I've been playing Duke 3D since it came out (I'm old!) and have been making maps off and on for years. I got back into things with the release of the World Tour, as well as the incredible Legacy Edition mod. That, along with seeing how far voxels have progressed in the community, got me thinking about updating some old maps so they look better with the new technology. One of the cool things the Legacy Edition did with Duke was to incorporate a lot of cut content. This immediately made me think of the two lost levels from the master himself, The Levelord: Sweeney and Sewer.
Playing the originals after so many years of video game level advancement made me disappointed, and made me realize why they had been cut. But I also realized that they still had some good bones in them. So as a challenge, I set about seeing if I could fix their issues, along with updating them for eDuke.
Sweeney: The Sewage Company
This map was the harder of the two to figure out. The map has a very "open world" design, which means the player can beat it in multiple ways. While a fun idea, once you know the fastest way to beat it, it makes the rest of the map pointless. The map suffers from throwing too many enemies at the player at once, rather than the waves of spawn that the final game utilizes. Lastly, and this is more of a nitpick, but the map uses a relatively small number of textures.
The changes I've made take advantage of eDuke, including adding lighting effects and adding more details (yay higher frame rates!).
Here's a link to a few more.
Sewer: The Sewers Below
Like Sweeney, this map had an open world play style which made it very easy to beat very quickly, as well as just throwing lots of enemies at the player. This map has seen more changes to it, though the core of the map is the same. While much has been done to create more structured routes through the level, you can still beat it in about a minute if you know how. More detail has been added as well. Both maps suffered from the early design principle of having Duke blow everything up as he walked by. Here, the areas of destruction have more focus, and trap the player in a more "fun" and creative way.
https://imgur.com/8a15cst
Link to the gallery.
Lastly, as inspired by the Legacy Edition, I wondered how these maps would have looked if they had been included in the original release. Looking at the notes from the .99 Beta, Sweeney would have come after the Bank level, followed by Sewers, which would have led to the Subway level.
The final levels of Episode 3 are arranged differently than what was in the beta build. I initially tried to have the player go from Sweeney to Sewer as two secret levels, but the way Duke 3D is hard coded makes this buggy. I instead decided to spread them out within the episode so that the player has more options for secret levels as they play through.
The .ZIP file includes two updated maps from Episode 3 that are only needed if you want to add Sweeney and Sewer into the game as secret levels.
Bank Roll
When you go to get the blue key, look down:
https://imgur.com/1eUSA1R
Use the steroids to fast jump across to the sign:
https://imgur.com/RhZ6r5Y
https://imgur.com/B7JE1um
Rabid Transit
When you go to get the red key, you'll see a part of the wall that has a slightly different texture.
https://imgur.com/gAQwEIc
Go back down the steps, and into the secret room with the babes. Hit this hidden switch here, then go back up the stairs:
https://imgur.com/K8fatuj
The part of the wall can now be opened, leading to the exit to Sewer:
https://imgur.com/MP8oId9
To incorporate both "Sewage Company" and "The Sewers Below" into Episode 3 copy the following code into your GAME.CON file:
Under Levels, add the following code at the end of the 3rd episode group (line 413):
definelevelname 2 11 sweeney_v2.map 04:40 02:59 SEWAGE COMPANY definelevelname 2 12 sewers_v2.map 05:15 01:09 THE SEWERS BELOW
For music, copy the following code over the entire music list for Episode 3 (line 456)
music 3 inhiding.ogg FATCMDR.ogg NAMES.ogg subway.ogg invader.ogg gotham.ogg 233c.ogg lordofla.ogg urban.ogg spook.ogg whomp.ogg layers.ogg stalker.ogg
To be clear, the maps work perfectly fine on their own. You only need the extra levels and code if you want to play them through the episode.
Attached File(s)
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sweeney-sewer_remix.zip (160.96K)
Number of downloads: 71