often.

[Demon of the Well]

Map 30 -- Darkness Without End - 173% Kills / No secrets

I'm going to put myself out there now, and state that I think this is one of THE best and most memorable megaWAD endmaps in the community's long, varied and fruitful history. Not just as an IoS-style map, mind you, but as a closing map in general. And it's so very, very simple, both conceptually and in terms of presentation! A brief slalom down a river of eternal fire ending in the infinite blackness at the Center of All Things, as a level it's a brief but massively-scaled invasion-type survival trial, tasking you with holding out against an endless wave of evil for long enough to find the opportunity to deliver the final goodnight kiss to the boss brain, which slowly descends to eye level at the foot of the abyssal beacon as its power is drained through its fevered spawning. From a gameplay perspective it's extremely simple content where, for all practical intents and purposes, you frantically run in circles and fire the BFG, but levies enough sheer firepower and physical presence against you that it doesn't feel weightless as a final challenge. The key to victory is as simple as knowing when to use the single V-sphere (hint: not immediately!), and the comically excessive carpeting of items and ammo around the beacon should more than carry you once you've figured out that the strategy for the level is not as entirely mindless as it may initially seem.

 

In terms of pure spectacle, the map's framing of a featureless black abyss with a literal sea of creatures pouring from it to converge upon your position at the foot of the illuminated beacon is a beautiful take on the powers of visual contrast and depictive minimalism, with waves and waves of glowing projectiles coursing through the darkness. It's the simplest scene in the game, and also the most extreme in terms of its sheer dwarfing scale and stark contrasting of darkness and light, and so makes a truly visceral impact. As I've said many times before, there are many forms a map 30 can take, many different slants on gameplay concept both within and without the bounds of the traditional IoS concept, but in my mind all of these are largely tertiary to what the final stop at the end of a long hero's journey ought best to be--something carthartic or poignant (or both), and a glimpse at Something Yet Unseen. For something that is at heart simply a big scrappy BFG-fest, "Darkness Without End" performs excellently in those regards, precisely because it's so boldly simplistic in form.

 

As per usual, I can easily find things here to nitpick, mind you--i.e. it's very distantly bothersome that the final weapon in the pickup chain at the start is the BFG, requiring you to switch to something else to hit the impact switch to actually start the final battle. I also feel that some kind of modest sprite replacement for Romero's head would've been in order, given that the mapset has a generally deadpan serious tone (occasional bits of subtle meta-humor aside). These are really incredibly minor quibbles, though, and have for me never detracted from the level's impact as a resounding exclamation point at the end of what has been a variously serene and histrionically roughnecked trip.

 

************************

 

As I seem to recall saying at the outset, before this past month I hadn't actually played through the great majority of Speed of Doom in several years now, but it is a WAD that has always remained pretty close to the surface in my mind when thinking about PWAD design. Coming back to it, then, I guess I was at least a little taken aback at how easily I found myself criticizing much of it, particularly the earlier maps by Joshy (though most of us have known from the beginning that m07 is pretty much just crap, no offense dude. ;) ). Thinking on it, though, there's really no reason to digest this as some startling 'Emperor has no clothes' revelation: taken as a single experience in a vacuum, while SoD pulls its weight in keeping you busy and entertained from the outset, it is very much a game that 'saves the best for last', and in hindsight I find that it has pretty much always been its third episode that burned so brightly in my mind (along with the odd earlier diversion, nearly all by Darkwave). Conceptually and mechanically very set and focused--perhaps even to the point of occasional fault, some might fairly say--both authors opt for design tacks that lend themselves better to full escalation. This being a 33 map set, the need for some kind of curve is at least implicit, and so to some extent those memorable E3 maps springboard off of their more restrained predecessors, which for their part are not without their own share of memorable ideas, flawed or hesitant though I found many of them to be this go-round. In that regard, I think a lot of the game as a whole is really carried through by the steady 1-2-1-2 alternation between both authors' very different design styles, Darkwave's moodier, more atmospheric and often relatively laid-back offerings contrasting starkly with Joshy's generally concise, no-frills in your face monsterboxes.

 

As a historical piece, this focus on the idea of very rich and very overt stylistic juxtapositions in both presentation and gameplay framing/intensity between individual maps (or individual arcs) over the course of a longer game is probably one of the set's watershed impacts on the scene (in contrast to the more traditional model of a steadier upslope with smoother stylistic transitions over the course of a longer game), and to this day creative thinking tends to grant pride of place to smaller, more artistically harmonious mapping duos or small teams, in contrast to the 'community project' model. Bearing in mind that many players were (and still are) willing to compare it to Alien Vendetta in terms of its overall impression or feel, SoD is also interesting as one of the last transitional mapsets between older styles of challenge/spectacle-oriented mapmaking and newer veins of design (though some may have been surprised to find just how limited its truck with 'slaughter' design actually is in practice, I'd warrant), and it's telling that many of its characteristic quirks in placement, pacing, and progression design are commonplace in the deeper, darker end of the gameplay pool these days.

 

On a more personal note, criticisms on a map-by-map basis aside, it's also been a great pleasure for me to revisit these earlier, more formative/exploratory works by two of my personal favorite mappers in all of the community, seeing their effective beginnings anew. Darkwave establishes himself as such here in what was essentially his debut, showing a penchant for pure mood that has continued into his modern work even as his gameplay brand has become more and more uniquely idiosyncratic; Joshy's work here is rougher and much herky-jerkier in pacing, mechanics, and occasionally balancing, but his love and talent for pushing the envelope with visceral, violent combat staging is here set in stone, to be refined into something truly remarkable later on down the road, as he learned to appreciate the greater freedom and deeper possibilities (and additional balancing challenges/hangups) of using much larger and more freely traversable playspaces.

 

My top five maps of Speed of Doom, in...uh, no 'particular' order, are:

Map 22 -- Dead Echo

Map 24 -- Hell's Honeycomb

Map 26 -- Blessed Hellscape

Map 29 -- The Ruins of Kalnik

Map 30 -- Darkness Without End

 

Oh yes, I'm also aware of m33, but for the time being I'm going to cordially decline the invitation to revisit it, as I fully agree with its author's decision to relegate it to a 'bonus' slot. It is worth a look as a curiosity for those playing the set for the first time, though, certainly interesting and perhaps informative as another of SoD's few truly overt nods/homages to an iconic WAD of yesteryear, inflected with Joshy's usual give-no-fucks attitude towards placement, of course.

[rehelekretep]

couldnt say it better myself DotW; map30 is marvellous. it elicited a genuine sense of dread/wonder the first time i played it!

[rehelekretep]

map30 fda

brilliant end to the wad. as DotW as said so perfectly, this just works and is a great example of an imaginative IoS fight. here's a video (testing out the prboom+ -viddump feature (thanks to @Ryback !)

 

map33 fda

i can see why this was cut. its a little bit 'anonymous techbase', which one other map suffers from a bit (maybe 3?). the elevator fight is the standout moment, but that's ripped from somewhere else.

 

summary

speed of doom FDAs pack

a really enjoyable mapset, perfect for my playstyle as none of the maps really draw things out or have you doing boring stuff repeatedly. even m23 which caught me in a bad mood, doesnt actually outstay it's welcome as youre perfectly able to zoom through the map(s) if you wish.

the only negative i can think of is the midi selection - nothing really jumps out to me, and the awful pitch of one of the early Darkwave maps was god-awful im afraid. for me, the MIDI soundtrack is a big part of a WAD (seeing as im spending more time than usual on each map... :p ) so it's a shame that the music choice wasnt more to my tastes.

Edited May 9, 2017 by rehelekretep : fixed all links now >.<

[Grain of Salt]

Just finished map10 :D