Stupid Question! Doom 1 or Ultimate Doom?

LakiSoft said:

Some should make a fan made remake of EP4 with new boss and new monsters and weapons. ;)

No, someone shouldn't.

LakiSoft said:

Some should make a fan made remake of EP4 with new boss and new monsters and weapons. ;)

Use a randomizer (Scalliano667 Shuffle, etc.). Should be right up your alley, and it saves us suffering another ridiculously moronic argument about "official" patches and what-not.

bimlanders said:

Plus, being an official release, why could there not have been something in the way of new content, be it a weapon, a couple of monsters, or maybe a new boss? How about new music? No? New sky... okay, not good enough.

Yes, the lack of non-map new content in Ep4 was probably the biggest disappointment to me. Really, what was there? A new sky and an interpic that wasn't as interesting as the rest in the game. Even if they'd done something like add an enemy from Doom2 and used a few of them for a boss-like battle for the final level it would have had a bit more "specialness" about it. (I'm thinking of something perhaps using the mancubus and a special that does something when they are all dead or maybe an archvile or two.) The code was all there. They only needed to use the sprites - which were also already done obviously. In fact, IIRC, the sprites for the mancubus fireball are actually in the Ultimate Doom IWAD already.

Enjay said:

Personally, I've always considered episode 4 as a bolt-on extra that doesn't really fit with the original game with regards to appearance, gameplay or even "story". I regard the original three episodes as being what Doom is and episode 4 more like a mission pack like "The Scourge of Armagon" is for Quake (but free, obviously) or, in modern speak, a DLC-like add on.

Finding myself in complete agreement... And yet, this resulted in E4 captivating my teenage brain more than anything else in the game. It was so out of place and abstract I'd immerse myself in those strange, intriguing environments. Whereas the first three episodes leave little to the imagination, the fourth immediately gave me a strong "we're not in Kansas anymore" vibe. No more story, no map progression nor map, not even a common theme from level to level. Nothing reminding you of human presence or existence at all, just a bunch of monsters and you, alone, against them. It felt like wandering off the rails and stepping in an alien dimension.

It took until Sunder to recapture that feeling for me, and no commercial games have done the trick. People want nice, relatable, understandable, human-readable environments. So-called abstract settings always have to be explained, broken down into words, reduced to tiny pieces, with hardly any room for interpretation beyond details, and even then, human-centric ones at that. Disappointing.

Phml said:

Finding myself in complete agreement... And yet, this resulted in E4 captivating my teenage brain more than anything else in the game. It was so out of place and abstract I'd immerse myself in those strange, intriguing environments. Whereas the first three episodes leave little to the imagination, the fourth immediately gave me a strong "we're not in Kansas anymore" vibe. No more story, no map progression nor map, not even a common theme from level to level. Nothing reminding you of human presence or existence at all, just a bunch of monsters and you, alone, against them. It felt like wandering off the rails and stepping in an alien dimension.

I couldn't agree more.

Eris Falling said:

The only thing I really didn't like was that bloody switch in E1M1 which took you outside.

This.

I never liked that switch either.

But I actually really like E4. The fact that it was different from the first three episodes made it really stand out. And it was harder, as well, which only added to the scariness. And it had plenty of atmosphere. That orange sky made the whole episode seem surreal and alien. A worthy add on. But in the end it is still an add on. Doom will always be the first three episodes.

Come to think of it, the level names are part of the problem with E4. The E1-3 names are pretty descriptive, so even without the intermission screen map, you would still get something to hang your imagination on. You have a basic idea of what kind of place you're in, and so the architecture, textures, etc. begin to make sense (because the designers put some thought into what that kind of place would look like, at a very abstract level). But with E4, you've got zip, nada. The level names don't even mean anything, they're just some strings they took from the Bible, out-of-context, and slapped them into their code because they sounded cool and they didn't want to be bothered to spend any more time on it. I don't even care about the lack of new content, but the way they released what they had just feel very haphazard.

Phml said:

Finding myself in complete agreement... And yet, this resulted in E4 captivating my teenage brain more than anything else in the game. It was so out of place and abstract I'd immerse myself in those strange, intriguing environments. Whereas the first three episodes leave little to the imagination, the fourth immediately gave me a strong "we're not in Kansas anymore" vibe. No more story, no map progression nor map, not even a common theme from level to level. Nothing reminding you of human presence or existence at all, just a bunch of monsters and you, alone, against them. It felt like wandering off the rails and stepping in an alien dimension.

It's interesting how I feel this way about the whole game(s), but for others it's specifically tied to certain levels. None of the environments in any of the main commercial releases made a lot of sense to me, but that was a critical component of it's beauty.

KiiiYiiiKiiiA said:

That orange sky made the whole episode seem surreal and alien.

How exactly is it alien? It isn't much different from a sunset sky.

For me SKY4 looks like mix of Hell Sky and Earth Sky which is supposed to be in game story. :|

Yes, it looks like the sky on the bunny scroller after E3M8.

Also my friend still has the shareware version of Doom 1. He never had the chance to buy the full or ultimate version and now he can't find the game anymore on local stores. Which is the best way to buy the game now? I know he is aware of Doom 3 BFG Edition that includes Doom 1 and 2 as bonus but until then, what is mostly recommended? Steam or Ebay?

Steam's pretty good if you catch it during a sale, but I'd personally look for a copy of the collector's edition on eBay unless he's interested in the Master Levels.

If he gets the game on Steam, then some source ports (notably Chocolate Doom, ZDoom, and GZDoom) will be able to detect the IWADs automatically (by looking at the Steam directory to see if Doom, Doom II, Final Doom, Heretic, or Hexen are available). It's by far the simplest way to get Doom to work.

Thanks for suggestions guys! He is already having Doom 2 and master levels, he is only missing full Doom 1 and Final Doom.

Tell him to grab them off Steam, then. The Collector's Edition tends to go for around $20 on eBay, so it's only worth it if you want all three games.

Unless you hate episode 4 then everyone prefers ultimate doom.
It's like saying "do you prefer 3 cakes or 4 cakes?"

I know it's like that. That's way i said Stupid Question.

It's actually not as simple as 3 vs 4 identical cakes, because we're effectively debating on how they compare to each other. If someone likes one kind of cake, they might not enjoy another kind as much, even if other people just want to eat all the cakes.

LakiSoft said:

I know it's like that. That's way i said Stupid Question.

Did you get as many Stupid Answers as you wanted yet?

This thread has degenerated into cake metaphors. I am disappoint.

Avoozl said:

How exactly is it [the e4 sky] alien? It isn't much different from a sunset sky.

Do you live near a nuclear test zone? Coz if your sunsets look like that... :P

No seriously tho, It does look very alien to me. Like what a sunset would look like on Mars or some other planet, with a different sun and a different set of wavelengths making up the visible spectrum. I always like that sky. IT is almost as if id said "Now let's find some colors as far away from your typical earth-blue-sky-thing as possible, and those oranges are the colors they came out with.

Never_Again said:

Did you get as many Stupid Answers as you wanted yet?

I will report your post as a big insult and admins will ban you for that, :)

Retog said:

Unless you hate episode 4 then everyone prefers ultimate doom.
It's like saying "do you prefer 3 cakes or 4 cakes?"

You could almost look at the topic this way: "do you prefer a perfect album of music, or the one that has tacked on bonus tracks which aren't so good?" But I guess that would be more of a discussion of whether we like E4 or not.

KiiiYiiiKiiiA said:

This thread has degenerated into cake metaphors. I am disappoint.



Do you live near a nuclear test zone? Coz if your sunsets look like that... :P

https://www.google.com/search?num=10&hl=en&safe=off&site=&tbm=isch&source=hp&biw=1280&bih=929&q=yellow+sunset&oq=yellow+sunset&gs_l=img.3..0j0i24l3j0i5i24l2.652.5574.0.5771.19.16.2.1.1.2.348.2785.3j12j0j1.16.0...0.0...1ac.1.6ySErA07ZlQ#num=10&hl=en&safe=off&tbm=isch&q=yellow+orange+sunset&revid=1894483922&sa=X&ei=AU9wUJ3NCJDM9ASbpYHADg&ved=0CEQQgxY&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_qf.&fp=78171e6dce42c88d&biw=1280&bih=929
some may be photoshoped, but most aren't.

Out of the 4 id episodes, E4 is by far my favorite. It has my favorite id map (E4M6) as well as a few other really good ones (E4M1, E4M2). The relatively large amount of mappers makes the episode have more diverse gameplay and visual styes than the other ones, yet the similar texture usage prevents the levels from being too disconnected.

Also the sky kicks ass.