Major retexture with unique, new set?

Freedoom could gain more of an identity of its own if it had its own high quality texture set in its maps, kinda like BTSX.

To note, this would not entail removing the compatibility textures. In fact, I think they should still be used, just not as much.

Thoughts?

i fully support this, but am unable to make new textures right now

I agree with this. Freedoom would benefit from an additional library of textures that aren't encumbered by the need to be metrically compatible with Doom's.

Here are some textures already submitted:

Wesley submitted these city building textures.
There are also some Raymoohawk textures here and here.

I think new textures would help a lot to give FreeDoom a distinct identity (once the maps are updated to use them).

It's a nice idea but it seems backwards to add a bunch of textures in the hopes that they might be useful. Should be the other way round - the need for textures in levels driving their creation.

At most. I'd say have a few extra textures for objects like windows, extensions and variations of the existing assets for sake of variety. But it's all a matter of opinion,

Example: Hexagonal Floor tiles exist. Variations can be, circular, square, rectangle, jumbled (tetris-like), or use different materials. Like wood, silvers, computer between the cracks of a metal flooring, etc.

In my opinion, more textures = more fun, even if we would need to create new maps with the new aesthetic or retexture all the maps already present (which is not a good idea).

Someone proposed to start a community project to create more maps for Freedoom. I think this is a good idea, eventually asking to limit the use to the new textures.

I gave some words on IRC before this thread was created...

No, I don't think it's a good idea to make an entirely new set of textures for maps to use, exclusively or in the majority. Freedoom hasn't been against including new textures as it is now, and policy shouldn't change from that. Mappers should do whatever they can to make levels look good, whether that means using textures common with Doom (which is preferable really, it keeps Freedoom's size reasonable and exercises the resources we have) or wholly new ones as they need it.

chungy said:

I gave some words on IRC before this thread was created...

No, I don't think it's a good idea to make an entirely new set of textures for maps to use, exclusively or in the majority. Freedoom hasn't been against including new textures as it is now, and policy shouldn't change from that. Mappers should do whatever they can to make levels look good, whether that means using textures common with Doom (which is preferable really, it keeps Freedoom's size reasonable and exercises the resources we have) or wholly new ones as they need it.

I thought the idea in the other thread was to make a community project that was essentially going to be a standalone TC that was based upon Freedoom, while allowing Freedoom to take bits and pieces from it if they were applicable to the project.

I think that Freedoom's mission of being an IWAD replacement for Doom 1/2/TNT/Plutonia should remain the same, and it probably wouldn't hurt for a constantly evolving fork to exist, wherein the mission is to create an evolving TC and/or new variant of the old game.

I personally think it would be interesting if several years down the line, the projects ended up being merged, and we ended up with something that could be used as an IWAD replacement, and a new game at the same time. And if new content was constantly being introduced to both elements, it would be pretty amazing.

fraggle said:

It's a nice idea but it seems backwards to add a bunch of textures in the hopes that they might be useful. Should be the other way round - the need for textures in levels driving their creation.

I wasn't suggesting that we make a whole bunch of random textures to figure out what to do with later. There should be specific intent behind each texture, like an industrial level calling for industrial looking textures.

Here's a rough example of what I have in mind. I'm aiming for about a 60/40 ratio of new/existing textures.

isn't this an avp2 texture?

jmickle66666666 said:

http://puu.sh/lNOhX/2d0f3bcade.jpg
isn't this an avp2 texture?

Yes, they're all textures from other games. As I said, it's a rough example, not a submission of any kind.

I agree with the idea of new textures, especially considering the possibility of a project fork. Perhaps something along the lines of visuals in Supplice would be fitting for the new textures?

BTW, the fork could also use a modified palette, with the concern over PWAD compatibility no longer being relevant.

ive been contacting several people over at zdoom who have agreed to donate several textures (i made sure they where from scratch/modified from freedoom) i'll post them as soon as i can sort them out

The custom texture thread at ZDoom Forums has some great assets. I've noticed zrrion the insect posted one for Hexen too. Maybe there are more? It is my understanding that the Zauberer project is currently in a major need of texture submissions.

lets not treat freedoom, blasphemer and zauberer as if they where a single project

raymoohawk said:

lets not treat freedoom, blasphemer and zauberer as if they where a single project

Yes, but on the other hand there's no reason they can't share assets if they're fitting.

i think its best if we pretend like we dont know about one project while working on the other. just imagine if all doom engine games had the same slightly modified assets, it would be horrible. and yes i know the doomguy was used as a basis for almost all humans, and theres the occasional reused texture, but the reused assets where generally modified from game to game

raymoohawk said:

i think its best if we pretend like we dont know about one project while working on the other. just imagine if all doom engine games had the same slightly modified assets, it would be horrible. and yes i know the doomguy was used as a basis for almost all humans, and theres the occasional reused texture, but the reused assets where generally modified from game to game

You basically just described Ultimate Doom and Doom 2. (It really does feel like the two games just had slightly modified assets.)

Actually, what I think would be interesting is if Phase 1 and Phase 2 had slightly different textures. Maybe when something in Phase 2 gets updated, the old texture gets placed in Phase 1, that way they both get updated over time, and they would appear to be slightly different from each other.

That would probably be a huge pain in the butt to maintain, though.

i meant hexen heretic and strife, they only reuse some assets and they are usually heavely modified

raymoohawk said:

lets not treat freedoom, blasphemer and zauberer as if they where a single project

I never suggested that (although I don't think there's anything wrong with sharing assets). I merely asked if you, being in contact with people at ZDoom forums, could ask or check if there was something usable for Zauberer, completely independently of your inquiries and/or search for new textures for Freedoom.

frithiof said:

Actually, what I think would be interesting is if Phase 1 and Phase 2 had slightly different textures. Maybe when something in Phase 2 gets updated, the old texture gets placed in Phase 1, that way they both get updated over time, and they would appear to be slightly different from each other.

That's a nice idea generally, but it is my understanding that many updates are either of vastly superior quality, or fix various errors in previous submissions. Because of this,moving older versions to Phase 1 would probably result in noticeable quality deterioration compared to Phase 2.

MrFlibble said:

That's a nice idea generally, but it is my understanding that many updates are either of vastly superior quality, or fix various errors in previous submissions. Because of this,moving older versions to Phase 1 would probably result in noticeable quality deterioration compared to Phase 2.

OK, fair point.

What about possibly having slightly different weapons for Phase 1, and Phase 2?

Most of the current weapons (in the more recent builds) are extremely polished, and are starting to actually look better than the original Doom weapons (I think this is outstanding and a good thing). Perhaps creating similarly high quality weapons for Phase 1, that are different looking (but function more or less the same way), would help to make them appear to be slightly different games, while retaining the textures and monsters, and other stuff.

Maybe weapons that are similar to the new ones, but modified slightly. Or maybe make the weapons in Phase 1 look nice and shiny, and the ones in Phase 2 could appear to be slightly worn from heavy use.

Making the two games not appear to obviously be clones of each other would be kinda cool. That was really more of id Software's fault than the Freedoom team's, but...

So maybe that's going quite a bit off topic from the texture thing, but it's an idea.

frithiof said:

What about possibly having slightly different weapons for Phase 1, and Phase 2?

An interesting idea -- I'd say a couple of the weapons could even be majorly different.

Does increase workload on artists though (too much? I dunno).

I would extend the idea to *maps* too, setting up certain guidelines (like texture usage) so the Phase 1 and Phase 2 are more unique to each other.

Maybe also different enemies? Like using different sprites for the Baron of Hell in Phase 1 and 2.

So there can be something like an "evolution" of the monsters from one game to the other.

andrewj said:

An interesting idea -- I'd say a couple of the weapons could even be majorly different.

Does increase workload on artists though (too much? I dunno).

I would extend the idea to *maps* too, setting up certain guidelines (like texture usage) so the Phase 1 and Phase 2 are more unique to each other.

Angry Saint said:

Maybe also different enemies? Like using different sprites for the Baron of Hell in Phase 1 and 2.

So there can be something like an "evolution" of the monsters from one game to the other.

Cool. :)

It's too bad that some folks are talking about forking, when there is a lot that can still be done with Freedoom itself. Even within the limitations imposed by id Software, back in the day, there is still a lot of room for "creative re-interpretation". (I'm not sure what the real deal was, but having Doom 2 be almost identical to Doom 1 is kinda lazy, regardless of how highly esteemed this community considers it.)

I think it would be kinda cool to have a series of themed levels, that kinda go in the same direction as Doom 3's (in terms of telling a story about how everything went wrong, in Phase 1**, and Phase 2 could merely be a story about dealing with the fallout from Phase 1, maybe add something about dealing with Freedoomguy's PTSD, in the intermission texts, to make it seem more involving), but aren't as confusing or shitty (I actually got lost in one of the early Doom 3 levels when I replayed it a year or two ago, and rage deleted it from my computer; I did manage to complete it a couple times at one point in my life, though, and I kinda liked the attempt at telling a story). Perhaps getting rid of Boom and going vanilla isn't entirely necessary, but deciding on a more proper use of the added abilities should be taken into consideration.

(I hope I'm not pissing off too many people by making these suggestions...)

** A scripted scene in E1M1 that shows a marine being teleported between two pads, and coming back as a zombie, could be a great start. And it's simple enough to get the point across while using resources that are known to exist in the Doom universe. Allowing the player character to also use the teleporter without any obvious change occurring could be an interesting start to things (or maybe have the Freedoomguy teleport into a room that is identical to the room he left, on top of a berserk pack, but then have everything proceed as if nothing was wrong with the player character). Or maybe that last part could be the level, since scripting events might be a bit much.

Honestly, when I play Doom I tend to pretend that I'm some guy that was experimented on, who ended up going insane, and ends up killing his fellow marines during his journey to Hell.

frithiof said:

What about possibly having slightly different weapons for Phase 1, and Phase 2?

Angry Saint said:

Maybe also different enemies? Like using different sprites for the Baron of Hell in Phase 1 and 2.

I think this was discussed a while ago, and it was decided to keep resources consistent across the two IWADs. I can't find the relevant thread right now though.

Anyway, this discussion is getting unrelated to the original intent of this thread. The major difference is that extra textures can be added into the IWAD and used in the levels, while still keeping the stock texture set for PWAD compatibility. The same cannot be done with weapons, monsters or items.

that was actually my suggestion, and i still stand by it

raymoohawk said:

that was actually my suggestion, and i still stand by it

Uhh what was your suggestion? keeping monsters (etc) consistent?

MrFlibble said:

The major difference is that extra textures can be added into the IWAD and used in the levels, while still keeping the stock texture set for PWAD compatibility. The same cannot be done with weapons, monsters or items.

Oh, you thought I was talking about adding additional weapons, monsters, and items?

I was thinking more along the lines of having different sprites for the weapons in Phase 1 and Phase 2, but their functionality would remain the same. Ultimately, my suggestion doesn't really matter if the artists don't want to make the assets.

frithiof said:

Oh, you thought I was talking about adding additional weapons, monsters, and items?

I was thinking more along the lines of having different sprites for the weapons in Phase 1 and Phase 2, but their functionality would remain the same. Ultimately, my suggestion doesn't really matter if the artists don't want to make the assets.

No, I didn't. IIRC, in the old discussion that I alluded to earlier, it was decided that assets should be consistent across both IWADs for the sake of PWAD compatibility (at least, this is how I remember it). That is why I said that adding extra textures, as suggested by raymoohawk and Sodaholic, remains consistent with this goal, whereas changing monsters or weapons inevitably affects PWADs played with the respective Phases.

However, I do think that the question of whether (some of the) resources should be different between the two Phases could be discussed - but in a separate thread. That would help better organize the development process.

On the question of textures, this collection was brought up in the Dark Forces thread recently. Some are obviously converted from other FPS games, but I'm not sure of others like Too Much Brown, psyren textures, Ogro, NMN Corporation and some others. Perhaps at least some are made from scratch and thus theoretically usable?