A demopack of some sort?

So, with the summer coming up and hot weather making being outside an undesirable option for our health and prosperity, I wonder if there would be some interest in demoieing collaboration of some sort. I would like to get as many peeps to contribute as possible and even encourage guys who record only occasionally, so unlike Noob Kyle, I want to properly settle on a wad that would be of most interest and ensure the highest possible activity. Suggestions are still present in older thread to which I linked to and you can get there by clicking on 'Noob Kyle' which is present a line above this one. With the rather huge amount and diversity of suggestions there, I believe it will be difficult to settle on something without ensuring eventual abandonment, but it's worth a try, isn't it?

I would adapt to pretty much anything chosen, although category should be either limited to just maxes or maxes + speeds + optional misc. stuff depending on amount and difficulty of maps present in chosen wad and besides that I don't really want demopack of zdoom demos, even though that's up to debate. I'd also prefer something with few demos already in dsda or none at all, so the outcome will be 'fresh', if you know what I mean, but that's also up to debate and not a definite restriction at all.

So, that's about it, I suppose. Hope to hear from y'all fellow lazyas... uhhhh... laddies. ;-)

Zones of Fear
Whitemare
Beyond the Hell
That weird Alt.wad made by Russians
Scimitar
Herian
JOW.wad
As much of NDCP2 as possible
Pcorf Community Project
Pedroom32
Project: Space (or psp.wad)
Revenger
The rest of Surge.wad

There. That should give the community quite a bit of choices to choose from.

ksshit? dtwid? or something ancient and underrated?

Kssht has already been done, except for Map 31.

Of all large wads with a very few demos, the most interesting to me are:
armadosia
garrulo
pc_cp

Or maybe let's wait a bit for cchest4? You can't get more fresh than that. :) Also it would be in the spirit of older doomworld demopacks (I think ksutra demopack thread was started very soon after wad's final release; same deal with vile flesh and extremal doom).

Jenesis
Base Ganymede
Epic 2 (probably unlikely)
Would love to see some more Epic 2 demos
These are ones which have not been mentioned so far. For which I would think are a good shout.

dew said:

ksshit? dtwid? or something ancient and underrated?

I think that last time demopack about dtwid went full shit :p
I'm not quite sure why, but I personally didn't participate in it because there's no point doing demopack with slower times than the current ones.

IMO inf-lutz was very cool for a demopack. That's why I prefer wads with only few demos, so there's something to 'conquer' in pacifists/nm(100s)/uv-max/tyson.

dew said:

or something ancient and underrated?

That would be probably the most plausible idea due to reasons above. I don't know about oldies, someone will have to do some enlightment. The only one I kept mentioning is 'squadron' (link in old thread). I even plan at some point to max the rest of it whole, did only very few maxes for it and only some old hyper slow maxes are in tables (you could probably do a faster FDA).

Maybe the reason why dtwid went into abyss was simply because there's too many maps and thus too much to ask for? So maybe aim should be at something with less maps? I didn't play dtwid so I can't say a thing.

Also the cchest4 idea is quite considerable, even though it's hard to tell if it won't be shit to record on. :p

As for the oldies, I can suggest Back To Hell - a episode 3 replacement for Doom 1, just like Lutz's Inferno. I enjoyed every map of it even though the design is a bit crude at times. There is many interesting and creative gameplay situations, each map has some unique features.

If we are talking old, how about marswar, I know it has some demos for it. It would be quite fun for me as it was the first Pwad I ever played :)
I suddenly feel all nostalgic.....

I'm quite unsure about how to settle on something. The way this thread will be heading on will be most likely just more suggestions about what to do pack of and maybe an occasional reason behind the choice, but I'm rather curious about how are we supposed to know that someone is pro or against certain choice. With passiveness that generally goes on around, I really don't want to guess. I could make a poll somehow somewhere, but filling it with those loads of possible choices doesn't seem like a reliable solution to prevent final choice from getting condemned. Damn, it's difficult to read your minds!

Any ideas?

There has been an enormous amount of WADs mentioned in both threads, it's too many to choose from... Just pick these which have been mentioned more than once + your personal favourites, so that we have 6-10 choices. Then everyone interested picks three. Finally, you can count the "score".

From the mentioned before I liked pc_cp, sp_usimp and marsw301 best, though I'm afraid I won't be too active as recorder in the nearest future.

PS Revved damn, a PM is waiting to be read

wow, marswar has surprisingly few demos... and i'd prefer it over pc_cp any day, there would be too many issues with it.

there's also mlm (minilevel megawad)!

vdgg said:

There has been an enormous amount of WADs mentioned in both threads, it's too many to choose from... Just pick these which have been mentioned more than once + your personal favourites, so that we have 6-10 choices. Then everyone interested picks three. Finally, you can count the "score".

Very well, I think I'll accomodate it a bit though. I'll list in OP every wad that was mentioned twice or more times for now. If there will be some sudden burst in amount of desired wads, it can be altered.

vdgg said:

I'm afraid I won't be too active as recorder in the nearest future.

Aw. A demopack with purpose of getting the most activity possible without your demo would be just incomplete.

dew said:

wow, marswar has surprisingly few demos...

You mean the new version?
Because there is a full demopack for the old version. Or is it still not enough? :)

As I said, if peeps don't mind wad has already average recording history, there really is no problem with that. Demos of the old version desync with the new one, I presume (or else they would have been moved to the new one by now) so there had to be some changing, which is quite encouraging factor imho. I haven't really played this one as well, can't say a thing.

All it needs for a demo to desync is a node rebuild. I believe some of the maps in MW3 are new, but most have just cosmetic changes.

There are so many good wads that have few or no demos, that it would seem odd to revisit a frankly mediocre wad that has already received a great deal of demo attention (there was more than just the demo-pack) on the basis of mostly minor changes.

Personally, I think it would be good to see modern demos on some of the classic TCs and PCs. Batman, AOD, Aliens TC, for instance.

And certainly, whatever is chosen, the dtwid mistake shouldn't be made - existing demos should be considered viable for the pack, if the author is agreeable. That really appeared to cripple that project, although maybe there was a lack of enthusiasm for recording on it in general.

One last suggestion: if voting is to take place on a shotlist (a good idea IMO), then perhaps voters should also indicate how likely they are to record on their choice of wad (e.g. 1 = might record if I see something that looks interesting; 2 = will definitely record a few demos; 3 = will devote a lot of time and record lots of demos). That should help weight the decision towards wads where the demopack has a good chance of being finished.

I believe some of the maps in MW3 are new, but most have just cosmetic changes

The new maps are 15, 20 and 25 (in marswar.wad MAP15 was a Doom 2 conversion of MOONBASE.WAD, MAP20 - of Heretic E1M1 and MAP25 - of 11BONES.WAD). I plan to max them at some point.

frankly mediocre wad

:o

Willing to participate. I have no suggestions to come up with, since I usually play wads that have been overplayed, but when you all agree on a wad, I'd be happy to produce a couple demos.

Please don't go for a BFG fest wad, still. There's nothing like non-over-sophisticated maps where you fight mostly with chaingun, regular shootgun, some rockets, and you don't encounter heavy monsters at each corner. That's my two cents.

Grazza said:

... lack of enthusiasm for recording on it in general.

I think that there is no way to be sure that this won't be the case here sooner or later as well no matter the amount of prevention. And it's a scary and demotivating thought, especially now when it really seems to me like there's generally lower interest and motivation than it used to, but it may be just me and I'm usually seeing things only from the negative side. I mean, just now there is only a little bunch of us, and the difficulty of choosing something that will suit the already little bunch is already astronomical - unless my point of view on the matter is also shared by others - that is, I wouldn't mind demoing even downright crap stuff, because it's fun.

I also added some suggestions from old thread - if the same person mentioned something both here and there, it obviously doesn't have weight of 2 votes. DTWID was just preventively ignored, even though it would have around 6 votes alltogether.

wow, is pc_cp seriously a suggestion? it's wildly inconsistent quality-wise, some maps are terribad!

how about jenesis? that had just minor demo activity so far!

I'd also give a finger to jenesis, although I'm not entirely sure which one. :P
I recall FDAing it was a rather painful experience to me.

dew said:

wow, is pc_cp seriously a suggestion? it's wildly inconsistent quality-wise, some maps are terribad!

how about jenesis? that had just minor demo activity so far!

As someone who mapped for pc_cp, I can say that I didn't give any thought to demos at the time, and many of the maps in that wad appear to be the same way: long, straightforward, and rather uninteresting to plan for. Save a couple of maps (which already have been run by Revved), it really isn't demopack-worthy, IMO.

Jenesis would indeed be more interesting, though still not perfect.

I think that pc_cp is much more fun than jenesis because of its inconsistency. In "Doom 2 Unleashed" there is many different gameplay and design styles, many different experiences. One-man megawads tend to have much less variety, so to be fun they must be reaaaaally good in both these aspects. And while Jimmy's designs are pretty damn cool, I can't say that he is a gameplay guru.

Well, the weird thing about it is that I actually play Doom 2 Unleashed way more often than Jenesis because it has a weird sort of charm to it... I do think that the first 22 maps are somewhat demo-friendly as they tend to be a bit shorter. The third episode is filled with lengthy maps that, to be frank, I tried demoing a couple of times and just said, "Nope."

Then again, I've never actually been that good of a speedrunner, so I could be way off-base on that one.

I'd probably rather refrain from choosing both jenesis and pccp, seeing as how they are either pro or against thing, which is not a sign of a safe way I'm trying to take for now. They might suffice with the freshness factor because of the minor demo activity, but there is also the possibility that those wads have been undemoed for quite a while now for a reason other than lack of motivation - I'm not trying to imply anything at all.

j4rio said:

it really seems to me like there's generally lower interest and motivation than it used to, but it may be just me and I'm usually seeing things only from the negative side. I mean, just now there is only a little bunch of us, and the difficulty of choosing something that will suit the already little bunch is already astronomical - unless my point of view on the matter is also shared by others - that is, I wouldn't mind demoing even downright crap stuff, because it's fun.

I think this forum has a much higher level of activity, and there are more active recorders than when we did the first few demo packs here. You just need a couple of guys who are keen to get a project finished (and thus willing to do the "filler" lmps needed to complete at least the Max table), and maybe a few others to record whatever seems of interest to them. I mean, the original MW pack was just Rich starting to record, and I did a fair few, and Opulent filled in a couple that remained. Stroller pack was just Kristian and myself having a bit of fun, and Vince adding a few before he got bored with the category.

On the subject of recording on "crap but fun" maps, that's a good point. Some maps that are objectively poor are fun to record on, much more so than some beautiful maps where it is a pain to record. Maps where the typical Max time is over 10 minutes should probably be avoided, unless there are some special circumstances that mean you have highly motivated recorders (e.g. sf2011, where the mappers themselves are the keen to record).

I'd be down with doing a non-optimized + table filler demo. I guess I don't really care what the wad is.

So is it gonna be MW? As soon as I'll finish my Scythe/BGComp movies, I will gladly participate.

Grazza said:

I think this forum has a much higher level of activity, and there are more active recorders than when we did the first few demo packs here.

Allright then.

TimeOfDeath said:

I'd be down with doing a non-optimized + table filler demo. I guess I don't really care what the wad is.

Awesome.

Akse said:

So is it gonna be MW? As soon as I'll finish my Scythe/BGComp movies, I will gladly participate.

Well, there is a thing about it that it'd not be table-filling for the most part. As it was already pointed out, many maps that desync have undergone only cosmetic changes.