joepallai

thank you so much @Xyzzy01!!!   You salvaged this for me.  thanks

Thanks Chris

Thank you!

hmm...it was on a white background just a minute ago.

Thanks Biodegradable!  

some days I need just that, but I generally go slightly more casual with mapsets like Slayer on the upper end of my skill level

Welcome @Reelvonic 

Here's the most recent update to what was originally planned to be Map06 of PUREDOOM.   The biggest change is I'm now using DBX2 due to a random windows update preventing GZDoombuilder from loading maps into Doom from the editor.   

Also started working the NE area again since I had a random idea that wasn't too terrible.   This should allow me to connect the two sections easily in that area and have a decent weapon/powerup as a reward for the area.   Thinking the reward should be enough for the player to last long enough to reach the yellow key via the middle building.

Enough rambling...

Thanks Catpho! 

   The piston is one of those stupid little things that Doom can do that just makes me smile; I mean, there's no real reason for it other than it kind of looks cool, and it's almost totally nonsensical in a mechanical sense but yeah...had to have one.

Joe

Thanks Khorus!

Yeah, I remember you were into mini Coopers in a big way, so I thought you'd appreciate the story.

He might have had help with the engine block, but the rest was on his own.   I always wondered how long it took him to disassemble then reassemble the whole thing; had to be a month or more.   

Nice, it will be good to get back to the old routine.  

I have a funny but true story for you Chris. 

So back in '89-90, in the months leading up to Desert Storm; I was stationed at RAF Lakenheath  and was walking back to my dorm room (Building 948) after working to midnight on the flight line (I was an AGE mechanic).  It's dark and quiet but I see a flashing light high up in the dorm rooms that I could swear was a flash from a welding torch; same blue-ish light and flickering pattern.   I wait outside to see if it happens again and sure enough there's that welding light again coming from one of the rooms on the third floor.

Intrigued I go upstairs, look for the light to flash underneath the correct door and then knock on the door that I saw the welding light came out of.  The door opens up and one of the newer guys (Trevor or Travis...something with a "T") is standing in front of me, cigarette dangling from his mouth with the welding torch in his right hand and a blue Mini Cooper wagon behind him; fully assembled and in the middle of a 3rd floor dorm room (about a 12' by 12' space).   

It's not something you ever expect to see in a 3rd floor dorm room...

I was dumb founded and stood in the hall for a good minute before Trevor/Travis told me to step inside.  I think the first thing I said was "Why" and his answer was a sheepish, "...just thought it'd be funny" or "fun to try".  He went on to tell me that the hardest part was getting the engine block up the stairs (no elevator in this old dorm).  I had a beer with him and went down to my dorm room to forget what I saw as I was scheduled to head out to Saudi in a couple of days.   

A few weeks later I heard there was a surprise inspection in our dorm and the mini was found during the inspection (how could it not be).   Trevor/Travis got into some serious trouble and I presume ended up in military prison over the prank.   (my guess is he did this to get out of going to Saudi--still it was extremely funny to all of us 48th EMS mechanics and we kept wondering what the looks on the officers and master sergeants faces were like upon discovery.)

Joe

Thanks Chris,

   I'll get through it.  I have a major project lined up at the house (more sheet rocking and insulating--fun!) and the writing project along with the isolation map.   This job just seemed invincible after such a long time doing it (hell we were working Saturdays prior to this).   

Again thanks and stay safe yourself. 

Joe

The full on drunken rant was a week or so ago.  I saved it to a text file for posterity.  (it's not even a particularly good one)   Today's mini-rant was while I was at work on break, though similar subjects are covered.

[Fuck it, here is last week's drunken rant; I was well onto my 4th Bass Ale at the time, had a pretty bad week at work and all I wanted to do was work on my level for fun; but noooo...she had to call out again on work.] 

"I'd get more mapping done if my wife would stop calling out sick for work....grrrrrr.....

on the bright side I figured out a progression issue with Map06 of PUREDOOM (formerly?)(still thinking about redoing the 4 levels I've made previously (mostly touch ups) and doing a smallish PUREDOOM mapset officially and then continuously updating it until I have a proper megawad.   Figure by the time I retire I'll get most of it done.

[editor's note--just chalk this up as a drunken rant/shit-post and keep it on hand for blackmail later]

stray thought occurred, I'm approaching 24 years of actual Doom mapping (in Feb.) with 25 years of attempted mapping (took a year before I found success with wadauthor). 

In the years following I've also dabbled in quake mapping (at the time I couldn't give up my computer for the time it took to compile the lighting, so I went back to Doom editing).  Thief editing (this one broke my heart as I actually like Thief better than Doom for the sheer tension it creates in the player....but the editor is a broken piece of shit at best, with random compiling crashes as a feature...SS2 editing suffered the same issues sadly).   what else?.....Unreal Tournament/Unreal editing...never was satisfied with the sense of scale; it just always felt like I had it wrong (plus in UT I couldn't get the maps to test properly without the player killing himself upon spawning--which is really too bad as I loved UT more than Q3...)   Max Payne editing had the same problem as Q1's compile times on my one and only computer...I just couldn't give it up for the time needed to compile a map...

I made some cool Lode Runner and Jumpman maps, not that I have a C64 or PlayStation anymore...(but they were actually cool to play).  even objectively speaking, these were  cool to play.

what else>?  

Pretty much every editable game up to Doom 3 I've tried and one reason or another I came back to Doom.  Structurally I can do the work, but it usually boiled down to setting up the actions within the level and scripting that would throw me off.

  There's also my perfectionism and desire to make that one map that finally gets me recognized as the genius that I truly am (/sarc)(in case it needs to be said).

I have no idea if what I make is popular or cutting-edge or even what the "community" even needs or wants anymore; but it's what I like and in the case of "Parechesis" what I thought was missing from modern maps; but mostly it's what I like and want for myself...or want for myself six months down the road when I've forgotten half of the triggers and monster blocking lines within one of my own maps and I'm playing it for the "first time in..." and the map surprises me still.   I love that...I really love when that happens within my own maps and it becomes new again (probably why I love Hellrun so much--you just cannot predict all the variables).

Actually, the more I think about it; the more I have no fucking idea what players actually want.  You see all kinds of mapper posts with screenshots and some sort of inherent threat to discontinue their "hard fought" "work" but all I see are simple fucking rooms with a single height and light value, no interesting architecture and these assholes get multiple likes from the community--for almost zero fucking effort...

It's unreal (no pun intended)---I mean come on...this is shit that any one of us would dismiss in 2000 but because the "community" is approaching 25 years; we're suppose to be better than that...Fuck that.  Shit is still shit, goddamnitt.  

Yay, you made a fucking map using GZDoombuilder--you're a fucking hero~!  So hard.  no no, you truly are an artist--here's a fucking parade.  Let me polish off the caco I've withheld for 20 fucking years and give it to you, because you have a vision. 

Is it just me?  I'm seeing far too many of these threads, "Should I continue?"  In my line of work, if you have to ask then the answer is "NO".  Really fucking simple people.  Honestly it really is that simple.  9 times out of 10; if you have to ask then the answer is "No".

Maybe I'm just being a dick...maybe I'm just old and jaded and disappointed and pissing in the wind here as a final act of defiance...but I see all these "look at me" type threads and I think back to the only positive feedback I received on one of my levels for damn near 10 years being a quip on a 2002ADO review that they liked my level the best out of all of them; and I just cant help but think "Fuck you" you have it so fucking easy now kid.  

I don't think I kept it; but if I did it's currently boxed away while I'm busy sheetrocking the upstairs.

So I don't think I downloaded this level; instead I think it was on a disc that Anthony Soto mailed me back in 2000 or 2001 or so.  I've had it for so long I just assumed everyone else had it.

I did have an idea to map a dm map of the Zildjian factory layout where I work;  but held off in case the owners didn't care for the idea.   I still want to get permission to take pictures of the place and try it, but approval is unlikely.   I could probably get away with it...but don't want to risk upsetting the owners---also at the time the factory layout was more linear in flow to aid in productivity, so it might not translate as well as I would want it to.

Other places I've worked (Air Force bases, a retail store, etc.) have given me ideas to try; as well as places I've visited/lived in.   Nothing definite has come of any of this in my Doom levels that I remember, but we'll see down the road.

lol...good to hear I'm not the only one.

Catpho, thanks for the heads up and recommendation of Imgur--that was so much easier than I expected; the pages are all set now.  Joe

Sure thing.    I've been thinking of zipping them all up and making them available that way as well.   Thanks for the interest.   Joe

okay that works;  I'll send it over the weekend once i finish it (I'm roughly 90% complete)

Interested in playtesting an Ultimate Doom map?

Thank you for these reviews; it made my day!   

You are looking at the apex of the computer gaming era; games were amazing then.  (95 - 03)

It's definitely the computer screen textures; perhaps a flat (detail-wise) texture in its place would work better as the architecture is really working as detail here.  Even consider recessing the computer walls further behind to allow movement behind the new pillars add (bottom-most shot).   A pipewall texture in the dominate color theme would work well really well here.

Fonze,  I see what you're saying; but I have heard of people flying halfway across the world to play Doom together and/or meet (Kristian Aro and Paul Corfiatis, Badhko (?) and the Swedish Doom scene, etc.   I'm going to look into this a bit, see if it's feasible on my end and then do a formal announcement for some time next year.   I don't want to rush it and I do want it to be mapper focused (because that's what I know and therein lies my main interest) but this idea has been on my mind for about 15 years now.   I think it's time to at least try it; maybe in a small venue first, then expand if the idea is successful.