Good Doom/Heretic/Hexen WADs

[tormund]

What's with all this controversy with the Brutal Doom mod creator Sergeant Mark IV?

He recently released a shitty megawad that features missing textures and rest being of mixed qualities in addition to not being aligned well, ripped maps from freedoom, shittier versons of his own previous maps and end of episode screens popping up in the wrong place.

I watched a stream of that, and it really looked like a kitchen sink of a megawad. I particularly "liked" how there is no consistency in detailing and style between maps, you have the mixture of basic looking maps with shoehorned GZdoom stuff, and really overdetailed maps. One map will be completely abstract group of rooms and corridors, and then next map is "realistic" and extremely detailed city or base...

As far as the controversy goes, it's a combination of him originally not crediting the sources he used for BD, and him almost always behaving like a stereotypical Halo/CoD player during the heated chat (casual racist comments, general rudeness towards anyone and anything, getting really angry at the slightest criticism of his mod, making fun of other modders, mods and players...). Brutal Doom's fanbase isn't helping either. I think the last straw was when he told one Doomworld user with legit mental issues to go kill himself.
Basically, he is the worst kind of

.

It's worth mentioning that some of the prominent members and moderators of places like Doomworld or Zdoom forums are on the SJW side of things and can be really petty themselves (especially Zdoom's WildWeasel), so Mark's "fame" is partially overblown due to that.

 

[ghostdog]

Bah, wherever there are modders there is drama. Especially in such a rich and old modding community as doom. IIRC there was some seriously moronic drama when Saturn X Ep1 was released. There was some other team of modders that had xtreme butthurt with the team that made it and they were constantly shittalking and giving ratings 0/5 on that mod, which BTW is fucking great.

 

[tormund]

Knee Deep in Zdoom also had loads of epic modder drama and butthurt related to it. It was so big, that it convinced Kaiser (of Doom 64 EX fame) to create full length TC inspired by entire KDIZD meltdown. https://www.doomworld.com/idgames/levels/doom2/Ports/megawads/cif3
(it was a fun TC too, imagine Doom equivalent of The Nameless Mod)

 

[PeachPlumage]

Sounds very Codexian.

 

[Gragt]

Shitty balance is the biggest problem I have with many modern wads. Mappers often seem to go for style over substance these days.

I frequently find myself really enjoying the first few maps of some super detailed, beautiful megawad only to become frustrated midgame because there simply is not enough ammo to kill all monsters. Custom enemies can aggravate this issue because they tend to have more HP.

That’s why I love Plutonia: it looks great, especially for a vanilla WAD, and plays great, being hard and tricky but not stupidly unfair.

 

[tormund]

Plutonia's gameplay proved to be really hard to emulate well, despite it having arguably most influence on the mapping scene to this day. Few wads managed to pull it out without becoming too frustrating or just tedious. Look at Plutonia 2, unofficial sequel from some years ago, to see how easy it is to mess it up and go into genuinely unfair BS territory, despite it being made by some top mappers and trying to be a maximally faithful tribute.

 

[PeachPlumage]

Re-playing doom I love the way that all of its parts come together to create something that is really enjoyable and addictive even to this day. The different enemy types, the unique sounds and weapons of each enemy and the strategies that sometimes need to be used by the player. The player's weapon arsenal that gradually becomes more powerful in a very progressive and numeral way. I still jump when I hear an enemy make a sound and when something in the environment is activated and then the enemies pop out. The seamlessness of going from a tightly small style indoor area to that of a really vast expanse outdoor area still amazes me as it did back when I first played doom years ago.

 

[Gragt]

Plutonia's gameplay proved to be really hard to emulate well, despite it having arguably most influence on the mapping scene to this day. Few wads managed to pull it out without becoming too frustrating or just tedious. Look at Plutonia 2, unofficial sequel from some years ago, to see how easy it is to mess it up and go into genuinely unfair BS territory, despite it being made by some top mappers and trying to be a maximally faithful tribute.

Oh yes. One of the things I like about Plutonia is that the maps tend to be small but with a very tight and memorable design, so even when you restart from scratch you are never too far away from the place where you died.

 

[Sothpaw]

Oh yes. One of the things I like about Plutonia is that the maps tend to be small but with a very tight and memorable design, so even when you restart from scratch you are never too far away from the place where you died.

I'm playing Plutonia (on map 23 now) for the first time now and I really like the smaller maps. I played the Master Levels and TNT a few weeks ago and some of those maps are way too fucking big.

One thing about Plutonia though is everything is a trap.

 

[Riskbreaker]

So, (over)ambitious Fortune's Run TC is actually alive and it even got a demo.
http://forum.zdoom.org/viewtopic.php?f=19&t=50188
There really isn't much to that demo map, extremely short and straightforward escape from a rusty, dingy spaceship. 'Tis more notable as a showcase of some of the new mechanics and additions that will be introduced in this TC. Thief-like stealth system based on lighting and sound is the main attraction, together with the promise of DE-ish location damage. You'll also have a taste of leaning, dual wielding, new inventory system and a PDA that can be navigated with mouse.

Spoiler

 

[Campion]

It doesn't look like it was brought up in this thread, but I recommend Aeons of Death. It's a megawad that's like a compilation of most of the relevant 90s FPS games crammed into Doom.

 

[tormund]

That is a gameplay mod, not a megawad. I never tried it, and from what I saw it looked like it kept becoming more and more of a kitchen sink as development went on... I also remember controversy and juicy argument that started when it got one specific "award" in one of the past Cacowards.
I know it has its fair share of fans however.

 

[Campion]

Haha, yeah I probably used the wrong word there. To be honest, from the different versions I've tried, it seemed like they would bring in a bunch of weapons or gameplay features, then inexplicably take them away or replace them with different ones as it went along. I'm one of those people who just download the thing and never interact with the community, so I've never been aware of any drama surrounding it. Perhaps I'm better off.

One of the other things I like about the mod are the absolutely atrocious engrish title cards that seem like they were written by a angsty 13 year old.

Spoiler

 

[Alex]

Murder is in the air, everywhere you look around...

 

[Astral Rag]

Replaying Flashback to Hell on a new laptop and oh god it's still heavan.

This is one beautiful, balanced 12 level Doom 2 reimagining. Will have to play all the author's other Doom creations next.

 

[Riskbreaker]

Vordakk is superb mapper, I reckon that Oblivion will be exactly to your liking: balanced, really professionally made D1 E1 replacement ('tis actually a full re-imagining of an episode he released few years ago which was pretty good stuff to begin with, and definitely worth a try, despite that overblown humility about it on Oblivion's archive page).

 

[PeachPlumage]

Looks like Flashback to Hell and Oblivion is on the cards for Christmas. That soundtrack is awesome, listening to it now. Any other soundtracks you guys can recommend to check out?

 

[tormund]

Any other soundtracks you guys can recommend to check out?

I love soundtracks from BTSX series and DV 2.

 

[PeachPlumage]

Thanks, tormund.

 

[Astral Rag]

 

[PeachPlumage]

Crazy!

 

[baturinsky]

http://www.doomworld.com/cacowards/ has 2015 results

 

[tormund]

That was posted few pages ago.
2015 was a really good year and 2016 promises to be just as good (especially since there is a high chance for a uncommonly large number of heavy weight TCs to be finished during 2016: Blade of Agony, Hocus Pocus Doom, Golden Souls 2...)

 

[PeachPlumage]

All I have been playing lately is doom and I have so much to catch up on in terms of wads and mods. I won't have much time now to get to playing my Icewind Dale series winter playthrough.

btw has anyone played Hell to pay?

 

[oddech_wymarlych_swiatow]

It's kind of weird no one has done a SMT:Strange Journey TC for Doom yet... SJ is basically closest thing to 'Doom RPG', even more than official Doom RPG so...

Spoiler