Doom Turns Sixteen

I am confused by the worst WAD award. Why? A number of reasons.

Is it even a WAD? The Cacowards article links to... an article, not a WAD. Is there even a WAD or is the award effectively a group award for all WADs that indiscriminately use it?

A WAD/Article can get an award (good or bad) because of what other people do with knowledge gleaned from it? That's like saying doom.wad sucks because so many people have made shitty was based on it or MacBeth sucks because your school drama society didn't understand its context when they put on a performance of it.

And finally the Detailing article says "Tuesday, 14 November 2006". So, it's an award in the 2009 Cacowards based for a 3 year old article? I have to admit, that does just sound like an excuse to get something off your chest (not that I personally am averse to such things ;) ).


That being said, I think the awards this year pretty much hit the spot. Of course, there are some that I personally would have placed in the awards that didn't get one and some that got awards that I don't personally rate as highly as others clearly do. But, I'm not the one doing the awards and half the fun of it is comparing the team's ideas with mine.

Well done and thanks to the team for pulling it all together and making it an interesting read once again.

Now, I'm going off to have sex with Doom because it's finally old enough to give consent in the UK.

Enjay said:

Now, I'm going off to have sex with Doom because it's finally old enough to give consent in the UK.

Ahah - now I know why it rejected me and muttered something about experience before boarding a train headed northwards...

Enjay, I think someone mentioned this before, but it's more in the line of the '94 WADs award (which weren't released in '05.) By pointing to the article it points to all the 2009 WADs that used it, and notifies us that they're in general poor enough to be mentioned indirectly like this, as they don't deserve more recognition than the slavish cause of their mediocrity.

It appears the reason it shows up this year and not before is because the judges felt that such "by the guide" WADs have finally managed to become too common. In previous years they, or any specific cause for them, may have escaped notice.

I restate my question: If these WADs have been so common and there's so many of them that they have become annoying, where are they???

I still haven't seen a single valid link to such a project.

Enjay said:

And finally the Detailing article says "Tuesday, 14 November 2006". So, it's an award in the 2009 Cacowards based for a 3 year old article? I have to admit, that does just sound like an excuse to get something off your chest (not that I personally am averse to such things ;) ).

The detail guide needed some time for (enough) maps to be made on it's behalf. If it were the 'worst wad' award three years ago when only two or three wads that were mapped religiously to that guide, unlike the bazillions there are today, no one would get the joke.

Graf Zahl said:

I restate my question: If these WADs have been so common and there's so many of them that they have become annoying, where are they???

I still haven't seen a single valid link to such a project.

Mostly Zdoom Forums and Skulltag Forums.

That still doesn't constitute a link to a *released (in 2009)* project that is a supposed 'victim' of overdetailing.

It seems to be something a few people complain about but when called to bring proof you all fail. I will continue with this until you can prove that it was justified. So far you haven't yet.

Cacowards: Serious Business™

Dam time flies... Happy birthday doom! Hope to see/play some of the worst wads ever! :P

Graf Zahl said:

That still doesn't constitute a link to a *released (in 2009)* project that is a supposed 'victim' of overdetailing.

It seems to be something a few people complain about but when called to bring proof you all fail. I will continue with this until you can prove that it was justified. So far you haven't yet.

http://skulltag.net/forum/viewforum.php?f=13

Find a project in here that doesn't do what scuba steve described is the result of the guide.

40oz said:

http://skulltag.net/forum/viewforum.php?f=13

Find a project in here that doesn't do what scuba steve described is the result of the guide.

The Empty Museum ;) There we are - what do I win?

Heh, I'm actually kind of glad that over-detail got the worst wad award. Whenever I'd preview one of my wads, someone would say "there's not enough detail, go look at Tormentor's tutorial". It's really one of the main reasons I stopped trying to map. Now that it's been given the Worst Wad Award, I feel like mapping again.

I'm going to check out the detail guide now... Just to see what the fuss is, you understand.

Abyssalstudios1 said:

I certainly wouldn't consider it as some kind of bible for mapping. It's more a 'nifty hints' thing than anything else.

My 'nifty hint' would be to avoid that guide like the plague.

Graf Zahl said:

I will continue with this until you can prove that it was justified. So far you haven't yet.

Whew thank God, I know I won't be able to rest until Graf Zahl is satisfied with something he has zero control over.

Patrick said:

asfasdasphhh .... * Spits out drink *

My untitled project didn't win an award?

* storms angrily out of community *

MINE NEITHER! D:

Great work guys :D

Congrats to all the award winners!
The worst wad award was unusual this time, but I agree with what has been said in the article.
I also have doubts that any kind of detailing-guide is going to magically turn newbie mappers into pros, but I still think it can serve as a rough guide for more experienced mappers...

Just keep mapping, learning from own mistakes and trying to evolve an own style etc. is still the best way to go though IMO!

It's terrible (or very good!) that I was just three years old when I started playing this, and never stopped since. Doom has consumed 85% of my gaming life. Doom owns and these projects own. Good job guys.

Danarchy said:

Heh, I'm actually kind of glad that over-detail got the worst wad award. Whenever I'd preview one of my wads, someone would say "there's not enough detail, go look at Tormentor's tutorial". It's really one of the main reasons I stopped trying to map. Now that it's been given the Worst Wad Award, I feel like mapping again.

I hear that, although while Torm's guide was never referenced when I fired up a demo of my WIP stuff on ZDoom.org, the only real comment I got was "linear and boxy". This despite stating in my first post that I didn't really care for detail. The "linear" thing I can live with for now. The fact is I'm still learning. (BTW, props to the DW crew for being a lot more receptive, constructive and encouraging ;) )

I think the key here has been stated many times in this thread already: Doom is a 16 year old game. It was released at a time when 3D gaming was still in its infancy and as such wasn't really meant for Crysis levels of detailing. Sometimes it can come off well, but in a lot of instances it is used as a mask for the map being substandard.

All of this raises a question in my mind: is there really a right way to make a wad? There are certainly lots of wrong ways to make a wad (as so brilliantly and hilariously demonstrated by this year's Mockaward winner), but while anyone attempting to make maps for our favourite old skool shooter certainly needs to learn the basics, I would say that they would also need to develop their own style, in terms of both gameplay and visuals, not endlessly try to copy something which may be out of their league at that stage.

Still, happy birthday to Doom and congratulations to all who picked up an award. Pity that Titan 2 didn't get a gong, but we all know it's class anyway :P

scalliano said:

I hear that, although while Torm's guide was never referenced when I fired up a demo of my WIP stuff on ZDoom.org, the only real comment I got was "linear and boxy". This despite stating in my first post that I didn't really care for detail.

Boxiness is not a question of details. Take E1M1. It's quite low-detail, isn't it? Yet it's not boxy.

On another note, I took some time to play LOS, based on the fact that it won a cacoward. And while a few things could have been done differently, (easy for me to sit here and say of course), overall it was amazing. Atmospheric, dark and really scary in parts. I had an awesome time playing through it. Painkiller meets Doom3.

Someone said that it was pretty cool to play coop too, which it surely would be.

Great work, totally cacoward-worthy. I am presently playing through it again on Nightmare.

Kyka said:

Spoiler

Also, if you sit through the credits at the end, there is a bonus hell level right at the end, which is really really neat.

Inexplicably, my computer really struggled with this level, despite my turning off every graphical feature I could think of. I still endured it, but it was far less enjoyable than it would have been otherwise. I really enjoyed the rest of the wad so it's a shame I couldn't end it on a higher note.

Graf Zahl said:

I restate my question: If these WADs have been so common and there's so many of them that they have become annoying, where are they???

I still haven't seen a single valid link to such a project.

http://www.doomworld.com/idgames/?id=15948

It's nice to see at least 2 awards for multiplayer wads this year (GVH and UDMX)instead of the usual 1... not to mention the mapper of the year award going to somebody who primarily worked on multiplayer maps.

There are lots of quality multiplayer maps out there that never made it into the awards. I highly recommend that some of these wads be checked out. Not a single invasion map has won an award yet and every year I scratch my head and try to figure out why when there are so many quality options to choose from.

Aabra said:

There are lots of quality multiplayer maps out there that never made it into the awards. I highly recommend that some of these wads be checked out. Not a single invasion map has won an award yet and every year I scratch my head and try to figure out why when there are so many quality options to choose from.

Are you kidding? I've never found a single one. The best invasion maps released so far has been those in ST itself.

Armageddon 2 was cool, yet it was badly designed : you just can't beat it in Single Player.

That's one of the main problems in recent Invasion wads : mappers tend to throw lots of very dangerous monsters in open spaces ( like Eriance's Diabolists in Armageddon 2's case ), it's just impossible. Dying and respawning continuously is not really what I'd call good gameplay.

As kristus said, stock Invasion maps in Skulltag are good.

You know what would be nice for Doom's bday?? Some more Necromantic Thirst screenshots :D:D

[WH]-Wilou84 said:
Armageddon 2 was cool, yet it was badly designed : you just can't beat it in Single Player.

That's one of the main problems in recent Invasion wads : mappers tend to throw lots of very dangerous monsters in open spaces ( like Eriance's Diabolists in Armageddon 2's case ), it's just impossible. Dying and respawning continuously is not really what I'd call good gameplay.

As kristus said, stock Invasion maps in Skulltag are good.

Armageddon 2's monster count was literally doubled after V4. That was Wario's decision because of how it was, back in the day, hosted by SuperGod and there were about 20 people at average in the server, making it extremely easy in multiplayer. Right now it's just tedious, but I hope we will get to fix it in the next versions.
As for being nominated for an award... Well, as long as it's eligible, I'm on for it. I'd love to see an invasion wad getting a Caco.

Ven said:

Armageddon 2's monster count was literally doubled after V4. That was Wario's decision because of how it was, back in the day, hosted by SuperGod and there were about 20 people at average in the server, making it extremely easy in multiplayer. Right now it's just tedious, but I hope we will get to fix it in the next versions.

I've never bothered to look that much into ACS, but I guess there should be a way to spawn monsters according to player count. This way, Single Player would be more interesting maybe. Armageddon 2 really has cool ideas in it.

Use3D said:

You know what would be nice for Doom's bday?? Some more Necromantic Thirst screenshots :D:D

Haha, well progress is quite slow those days, we don't really have something new and fancy to show... Yet I hope this project will be released before Doom turns 18 :>

Creaphis said:

Inexplicably, my computer really struggled with this level, despite my turning off every graphical feature I could think of. I still endured it, but it was far less enjoyable than it would have been otherwise. I really enjoyed the rest of the wad so it's a shame I couldn't end it on a higher note.

Same here. But still I enjoyed every framerate destroying moment of it.

The final credits strongly implies that there will be more, so I look forwards to more of this...

[WH]-Wilou84 said:
Armageddon 2 was cool, yet it was badly designed : you just can't beat it in Single Player.

The main focus was Multiplayer though. In my maps I did add unflag a few of the spawn spots for singleplayer and added a Doomsphere for the boss fights, but overall it was meant for a huge amount of players.

I've seen some creative, well-made invasion maps but what stands between them and Cacowards, in my mind, is that they're just not worth remembering. I mean, invasion is fun for a bit, but it's tedious and repetitive (when not impossible) in single-player, it doesn't work as a coop game because it doesn't inspire cooperation (there's no reason to try to keep each other alive when dying and respawning are free) and it doesn't work as a competitive game because there's nothing to compete for but the highest kill count (which does not necessarily reflect skill or contribution). There's some fun to be had from invasion wads, but the fun is in their novelty and their mindless carnage, and the fundamentally ephemeral nature of this fun means that it's impossible for an invasion wad to ever be made that people would want to look back on and revisit ten years from now. As that's the case, why immortalize one of these wads on an awards page?

Kyka said:

The final credits strongly implies that there will be more, so I look forwards to more of this...

I think that's just how games end. When was the last time you played something that didn't end by waving its sequel potential in your face?