Atonement [33 Vanilla DOOM II Maps] [Now on idgames]

[Moustachio]

 

Atonement is a 33-level wad for Doom II. It is fully compatible with vanilla Doom II. It's been tested with DOSBox, Chocolate Doom, Crispy Doom, GZDoom, and the Eternity Engine.

 

The maps range from small to large, easy to hard, and everywhere in between. Unlike most wads, the shorter maps in this wad tend to be at the end. They are by no means a cakewalk though.

 

The first maps in this wad were originally released 5 years ago. Hopefully, the progression in my mapping style becomes apparent as you play on, although the old maps have also received some updates both minor and major.

 

You can download the release candidate below. I'm counting on my fellow Doom wad enthusiasts to help me out here and mention any game-breaking or otherwise noticeable bugs they find. If you've been waiting for a finished version of Atonement to begin playing, here you go. This is pretty much the finished wad. With any luck, I will be able to upload this version to idgames on Halloween.

 

Download:

idgames Archive

Google Drive

 

All of the midis for this wad were provided by Dial-up for Murder. Here's a link to the music I used ^{(thanks, Tim!)}:

• MIDI Dreams
• MIDI Nightmares
• Atonement

 

 

Story:

Spoiler

You are the premier marine scientist working on the UAC's baddest tech yet: inter-planetary transport. You're up on Mars, making sure the new machines don't turn people into giblets. A few lost volunteers later and you've finally perfected your invention. On the way to power on the machine you start to feel an uneasy presence nearby...

 

Edited November 30, 2022 by Moustachio : Final release on idgames.

[Nine Inch Heels]

5 hours ago, Matt534Dog said:

(Special Thanks to Nine Inch Heels for a lot of playtesting! You rock!)

No need to thank me. I had a really good time with your maps, and I actually feel bad that I couldn't find more time to spend on them just yet.

[CaptainManiac]

that's called a jewel now

[Moustachio]

3 hours ago, Nine Inch Heels said:

No need to thank me. I had a really good time with your maps, and I actually feel bad that I couldn't find more time to spend on them just yet.

No, don't feel sorry about it. You were such a huge help, I was surprised you found time to even just play through them all in their various iterations. And hey, I'm obviously still going to need playtesters for the rest of the project, so, if you want, I can send you a few new maps every so often.

 

3 hours ago, CaptainManiac said:

that's called a jewel now

Huh?

[EverCoo]

What visual mods are you using? They look really nice

[Misty]

This looks good, judging by screenshots. Maybe I should record demo and check how this plays. I hope, it won't kill me on hmp. 

[Moustachio]

Just now, MysteriousHaruko said:

I hope, it won't kill me on hmp. 

I haven't implemented difficulty settings in the first map, but the second and third have some rudimentary balancing. That being said, I don't think the first map is too terribly difficult.

[Moustachio]

2 minutes ago, EverCoo said:

What visual mods are you using? They look really nice

I'm using all the fancy OpenGL settings in GZDoom as well as Duke Shadows (DN3D style shadows for enemies), Smooth Fluids, Super Brightmaps, and Droplets for blood splatter effects. I'm also going to try out this Revised Splashes mod if anyone wants to experiment with me: https://forum.zdoom.org/viewtopic.php?f=37&t=35547

 

--Links--

Smooth Fluids: https://forum.zdoom.org/viewtopic.php?f=37&t=55161

Droplets: https://forum.zdoom.org/viewtopic.php?f=19&t=46509

Super Brightmaps: https://forum.zdoom.org/viewtopic.php?t=29792

Duke 3D Shadows: https://forum.zdoom.org/viewtopic.php?f=37&t=54992

Revised Splashes (haven't tried this yet, but it goes well with Smooth Fluids apparently): https://forum.zdoom.org/viewtopic.php?f=37&t=35547

[Salt-Man Z]

Whoo, those screenies looks fantastic!

[Killer5]

Hello. Maps were pretty fun. I got lost in map01 a bit. More comments in txt.

Atonement.zip

[Moustachio]

6 hours ago, Killer5 said:

Hello. Maps were pretty fun. I got lost in map01 a bit. More comments in txt.

Atonement.zip

Great demos! I really enjoyed watching them, but for some reason the third demo desyncs after the first death. Either way, I'm glad you enjoyed my maps! :)

[Killer5]

@Matt534Doghmmm.. did you watch the demo using complevel 2? i just tried watching it again and it didnt desync.

[Moustachio]

@Killer5 Hmm, nope, still desyncs... :/

[Nine Inch Heels]

afaik, you don't need to enter a complevel for demo playback at all, because the cl should be part of the demo.lmp, but I'm actually not 100% sure about this.

[Adahn]

I played the first map and so far it's really good, I like the gameplay and layout of the map. I think your heading in the right direction by focusing on gameplay, I really had a lot of fun playing this wad.

[Moustachio]

@Jthom Thank you so much! I'm glad you enjoyed it! Good thing I'm not the only one who's feeling this gameplay-first mentality.

[baja blast rd.]

Hey, I played this set a few days ago and revisited 02 (which was my favorite) today. 

 

1)

 

Spoiler

 

The HK on the bottom here doesn't warp in because the sector it's in isn't joined by sound. In limit-removing I'm pretty sure joined sectors that are non-contiguous have trouble moving with monsters on them, so the old school method of linking these sectors physically with a tube would do.

 

2)

 

Spoiler

 

These teleport sectors are quite slow. They have one line responsible for a fairly large closet, so monsters will still be trickling in very late. I wrote a post on closets here. Points #2 and #3 are relevant. A monster that fails to teleport will likely walk the entire length of the closet more than twice, which in the case of slow monsters like former human troopers, leads to them appearing very late. 

 

I actually don't think this is a problem in this case (in a fast-paced run I can route with that in mind), but it's something to keep in mind for the future. 

 

The highlights were the two-vile reveal, a nice surprise on my first playthrough, and the mass spawn-in trap, which isn't overtly pressuring but fun. Mass spawn encounters that blanket a large complex space (e.g. both outdoor areas and a variety of indoors ones) are pretty rare. This one has the additional wrinkle that you can release a vile and a whole lot of stuff if you try to camp back there, which I'm noticing now. The low-tier spam in the vile room is also fun to mow down. 

 

Thoughts on 01 and 03 coming at another time.

 

[Moustachio]

13 hours ago, rdwpa said:

The HK on the bottom here doesn't warp in because the sector it's in isn't joined by sound. In limit-removing I'm pretty sure joined sectors that are non-contiguous have trouble moving with monsters on them, so the old school method of linking these sectors physically with a tube would do.

Aw really? Dang, that's the second time I've had to rejoin those sectors... I wonder why they keep coming undone. I'll update with some texture and bugfixes then since there's enough to fix now to warrant a patch.

[Pure Hellspawn]

is this considered a sequel to "Interception"?

[paymentplan]

Here are my FDAs for the maps.

 

All three of these maps are big (and I mean big!) monster filled spaces. I'd agree with @Killer5 that there's never a dull moment. The overall look of the maps is very good as well. Your detailing is in the sweet spot where the maps are visually interesting without causing too much clutter for the player to get stuck on.

 

For me, though, the size and length of the maps is a bit of a downside. I tend to like shorter, punchier maps, so bear that in mind. I think that a lot of the areas in this map would benefit greatly from being shrunk down 10%-20%. A good number of fights take place in these wide open rooms with plenty of space to dodge everything. Some fights could be made a lot more interesting (since you're focusing on gameplay) with more obstacles like pillars or splitting the arena into sections of differing height. But the large physical size of the rooms and spaces in the maps does give a weird alien sense to them. Like the player is trudging through a place where giants once lived. I think thematically that's neat, but can impinge on the enjoyability of the gameplay and can in some cases obfuscate progression. I never quite got lost, but often felt vaguely overwhelmed by the scope of the maps.

 

That fight in the outside area of MAP02 is a good example of this done right. It's a large area, but the teleporting in monsters come from all sides so the player has to be vigilant to not strafe right into a hell knight or cacodemon. I also really liked the fight with the revenants and cacos at the rocket launcher in MAP03. The pillars there give the player something else to be aware of while firing rockets into the baddies. 

 

Since I generally go for shorter maps, I found myself getting a bit impatient towards the end of these, especially MAP03. Of course, that led me into some tricky predicaments...

 

In any case I wish you luck and stamina in your endeavor! I'll gladly check in on the progress and offer up more FDAs and thoughts.

atonementppfdas.zip

[Moustachio]

1 hour ago, Pure Hellspawn said:

is this considered a sequel to "Interception"?

 

Haha, I mean it's certainly a follow up from me, but the design goals are completely different, and it's not a community project.

 

@paymentplan Really? And here I was thinking I was making medium/small sized maps... Honestly, I just make areas that feel good to run around in when I map, but I guess some claustrophobic sections wouldn't hurt. Thanks for the review! I can agree with pretty much everything you said, and it's always helpful to get an alternate perspective from someone who has a different taste in mapping styles.

[Moustachio]

Hark, an update!

 

Edited August 18, 2017 by The Mysterious Moustachio

[Moustachio]

I went and updated the OP with much more information about what the project goals are. If you are interested in testing maps or composing music, send me a message!

[Xangi]

Man this mapset doesn't screw around, anyway I played MAP01 and MAP02, looks good but I feel like MAP02 in particular suffers from the whole "Doorway cover shooting" thing where it's far easier and more viable to simply poke out around a door frame and take potshots/kite enemies over rather than engage in any kind of run 'n' gun combat. In this case I think it's just the density of enemies vs the size of rooms. I'm not saying set up more ambushes, but perhaps create the rooms in such a way that only a portion of the enemies are initially present, luring the player into the arena then teleport in the rest (gradually if they're hitscanners, just to avoid exploding their HP too fast) once they reach a point far enough in that it's easier to stay and fight. Not every encounter had that though, maybe about 40-50%.

 

That isn't to say I found it overly hard though, the difficulty aside from the previously mentioned bits is quite good, it didn't feel cheap or anything so great job there. Looking forward to playing the rest when it isn't 3AM in my timezone.

[Walter confetti]

Looks awesome from the pics!

[MFG38]

Loving the aesthetics going on here! I'll keep an eye peeled.

[dobu gabu maru]

Played a bit of it, only skipping to the next map whenever I died (which was like 2/3rds through each map). First thing I'm going to warn is that the maps are really large, sprawling, and grindy, so that a megawad worth of levels like this is totally unappealing to me. It might be appetizing for other people (literally every other player has given positive feedback it seems), but this could easily become an exhaustive set, especially if the gameplay doesn't vary from map to map.

 

Which brings me to my next point—you have a tendency to just jam monsters into big rooms without much rhyme or reason. This is similarly echoed in your munitions placement, which are scattered about at the edges of nearly each area, with only the rocket field portion of MAP04 being something that was identifiably different. This makes combat feel hohum as you charge through fields of meat and receive ammunition & health fairly evenly, battles only getting hot if an archvile shows up to wreak havoc. If I could hazard a guess, it seems like you map the entire layout first then fill it with monsters, no? I really think you should probably consider what enemies serve the layout better, and think about what the player's reaction is likely to be upon entering a new room.

 

Lastly, I suggest avoiding "monotexturing" rooms, like the starting room of MAP02 and the BIGBRIK1 room in MAP04. Using different textures for pillars, cubbies, sections of a wall etc. help flesh out a map a lot more, and the less the room looks like you copy pasted a single texture over the entirety of it, the better.

 

Good luck mapping the rest of the set.

[Moustachio]

@dobu gabu maru Yeah, that demo is a little bit outdated at this point. I've made a lot of improvements since then; I'm always going back and adjusting my older levels. Your feedback is going to be really useful though.

[Moustachio]

Here's a new map: http://www.mediafire.com/file/c5m99nn7tma6hx3/hecticcastle.wad (MAP01 SLOT)

 

-=TESTED ON CRISPY DOOM 4.1 AND CHOCOLATE DOOM 2.3.0=-

 

STRIKE ON HECTIC CASTLE

 

Exit Times

Casual UV Playthrough: 9:33

UV Max Playthrough: 23:00

[bioshockfan90]

Looks great! I'll play it and give my feedback once i'm off work!