[Ninety-Six]

And I now appear softlocked in the third level. Grabbed the yellow key in the fire cave, and the only way back to progress seems to be through a red card slot (which I'm guessing is an elevator back to the surface because I certainly don't seem able to come back the way I came).

Did I miss a red key on the surface? I ran around not knowing what I was supposed to do with the only way forward appearing to be a lake with a bed about five astronomical units from the surface. It's not like it would have been the first time I was asked to do such a thing.


EDIT: Yeah I had to restart the episode from scratch because I didn't have an earlier save. And yes that was indeed a softlock.


So the red key was inside the building in a tiny very missable alcove in the bathroom. A building that requires the blue key which can only be found by standing atop the second pyramid in the temple, which without a jetpack you would have to pass by the first pyramid first, and why would you not climb up there first to which you find nothing, but if you climb to the top of the second pyramid the floor below lowers into an egg nest and also a blue key spawns on top of the first pyramid why would i go back to the first one since there was nothing there and nothing seemed to happen especially since i had to go by there first of course i climbed up first and then why would i be directed to the dead end nest why not have the key in there

[Arzca]

Another James Duncan map: Overkill

https://msdn.duke4.net/hotoverkill.php (MSDN review and screenshots again)




This map wasn't necessary as spacious as his Condemned that I played some time ago, but the map remains quite unlinear, which just happens to be my cup tea. There were some interesting things, such as door opening up-lights associated with a pair of swing doors. I don't think I've seen this effect being used with swing doors before. Some other 3DR-style "fancy" doors can be found around the level as well. Some small underwater sections can be found as well, although most of the are just for connecting different areas together, instead of providing additional gameplay, which might be for Dukematch purposes, as the author states the level was made with Dukematch in mind.

The gameplay was quite fun in my opinion, and to some extent, it can be compared to Condemned by the same author, because there are various routes for the player to take, and sometimes you might just "accidentally" find a new route to gain a new weapon sooner, and so on. And let's not forget our dear and lovely C-9 effects, shoot any fire extinguisher you come across, and it will destroy a small piece of a wall. So simple, but yet so satisfying. Monsters weren't that tough, but there was a small room with a handful of Protector Drones / Alien Beasts in it, with a limited space to dodge their attacks, because you have fight them while standing on a narrow bridge made of sprites. There are some spawning Pig Cop Tanks, Commanders and a late map mini Battlelord, but by the you face them, you should have a decent arsenal.

Could be a coincidence, but I think it's funny how the Nukebutton area looks as if it would eventually lead to the author's previously mentioned map, Condemned...

[Ninety-Six]

and then a 10-piece switch "puzzle" spread across two rooms why.


EDIT: Followed by a battlelord with nothing to fight it with, a door that sometimes opens when the numbered switch aligns, and sometimes closes, and then sometimes closes anyway, and then the door to the tram also closing for no reason, a bunch of enemeis in dark areas with minimal ammunition again


I made it past the canyon and I am only experiencing raw frustration. Yeah I think I'm done here.

[ck3D]

^ You might not have made it to the Water Bases, but at least you sound certain of your Last Reaction.

[FistMarine]

Alright, haven't posted in a while, so I might as well post what about I have been playing in last couple of months:

I have finished a bunch of maps by ck3D (the latest I finished were Overtime and the Anarchy City series) and others such as ARSP1, as well as Alex City by Aleks (Alex Pistol), all done on either Duke3D 1.3D (mostly some of the maps by ck3D that had 1.3D cons) or Duke3D Atomic 1.5, in DOSBox 0.74-3, on CGS difficulty and getting 100% in each level. I started the user maps (except those 1.3D ck3d maps that replaced E1L1 of original game) with command line parameters: DUKE3D.EXE -MAP ARSP1.MAP /S3 for example. This was to ensure starting on skill 3 because otherwise, starting the map from User Map menu in SETUP.EXE would start it on skill 0 or 1 on v1.3D and skill 2 on v1.5, as far as I know.

In past two weeks I also remember playing Tribute To Action II (a long DukePlus map that took me 70-80 minutes and had 17 secrets, initially missing about 5 but I reloaded an earlier save before the area you can't backtrack anymore and did my best to find them, some with help of Mapster32) and then I decided to start Duke Nukem 3D Atomic Edition v1.4 (considering it was my birthday and the coincidence happened Plutonium Pak/Atomic Edition v1.4 was released on same day a year later) which I never played before (only 1.3D and 1.5) and spot some differences, only went half-way through The Birth episode and reached Area 51. I gotta say that I had some problems with v1.4 where sometimes it glitched save screenshot and froze DOSBox while saving and those saves from last level entered were deleted, so I had to be careful and play 1-2 levels at a time, because the first time it happened I lost the Duke Burger saves when I entered in the building and it froze upon saving but thankfully I still had my first save from end of It's Impossible, so I could continue fine and did Duke Burger and Shop-N-Bag in one go without problems and stopped at beginning of Babe Land.

Unfortunately I died once at end of Babe Land (in front of nuke button) as the last Protector Drone glitched through wall and I accidentally fired Freezethrower at wall, causing shots to bounce back at me and almost killed me, then the drone suddenly appeared behind me and killed me. I was out of medkit at that time as well and was screwed either way due to those stupid laser traps in that room (and left 1-2 secrets behind to save the atomic health for after clearing the level, I still picked those two up in targets room since those have a tendency to not become accessible again later, only when you reach the area first time). This was a massive slap in the face considering I rarely die these days in original levels and I was doing extremely well in the level, I had 200 health, 100 armor and 100% medkit when I cleared the beginning parts (after getting the red key) but took a lot of damage halfway thanks to those goddamn pig cops (there are so many in this level) and yeah I will admit I was kinda pissed at the situation and decided to restart the level. Was considering doing a "forced" pistol start but I quit in frustration because I knew I was fucked (if I couldn't do the level with all that stuff I entered, do I stand a chance pistol starting it? Although I consider pistol starting each Duke3D level one day) and when I started the game again, I loaded the save from end of Shop-N-Bag, then cleared whole Babe Land without dying this time as well as doing Pigsty. Then I reached beginning of Area 51, saved (it glitched a bit when I saved), quit and when I came back just to check if my saves are fine, the Area 51 save was strangely gone. Good thing the rest saves were unaffected, as I have a backup save per each level, with another backup save on current level. I don't understand why v1.4 is so glitchy, until that time I have played Atomic Edition only in v1.5 and wanted to give v1.4 a try to see if there are some differences worth noticing but never thought it would be so glitchy. I have recorded gameplay videos on YouTube if anyone is interested in watching them, not only of this The Birth playthrough but also those user maps I played so far. I may only post The Birth videos, just let me know if anyone is interested and I will post them tomorrow.

As for those glitches caused and saving often on multiple slots, this is an important lesson to learn and I hope it will be useful for others. After reading Ninety-Six's frustration with Last Reaction, I can feel the pain he experiences. I've had rare situations (not necessary Duke3D related) where I only went with one save or two saves in same level and still managed to get softlocked (or missed something without way to backtrack) and saved like that, though I usually had a backup from previous level or something like that. If not, I was fucked and was forced to restart since I refuse to cheat when playing normally, only when I'm forced due to poor level design, I will cheat. This means unlike most people who seem to often cheat with noclip in most YouTube videos I have seen (of many games, doesn't have to be Duke3D only), I prefer to do without any sort of cheats. To give an example, in past two months when I played through ARSP1, I encountered one situation where I got softlocked in bathroom after I destroyed the toilet and saved, I realized I got stuck and the only way out would have been to use noclip (no I didn't have jetpack and Duke's jump height wasn't enough to get out of here) and instead I decided to kill myself with a pipebomb and reloaded an earlier backup save I had made moments prior. If I hadn't done that backup save, I would have restarted the map from beginning. I'm sure ck3D knows what I'm talking about since I sent him my Duke3D videos that I recorded so far. In other words, you can avoid cheating by just saving often and on multiple slots. No need to use noclip in these cases. Just my two cents here.

And speaking of LR&WB, I haven't played that TC in years and was considering playing it these days (just to note that the first 3 levels are really bad but THEN it gets better) but like I said I've got so much stuff to play that is very difficult to finish all these, I can do 1-2 levels per day of multiple things I have in progress and although these will take forever to finish if I move at this rate, this also means that I may finish multiple things simultaneously and then I can start 2-3 more maps/mods at same time. Now I remember after reading Ninety-Six's comments, exactly the kind of bullshit those first 3 maps contain and I'd advice you to NOT give up, it definitely gets better after that. Since you are finding the secrets (unlike me years ago when I barely found some secrets and struggled at some points in first few levels, though at same time I was playing in EDuke32 with better controls and mouselook), you should have an easier time. I plan to go through LR&WB soon (in fact tomorrow marks the anniversary of Duke3D Atomic v1.5 which means I will strictly focus on Duke3D related stuff) and this time I will do it in DOSBox (yeah I can imagine it will be painful with just the keyboard controls) and hopefully I should be doing it fine but I would like to know first where you found that secret Scuba Gear in first level, it will be a massive help this time around. But like I said, don't give up, the later levels get much better. I'd say it like this and I believe The Watchtower said it as well:

Last Reaction
Levels 1-3 (bad)
Levels 4-6 (average)
Levels 7-11 (good)

Water Bases
Most (all?) levels are really good, on par or maybe better than LR levels 7-11.

I'd also recommend Chimera as well, even if it was unfinished with just 7 levels (the nuke button doesn't work on last level, unless you play the fixed Addon Compilation version) and I know there's few things about it that have mixed reactions like the weird yellow alien and some levels may not be as good but as far as I remember, Chimera was a blast, shame it was unfinished. Maybe one day the author might return and finish the episode, who knows?

Also forgot to mention there is a secret level in Last Reaction episode as well, it's towards the end of episode, I think on penultimate level which shows the Stadium entrance and has an UFO in the middle. Not sure how to access it because years ago I must have missed it and had to play it from pistol start. I believe the Addon Compilation readme files mention hints to reach secret levels, so if you are playing the compilation version, you are pretty much set up.

[Arzca]

RunningDuke, on 09 December 2020 - 11:56 PM, said:

To give an example, in past two months when I played through ARSP1, I encountered one situation where I got softlocked in bathroom after I destroyed the toilet and saved, I realized I got stuck and the only way out would have been to use noclip (no I didn't have jetpack and Duke's jump height wasn't enough to get out of here) and instead I decided to kill myself with a pipebomb and reloaded an earlier backup save I had made moments prior. If I hadn't done that backup save, I would have restarted the map from beginning.

I don't remember much about making ARSP1 but, there is a small sector inside the room, and if you walk on top of it and perform a jump, you should be able to get out of the secret. Still, bad design is bad design and there's no way around it.

Not proud of the map these days, but if anything, it's these kind of maps that will eventually tell the mapper to learn away from their bad habits. My issues at the time were rushing, inconcistency and the lack of patience, which would often result a mess of a level that all of my maps from 2003-2004 would be.


These maps taught me the "dont's and no's" of mapping, and that's a valuable lesson for any mapper.

[Ninety-Six]

RunningDuke, on 09 December 2020 - 11:56 PM, said:

And speaking of LR&WB, I haven't played that TC in years and was considering playing it these days (just to note that the first 3 levels are really bad but THEN it gets better) but like I said I've got so much stuff to play that is very difficult to finish all these, I can do 1-2 levels per day of multiple things I have in progress and although these will take forever to finish if I move at this rate, this also means that I may finish multiple things simultaneously and then I can start 2-3 more maps/mods at same time. Now I remember after reading Ninety-Six's comments, exactly the kind of bullshit those first 3 maps contain and I'd advice you to NOT give up, it definitely gets better after that. Since you are finding the secrets (unlike me years ago when I barely found some secrets and struggled at some points in first few levels, though at same time I was playing in EDuke32 with better controls and mouselook), you should have an easier time. I plan to go through LR&WB soon (in fact tomorrow marks the anniversary of Duke3D Atomic v1.5 which means I will strictly focus on Duke3D related stuff) and this time I will do it in DOSBox (yeah I can imagine it will be painful with just the keyboard controls) and hopefully I should be doing it fine but I would like to know first where you found that secret Scuba Gear in first level, it will be a massive help this time around. But like I said, don't give up, the later levels get much better. I'd say it like this and I believe The Watchtower said it as well:

Thing is I made it past the first three levels. I'm on level 4 and just getting more and more infuriated.

Here's a thing I've noticed. So far these levels seem to count on the player finding damn near all the secrets to survive. Expecting the player to find some secrets to get by is fine; expecting the majority is not.

Moreover, so far every level has had one particular secret. A room that is basically a massive ammo dump. These levels are balanced expecting you to find this exact secret. I'm on level 4 and have yet to find this secret, and so the dearth of ammunition continues to be an utterly massive problem. As does the abuse of darkness and the poor placement of enemy types. Particularly Battlelords. George here loved to put Battlelords in a lot of tight spaces where you don't generally have room to use explosives safely but the battlelord has no such trouble ripping you to pieces at such short range. That is of course assuming you even have any explosives. Which, without finding said secret, you almost certainly don't.


Unfortunately I would classify this level as quite awful too. Right in line with the travesties that are the first three levels.

RunningDuke, on 09 December 2020 - 11:56 PM, said:

though at same time I was playing in EDuke32 with better controls and mouselook) .. and this time I will do it in DOSBox (yeah I can imagine it will be painful with just the keyboard controls)

DOS Duke 100% supports mouse and keyboard.

[Aleks]

RunningDuke, on 09 December 2020 - 11:56 PM, said:

I have finished a bunch of maps by ck3D (the latest I finished were Overtime and the Anarchy City series) and others such as ARSP1, as well as Alex City by Aleks (Alex Pistol), all done on either Duke3D 1.3D (mostly some of the maps by ck3D that had 1.3D cons) or Duke3D Atomic 1.5, in DOSBox 0.74-3, on CGS difficulty and getting 100% in each level. I started the user maps (except those 1.3D ck3d maps that replaced E1L1 of original game) with command line parameters: DUKE3D.EXE -MAP ARSP1.MAP /S3 for example. This was to ensure starting on skill 3 because otherwise, starting the map from User Map menu in SETUP.EXE would start it on skill 0 or 1 on v1.3D and skill 2 on v1.5, as far as I know.

Glad to see you posting again, man! I'd sure love to see your video of Alex City, would be fun to see how people would play it these days

Arzca, on 10 December 2020 - 01:18 AM, said:

I don't remember much about making ARSP1 but, there is a small sector inside the room, and if you walk on top of it and perform a jump, you should be able to get out of the secret. Still, bad design is bad design and there's no way around it.

Not proud of the map these days, but if anything, it's these kind of maps that will eventually tell the mapper to learn away from their bad habits. My issues at the time were rushing, inconcistency and the lack of patience, which would often result a mess of a level that all of my maps from 2003-2004 would be.


These maps taught me the "dont's and no's" of mapping, and that's a valuable lesson for any mapper.

I remember this level having a very "classic" design, which was not that common back these days. Anyway, we were just teenagers back when making these maps (same with me and Alex City), so that was still more about experimenting and learning build techniques than having a plan and vision for a complete level. It's cool to see people from back then still making maps after so many years and how they have developed and advanced.

[Arzca]

Aleks, on 10 December 2020 - 02:15 AM, said:

Anyway, we were just teenagers back when making these maps (same with me and Alex City), so that was still more about experimenting and learning build techniques than having a plan and vision for a complete level. It's cool to see people from back then still making maps after so many years and how they have developed and advanced.

The word "experiment" sums up our early creations pretty well: What was between the start and the Nukebutton was not that important, as long as there was at least one cool looking area xD. These days, we have the building "blocks" for our levels, and we can carefully consider our individual design choices, craft a more consistent experience and add some of our personal touches / signature design into our levels. Even I'm more of a Doom mapper than a Duke 3d mapper these days, I'm all but done with Duke 3d.

And I should probably give AlexCity a go, for old times' sake.

[Ninety-Six]

Serious question: is the last level of Duke Forces intended to be beatable? Like at all?

[Ninety-Six]

I gave LRWB one last chance to redeem itself. I forced myself to suffer through the agonizingly long, dark, and directionless level 4. I managed to find the ammo dump secret, and shocker the combat went from unfair to a curbstomp. That's not a good thing.

I made it to level 5. This was the TC's last chance to save itself. And the result was a long winding level with no direction, capped up with an instant death pit in darkness so thick the nightvision didn't help.


Yep, done for real. I don't care if it gets good at level 7. It is absolutely not worth the suffering until that point. And frankly despite the middle levels here being not as hated, honestly I don't see a difference. Sure, they look a little better and have more texture variety, but that's the only improvement. The aesthetics. I care way more about how the levels play and...these are bad. These are really bad. In fact I will go so far as to say these are some of the worst Duke 3D levels I have ever played. Very few maps or mapsets managed to elicit such pure unpleasantness, but this is one of those "elite" few.


I legitimately hate this mod. Fully and completely. There's no way around it. This mod has given me no reason to suspect that it will get any better. While the aesthetics have improved, the level design itself has remained a consistently flat level of abject misery that I haven't felt for a very long time (at least for Duke). I'm tired of running around not knowing what the hell I'm supposed to do. I'm tired of fighting enemies that seemed to have been placed with very little thought or care. I'm tired of running dry on ammo because there is barely anything on the critical path. And I'm tired of having to search for essential supplies that the mod author decided to hide.

Maybe the later levels will eventually get over the more glaring issues. But there is such a fundamental misunderstanding of level design being demonstrated that I think it will just end up being band-aids on a severed arm. There are so many problems that fixing the biggest ones still won't make these good. These legitimately feel like someone's first mapping attempts wrapped up in a fancy con file, and I wouldn't be surprised if they were all built in the play order.



I apologize for dumping all over what is considered one of the greatest Duke TCs of the pre-source port days, but I simply cannot force myself to play through this anymore. These levels are just so awful that I honestly couldn't care less if I was completely wrong about what's in store. For all I know as soon as the level counter hits 7 it'll go from amateur trash to commercial grade expansion pack. But honestly at this point I don't care anymore. It's not worth it. I have given this mod far more chances than it ever deserved, hanging onto hope that it gets better. Wanting to like it and to see why it's so praised.


But I just can't do it anymore. I'm sorry.

[ck3D]

Damn man, don't let a game give you a nervous breakdown, you're supposed to be enjoying that shit (somehow, from what I can tell from your description; I wouldn't know myself, I don't think I ever played LRWB, although both the usual good and now awful press are kind of making me eager to). It's admirable you tried really hard to get through it legit, however from the sounds of it I myself would have given up two levels in and just DNCLIP'd or DNSCOTTY'd through all the annoying stuff if my goal was to try and understand the popular appeal and I wouldn't have broken a sweat over that. Your time is precious and the portion you spend playing shouldn't be spent enduring things, at least I know that if I don't feel pleasantly involved in the experience then I'm out (which might be the reason why I stopped playing video games in general a long time ago). In fact that's the sole purpose of the importance of good vs. bad design. Making levels that are readable on that level really is an art though, one could say bad design would be Google translating a foreign language and only manipulating singular words to string together then stutter on naive gibberish, whereas good design would be actually mastering the vocabulary and grammar and being able to form elaborate yet coherent and original sentences.

Like I was saying I can't share my own experience with that TC since it's non-existent, but your commentary essentially described everything I think good level designers should primarily try to avoid. Even if the goal is to make the player feel uncomfortable for tension, it can be done right and in a manner that doesn't make you feel like you're being trolled like in a Mario Maker level a five-year-old would have made.

[Ninety-Six]

ck3D, on 10 December 2020 - 10:35 AM, said:

Damn man, don't let a game give you a nervous breakdown, you're supposed to be enjoying that shit (somehow, from what I can tell from your description; I wouldn't know myself, I don't think I ever played LRWB, although both the usual good and now awful press are kind of making me eager to). It's admirable you tried really hard to get through it legit, however from the sounds of it I myself would have given up two levels in and just DNCLIP'd or DNSCOTTY'd through all the annoying stuff if my goal was to try and understand the popular appeal and I wouldn't have broken a sweat over that.

When I go for something I go in hard. Because I don't like to hate things, despite how vocal I can be. I often try really really hard to like something. To, at the absolute least, understand the appeal and safely declare "it's not my thing."

But when something is as player-hostile as this is, that's just not going to happen. And unfortunately it can sometimes take a really long time for me to accept that I truly hate what I'm playing. It's about my 4,529,763rd bringing my immortal nemesis into the topic, but that's the story of my experience with Doom's Ancient Aliens in a nutshell. Wanted so, so, so desperately to like it but couldn't no matter how much I tried. It took over a year of trying to go back in and hoping it would be better this time before I got the message.

And at least AA had stuff to like. Imagine how much I would have to hate something to quit five levels in.


Also considering I can barely stay afloat through continuous play, I had no faith in the ammo balance for a pistol start via DNSCOTTY. True I could have skipped enemies but the fights are literally the main reason I play first person shooters. So skipping an enemy is tantamount to just turning the game off for me in most cases (there are exceptions, such as when it's very clearly communicated to the player that standing your ground is a hopeless endeavor (ex. the Red 1 Remake, your own Anarchy City X, etc). When it's made abundantly clear that killing all the things is not intended, or at least not right away, then it's a non-issue and the challenge can then come from survival over triumph. Needless to say LRWB is very much not in that category).

ck3D, on 10 December 2020 - 10:35 AM, said:

Your time is precious and the portion you spend playing shouldn't be spent enduring things, at least I know that if I don't feel pleasantly involved in the experience then I'm out

I know that, but a part of the problem with going in as hard as I do is when I decide to sit down and play something... that's it. That's my day right there (or evening or whatever). Everything gets so focused and adjusted for that that if it goes to crap, that's the entire rest of my day ruined. I wish I knew how to stop that but.



Part of the problem here is that I do wish I could like it. I like the concept it brings to the table. Sure, seeing custom enemies isn't the most unique thing in the world, but centering an entire TC around a whole game's worth of new enemies but without changing the existing ones or the vanilla gameplay in any way... that's still not a very common thing and I always appreciate fighting new enemies while keeping everything else classic. Unfortunately the execution is just...

ck3D, on 10 December 2020 - 10:35 AM, said:

Making levels that are readable on that level really is an art though, one could say bad design would be Google translating a foreign language and only manipulating singular words to string together then stutter on naive gibberish, whereas good design would be actually mastering the vocabulary and grammar and being able to form elaborate yet coherent and original sentences.

Even if it were just the readability issues alone... well I still wouldn't like it very much but it wouldn't make me so thoroughly miserable that I quit five levels in. As an example of this, I put forward FM2/3/4X. I'm very much not a fan of the lack of direction almost every level suffers from, but I also acknowledge that the rest of the package has plenty of merit (I'll grant the readability thing is a large blemish in my books but I digress). The aesthetics are very standout, whether it's mimicking 3DR to a T or taking a surreal unique direction. The combat is perfectly balanced for the level of difficulty it aims for, both in terms of ammo and health, the list goes on. Again, the readability thing does mark it down heavily for me, but I don't outright hate it. I made it all the way up to about E4L2 before I decided that I'd had enough.

This on the other hand, is pure misery. I can't find anything redeeming in what I've played through. I know the aesthetics improve but the haphazard enemy layout, the abuse of darkness, the per-level existence of what basically amounts to a DNSTUFF cheat in map form but one that is essential to survival, ensuring the combat is only ever weighted heavily in one direction or another with no in between, the extremely poor conveyance of what the player is supposed to do next, the deliberate hiding of essential supplies, the softlocks.... And those are just the big issues. This isn't even counting the many smaller problems that would, by themselves or even together in the absence of the more serious issues, be forgivable from inexperience but altogether the entire package just becomes one of the heaviest slogs I ever pulled through, and I didn't even get halfway.


If you want to try it yourself and see where you fall on the spectrum of opinions, by all means. Despite its age it still has a valid link on MSDN.

[Aleks]

Just played Arzca's Restaurant Conspiracy, for old times' sake It indeed bears a very strong resemblance to Freeway (and in general to classic design, mostly Shrapnel City with that use of textures), but in a certainly nice and stylized way (especially liked the sharp shadows at the outside parts). The gameplay was quite challenging, the beginning when I triggered a lot of monsters before finding any decent weapons got me fucked the first time around, but after that everything was really balanced. I really liked some clever Pig Cops stayputs that actually would cooperate more than expected (behind the fences on the upper street level) and attack/ambush the player instead of walking into invisible walls. Secrets distribution was also very reminiscent of the classic maps, managed to find them all without too much extra exploring, but they weren't obvious either. Very enjoyable experience, man!

[Arzca]

Aleks, on 10 December 2020 - 04:22 PM, said:

Just played Arzca's Restaurant Conspiracy, for old times' sake It indeed bears a very strong resemblance to Freeway (and in general to classic design, mostly Shrapnel City with that use of textures), but in a certainly nice and stylized way (especially liked the sharp shadows at the outside parts). The gameplay was quite challenging, the beginning when I triggered a lot of monsters before finding any decent weapons got me fucked the first time around, but after that everything was really balanced. I really liked some clever Pig Cops stayputs that actually would cooperate more than expected (behind the fences on the upper street level) and attack/ambush the player instead of walking into invisible walls. Secrets distribution was also very reminiscent of the classic maps, managed to find them all without too much extra exploring, but they weren't obvious either. Very enjoyable experience, man!

The start can be quite overwhelming, but I added some extra weaponry and ammo around before the release, so people can select any side area and secure a foothold. Those RPV's can be a nuisance, but due to their weak attacks they can be mostly ignored till you have enough ammo to take them out later.

I never mantioned it here but thanks to @ck3d for mentioning the map here and someone for asking the release. To be honest, I never considered this map "good" prior to the release. I thought about releasing it around 2016, but I didn't feel it would fare that well, because I had not followed Duke 3d user map scene in years during those days, so I didn't really know how people would react to classic levels, so I basically forgot all about it and left it be. In a way, it is quite interesting how something simple as a gameplay and ammo overhaul can make the map ten times more fun than it would have otherwise been. Because of this, I've had a sense of closure with Restaurant Conspiracy in a way, and something simple as a gameplay overhaul made this map bloom like a flower in the rain.






And now, I shall present some highlights from a 7-hour 2-player coop User map coop LAN session I had yesterday with a friend of mine. A plenty of "Out of Sync", "Timed out" and straight up crashes were encountered during the 7-hour marathon, but the fun always outweights the bad. Mostly we were playing the "same old" maps, but here are some our new favourites;

Siebenpolis: A refreshingly challenging level with a tough beginning. We died a few times early on, but got the hang of things once we had secured a foothold + some weaponry. The action settled down a bit after the main street area was cleared, but there were some nice and challenging spawnfests later on, including distant mini Battlelords, Tanks, Octabrains and a huge horde of Assault Troopers which was fun to gun down with a friend. Ammo was a bit low early on, partially because we didn't know anything about the map and it took us some time to learn the weapon / key inventory (Jetpack and Portable Medikit) locations. It took us forever to find all of those switches that would open the last gate leading to the Nukebutton, but it was very fun and challenging experience. I also liked the "depressing" atmosphere (palette #7?) the map had, and there was no way to escape it. It took us 1h and 3 minutes to complete this. It is also refreshing to have a vertical map like this where using a Jetpack is a must. A great level. We'll be playing this again, many times for sure.

Shaky Grounds Pt1: Apocollapse (COOP Version) This is The Map, so I won't be discussing about any details or design, because all the praise this map deserves has been said by other people, and for me there is nothing more to add. Instead, I'll be telling the story from Coop point of view. It was one of the toughest maps we've played over the years on coop (excluding stuff like Duke's Nightmare V4 and such). At the start we didn't have too much ammo, and we were forced to ignore majority of the Slimers and Octabrains inside the underwater lab. We also used mid-level saves because some jumps were a bit challenging and we ended up failing a bit too often, this was not due to design, but because of a very aged USB-keyboard with a bad Spacebar which I used (my friend played with my main PC and I was using my ancient laptop with the previously mentioned USB-keyboard). After we had ignored all the Slimers and Octabrains, we got into the city (or what was left of it). At this point, we were struggling a bit as we were a bit low on ammo and didn't know where to look ammo / weapons from, but after securing the entrance of the shopping mall, we got the hang of things. The Sushi-place spawn ambush was quite fun, as there was some tension when we were attacked from many directions (mostly Assault Troopers and a few Commanders). The shopping mall was probably the easiest section, and we didn't struggle too much there. The final fight went quite well too, even we were attacked from various directions by Octabrains, Assault Troopers and Commanders, but our teamwork and weapon usage was quite solid here, so the bad guys fell down pretty quickly. I also liked how the "Coop hub" opens up as you progress through the level, and even we died a few times, backtracking wasn't painful because we could almost continue from where we left off. It is admirable how such a legendary map like this gets a Coop version as well. That's what I'd call dedication. A tough map, but it's exactly maps like this that get me and my friend excited because of the challenge it presents. 40 minutes of time well spent I'd say. Sadly, you don't get to see the city getting rekt when playing this version, but that's more of a nitpicking stuff.

[ck3D]

@Arzca my pleasure, Freeway has always been one of my favorite maps and I just loved your take on the doubling up its dimension, so to speak. Design looked real cool and just making that map altogether must have been quite the effort, one worth eventually making it public in more than video form at least. I have yet to directly play it and experience it myself (I only watched that video of yours that I shared and then later read the reviews) but it's definitely on my list, from what I've seen I think it'll be right up my alley and that for one I will appreciate the relative challenge.

I'm also happy you really seemed to enjoy Siebenpolis in Coop (and that it did turn out to be fun to play, I never tested it), I still like this map (although I'd need to release a version with the visibility bumped all the way up sometime; its current darkness can be a bitch with the open scale and long-distance fights), it's definitely bound to always be hit or miss with people given the aesthetics and unconventional means of progression however so whenever people report actually appreciating it, I always find it cool.

Ninety-Six, on 10 December 2020 - 11:17 AM, said:

If you want to try it yourself and see where you fall on the spectrum of opinions, by all means. Despite its age it still has a valid link on MSDN.

Yeah I know, I actually might sometime. All the anti-player talk is reminding me of quite the amount of works I always looked up to from a technical perspective but only very exceptionally got into as a player because of how overwhelming, frustrating and sometimes cheap the progression is in those, for instance Billy Boy and Zaxtor are two of my favorite Build artists yet I must have looked at their levels in Mapster more than I ever did directly in the game because there you're not subjected to the author's occasionally arbitrary rules.

[Arzca]

ck3D, on 11 December 2020 - 07:59 AM, said:

I'm also happy you really seemed to enjoy Siebenpolis in Coop (and that it did turn out to be fun to play, I never tested it), I still like this map (although I'd need to release a version with the visibility bumped all the way up sometime; its current darkness can be a bitch with the open scale and long-distance fights), it's definitely bound to always be hit or miss with people given the aesthetics and unconventional means of progression however so whenever people report actually appreciating it, I always find it cool

Wow. I didn't know it was your level.

Regardless, it was the gameplay that got us hooked. The darkness might have caused some problems early on (aside from us just "jumping in" without knowing anything about the map), but once the main street was cleared, we didn't have too many problems with any bad guys that spawned in later (not even mini Battlelords). Navigation was a bit difficult at times due to darkness (while looking for those windows where the switches are usually located), but as we learned the layout and started to remember various places around the map, it wasn't too bad, as we started to recognize some places where we had already been to and places where we had not yet visited. I'm sure we'll do a lot better next time.

I personally liked the big scale, and how intimidating some of the fights were at first glance, particularly the main street (the first big fight), but it is very fun (could be just me alone lol) to have a fight in a map that looks very hard, and you're not instantly given a Devastator+99 missiles. Instead, you have to improvise on the fly to create a strategy to tackle the "low-priority" threats, like Pig Cops and Enforcers before you gain access to those big guns. I like being challenged when playing a map, and Siebenpolis does just that, not only in the monsters / weapon department, but also in the navigation department. Maps like Siebenpolis are the kind of maps that have replay value, because there are so many ways to play them better the next time you play, like completing the map faster, selecting a different route, using weapons more efficiently, or just simply finding all the secrets.

BTW, we did find all the secrets (or actually, my friend found all of them, I found none).

[Merlijn]

@ Arzca: that's really cool, it's the first time I get feedback on the coop version of Apocollapse! Glad to know it works mostly fine since I was never able to actually test it.
But I guess coop mode needs some more ammo pick ups?

It's a bit of a shame I had to remove the opening scene, but obviously you can't respawn in a crushed sector.
Glad to know the hub idea worked out nicely, it's a more refined version of something we did with Clear the coast (having teleporters open up once you get beyond certain points in the map).

The 2 sequels also have coop support, but they may be a bit less coop friendly. There's no hub so you'll respawn back at the beginning in those.
Tragedy should work fine but I'm not sure about Epicenter. Anyway, thanks for sharing the experience!

[Arzca]

Merlijn, on 11 December 2020 - 09:20 AM, said:

@ Arzca: that's really cool, it's the first time I get feedback on the coop version of Apocollapse! Glad to know it works mostly fine since I was never able to actually test it.
But I guess coop mode needs some more ammo pick ups?

It's a bit of a shame I had to remove the opening scene, but obviously you can't respawn in a crushed sector.
Glad to know the hub idea worked out nicely, it's a more refined version of something we did with Clear the coast (having teleporters open up once you get beyond certain points in the map).

The 2 sequels also have coop support, but they may be a bit less coop friendly. There's no hub so you'll respawn back at the beginning in those.
Tragedy should work fine but I'm not sure about Epicenter. Anyway, thanks for sharing the experience!

Hey, long time no see!

EDIT: I forgot to point out that we are using modified USER.CON file while playing coop that gives us extra ammo (30 Shells from a box, 100 bullets from Chaingun ammo box, 10 Rockets from RPG Ammo, 10 Pipebombs from a box and so on) by default in case a map doesn't have enough multiplayer ammo.

Still, I think there could have been 2X Scuba Gears (the other could pal #1?) and maybe some low tier ammo (Pistol and Freezethrower) prior to the underwater lab. Maybe some extra ammo and Health on the first street (after Duke says "Holy Shite") wouldn't hurt, like a Portable Medikit, some extra Shells and small some other small pickups.


And for those who don't have a chance to play Co-op, inventory items respawn by default, which was the case during our playthrough.



Very much looking forward to the boss map of the series. I do understand if you want to drop Co-op support, because it might take a number of sprites away from your creations while going for the absolute limit

[Ninety-Six]

I'm curious. What did you use to play co-op with?

[Arzca]

Ninety-Six, on 11 December 2020 - 10:01 AM, said:

I'm curious. What did you use to play co-op with?

EDuke32 OldMp

[ck3D]

Arzca, on 11 December 2020 - 09:19 AM, said:

Wow. I didn't know it was your level.

Ha, that's even greater! I think you described all the strengths I was trying to put into that level really well, and I'm glad you got the intended experience. Like I was saying, a lot of people (including reviewers) didn't really like that map and the pal 7 thing put quite the number of players off by default (but the niche who liked it really liked it). Not that I care, it's logical that a piece of work will speak to who it will speak to, I just kind of wish I had released a version with no visibility fog as that would eliminate everything about the darkness which is the worst practical flaw of that map (but if you're into literally obscure exploration of big places then it can also contribute to the mood). For instance, ideally, struggling to find the open windows should only happen to such an extent, otherwise it takes a dedicated Duker. Props to your friend for finding all the secrets in a blind playthrough too, IIRC they aren't super well hidden (although the palette might help mask a few) but they're kind of spread apart from one another and a bit random, although somewhat numerous. One thing I always got completely inconsistent feedback on regarding this map has been the monster to item ratio too, it's always been night and day between 'you'll be properly set no matter which route you take which is great' and 'the concept only works so well as a lot of bad routes will fuck you up'. I guess in general, there's always stuff around but it really depends on the player's style whether or not they spot it. I also once saw a comment along the lines of 'I'm really impressed, fine-tuning the gameplay in this map must have taken months of beta-testing' when in reality I just pulled it off first try in half an hour and voilà, that was the map.

Making it was a formative experience in many ways though, it taught me to approach mapping from a different angle that was interesting to explore.

[Ninety-Six]

So with LR&WB being an absolute total loss, I was still really in the mood for something that scratched that same itch. I wanted vanilla gameplay with some new enemies to play with.


I still haven't found such a thing yet but I'm open to recommendations.


In the meantime, I decided to play the Starship Troopers TC again. Last time I played it was back in like 2013, and I didn't even finish it. Got to about the second episode before I forget what happened. Also back then, I had no idea what was going on as I had neither read the book nor seen the movie.

I still haven't done either but this time I noticed the lengthy story text on the ModDB page so I was a little more well-armed.


Beat episode 1 just now and I must give credit for how surprisingly tense it is. This is another good example of killing everything being clearly communicated as the wrong thing to try and do. Between the infinite spawns for some sequences and just how deadly even one lone bug can be, it's an experience to jump at every noise and sweat at every encounter. I like it!

[Mister Sinister]

Well, my friend, if you're looking for a vanilla mapset which will hand your ass to you I'm gonna play the "shameless self-promotion" card and recommend you giving Death Drive a go.
It's a vanilla style episode with 5 maps each made within 20 hour limit. I also slightly rebalanced the game to make it tougher for the players. The most bullshit you'll find there is excessive use of turrets in level 2.
Try it, it'll only take an hour of your time. You can find it on MSDN or EDuke addon compilation.

[Ninety-Six]

I have that and a few other hardcore mods slated away for playing sometime soon. I'm looking specifically for custom enemies alongside vanilla gameplay, unless that qualifies? Difficulty is certainly welcome in any case, though.

[Arzca]

ck3D, on 11 December 2020 - 11:58 AM, said:

One thing I always got completely inconsistent feedback on regarding this map has been the monster to item ratio too, it's always been night and day between 'you'll be properly set no matter which route you take which is great' and 'the concept only works so well as a lot of bad routes will fuck you up'. I guess in general, there's always stuff around but it really depends on the player's style whether or not they spot it.

Maps with somewhat limited resouces can be either a hit or miss in the gameplay department, and the map may sometimes favour a certain playstyle over casual approach. It was fun to get a confirmation for some of my observations from the author himself, because it just happens that one of my older maps (X3 Studios, I'm looking at you) shares some similarities with Siebenpolis in the gameplay department. Although X3 Studios turned out to be more of "git gud lol" map for a small group of Dukers who don't care about high difficulty, monsters respawning behind your back etc, instead of a map for any casual Dukers to take on. Perhaps this was the reason I felt at home when playing Siebenpolis, and I was able to recognize the reasons and some familiar gameplay patterns from my older work.



In other news: Next, I'll try beating AlexCity 1: Bank Heist: https://msdn.duke4.net/hotalexcity.php (MSDN review and screenshots)

[Merlijn]

Arzca, on 11 December 2020 - 09:57 AM, said:

Hey, long time no see!

Very much looking forward to the boss map of the series. I do understand if you want to drop Co-op support, because it might take a number of sprites away from your creations while going for the absolute limit

Hey! Believe it or not, sprites aren't really an issue, I never came close to hitting the sprite limit. It's always the wall limit that gets you first haha.
So adding in extra goodies with the blue pal is not a problem at all.

The biggest issue is the earthquake scenes, which can lock the player out when they die and respawn at the beginning. The 'solution' in Apocollapse was quite crude by completely removing the scene.
But that wouldn't work in an episodic format.
I'll see if I can find another workaround, because I would like the maps to have co-op support.

[Ninety-Six]

What about opening teleporters or something after the scenes occur?

[Merlijn]

Ninety-Six, on 12 December 2020 - 12:28 AM, said:

What about opening teleporters or something after the scenes occur?

That's what I have in mind for Epicenter.
Apocollapse is a bit harder to figure out, since it opens with a big earthquake scene where everything gets crushed.
My current idea is to give the co-op players a little hub, where they'll have to wait until the earthquake scenes are over.
Then, a teleporter will open for them so they can join. It's not perfect but at least it would make the map playable in co-op.

[Ninety-Six]

And now I've encountered yet another softlock, now in SSTTC. For the final level of episode 2, apparently their idea of balance is to 1.) Give no indication that it even is a finale until you find the boss, 2.) make it a long winding maze filled with bug spawners 3.) give you no supplies at all during the level so that when you find the boss after wandering a maze you are literally unable to kill it.

I've tried. I've cheated with god mode and no I do not have enough ammunition to kill the boss. I had to cheat of course because with no health and infinite spawners protecting the boss because of course there was no way to find out otherwise.

The only way to win is to apparently know from the very beginning that this is a boss level, where exactly the boss is, and what the most efficient route to take to it is in order to ensure you have enough supplies needed to fight the boss.

Great level design!


That makes three completely different mods in a row now where I've run into impossible scenarios. I'm batting a thousand here.