[Aleks]

I think it's a good time to start considering the next month's choice. I believe Taivo's maps to be thrown in the poll, FistMarine suggested Last Reaction & Waterbases. And I'd like to nominate Duke Hard myself. If anyone has other ideas, please feel free to submit them, I'll start a poll around Saturday or Sunday.

EDIT: Also, no video from me this month, I hope I can make one the next month. The microphone is being a dick with OBS, no matter which one I use.

[Sanek]

^How about Rob Wijkstra's retrospective? His maps is very colorful and bright, perfect match for mid-summer fun!

[Ninety-Six]

Acme Weapon Factory:
Difficulty - Come Get Some
Time - 17:30
Enemies - 79/79
Secrets - 2/2
Music - Space Storm
Port - eDuke32
Other - Darkus' GAME.CON fixes used

This was one I thought I hadn't played before, but as soon as it started I instantly recognized it as one of the maps in Jblade's fantastic Nuclear Showdown, in the Fallout Tour episode. As soon as I started playing I died almost instantly to a cheapbomb trap. good start


Actually, besides that, the combat was probably the best it's been so far. Even the gate control/commander encounter Alex warned me about wasn't actually that bad since at least there was room to dodge beyond the gate. Not a lot of room, but more than having the walls scraping both my shoulders at the very least. But yeah I enjoyed the combat quite a bit in this one. Bit more challenging in a good way, had better flow to it than his previous works... Fairly shotgun heavy (I'm starting to understand the Glavic linkage) but Duke's shotgun is pretty good so no complaints there. Besides, there was still room for the chaingun, RPG, pipes, and even the pistol to have a turn in the spotlight. I've been noticing that Pinxton doesn't seem to use the non-shareware weapons much; if they even do show up in the map it's fairly haphazardly placed and ammunition for them can be abundant or nonexistent. For this map in particular it was also interesting to notice that we didn't see any lizard troopers until well into the factory, but by then we'd already seen Pigs and Enforcers. It wasn't a problem since you are properly armed in the outdoor area, but it's still interesting to note.

About the only criticism I have for the gameplay is how dark it was at times. Made fighting or even navigation in those areas a bit of a pain. Not to any severe degree or anything, but could have used some brightening here and there.


Visually, I see Pinxton's affection for Blast Pit rearing its head once again. Another room that seemed to pay homage to that chapter, but a different one from Rocket (which this is apparently a sequel to, anyway). There was also the return of the transparent liquid containers from Research Facility. The highest praise I can probably give to the map's visuals is that it reminded me of the printing factory I used to work at, especially in the freight room with the offices looking over the factory floor.



Hazardous Chemicals:
Difficulty - Come Get Some
Time - 13:50
Enemies - 82/82
Secrets - 4/4
Music - Baked Goods
Port - eDuke32
Other - Darkus' GAME.CON fixes used

Despite the txt claiming this level was based on Doom's "Computer Station" (E1M7), the level only really starts like that. Besides the first room inside the factory proper and the slime pit, as the level progresses you see two rooms borrowed from Phobos Lab (E1M5), and then even some more Half-Life, with a room imitating an area from near the end of Apprehension, and a room near the start of the following chapter, Residue Processing.

Combat was good; not as good as MPweapon, but still among the better ones thus far. Also I'm not sure if it's an eduke clipping thing, but you can skip basically the entire level from the slime pit.

[Ninety-Six]

The Railway Station:
Difficulty - Come Get Some
Time - 12:42
Enemies - 82/82
Secrets - 3/3
Music - Gotham (my favorite song in the game)
Port - eDuke32
Other - Darkus' GAME.CON fixes used

This is another I played before, once definitely while beta testing Alien Armageddon, and I'm pretty sure another time as well.

So on the one hand I like the attempts to make the map more dynamic. More explosions and visual damage, making it feel more vanilla. On the other... this map didn't seem to be the most thoroughly tested. The very first water sector teleport isn't aligned properly, making it extremely easy to kill yourself. There's a medkit in an alcove in the bathroom that won't let you out if you decide to go in there. I remember reporting that softlock during the AA testing.

And even besides the bugs, there are things like the switch to call the elevator in the starting red room blends in way too hard with the wall.


I'm really not entirely sure how to feel about this map. The good parts are great but there are some critical failures that also drag the experience down. Probably the most mixed opinion I've had on any of these Pinxton maps.

 Aleks, on 14 July 2021 - 10:06 AM, said:

then typed DNDEBUG

I've not actually heard of this one. What does it do?



The Restless Resort:
Difficulty - Come Get Some
Time - 12:13
Enemies - 40/40
Secrets - 0/0
Music - Lemon Chillllllll
Port - eDuke32
Other - Darkus' GAME.CON fixes used

um

i

well

er



i dont think a map has ever blueballed me this much in history


sorry im a bit speechless at the moment. the only words i can think of right now are "that's it?!"


Let me try starting with the simple stuff. I think this is the first map from him that used Atomic assets, instead of just 1.3D. It was a nice change of pace. I liked the story and the buildup. The EDF base was very convincing, as was the island itself. I didn't really see any actual resort though. Just another EDF base.

The gameplay was a bit spicy but also kind of rough. I also wasn't a fan of the strict linearity of the map, with no room to explore for secrets or anything. The ending was also confusing as you're not really told that you have to return to the base and then go through the second teleporter that had been closed until then


And Pinxton's intense love affair with Half-Life's Blast Pit chapter continues, going far enough that you had to turn on oxygen and fuel to run a test fire to burn the alien in the middle. ...the alien that i guess was the sky god. just a sentry. that you don't even have to fight. it's the fearsome sky god that the story had been building up to, even with an ominous motion detector screen. and

and it's just a sentry


that you burn in a garbage fire why was it standing in the garbage fire

how was a single sentry a threat



what

[Aleks]

Gotta admit I enjoyed all your more thorough Half-Life analysis of these maps, Ninety-Six!

Quote

Also I'm not sure if it's an eduke clipping thing, but you can skip basically the entire level from the slime pit.

Don't think this has to do with EDuke, I thought it was just a simple missed skip by the author, although wouldn't put my money on it. The way from slime pit was quite obscure though, so I didn't really find the shortcut before finishing the map really

Quote

I've not actually heard of this one. What does it do?

It shows the gamevars on screen and saves the current state into the log file, but what is more important - it also creates a debug.map with the current state of the map saved, that means all the activation, cycling lights etc. It's very useful for testing more complex effects (or just regular Build jank that doesn't work as expected), as you can analyze the activated state of the effect more thoroughly than in game.

Quote

...the alien that i guess was the sky god. just a sentry. that you don't even have to fight. it's the fearsome sky god that the story had been building up to, even with an ominous motion detector screen. and

and it's just a sentry


that you burn in a garbage fire why was it standing in the garbage fire

how was a single sentry a threat

A Battlelord sentry is no match for Duke, but I believe he can easily deal with either a native islanders with not much hi-tech weapons or a science expedition. As for why was he standing in the garbage pit - maybe neither the Battlelord nor his followers realised what's its purpose and thought it's just the proper place for the god to stay, also it was quite well fortified. The bigger question would be, how did the tank get into a completely remote part of the beach and why did someone left it pointing its gun at the EDF base just like that?

[Ninety-Six]

Finished Crucial Conflict. Played it as an episode, not that it mattered too much. Gotta admit, I'm a bit underwhelmed...

Suspicious Storage:
Difficulty - Come Get Some
Time - 12:28
Enemies - 45/49 (last 4 enemies are all unreachable sharks)
Secrets - 0/0
Music - Baked Goods
Port - eDuke32
Other - Darkus' GAME.CON fixes used

First map didn't start off too well, for two main reasons. The first was the deliberate lack of ammo. I haven't complained about that this whole time because I use a lot of ammo conservation techniques, alongside being a completionist and an explorer, so I haven't usually been low on ammo. I was here, and that was by design. I'm not the biggest fan; this isn't a situation where you are absolutely 100% not meant to kill everything. You still can, it's just a slog. I don't like having to just skip over enemies...

The second reason was that literally half of this entire level is just Uplink. The Half-Life demo level. The freight yard is recreated completely accurately, and even the whole mission about aligning the dish to get a radio uplink is another callback to that chapter. There's even an area that recreates a small section of Opposing Force. I like Half-life just as much as the next guy (I've clearly played through it enough times to recognize all of these), but you can only get away with recreating so many areas before it stops being an homage.

It kinda makes him getting angry over Alejandro a bit hilarious in hindsight.


Waterworld:
Difficulty - Come Get Some
Time - 18:44
Enemies - 41/41
Secrets - 0/0
Music - Water World (obviously)
Port - eDuke32
Other - Darkus' GAME.CON fixes used

Played continuous, not that it mattered with how the level starts. The opening definitely didn't start off on a good foot. Got cheaped out twice. The first was the pipebomb being thrown at you in the vents (which is yet another sequence taken from Half-Life), which kills you if you don't expect it to explode which most probably wouldn't. The second time was on the next island, after getting the chaingun and the wall detonates behind you (in a very small room) and two pigs descend and start plugging your back full of buckshot.

It got better after that. The half-life textures illustrating the underground base was a nice change of pace.


Acupa Dylana:
Difficulty - Come Get Some
Time - 29:49
Enemies - 52/52
Secrets - 0/0
Music - Sneaky Snake
Port - eDuke32
Other - Darkus' GAME.CON fixes used

Well the good news is that the Half-Life aping stopped and there wasn't any real cheap traps. The bad news is that this was another anticlimax of an ending. Pinxten doesn't really seem to end things very well; a lot of his previous maps lacked any sort of finale as well. It was a bit more acceptable there, though. Here, as the final entry in this episode and apparently the final entry in his whole career... it gave me Restless Resort flashbacks (though at least you got to fight the battlelords this time). After building up the main villain (again), I was expecting a proper boss, even if it's just a Cycloid Emperor with a new name or something. Instead, just like with Restless Resort, the level just kinda...stops.


I've been noticing that my opinion on Pinxten's maps seems to be almost the complete opposite of the majority's here. I seem to like the least popular ones and have a more negative opinion on the more liked ones. Not that I hate any of them but still.





ADDENDUM: I decided to do a quick replay of Alejandro's EDF Secret Base level to weigh in on the controversy, now with Pinxten's work fresh in my mind and.... I really gotta be honest. I think Pinxten severely overreacted. There is really not much here that rips off his stuff. Some of the texturing choices are similar, sure. Using the Valdeez-2 textures for a half-aquatic base and the sector trees are quite similar.... but that's really about it, unless you want to argue the choice of sky texture too, which is kinda stretching it, imo. It's not like Alejandro rips off entire rooms like Pinxten did for Half-Life a dozen times. The closest thing to a Pinxten room is the part where you drop out of one of two shafts. That specific part is probably an homage but the rest of the room is wholly original.

On top of that, Alejandro does have his own distinct style, which is apparent when placed side-by-side. They both take cues from the vanilla levels and both enjoy their more cramped spaces, but I feel the two look different enough despite that.

Spoiler

I'm also of the opinion that Alejandro's levels are more refined in terms of gameplay. He also likes his shotgun combat but the flow of the levels are exquisite.

[High Treason]

Came out a bit long, but whatever, not changing it now:


MPCC1:
Not a fan of this style of gameplay, at all. I'm told the intention was to run away from monsters, but usually when I do this in a level, they tend to sneak up behind me, so that was never gonna happen. Visually it's a bit hit and miss also - while there's nothing particularly terrible that I can think of, I feel that most of the areas don't quite live up to what Maarten had shown he was capable of, a notion that I only lean on more so by how good the ending areas of the map generally looked.

MPCC2:
Quite a rocky start. Visually it's much more consistent than the first one, so can't really complain too much there. The custom art seems unnecessary, but at the time this would certainly have made the map seem like something of an occasion, I guess. Not very memorable, regardless, though it at least didn't annoy me anywhere near as much as the previous one.

MPCC3:
Thankfully this makes up for the mixed bag that was the previous two levels. Visually it's generally good, though again it probably didn't really need the custom art. The ending area is particularly nice to look at, but isn't really the best environment for fighting the blord. There are a couple of small annoyances along the way, primarily that Weiderslow elevator. I do like when the lore of the aliens is explored a little, too, so that appeals to me. Overall I did enjoy this one, so it was nice to see things ended on a high note and a bit of a shame Pinxten doesn't seem to have made any more levels.

[Aleks]

So, here's the voting for next month's choice - as before, please copy it and add a plus wherever you want to cast your vote:

Maps by Taivo Maripuu
Maps by Rob Wijkstra (Highwire)
Last Reaction & Waterbases TC
Duke Hard +

[Ninety-Six]

 Aleks, on 25 July 2021 - 11:07 AM, said:

Maps by Taivo Maripuu
Maps by Rob Wijkstra (Highwire) +
Last Reaction & Waterbases TC
Duke Hard +

Only because I played the other three fairly recently (in fact DH is part of my normal rotation).

[Sanek]

 Aleks, on 25 July 2021 - 11:07 AM, said:

Maps by Taivo Maripuu
Maps by Rob Wijkstra (Highwire)+
Last Reaction & Waterbases TC
Duke Hard

[jkas789]

 Aleks, on 25 July 2021 - 11:07 AM, said:

So, here's the voting for next month's choice - as before, please copy it and add a plus wherever you want to cast your vote:

Maps by Taivo Maripuu
Maps by Rob Wijkstra (Highwire)
Last Reaction & Waterbases TC
Duke Hard +

This one was hard, but I guess Duke Hard is well known enough in the community to be chosen as the follow up to Roch.

[quakis]

Despite voting for this one, I didn't get around to participating as I'm still working on my series of ROCH reviews :( Not going to cast a vote this time, but I'm hoping Duke Hard wins to give me time to catch up, haha. Happy enough with my review for DH I can just give it a chill replay instead.

[FistMarine]

MP Hydro
Finally got around playing this map and honestly it was ok, though very bland at times and not very interesting. There was decent amount of supplies and progression was mostly clear. There is a single RPG secret to be found in a vent and when diving underwater, there is a small sector that was very difficult to fit through (even in Duke3D 1.3D in DOSBox), at least when coming back with the yellow key collected, it took several tries and after quitting (don't worry, I saved!) and reading comments just to check what others said, I realized this might have been the problematic area mentioned previously that required cheats to get past. I keep trying and eventually Duke made it through, so it's definitely possible to make it through, just it takes more tries and I wish this part was tested more. I took a screenshot (the second one) with the problematic area, so I'm assuming that one was. Well I'm glad I didn't have to noclip since I really don't want to use any cheats!
Also I agree when comes to last part being disappointing, I also expected a big fight happening on Stadium, instead there were just 2 commanders. OK I wish I had an extra rocket (so I had to spend a bit of chaingun ammo to finish one off) as I used one earlier to kill a trooper in a water tube near beginning and another rocket I used to destroy those two tripmines (good thing I've seen them in time!) that somehow didn't get destroyed when I threw that pipebomb, don't know how it happened because the pipebomb was in front of them, I just took cover behind door and when I came back the tripmines were still there, so I had to shoot a rocket.
Then at end of level, there are simply two rocket shooters, all you have to do is grab card and run forward, then you get to the exit. A rocket's splash damage may have reached me from behind but it only did 5 damage, so that's ok, I think the explosion becomes weaker the further the rocket travels.
Overall, the map was just ok, nothing memorable and nothing special about it. I was expecting seeing a problematic water area at some point in level (maybe near end?) with glitchy sectors when submerging/surfacing but I think I might confuse with an old user map that I can't remember what was called and I played it many years ago. Anyone knows what it was called? Also what's up with the 1980 date of the map? It's the same thing with the first Aqua map that had a modified date of 1995 I think.

The Restless Resort
That was a pretty interesting map, although shorter than I expected. I was surprised by the design, it feels like the author has learned a lot since the older maps he designed. The design is a lot cleaner and more interesting. I also liked how there was an enforcer corpse with a chaingun located nearby, to add a bit more to story. Would have been funny if one of the first enforcers encountered dropped the chaingun (so I can get it a few seconds earlier) but that didn't happen (though one of the last enforcers did drop a chaingun, as seen in screenshots).
I found interesting that cave of death (or whatever was called) putting pressure on the player at first, getting locked with the wall closing behind but then finding out you can escape (and I also blew up those tripmines earlier, to not deal with them now) and get a devastator as reward. Shortly after fighting more monsters, you get to fight a pig cop tank AND get on an actual tank that you can use to blow up the garage door and progress through the level. That was fairly cool actually! Like in MP Hydro, I used my portable medkit just before finding a large medkit, oh well. It's not like the medkit is just to carry it in inventory but I always find annoying when I have to use my medkit when below 50% health and then shortly after you get to find a health pickup somewhere close, meaning if I had waited just a bit more, I would have made use of that pickup. But hey, at least I'm making good use of the medkit and in both cases I still had a bit of medkit left.
And then comes the cool/funny part with blowing up a Mini Battlelord. Activate Oxygen and Fuel and press on that switch (I just kicked it) and then the Mini Battlelord will explode! Then the map is done, as you are told through viewscreens that you can return to the base, where the second teleporter (locked before) is now open! Fun map! I also remember playing that part before (with the Mini Battlelord), it was part of one of the Community Build Projects which I hope we get around playing one day, as there's lots of community build projects released and even spinoffs like 1 hour CBP, 1.5 hour CBP, 2 hour CBP, Beach Community Project, etc. I hope to get a list of all the maps and suggest them for the next few months or something.

Crucial Conflict 1: Suspicious Storage
Now I remember why I didn't enjoy Crucial Conflict maps/episode back then (in 2012 or so) when I played them first time, even if I played them on Let's Rock back then, I always found them frustrating due to various reasons and lack of health, though I may have replayed in 2014 (maybe on CGS?) and still found them annoying. Well this time I'm doing them both individually and as an episode, in DOSBox on CGS skill! I just did the first map and it was ok but some parts felt a bit annoying and generic with those crates everywhere, had me almost killed at times but somehow I survived. The minefield from the MPRocket/MPKolp also returns and I think this one is a lot deadlier! However I found a safe location to just jump on those ledges and then you should make it to the door without any damage. It's too bad I couldn't access those health packs at that time as I kept trying to jump to reach them but I managed to get them later. Also crouching while on those ledges somehow made the game detect I was on the ground and made those mines explode without taking any damage. That was strange but I definitely remember from various maps that crouching on ledges somehow makes Duke touch the ground and still use the protective boots for example (if I was on top of acid), in this case it made Duke touch the ground and trigger the mines somehow.
On that circular area, I was hurting for health and a wall explodes next to me, I got down from 28 to 9 HP but thankfully still survived and the pig cop fell down in the tubes after I grabbed the medkit and killed the trooper. At least I was given a medkit for that (most likely to survive the fall, if that medkit wouldn't have existed, I don't think I would have survived the fall) and shortly after the platforming part, I was able to get most of my health back with the two medkits I've seen earlier, with an enforcer spawning that defends them. If you are wondering where does the early armor come from, I got it from a pig cop in the first crate area and it definitely helped a bit before I grabbed the actual armor, though I didn't like those sniper commanders because ammo was scarce and I killed them with whatever shotgun ammo I had left and pistol ammo (that was somewhat plentiful), I got even a rocket to the face (ouch!) while I was trying to aim up.
Then later at the map, you must make your way through this mess and you are then supposed to backtrack and open that locked door at the beginning. THEN you are given a portable medkit that you don't even need for this section (though it's much appreciated since most likely players will be low on health at this point) because if it was continuous playthrough (as part of the Crucial Conflict episode), then the next map would begin in a weaponless sector, right? As far as I remember from playing the maps years ago, you are better off using the medkit before starting the next map, so you have 100 health at least because you wouldn't want to have less than 100 health in these difficult maps.
Oh and finally, there's some sharks that can bite you through windows and are impossible to kill (even with the pipebombs as it was very difficult to throw them at window without picking them up and they most likely won't reach them), though I didn't have any missing kills in my version, I guess in 96's case, it's part of the fixed GAME.CON? Now that's interesting how fixing the kill counter can make some maps impossible to complete with all kills compared to the buggy vanilla behavior.

Soon I will do MPCC2 and MPCC3, which are the only remaining maps and set up with batch files that rename the art files and most likely will start the maps on Let's Rock skill setting due to the fact they don't specify skill level when map is loaded (just like running them from SETUP.EXE), so I might redo them on CGS with renaming the art files myself at a later time, before doing the whole trilogy as part of an episode and also give download links to the places where I downloaded every map from, since I didn't actually use Aleks' package from the opening post and I want to give links to the updated MPRail and MPCC episode which aren't included in the first post. Additionally, I didn't bother with changing the song playing in levels, so I just played with the default dethtoll music in every map so far, so let's hope when I play through the MPCC episode, I get to hear something else, whatever tracks Pinxten chose for the episode. Hope to do all of this before the end of the month.

Also regarding mprail missing kills, I just watched High Treason's video a while ago and it appears he got all the kills, probably as a result of using the Freezethrower on the same pig cop to get the extra shotgun ammo and used armors (the only enemy that drops stuff when frozen). I never realized that you can inflate the kill count with the freezethrower, I was under impression you get a kill for freezing an enemy but then after thawing, you get a new enemy to kill and it's probably one of the fixes that EDuke32 did a while back, like with the slimers eating live monsters correctly substracting a kill because I just realized in vanilla if a slimer eats an enemy, then that enemy DOESN'T add to kill count (just like if an enemy is hit by a moving train) because it is removed from the game. Now that explains why in World Tour I was missing an enemy in E2L6 in two different sessions, because they fixed slimer eggs adding extra kills behavior from vanilla but didn't fix the enemy getting eaten by slimer, so you end up with missing kills if a slimer decides to eat a live enemy, though it doesn't explain why I only had 38 kills instead of 41 in MPOrbit, perhaps I missed 3 enemies that were supposed to spawn somewhere but didn't spawn? I'm not sure what's the correct behavior in these cases but I'm tempted to experiment with a few different ports/versions in a test map and then note down every behavior I notice and post in a separate topic, that way we will know why in some levels we don't get all the kills! I'm also surprised that 96 got all kills in mprail, wonder if it's just the enemy not spawning inside mirror like it happened to me, Aleks and few others. This mystery should definitely be solved one day!

And once again, sorry it took forever to play this month's entries, didn't expect the entries to be so difficult to set up properly this month with different versions of same maps, duplicates and various other issues, otherwise I would have dumped them into same folder. Though I did have two different folders set up for each half of ROCH series, while in case of Pinxten's maps, it was surprising to see things weren't going to be as easy and I didn't want to have conflicts with the files or overwriting any of the maps which took a few days to plan, so let's hope the next month's entries will not be such a hassle to set up.

I will vote soon for the next entry (after I finish the two remaining maps) and since LR&WB is not going to win, I would rather mention Community Build Project series in its place or maybe just add separately as 5th option to vote. After all I think either Duke Hard or Highwire maps will win, so I must choose carefully the next month entries.

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[Aleks]

 FistMarine, on 27 July 2021 - 11:02 PM, said:

Also what's up with the 1980 date of the map? It's the same thing with the first Aqua map that had a modified date of 1995 I think.

I think in this case it's just an unintentional bug, but IIRC Fernando Marquez did that on purpose with some of his maps

Quote

The minefield from the MPRocket/MPKolp also returns and I think this one is a lot deadlier! However I found a safe location to just jump on those ledges and then you should make it to the door without any damage. It's too bad I couldn't access those health packs at that time as I kept trying to jump to reach them but I managed to get them later. Also crouching while on those ledges somehow made the game detect I was on the ground and made those mines explode without taking any damage. That was strange but I definitely remember from various maps that crouching on ledges somehow makes Duke touch the ground and still use the protective boots for example (if I was on top of acid), in this case it made Duke touch the ground and trigger the mines somehow.

Also jumping over the minefield might trigger the mines, at least it did in my case. In EDuke, touchplate behaviour was changed, so that if sprite is angled upwards, it should trigger only while stomping on the ground and downward should also trigger while jumping/flying over the sector, while in regular Duke they would always trigger. This is still not 100% correct now though, as also stomping on a sprite which is located above ground seems to trigger touchplates pointing upwards.

Quote

Oh and finally, there's some sharks that can bite you through windows and are impossible to kill (even with the pipebombs as it was very difficult to throw them at window without picking them up and they most likely won't reach them), though I didn't have any missing kills in my version, I guess in 96's case, it's part of the fixed GAME.CON? Now that's interesting how fixing the kill counter can make some maps impossible to complete with all kills compared to the buggy vanilla behavior.

Sharks are normally not added to the total count of enemies, but they are added to kill count when killed, so this could also be effectively used to "cheat" the counter and get 100% kills while sparing some regular enemies actually.

Quote

Also regarding mprail missing kills, I just watched High Treason's video a while ago and it appears he got all the kills, probably as a result of using the Freezethrower on the same pig cop to get the extra shotgun ammo and used armors (the only enemy that drops stuff when frozen). I never realized that you can inflate the kill count with the freezethrower, I was under impression you get a kill for freezing an enemy but then after thawing, you get a new enemy to kill and it's probably one of the fixes that EDuke32 did a while back, like with the slimers eating live monsters correctly substracting a kill because I just realized in vanilla if a slimer eats an enemy, then that enemy DOESN'T add to kill count (just like if an enemy is hit by a moving train) because it is removed from the game.

Hah, had no idea just freezing an enemy would add a kill (although I knew about pig cops dropping stuff when frozen). Same with trains, I thought it worked the same way as squishing.

Quote

Now that explains why in World Tour I was missing an enemy in E2L6 in two different sessions, because they fixed slimer eggs adding extra kills behavior from vanilla but didn't fix the enemy getting eaten by slimer, so you end up with missing kills if a slimer decides to eat a live enemy, though it doesn't explain why I only had 38 kills instead of 41 in MPOrbit, perhaps I missed 3 enemies that were supposed to spawn somewhere but didn't spawn?

There's a bunch of alive slimers hidden in a dark vent you need a jetpack to get to in MPOrbit, it's not marked as secret, there's RPG ammo or something also, so this might be it.

[FistMarine]

Quote

I think in this case it's just an unintentional bug, but IIRC Fernando Marquez did that on purpose with some of his maps

Ah yes, I remember that as well! But in this case I was referring to these two very old maps, before Fernando Marquez released the FMX series and messed with the dates of the files. I seem to remember there was a discussion over the AMC web forums over Mikko criticizing Fernando and I think I remember the modified dates being mentioned as well. Would like to talk to Fernando again, as I talked to him last year on this forum when he came back and released FM4X. I'm curious when we get to play FMX series for the club, as they also had several releases and released separately in multiple places, will take a while to sort out and play through every version.

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Also jumping over the minefield might trigger the mines, at least it did in my case. In EDuke, touchplate behaviour was changed, so that if sprite is angled upwards, it should trigger only while stomping on the ground and downward should also trigger while jumping/flying over the sector, while in regular Duke they would always trigger. This is still not 100% correct now though, as also stomping on a sprite which is located above ground seems to trigger touchplates pointing upwards.

Hmm, I see. It seems a bit complicated but regardless of which is the correct behavior, the map is still pretty difficult and it's recommended to save often. I'm surprised I didn't step on any of the mines, though I haven't tried to go back from the end of level (before dropping down) to see if there were any leftover mines.

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Sharks are normally not added to the total count of enemies, but they are added to kill count when killed, so this could also be effectively used to "cheat" the counter and get 100% kills while sparing some regular enemies actually.

Yeah, I know that. I think I may have gotten all kills normally, so there was no reason to try to kill any sharks, I only wanted to see if I could kill them (as I usually kill them in general, also in 1.3D they are slightly smaller and harder to hit) but can't tell if I killed any or not since it's pretty much impossible to tell in this case. But in 96's case due to using the fixed GAME.CON by Darkus, this meant that sharks count as actual enemies and he couldn't get all kills this way. Still doesn't explain how he managed to get all kills in MPRail, would like an explanation and how to get all kills without those troopers getting stuck in mirror.

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Hah, had no idea just freezing an enemy would add a kill (although I knew about pig cops dropping stuff when frozen). Same with trains, I thought it worked the same way as squishing.

I didn't know that either, I was used to EDuke32 behavior where I could notice on my own (as I always have level stats enabled in source ports) when comes to freezing and slimer behavior, it seems it has been fixed in both cases, though in the trains' cases, I think the monsters still count as removed from game without adding to kills. Recently when watching High Treason's video of MPRail, it seems you can freeze same enemy to add to extra kills and "cheat" the game like you mentioned with sharks. However I had no idea about that so I guess I could try. Or maybe he was lucky that the troopers didn't get stuck inside mirrors, who knows? All I saw was 0 missing kills at end of level, while I couldn't in any of attempts get all kills, I would miss at least 1 to 3 enemies! I guess I should replay MPRail until I get it right.

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There's a bunch of alive slimers hidden in a dark vent you need a jetpack to get to in MPOrbit, it's not marked as secret, there's RPG ammo or something also, so this might be it.

I already knew about that and mentioned previously that I initially had 5 missing kills but then I found that hidden vent with the 5 slimers and RPG, so then I got all kills. I was just wondering what's with the difference of 3 kills, why I couldn't get 41 kills too? I'm sure I missed a touchplate (or switch or whatever) somewhere that spawns the 3 monsters but since they weren't spawned, game considers I got all kills. I will take a look later today since I still have my folders and saves, I just want to do MPCC2 & MPCC3 first (and then the MPCC episode).

[Ninety-Six]

 FistMarine, on 28 July 2021 - 02:52 AM, said:

But in 96's case due to using the fixed GAME.CON by Darkus, this meant that sharks count as actual enemies and he couldn't get all kills this way. Still doesn't explain how he managed to get all kills in MPRail, would like an explanation and how to get all kills without those troopers getting stuck in mirror.

Yes, the sharks are added to the total kill count in the fix, to prevent them from being cheated. The kill counter fix is actually probably the single best fix of the whole package (and was what Darkus originally set out to do anyway), as it's accurate about the actual monster and kill counts.


As for all kills in MPRail, I didn't really have any trouble...? The troopers never got stuck in the mirror for me. Not sure if it's just dumb luck or if the fixes came to the rescue again.

[Morpheus Kitami]

Both of these are on Let's Rock
MPPower:
The opening pack of pipe bombs are a bit awkwardly placed. There's a barrel quasi-blocking them. I didn't get them until after killing the pig cop and taking a look around. I also wasn't so sure how to get past a bunch of crates near the start, until I discovered I could crouch through them. Is this an Eduke thing or was that always intentional?
I really like this level's use of verticality. Its just so cool to be able to sneak attack some dudes waiting for you through a door, only to shoot them from below. You get that opportunity a lot in this level. While I didn't like the drones in the power plant portion, I did still like the use of verticality otherwise. The bit where there's a rocket launcher in lava I didn't care for, mostly thanks to it being awkward jumping back onto the railway.
The part with the monsters hiding behind sandbags on this level is giving me flashbacks to the opening level in WWII GI. God, how I hate that level. Thankfully, in this game you don't has infinitely spawning "allies" shooting you in the back. Still, this part marks a marked downturn in the level's quality. This last area feels weird and tacked on. I went through this level twice, and the first time I skipped the central building and went straight into a blocked off pit, thinking it a side area, only to discover it was the end. The second time, I enter the building, go up some stairs and promptly get annihilated by the floating rocket dudes who spawn in. While most of the enemies teleporting in were covering old ground I wasn't exploring anymore, and were also alien soldiers, this felt like the author very subtly saying "fuck you" at me for some reason.

MPRocket:
This level's got one tight opening section. Lots of combat in tight places without a lot of health or weapons. Died quite a few times in this section. I found this unusual change of pace from most levels (where ammo is never a problem) to be very appealing. Although this chain of events was extended thanks to not realizing you had to jump into the lake from the cliff. That caused me to be very economical with explosives and had to abuse the pistol against a few enemies I didn't want to use it on. I think I had very limited explosives against the floating rocket dudes. (sorry, don't know the names off-hand)
After that, it dives a bit in quality. The slime pit felt like it should have been a setpiece, but only became a nice bit of scenery, and the rocket itself was kind of lame.

[FistMarine]

 Ninety-Six, on 28 July 2021 - 11:06 AM, said:

Yes, the sharks are added to the total kill count in the fix, to prevent them from being cheated. The kill counter fix is actually probably the single best fix of the whole package (and was what Darkus originally set out to do anyway), as it's accurate about the actual monster and kill counts.

As for all kills in MPRail, I didn't really have any trouble...? The troopers never got stuck in the mirror for me. Not sure if it's just dumb luck or if the fixes came to the rescue again.

Would like to see this fixed GAME.CON in a future re-release of Duke3D (if there will be another one) as part of one of the enhancements because Duke3D desperately needs a good official remaster (with fixes, etc) after the previous disappointing Megaton and World Tour. I know EDuke32 and RedNukem sort of fill that role but it doesn't hurt to have an official release. Maybe if we get lucky one day. Oh wait, wrong topic to talk about that...

Regarding MPRail, I will give a couple more tries later today or tomorrow to see if I can get all the kills without the troopers teleporting inside mirror. To me it might seem that since you used a more recent EDuke32 build with the fixed clipping changes, maybe the troopers simply didn't get stuck inside mirror and you were able to get all the kills normally.

Anyway, time to wrap up the Crucial Conflict series but before that, let me quickly say that the batch files will make a copy of the art file (mpart.art for mpcc2, mpcc3.art for mpcc3) and rename it to TILES014.ART, then it starts the map on let's rock skill. After that I quit game (it fails to delete the art file created) and then I was able to start the map on CGS skill (like I usually do with every user map) with the command line parameters: DUKE3D.EXE -MAP MPCC2.MAP /S3

The process for starting MPCC3 is the same, except it first requires deleting the TILES014.ART file so that the new one can be created the same way or else the previous one remains and vice versa if you plan to replay the previous map. That way I made sure there was no art conflict in same directory and the maps were done on CGS skill. Not that it mattered since there don't seem to be skill settings implemented after I took a look in mapster, the monsters don't have skill settings assigned to them, which means the maps will feel the same no matter what skill. Meaning they are HARD! Also I know I could just rename the art files myself but I wanted to see how are the batch files handling the situation. I would still recommend grabbing the episode release below and other links I will be posting but for now, enjoy my thoughts about the maps:

Crucial Conflict 2: Waterworld
I will be honest and say that I didn't enjoy the beginning part of the map because it starts you weaponless (even hurt a bit with 97 HP, though if you die and restart level, it then starts you with 92 HP!) and there are two pig cops that randomly spawn in the water part at the beginning and yes I will admit I died 3 times in this map (the only map I managed to die), you will see shortly why. Had to kick them (thankfully the first one dropped an used armor, funny how it kept happening in these CC maps) and then kick an octabrain behind creates which saved me ammo for later. Tried kicking those two pig cops through crates and I simply couldn't kick them no matter in what position I was. Also the second pig cop that spawned outside killed me at same time I killed him by kicking, so I reloaded my save, killed him with surviving this time, got a shotgun with 2 shells, saved and then I got stuck as I couldn't figure out what to do! I then got up there blocked by invisible walls trying to get on the island and got shot by troopers until my health was 9. I was out of ammo (except those pipebombs that I couldn't find the stupid tiny crack to progress and wasn't sure on what to use them) and decided to kick the fire hydrant and kill myself (I did this one on purpose) and after reloading and checking everything, LATER I noticed the crack in pipe. I save, explode the crack and try crawling through these stupid vents until a pipebomb spawns in my face (thinking maybe it is for blowing up another crack) and THEN a bullshit explosion trap kills me without any warning! WTF? That was incredibly cheap but after knowing about that stupid trap, I reload my save game and try to trick it so the explosion doesn't get me while I run back to where I crawled in vent. I manage to avoid that trap and as reward, the pipebomb was there intact somehow (probably it didn't "see" me so it remained inactive and unaffected by explosion), so I picked it up. After that, progression was smooth and the design actually impressed me. I eventually find another shotgun + shells, as well as the pistol. I liked how I was supposed to activate the lighthouse and get enough light so the boat appears and I liked traveling to the island, it reminded me of the secret level in Grins of Divinity TC (which I didn't enjoy much but there were some good maps in that mod and I guess they got inspired by this map or something) which had a similar part with traveling with boat to another island.
Then I get there, clear those troopers and hiding pig cop and somehow I miss that door that leads to chaingun "secret" area (which in turn also meant I missed two pig cops that were supposed to spawn, even if I got all kills) and proceed further.
Besides some cramped areas with monsters that can easily take shots at you if you don't expect them (like pig cops around corners or a surprise commander), I manage to survive through all this mess and grab another armor pickup near end of level. Also that portable medkit (I wish it was given earlier) went unused since I ended up with 80 health at end of level. The only disappointing thing is I ended up missing the chaingun, I had 150 unused ammo for it. I replayed the second half of the map (by loading saved game) AFTER I finished MPCC3 and then I got 41 kills instead of the 39 you see in screenshot. And no there's no marked secrets in the map but I assume that the chaingun was meant to be one and the RPG secret stash was supposed to be another, in that mining area or whatever was supposed to be.

Crucial Conflict 3: Acupa Dylana
I will say that this was a much better balanced map, with you being given all the weapons you had in the previous level right at start (funny how I happened to miss chaingun first time around in previous level, yet there was story conflict in this case ) although the armor is strangely absent, so you must be careful for a while. You will notice you can go back to part of the previous map by taking the elevator and there is a very difficult to notice crack that you can blow up to get the atomic health, this being the first secret of the map (there are 4 secrets to find in this map), then go back to where you started the level. The first enemy you will meet is a commander and you must quickly take it out with your stronger weapons. I took some splash damage from a rocket but most of the damage was repaired by that medkit in the elevator mentioned previously. After that, you can get the second secret by pressing on those panels/computers, revealing extra shotgun ammo (and a large medkit)! Then there's two more secrets to find (devastator hidden behind a vent behind vending machine that can be pushed by finding and shooting a hidden button, as well as Freezethrower in the room with the spaceship).
I don't have much to say about this map other than the design and balance was much better this time around (especially with the two hidden atomic healths you can find, which I missed years ago when I played the map) and there are some cool bits like when you have to pick up a card (I always found cool in some user maps that you can pick up random objects that don't show up in inventory and place them at random places) and that Health-o-Matic near end of level that can spawn health. And that sequence with spaceship that leads to the alien planet complete with a minute of traveling, that was also cool. There are two mini battlelords and a few octabrains that spawn at end of level, I remember this battle being a pain in ass years ago, this time I did in first try but I took a lot of damage and barely survived. Kinda wish you were given a portable medkit earlier. I also liked the scrolling text at end and it teased a sequel that sadly didn't happen. Would have really liked to see what Pinxten would do later, since the Crucial Conflict maps were actually pretty good design wise (the first one being a bit generic at times) but I wish they were better balanced, it seems health was a bit scarce and armor pickups, as well as portable medkit, would often be given towards the end of the map, meaning if you don't get early used armor from pig cops (like it happened to me) and have bad luck with enemies hitting you, you will struggle to keep Duke alive. And there's no water fountains to help you this time around.

Overall, most maps by Maarten Pinxten were enjoyable and I don't think there was a bad map or a map I truly hated, there were some generic and uninteresting maps but there were also some really good ones that felt like early 2000s maps and I also like these kind of mission based maps where you are given a story from viewscreens and in some cases (like in the last crucial conflict map) it even contains an object you can pick it up and use it later, I always found this interesting and I'm not sure how it was achieved but I know it was often featured in many 2000s user maps, especially the ones focused heavily on story. Now I don't really care about stories in early FPS games but I thought that this is a neat touch in these user maps that come with story in text files and presented in game in viewscreens, makes it feel a bit more interesting to play through, knowing you have a real objective to complete and so on. If that makes sense, sorry for my limited English here but I am not sure how to exactly explain this part.

I guess I'm gonna vote for Highwire maps because I don't recall playing through them other than the Christmas themed map Driving Home For Christmas and while Christmas might not make sense during summer, the author has also made Tropical Alien Massacre and Sun Burn (the former is included as a map in the latter) and I think these would be fitting for the next month, as alternative to Duke Caribbean or something. I don't really feel like playing Duke Hard at the moment considering the episode is quite long and there are 4 versions available (which I want to do all of them) and they are made for different/specific EDuke32 builds and in those cases, if it ends up winning, I'm gonna prepare the EDuke32 builds r5498 (last December 2015 build), r5974 (last December 2016 build) and r7299 (last December 2018 build) to play Duke Hard versions 1.0/1.1, 1.2 and 1.2.1 respectively and then hope the mod doesn't break, otherwise I might be forced to cheat through. I never use cheats EXCEPT in these very rare cases, so let's hope there will not be any game breaking bugs in the chosen EDuke32 builds. I'm not gonna risk using latest EDuke32 build, especially since just 1-2 years ago someone reported Duke Hard being broken in latest EDuke32 build and Aleks already warned me about that, so I just use the latest build from the year the mod came out. Yes I know Duke Hard initially came out in summer 2014 but I find the EDuke32 2014 builds outdated and prefer using at least the December 2015 one which has the same modern menu/interface that I'm used to in EDuke32.

However if HighWire maps win, then I would suggest to pair them with Taivo's maps because I don't think there are too many maps created by Highwire and I feel like the next month should have at least 10-15 maps to play through, I mean if Duke Hard has like 17 or so maps to play through, why can't other entries also have a similar map count? Also another suggestion for the next month or September, would be the Community Build Project series (instead of LR&WB I suggested earlier), I think they are about 9 official entries and a couple various spinoffs like 1 Hour CBP, 1.5 Hour CBP, 2 Hour CBP, Beach Community Project and so on, which would be interesting to group them all for a month, as I know there's a few lesser known CBPs and they should all be played at least once. This would be a contender for September I guess.

Here is the current vote tally based off Aleks' table:

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Maps by Taivo Maripuu
Maps by Rob Wijkstra (Highwire) +++
Last Reaction & Waterbases TC
Duke Hard ++

I would suggest from now on, if we are going to vote for an entry, instead of copying same list and adding + next to it, we should do like at Doomworld megawad club, add +++ before the entry nominated and we should be able to vote up to 3 entries, so if I wanted I could vote for LR&WB, maps by Highwire and Taivo. And then in case of a tie between various entries, one of them gets randomly chosen by Aleks. I hope these rules take effect the next month, so there will be less confusion for voting.

Before I post the screenshots, I will post ALL the 4 download links/places where I got the MP maps from. This includes the second release of mprail and the mpcc maps as an episode, both of which were excluded from the archive included in first post.

https://www.gamers.o...uke3d/maps/k-o/ (MPRocket and MPRail old version)
https://www.gamers.o...d/dukeinc/maps/ (MPHydro)
https://dukeworld.co...rrent/maps/k-o/ (All the rest maps)
https://dukeworld.co...urrent/tc/mpcc/ (Crucial Conflict as an episode)

Also this time no overall stats about total time, how many enemies killed and secrets found in all the maps, individual stats can be seen in screenshots for end of each level.
Only 3 total deaths in MPCC2, as well as a death I won't count in that buggy mprail where I died once by submerging when I started the level.
I will play through MPCC episode soon and see if there's any difference to be found in the maps.

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[Ninety-Six]

 FistMarine, on 29 July 2021 - 12:48 AM, said:

To me it might seem that since you used a more recent EDuke32 build with the fixed clipping changes, maybe the troopers simply didn't get stuck inside mirror and you were able to get all the kills normally.

That's also true. I forgot about that.

[Aleks]

So, it seems Highwire/Rob Wijkstra's stuff won this time. He has released a total of 4 (or 5 - no idea about Sun Burn, as MSDN link is dead and it isn't listed anywhere else) SP maps and a couple of DM maps (including City Terror TC, which is dedicated for multiplayer), but I believe these are optional if anyone wants to roam a bit alone (and, in case of CT, kill some innocent bystanders).

FistMarine proposed to add some more maps to this month's pool, he suggested to add Taivo's stuff (that is 10 maps, 2 of which have 2 versions (Dogville and Babes Reloaded), 2 DM maps and some "collaborations" (Roch Island, Spiegul contest map). What you guys think about it? I will make the topic during the following week, but if someone's eager, then I guess you can already start with Highwire's stuff.

[Ninety-Six]

If we add another, I suggest someone who also has a somewhat smaller pool of maps. Tavio has enough to sustain an entire topic by himself, and could be a bit overwhelming against Highwire's.

[ck3D]

^ Then my first thought is maybe Fakir's maps would be a good match to accompany Highwire's; IIRC they used to work together on stuff a fair bit and, individually, they have a comparable number of releases under their belt.

[Aleks]

 ck3D, on 02 August 2021 - 01:54 AM, said:

^ Then my first thought is maybe Fakir's maps would be a good match to accompany Highwire's; IIRC they used to work together on stuff a fair bit and, individually, they have a comparable number of releases under their belt.

Was my thought as well, that Fakir would be a good counterpart for this month (Sewers and Strippers is their collaboration). How about it?

[FistMarine]

 Aleks, on 02 August 2021 - 03:02 AM, said:

Was my thought as well, that Fakir would be a good counterpart for this month (Sewers and Strippers is their collaboration). How about it?

I like the idea of pairing Highwire's maps with the Fakir's maps, it's far better than the suggestion earlier to pair with Taivo's maps, perhaps Taivo's maps can be left for the next month. Plus I also noticed that Sewers and Strippers is their collaboration map, so go ahead and host the topic with the works created by Fakir and Highwire. I sent you the download links for the authors' works in the PM. Let me know if I missed anything, a download link for one of releases or something.

[Ninety-Six]

Sounds good to me.

[aglavic]

Hi! Just a small statement haha
I was surprised to come to read a Duke3d forum after so long time and find that people is still wondering if I copied Mpcc maps or not

So... Did I copy any Mpcc map? No, in no way.
Did I get inspired? Surely! I really don't remember but who doesn't get inspired by things one likes? You don't need to be explicitly thinking in other map (or thing) when developing yours to end up with something which in some way looks similar.

I think it was my bad to take the complaints seriously while I shouldn't just have cared. (And that's really why Edfsb was temporarily removed from Msdn, I just really didn't want complaints from anyone while if the same thing happened to me nowadays I think I'd have taken a completely different position).

One doesn't make maps to be the best, the only, etc. Just to have fun and give something to the community to play.

Apart from all of that, nice to see there is still a Duke community and some big old names still unvealing new things

Greetings!
Alejandro

(Sorry for the off topic )

[Ninety-Six]

 aglavic, on 07 August 2021 - 07:15 PM, said:

(Sorry for the off topic )

Nah, it was a subject that was brought up a couple times in the thread, so your input is perfectly relevant, I think.

The only one who seems to think you copied was Pinxten himself. I even replayed the EDF Secret Base level with his maps fresh in mind and I didn't see anything that looked like a wholesale copy, to any degree. The closest I came to finding something were the two pipes right next to each other, and you drop from one of them. That was really about it, and the actual room that was in was not based on anything.

And I think it's stretching the term quite a bit to call the pipe drop a "copy." I mean Quake had an entire level based on that.

[Aleks]

 aglavic, on 07 August 2021 - 07:15 PM, said:

Hi! Just a small statement haha
I was surprised to come to read a Duke3d forum after so long time and find that people is still wondering if I copied Mpcc maps or not

So... Did I copy any Mpcc map? No, in no way.
Did I get inspired? Surely! I really don't remember but who doesn't get inspired by things one likes? You don't need to be explicitly thinking in other map (or thing) when developing yours to end up with something which in some way looks similar.

I think it was my bad to take the complaints seriously while I shouldn't just have cared. (And that's really why Edfsb was temporarily removed from Msdn, I just really didn't want complaints from anyone while if the same thing happened to me nowadays I think I'd have taken a completely different position).

One doesn't make maps to be the best, the only, etc. Just to have fun and give something to the community to play.

Apart from all of that, nice to see there is still a Duke community and some big old names still unvealing new things

Greetings!
Alejandro

(Sorry for the off topic )

Hah, good to see you're still lurking around here, Ale!

And people are bringing that back more as a nostalgia thing/peculiar stuff of how people behaved back in the day, same with Dogville/Roch. I completely agree about the part of getting inspired, even subconciously, by other people's work, but that's still pretty far from any kind of "copying". Of course taking a huge chunk of someone else's map and directly pasting it into one's own with minor changes would be a dick thing to do and people would condemn it, but maps looking similar to eachother during certain periods is pretty natural with how it all evolved really. Otherwise, Bob Averill would have to be really angry at basically everyone in early 2000's using his type of trimming corridors

[Merlijn]

Played 2 more MP maps, unfortunately didn't find the time to play his little episode.

MPorbit.

Interesting map, I kinda hated it during the first half but then the map managed to win me over and I ended up liking it.
It probably helps that I didn't choose the wrong path in the beginning (the one with the enforcer in it), which saved me from some needless frustration.

But yeah, the map felt awkward and cramped in the beginning. But then the layout started to make sense and I ended up enjoying the rest of the map.
Maarten manages to give his own spin to the space theme and it works quite well. Even though he puts pigs in space, which is usually a big nono.

MPresort

Still easily my favorite MP map, it's quite unique with its island/jungle setting and the little prologue in the EDF base just adds that bit of extra flavour to it.
I can see why some people are disappointed by the final 'battle', but I still think it's a cool nod to Blast Pit.

@Ale: cool to see you drop by! And you're right, nothing wrong with being inspired by others as long as it's not a direct copy.
BTW we also talked a bit about your Favela map, does that thing still exist?