Good Doom/Heretic/Hexen WADs

[tormund]

I finished "Doom Vacation" https://www.doomworld.com/idgames/levels/doom2/Ports/v-z/vacav14
It's a short partial conversion based on famous Duke Caribbean. "Based on" is an understatement, since architecture, layouts, secrets are carbon copy of Duke Caribbean maps. Even the music, sound effects and low res girls are there... Weapons are also replaced by Duke Caribbean weapon sprites. There are only four maps, but each is faithful to original. If you played original Duke expansion youll know exactly what to expect. I just wish he replicated all maps and gave beachy facelift to Doom monsters.:D

 

[Riskbreaker]

I'm slowly going thru last year's public beta of Stomper. Right now I'm at map 15 and I have been really enjoying myself so far (not really sure if I'll finish it now or wait for the final release, which is why I'm posting this now).
Gameplay and layouts of opening maps have this distinctly vanilla Doom 2 quality to them only with quite higher level of detail and some neat new textures, map 1 itself is a pretty sweet homage to Entryway. Map 5 presents a notable jump in difficulty but in a good way, it feels like something straight from Alien Vendetta. Following maps are pretty heavy on hated chaingunners, both of sniping and of waiting-behind-the-cover variety, but surprisingly I didn't hate the way they played once I adopted appropriately careful playstyle. They also feature some non-linear layouts, and there is some pleasure to be found in finding the optimal route and gaining the upper hand on the mobs. Tho, on the other hand, some of them were on the unintuitive and keyhunty side.
Few maps were genuinely great looking, but they were contrasted by other that, while not in any way bad on the eyes, featured much more basic detailing and lighting (tho. that is to be expected considering how unfinished this megawad was when the guy that's currently working on it took over).

Spoiler

 

[tormund]

^Stomper has been on my to play list for a long time now. Last I checked there weren't any updates about next beta for ages so you might as well finish it if you like it, since who knows when or if it will be finished...

 

[Corporate_Jew_Master]

Project MSX is weird as fuck but I like it. Just play with shift key pressed and use only fists.

 

[ghostdog]

I'm slowly going thru last year's public beta of Stomper.

It seems the dropbox link for the beta in the Stomper thread is down. Is there any other place you can download stomper, and if not can upload it somewhere?

 

[Riskbreaker]

I'm slowly going thru last year's public beta of Stomper.

It seems the dropbox link for the beta in the Stomper thread is down. Is there any other place you can download stomper, and if not can upload it somewhere?

Here ya go, latest publicly available beta (1c):
http://www.moddb.com/games/doom-ii/addons/stomper-beta1c

 

[Ninja Destroyer]

So I finally finished on the latest awarded wads - Skulldash. It's a mix of platform game and regular FPS. You need to grab 75 percent of the coins to unlock the exit to level. They have different colours too, so some of them will give you health/armor/time. The last one is important since you really need to move on if you don't want to see 0:00 on the upper right corner of the screen. After that is just :splat: and you need to play it again. If you are lucky and find all the coins you'll get a secret mega health to grab.

Every level has it's unique quirks (I liked the one with low gravity, yes you need to enable jumping to be able to beat the game). There are some random new monster well known from realm667. Plus we have a custom minigun which I saw in some other mods, grenade launcher, railgun. I didn't saw BFG7000 on any of the maps. Sadly your inventory beside the health is taken away and after beating the level you are returning to the hub map where you choose another map from the tier chambers. It's not long, but some of those levels will make you weep when you battling the monsters and the clock is ticking too loud. It's not very difficult once you know the map, BUT the last level where you need to fight 3 earlier bosses at the same time AND after that beat the Overlord is a "little" unfair.

 

[tormund]

Project MSX is weird as fuck but I like it. Just play with shift key pressed and use only fists.

Awesome gameplay mod, I mentioned it few times in this thread. I'm my experience Project MSX was the ONLY gameplay mod that successfully adds elements of some recent shooters, in this case Crysis and Vanquish, to Doom. It isn't everyone's cup of tea and it doesn't work well with some map styles (try to play it with some harder slaughterfests like Combat Shock and the result will be unplayable clusterfuck) but I had tons of fun with it. I even replayed entire Community Chest 4 in combo with Project MSX.

 

[Astral Rag]

 

[tormund]

That was so written by Romero himself.:D

 

[Riskbreaker]

Finished "We´re All Dead Here" and "Church", both made by Arch (of Pirate Doom fame).

https://www.doomworld.com/idgames/levels/doom2/Ports/d-f/deadhere
https://www.doomworld.com/idgames/levels/doom2/Ports/a-c/church

First one is a 4-map mini episode for Zdoom. Good looking, non-linear maps with relatively easy gameplay. They are also pretty different from one another, both in the visual and in the gameplay department, and Zdoom gimmicks become ever more prominent with each new map. They contain decent amount of new resources (mostly taken from Blood), and quite a few new enemies (which also become more common as one progresses thru the episode).
Some of these maps are pretty creative, for example one map starts out as this innocent unassuming techbase, only it contains one literally demonic twist (clue is in the name!). Or third map, "Chaos Dimension", which need to be seen and played for oneself to be appreciated.
Fourth map, titular "We´re All Dead Here", is the star of the show: huge, moody non-linear map consisting of a (ridiculously detailed) cemetery placed just next to an abandoned small town over which, in a classic horror fashion, looms an imposing fortress. Great exploration, superb visuals (again, detailing and lighting in cemetery areas is really fucking impressive), few neat scripted moments. Gameplay is on the easy side, even if that starting monster count is pretty misleading. One somewhat annoying part of this map was the battle against bunch of Blood's stone gargoyles, and only because those bastards are prone to flying beyond the map's borders.

Second wad, "Church", contains single map that serves as a sequel/finale to "We´re All Dead Here". Pretty linear affair, and significantly more difficult than any of the maps from "We´re All Dead Here". Can't say that I was a big fan of gameplay in this one, as it is pretty reliant on arena combat (visibility is also pretty impaired at times). It looks nice tho, and has a pretty neat theme - insides of this church in which you'll do most of the fighting become ever more deformed and demonic as the battle goes on.

Spoiler

(I'm pretty sure that this particular skeletal snake served as a bridge in that "lost civilization"-themed map from Pirate Doom)

 

[tormund]

Not only do the weapon sprites look like ass, weapons even become Next Gen Blurry when shot.

 

[lightbane]

Let's see:
- Weapons are so big that they make it hard see what the hell you are shooting (especially with these unnecessarily flashy projectiles).
- Weapons do not seem to have anything resembling balance, instead some are clearly better than others while certain ones are more dangerous to yourself than anything else.
- Pointless and unnecessary weapon mods that make the above issue even worse.
- Monsters look kinda dull and dumb modifications of original Doom ones.


Indeed, this is a worthy Doom 4 emulation.

 

[tormund]

It's not 100% worthy yet, he needs those BD-inspired immersive (TM) cinematic (TM) finishers for that.

 

[Gragt]

I finished The Lost Episodes of Doom a few days ago. It was actually quite pleasant, though there is much much better available. The first half was made by Christen Klie and it’s the part I enjoyed the most. As I said before, I don’t “like” his style but I can appreciate it thanks to its taut design and ability to disorientate, plus I also grew found of the north/south/east/west pattern and the light puzzles thrown in for good measure — light enough to not stop the action but provide a distraction and a bit of a surprise. His work for the Master Levels is better but this one is certainly nice. The second half, by Bob Carter, I found more problematic. On one hand, I like the size of his levels, which is a nice contrast to the claustrophobic design of Klie, but, as many have already noted, they feel way too empty and one can’t help but think that most of this space is wasted. There are very little good encounters to be found, and he showers you with so much goodies (megaarmors, soulspheres, invulnerabilities before each Cyberdemon encounter) that the whole thing ends up being too easy to the point of hand-holding — be glad that this is only Doom, else you’d encounter megaspheres as well! The final level being the same as the first was an interesting twist, although not really used well — if you don’t do a pistol start and arrive with the BFG, the encounter with the Spiderdemon is simply trivial and the level can be finished by exploring only the first couple of rooms.

Interesting little WAD. Not very difficult, especially the second part, and some nice surprises to find but your mileage may vary. Not a must-play by any means but it can yield some good times.

Edit: some exemples of good ideas that should have been given more polish: at some point you can teleport to a room that will teleport you to a room that is exactly the same, and the only exit is via a teleporter that sends you to an exactly similar room. That’s a nice way to mess with your mind, with the content of the room being exactly the same, but with only two imps the thing becomes an annoyance over time. A surprise should have been added in one of these, preferably after you had been lulled into a false sense of security.

 

[Darth Slaughter]

Well, I'm playing Sunlust in ultra violence. After the mouselook discussion in the othe thread (the nu-D44M one), I decided to play it with vertical aiming/free-look set off. Of course, using the mouse to turn left and right, but still now I'm limited by the doom vanilla rule set.

So far, I finished map 10. I'm loving this wad, but sometimes it pisses me off, like when they put you in crammed spaces with 30 to 60 top tier monsters (baron's, pain elementals, cacos, cyberdemons). Also, sometimes monsters get stuck and don't teleport from their hidden closets. I heard it will get even harder later, so...

Anyway, I'm trying to get all secrets, but I missed one in map 10, I know where it is, above a waterfall, with two mancubi. Is there a way to get there, without cheating?

 

[tormund]

Don't get this wrong, but it is pretty unlikely that someone will remember exact placement & solution of a particular secret in some megawad's map, unless he played same megawad recently or worked on it. Not to mention that bunch of players (myself included) don't even try to go for 100% secrets most of the time. It's pretty commendable that you are aiming for 100% TBH, especially with a megawad like Sunlust.
Your best bet is to check online for video playthroughs of that map.

 

[Darth Slaughter]

Don't get this wrong, but it is pretty unlikely that someone will remember exact placement & solution of a particular secret in some megawad's map, unless he played same megawad recently or worked on it. Not to mention that bunch of players (myself included) don't even try to go for 100% secrets most of the time. It's pretty commendable that you are aiming for 100% TBH, especially with a megawad like Sunlust.
Your best bet is to check online for video playthroughs of that map.

well, i try to 100% kills and secrets, but sometimes, secrets are not possible without cheats (even in some original missions). I actually got the secret using the idclip, as I couldn't find any switch/trigger spot to go above the waterfall. there was anothe level in which monster got stuck in initial separate rooms, and so I couldn't kill them. But in these cases, I'm ok with cheating before exiting the level just for the sake of completeness, or leave as it is.

Anyway, the videos on youtube don't mention the specific secret I want. I was hoping there were dedicates forum threads about a specific level/wad, though. But anyway, no harm done.

 

[tormund]

There are dedicated threads on Doomworld, large ones in case of bigger release like Sunlust. They aren't of much use for hints however (you can always make account there and ask in that thread, but some time has passed since Sunlust has been released and this goes back to what I have said earlier).

One thing that might help you, even if it is basically cheating too, is to enable showing of trigger lines in GZDoom's automap options. If you do that, the linedefs with which you can interact will always be highlighted on automap.

 

[Tehdagah]

Well, I'm playing Sunlust in ultra violence. After the mouselook discussion in the othe thread (the nu-D44M one), I decided to play it with vertical aiming/free-look set off. Of course, using the mouse to turn left and right, but still now I'm limited by the doom vanilla rule set.

Playing without mouselook is annoying. The aim assist can easily kill you if you are using a rocket launcher.

 

[Darth Slaughter]

Well, I'm playing Sunlust in ultra violence. After the mouselook discussion in the othe thread (the nu-D44M one), I decided to play it with vertical aiming/free-look set off. Of course, using the mouse to turn left and right, but still now I'm limited by the doom vanilla rule set.

Playing without mouselook is annoying. The aim assist can easily kill you if you are using a rocket launcher.

To be honest, I'm doing this just to see if there's a significant difference. I tell you: there isn't.

 

[Tehdagah]

Well, I'm playing Sunlust in ultra violence. After the mouselook discussion in the othe thread (the nu-D44M one), I decided to play it with vertical aiming/free-look set off. Of course, using the mouse to turn left and right, but still now I'm limited by the doom vanilla rule set.

Playing without mouselook is annoying. The aim assist can easily kill you if you are using a rocket launcher.

To be honest, I'm doing this just to see if there's a significant difference. I tell you: there isn't.

It will happen, soon or later.

 

[Darth Slaughter]

Well, I'm playing Sunlust in ultra violence. After the mouselook discussion in the othe thread (the nu-D44M one), I decided to play it with vertical aiming/free-look set off. Of course, using the mouse to turn left and right, but still now I'm limited by the doom vanilla rule set.

Playing without mouselook is annoying. The aim assist can easily kill you if you are using a rocket launcher.

To be honest, I'm doing this just to see if there's a significant difference. I tell you: there isn't.

It will happen, soon or later.

I played through all original levels of ultimate doom, doom 2 and final doom, pirate doom, winter's fury with mouselook last month. Pirate doom and winter's fury even requires mouselook.

Now I'm playing through sunlust (a wad that is difficult as hell) with no vertical mouse look. And i'm having no trouble that unlocking mouselook would solve.

 

[dednaem]

There absolutely is a difference with mouse-look on.
Regular auto-aim only works when you are at a certain distance from the enemy, if you are too close or too far it doesn't work. Which forces you to put yourself in their line of fire.

With mouse-look, on the other hand, you can shoot at anything from any distance and any angle, which breaks a lot of encounters. If there's a group of enemies on top of a ledge above you, you can simply run up to the wall below them and shoot upwards without them ever being able to hit you back. There are also tons of situations where you can snipe everything from a safe distance while the intended design was for you to man up and put yourself at risk.
With just a little creativity you can find a lot of safe spots where enemies won't be able to hit you. Sunlust is filled with these kinds of situations.

You can also pick apart individual targets in large groups (Pain Elementals being the most common example) while the intended design is for enemies in the front to act as tanks, protecting the more important ones in the back.

EDIT: here's the secret you were talking about: https://youtu.be/RvFPAZr7x7g?t=372

 

[Darth Slaughter]

There absolutely is a difference with mouse-look on.
Regular auto-aim only works when you are at a certain distance from the enemy, if you are too close or too far it doesn't work. Which forces you to put yourself in their line of fire.

With mouse-look, on the other hand, you can shoot at anything from any distance and any angle, which breaks a lot of encounters. If there's a group of enemies on top of a ledge above you, you can simply run up to the wall below them and shoot upwards without them ever being able to hit you back. There are also tons of situations where you can snipe everything from a safe distance while the intended design was for you to man up and put yourself at risk.
With just a little creativity you can find a lot of safe spots where enemies won't be able to hit you. Sunlust is filled with these kinds of situations.

You can also pick apart individual targets in large groups (Pain Elementals being the most common example) while the intended design is for enemies in the front to act as tanks, protecting the more important ones in the back.

EDIT: here's the secret you were talking about: https://youtu.be/RvFPAZr7x7g?t=372

YAY! thanks.

The difference in gameplay exists, but playing in both ways recently, there's no impactful difference in confort or difficulty. I don't think it would be easier to go through a level with mouselook on. The sunlust level 9 had revenants in a pit that if I had mouse look, I could just aim down and kill them from above. But it still requires you to be smart and avoid their attacks. The only thing is since I don't have mouselook on, I had to do it in another way, that was also effective, and It didn't gave me that feeling of going back to the convenience of mouselook, because the other strategy I devised was convenient already.