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NiGHTMARE

NiGHTMARE's Boom tricks ! (update 2)

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I've just released a new Boom / Doom 2 wad that level designers may find interesting. It features a level which contains various rare or unique tricks that you can implement in your own levels. The level only has two tricks at the moment, but I will be releasing more versions in the future.

You can find it here.


These are the two tricks it currently contains:

Breakable lift

A seemingly normal lift lies in the centre of the room. However, the 'break' switch will cause it to stop working, and the 'fix' switch will make it start working again.

Make sure the lift is all the way up before using the 'break' switch, otherwise it won't work properly.

note: works with doom(2).exe


Breakable door

This works in a similar method to the breakable lift. The 'break' switch will prevent the brown door from opening, and the 'fix' switch will let you open it.

The door should be fully closed before using the 'break' switch.

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I made a basic room over room effect (sort of like a car park), you can only stand in the lower floor (but view the higher levels floor/ ceiling). A bit limited but easy to construct, Doom2.exe compatible.

Would that be of interest?

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I've uploaded another version of the wad. It contains two new tricks (and a little bit of added detail to the existing rooms ;) ).

Rising/lowering 3D crates

These give the appearance of true 3D (but of course they're not).

note: works in doom(2).exe


Moving wall

Press the switch on the brown wall, step back and watch as the wall
seems to move backwards.

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Re: Breakable doors/lifts: I've done an effect like that before. My first ever proper level was a tech base where the power went down, and none of the lifts and switches would work (the doors would, though) until you turned the power back on. (op-lite2, map 07)

Effects like those and yours are really cool.

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I've done a moving crates on lifts thing before. :) Sorta similar to
your crate moving thing. Mine needed unreferenced sectors and stuff,
and it was very easy to screw up. I first saw it in one of the early
Eternal levels. You need a certain node builder to get it to work
properly, though (at least the way I did it) or you'll get a huge HOM
and invisible wall effect.

Good work. :p

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VolteFace: heh, you don't need to mess around with sector references at all to have crates on lifts, just use dummy sectors :) If you don't get it, don't worry, I'll include this in the next version.

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Cool, i've been trying to make lift with objects on it for a while. All my solutions are a bit cludgy. Did you get the maps?

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Six more tricks have been added. Half of them you've probably seen before, but you most likely haven't seen a death switch, armour and health switches or 'natural' water in a Boom level before.

I've also made a few improvements to the broken door and moving wall tricks.


Lift with crates

A pretty simple trick, this lift has a couple of crates on it that will lower and raise with the lift.

note: works in doom(2).exe


Light pulse

Press the switch in the middle of the darkened room, and it'll light up, only to immediately fade back to its original light level.

note: works in doom(2).exe


Death teleporter

Step on the teleporter marked 'die' and you'll be killed.

note: works in doom(2).exe


Death switch

Using the switch marked 'die' will also kill you.


Armour/health switches

Using the switch marked 'armour' will give you five armour, and the 'health' switch will give you five health. Each switch can only
be used once.


'Natural' water

The water lowers and rises, albeit rather jerkily.

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fen boi: I got them, thanks. I've still got a few more tricks of my own to add, but once they're done, I'll add your 3D tricks in :)

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I was playing through pleiades.wad by Roger Ritenour the other day, and I was on map08, Star City. Anyway, there's a building you can walk into, and there's a sort of crate-lifting machine there. The machine's arm is holding the crate in the air, and if you use ZDoom's "fly" command, you can float up and plainly see the top of the crate. You can also walk under the crate and see its bottom. How is a "floor-over-floor" effect like this made?

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NiGHTMARE: There is a way to do switch activated items with doom(2).exe,
as well. kwic.com/~junior/SW-ITEM.zip]Example. :) I used
to use this is my old levels, but unfortunately I don't have any of them
anymore.

For the death switch, you could put a few barrels beside a dummy player
and activate a crusher -- if the barrels don't kill you, the crusher
will.

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NiGHTMARE said:

VolteFace: heh, you don't need to mess around with sector references at all to have crates on lifts, just use dummy sectors :) If you don't get it, don't worry, I'll include this in the next version.

Oh... heh, I was under the impression that the lifts would go down to
the lowest adjacent floor height, so it would appear as if the crate
got lowered into the lift.

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DooMBoy said:

I was playing through pleiades.wad by Roger Ritenour the other day, and I was on map08, Star City. Anyway, there's a building you can walk into, and there's a sort of crate-lifting machine there. The machine's arm is holding the crate in the air, and if you use ZDoom's "fly" command, you can float up and plainly see the top of the crate. You can also walk under the crate and see its bottom. How is a "floor-over-floor" effect like this made?

I just checked it out, and MAP08 is Nuclear Plant... I see an arm
holding a big metal slab in air, if that's what you mean. It's actually
just two middle-textures side by side, Y-aligned in the air. The outside
looks like metal, but the inside is a solid black texture. You can't
actually see the top of it because it's not there -- you are just seeing
the black texture on the inside of it.

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VolteFace said:

Oh... heh, I was under the impression that the lifts would go down to the lowest adjacent floor height


They do :)

You have to make another sector 'out in the void', and change its sector references to the crate sector. Then make another sector joined on to this, and give it the floor height you want the crate to lower to.

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Aha, so I was right. :) When you said you didn't need to change sector
references, I thought you mean all you needed was dummy sector and it
would do it automatically. Some of the crappier nodes builders will
screw this effect up BAD.

Edit -- Oops, no they won't; I see how the effect is done now and it's
not quite the same as my way. My way involved taking the reference from
the parent sector, so the lift sector wouldn't have any reference to the
crates.

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Heh, my 2 pence (I'm English!):

First, I'm assuming that you're familiar with the tricks found in DW's tutorials section.

Doom2.exe compatible:

Bar blocking door:
Make a self-referencing sector, with STEPTOP (Or similar) texture aligned to the top of it outside of a door, roughly 24+ pixels away from the door, and make the outer line SCROLLING (Hence usage of STEPTOP) so that the door behind doesn't open from too far away. Also, make a dummy of this sector with a dummy of the floor surrounding it (For compatibility reasons) and a switch elsewhere to lower it to floor level.

Hence, there is a door with a bar blocking it that can't be opened until the bar is removed.

Shiny fluids (Many thanks to MAONTH for this one, he created it):
Create a small light (With LIGHT5 or whatever) in some water, about 16 high. Now reference the outer of it to a sector with the exact SAME properties as the water it's in, bar a slightly lighter light level. You now have a light cast onto the water, that 'follows' you realistically. Only problem is that this happens on the ceiling as well, unless you use the sadowcasting fake (V.High ceiling with no upper textures) or a F_SKY ceiling.

Double sky with no HOM (Kinda created by me and FREDRIK in unison, following an IRC discussion):
Simply use the shadowcasting fake on a sector with a non-sky texture to eliminate the HOM. Some creative work may have to be done to get this to work with complex sky/non-sky areas, but it's worth it.

Boom-compatibles only:

Blurry warp:
Place a blank black texture (Transparent) over HOM for a teleporter. You will notice that things that pass this part of the screen will 'blur'. This actually looks better at lower frame rates, due to the way it works.

Shiny floors:
Put some 64-high crates on a floor, and a sector AROUND it with a transparent version of the texture, flipped upside-down, aligned INTO the floor graphic. You now have a reflection of the crate on the floor.

MBF Only:

Fake mirror:
Take a screengrab of a part of your level. Use it as a texture, and make a 'sky window' with this texture as the sky, and a transparent SHAWN2 outside it on the opposite of the area you took a screen of. You now have a fake mirror that works with all MBF-compatibles.

Heh, have a play and see what you can find, really. The Doom engine rules for reaky effects.

Apologies, though, if this isn't very clear. It's hot here and my brain isn't working well ;)

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Well, I had a three essay deadline to meet yesterday, so most of the past couple of days were taken up with that ;) I've been working on couple of other maps today.

However, I have added a new 3D effect (one which doesn't create any HOM) which I don't believe anyone else has done before.

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not one of the ones I sent?, very interesting :)

UPDATE: just tweaked a 'standard' Boom effect to give it a more 3D look, theres a minor flaw which may take some thinking to remove. I might save it for my freedoom level. More interesting than wow.

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FYI, have a Boom version of the fake polydoor which is repeatable(the vertically opening one). Will send an optimised version soon.

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My E1M3 for freedoom has a crate on a teleport platform that dematerialises when you hit a switch. Its quite simple (lower pegging and floor lower with texture transfer when the floor stops) but I thought it was quite neat.

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Fraggle: nice :) Does it have a teleporter flash as well? If not, I think I may know how to add one...

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I ahve a quick question. you seem to know a great deal about wads, as myself, and was wondering something. how do you make Hanging objects, like a switch on a wall that doesn't touch the ground? anyway, there is an example in Level 31(PHARAOH) in doom 2.

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