Your thoughts on TNT Evilution

[silentzorah]

I just like the music.  But that's about it.

[Urthar]

I found it more accessible than Plutonia, but less consistent in quality. I occassionally get the urge to replay Plutonia, but I don't think I'll ever revisit Evilution.

[SleepyVelvet]

TNT: Evilution - The first two-thirds of the wad are great!  The last third of the wad becomes long, dragged out maps iirc.  I actually didn't finish TNT Evilution the first time through it.  I never really decided to explicitly stop playing, but instead just burnt out and never continued.  I slowly went on to other things while tapering out.

 

I think I set out to complete it again a few years ago.  But, to be quite honest: I don't actually know if I completed it, or just have a false memory of watching other people complete it and pretended it was my own memory.  Those last stretch of maps leave foggy memories despite a few interesting scenes here-and-there.  Map30 is good though, and I do remember actually playing that one, though I seriously can't remember if I idclev'd to it or played up to it.  My brain is not very good at being a brain sometimes.

 

If you or your friend is new to Doom and they are playing TNT after the other iwads, don't let them get the impression that they are "getting bored of Doom entirely" when they play the last stretch of TNT.  Instead, tell them that it might be a better idea to go into Alien Vendetta or Scythe, or something.

[jazzmaster9]

I have a love hate relationship with TNT.

on one hand it has a great soundtrack and some of the levels have interesting ideas.

on the other hand... Mt. Pain, Habitat. the later is super is probably the worst map in any IWAD and Mt. Pain is close second.

The art quality on the new patches is also lacking.

 

The first half is pretty good but then devolves into utter WTFness.

[seed]

11 hours ago, Master O said:

 

What do I think of TNT?

 

It needed more Egyptian levels with missing yellow key cards! 

No need to quote the whole post since it's quite long.

 

But talking about secret levels, once again I failed to locate any of the secret maps (that's quite a performance :v).

 

As it stands right now:

 

Doom 2 - Missed 'em.

Doom64 - Missed 'em, but found them all the second time around (locating Hectic is highly cryptic though, I was never going to find it on my own).

Plutonia - Missed 'em.

TNT - Missed 'em.

 

I suck at finding secrets in general but as it can be seen it's even worse with locating secret levels. As about that specific Egyptian level, heard the GOG version of the game includes the patch that corrects this, although there's a way to finish the map even without it by using an exploit.

[The_SloVinator]

Great up to map 21. After that, Heck is the only decent one.
Worst map has to be Mount Pain. Map design was boring & uninspired.

 

New music is good with the exception of two tracks.

[yakfak]

adore the ethos of TNT but playing the thing is really depressing. sometimes the overbearing nothingness comes across as a mood of its own, sometimes it just looks like nothingness. metal.mid is also fucking terrible

 

map 11 is cool though

[riderr3]

Why people complaining on Dead Zone?
Just take a look on it's unique layout. Who makes maps like this nowadays? Almost nobody.


Words of support:
+techbase TNT maps is much more tech-basey than Doom 2 equivalents.
+E2 sky is one of the best skyboxes in classic Doom: a view to galaxies. Moreover there are wide skyboxes.
+despite Habitat is most criticized level, it have some interesting things like waterfall flowing from acid to river and secret right in the exit pit.
+some cool fitting textures, especially those that are animated.
+MAP16: Deepest Reaches is probably one of the best maps from classic IWADs: music, sky, caves, waterfalls and feeling like you descend somewhere deep, and pass through ritual places. Especially red key obtaining is interesting quirk.
+Secret levels is more interesting than those Wolf3D dumpings for Doom 2. The only purpose of WolfSS guys is free states for using in PWADS.

My complainings on TNT is probably:
-bugs on MAP31 (fixable)
-annoying puzzle on MAP30
-Redemption probably is the least favorite map in IWAD. There are no annoying design but because this map looks like it's missed something.

In other things, I like TNT little more than Doom 2. I'm also like both parts of Final Doom equally.

Edited December 28, 2017 by riderr3

[NuMetalManiak]

Dead Zone's fugly, but at least it plays well. Mount Pain on the other hand...

[Master O]

6 hours ago, Agent6 said:

No need to quote the whole post since it's quite long.

 

But talking about secret levels, once again I failed to locate any of the secret maps (that's quite a performance :v).

 

As it stands right now:

 

Doom 2 - Missed 'em.

Doom64 - Missed 'em, but found them all the second time around (locating Hectic is highly cryptic though, I was never going to find it on my own).

Plutonia - Missed 'em.

TNT - Missed 'em.

 

I suck at finding secrets in general but as it can be seen it's even worse with locating secret levels. As about that specific Egyptian level, heard the GOG version of the game includes the patch that corrects this, although there's a way to finish the map even without it by using an exploit.

Ok, I won't quote the whole post. [/sarcasm]

 

http://doomgate.de/files/duub/index.html has utilities that allow people with non-patched versions of TNT and Plutonia to patch them to the GOG/Anthology release.

 

https://www.doomworld.com/idgames/themes/TeamTNT/finaldoom/tnt31fix is for people who just want to load TeamTNT's patch file separately.

[Lila Feuer]

6 hours ago, Agent6 said:

Doom 2 - Missed 'em.

Doom64 - Missed 'em, but found them all the second time around (locating Hectic is highly cryptic though, I was never going to find it on my own).

Plutonia - Missed 'em.

TNT - Missed 'em.

In short: MISSED.

[seed]

Just now, cyan0s1s said:

In short: MISSED.

Beware, recently started playing Ultimate Doom as well (check the Post Your Doom Videos thread), expect me to miss them yet again :v .

[Zulk RS]

TNT is my most favorite of the 4 IWADs, that too for subjective reasons.

 

Though this may not be true, TNT will always feel like a ZDoom (Hexen/UDMF) megawad before Zdoom mapping existed. I feel like a lot of things TNT does using bugs and engine properties are implemented in ZDoom such as unbreakable glass (Stronghold) and 3D mid-textures (I think Central Processing). Just the stuff it tried to pull (with varying levels of success) alone scores it massive points in my book. Ambition aside, I really feel more comfortable playing TNT than I ever did playing Plutonia. No matter how horrible some of it's levels got, I never felt like TNT was forcing me to play in a way I'm not comfortable playing. TNT's gameplay is much slower paced in my opinion and the maps are suited to my more cautious approach to Doom. The 2nd sky texture with the stars and whatnot remains my favorite sky texture ever (that includes PWADs I've played). Also, I can't decide which one is my favorite TNT map; I'm split between Dead Zone, Mt.Pain and Stronghold. Crater and Wormhole are pretty up there on the favorites list too.

 

One thing I'll complain about TNT though, is that the maps that sucked sucked hard. Metal has to be my most disliked map among all 123 IWAD maps (not counting E4 of Ultimate Doom). Map31 was also pretty bad. MAP30 was uninteresting except of the starting puzzle which I, ironically, hated as a small kid. Some of the later maps seem unnecessarily large and empty. It's like if ZDoom existed then, these maps would've either been split into two maps or populated with more enemies or both. I especially disliked the chaingunners hidden behind mid-textures (Though that's still nothing compared to Plutonia's infinitely resurrecting chaingunner nonsense). In spite of these short comings, for me the positives of TNT far out weigh the negatives so much so that it has cemented TNT as my favorite of the 4 IWADs with Doom 2 being a very close second.

 

Rant over

[Labryx]

Like in the Plutonia thread, having replayed through both Final Doom episodes I said how much better Plutonia's levels felt to play over TNT. However, I still had some fun with TNT's levels albeit not as much as Plutonia. Like many said here, TNT has a pretty decent amount of good levels with interesting architecture and realistic looks areas that are also interesting to play at least up until MAP21: Administration Center. From then onwards most of the levels kinda lose their appealing architecture look and most importantly, interesting gameplay and it just becomes a mixed bag at that point.

 

That being said TNT has the best OST in the classic doom games IMO and some of the levels in the first 2 episodes are some of my favorites in all of the iwads. My favorite levels are MAP10: Redemption, MAP17: Processing Area, MAP18: Mill, MAP20: Central Processing, and MAP31: Pharaoh. My favorite track from the OST has to be the one that plays on MAP10 and MAP18, it feels so epic and "revenge-filled" sort of like what the story to TNT is.

 

 

[StoneMason]

TNT does have its share of duds (particularly Metal and Habitat). But I think its decent-good levels outweigh the bad, and certainly had some neat ideas. My favorite secret levels out of the iwads for sure. Dead Zone is also fantastic.

I often like to think that Memento Mori would've been a better choice for iwad status, as I personally saw that as having the stronger mapping team, and stronger texture set.

[Danlex]

I like the creativity of TNT, but i dont like the design of some maps

(Mt pain and Habitat, for example)

[Job]

TNT > Plutonia 

[Dirk]

Why is there so much hate for Mt. Pain?  It's not the best level out there, but I always thought it was a memorable, fun experience.

[GarrettChan]

3 hours ago, Dirk said:

Why is there so much hate for Mt. Pain?  It's not the best level out there, but I always thought it was a memorable, fun experience.

I once hated Mount Pain due to the influence of some "famous" people (probably like Youtubers) out there, but now I don't really hate this map because IMO it's not that bad (except the music). It's one of those maps you need to be brave. Being too conservative would back-fire on this map.

[Erick]

5 minutes ago, GarrettChan said:

I once hated Mount Pain due to the influence of some "famous" people (probably like Youtubers) out there, but now I don't really hate this map because IMO it's not that bad (except the music). It's one of those maps you need to be brave. Being too conservative would back-fire on this map.

I kind of wish MAP08: Metal and MAP27: Mount Pain had some original music for them, then it would have probably been less frustrating to go through them, even though I don't really find either of the maps bad, if anything Mount Pain is pretty fun when on a rush, especially on Nightmare.

[T-Rex]

TNT Evilution may not come as close to topping Plutonia in terms of gameplay and level design, but it still has its place as being a Doom wad that was sadly placed as one of the most infamous wads due to the whole commercial release controversy, since it still has its share of good levels, especially those designed by Tom Mustaine, the Casali Brothers, and a few others. One of Evilution's strong points is that being one wad of the Final Doom duology, it serves its purpose as being a wad that while slightly tougher than Doom 2, it's still accessible for the amateur players, whereas Plutonia was made strictly for the veterans who have played through Doom 2 on UV and are looking for a much more challenging experience; a concept which would be taken and expanded on by future megawads like Hell Revealed, Alien Vendetta, etc.

 

This is further evident when you compare the Casalis' Evilution maps to Plutonia's. While they're considerably harder than most of the maps Evilution has to offer (except for Mount Pain, which is difficult, but for the wrong reasons), they are not as punitive as Plutonia's mapset. It is clear that while the Casalis designed maps primarily for themselves, they had to tone down the difficulty of their maps for Evilution to make them approachable for the amateurs, though still challenging enough to make them stand out from the rest of TNT mapset. This kinda makes me like Evilution a bit more than Plutonia, because there's like a natural progression in the difficulty curve, albeit slightly steeper than Doom's 2, whereas Plutonia starts ramming you at the very first level and never lets up, kinda like Ultimate Doom Episode 4, but 50 times much worse. Oh, and Map15: Dead Zone happens to be one of my favourite Evilution maps, with its nonlinearity, the multiple entry and escape routes, the techbase theme, and that its fairly short. I also happen to have a soft spot for Habitat. Despite it being widely hated by many within the Doom community and even by Doom players like BigMacDavis and AltimaMantoid, I'm one of the few who actually like this map. It's just the weirdness of it that somehow makes me enjoy it.

Edited December 29, 2017 by T-Rex

[Diamhea]

As a big techbase-head, I definitely enjoyed parts of TNT. And the poster above me mentioned Dead Zone; that one stands out.

[PasokonDeacon]

15 hours ago, Mason. said:

I often like to think that Memento Mori would've been a better choice for iwad status, as I personally saw that as having the stronger mapping team, and stronger texture set.

Having played Memento Mori earlier this year, I wish I could agree. TeamTNT at least put out a more unique and consistently themed community pack for Shawn Green and id Soft to roll into Final Doom. Some maps in Memento Mori are excellent and should have made it in, but there's a bunch of mediocre or a few actively poor levels which are just unfortunate to deal with. The megawad's ambition and clear-as-day passion does shine through, and I have to marvel at MM knowing how difficult it was to map back then without tools I take for granted today. Evilution's also better tailored for an easier continuous-play run with an easy difficulty curve on UV, while MM has a bunch of maps emphasizing co-op as well as a harder difficulty curve. One could say Evilution had more commercial appeal because of these factors; Icarus might have been the best fit if we're judging the megawads' Final Doom viability by ease of accessibility (but they'd have to balance the hell out of ICARUS MAP01).

I don't have much to say about TNT: Evilution that the others haven't covered. The IWAD's still fun and interesting to replay on occasion. and it spawned a bunch of great mapping ideas in-between the less compelling or well-designed ones. New music's hit-or-miss but certainly a nice break from the Bobby Prince collection. MAP13 remains my favorite for its polish, quick Cyberdemon, verdant night visuals, and unorthodox open-ended progression.

[JDoyle]

On 12/27/2017 at 6:10 PM, Alfonzo said:

It's an interesting ensemble but it receives far more attention than it deserves thanks to its commercial status. If it were Icarus making up the second half of Final Doom, your memfises and Unis may very well be talking about the atmospheric and exploratory elements true to that set of maps, instead; how the end-of-level matchbox motif with its red keys vied with Plutonia's glowing diamonds for inspiring continuity in modern works, or something. Capn Clever observed in one of the EotW dissections of Team TNT (I think it was this episode, oddly enough) that Icarus fits a model better suited for public consumption with its sharper focus in ship/planet/simulation navigation, and that at some point it must have been destined for the shelves in Evilution's place. I can't help but agree. Certainly I think there are some unique traits to the IWAD that you can discover—and imagine—with enough examination, but this is also true of a number of works that haven't had the fortune of being placed under the commercial spotlight.

 

Mustain, O'Brien and the Casalis are way cool. Brian Kidby goes alright as well.

I hope I'm not taking what you said out of context, but I can assure you there was never any talk about making Icarus a commercial release. In fact a lot of the motivation behind Icarus was to "make up" for the fact that Evilution was announced as a free add-on, then withdrawn when negotiations with id started. 

[superchargecacodemons800]

@Agent6 TNT Evilution is bloody terrible.

 

First of all it has soooo many incorrect designs and even glitches. Then it has a load of maps that are just to piss everyone off / sabotage the WAD. For example, Map22 has a set of pointless secrets that I have no earthly idea about WTF is the point of them and it even has a secret inside the exit that when you try to reach it you'll leave the map. Then Map27 is just unfair with a load of enemies and no health or space compared to the required amount of health/space for such map. Also, TNT has a concept that I don't understand, and Map31 is impossible since the yellow key is multiplayer only, which is something else that I have to add to the inbred list. Furthermore, it only has 5 really good maps, while the other official WADs have more than 20, and the boss level (Last Call) features the dumbest music track (Into the Beast's Belly) that anyone made.

 

P.S. If you wonder why I am so similar-opinioned that's because I'm a big fan of AltimaMantoid and BigMacDavis and several others

[Lila Feuer]

Mount Pain is always hard I noticed, pain indeed.

[Alfonzo]

2 hours ago, JDoyle said:

I can assure you there was never any talk about making Icarus a commercial release. In fact a lot of the motivation behind Icarus was to "make up" for the fact that Evilution was announced as a free add-on, then withdrawn when negotiations with id started.

Sorry, yes, I must have got my facts confused (and placed words in Capn's mouth to boot). The context is me being lazy!

[Doomkid]

Sorry for the aside, but I notice some people talking about TNT having bad MIDIs? What bad MIDIs? The best music in the entire Doom series to this very day comes from TNT! This is subjective of course but the songs have the most interesting and unique structure of any official Doom music and the widest range of sounds/emotions despite only consisting of a handful of original compositions. Truly fantastic stuff. If talk of excellent music in games comes up, I always reference TNT.

[Combinebobnt]

it's old

[rehelekretep]

still my favourite iwad - and i replayed it recently for the 3rd (?) time.

the two bad things that stick out for me is its very ssg heavy on pistol starts, and some of the progression is a bit confusing.

i still dont understand why i like it so much; all the tribute wads (tht threnody, revilution) im not such a fan of, i normally prefer maps that dont have secrets or puzzles and have clear progression etc.

oh well!