[The Battlelord]

Does someone had the chance to play the exact same version of Hollywood Holocaust in this video? With all those posters and light effects? It looks so cool. (before someone think is OT, it is a Doom mod )

I know that it is the 31st map of "Hell on Earth starter pack" but it does not contain the exact same things.
In first place i tried the "Extermination Day" (even some older versions), as the title suggest, but no luck, looks like the map is no more there. (i gave a quick look by warping through each level)
Any hint about please?

[MrFlibble]

I feel the need to keep track of various Doom mods so posting this here.

[DisgustedGrunt]

"...and in his defeat entombed him in the cursed sarcophagus."

[MrFlibble]

Another Icarus video of a mod to keep an eye out for:

As far as I can tell, it already beats NAM both in the visual and features department.

[ReaperAA]

BTSX E1 is now available as an addon for the Doom console port. FInally a modern "Doom 2" megawad makes its way to an official release.


Twitter post

[Ninety-Six]

Every time I try playing a new (traditional) wad, I end up feeling like I want to never play a Doom wad ever again. Because pretty much every time I do, it ends up going to hell (pun not intended) because someone decided that being "cheap" was a good substitute for being difficult. And oftentimes it culminates in a level so obnoxiously frustrating that it ends up dragging the entire experience down, even if most or all levels previous were pretty good.

Every single infuriating time.

It's not that I don't like hard wads. I love a good challenge. Going Down is incredibly hard, for instance. But it is (for the most part), a fair challenge. I mean it could go to crap later since that one I have no shame in admitting it was a bit too spicy for me (stopped at MAP16), since minus one or two missteps (nothing can be perfect) it was a fair challenge. My continued life or immediate death depended pretty much entirely on me being able to execute. No trial and error bull. No running around like an idiot not knowing what I was supposed to do in the middle of a firefight I had no hope of winning otherwise.

What I absolutely cannot stand under any circumstances are kaizo traps, or being blindsided by hitscanners I can't see behind a fake wall, or fighting very tanky high-tier monsters in extremely tight spaces with chaingunners and shotgunners peppered in in the pitch-fucking dark or being faced with two identical switches, one of which progresses the level and the other kills me with a crusher, or literally dying three seconds after the level starts because some asshole decided to spawn chaingunners and explosive barrels behind me before I've even finished surveying the starting room and analyzing what other threats are in there. Just because you kill me doesn't make it hard. Real difficulty is earned with effort.

This is made worse by the fact that I try to play saveless, because I really hate savescumming. I even try to pistol start after a death (like Doom was originally designed to do). So trial and error? Yeah dying because of something I couldn't have hoped to avoid without psychic powers is one of the worst feelings I've gotten the "pleasure" of experiencing. And I've experienced it over, and over, and over, and over and over.

Sure I could cheat, but once you start cheating, you never really stop do you? And it doesn't feel rewarding to essentially skip a level because, at least to a challenge-seeker like myself, I'm not only bored out of my mind with no resistance against me, I'm also forced to witness the lost potential.

All I really want is to play through some solid firefights where success or failure depends solely on my ability to quickly come up with a plan of action and then to execute. Living on the edge, mind racing at a million miles an hour as I constantly analyze the changing situation and deciding what needs to be done... I might be the weird one, but when a death legitimately feels like my fault, I don't ever really get mad. I don't feel like I've just been punched in the face. When a death is my fault, I go over what happened in my head, and try to learn from the experience. Not in the sense of learning what the level is throwing at me (though that happens regardless), but simply learning how, with the knowledge I had at the time, what I did and what else I could have done better. What calls I made that might not have been the wisest, what areas I fumbled the execution.

But when I'm killed by something that is just the level dicking me over, then there's just nothing to learn. Nothing to improve on, other than "hey now you know this part of the level sucks." If death is necessary to progress, outside of sheer dumb luck, then it's just not fun.


I've alluded to this sort of thing in the past but I've never really gone into depth with my feelings on the matter (because it just happened again.) Considering how many of the levels I linked (as well as the plenty I haven't) were Cacoward winners and their authors were and are vaulted members of the community, it doesn't really seem like there is any stopping of this crap. If I remember right, some of the writers for the cacowards even admit that difficulty in doom wads is a "series of kaizo traps that must be memorized" but nobody seems to see this as a problem. Some of these are even being officially recognized by id themselves and being made available for everyone to play.

To be honest, I've wanted to drop out of the doom modding scene for years now, and the real actual truth of why I haven't is because of the music. That's literally the only reason I still keep trying (because I'm not someone who can just sit there and listen to music without doing anything).

[Morpheus Kitami]

Ninety-Six, on 04 July 2020 - 01:06 PM, said:

Every time I try playing a new (traditional) wad, I end up feeling like I want to never play a Doom wad ever again. Because pretty much every time I do, it ends up going to hell (pun not intended) because someone decided that being "cheap" was a good substitute for being difficult. And oftentimes it culminates in a level so obnoxiously frustrating that it ends up dragging the entire experience down, even if most or all levels previous were pretty good.

Out of curiosity, and subtle self-interest, have you given the Doomer Board Projects a shot? The last two Spaceballs 2 and Dead but Dreaming didn't seem to have anything you described down below. And judging by the way the projects are set up, it seems unlikely to me that the earlier ones have those issues. Of course, Dead but Dreaming is supposed to be played on Nightmare, which is another can of worms...

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What I absolutely cannot stand under any circumstances are kaizo traps,

You mean like fake exits? Kaizo trap, as I understand it, is a trap you have to dissolve before completing another goal. It came from Kaizo Mario killing you as complete the level, rendering your progress null and void. Someone pulling that in Doom doesn't have that same effect. Nitpicking on my part, sorry.

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or literally dying three seconds after the level starts because some asshole decided to spawn chaingunners and explosive barrels behind me before I've even finished surveying the starting room and analyzing what other threats are in there.

This is literally the worst thing any level designer can possibly do. Level starts are something sacred, you should never have an enemy be alert unless the player can't be attacked by them. Not Doom, but Catacomb Armageddon and Catacomb Apocalypse did this it heavily marred some otherwise good games.

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This is made worse by the fact that I try to play saveless, because I really hate savescumming. I even try to pistol start after a death (like Doom was originally designed to do). So trial and error? Yeah dying because of something I couldn't have hoped to avoid without psychic powers is one of the worst feelings I've gotten the "pleasure" of experiencing. And I've experienced it over, and over, and over, and over and over.

I can't help but feel 95% of wads screw over saveless runs. I'm not sure how many screw over pistol starts, but its got to be a ton.

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To be honest, I've wanted to drop out of the doom modding scene for years now, and the real actual truth of why I haven't is because of the music. That's literally the only reason I still keep trying (because I'm not someone who can just sit there and listen to music without doing anything).

Why not export the midis and insert them into a different game?

[Ninety-Six]

Morpheus Kitami, on 04 July 2020 - 07:49 PM, said:

Out of curiosity, and subtle self-interest, have you given the Doomer Board Projects a shot? The last two Spaceballs 2 and Dead but Dreaming didn't seem to have anything you described down below. And judging by the way the projects are set up, it seems unlikely to me that the earlier ones have those issues. Of course, Dead but Dreaming is supposed to be played on Nightmare, which is another can of worms...

I played the Fall of Civilization thing from a couple years ago, which was close enough. It was pretty decent (minus the last map which I can't judge because it lagged my game to hell). I've been debating it for a while but don't have much else to go on. I've become more and more averse to trying out unknown things over the years for what I think are understandable reasons.

Morpheus Kitami, on 04 July 2020 - 07:49 PM, said:

You mean like fake exits? Kaizo trap, as I understand it, is a trap you have to dissolve before completing another goal. It came from Kaizo Mario killing you as complete the level, rendering your progress null and void. Someone pulling that in Doom doesn't have that same effect. Nitpicking on my part, sorry.

To be honest, I was both taking the term as used in a quote by one of them, and also to refer to in-general any bullshit traps you can't avoid without dying to them first. I know the term refers to something specific in mario, (and "kaizo level" ironically doesn't mean a trap-filled level but more just the really difficult levels involving highly difficult tricks that exploit flaws in the engine).

Morpheus Kitami, on 04 July 2020 - 07:49 PM, said:

This is literally the worst thing any level designer can possibly do. Level starts are something sacred, you should never have an enemy be alert unless the player can't be attacked by them. Not Doom, but Catacomb Armageddon and Catacomb Apocalypse did this it heavily marred some otherwise good games.

I generally agree, but as long as they're far enough away to still give me time to analyze the situation, it isn't much worse than a nuisance.

Spawn them behind me, close by, and alert though? Then I see red.

Morpheus Kitami, on 04 July 2020 - 07:49 PM, said:

I can't help but feel 95% of wads screw over saveless runs. I'm not sure how many screw over pistol starts, but its got to be a ton.

I know the vast majority are balanced for pistol starts, but yeah they definitely do not care about saveless. I know one wad came out a few years ago that was notable for being saveless-friendly, just really hard. It was said to have inspired a small trend of other saveless-friendly wads but it seemed like it never gained much traction.

Morpheus Kitami, on 04 July 2020 - 07:49 PM, said:

Why not export the midis and insert them into a different game?

I've thought about that. But I'm limited to pretty much only other shooters from around the same time since most other games I can think of that support changing music around and support midi formats are them.

It's not necessarily a bad thing since I love these sorts of shooters; it's just a matter of being able to do so without having a remainder left (most of these being full 32-level megawads usually meaning 32 unique songs, plus the title, intermission, and results themes).

Though it will be a metric pain in the ass to do it that way (extract from wad, place in directory, rename either the files themselves to suit the new game or edit something like a con file to point ot them over the defaults). But I figure I will probably end up doing all that eventually. I can't imagine I'll be able to take much more of this before deciding doing all that setup is worth the effort over the alternative.

[MrFlibble]

Ninety-Six, on 04 July 2020 - 01:06 PM, said:

This is made worse by the fact that I try to play saveless, because I really hate savescumming. I even try to pistol start after a death (like Doom was originally designed to do). So trial and error? Yeah dying because of something I couldn't have hoped to avoid without psychic powers is one of the worst feelings I've gotten the "pleasure" of experiencing. And I've experienced it over, and over, and over, and over and over.

I'm with you on this, but as for the tendency of making such unfair difficulty situations being still there, I believe that some player probably like this style of game.

Personally I like the exploration part of FPS gameplay more than combat, and as I tried out many vanilla WADs (mostly for nostalgic reasons, not because I necessarily like them more), many put me off for a similar reason -- you seem to wander, sooner or later, into situations deliberately designed to punish the player as much as possible.

Generally, Doom map design (at least in the vanilla-style department) seem to lean heavily towards a scheme where you just walk from one room with monsters to another (with optional monster closets here and there). It is then just a matter of individual mapper's choice whether the player comes to each room equipped to handle the monsters or not, and whether the room design give the player some aid in overcoming the odds (like providing adequate cover).

[NNC]

Even the more modern maps/mapsets end up being samey and boring in the end. Ancient Aliens for example is literally just a few levels dragged into a megawad size with occasional change in palette and the constant rise of monster number. The gameplay and the core aesthetics become totally predictable by Map14-15. The same goes to the likes of BTSX, Eviternity, and not to mention the ""classic"" style wads which all feel like randomly generated rooms without any thoughts behind (DTWID series, Deathless, NEIS, Double Impact etc.) All of these became semi-slaughter by the end with non-stop harrassment from enemy waves after enemy waves, and pushing random buttons, getting random keys during progression. Long story short, they overstay their welcome and you're glad you finish them.

Funny how mappers advertise their projects with sexy large-scale screens from the outside, despite the level being played inside bland and samey areas all the time, so those screens are always irrelevant.

In short, the vast majority of them don't have the professional touch which separates the true classic from a pretender hackwork. So far, the best modern (limit removing, post-2000) wads I played were made by true level designers: Sigil of course by Romero with it's incredible visual narratives, beautiful aesthetics, varied (but coherent) gameplay elements and so on.... E1M4b and E1M8b for the same reason, they are the real DTWID levels.... Arcadia Demade by JP Lebreton (even with its issues it's a wonderfully memorable and atmospheric journey).... No Rest for the Living and Redemption of the Slain by The Castle and Squibbons (NRFTL really feels like Doom's variant of LA Meltdown with great sense of place and comfy bt challenging gameplay, while RoTS has a truly awesome blend of modern gameplay style with dynamic music and classic elements).

While I'm infamous here for being overly critical of Duke 3D mapping as well, but quite frankly the Duke community produced more interesting mapsets through the years, probably because the Mapster is much harder to use, the creators have to be more committed. Ion Fury is a good example as it was made by people who had no history in pro-level designing before, but ultimately ended up creating very strong levels (probably too strong considering IF failed in some other respects, like character design).

[Morpheus Kitami]

Ninety-Six, on 04 July 2020 - 09:20 PM, said:

I played the Fall of Civilization thing from a couple years ago, which was close enough. It was pretty decent (minus the last map which I can't judge because it lagged my game to hell). I've been debating it for a while but don't have much else to go on. I've become more and more averse to trying out unknown things over the years for what I think are understandable reasons.

I've heard that Dead but Dreaming is quite comfy on UV, but I'm not sure I can give you much else in favor of them. They're nice, but not mind-blowing. All the levels are designed to be finished in under 12 minutes though, which is why I thought of it.

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To be honest, I was both taking the term as used in a quote by one of them, and also to refer to in-general any bullshit traps you can't avoid without dying to them first. I know the term refers to something specific in mario, (and "kaizo level" ironically doesn't mean a trap-filled level but more just the really difficult levels involving highly difficult tricks that exploit flaws in the engine).

I think that's just trial and error.
I wasn't aware about the Kaizo level part. The only wad that describes that is some of the stuff in Mockery 2.

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I've thought about that. But I'm limited to pretty much only other shooters from around the same time since most other games I can think of that support changing music around and support midi formats are them.

Puzzle games from the time period and some strategy games, I guess.

As an aside I wasn't really aware of this problem. See, I'm usually loading up some weapon mod along with the mapsets, like Police Brutality or Final Doomer. Making me assume that the difficulty is in my weapon pack. Not an unreasonable assumption.

Now, the things you're saying and the things Watchtower is saying makes me think about my own Heretic-related project that I've been working on and off for a year now. Mostly off, I prefer working on RPG projects. Anyway, because its Heretic I can easily divide it up into multiple episodes with varying graphical experiences. First episode's a village, mostly outside levels, few inside. Second's a castle, almost all inside. Third's probably going to be a tower or something. Now I can't claim I'm particularly good at any of this yet, but I know enough to keep themes, looks and motifs consistent within an episode, not to mention unnecessarily large amounts of reoccurring symbols. At the fourth episode it goes off the rails and turns into some kind of Lovecraftian puzzle game. Which considering my experience will either be completely trash or fairly nice.
Which leads into a consideration, when I'm designing these levels I don't want the monsters to just be waiting for the player, I want traps. Lots of traps. I've probably already done something you hate, but something occurred to me on the second level. Reoccurring traps. First level, nothing. Second level, crystal vial with a ton of monsters, third level, oops, more monsters. Fourth level the player gets savvy to this and thinks I'm going to pull a double cross, but nope, trap motif goes throughout the entire episode. Bullshit the first time, waiting for the other shoe to drop the rest of the time. I don't like slaughterwads anymore than anyone else here is professing and I want to fall into the camp as little as possible. I'm sure I'll fall into the category of crap puzzle at one point or another.
Dunno why I wrote all this, possibly asking for more examples of crap to avoid, possibly feeling out potential beta testers. Its a mystery to even me.

[Danukem]

The Watchtower, on 05 July 2020 - 02:01 PM, said:

Ion Fury is a good example as it was made by people who had no history in pro-level designing before, but ultimately ended up creating very strong levels (probably too strong considering IF failed in some other respects, like character design).

They had more level design experience than many professionals have. There's nothing magical about "pro-level" mapping, it just means you tried to make money at it. I would argue that the level designers who have been making maps for Duke 3D since the early 2000s or before are on the average better level designers than most highly paid professionals. Modern game design doesn't even provide the necessary kind of experience to make good levels in most cases. There are exceptions, like what Akane Studios does with the Dishonored series, but for the most part modern level designers make pretty corridors with fake choices.

EDIT: btw that doesn't contradict a single thing you said, I just felt like ranting about that.

[Ninety-Six]

MrFlibble, on 05 July 2020 - 02:01 AM, said:

I'm with you on this, but as for the tendency of making such unfair difficulty situations being still there, I believe that some player probably like this style of game.

Some do, but nowhere near enough to account for the sheer saturation of trial and error level design that the doom community produces and lauds. I just think they legitimately don't know the difference between genuine difficulty and bullshit.

I could be biased from literally years of constant let-downs, but I don't see any evidence of such a distinction. It's really not much different from a child's first level editor project, where they try to make "the hardest level evur". They just look prettier.

The really sad thing is, I'm not 100% against T&E level design. But it takes a very skilled hand to make it work. When you kill the player from an unseen trap, you need to give them something out of it. The simplest example would be humor. Case in point, I Wanna Be The Guy if anyone remembers that old thing. It is an entirely T&E based game (albeit with some genuine challenge mixed in). In theory it should be garbage. And for a good few people, it definitely can be. However, I think what makes IWBTG work is that every bullshit kill is set up like a joke and a punchline.

This can be clearly seen within the first few screens of the game. You take the upper path and walk under some trees with apples in them, one falls down, crushes you, and not only do you die in one hit, but you explode into such a ludicrous amount of blood and body parts that fills the screen that you can't help but appreciate how over the top it is. On your next attempt, you bait the apple, and the next few, and start clibming the platforms that will take you over the trees and out of the screen.

And then one of the apples falls up and kills you. Once again, it is so absurd and was set up so beautifully that even as you get angry, you just can't help but laugh. And the entire rest of the game is like that. There are set ups and then the game subverts those same expectations in such a ridiculous fashion that it's funny as well as infuriating. No two kills are ever exactly the same.

The key takeaway is that the T&E in IWBTG still gives you something in return for killing you: humor. If it works for you or not is subjective, but there's at least an attempt. Something that I just can't see in most doom wads. They take their levels so seriously and seem to present them as such. Even if it isn't humor I don't see them trying to give the player anything in return for killing them. Fancy sector art really doesn't cut it, not only because it wears out its novelty after a while, but because it's pretty much entirely separate from the gameplay. It's not compensation for being killed cheaply.

MrFlibble, on 05 July 2020 - 02:01 AM, said:

Personally I like the exploration part of FPS gameplay more than combat, and as I tried out many vanilla WADs (mostly for nostalgic reasons, not because I necessarily like them more), many put me off for a similar reason -- you seem to wander, sooner or later, into situations deliberately designed to punish the player as much as possible.

The Watchtower, on 05 July 2020 - 02:01 PM, said:

Even the more modern maps/mapsets end up being samey and boring in the end.

Older and newer wads suffer from the same trial-and-error problem. Older ones I can call more forgivable due to the naivete of everyone being amateurs, but the moderns ones that have more experience (to the point of them arrogantly proclaiming themselves to be "professionals")? There's really no excuse. How pretty it looks or how nice the soundtrack is can't make up for the constant frustration.

The Watchtower, on 05 July 2020 - 02:01 PM, said:

Ancient Aliens for example is literally just a few levels dragged into a megawad size with occasional change in palette and the constant rise of monster number. The gameplay and the core aesthetics become totally predictable by Map14-15.

I'd say the gameplay became established all the way back in the first level. Where you are forced into a tiny alcove to open an essential path, with the cyberdemon turret launching rockets at you since the alcove is in clear view. You have no room to manuever and it's basically luck if he decides to fire on you while you're in there.

And then of course the map spawns in a zombieman for the sole sake of making you stay in that alcove longer to make it even more likely you die from a rocket.



I do not like Ancient Aliens. I really don't. It has one of the most wonderful aesthetics I've ever seen (I love neon), one of the greatest soundtracks to a wad I've ever heard, and the gameplay is some of the most miserable experiences in level design I've ever played.

Morpheus Kitami, on 05 July 2020 - 06:09 PM, said:

I've heard that Dead but Dreaming is quite comfy on UV, but I'm not sure I can give you much else in favor of them. They're nice, but not mind-blowing. All the levels are designed to be finished in under 12 minutes though, which is why I thought of it.

I actually decided to go and try the first of them last night (Monuments of Mars). Ares Compound, the third level? It was actually exactly the kind of level I was looking for. It was fast, it was intense, it was difficult and I spent the entire playtime in combat trying not to die, under fire from all angles. But it never felt like I was being dicked around nor did it feel like I was being cheaped out.

So good call on that. I'll probably check the rest out. Thanks.

Morpheus Kitami, on 05 July 2020 - 06:09 PM, said:

Dunno why I wrote all this, possibly asking for more examples of crap to avoid, possibly feeling out potential beta testers. Its a mystery to even me.

Well if you want a bullshit-detector, I can probably help. I will have to brush up on my Heretic, though. Haven't played it in years and I don't think I ever even beat the last two eps.

[Morpheus Kitami]

Ninety-Six, on 05 July 2020 - 06:49 PM, said:

The really sad thing is, I'm not 100% against T&E level design. But it takes a very skilled hand to make it work. When you kill the player from an unseen trap, you need to give them something out of it. The simplest example would be humor. Case in point, I Wanna Be The Guy if anyone remembers that old thing. It is an entirely T&E based game (albeit with some genuine challenge mixed in). In theory it should be garbage. And for a good few people, it definitely can be. However, I think what makes IWBTG work is that every bullshit kill is set up like a joke and a punchline.

Part of the reason IWBTG works and many games don't is that it designs itself around that bullshit. A lot of old NES games have bullshit designed to extend the length, and all those games are very limiting in terms of survivibility. They don't have lives and checkpoints are limited to each level usually. Silver Surfer on the NES, throws a million things at you, your hitbox is the size of a mountain, and everything kills you. What does IWBTG have? Unlimited lives, tiny hitbox, and frequent checkpoints. Each attempt takes less time, comparably.
Another old indie game also did this trick, Super Meat Boy. Every level is bullshit, but it only takes a minute to finish each one so who cares? It also used to be what people compared hard games to, before everything was the Dark Souls of X.

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The key takeaway is that the T&E in IWBTG still gives you something in return for killing you: humor. If it works for you or not is subjective, but there's at least an attempt. Something that I just can't see in most doom wads. They take their levels so seriously and seem to present them as such. Even if it isn't humor I don't see them trying to give the player anything in return for killing them. Fancy sector art really doesn't cut it, not only because it wears out its novelty after a while, but because it's pretty much entirely separate from the gameplay. It's not compensation for being killed cheaply.

So...what you're saying is you'd like an IWBTG-themed Doom wad. I better find a sound effect of a guy saying splat then.

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I do not like Ancient Aliens. I really don't. It has one of the most wonderful aesthetics I've ever seen (I love neon), one of the greatest soundtracks to a wad I've ever heard, and the gameplay is some of the most miserable experiences in level design I've ever played.

I liked the color themed secret level, but I can't remember much else of the wad beyond the pyramid. And the first level. That was just as bullshit as you mention. Curious, I can remember almost every FPS I've played, and a good chunk of Doom wads, but I completely blank on AA. There was more than one Ancient Egypt-themed level, right? Because I like Ancient Egypt and I can't remember any other levels.

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I actually decided to go and try the first of them last night (Monuments of Mars). Ares Compound, the third level? It was actually exactly the kind of level I was looking for. It was fast, it was intense, it was difficult and I spent the entire playtime in combat trying not to die, under fire from all angles. But it never felt like I was being dicked around nor did it feel like I was being cheaped out.

So good call on that. I'll probably check the rest out. Thanks.

I'm glad I could help.

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Well if you want a bullshit-detector, I can probably help. I will have to brush up on my Heretic, though. Haven't played it in years and I don't think I ever even beat the last two eps.

Little bit of advice for E5, try not to wand start some of the later levels. I love all of Heretic, but pistol starting some of those levels is not something I consider high on my list of things to do.

[Ninety-Six]

Morpheus Kitami, on 05 July 2020 - 07:30 PM, said:

So...what you're saying is you'd like an IWBTG-themed Doom wad. I better find a sound effect of a guy saying splat then.

To be honest? If someone can do it while sticking to the same tenets that made IWBTG work, then I'll be more than happy to play it.

At least then it will be wearing its intent on its sleeve.

Morpheus Kitami, on 05 July 2020 - 07:30 PM, said:

I liked the color themed secret level, but I can't remember much else of the wad beyond the pyramid. And the first level. That was just as bullshit as you mention. Curious, I can remember almost every FPS I've played, and a good chunk of Doom wads, but I completely blank on AA. There was more than one Ancient Egypt-themed level, right? Because I like Ancient Egypt and I can't remember any other levels.

The whole first episode was like a weird Egypt/Western/Aztec hybrid.

I remember every level in detail, despite any blandness purely out of how pissed off each of them made me.

Sad part is I went all the way to the first level of episode 3 before I finally decided I had had enough and it wasn't going to get any better. Sometimes my stubborn nature really works against me...

Morpheus Kitami, on 05 July 2020 - 07:30 PM, said:

Little bit of advice for E5, try not to wand start some of the later levels. I love all of Heretic, but pistol starting some of those levels is not something I consider high on my list of things to do.

I have heard some horror stories about both of the SotSR eps. I think I'll approach them like I do Thy Flesh Consumed and forego the "pistol/wand start on death" thing.

[ReaperAA]

The Watchtower, on 05 July 2020 - 02:01 PM, said:

The gameplay and the core aesthetics become totally predictable by Map14-15. The same goes to the likes of BTSX, Eviternity, and not to mention the ""classic"" style wads which all feel like randomly generated rooms without any thoughts behind (DTWID series, Deathless, NEIS, Double Impact etc.)

Sorry but this is completely objective. While AA and BTSX do get samey at times, the rest of the wads had plenty of variety to keep me interested till the end. And many other people had same thoughts as me.

The Watchtower, on 05 July 2020 - 02:01 PM, said:

All of these became semi-slaughter by the end with non-stop harrassment from enemy waves after enemy waves, and pushing random buttons, getting random keys during progression. Long story short, they overstay their welcome and you're glad you finish them.

From the examples that you mentioned, only Ancient Aliens qualifies as slaughter. None of the others are anywhere near slaughter. And even AA is nowhere near unfair if played on a below-UV difficulty.

The Watchtower, on 05 July 2020 - 02:01 PM, said:

In short, the vast majority of them don't have the professional touch which separates the true classic from a pretender hackwork.

Can you stop worshipping "official" mappers? There is nothing magical about being a professional vs being an amateur. Also most of the modern Doom community mappers actually have far more experience than what id developers had when they made Doom's levels.

The Watchtower, on 05 July 2020 - 02:01 PM, said:

So far, the best modern (limit removing, post-2000) wads I played were made by true level designers: Sigil of course by Romero with it's incredible visual narratives, beautiful aesthetics, varied (but coherent) gameplay elements and so on.... E1M4b and E1M8b for the same reason, they are the real DTWID levels.... Arcadia Demade by JP Lebreton (even with its issues it's a wonderfully memorable and atmospheric journey).... No Rest for the Living and Redemption of the Slain by The Castle and Squibbons (NRFTL really feels like Doom's variant of LA Meltdown with great sense of place and comfy bt challenging gameplay, while RoTS has a truly awesome blend of modern gameplay style with dynamic music and classic elements).

I personally found Sigil nothing more than an okay mapset, The only really memorable things in it were the.crusher maze in E5M4 and the cyberdemon maze in E5M6. The rest was pretty much just walking on thin/tight ledges while slowly picking off enemies. Regarding RotS, I haven't played it so I won't comment on that. Though, I will admit that NRFTL is a fantastic mapset.

The Watchtower, on 05 July 2020 - 02:01 PM, said:

but quite frankly the Duke community produced more interesting mapsets through the years

This is again completely objective. Both communities have different styles of mapsets. I personally prefer Doom community mapsets as I prefer more combat oriented maps over exploration/adventure type mapsets.

The Watchtower, on 05 July 2020 - 02:01 PM, said:

Ion Fury is a good example as it was made by people who had no history in pro-level designing before, but ultimately ended up creating very strong levels (probably too strong considering IF failed in some other respects, like character design).

Ion Fury has fantastic level design, but the levels of IF should not be compared to those of Doom engine games. IF's maps are focused on world-building with some combat-oriented set pieces sprinkled here and there, whereas Doom mapsets are mostly combat oriented with small amounts of world-building. They are just... different with different audiences.

[NNC]

Trooper Dan, on 05 July 2020 - 06:18 PM, said:

They had more level design experience than many professionals have. There's nothing magical about "pro-level" mapping, it just means you tried to make money at it. I would argue that the level designers who have been making maps for Duke 3D since the early 2000s or before are on the average better level designers than most highly paid professionals. Modern game design doesn't even provide the necessary kind of experience to make good levels in most cases. There are exceptions, like what Akane Studios does with the Dishonored series, but for the most part modern level designers make pretty corridors with fake choices.

EDIT: btw that doesn't contradict a single thing you said, I just felt like ranting about that.

I still think nobody came close to Allen Blum in terms of Duke 3D essence. His maps, even the 2016 ones have something that others don't. Build mapping is different though as you can go nuts with details, but Duke 3D assets weren't necessarily made for this type of design, that's why I'm glad the community produced Ion Fury. I agree with what you said though about modern gaming design. It's completely different and heavily relied on set pieces instead of creative layouts, geometry and gameplay.

[NNC]

The cyberdemon in AA level 1 was highly memorable and frustrating experience. IMHO Romero made a much better job in E5M5 with the two cyber turrets, it's much less trial and error and it gives you goosebumps without being treated unfairly.

[Ninety-Six]

ReaperAA, on 05 July 2020 - 09:55 PM, said:

From the examples that you mentioned, only Ancient Aliens qualifies as slaughter. None of the others are anywhere near slaughter. And even AA is nowhere near unfair if played on a below-UV difficulty.

In complete fairness, BTSX does get slaughtery near the end of both episodes (plus the secret levels).

As for AA being not-unfair on lower difficulties... that doesn't really justify it. If they could only think to make it harder by just being cheaper, that only highlights my point.

Though as I understand it, most wads, including AA, were developed for UV first, with the lower skills derived from it, so that is still a problem either way.

[ReaperAA]

The Watchtower, on 05 July 2020 - 10:53 PM, said:

The cyberdemon in AA level 1 was highly memorable and frustrating experience. IMHO Romero made a much better job in E5M5 with the two cyber turrets, it's much less trial and error and it gives you goosebumps without being treated unfairly.

You mean those 2 cyberdemons which are almost zero threat once you know what to do. Yup, definitely better than God-forbid an actual threat (not saying that the cyber demon in AA map 1 is great as that one can catch you in an unfair spot).

Also if that cyberdemon is too frustrating, then just play the wad on lower skill where it is replaced by a mancubus.

[Ninety-Six]

ReaperAA, on 05 July 2020 - 11:36 PM, said:

Also if that cyberdemon is too frustrating, then just play the wad on lower skill where it is replaced by a mancubus.

Only on the easiest skill. And quite frankly, it's insulting to have to lower the difficulty to get past what is essentially an explosive slot machine. That is not good design and it never should have been there in the first place. Higher difficulty should mean a higher difficulty, not "look at all these hundreds of thousands of beginners' traps and roulette wheels with guns."

[ReaperAA]

Ninety-Six, on 05 July 2020 - 11:23 PM, said:

In complete fairness, BTSX does get slaughtery near the end of both episodes (plus the secret levels).

As for AA being not-unfair on lower difficulties... that doesn't really justify it. If they could only think to make it harder by just being cheaper, that only highlights my point.

Though as I understand it, most wads, including AA, were developed for UV first, with the lower skills derived from it, so that is still a problem either way.

I haven't completed BTSX E2 so I won't comment on it. But in BTSX E1, the only 2 maps that are slaughter are map 19 and the very last map. And even those are only semi/proto-slaughters.

And regarding the difficulty question, most modern Wads are designed and well tested on the 3 major difficulties (HNTR, HMP and UV). Also in case of AA, many of the guest mappers actually played and designed their maps for lower skills first (Esselfortium I think is one of those).

[Ninety-Six]

ReaperAA, on 05 July 2020 - 11:48 PM, said:

And regarding the difficulty question, most modern Wads are designed and well tested on the 3 major difficulties (HNTR, HMP and UV). Also in case of AA, many of the guest mappers actually played and designed their maps for lower skills first (Esselfortium I think is one of those).

Even so, it doesn't change that the only way they thought they could make their levels harder is to make them cheaper. As I said, either way it's a problem. They either started off with cheap tactics or got lazy when it came time to make their levels harder.

[ReaperAA]

Ninety-Six, on 05 July 2020 - 11:51 PM, said:

Even so, it doesn't change that the only way they thought they could make their levels harder is to make them cheaper. As I said, either way it's a problem. They either started off with cheap tactics or got lazy when it came time to make their levels harder.

While some of the trap were definitely cheap, many of the hard traps could be "sensed" and thus even survivable with good enough skill and intuition. As a general rule, if you see an area with some ammo, then make sure to equip the weapon that uses said ammo. Also be in your guard when pressing a button or grabbing a key. And when entering an unknown teleporter, make sure to equip a plasma gun (if you have it). Basically what I am saying is that what may appear "cheap" to one player may not feel cheap to another.

To prove my point, I want you to do me one favor. I want you give a shot to map32 of Eviternity and then give me your opinion on it. It is a marathon map and by no means an easy one, but it is not on the level of AA's difficulty.

Ninety-Six, on 05 July 2020 - 11:39 PM, said:

And quite frankly, it's insulting to have to lower the difficulty to get past what is essentially an explosive slot machine.

No body should feel ashamed of playing a game on a lower skill. Believe it or not, back in around 2015-ish, I used to have the same "UV or bust" mentality. And because of that, I had a frustrating time on some wads. It wasn't until I lowered the skill level when I truly started to appreciate the work that went into the maps of such wads. Trust me, you would feel much better if you do it because UV is more often then not designed for Doom gods.

[Ninety-Six]

ReaperAA, on 06 July 2020 - 12:15 AM, said:

While some of the trap were definitely cheap, many of the hard traps could be "sensed" and thus even survivable with good enough skill and intuition. As a general rule, if you see an area with some ammo, then make sure to equip the weapon that uses said ammo. Also be in your guard when pressing a button or grabbing a key. And when entering an unknown teleporter, make sure to equip a plasma gun (if you have it). Basically what I am saying is that what may appear "cheap" to one player may not feel cheap to another.

Being on your guard doesn't do anywhere near enough.

Map 5, waterfall arena. Obviously an arena. Step forward, mancubi and arachnotrons spawn. Start battling. Get roasted from behind because some spawned behind the waterfall. If you were unlucky enough to not be facing said waterfall, you take more than enough damage to die if you aren't at super health.

Map 6, floor lowers. Walk forward, chaingunners on both sides. Run forward because you need cover. Archvile! With no cover. What a pleasant experience!

Map 8, saucer 2. Three archviles. A dozen specters. They can flame you through them, you can't shoot through them even with plasma. And the space is so damn narrow that you can easily get pinned. So an archvile is flaming you, you have your plasma on him but he's not flinching (or alternatively, you're getting flames from both sides). You just got pinned from behind. What do you do? Keep holding fire and pray he flinches, which isn't guaranteed? Or turn around and try to roast the pinky, which you probably won't have time to do?

Map 8, saucer 3! Huge open line of sight space that you can only walk on a narrow section. Barely any cover. Archvile on the other end. Two pairs of hell knights on both sides, plus two others behind them each. Getting flamed because of course you are. Space is narrow enough for the hell knights to totally block the minscule cover there is especially since they spawn right there. And if they attack while you're in there, you hardly have the space to dodge. Laterally is almost impossible due to the ring shape, unless they fire at an exact time. Otherwise, you ahve to step out of cover. And if you're mid-ignite, well i guess you never needed that health, did you?

Map 8, horde battle! Bunch of revenants! Archviles on two sides! Good chance you won't even hear them over the revenants, especially if you aren't already near their closets! Won't know until you're already on fire! Wide open space with no cover! You need to get to the closets, by killing the revenants, while both archviles are flaming you, and praying one of them didn't have their AI break and they aren't still in that alcove meaning you wouldn't have cover there either! And imagine not knowing what you were facing or where the monsters would come from! Fun stuff!


Do I really need to go on here? I will anyway, because I want to draw more attention to that map 1 bullshit.

It's not "can catch you in an unfair place." No, no no. There is no "can." It's not some accident. He literally spawns a zombieman for no other reason than to keep you in the alcove longer. The only reason he's in there is to delay you for another half a second and make it even more likely that you get rocketed and killed. That is it. That is the only reason he's there. You dying to some RNG bullshit isn't happenstance. It's by design. This is how skillsaw decided to start his "epic." By arbitrarily telling the player to go fuck themselves. And it only gets worse from there.

ReaperAA, on 06 July 2020 - 12:15 AM, said:

No body should feel ashamed of playing a game on a lower skill. Believe it or not, back in around 2015-ish, I used to have the same "UV or bust" mentality. And because of that, I had a frustrating time on some wads. It wasn't until I lowered the skill level when I truly started to appreciate the work that went into the maps of such wads. Trust me, you would feel much better if you do it because UV is more often then not designed for Doom gods.

That's the thing. They aren't. If the theoretically best player ever will still die because the level requires psychic powers and/or good luck, it's bullshit. I'm no doom god but if I have to ask "How the hell was I supposed to know that?" then the level failed. End of story.

[ReaperAA]

Ninety-Six, on 06 July 2020 - 12:43 AM, said:

He literally spawns a zombieman for no other reason than to keep you in the alcove longer. The only reason he's in there is to delay you for another half a second and make it even more likely that you get rocketed and killed. That is it. That is the only reason he's there. You dying to some RNG bullshit isn't happenstance. It's by design. This is how skillsaw decided to start his "epic." By arbitrarily telling the player to go fuck themselves. And it only gets worse from there.

I know you are talking about that berserk alcove. Well you can near-100% guarantee survive that trap if you hug the wall on the left as shown in the image. Even if his rocket gets inside, you would only take some damage from a single rocket splash.

https://imgur.com/a/C0bOI9w

[Ninety-Six]

ReaperAA, on 06 July 2020 - 01:15 AM, said:

I know you are talking about that berserk alcove. Well you can near-100% guarantee survive that trap if you hug the wall on the left as shown in the image.

https://imgur.com/a/C0bOI9w

unless there was already a rocket flying in, in which case, ripperoni.

It really shouldn't even be "near" 100%. I know Doom itself has some issues with its RNG, but a level designer should not go out of their way to weaponize that against you. It isn't fair, it isn't fun, and it isn't good game design. It's pure laziness pretending it's difficult by masking it with a body count as opposed to creating structured, thought-out encounters that give the player not only the preperations they need to survive but also the knowledge.


I do not ask that everything be perfectly transparent and predictable down to the letter (though I freely admit I would not complain if that was the case). What I do ask for is that reasonable accommodations be granted to the player. For instance, one of skillsaw's favorite tricks is to teleport you or drop you right into the middle of a tightly clustered horde of revenants. It happens on numerous occasions throughout ancient aliens and is even more prominent in his Eviternity level. Situations where if you have literally anything besides the plasma rifle or BFG out, you die. That's it. No other weapon has a high enough DPS, and you literally don't have enough time to switch guns.

It's even worse when it isn't even a marked teleporter, instead being an invisible linedef. And I'm sorry if I don't have the plasma rifle or BFG out at all times. They or their ammo types are not always present before such an encounter (in my experience, literally less than half the time), and as such I tend to hold the SSG or chaingun at the ready, since it can deal with most situations. And I don't like wasting plasma on a couple zombies because that sort of ammo is precious. You can never know how much of it you will get in a level, so I'd rather save it for big battles, big foes, or emergencies.

[NNC]

ReaperAA, on 05 July 2020 - 11:36 PM, said:

then just play the wad on lower skill where it is replaced by a mancubus.

I think the wad sucks, so I skip this offer.

[NNC]

I don't understand the point of HNTR anyway. I think there should be two difficulties in monster placement, one normal and one hard, and ITYTD is good as the easy one for taking less damage but with the normal enemy count.

[Ninety-Six]

The Watchtower, on 06 July 2020 - 03:00 AM, said:

I don't understand the point of HNTR anyway. I think there should be two difficulties in monster placement, one normal and one hard, and ITYTD is good as the easy one for taking less damage but with the normal enemy count.

I see where you're coming from, but I disagree. I prefer the older way of handling difficulty by way of more numerous and/or powerful opposition. From my experience in shooters that mess with damage values, it tends to make things a bit foggier.

First and foremost, it's much less clear what exactly changes. In modern shooters, difficulty is almost 100% determined by some damage value manipulation, either for your attacks, attacks you take, or both. But it's pretty much never going to be clear from the outset what that actually means in practical terms. Even in games that have the courtesy to tell you what difficulty selection actually does (Half-Life comes to mind), it still depends on you to sort of figure out the exact magnitude of difference. Double damage? Half damage? Quarter?

Contrast with how older shooters do it, and it's instantly clear what changed, because suddenly there are a lot more angry things that want to kill you.

Secondly, in my opinion I think messing with those values makes trying a new difficulty a lot rougher than it should be. Imagine if in Hollywood Holocaust that first trooper on the box suddenly went from taking 3 pistol rounds to die to 12. It would completely throw you off.

Now, I understand devising new strategies is kind of the point of playing again on a higher skill level. However, if you played through it once already, you're not just devising new strategies. You're having to completely throw out everything you knew, and it causes some what I think is unnecessary confusion as you fight habit.

Whereas with just more enemies, those old strategies still work, you just have to come up with new ones on top of those. I think it creates a much more dynamic combat flow, and actually rewards the skill you obtained previously rather than forcing you to essentially relearn the game. Plus I just think it makes for a smoother transition to higher difficulties overall, encouraging you to go for it again rather than discouraging you by confusing you and punishing you for old habits.


That being said, I think changing values is acceptable for the easiest of easiest skills, primarily aimed at people who are either completely or still relatively new to video games or FPSes overall, so we agree on that much.