Jump to content
Search In
  • More options...
Find results that contain...
Find results in...
Pan

Deep Sea wad - need play testers and opinions

Recommended Posts

I've created a challenging map with an oceanic wood base theme. I am thinking of creating a mini-sode, and would love some feedback on the first installment.

Here's the story;


You are a marine in a future apocalyptic war. While on a recon mission, your vessel was torpedoed deep in the Pacific Ocean. Only you and 3 of your fellow marines managed to launch a life boat before your ship sunk.


After drifting for days, you sight a strange wooden base emerge over the horizon. It appears deserted.As you approach the dock your life boat suddenly comes under heavy fire and your 3 comrades are wasted. You managed to scramble into the radioactive water and onto the dock, heading for cover from the onslaught.This strange wooden base has a radio somewhere. Your object is to find the radio and call for help.

 

Gameplay;

 

My idea was to create strategic combat, not just run and gun (if you try that in this map you'll quickly die). You need to tackle each section of the base methodically and try different approaches. Personally, this map kicked my ass until I found a useful strategy for approaching it. Now it is relatively easy.

Map specs;

 

This is a doom 2 wad mapped in zdoom for doom format.

It is a pk3 file. As you know, just drag into gzdoom to play it.

Screenshots;
 

Spoiler

1z2zyao.png

1585aw5.png



UPDATED Download; http://www.mediafire.com/file/g3de7aj43774379/Deep+Sea+wad.pk3

 

 

Edited by Pan

Share this post


Link to post

Am I the only one who thought this would be a WAD made with DeepSea?

Share this post


Link to post

Some thoughts:

 

- The pain elemental; if you kill it when it appears things are much easier, but if it drifts away before you can kill it, you won't be able to kill it for a while from the maze and the lost souls become very annoying.

- The clouds of cacos are lethal if you engage them in the maze, you can go back to the beginning and have an easier engagement but it slows down the flow of the game a lot in my opinion.

- The first area was the hardest part for me, once you clear the pain elemental and the cacos things become much much easier.

- The supercharge/armor in the blue key area seems too much. You suddenly get a ton of HP for little risk. I'd put smaller health packs there and more health in the early parts of the map. Maybe even move the pain elemental to this part.

- The three archviles; not sure if it's intentional but from the maze to this point was pretty chill and unexpectedly you get three archviles on your face. I'd make the difficulty smoother.

- After the archviles there's another bit with little challenge, like those pinkies: you have all the space of the world to move around and walk back, I don't think anyone will get hurt by them.

- The cyberdemon corridor: I had a problem with the 2 skeletons on top of the columns, I couldn't hit them with the shotgun/chaingun, not sure if it was just me or something was actually blocking the shots. I had no problem hitting the Imps in the other columns. When I changed to the rocket launcher I could finally hit them.

 

I recorded a demo:

gzd30 deepsea.zip

Share this post


Link to post

Thanks for the feedback :)

I noticed in your demo that you died quite quickly and you don't complete the map.

The challenging first section is much easier if you tackle the cacos and pain elemental in order. Like in your demo (before you died), first go down and kill the zombiemen and chaingunner, grab the chaingun, then run back to the ammo alcove with the green armor and the take care of the first cloud of cacos from that vantage point. Then the pain elemental will creep into your alcove- kill it before it starts spitting out too many lost souls. Then the second cloud of cacos will appear and you can dispose of them while inside the alcove with plenty of cover. Once this is done, then go down and take care of the imps and the hell knights, then enter the maze and it should be easy from there, unless all the hit scanners give you a problem - they do for me through attrition.

You're right it's too easy after the maze - too much health and too much ammo, and I agree the pinkies are not much threat. The 3 archviles are easy to deal with because you will have a BFG by that point, I was actually thinking of making them come up from behind instead so it's a bit harder. I'll make some adjustments and upload a new version later.

Edited by Pan

Share this post


Link to post
9 hours ago, Voros said:

Am I the only one who thought this would be a WAD made with DeepSea?

Nope, absolutely not.

 

Would have been interesting though. ;-)

 

@Pan
 

Quote

I noticed in your demo that you died quite quickly and you don't complete the map.

I do not know if guineu actually finished the map in his demo or not, but assuming that he finished the map, there's a good chance you're playing his demo back in a different version of GZDoom, which just so happens to break demo compatibility.

 

There's also a good chance that demos go out of sync for seemingly arbitrary reasons.

 

As a side note: If you play his demo that he made on an older version of your map back with a newer version of it, it will desync at some point anyway.

Edited by Nine Inch Heels

Share this post


Link to post
55 minutes ago, Pan said:

I noticed in your demo that you died quite quickly and you don't complete the map.

I died at the Cyberdemon, ate a rocket while trying to take out the pair of Revenants. Maybe there's some desync as Nine Inch Heels said, I used GZDoom 3.0.0 to record it.

 

 

But don't bother with the demo, I did pretty much what you describe with the difference of pushing a bit further into the maze after getting the Chaingun to kill the pain elemental before rushing to the starting alcove as you mention to dispatch the cacos from relative safety.

 

As for the Archviles/BFG; maybe it's me that I messed up there as I used most of my Cell ammo for the Mastermind just before them so I had to dispatch the archviles with rockets and barely managed to do it.

 

Share this post


Link to post

You were right! I ran the demo on the newer version of GZ Doom and you made it to the cyberdemon.

Nice work, you played very well.

I'll take on board your advice for improving this map and i'll provide an updated version later.

Share this post


Link to post

I've taken onboard some of Guineu's advice and have made an updated version of the Deep Sea map.

Overall, this version is much more challenging for me, but it's also more fun. There's more emphasis on ammo and health conservation throughout the map, but please let me know if this isn't balance. I have been able to finish this map with ammo to spare, but it requires being strategic with your weaponry selection for each battle.


There are more enemies overall but the frustrating first battle has been changed. The cacos and pain elemental have been moved closer to the starting area, so they can be dispatched more quickly from the alcove, without harassing the player from a distance.

The challenge is more evenly spread throughout the map now. The maze is harder, as is the battle to the revenant tower, and the battle through the imp encampment to the Spider Mastermind and the Cyber Demon. I have also added a new section for a blue key battle.

 

Good luck with this!  

Download: http://www.mediafire.com/file/g3de7aj43774379/Deep+Sea+wad.pk3

Share this post


Link to post

Hi all, sorry for the hiatus (been traveling) and thanks for the feedback. 

Thanks for the positive responses. I am going to build a mini-sode or megawad continuing the story of the marine after he navigates off of the ocean fortress. I am going to keep the theme consistent, story driven and oceanic. PM me if you would like to get involved in mapping for this for a megawad.

 

Thanks :)

Share this post


Link to post

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×