head_cannon

I play most mapsets in Continuous mode the first time I experience them, and the resource-management aspect of that mode means that I almost-always turn back after I've cleared the exit room to take one last look around - often there's been a Soulsphere or a Megaarmor teased just out of reach that deserves a bit of attention & puzzle-solving now that it's quiet, and I do my best to claim those prizes and top up my resource totals as much as I can. I rarely spend more than a couple of minutes on these final passes, though: usually I'm too excited to get to move on & see new content. I want to stress here that I quite enjoy the experience of exploring and finding stuff, because my answer to the prompt is: Absolutely Not. I have mad respect for mappers who put some of their precious time into this hobby, making cool shit and giving it away for free. And it's going above & beyond when you create extra, bonus things off the critical path that the audience might never even see - I'm grateful for the practice. But I think it would poison the experience if I ever turned on the mid-game stats that modern ports have as one of their options (and which the original game never had). Of course I understand why the tool's been added to modern ports: Speedrunners need this data to make sure they're on pace, haven't missed any step in the route, and so they know that they're clear to exit. But if you're not routing or demoing a level, if you're just playing a videogame to unwind, then I consider it actively counterproductive to the goal of having fun. For me, at least. This game's visceral, immediate nature and hostile environment has the ability to make me suspend my disbelief and engage my fight-or-flight reflex from the safety of my chair in my den, and I don't think it'd capture my imagination as well if I was absolutely certain of what was out there waiting for me.

I really enjoyed this Knee-Deep In The Dead tribute; it's one of my favorite things I played all year. I thought the lighting and atmosphere was fantastic and that the "otherworld" interlude was a really cool way to break things up and allow the WAD's techbase aesthetic to stay cohesive without getting too monotonous. I gave it a playthrough on Crispy Doom, and then later switched over to PrBoom+ to record a -complevel 3 demo to post here, mostly as an excuse to play it again. But also to demonstrate the problem I discovered when I tried to finish it the first time - I'm afraid there's a softlock in E1M8 I have to report. arrokoth-UV-hc.zip In most E1M8's I've seen, whenever people want to use Tag 666 and have some sectors lower when the last Baron is killed, they usually follow id's example and lock the player in with those monsters. This level, however, sprinkles Barons around the map in several encounters. So when a player acts sensibly and jukes past those big dumb barriers, the level becomes unwinnable later since the cool scary final battle is past a point-of-no-return. It's a real shame that I wasn't able to finish your mapset - I had been having a wonderful time doing this dungeon-crawl and trying to outwit its traps, and to have it sputter and stall out like that right at the finish-line does a disservice to how fun a ride it is up until that point. Now, this problem is mostly mitigated by being able to comfortably assume that your audience is a nerd who already understands Keens and Dead Simples and whatnot, but every other level in the set had been a joy to move through, consistently providing the satisfaction of kicking a hornet's nest and getting away with it, prize in hand, so I doubt that I'm going to be the only person who plays map 8 the same way they played the rest of the set without realizing that, on this map only, there's a scavenger hunt in place. I love vanilla-compatible stuff like this that knows how to make the software renderer shine & which lets the player have fun without straightjacketing them into only playing the encounters one correct way. I'm sorry to have to register a complaint on it, and if it's too late to fix it, that's fine since it's not a complete game-breaker - like I said, 9 times out of 10 you can assume the metaknowledge of a player that has Doomed before and knows what the E1M8, E4M8, & MAP07 actions do. In any case, thanks for making this!

I always enjoy reading the analysis & storytelling that gets posted by this scene's writers & scribes. Long before I ever registered an account, I was reading old DWMegawad Club threads to alleviate the boredom of work. Then as now, I respect Demon Of The Well's ability to depict this art-form's ability to conjure anxiety & stress in such detailed, evocative terms. And a hearty congratulations to scwiba, Maribo, and Cardboard Marty for making such a stellar debut! The sidebar where midi artists talk about the craft was neat too.

IEbadideaHMPhc.zip Category: 1 Difficulty: HMP Dead on MAP14 with 42 kills

Ironman-ABSOLDIS-hc.zip Category 1, Dead in MAP02 with 33 kills.

IronmanUNWELCOMEhc.zip Category 1, Dead in MAP01 with 29 kills.

IEetitanHMPhc.zip Category: 1 Difficulty: HMP Survived in 1:49:48 A pretty cool mapset. The six levels did all feel of-a-piece, part of one large fortress, and the architecture had enough variation to keep the limited texture palette from making things too monotonous or disorienting. I appreciate how the detailing never caused me to get snagged on anything and that the gameplay space was kept clean & functional. Progression could sometimes be a bit convoluted, but I thought it was cool how it always seemed like there was more to uncover off the critical path. I had fun with this one. Thanks for selecting it for this month!

I appreciate the answers & clarifications in this thread: I had made some PBs for the main 3 episodes of DTWID, and was considering putting them in the archive, but I'd been using a midipack for practice + attempts and only afterwards did I wonder if loading additional WADs besides the levels would be seen as a suspicious practice that would cause administrative headaches. I know that the stakes are so low when posting PBs to make this next question irrelevant in my case, but in general: Should I mention the midipack WAD I used in the text file, just to preemptively explain the anomaly in the metadata in case anyone was concerned? It's a little awkward in this case since it's not one of the "marquee" releases like the TNT or AV soundtrack replacement, but a custom one instead which wouldn't be recognizable - there's only my word that it replaces midis & not sound-effects.

Ironman-contain-hc.zip Category 1, Dead with 578 kills. Wow, this is a really cruel map. The early chapters were stressful because of the sheer amount of crate maze you have to traverse before you hit your first Berserk Pack to get to stop limping around at single-digit HP, and the lategame stages were just as stressful because of the roaming boss monsters blocking the way. The escalation was well-handled and this overlong three-key epic totally earned its extended running-time. Thanks for selecting it for this month!

IEenslaveHMPhc.zip Category: 1 Difficulty: HMP Softlocked on MAP01 with 24 kills.

D2TWID was the first Doom 2 PWAD I ever played. I am exactly the kind of sicko who appreciates the execution of MAP09's weird House Of Pain-esque linedef puzzles and their counterintuitive solutions, but the main thing I enjoyed about the WAD was its style of trap design: a "gag-a-minute" series of surprises that gave the sense of the level-designers being entertainers focused on making the audience gasp or laugh, rather than instructors subjecting the audience to final exams. D2ISO has that same spirit, that same ethos of spiteful mischief and whimsy which makes it such a fun ride even as it raises the stakes and introduces more lethal threats and stricter resource allotments. Nearly all of its thrills and spills have ways to patch yourself back up after the mean sucker-punch has concluded, and the encounters are generally tuned to make the player go "holy shit!" instead of to make them sigh and immediately go into the menu to reload a save. This playful antagonism combines with the blatant silliness of the "failed google translate" gimmick to keep things lighthearted even when they get a bit brutal. D2ISO's level of accessible challenge positions it in my mind as the Plutonia to the original's Doom 2, the next logical step up. - The Continuous campaign struck a great balance by letting me have a more-or-less unrestricted arsenal but then rationing the heavy weapons' ammo so that I always had a little less than I would have liked - I'm quite fond of the tension created when I have to carefully consider whether to risk wasting ammo by charging into a new area with high DPS ready to go or whether to risk the damage taken from the second of helplessness when switching to a cell weapon after the attack has already begun. My second Pistol Start playthrough added a new wrinkle by adding additional objectives: not only did I have to keep the critical path's item locations in mind, but now I had to explore more thoroughly to track down key weapons and fit these new puzzle pieces into place in the route. The tolerance for aimless bumbling is of course less generous when you apply those additional restrictions to the game, but I ultimately found this hard mode to be quite satisfying since even the harshest maps had an underlying method to them to discover. It felt great taking something that seemed so unfriendly and insurmountable at first and then working out the most efficient path until I could execute a saveless run through the level & feel like I had truly defeated it. Presented below are the maze solutions I came up with: a series of -complevel 2 demos recorded in Crispy Doom.

IronmanMutinyHC.zip Category 1 Dead on MAP02 with 56 kills. Mutiny's been on my backlog for a while, so this was a great opportunity to finally give it a try. Brutal stuff, but really good-looking and sounding. After revisiting it with saves and exploring up to MAP05, I'm probably going to drop down from skill 4 for the rest to see if that salves the constant restrictions on ammo & health & space. Even the aggravating stuff is undeniably polished, though. As always, thanks for organizing events and creating these prompts to try stuff out and get killed by it. :)

IEabyssHMPhc.zip Category: 1 Difficulty: HMP Dead on MAP09 with 7 kills. I probably should have tried on UV instead; combat seems very mild with the focus instead being on exploration & puzzle-solving. This levelset quickly trains you to check your map and be aware of all the secret passages within the walls of these castles. I'm not a big fan of hiding secret doors by making them completely indistinguishable from the surrounding walls, with no hints or clues, but I have to admit that this levelset succeeded at making the Computer Area Map feel like a real treasure because of how it opened up progression by revealing those hidden paths. Plus, the E1 maps were all small & concise enough that working out the next puzzle solution was never too much of a chore. For a 1995 WAD, that was actually pretty fun. Cool pick for this month.

Limit-Removing megawads: Both CPD and Uprising by Cheesewheel 25 Years On Earth by Phobus Scythe 2 by Erik Alm NOVA & NOVA II - Episode-length WADs: Return To Hadron episodes 1, 2, & 3 by cannonball Demonic Deviation by cannonball Glaive 1, 2, & 3 by EANB Tangerine Nightmare (except for MAP08) ...Pretty much every Doomer Boards Project.

https://dsdarchive.com/wads/oatb Filling some blank spots in the UV-Speed table for Oops All Techbase. Some levels were too cramped or too deadly for me, but there was a good handful that were really fun to try to run right through. Overall I enjoyed this set. MAP01 Time: 1:46 - oatb01s146.zip MAP03 Time: 3:47 - oatb03s347.zip MAP04 Time: 1:55 - oatb04s155.zip MAP15 Time: 1:41 - oatb15s141.zip MAP16 Time: 5:32 - oatb16s532.zip MAP19 Time: 3:28 - oatb19s328.zip MAP25 Time: 20:09 - oatb25s2009.zip