m39

[m39]

Doom WADs’ Roulette Bonus Round: Speed of Doom's MAP33

B22: Descent to Nowhere (Speed of Doom’s MAP33)

Main author(s): Josh Sealy (Joshy)

Release date: March 28th, 2010

Version(s) played: Final

Required port compatibility: Boom

Levels: 1 (MAP33)

Today, we are going back to Speed of Doom, with the normally inaccessible MAP33 – Descent to Nowhere. It was made by Joshy, so expect it to be the more annoying type of the difficult map.

This map was made in ten days according to Doomwiki, and supposed to be the original Descent to Core; it’s also the revamped version of the old map Joshy made during his phase of copying Alien Vendetta and Hell Revealed maps. Long story short – it didn’t fit and ended up as a warp-only bonus map.

The map looks fine. It doesn’t really have anything interesting to look at aside from maybe the cave behind the yellow door, but there wasn’t anything jarring to look at.

The music was made by stewboy called Jail Break. It’s good, but nothing else.

The level seems to be easy to understand. The only annoying part was the very long elevator ride that takes a couple of minutes and has a missable secret and two energy cell packs. But at least it also has a gauntlet to distract you.

Also, I would prefer that the door leading to the exit switch to open like normal instead of requiring shooting it.

It’s probably no secret, if you played Speed of Doom, to realize that Descent to Nowhere is hard. I mean, it was made by Joshy, for crying out loud. Is it at least manageable? I guess… But I feel like some of the battles require finding a secret to beat them without ripping your hair out. Try beating out four arch-viles protecting the yellow key without the secret BFG without going insane.

The only bug I saw was a levitating pinky in the red key area, stuck in the wall.

And I think that’s all I have to say for this map. Descent to Nowhere is a fine map, but that’s it. I can partially see why Joshy replaced this map with the current MAP15.

There is another map for GZDoom from 2010 on my bonus list, but from my first impressions, it looks like the author didn’t know how to make proper fights in the outdoor area, and it turned into a mosh pit with next to no proper cover. I think that, in the best-case scenario, I’ll take a look at it without enemies after dealing with whatever the first WAD on the 2011 roster is.

Thanks for reading my coping slop. I’ll see you all next time.

[m39]

Doom WADs’ Roulette: Revenant Awards 2010

…

We are back.

REVENANT AWARDS 2010 EDITION

We are done with the Cacowards 2010 roster, folks, so that only means that this ripoff is back!

I’ll still be choosing the WADs that gave me the most fun, so there are no changes in that department.

And we have a lot of categories with more than one WAD… It’s actually only four, but for this wannabe award ceremony, that’s kind of a lot for me.

But anyway. Let’s not waste any more time and get into the first category.

SOLE SURVIVOR – BEST 1 MAP LONG WAD OF THE YEAR

Even though I like all of the maps, choosing the winner here was easier than I expected. Drip Feed was good, especially in its second half, but it should’ve toned down with enemies at the beginning, along with being less mangled; not to mention having to idclev or type command code to get to the map instead of just placing it in the MAP01 slot (it was archaic even before 2010). Valhalla was surprisingly good for a ZDoom WAD, even if it looks the same in every location, which can get confusing, along with other personal problems.

And then there is the winner – Arcadia Demade. It might be unpolished in some places, but here, the things that would be considered an annoyance in other WADs, like teleporting enemies and confusing layout, fit perfectly here when you realize that this map was made by one of the Bioshock 1’s designers.

So… yeah. I have nothing else to add here.

PUG-OF-PINK – BEST 2-7 MAPS LONG WAD OF THE YEAR

I have mixed feelings about choosing the winner in this category. Unloved is a better WAD, for sure, but Beyond Revival felt much less polarizing.

Honestly, if I had to pick the poison, I would choose Beyond Revival. It might not be as interesting as the other WAD, but I remember having more fun with it rather than with Unloved. And that’s why the former gets the award.

GOLDEN SPIDER – BEST EPISODE REPLACEMENT (8-9 MAPS LONG WAD) OF THE YEAR

I won’t be counting “Curse of D’Sparil” here, since I only managed to pass 3-4 maps, and I don’t think I’ll finish it due to how tiresome it is.

We will start with choosing the winner that requires a source port. And you know what, let’s just cut to the chase – No Rest for the Living gets the first award in this category, because what kind of WAD does it have as a competition? TurboCharged ARCADE! – The Sequel Episode? Yet another Mockaward winner?

But seriously. TurboCharged 2 has interesting concepts, and it’s better than its predecessor, but it’s still nothing compared to NRftL, which blows it out of the water. It even blows TNT and Plutonia out of the water.

The second award goes to the second episode of Base Ganymede, which wins by default. While polarizing, I remember having fun playing it.

OFF THE WALL – BEST PARTIAL/TOTAL CONVERSION OF THE YEAR

Choosing the winner for this category was really easy, since it's Threshold of Pain. Stronghold WAD might have its fans, but for me, it’s just another one of Tormentor’s overblown projects, not to mention how it feels like it was made more for co-op rather than singleplayer. ToP might have at least one annoying new enemy, and some of its maps feel like dragging on, but I still liked it, and it’s great for people who like the PS1 port.

OTHER AWARDS

As always, or as almost always, there will be WADs that won the award by default. For 2010, we have three of these.

UAC Ultra gets the Platinum Revenant award for the best 10-19 maps long WAD/megaWAD of the year. It might lack in colors, but it was really fun to play from what I can remember.

Epic 2 earns the Full Deck of Diamonds award for the best 30-32 maps long megaWAD of the year. Not as good as Hell Grounds and has a severe case of too many corner goblins, but when it gets good, it gets really good.

And Speed of Doom gets the Big Fucking WAD award for the best 33+ maps long megaWAD. This WAD has some of the best slaughter maps created, and that’s coming from someone who is not really a fan of these. I especially recommend the Darkwave’s maps; Joshy’s are more mixed bag for me.

CONCLUSION

And that’s the Revenant Awards 2010, folks! Apologies for sounding off in some places. I think I have a couple of loose screws in my head while writing these words. I would say more in some parts of this post, but my brain wasn’t rotten by school essays we all had to write.

Before I take a break from Doom WADs, there are still two maps on my bonus list to play.

See you next time.

[m39]

A very short look + rant on Stronghold WAD

Hello, Tormentor…

We meet again…

Yes, folks. It appears that I was unlucky enough to take a look at another WAD project made/led by Daniel Gimmer.

Now, I’ve played three of his projects before this one. I remember liking ZDMCP1, where he was a project leader, although this map had questionable decisions regarding some parts of it, like new weapons. And despite liking both of his 2007 projects (that were on Cacowards), those were even more polarizing. Knee-Deep in ZDoom, looking at it now, feels like an overblown project that even by 2007 was a polarizing mess, and Ultimate Torment and Torture, while not as messy as the former, felt so pretentious that the level of pathos could make you burst out laughing.

Now, we end up today, with Stronghold: On the Edge of Chaos…

Why do I feel like the title is pretentious before I even played the damned thing?

Stronghold is, in the most basic explanations, a mix of tower defense and FPS genres. Think of it as Skulltag’s Invasion’s pretentious cousin. 34 normal maps plus a training map, 4 secret maps, and a hub. Dozens of new monsters, items, weapons, etc.

It also feels like it was prioritized for co-op. I tried playing the first normal map on HMP, and I felt like it was unbalanced for singleplayer, since it gives you next-to-no time to prepare between waves. It would be great if they allowed you to start the next wave on your own volition instead of giving you at best 10 seconds to grab a new weapon/ammo and heal yourself. Along with saving enemies coming from multiple holes in the final wave, if they wanted to have it in singleplayer as well. I wonder if it’s even possible to complete any of the maps alone without being forced to use powerups.

These can be bought in the hub, along with permanent health/armor enhancements. Oh, and by the way, you won’t be allowed to buy anything unless you have at least one extra life (you start off with three), and these cost a lot, strengthening my argument that the singleplayer mode was half-assed in the making.

I also have mixed feelings towards the audio-visual side of the WAD. The maps that I played seem to look nice, but the other stuff, like new music, sound effects, and weapon sprites, feel questionable at best, with the super shotgun looking and sounding off the most. Not to mention enemies barely bleeding, but that’s a nitpick at this point.

In normal circumstances, I would stop talking about this WAD here, saying that it was not for my tastes, and call it a day. But this is the case of a WAD that insists upon itself. Don’t believe me? Take a look at the part of the description in the text file:

You know Doom, it is always the same, get some weapons, infiltrate the destroyed UAC base or demon hive, kill all the monsters and hellspawn and find the exit switch. This was Doom... until now: […]

…

My brother in Christ- You are an Invasion mod with Tower Defense elements mixed in! You are not reinventing the wheel! You are not a messiah of Doom WADs!

And, sure, most of the Doom WADs, when stripped to the core, are basically the same – find keys and kill enemies until you reach the exit. But from what I experienced, playing WADs and maps that appeared up to 2010 (and even some after that year), I have to say – NO!!! Doom is not always the same thing!

Even when you only take a look at the games and official WADs, Doom II has maps that happen in the city during its second third, along with secret maps referencing Wolfenstein 3D! And Doom 3, while having a progression from tech base to hell, offers a much different experience from the Classic Doom; it’s closer to survivor horror than another flying around and murdering everything in sight!

Why does the person who was behind the description (providing it was either Tormentor himself or someone else) pretend that it’s always the same thing?! Why do they ignore many of the partial/total conversions, better or worse, that were created before this one came out, after 4-7 years of its development?! Why do they pretend that Doom WADs were nothing but techbases and heck itself, when the last WAD I reviewed had an Egyptian theme for 2/3rds of it?! Do they also think that all WADs were 32 maps long before this came out?!

…

Honestly, aside from sheer arrogance and pretentiousness, I have no idea why they act like that. All I know is that this WAD is another Quarter-Death that sniffs its own farts thinking it’s Half-Life 3. I might have gone hyperbolic for a moment, but this is how I feel right now.

If you want to try the WAD and have a couple of friends who would be interested as well, then go ahead. I won’t stop you.

As for me, I think I’ll start preparing the Revenant Awards 2010.

I’ll see you then.

[m39]

Doom WADs’ Roulette (2010): Epic 2

G9: Epic 2

Main author(s): Alexander S. (Eternal)

Release date: November 25th, 2010

Version(s) played: ???

Required port compatibility: Vanilla

Levels: 32 (classic 30 + 2)

Today, we are playing another Eternal’s WAD. This time, it’s the sequel to his 2007 WAD, Epic.

Now, the first Epic, despite being janky, was one of my favorite WADs of the 2000s, so as you can see, Epic 2 has a high bar to pass, especially with the vanilla restrictions compared to the predecessor’s Boom compatibility.

Let’s see if Epic 2 lives up to the hype.

I would say that for the vanilla restrictions, Epic 2 looks pretty good. It’s kind of hard for me to talk about how the WAD looks without comparing it to Eternal’s previous work, since those require a source port to work properly, but from what I’ve seen here, there are areas that look incredible.

While most of the maps are in the Egyptian theme, the second third of the WAD throws a curve ball here, offering more original locations for lack of better words like spaceship or vaguely Earth-like places, including the city map (this one is my favorite from this part of the WAD).

There is also an additional WAD for the OpenGL ports that changes the sky textures. Mostly it’s just a more HD version of the original sky textures, but the one in the final third and secret maps changes from nighttime to either dawn or dusk (my money is on the former).

Some of the monsters and items get a little makeover as well… With pain elemental looking unintentionally questionable to say the least.

Also, the rocket launcher now looks like a flamethrower from PowerSlave. Forgot to mention that.

I liked most of the music. Although I feel like some of the tracks were either too quiet or too loud. The one in Gunman will especially make you deaf if you use a source port and won’t dial the music down to around 25%.

Most of the new sound effects are also fine. Not a fan of the ones for lost souls and pea shooter/chaingun, though.

Epic 2 tends to get cryptic sometimes. It likes hiding switches behind walls and corners, but I would be lying if I said it’s complete moon logic. Most of the time, finding the switches was rather easy.

Sometimes, you would not believe that this is a vanilla WAD due to the voodoo magic it does behind the scenes, like one door requiring multiple switches to open, doors that open like actual ones instead of just sliding up, etc. This is not the first time it happened, though; Espi was capable of doing that years before this WAD, from what I can remember.

Unfortunately, there were also a couple of moments with slow-moving auto-lifts... I swear to God, there will be at least one WAD in each of the yearly rosters that has something that even in the late 1990s was seen as outdated and cringeworthy.

But changing the subject. Before talking about moments in some of the maps, I have an advice for you – press on walls with hieroglyphs on them, since these can hide either a secret or an important switch/passage.

Now the moments:

The final location of Goldmine, along with the entirety of Tower, references the first Epic, where you arrive at the final map by train. Although I remember that instead of exploring the tomb in the rock, in that WAD, you were exploring one below the pyramid.

Alien Ship ends with you boarding a flying saucer and slaughtering its crew in Mebius before ditching it in Orion’s Belt. You steal another aircraft by the end of Hologram, although this time, you crash at the start of Gunman without killing anyone on it.

The aforementioned Mebius has dispensers scattered across it that will heal you when used.

Astral Base has red lasers that will kill you if you touch them. These also appear in Escape (supposedly; I can’t remember encountering these).

You die at the end of Anomaly Zone, forcing you to start the WAD’s final third with nothing but a pea shooter.

I’ve counted at least three maps in the final third that utilize Keens to progress further.

One of these maps is Ogdoad. This map references Eternal Doom the most, since it’s based on Darkdome from that WAD, down to turning on and finding eight switches before being able to grab one of the keys, with the difference here being, of course, Ogdoad using an Egyptian theme, and the key and switches being red instead of yellow. It is also the most moon-logic map out of the entire Epic 2, which shouldn’t be surprising considering what inspired this map. I don’t recommend playing this map multiple times. Once in a while is enough.

Amenthes is yet another icon of shit. At least this time, you can quickly finish it with mouse look on, and you get some gauntlets before reaching the boss.

Osirion is a Misri Halek homage, down to one of the keys being placed in a rocky area. It’s definitely more memorable than Harbour (it’s a fine map on its own IMO though).

I think the difficulty is slightly above medium. Most of the time, it’s manageable, but it never gets too easy. Then you get to around the last third/fourth of the WAD, where it gets hard. It wasn’t as insane as Speed of Doom from what I can remember, but there were moments with a slaughter level of fights. Mortuary, for instance, has at least two encounters where the room turns into a mosh pit that you can only survive with an invun.

Now, trying to memorize Eternal’s previous WADs that I played, I remember that there were some cheap moments here and there, some including corner goblins.

Well, let me tell you – out of all cheap stuff Epic 2 has, it is ESPECIALLY ADDICTED to corner goblins. I’m serious. I feel like at least half of the areas on all maps have hitscanners (or imps) hiding in corners of the entrance. And it gets annoying really fast. I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to hear METH LAB for the hundredth time when entering the new area. This is a crutch to artificially increase the difficulty. And after playing around 15 years of Doom WADs, I might be numb to this, but not when it repeats so much.

Changing the subject to something more… neutral, there are a couple of times where you see platforms (usually pillars) that have respawning hoovies on them (usually those buggers). It’s not as bad as it sounds, since it’s not a large number of enemies waiting in a queue to teleport on the pillar.

As for bugs, there weren’t any. Just two instances where there was a wrong texture on a colored door (and in both cases, half of the door had a red indicator instead of a yellow/blue one).

Epic 2 has annoying stuff in it, but I think I would still call it very good. It looks great despite vanilla restrictions, and it wasn’t as cryptic as you may think. Plus, I like what the author did with mechanics when under the aforementioned restrictions. If it only turned down with the difficulty cheapness, especially with the corner goblins, I would consider this WAD great instead of just very good.

Now, is this WAD better than Epic 1? I would say yes. Same thing when compared with Gravity.

Is it better than Remain 3 and Hell Ground? Now that’s debatable. Remain 3 has annoying gimmicks as well, from what I can remember, like some enemies, but I think I had a better time with that WAD than this one. If I have to be merciful, I’ll say that these two are equal to each other, and it all depends on whether you prefer shorter or longer WADs. And as for Hell Ground- DON’T BE RIDICULOUS! Hell Ground is better!

But let’s calm down. We are getting close to the end of the 2010 roster, and it looks like the final WAD is made by a team of WAD makers…

…led by Daniel Gimmer...

…

sigh

Fuck me sideways…

-_-

Okay, I’ll say it now. Do not expect the normal review from the final WAD. I might check a few maps (from what I’ve seen on YouTube), but that’ll be it.

Besides, I have a couple of Doom maps from 2010 to finish playing for the second time.

I’ll see you next time.

[m39]

Doom WADs’ Roulette (2010): Drip Feed

G8: Drip Feed

Main author(s): Trevor Primmett (iori)

Release date: May 18th, 2010 (database upload)

Version(s) played: ???

Required port compatibility: Boom

Levels: 1 (MAP30 replacement)

Today, we will be looking at another map made by iori. We already met him a couple of times, such as with Songs of the Damned (which was one of the best maps of the 2000s) and a bunch of contributions to community projects before this. And now he won another Cacoward.

It will be hard to top SotD, but who knows? Maybe this map will be better than his last one. Let’s find out.

Well, for starters, the map looks good. It looks the same in many locations, but it still works for being trapped in some kind of demonic castle. The architecture also looks great… I think? And I definitely have no cons on the new imp’s fireball…

…

Let’s change the subject.

Drip Feed is one of those maps where you usually ask where the fuck do you go next, with its mangled-maze design and, in case of this map, at least three switches that you won’t have any idea what these did. It’s not that bad after the blind playthrough, and definitely not as moon-logic-filled as some of the WADs I played in the past, but it can still get quite jarring.

I would say this map isn’t hard. Sure, the beginning up to the blue key tends to get annoying due to you being bombarded from every direction with a small amount of cover most of the time and having not enough weapons for most of that time, but thankfully, it gets easier from that point.

All the stuff I know about bugs is that some of the marble columns don’t appear on the map (according to Doomwiki).

Drip Feed is a good map, but it has problems. I would be happy if the author toned down with the enemies in the first third of it and made it less confusing. But at least it’s playable.

Thankfully, something tells me that the next WAD will be much better, with Eternal returning with the sequel to Epic.

See you next time.

[m39]

Doom WADs’ Roulette (2010): Speed of Doom

I wonder how much time will pass until [Speed of Doom] turns into another slaughter galore.

…

Turns out… when the second episode starts, in my opinion.

G7: Speed of Doom

Main author(s): Josh Sealy (Joshy) and Darkwave0000

Release date: March 28th, 2010

Version(s) played: Final

Required port compatibility: Boom

Levels: 33 (standard 30 + 2 and the warp-only MAP33)

Finally. A fully-stacked megaWAD (plus warp-only MAP33).

But what is this WAD? Well… This is Speed of Doom, a WAD made by two goobers – Joshy and Darkwave0000. It started out as a semi-speedmapping project (according to one of the textfiles), where the authors had one week per map to finish, but with the growing complexity of the maps, this rule was dumped into the trash can.

The story is that you wake up in the cave you were supposed to check out, and the sky is green because of the chemical apocalypse or something (it didn’t happen on Earth, FYI), and you are immune to its effects. Try to guess who’s responsible for all of this mess (it’s not the UAC chucklefucks this time; the textfile doesn’t mention them).

Now, with the information out of the way, why won’t we finally take a look at SoD and see what it has to offer?

For now, I’ll try talking about the WAD without comparing which author did a better job. I’ll save this for the near end of the review.

Now then… The WAD looks great. For now, it might be one of the best-looking WADs of 2010. Some of the maps look more primitive than the others, but the highs overwhelm the lows by a mile. I would say more about the visuals, as I think it will be better if you play the WAD yourself.

Aside from two stocks (one per classic game), I enjoyed the music very much. Without counting the ones taken from other WADs and games, most of it was made by Stuart Rynn, with Jimmy Paddock providing an additional five tracks. Even Darkwave himself added two another tracks to his maps. Aside from Stars being my favorite (duh), my top choices would be Getaway, MIDIfied Midnight Carnival, and probably either Gluestar or Drips, if not both.

Speed of Doom is not a complicated WAD, although there were moments were I got stuck, like with the titular Ruins of Kalnik in the hub area, where you have to figure out that you can run to them from its northwest side through a hole in the wall. Other than that, it was mostly switch-hunting bullshit.

Like with both Scythe WADs, the WAD is separated into three episodes, where you end up dead at the end of one before pistol-starting another. The second episode’s ending is pretty hardcore, since you basically place yourself in the coffin, and according to the intermission screen, you go to hell by aiming a peashooter at your temple.

FUN FOR THE WHOLE FAMILY >:]

As for some of the other maps, the Core is where, at the end, you blow up the titular machine and everything goes dark.

Resurrection, aside from waking up in a cemetery, has a couple of references to E1M1.

Hais Temple felt like it was upside down most of the time.

Darkness Without End is yet another icon of shit (I can’t free myself from these). This time, you are forced to wait around 3 minutes until you can blow up John Romero, while there are hundreds of demons, and there are 24 spawners on HMP.

People can scream into the heavens how some of these are good, and I would never believe them.

Now for the secret maps, the first one, which I like to call Binary 666 (original title is actually 666 written as a binary number), is a complete oddball when it comes to the map theme. Unlike mostly slimy caves (with tech bases), mostly earthly ruins (also with tech bases), and hellish landscapes of each respective episode, this map is completely made out of tech stuff. Like you ended up in some kind of simulation. And while I really like this map, I don’t like the way you get there from Descent to Core – you have to arch-vile jump on a small, grassy molehill where the spiderbitch was to unlock access to the red key required to access the secret exit.

The second secret map, The Pyramid of Death, is something that I would call a masochist’s delight; the type of map regular WAD enjoyers would play with god mode and infinite ammo. That’s how I played it, at least, and I’m throwing the towel on beating it normally. Getting there is much easier than Binary 666 – you just have to find 7 Keens scattered around that map and kill them to unlock the passage near the regular exit. Other than that, the intermission screen describing it says the truth.

I salute everyone who managed to beat this map legitimately, even on easy.

Speed of Doom is hard; there is no doubt in that. It might start normally with the medium challenge, but as soon as you reach Meat Grinder, it will get only harder and harder; not to mention some of the maps having hundreds upon hundreds of enemies, starting with Sledge. Stuff like Poison Ivy II will give you nightmares (although, not as much when not pistol-starting and on the easier skill).

While most of the time it was rather fair, the difficulty has some annoying bumps, like pop-up monsters, these teleporting front to back, starting the map surrounded by them, and probably something else that I couldn’t think about.

There was one nasty bug that I encountered on Simple Prison-Yard, where one of the arachnotrons didn’t spawn, and I had to use cheats to kill it. I don’t know if it’s because of where I stood or due to the version of GZDoom that I played, but it happened.

And now, it’s time to ask – which one of the two authors gave me more fun? Let’s start with comparisons – Darkwave’s maps tend to get big and sprawling with a lot of monsters and ammo; basically, more-standard slaughter maps. Meanwhile, Joshy’s maps are smaller, more cramped and claustrophobic, and go nuts with the difficulty, whether fair or not.

Personally, I prefer Darkwave’s maps over Joshy’s; at least the former’s slaughter feels like something even someone who doesn’t like these kind of maps (like me) can have a blast playing these, compared to the latter’s maps that feel more like a gimmicky challenge with artificial bullshit and high RNG sprinkled in-between. And, hey, when you are surrounded at the start, Darkwave at least makes the enemies turn around so they won’t see you at first.

But at least Joshy can make hard maps with a small amount of enemies, I might add.

And, I think that’s all I have to say about Speed of Doom. I’m at the second run of MAP27 as of writing these words, but that’s enough for me.

Despite having questionable difficulty in later episodes (mostly from Joshy), it’s still a great WAD. It looks great, and it plays great. What’s more to add?

If you are interested in this WAD, at least play the Darkwave’s maps; some of these were the best slaughter maps I have played by now.

And as for MAP33 – Descent to Nowhere, like with Plutonia 2’s MAP33, I’ll save it for a bonus round, since you can get there only by warping.

Now with the (hopefully) hardest WAD of the 2010 out of the way, the remaining WADs will be checked out faster. And thankfully, the next WAD on the list only has one map.

I think I’ll start playing it in the nearest Monday.

See you next time.

[m39]

Pure.

so polite

[m39]

Protect the child at all costs!

one step closer to fitting in

close ups:

[m39]

Doom WADs’ Roulette (2010): Valhalla

G6: Valhalla

Main author(s): Edward Cripps (Ed)

Release date: November 14th, 2010 (bug-fix version)

Version(s) played: With bug-fix

Required port compatibility: ZDoom

Levels: 1 (MAP01 replacement)

Today, we will be having a map made by Ed Cripps. We encountered his work years ago with Sin City 1 from 2001. If my memories aren’t faulty, I remember that map fondly in spite of being an early ZDoom WAD, and these tend to age faster than milk.

Will Valhalla be better than Sin City 1? Well… Why won’t we take a seat and have a look?

The map looks great, if not overly detailed, to the point of my computer slightly choking itself up while trying to load it. It gives me the post-apo vibes (the sky texture helps with that) with exploring some abandoned complex/bunker/whatever.

There is some music here, although it’s pretty damn quiet. I don’t think I’ve heard anything while playing the map (especially during my blind playthrough), so I don’t know what to think about it.

I don’t really think this map is complicated, although the same-looking areas tend to get confusing, and sometimes it gets hard to exit some of them. Luckily, if you get lost, you can follow spawned enemies to the next important area.

Valhalla can be challenging to some degree, although I would like it more if we had armor sooner than around the second half of it, and didn’t throw two fights that are just random shit being thrown at you.

Aside from the aforementioned minor stability problems, I didn’t encounter any other bugs. The Doomwiki mentions some enemies not being able to teleport to fight, however.

Valhalla is a pretty good map to play (and yes, it is better than Sin City 1). Despite having some problems, there wasn’t anything that severely hindered it. And hey! It’s not overwhelmed with the ZDoom features, so that’s always a bonus.

As for the next WAD on the list, it looks like we will be playing some banger, since it’s Speed of Doom…

I wonder how much time will pass until this WAD turns into another slaughter galore.

See you all next time.

[m39]

Unloved WAD's enemy list

Hey guys. I’m back from Cracow… Need to remind myself to not take me mum with me on vacations; it’s like I was babysitting a child who wants to see everything (she really wanted to see Cracow).

But enough of personal stuff. We will be talking about new monsters that appear in the Unloved WAD; if you haven’t seen my review of it, go do that first.

I’ll try going in order these guys appear (somewhat).

We start with a chainsaw zombie. A melee enemy with next to no wind up. I don’t recommend going melee on them.

Bloodfiend is a red pinky that spits blood on you from a distance. Honestly, a good update from when these buggers would suddenly charge at you without any warning (and were differently named).

Golem from Heretic appears as an enemy here. If you didn’t play that game, it’s basically a weaker pinky with a smaller wind-up. Doom shotgun has a chance to blow it up to smithereens in one shot.

Howler acts similarly to the arachnotron, except it’s an imp variant. Kind of hard to notice these in this WAD.

Soul harvester is an imp with homing projectiles, and these have insane sharp turning. Might as well be hitscan since 9 times out of 10, you get hit even after dodging the fireball.

Satyr is a hell noble that can only melee you. Nuff said.

There are two familiars you fight. One is a bat that is annoying to kill since it’s very small. The other is a dragon – still annoying, but at least it’s slightly bigger than a bat and is more distinguishable.

Acolyte is a reskin of a dark bishop from Hexen, where he shoots a spinning line of projectiles at you.

Cultist yells like the ones from Blood, but unlike these guys, his attack doesn’t shred health (it’s still really fast though).

Vulgar shoots a projectile that poisons you and looks like a mix between an imp and a skeleton to me.

Lord of heresy is a tougher baron of hell. Nuff said.

Imp warlord can summon familiars along with using shields and firing powerful attacks. At least they don’t have much health.

Disciple is a tougher variant of a flying human cultist with two attacks (at least that’s how many I’ve noticed).

Daedabus is a tougher variant of mancubus that looks like the one from Doom 3.

Dark avatar is one of the two new boss enemies. It’s a reskinned heresiarch from Hexen, but unlike the acolyte, he has different attacks, with the protection spell being thrown out of the window (thank God). Two/three BFG face-blasts will blast him to kingdom come.

Suicide zombie is basically a headless kamikaze from the Serious Sam series (down to even screaming like him) – runs towards you before blowing himself up.

Wicked is actually scrag from Quake I but with homing projectiles instead of spitting acid.

Thamuz is the second new boss. It’s a cyberdemon variant with BFG. Can be killed in two/three BFG shots like dark avatar, although his attacks feel like were filled with more bullshit. I feel like it’s a dice roll if you won’t end up obliterated before you even step off the lift unless you place yourself in such a way that the boss won’t notice you on it.

According to Doomwiki, there are also a couple of enemies that weren’t used, like rocket zombie and cybruiser.

And that’s the list.

Thankfully, the next WAD on the 2010 roster, despite being another ZDoom extravaganza, has only one map. So hopefully it won’t take long to gather materials for the next review.

I’ll see you then.

[m39]

giggling

That's the last thing I'm gonna show before being unavailable for a week (vacation). I just wanted to show a noncontextual spoiler from the newest chapters of Deltarune that cracks me up.

See ya.

[m39]

Doom WADs’ Roulette (2010): Unloved

G5: Unloved

Main author(s): Paul Schneider (BlueEagle)

Release date: April 14th, 2010

Version(s) played: 1.3

Required port compatibility: GZDoom

Levels: 5 (hub-based)

Here is some spooky underdog today – Unloved. Despite its name, it earned one of the Cacowards from 2010.

No. There is no story. You are just stuck in your house, which is either haunted and bigger than it looks, or you are just losing your marbles.

I’ve run out of things to say in the intro, so why won’t we look at the WAD itself?

The WAD is creepy… What? You want me to say more? I mean, there is a living room that’s either covered in ice/web that can change into demonic guts when going from MAP01 to MAP03, a river of slime, demonic church, spooky child room with the blue keycard in the crib, the fact that you can see the buildings in the distance in your house but the glass is bullet proof and the exit is bricked up, etc.

Does it all at least look good?

…

Yes… It looks very good IMO. Nothing else to add here.

The music fits as well, although I feel like the track from the Basement’s Basement is a bit tryhardy. My favorite one is in Lost Childhood; it adds to the creepiness.

This WAD is not complicated, although you might have problems with finding some switches (the darkness in some of the areas doesn’t help). If you have probably guessed from the description at the start, Unloved is hub-based, with Alone connecting to the other maps.

To make you understand it slightly more, you start trapped in your bedroom, find the yellow/red keycard (depending which one you get first), unlock access to the blue one and the super shotgun, grab the yellow and red skulls, unlock access to the blue skull laying in the attic, and finally returning to Lost Childhood to kill the final boss and unlock the exit door in MAP01.

If you hate cheap jumpscares, don’t worry, there is only one in MAP01. And it’s just a revenant that doesn’t even appear.

Also, jumping is required in some cases.

The WAD is rather challenging from start to finish. It takes a while to be able to shoot something that is not a peashooter.

Although, I feel like at least third of the fights feel full of bullshit. Mostly due to how many times you fight an armada of monsters in tight areas. I feel like there is at least one such fight, like, for instance, the church in MAP03, the second half of MAP02 (as in probably everything behind the red door #2), or, to a lesser extent, fighting cacos in the caged-up maze in MAP04. Unless you find a secret BFG on MAP04, and/or go for the wrong map, you will be suffering.

Two of the biggest cases of how fairness is uneven are the yellow skull area and the aforementioned, demonic church, both appearing in Living Room. The former is actually fun, with a lot of space to make monsters fight with each other and finish off the scramblers. The latter meanwhile, while giving you rockets, plasma, and a megasphere, forces you to fight around a similarly dense army of demons and cultists, while giving you a smaller main area, plus a couple of smaller rooms to press switches, where each one summons an arch-vile that starts resurrecting everything and a boss. Good luck trying to beat it without a BFG or ammo for it.

If you want a rather perfect roadmap to not rip your remaining hair out, go like this after the first visit in MAP02 – yellow 1 (MAP03) ==> blue 1 (MAP05) ==> everything else before going through the red door on MAP02 ==> the rest.

There are a lot of new monsters to fight, but I think I will describe them in a separate post because there are a lot of them. Here, I will only mention a tougher imp that shoots toxic fireballs, scrags that shoot homing projectiles, some enemies from Heretic and Hexen, and the BFG cyberdemon as a final boss.

Unloved is another case of a ZDoom WAD that probably went too far with its idea; although, I think this one feels better than the similar ones that I played. It is flawed, in some moments even deeply, but it’s still a good WAD. It’s worth at least taking a look at on the easy difficulty.

By the way, there is also a game based on this WAD, made by its author and released in 2016. It might look like an Unreal Engine 4 slop for me, but what do I know? Maybe I’ll try it one day.

Also, don’t expect the enemy description in the following days, since I’m flying to Cracow this Sunday for a week.

But, yeah, that’s about it for today.

…

See ya next time.

[m39]

Doom WADs’ Roulette (2010): UAC Ultra

So, uhm… a little change of plans, people. Turns out Curse of D’Sparil seems to be a slaughter map fest, and I don’t really want to waste a couple of days forcing myself to finish it as quickly as possible (currently, I’m at the fourth map). I’ll probably finish a map or two in between other reviews (screenshots and secret hunting will be completed in one go when I reach that part), but don't be surprised if my second playthrough will be on easy.

So, yeah, let’s take a look at another WAD from the roster.

G4: UAC Ultra

Main author(s): Jamie Bainbridge (Super Jamie) and Jon Vail (40oz)

Release date: March 28th/29th, 2010

Version(s) played: 1.2

Required port compatibility: Boom

Levels: 12 (11 normal ones and an epilogue)

Now, here, we have a somewhat of a semi-underdog. While Super Jamie is a member of the BTSX Team behind the two episodes of the titular series, WAD enjoyers will recognize 40oz much quicker than the former one. I mean, come on, the latter kickstarted the Doomer Boards Project series of WADs that goes from 2018 to this day; not to mention winning the Mapper of the Year award in the 2010 Cacowards.

But enough about the authors. What is UAC Ultra exactly?

Well, it started as an experiment by 40oz to see if it was possible to make amateurish maps look great with brown textures. Four completed maps later, the WAD ended up in a garbage can.

Later on, he came out with the idea of making a WAD (different intentions) with Jamie since they both noticed that their map-making style is similar. While talking, the latter mentioned wanting to make a WAD with new textures (especially Quake ones), reminding the former of his abandoned experiment. 40oz decided to dust off and improve the old textures (at least that’s what I understood from the Doomwiki), and he and Jamie started working on the WAD in mid-November 2009. It was announced on January 6th of the next year, and the rest is history.

Speaking of history – What bullshit and where did the UAC do this time?

You pick up a note.

Mars…

You pick up another note.

Unethical experiments…

…

So, Tuesday, I presume.

If I could describe the WAD’s design in one word, it would be oppressive. The facility feels like it was made by hell itself; the Mars’ terrain looks off as well; even the skyboxes feel oppressive. It looks so great that it doesn’t make me think of how the indoor locations look samey most of the time.

But, not gonna lie, some part of the wishes there were more colors.

Half of the soundtrack is made out of the one from the Abuse game, while the rest is one stock and the tracks made by Nick Baker and Jimmy Paddock. It was great to listen for most of the time; I don’t think I have anything severe to complain about.

The maps didn’t really feel complicated. There wasn’t even that much backtracking, which is always a plus.

A couple of times, you will be forced to walk into a cold room or a radioactive outdoor area, and have to find a rad suit. Thankfully, there is a plethora of these, so you won’t be in that much danger.

You end up killed at the end of Collapsys and forced to pistol-start the next map.

And BTW, that next map, Haymaker, is the typical Dead Simple clone, down to using the stock music. The only different things are the textures and the new enemy that appears after dealing with the typical meat cannon of these kind of levels.

On the other hand, Sick, the final, normal map of the WAD, is not another icon of shit (thank God). You just have to shoot three, fleshy tentacles of the boss (called Chimaira), and destroy its heart that shoots a barrage of fireballs.

Also, this WAD ends with a credits map. Just mentioning that.

UAC Ultra is somewhere in the middle when it comes to difficulty. Starts off easy and steadily becomes hard by the final two or three maps (minus the epilogue map). Although, I feel like Sick is filled with much more bullshit than Skagway; at least the latter only had lacking rockets and plasma.

Other than that, there is other cheap crap sprinkled in between the remaining maps but nothing to severe.

It also has a new enemy – haymaker. A fusion of a cyberdemon and maulotaur that throws three mancubus’ fireballs and looks like it endlessly charges while moving.

UAC Ultra can easily fit into the category of great WADs that have aged well. It’s fun to play, even when it sometimes doesn’t look that interesting.

I wish I could say more, but I think it would be better if you check the WAD yourself.

Next WAD on the list – some spoopiness, I presume. And no, I’m not waiting until Halloween.

See ya later.

[m39]

Noelle at the most huggable/floofiest.

girl of all time

[m39]

Deltarune No Longer Tomorrow

Okay… Yesterday, I finished the newest chapters of Deltarune (3 and 4 as of writing these words). I had a blast playing them, despite sucking at bullet hell games (Raise Up Your Bat is the best music track from both chapters).

Had to block all the popular social media sites to avoid getting spoiled.

Also, note to self - play only in the morning to avoid an adrenaline rush while trying to sleep... and limit myself to only one chapter per day.

[m39]

Doom WADs’ Roulette (2010): Arcadia Demade

Something, something, Would You Kindly joke funny… I have no idea where to put it.

G2: Arcadia Demade

Main author(s): Jean-Paul LeBreton

Release date: August 19th, 2010

Version(s) played: ???

Required port compatibility: Limit-removing

Levels: 1 (MAP01 replacement)

Hey! Ever wanted to play part of Bioshock 1 in Classic Doom? Now you can. This is Arcadia Demade, a map based on the original game’s Arcadia and Farmer’s Market, made by one of the designers behind both Bioshock 1 and 2 (although I’m not completely sure if he helped with both of the original maps the WAD is based on).

Now, it would be one thing if this map were made by just your typical, WAD-making bloke who happens to enjoy Bioshock. But the fact that it was made by someone who was working on this game?! Bruh… How about we skip to the map, because I can’t wait!

Despite looking like it uses only stock textures (aside from the sky one), I think this map looks great. In spite of playing Bioshock years ago, I still managed to recognize many locations from the original maps, like the ADAM-infused plant represented here by a bunch of skulls, Julie Langford’s lab, the area with a gigantic tree (although without the aforementioned tree), etc.

The music track is also great. It was made by John Weekley, who would, a decade later, earn two Odyssey of Noises awards in a row. And this is one of the earliest works, people.

The map is kind of complicated, but mostly due to how mangled it is. Even then, I don’t think it’s worth calling it a con since it was based on the original Bioshock maps, so I don’t think I should be that irritated by the map’s design.

The map has a secret exit – all you have to do is reach the normal one, and come back to the starting area to notice a new corridor leading to a new teleporter.

By the way, the starting area, as you progress, unlocks a sort of one-way fast travel teleporters that will let you come back to the visited areas without wasting time.

AD is rather easy. I can recon only one cheap hitscanner ambush, and even then, there is a lot of health and armor scattered around the map. It’s not that surprising to me since the map focuses more on an atmosphere.

Speaking of which, a lot of monsters tend to pop out and disappear. Normally, it would be annoying, but with this map, it feels like it was simulating the behavior of Houdini Splicers, who like to appear and disappear before chucking a fireball at you. It works especially well when recreating your first encounter with this enemy type in the original game.

While I didn’t find any bug on the map, Doomwiki mentions a really nasty one – normally, your way to the normal exit is blocked after crossing one of the nearby linedefs, and you have to press the blue switch to unlock the door back. The problem is that that switch can be pressed only once, so if it happens that you didn’t cross all of the five linedefs that block the door before pressing the switch, then congratulations, you just soft-locked your ass from completing the map unless you noclip through the door.

Arcadia Demade might be an unpolished diamond, but it’s a diamond nonetheless. It’s a great recreation of part of Bioshock 1, and the fact that it was made by one of the game’s designers makes it even better. Even the cons that would annoy me in the other type of map/WAD feel like they nicely fit here.

So, yeah. This map gets a 100% recommendation from me.

Unfortunately, I am taking another one-week-long break from reviewing since Deltarune Chapters 3 and 4 are out on June 4th or 5th (I don’t even know anymore), and knowing the Undertale fandom, they will immediately flood the Internet with spoilers. Besides, I just had a mole from my jaw removed; I need some rest.

But, hey! The next WAD is going to be interesting. It’s going to be a Heretic WAD.

I’ll see you next time.

[m39]

Doom WADs’ Roulette (2010): No Rest for the Living

Welcome to the ten best WADs of 2010 (according to Doomworld). And we start off with a bang.

G1: No Rest for the Living

Main author(s): Arya Iwakura (Squibbons) and Russell Meakim (The Castle) of Nerve Software

Release date: May 26th, 2010 (along with the X360 port of Doom II)

Version(s) played: ??? (used Doom + 2 to run it properly with the 2021 MIDI pack)

Required port compatibility: Limit-removing

Levels: 9 (standard episode format)

And that bang is official content for Classic Doom. People thought we were done with stuff for the originals, and yet, lo and behold – No Rest for the Living, a new episode for Doom II. Originally released with Doom II port for Xbox 360 (weird choice but okay), it would later be brought on PC (officially) with Doom 3: BFG Edition on October 16th, 2012.

The plot, from what I’ve gathered, takes place after Doom II, and it involves a cyberdemon trying to, and bear with me on this one, […] turn hell into a personal amusement park, and make Earth the ticket booth.

…

Let’s just go with the standard hell invasion stuff, okay?

Around 14 years have passed since the last add-on for Classic Doom. Time to find out if this one will deliver.

There are two ways to look at NRftL – with and without context. If you take a look at this WAD without context, then it looks rather good. For a limit-removing WAD, it has many great-looking locations, although something tells me that I saw better stuff in other WADs of the past.

But, if you add context to the WAD, knowing that it’s a new episode to the Classic Doom after 1996, than it looks incredible. It blasts the other, official stuff out of the water.

When it comes to music, it’s made of stocks, but at least the tracks are arranged differently (providing that you don’t use the BFG Edition IWAD).

Since I’m not a fan of stocks, I used the MIDI pack made in 2021, and it’s great. My favorite tracks were Homesick, Dry Gulch, and Staccato Slaughter.

The levels weren’t complicated (at least for me). I don’t think I even encountered a moment where I had to stop for a while to think what to do next, and if I had, it was probably due to how some of the maps are mangled, like Inferno of Blood.

Many of those maps use a carrot on a stick to tease you (especially Earth Base). But instead of a proverbial carrot, it’s usually a key/weapon/item.

At least three of the maps also have unmandatory keys, scattered in secrets that might even require other secrets.

NRftL can get challenging, but it’s still rather easy compared to some of the harder mods in the past. If you compare it to the previous, official WADs (minus Plutonia), then, yeah, it’s hard. The only parts where it got legitimately hard for me were with the final fight in March of the Demons and, maybe, Tomb of Malevolence, where you fight the cyberdemon in tight areas (if you don’t know where the switches are and/or have no BFG).

The WAD likes to get devious – Earth Base fills back with enemies if you grab the yellow key; Vivisection tends to flood itself constantly with enemies, especially after grabbing the red key; and the aforementioned final battle in March of the Demons distracts you with spiderdemon while the arch-vile resurrects dead demons.

Also, because I forgot to mention, there is no backpack throughout the entire WAD until MAP08.

The WAD itself doesn’t have any bugs, although I had problems properly playing it with the MIDI pack. It somehow works when I use the PRBoom+ version of the latter with the Doom+2 version of the IWAD (probably because ID24 feels like MBF21 with some additions). Trying the ZDoom version of the MIDI pack with the original IWAD doesn’t work, and if you modify the former with SLADE, you are unable to play the WAD normally without command lines (at least, that’s what I experienced).

But aside the problems with the MIDI pack, No Rest for the Living is a great WAD. If you are able to play it, do it! You won’t be disappointed.

Also, check Civvie’s video in it. He does a much better job of describing the WAD than me.

As for the next WAD, it’s going to be interesting as well. Because we will be exploring part of Rapture.

I’ll see you then.