Endless Random /idgames WAD Adventures #056

[ICID]

^{(logo by @4MaTC)}

 

ICID, what the hell is this now?

Endless Random /idgames WAD Adventures is a small project of exploration, interaction, entertainment and reviews where we meet once every two weeks to select random WADs in search of hidden treasures, lost promises, or our worst nightmares! We use the /idgames archive’s special feature that lets us search for random files. Of course, sometimes the results are resources or unplayable stuff, so we focus on looking for WADs.

 

So, what do we do here?

1. Play at least one random WAD in a two-week period of time. WADs are selected using the Random File feature on /idgames or from the list below.
2. Post a review of whatever you play.
3. Always provide the name of the WAD, the name of the author, and a link to the file.
4. Play however you want, on any skill level, and with any source port, as long as you play the WAD as intended/in working shape.
5. Be respectful. It's okay to criticize a map, but remember that many mappers read these review threads and behave accordingly. Also, please don't tag mappers into a negative review of their work.

 

What kind of WADs are we looking for?

Any file on /idgames is fair game, but most of us choose to stick to singleplayer Doom or Heretic WADs that work in our sourceport(s) of choice. If you're worried about finding Terrywads or broken files, I also pull at least five random WADs for the event. Feel free to play them with me if you wish, or look for your own! The point of the event is to encourage you to explore this vast, random world. 

 

Recommendations for reviewing:

Spoiler

1. Please take screenshots or video of your adventures.

2. Commenting the source port and difficulty level is not required, but provides helpful context to your review.

3. Try to stick to no more than 1 WAD per day to avoid burnout, but this part’s all up to you, champ!

4. Reviews of all formats are valid. Both longform and shortform are good as long as you write with integrity.

 

Endless Random /idgames WAD Adventures of this event: 

1. UAC SECRET MILITARY BASE
2. Guts and Glory
3. A really really really big hole full of monsters
4. FURDEMON
5. Real Men Use Doombuilder

 

Spoiler

The Top 10 (out of 61):

 

1. @Roofi | 6245

2. @LadyMistDragon | 3020

3. @Sena | 2445

4. @Walter confetti | 1950

5. @brick | 900

6. @ICID | 885

7. @Endless | 860

8. @Thelokk | 725

9. @Clippy | 520

10. @smeghammer | 425

 

Join the Doom Master Wadazine community for more events like this! » https://discord.gg/Q2RKn4J

[Endless]

Island.wad | Sean Mathews | 1995

 

 

Ah, a little nice surprise! Don't let the brown textures deceive, this is actually and island, although without your typical tropical lushness, it's more of a vacation spot for demons and the like. A quite big map with more than 300 enemies, Island is a decent effort that manages to check the boxes for good fun clocking at around 15-20 minutes of gameplay. It is rather big, but not as lost as some other maps from the era, and the combat is all-around pretty fun. Lovely little piece that 90s lovers would surely like.

[jmac]

Joining in on this for the first time. I ended up with Slaughter Until Death, an episode 2 replacement released in 1994 by The Innocent Crew.

 

I had not heard of this wad, but it seems promising so far, especially given the time it was released. I am using DSDA for my playthrough.

 

 

I had to double-check that this map really was from 1994, especially after I saw the pentagram window custom texture. Given the year it came out, this is very impressive to me. There were some awkward level design choices, some rooms that seemed pointless, and a couple stuck monsters, but all in all this was genuinely enjoyable. I'm now looking forward to the rest of this wad. 

[Endless]

1 minute ago, jmac said:

I had not heard of this wad, but it seems promising so far, especially given the time it was released. I am using DSDA for my playthrough.

A real classic from 1994. It was part of the Top 100 WADs of All Time feature from Doomworld. I remember playing it a long time ago. It's a solid WAD for the year, the TiC would also release a sequel: The Evil Unleashed.

[LadyMistDragon]

1 minute ago, Endless said:

A real classic from 1994. It was part of the Top 100 WADs of All Time feature from Doomworld. I remember playing it a long time ago. It's a solid WAD for the year, the TiC would also release a sequel: The Evil Unleashed.

The TiC? Daaaaaang. I'm told Oblivion is a little better, but I mean, Thomas Moeller specifically seemed to have slaugter-lite leans in his combat which are evident especially in his Requiem map.

 

[Roofi]

Year 2 Month 03 Day 07

 

I play until I die or intentionally stop. I don't comment the wad where I died/stopped.

 

[1] VortexDM by John C. Boyle (1996)

 

Spoiler

 

 

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A deathmatch with plenty of hideouts and snipes set in a brick dungeon-like arena of stairs, lifts and double-backs.

 

Those are pretty nice looking sewers with advanced lighting and shadow works considering its early release date. However, most of the layout consists of crampy 64 pixels wide corridors which don't seem practical for multiplayer.

 

[2] walzhaus.zip (1994)

 

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Alright boys and girls get ready to jump for joy...
Here is a wad for doom 1 or doom 2.
It is my house...yahoo...and it has two...yes two floors...oh joy!
I think it be neat.

 

A myhouse.wad which I'm 99% sure I played it elsewhere. I remember of the roaming Spider-Mastermind and the garage with the invulnerability sphere next to it. The wad has some new textures which don't really enhance the aesthetics but still add a bit more personnality to the house.

 

The same map can be played on Doom 1 and Doom 2 but I don't recommand you to play the Doom 2 version at all : the author added a stupid Icon of Sin which highly encourages you to skip the map instead of letting you exploring the different rooms at your own pace. It has doomcute and my favourite is the small switched on TV made with a scrolling sky.

 

Grade : C

 

[3] Snake Doom by @Miffe (2000)

Spoiler

 

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Control the snake and collect apples

 

Snake recreated in Doom ! Control your snake made of FLAT22 textures after binding two buttons in order to go left and to go right. You can change the speed of your game at any time and the faster you choose, the more points you get. Speed 1 is boring whereas Speed 19 is almost impossible. I chose Speed 8 and I managed to score between 140 and 150 points.

 

I don't exactly how the original snake game was on mobile phones but you sometimes have to deal with reverse directions. When the snake approaches you and you want it to turn to your right, you have to turn to the left for example.

 

It's a fun game made with zdoom features which occupied me for several minutes.

 

Grade : B

 

[4] The Final Invasion by Nambona890 (2014)

 

Spoiler

 

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On Venus, hell has overtook an ancient alien temple in the Bula-Heni valley. You recently discovered it when you were searching for demons that escaped a containment facility. It has the demons you were looking for that were contained. Now go kill those bastards.

 

It was a normal day in a hell castle and ... OH NO !!! YOU GOT CAPTURED BY THE IMULLNIATIS ! AND E.T TERRY-TRAPPED THOU ! But the doomguy is still alive technically speaking and still wonders what the fuck he's doing here.

 

Just a tip : If you see Nambona890 in the author section, flee !

 

Grade : F

 

[5] H2HMUD01 by Dave Swift (1995)

 

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This is an Offical wad for the H2HMud International Doomers Competition.

 

This is the early version H2H-Xmas's map 12 "The Court yard" and whereas I kept few memories about the maps of this wad, I still recognize the multi-level areas with the water pool and the fact this map host a shitload of revenants and ammo. I bet this lone map contains more revenants than the whole Plutonia. Make a note of this , dear Plutonic addicts !

 

H2HMUD01 contains a few (ugly) textures but no santa nor snow in sight yet. Anyway, you maybe already know I'm a fan of proto-slaughtermaps and that one did not disappoint me. Blasting tall skeletons with super shotgun and rocket launcher underregarded activity. The beginning is a bit spiky since the medkits and several spheres are not directly available.

 

Also, that map has some jumpscares with large closets full of screaming bastards which open behind you ! Fun hectic map.

 

Grade : B

 

[6] Fire Storm by Mutt Man (2003)

 

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Prepare to enter the Firestorm. Select your weapons combination and enter the grim deathmatch arena. Slug it out with your competitors and a furious horde of enemies while trying to gain access to hidden caches of weapons and power ups.

Network play requires cooperation between two players to end level. Level was designed to be played as a deathmatch with respawing on, providing maximum level playability and carnage :) If you play solo, do it in nightmare mode.

 

Yes, this is the kind of map following the "choose your weapons" trope but your choice don't matter because I don't know which is the best weapon to fight the boredom generated by this map. This map has few enemies, ton of ammo , power and blank crampy monotextured corridors which only aime to disorrient you. I should have played this map on nightmare as the author ordered it but it wouldn't have made a difference either way. I didn't find all the hidden caches and... I don't care.

 

Moreover there are some obvious softlocks the author didn't spot.

 

Grade : D+

 

I stop here for today.

[LadyMistDragon]

AllAlone.Wad (1997) by Doug Merrill (Eternity)

 

A set of two maps so titled because they are cooperative maps you can finish alone (cue Uwe Boll in the Dungeon Siege movie cackling "ahahahaha! Brillant"). Unfortunately, they're just not very good in the visual sense and also have rather simplistic and linear layouts not worth discussing, not to mention a few blatant misalignments. In some ways, one might call this "proto-slaughter" but it's not very challenging due to the vast amount of room and relative amount of cover, and in any case, the lack of weapon variety really hurts it. This is especially the case in the outdoor square of the second map, where you get a BFG which basically exists to clear out the Cacos and do little else. That being said, it's ultimately fairly painless if you can avoid hitscanner fire enough and it's not actually that repetitive in relative terms, but there's still little of note happening here 4.5/10

[Roofi]

Year 2 Month 03 Day 08

 

I play until I die or intentionally stop. I don't comment the wad where I died/stopped.

 

[1] The Theater by @08scatman (2014)

 

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Have you heard "The Theater" creepypasta? Maybe This creepypasta was amazing for me so I got the idea to integrate this creepypasta into Doom. You pretty much know how this creepypasta will look like

 

After seeing the author name's, the skulltag compatibility and the word "creepypasta" in the description, I was sincerely afraid to play a crappy terry wad which would ruin my adventure.

 

But fortunately it's not the case at all ! The Theater turns to be an amateur horror-themed map where the doomguy goes to theater in order to watch one of the recent movies : Plutonia , Wolfenstein 3D , Hexen...

 

He is welcomed by the manager, portrayed as a red marine, which progressively become possessed.  At the end, the level crashes and sends you to the console.

 

"The Theater" was supposed to be scary but he it drew a smile on my face instead ! For those who want to know the original creepypasta, check the video :

 

 

 

Grade : B

 

 

I failed at performing a moon shot in Poogers's Map 03.

 

Spoiler

 

[LadyMistDragon]

Square of Destruction (2008) by hardcore_gamer (Eternity)

 

A square map with a beautiful night sky. Oh well, too bad there's so much marble. But all facitiousness aside, there is some great use of shadows and some rather menacing detailing: read, the room near the beginning with the hanging corpses and demon-head portraits. Also, that outdoor area with the eves running along the outside of the blood pit was really nice, along with the cavern and flesh-filled rooms. Too bad the yellow key was only tagged for multiplayer because hardcore_gamer do channel Dario Casali like that. A real shame because while the combat isn't great with the somewhat careless monster placement, it ain't half-bad either. But the bug lowers the score by necessity to 4 out of 10. Sorry, but this shit doesn't belong in a so-called "single-player" map.

 

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[DrRock]

Mark's Music For DOOM 1 by Mark Moore (Vanilla, 1997) – Doom

played in Zdoom 2.8.1

 

A music replacement for the first episode of Doom that consists of randomly pulled midis from the web available at the time. I recongized a windows midi(Canyon, I think) and several ragtime midis that have been used a million times over since. There are also midis I don't recognize in here that are almost assuredly are either tv show or movie themes. This clahes with the game in an annoying manner and chances are if you are hunting for 90s midis you already have these downloaded from somewhere else. E1M7 is not too bad however, you might find use for it in your own works.

 

Unameit2 by Vincent Lozupone (Vanilla, 1997) - Doom II

played in Zdoom 2.8.1 on Ultra-Violence

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The author's description makes this out to be a rather tough to get through level, but in actuality this is a very benign map 13 replacement with a few 90s-isms present. Steep stairwells with ceilings low enough that you can get a little stuck in them and unmarked key doors. Aside from that it's not too bad if you don't mind any lack of real combat scenarios or big hitters thrown your way. I commend the author for making the entrance to the hidden away blue key legible enough that attentive players can find it without the need for dry-humping walls for minutes. Quite likeable if short and lacking in difficulty.

[LadyMistDragon]

Smokepack (1995) by Smoke (Eternit, Zandronumy)

 

I played a mediocre deathmatch wad so you don't have to(don't tell Ludi, she'll crucify me)! But no, there are too many large and open spaces, Smoke wouldn't know 'detail' if it hit him square in the head, and areas with are 'different' (for instance, the barred overlook in the wooden fort or the darkened hallway in Map 02) either fall entirely flat or were in areas bots didn't even go. 2/10 Don't worry, tomorrow's entry will be MUCH better!

 

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[Walter confetti]

UAC SECRET MILITARY BASE by JONATHAN RENNIE-MCCORMACK - Vanilla Doom, SP, 1996, played with Eternity "forseti" 4.0.2

Spoiler

A very barebones techbase fileed with BROWNx textures and set for some reason in the Hell episode, includes as well a lovely crude attempt of doing a starship hangar at the northern path of the level. The light brown and the green textured areas are blocked by a impassible lines, again without any reason. But despite this, the level is cool, have a decent shaped layout and some interesting ideas, all thinking the author had 10 years at the time he made this map! Reminded me of "The Crater" from TNT Evilution somehow and i don't know if this is a good or a bad thing to say, but let's end this with "Good for the author of this map, bad for the author of the Evilution map"

 

Guts and Glory by Brent Hollett - Vanilla Doom 2, SP, 1996, played with Eternity "forseti" 4.0.2

Spoiler

 

7 maps sets in 7 different wads for some bizarre reason, all based upon square-ish, corridor layouts with some sorts of puzzle element in it and ammo going scarcer and scarcer while you progress this thing, tries hard to been some sort of ultimate hardcore Doom challenge, but it fails miserabily unluckily. In the end i had to IDFA for beating the levels! The only decent thing is the kind of "backrooms" experience while progressing in all this samey looking corridors. Some levels goes from "what?" to "i can't believe it's just this!" (look at MAP02). Meh, skip it.

 

A really really really big hole full of monsters by Busted Corpse - Limit removing ports, Doom 2, SP, 2001, played with Eternity "forseti" 4.0.2

Spoiler

 

Visually better than the previous two entries, but still have a broken gameplay with mandatory key impossible to reach, weird map progression and a overall not so good experience. The map start with the titular hole full monsters (including a pain elemental for good measure) and evolves in this hellish structure, some stuff is cool and the map looks kind of good, so that's ok with me. Acceptable.

[brick]

Brick | 3 wads | 2 maps

 

S'mores Cookie (2021) by Timothy Brown (MArt1And00m3r11339). For Doom II iwad and GLBoom+. Played with GZDoom.

Oh hey it's that guy again, with another food-related map name for a map that has little to do with the titular food. To be fair this one fits more than Pepsi Apocalypse did, the starting circular platform almost looks like the cookie, though the colours are the other way round (the brown bits stick out of the mostly white cookie). It's still an all-out slaughter map with 7000+ enemies and completely not my thing, but I took a little cheaty tour to see what it was like. It does have more structure than either of the other Brown maps I've played, with distinct arenas each with its own gimmicks and goals. The first has enemies teleporting onto the cookie in a trickle with two cyberdemons rocketing from a distance, there's some platforming to do to get to them. There's nowhere near enough ammo here so I think the idea is to get both cybers killed by infighting while trying to keep the population at manageable level. Switches near each cyberdemon open the door to the next part. This has two stairways each leading to a switch and both swarming with a thousand imps. Pushing both collapses the stairs into another thousand HKs and a few cybers in cages, I can't even imagine how you're meant to survive being mauled by the HKs in such close quarters. The next arena is a similar setup except the cyberdemons are roaming the ground floor freely while HKs trickle down the stairs, and the teleporter out is of course all the way at the top. This takes you to another circular arena, where you have to survive for a few minutes against hordes of just about everything but mostly barons, until the exit opens up. This last arena has a bottomless BFG, but for most of the others the only viable weapon is the plasma rifle (there's a rocket launcher, but the only time you're given rockets is against the imp hordes). There's a non-zero chance I could have enjoyed the map with the enemy count pared down to 3 digits, but I'm sure it has an audience in its current state too, maybe for those who enjoy Nostril Cavern or World Orifice.

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Sentinel (2014) by Memfis. For Doom II iwad and PrBoom+. Played with GZDoom.

This is a deceptively small map with an even more deceptively low enemy count, and it is hard. Typical for Memfis it is also stingy on ammo and very stingy on health, and has no difficulty balancing. The opening is pure Tyson against demons on a damaging floor, then hitscans and others join in. I restarted many many times before managing to survive with almost no health. The rest is more manageable but does rely quite a bit on foreknowledge, especially the red key ambush and the surprise archvile. These are the only two real fights and they're both very deadly. The finale is laughably easy, pitting you against a half dozen zombiemen that died to a single rocket before I claimed the exit. I liked the my previous Memfis wad a lot more but I think those who enjoy small-scale combat challenge a la early Hell Revealed will like this one.

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Boomlightgen source code (2020) by cybermind (aka Mistranger).

It took me a few re-reads of the text file to understand what this is about. Basically there's a map cybermind released back in 2015 called The Last Sanctuary which used some Boom trickery to simulate a day/night cycle, with light levels in outside areas dynamically changing as time passes. Cybermind didn't set this up manually but instead wrote a tool that would take the light levels of sectors with a specific tag range (all outdoor sectors would use tags in this range; other map actions may or may not be assigned to these tags, either way it doesn't interfere with the tool) and compute a script. When this is fed into WadC it will generate all the linedefs and sector machinery for a voodoo doll "script" that runs with the map and simulates the day/night cycle. The biggest disadvantage of the tool, acknowledged by the author, is that the resulting voodoo script takes up a huge amount of linedefs (we're talking 20 thousand). I'm not very programming literate and couldn't understand any of the code, but I did have a look at The Last Sanctuary in-game to see the cycle first-hand. The light transition is obviously not very smooth, but it's still pretty cool to be walking and fighting through a sunlit valley while the light slowly dwindles until it's night, especially since the sky also switches to a starry black after sunset. When I looked at the map in an editor I could see a crazy amount of lines and sectors referencing each other. I'm not sure just how good this tool it or if there's a simpler way to accomplish a similar effect, but I'm a bit of a sucker for those simple vanilla or Boom tricks that make the engine seem like so much more than it is.

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Edited April 7, 2023 by brick : typos

[Roofi]

Year 2 Month 03 Day 09

 

I play until I die or intentionally stop. I don't comment the wad where I died/stopped.

 

[1] MPFORT by Maarten Pinxten (2013)

 

Spoiler

 

 

Quote

Medium level with some nice features added. Run for the supercharge!

 

According to playerlin's idgame comment, this level was made in 1996 and there is no evidence to contradict this. MPFORT is a smallish ultimate doom mostly in the theme of Ultimate Doom's Knee Deep in the Dead but with some oddities such as some out of place hellish areas with cacodemons locked in cage or, more generally, a more abstract and crampier layout than the original UD's E1 maps.

 

I enjoyed it overall thanks to the various paths to take and the low difficulty. The supercharge's secret mentioned by the author  was useless in my walkthrough because accessible just before reaching the exit.

 

Anyway, MPFORT replicates the good old Doom experience quite well, but with cheaper aesthetics.

 

Grade: B-

 

I stop here for today.

[LadyMistDragon]

Surge (2012) by Joshua Sealy @Joshy (From Doom With Love)

 

Speed of Doom only probably stands next to Sunder and Sunlust as the most important PWAD of the past 13 years. But although there was the vague idea of a sequel, Joshy and Darkwave fell out of regular communication for no particular reason other than being one or the other or both stopped for a bit. So Joshy would then start work on a project much closer in spirit to the original vision for Speed of Doom consisting of maps with a more speedmapp-ish length. Although he kept excellently to the limits for around 13-14 maps at least, it might have been inevitable that signs of larger ambition would eventually start to creep in. In any case, he was in the middle of college and didn't think he'd have any more time for mapping, so he would end up releasing this set at the beginning of 2012, with an 18th map set in a sort of sewer only partially in development and his semi-permanent retirement announced in the text file. Well, stuff happened, he was asked to do a map for Back to Saturn X and then, he'd end up taking a second look at Surge, then fleshing out, combining, expanding, and increasing the difficulty of the old maps while adding in some new ones to make a full megawad. The end result was, wait for it, 2014's Resurgence. Now it seems that Josh wants to go into therapy(as a therapist, XD), so perhaps his retirement will indeed be a semi-permanent thing. Which means there'll have to be a new Plutonia godfather if someone wants to make Plutonia 4, I suppose, though that doesn't discount continuing contributions of a map or two.

 

But finally, we gotta talk about the map. It's interesting that despite the lack of a story or even named maps that would normally mark something that was worked on for at least a bit, there seems to be an underlying visual narrative. I think we can talk about that inside the map descriptions themselves.

 

Map 01: A map that Joshy himself called forgettable, but it does it's job as a Map 01! Maybe there's a little too much pistoling action, but these cramped red caves manage to set the mood beautifully! Not so surprisingly perhaps, it was not included in Resurgence

 

Map 02: still an easy map, but about as tight on ammo as the last map. some slightly spicy moments, but it's still lots of low-tiers. And don't be surprised if you've got to pistol a pinkie or two.

 

Map 03: The red caverns grow more expansive and gorgeous, although this is also where Josh's ever-notorious damage floors start to rear their ugly heads, though perhaps not everywhere such as near the RK. Also, the cavern with lava running down the middle and Lost Souls was a shockingly strong moment in this early section of the wad, even though it's not even that threatening.  And you even have the opportunity to rocket little pairs of Imps far away from your position! Even though this starts off like a Tyson map, the Rl and later chaingunner prove to add a lot. The Lost souls still aren't too threatening, but they're stil a problem until a changun is found

 

Map 04: Well, ammo manages to be even tighter, even though you should find a berserk pack before too long. "Cold Sublety" was the first midi I recognized (were the others from Plutonia 2 and Speed of Doom?) and honestly, it goes quite well. Cliffside Imps start to become a more serious menace here(definitely not important), Not so much the case with the RK teleport trap, although if you can actually be bothered to climb the cliff and wind around to the ruined building before that (dunno if there's an intended order), you might be better equipped. Good thing too, because ammo comes at a serious premium. Nice square arches you can see at the beginning.

 

Map 05: Well, finally a true hot start! "Elf" from Heretic then proves a most appropriate introduction! Some scrambling, quite a few enemies close by and larger numbers than any previous map but with little to distinguish otherwise, besides the presence of an open-air lava pool with quite a few high platforms and some chaingunners/Imps on raised surfaces. Strangely enough, our ammo woes disappear close to the end!

 

Map 06: I think we're all getting a little tired of Hell and window-dressing Imps, right? Well, this isn't really all that much harder if anything! But we're finally leaving the mountains and entering a fort of sorts. That green armor placement in the front of some shotgunners is so trollish. But ammo manages to be almost plentiful this timer around! Despite the presence of two Mancubi and 3 Cacodemons each in distinct locations, the over-reliance on Imps approaches the point of parody. Josh is good enough with combat that it's not quite as much of an issue as one might think. I did end up cheating to get the red key because I'd pressed every switch and it didn't really seem worth it. BK trap was sufficently dangerous though with pairs of pinkies and a chaingunner emerging from each room

 

Map 07: Now here's a map that can be seriously annoying if you don't know what you're doing. In a last series of knolls stands this wooden fort, with mancubi on the immediate ledges, a Baron of Hell standing near the exit, and some other varieties of monsters on the lower ledges. don't press the switch below the Baron if you don't want to be melted by Arachnotrons. This map would be scrapped in Resurgence but making variations on Dead Simple is easy.....I think!

 

Map 08: A fortress with some gray marble walls surrounding. I was quite intimidated when "You Suck" started blaring from the speakers. But the apocalyptic mood conveyed by that track comes more from the large mobs of weak enemies that attack at different points. The Arch-vile at the left will be threatening at first, but seemed random. The hitscanner trap at the graveyard is quite nasty but somehow still manageble, although you must be quick to get the RK for some reason...probably. Those hanging poles in the middle are quite intimidating though. This one would be cut entirely, and while it is a shame to lose any maps, it does feel a little wanting for personality in the encounters.

 

Map 09: Resurgence has the reputation of a wad with an all-over difficulty curve, so it's quite ironic that each map has seen a more or less consistent raise in difficulty. I have no idea why I brought that up now when you're attacked by Revenants and Hell Knights basically from the beginning and the other middling opposition is just enough to distract your fire, but this little blood moat surrounding an outpost almost seems like it should be easier. Standout encounter is, of course, the Cyberdemon guarding the fireplace in the basement, along with his two dogs that serve as a nice distraction. I dunno who could kill him the first time.

 

Map 10: So I suppose people who've completed Going Down (which this maps somewhat resembles in square layout and overall amount of verticality in a map or two) would probably sneer at the overall difficulty of this, but it's still probably the most challenging thing thus far. We return to red rock, although things aren't so mountainous, and most of the map is indoors at any rate, but there are many large pools of lava that are damaging. There are no rad suits, but we won't be spending enough time in them for it to matter much. What does matter is being assaulted by Revenants and Arachnotrons almost from the beginning! And there really isn't much of a place to hide, what with Revenants and chaingunners on at least one raised platform and an arch-vile whose location we neglected to note but is kind of sneaky Eventually we'll have to make a stand somewhere though. Just hope that you'll find the Super Shotgun sooner than I did since it's not really located so far from the starting location. There's the fairly helpless Mastermind of course....until we have to hit the switch right next to her that allows us to progress. Some platforming follows to get the rk, platforms which are rearranged twice for some reason. Not the hardest platforming even, definitely, but we're still godawful at it. After some incidental stuff, we stand on a ledge with an exit portal that kills us when we exit because no weapon but the pistol can cross dimensions or something. I don't get it, but it's a convention and a balance restorer most important in the modern age, so...

 

My research seemed to indicate that changes in monster composition were fairly minimal for the next several maps so it was decided to stop here. EANB ultimately proves to be a more successful purveyor of what Joshy was probably going for here. Too many Imps at the beginning and the set is in slight danger of heading into repetition for a little too long. I think though that things would go up a little more in intensity if more was played and for that reason, this set gets an unapolegetic 8/10, for having one of the smoothest difficulty curves in recent memory.

 

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Edited April 7, 2023 by LadyMistDragon : important clarification!!

[brick]

Brick | 2 wads | 3 maps

Adventure | 5 wads | 5 maps

 

Terrere 02: "Spookyness guaranteed" (2001) by Wim "The Mole" Vanrie

It's not very clear if this targets a particular port, none is mentioned, but the text does say it won't run with doom2.exe, so it's at least limit-removing. This is a very short but pretty good-looking map that goes, you guessed it, for a spooky atmosphere. I thought it achieved it well, partly with the choice of colours (and nice contrast with everyone's favourite E4 sky), striking a perfect balance between dark and not too dark, and favouring small ambushes and enemies teleporting in and sneaking on you rather than sending big hordes. The map does the "close wait 30 seconds then open" bars for ambushes a little too heavy-handed, but it's ultimately too quick-playing to be bothersome. There's also a custom MIDI credited to Miguel Moura, "a Portuguese engineering student from Lisbon" followed by Miguel's email (don't you love those times when people actually did this without having to worry about spam, scams, or death threats?). I'm half-tempted to write to him because the MIDI is really nice and fits the map perfectly. Very short wad but I like those, and I enjoyed the visuals and the light gameplay.

Spoiler

 

 

Evil's Playground (Diabolique part two) (2001) by Pablo Dictter

Pablo Dictter was very prolific for a few years in the early 2000s, then his releases became more infrequent, then after a 12-year hiatus he just drove by and dropped a new wad earlier this year. This is one of his earliest releases, a 2-map replacement for E3 of Ultimate Doom, vanilla-compatible as far as I can tell. The first map is alright, the main progression is straightforward but while Pablo calls the secrets "great" I thought they were incredibly obscure and I'm not even sure one of them can be reached. There are also a couple of mean spots, like the crusher room with 2 switches: one does nothing, the other closes the door and softlocks you with no way out. The lighting in the map looks great though, especially for an author's early map, and I enjoyed the vanilla detailing in parts.

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E3M2 confused me a bit. The text seems to indicate that E3M1 is a sequel to this, so I guess this was included as a bonus? I couldn't find any mention to this having been released on its own before. Anyway it's basically a remake of Doom's E3M5, with some very recognizable architecture, some looks almost like a copy-paste. It's not my favourite map in the IWAD but at least this version is smaller and shorter, with fewer endless excursions on damaging floor.

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Pablo went on to make much better maps but it's an ok wad overall, both maps are pretty short.

[Endless]

The Cellar | Harri Myllylä | 1996

 

 

Small little piece from 1996. This single-level WAD brought some interesting surprises with its heavy use of gore and scenic narrative. The torture chambers are subtle and simplistic, yet in that modesty I find it to be quite creepy. It is actually rare for WADs to be really creepy or make use of gore. It either is too little, or too much and it becomes edge. The Cellar works quite well with its introductory room by giving you a silent room filled with corpses and crucified bodies. It does look a little rough around the edges, but the rest of the map is overall, really decent and fun, and easy to navigate, which is already a big plus.

 

TechTemple | Artemis Entreri | 1994

 

 

Had high hopes for this one due to the interesting title name, but it is quite unremarkable. Nothing interesting to note, it is pure shovelware crap checking all the typical shitty design choices boxes.

 

a lost 2005 oddity | @Walter confetti | 2005

 

 

Well this was interesting! Suppodsedly a lost level that was found but never finished. According to the .txt, Walter promised to finish it at some point, but what happened? I want it now! :P Anyway. There's not much to check out as the level is, technically, WIP, I think, but the layout is pretty cool and the custom graphics add some nice charm to it. It seems like it would work great as a DM map too.

Edited April 8, 2023 by Endless

[Roofi]

Year 2 Month 03 Day 10

 

I play until I die or intentionally stop. I don't comment the wad where I died/stopped.

 

[1] Beginner's First Speedmap (1 Hour) by @SuyaSS (2022)

 

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Speedmapping is cool! and I wanted to try it for some time but never had that much confidence until NOW!!

BEHOLD!!

3 ROOMS OF CONTENT (and only 2 with action.)

Story: No Story for the map but here is how the map came to be:



Well, the idea of speedmapping a map came when I was coming back from my coaching. I had the idea of a room in which you press a switch and tons of imps come behind you. Then, I planned to use Boom Format for the first time for actual mapping purposes.

 

Well, I couldn't expect more than 2 minutes of gaming from a first baby speedmap made in 1 hour. Your mission is to clean the several overpopulated rooms. I feared running out of ammo before getting rid of the whole army of imps but it appeared I had just all I needed ! The SSG room's is the most elaborate area of the map , with its star-shaped sector. However, I like to mention the detailed usage of brick texture in the dark first area.

 

Overall, of course this map is criminally unsubstantial but I enjoyed the intense fights which happened here.  Some of the latest monsters such as the chaingunners and the caged imps seem stuck though.

 

Keep it up !

 

Grade : C+

 

I stop here for today.

[SuyaSSS]

1 hour ago, Roofi said:

[1] Beginner's First Speedmap (1 Hour) by @SuyaSS (2022)

I hate that map :D. I made a big mistake of uploading it before getting all the suggestions from doomworld. So now, there are two versions of this map. One with fixes for stuck enemies which is available only on the doomworld post while the idgames version is actually the old version. 

 

I also made so many better maps after that (including better 1hour maps) and just hate this wad's existence.

[Roofi]

2 hours ago, SuyaSS said:

I hate that map :D. I made a big mistake of uploading it before getting all the suggestions from doomworld. So now, there are two versions of this map. One with fixes for stuck enemies which is available only on the doomworld post while the idgames version is actually the old version. 

 

I also made so many better maps after that (including better 1hour maps) and just hate this wad's existence.

 

There is no reason to hate your own map, except if it's a troll submission. Mapping is hard, finishing a speedmap is still a success. Your submission was perfectly playable.

[DrRock]

Motor Rail by I'm me (Boom, 2005) – Doom II

played in Zdoom 2.8.1 on Ultra-Violence

Spoiler

Based on a dream the author had, this map takes place on a bit of railway that goes through a house and ends with a sector-based train. It all has a cutesy look to it but unfortunately doesn't play well at all. You're given a plasma rifle, plenty of ammo and almost exclusively mid-tier monsters to chew through save for the occasional lost soul. The level geometry is very cramped in places and thus likely to soak up half your plasma projectiles while you hold down your fire trigger. There is a Commander Keen replacement, apparently being some sort of switch signal that may or may not activate something but my main concern was to barrel through this as fast as possible, so who knows. This was also advertised as needing a boom-compatible port that supports the jump feature but never once did I have to jump to finish this extremely linear map.

 

 

HELLMART by Jim Higgins & Paul Romiti (Vanilla, 1995) - Doom

played in Zdoom 2.8.1 on Ultra-Violence

Spoiler

And for another approximation of real-life sorta places. Much more down to earth this time around, as the two authors decided to recreate their work place. The main store area doesn't really read as such and the warehouse part of the building does so only marginally better. Funnily enough, the meat coolers are cold enough to be damaging. The recreation of the locale seems to have been the main focus here as there really isn't much going on for solid play experience. If you've ever played a substandard early 90s map you'll have an idea of what awaits here. Despite trying I couldn't even find an exit.

[Walter confetti]

11 hours ago, Endless said:

Suppodsedly a lost level that was found but never finished. According to the .txt, Walter promised to finish it at some point, but what happened?

Where you read that i never finished this map? My English is bad, but i can't see any kind of advice that this is unfinished!

It was UNFINISHED when i found it back in the day, but what you have is the complete product i did at the time. Also, the year is 2009, not 2005!

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A younger me wrote:

"i'll grab it and i'll fix some stuff, and i made it with dm gameplay"

Ah, now i get the misunderstanding you had, f**k me and my bad sense of English grammar! I meant "I've grabbed and fixed"!

 

If there's anything that is missing, a eventual re-remake of this wad it could happen... Thanks for playing my map btw! Glad you liked it!

This map also uses 320x200 "working" textures... I recall misalignment using boom compatible ports.

Edited April 8, 2023 by Walter confetti

[LadyMistDragon]

On 4/6/2023 at 10:05 PM, brick said:

B

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Sentinel (2014) by Memfis. For Doom II iwad and PrBoom+. Played with GZDoom.

This is a deceptively small map with an even more deceptively low enemy count, and it is hard. Typical for Memfis it is also stingy on ammo and very stingy on health, and has no difficulty balancing. The opening is pure Tyson against demons on a damaging floor, then hitscans and others join in. I restarted many many times before managing to survive with almost no health. The rest is more manageable but does rely quite a bit on foreknowledge, especially the red key ambush and the surprise archvile. These are the only two real fights and they're both very deadly. The finale is laughably easy, pitting you against a half dozen zombiemen that died to a single rocket before I claimed the exit. I liked the my previous Memfis wad a lot more but I think those who enjoy small-scale combat challenge a la early Hell Revealed will like this one.

 

 

 

I really liked Sentinel because it wasn't just another speedmappy thingy but felt a little innovative, thanks to the gladiator concept. Agree on the rough beginning though and it was an ugly map, for what that's worth.

 

 

Now for something I really don't have the time to relate many details on but thankfully, doesn't really need much layed out....

 

Ranhexn.wad (1996) by ^_RANMA_^ (GZDoom

 

3 map set for Hexen. Short and simple and with little of visual distinguishment. And I'm pretty sure the text file on /idgames (because this person of culture(Ranma!) forgot to include it) is a troll because the shaking damage is likely to kill a mage, though that is a combat advantage. On the other hand, it's nice to see someone experimenting with scripting and doing a solid job, other than dialogue going by too quickly, but not very often. Stalkers still suck and while Korax is more of a ridiculous mustache twirler, he somehow feels quite colorless indeed regardless. Not even sure Korax is actually fought (that dragon thing at the end of Map 02 doesn't look familiar but I've also never finished Hexen) and the sorts of little details like mugs are oddly absent. Still, the only serious problem is waiting for scripts to conclude before progress becomes possible. Then the 4th map is a little combatless thing where you go to sleep, while the last map is a deathmatch-only thing that would actually be good if it wasn't so bloody overscaled. I suspect the chance of finding the Hexen equivalent of LEDGES.WAD or DWANGO is quite low at best when it's highly doubtful there's anyone still around who played Heretic and Hexen DM and has more than 1 or 2 memories of it. 5/10

 

 

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Edited April 9, 2023 by LadyMistDragon

[Walter confetti]

real men uses doombuilder by ravage - boom compatible ports, Doom 2, SP, 2006, played with Eternity "forseti" 4.0.2 and Plutonia

Spoiler

A jokewad of sorts with broken(?) WFALL textures (they aren't uploaded to the main wad, due to this I've used plutonia for make them work) that have a mixture of knee-deep in the visual style, Plutonia in gameplay style and 1994 user maps in layout format. Or that obnoxious map called "Letters of Doom" from the Vinesauce WAD Contest, you know that? I mean, that trope in mapping pretty known in early years of mapping to use authors name or some other type of phrase shaping the map layout, right? You can have a idea of this taking a look at the spoiled screenshots, anyway this is a pretty challenging map with some pretty interesting geometry and some nice looking lighting details all around the station, there's some misalignments here and there but overall it was a quite enjoyable experience.

 

FURDEMON by @URROVA - GZDoom, Doom 2, SP; 2020, played with GZDoom 4.10.0

Spoiler

 

Another funny quest by a newcomer from the community, this small mapset is a continuous hub adventure sets in a techbase \ alien world sorts of place, where the doomguy over fighting the usual forces of hell, fights as well a cartoonish cat furry creature born from modified from original demons by some machinery enchantments. Two cat bosses are included as well, and their health system is done by changing their names to some mockery like "an asshole" and "idiot cat". The levels, despite their first map look are cool and includes some pretty neat GZDoom trickery and some good design, especially in the portals design. Reminded me a lot of those wacky 90s partial conversions personally, with a addition of some Terrywad tropes for good measure (especially picking up a SOMEMONG in a secret alcove and the ear rape sound attack of the Furleader, beautiful). Overall, it was another pleasant experience for tonight!

 

Rage_11.WAD by David Rager - Vanilla Doom, SP, 1997, played with Eternity "forseti" 4.0.2

Spoiler

 

A small and nice looking wad that is the first of a (completed?) series of a episode sets in this small techbase textured like it's in episode 2 but it's located in E1M1. Nothing else to say over than it's pretty basic, fluid and fun. I don't get the exit sector tagged as secret, but ok. A good introduction map, i really hope this episode and this author goes somewhere with this.

[LadyMistDragon]

Soft Choice "Goes to Hell" (1994) by Christian Antkow (Eternity)

 

God, this is beyond unoriginal. Like, this combo of wooden floor with marble temple was so ubitiqous, it might as well self-parody. But this was released in the first 6weeks of DEU's release, so perhaps the impossible doors can be excused. Still, there's plenty of misalignments, rooms with flashing lights for basically no reason at all, with the only good thing being the spectre that confronted me shortly after starting. Is there an exit? I really couldn't give a fuck. At least ensure your Cyberdemon-containing warehouse has a decent amount of light, especially if you're immediately adjacent to an outdoor area 1/10

 

Spoiler

 

[Roofi]

8 hours ago, LadyMistDragon said:

Soft Choice "Goes to Hell" (1994) by Christian Antkow (Eternity)

 

 

Yes , I agree, I played this map a year ago and this map goes to hell indeed !

 

Year 2 Month 03 Day 11

 

I play until I die or intentionally stop. I don't comment the wad where I died/stopped.

 

[1] Fear is the Price of Sin by ReX Claussen @ReX (2006)

 

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base-styled map, requiring any limit-removing source port. [Tested on ZDooM and jDooM.]

 

This map replaces the eighth slot. Is it a hommage to the famous "Tricks and Traps"? Not exactly but I could recognize some common traits.

 

First of all, the map is anxiety-inducing. It suffices to shoot one bullet and you can hear the unfriendly grunts of your enemies behind the walls , and of course, some arch-viles' ones. Moreover, it has quite a lot of traps but the difficulty fortunately remains tame. In fact, Rex's map 08 was way easier and more organized than the IWAD map.

 

Secondly, You start in a hub but you have to recover a yellow key in order to unlock the different doors. Also, contrary to "Trick and Traps", there is no optional path. Every passage leads to a mandatory switch or teleporter which will contribute unlocking the exit.

 

While it's a limit-removing map, Fear is the Price of Sin has just a tad more details than the average Doom 2 map. I think the detailed light gradients , trims and borders mostly explain the vanilla incompatibility. Nevertheless, the use of stock textures is polished here and makes me appreciate the shades of grey and brown. I have a soft spot for the large outdoors surrounding the building which provide a nice feeling of liberty.

 

"Fear is the Price of Sin" is a tailor-made map if you want another classic experience.

 

Grade : A-

 

[2] Base32 by Caleb "Radromity" Sizemore @Radromity (2012)

 

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a small base style level

 

After visiting the several sections near the start, I thought Base32 will be a tribute to E1M1 where the most iconic sections are organized in order to build a new layout. Indeed, in order to reach the green armour on its pedestal, you no longer have to go up but down the stairs. Or another exemple, the outdoors areas are now greener and the toxic pool had been replaced by a small water pond.

 

However, Base32 also includes totally new sections. There is a for instance a crampy maze  which leads to a rocket launcher. Base 32 will occupy you for several minutes and Radromity incorporated some quirky designs. Despite the number of monsters being less than 100, you can blow up small armies with your RL, specially hordes of imps. Enemies tend to be grouped together and frankly, their placement is quite poor. There are a lot of imps standing behind windows begging to be killed. Anyway, I don't ask too much for a map of this magnitude.

 

I didn't know Radromity until now, so it's probably a first baby map and that one is pretty engaging. The level design is quite random but the inexistent difficulty helps to decompress.

 

PS : The elevator leading to the chaingun is glitchy. It lowers all the sectors of the maps. Fortunately, it doesn't softlock you.

 

Grade: C+

 

I stop here for today.

[LadyMistDragon]

Io Complex (2018) by SilentAvenger90 (GZDoom)

 

13 map set of largely short maps, featuring true vanilla Doomcute that's not merely rendered objects in a Doom space and used quite nicely in the context of a series of tech facilities. Storage facilities, little power generators, and sickbays are just a few of the locations that invite speculation on their function Combat is decent without being difficult and it's chock-full of custom monsters, one a red-haired 'zombie' that fires more rapid-fire gun, a gray Imp that takes 3 hits of a shotgun to dispose of and toward the end, a tank Cyberdemon and this rather metallic-looking Arch-vile. The weapons are also cool: a basic rifle that can shoot 3 bullets in a row, a full automatic modifier that causes it to shoot 10, a fully automatic shotgun, and souped-up versions of the other weapons too are also featured. Not too much else to say: it's quite remarkable again though that SilentAvenger was able to create such a vast array of these tech-type environments and keep a certain sense of realism without getting too overly detailed, like Espi perhaps. There are some weird texturing choices throughout thoughout though, and the difficulty curve doesn't really become noticeable until near the end. Still and easy 7.5/10

 

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[ICID]

 

UAC SECRET MILITARY BASE (1996) by Jonathan Rennie-McCormack

 

^{Play Settings}

^{Source Port: dsda-doom, complevel 3}

^{Difficulty: UV}

 

Per the text file, this is the first-time mapmaking effort of a ten-year-old, so I don't feel too motivated to make fun of it. Yes, it's a brown FULLBRIGHT maze with almost no height variation, a paltry 14 monsters, and invisible walls blocking the exit. But to be honest, I've played worse maps by adult mappers working with the full modern suite of modding tools. At least there's plenty of ammo and it's easy to figure out where to go.

 

Grade: 2/10

 

 

Guts and Glory (1996) by Ben Hollett

 

^{Play Settings}

^{Source Port: dsda-doom, complevel 2}

^{Difficulty: UV}

 

A towering achievement in awfulness and easily one of the worst things I've played for the ER/iWA. You do have to give the author some credit for the fact that each map (spread across seven individual WADs for maximum unpleasantness) is bad in a wholly unique way. MAP01 is a series of identical square rooms, MAP02 gives you four invuln spheres to deal with fewer than 20 enemies, MAP03 sort of throws teleporter traps into the mix (but is at least shaped like the NIN logo), MAP04 is a "shooting range" that lets you run straight to the exit without fighting a single monster, MAP05 puts you against a couple dozen chaingunners with no ammo or cover, MAP06 leaves your ability to pick up an essential key in the hands of a Spider Mastermind's RNG, and MAP07 is just a hole full of arch-viles, like that one DOOM 64 secret level except with no sense of humor. I legitimately had more fun with last week's Terry trap.

 

Grade: 1/10

 

 

A really really really big hole full of monsters (2001) by Busted Corpse

 

^{Play Settings}

^{Source Port: dsda-doom, complevel 2}

^{Difficulty: UV}

 

This is what you call "truth in advertising" I guess. If you go through my post history on this site (please don't) you'll see me mounting the occasional spirited defense of infinite height actors, a mechanic that I think (mostly accidentally) adds a lot to the original Doom and to WADs that know how to use it properly. This is the first WAD to truly make me hate it, as they make it almost impossible to actually fall into the pit without taking massive damage. Once you do (which is mostly a matter of RNG) you'll have to climb back up, plasma-ing anything that gets in your way and opening a couple key doors before you get to the exit which inexplicably contains a chaingun. No fun. Starting to feel like I need to apologize to my fellow adventurers for this truly abysmal lineup of maps.

 

Grade: 2/10

 

 

FURDEMON (2020) by URROVA

 

^{Play Settings}

^{Source Port: GZDoom}

^{Difficulty: UV}

 

A cutesy experiment from the early days of ZDoo- wait, 2020? Huh. Anyway, I have to admit that this is leaps and bounds beyond anything else I've played tonight, a clear labor of love where every encounter may not be good, but was obviously built with care and intent. This series of five lengthy maps is very aesthetically pleasing with lots of GZDoom trickery, original music, and a few basic-looking new monsters who are apparently dead set on turning the world into furries, one of whom appears to be the author's fursona. No judgment here.

 

I'd be lying if I said this all worked for me. The fur monsters are mostly annoying, the health is scarce, and there's way too much walking and swimming through poison for my taste. Leave that sorta mess in Doom Eternal. But I feel like I have to give it a good grade just for the sheer love of mapping on display. URROVA, I know you're active on Doomworld and you've been tagged into this thread, so if you're reading: this shows a ton of promise that's undeniable even to me as a known GZDoom hater. I hope you'll stick around the community and finish your new "Impscape" project. And the music is full-on great!

 

This is also where I have to admit something to you all. I usually consider myself a pretty good Doom player - I've UV-maxed Sunlust and NM100Sed most of the original games, for what that's worth for you. But I rarely bother to give these crappy random WADs my full attention, instead savescumming and, yes, occasionally cheating to blaze through and complete each map as quickly as possible. That's how I discovered that typing "resurrect" into the console while playing FURDEMON shows you this:

 

 

Before putting you in a trap room which kills you and then crashes GZDoom. It's a fair cop. I laughed.

 

Grade: 6/10

[Roofi]

Year 2 Month 03 Day 12

 

I play until I die or intentionally stop. I don't comment the wad where I died/stopped.

 

[1] No Remorse by Thomas 'Scorpius' Baden @Scorpius (2019)

 

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A small, simple map like Joshy's Caughtisle I created on Christmas Eve 2017. It serves a good challenge (or it did to me back then).

 

A dead-simple styled arena replacing map 07 for Plutonia. I'm usually not fond of traditionnal Map 07 but that one entertained me thanks to the slaughterish combats and easy-going gameplay. Indeed, Scorpius gifts you with the essential weaponry and a megasphere at the beginning of the map as well as two invulnerability spheres once you unlocked the access leading to the outer parts of the arena. And I can say , I had no remorse using them in order to devastate the small gang of arch-viles resurrecting the fresh corpses. 

 

Fun map. 

 

Grade : B

 

[2] rock and roll rebel radio against satan city by Walter "Daimon" Confalonieri @Walter confetti (2009)

 

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two 1024 maps, sets in a city\duke mod. First map as been inspired from some old sp duke map i played some tme ago...

 

Well, I stumbled on one of the early walter's works when his main preoccupation was to paste images of his favourite anime girls into his maps but you'll also meet many not-so-realistic women from Duke Nukem who are at least twice taller than Eternal Doom guy and probably as tall as a cyberdemon. Walter brings you a good dose of nostalgia with cheap Metallica midis and Duke Nukem textures.

 

While I spent a good time ogling at the different ladies standing in my way, I unfortunately can't say the same about the playing the maps themselves. Indeed, 

"rock and roll rebel radio against satan city" follows the 1024 concept which was trendy during the 2000's era. However, I find it extremly overrated nowadays since it often results to asphyxiating crampy layouts and ton of details which harm more the movements than actually please the eyes. Walter's two maps belong in this category. I really appreciate all the doomcute but navigating was a pain.

 

Moreover, Walter decided to be tight on resources. I almost died in the first map because the pistol was the only available weapon I had in my arsenal in front of an arch-vile... The second map was more enjoyable thanks to the berserk but the cyberdemon ruins it. I managed to find a way to cheese him. And worse of all, map 02 was broken when I played it. The red key didn't teleport as planned, so I had to use idclip in order to reach the exit.

 

Well, I like Walter's humor between the oversized women and the cheap metallica midi renditions but the gameplay prevented me to enjoy this wad. Way too crampy and stingy on resources.

 

Grade : D+

 

I stop here for today.

[LadyMistDragon]

HARRIS11.WAD (2000) by Lawrence Harrison (Crispy Doom)

 

While this map appears to have been last updated in 2000, it feels like a slightly-cleaned up '94 map at best. Doom 1? Check? Mandatory secrets? Check? Visual themes changing with seemingly no rhyme or reason? Check? But the thing is that it's a fine map if one is willing to accept '94 rules. I always admire the temerity of anyone who makes areas of maps in all bright red as if they're trying to damage players' eyes on purpose. All the same, this is proof that symmetry can be pleasing when a map is flawed in pretty much every other way. I like the altar structure separating the two area at the beginning. Exit placement is pretty bad admittedly, since it's in an area that you'd otherwise have no reason to go, but is the only remotely offensive thing about this inoffensive and easy map 5.5/10

 

 

Video below

 

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