Doom 2 Reloaded

this is flames 

Dull, but fun.

I have played hundreds of WADs and Doom 2 Reloaded is my favorite WAD of all time. I think I have played it more than 50 times.

No, I'm not joking.

I don't know what it is, really. But I never, ever get tired of this WAD. It's just perfect in every conceivable way. The gameplay is fantastic. It's not overly elite and difficult like most WADs these days. The levels don't shy away from linearity, while so-called good mappers are terrified of it. It's a one-man production, which automatically elevates it above others that are not in my view. One-man megawads are incredibly special and offer a window into the mind of its creator. And I can see that there is beauty within Andy's mind.

Great megawad that re-imagines Doom 2 how it should have been: With recognizably earth like settings. The maps look generally very realistic with some really good Doom cute furniture and the occasional funny vignette. Gameplay stays classic and imho on the easier side, which is a welcome treat in times of slaughtermaps and too much actual mapping, thus not having enough times to actually play Doom. This is no Sandy Peterson or overly hellish WAD mind you. You do get some hellish hellscapes in later maps, but the majority is earth-like and rather corridor focused. Enemy encounters are on the traditional side as well, with almost nothing standout, except that weird "Warehouse Siege" map that features what felt like 1,000 Archviles. I did not know how to progress there and had to cheat in the end, other than that you can pretty traditional encounters which means a shotgunner around the corner, and a pinky in the sewer, etc.

Even so, the really great design and occasional custom textures make this a standout WAD that traditionalists definitely want to check out.

This is Doom 2 The Way Team TNT Would Have Done.

And i love it!!!

From the get go we got seriously really good realistic maps that set a really good mood and atmosphere.

Brilliant design and texture work!

Linear? yes, but fun as hell, too!!!

There are really awesome ideas on this megawad, like the map you need to move stealthy to don't awake the teleporting Arch-viles. Marvelous!!!

But this megawad take the Team TNT design to the max, and that means that after map20, things start to fall apart a little. From this point, some maps feel like fillers, or too simplistic. While other are really awesome (map28 takes the cake).

I had a blast with this mapset, i played it a lot when i was a Brutal Doom player, but i didn't take a look for all the neat details here. Sure the blood blinded me, ugh.

But now, after replaying it vanilla (yes, vanilla, i can't describe the joy of seeing a mapset soo detailed on vanilla settings) i really have the chance to appreciate the intention of this author.

Marvelous work with some flaws.

Thank you, Andy Stewart for this amazing megawad!

It's a very bad megawad. Most of maps are very cramped and confusing to navigate and as if it wasn't enough, the power ups are in hard to find secrets. I don't care about the lack of music because I always use my own midi pack but I can see how it can affect other ppl. The worse maps for me were 18, 32 and 30 but almost all are bad. 
 

Repetitive maze-like level design mixed with dull, linear and uninspired gameplay that can be described by either "shotgunning Barons in a corridor" or "running out of ammo while shooting hitscanners, Imps and Pinkies in a straight line".

The gameplay stays mostly the same from the beginning to the end of this megawad, monotonously. It never reaches a territory close to Plutonia's mercilessness, but rather closer to Doom 1's repetitive loop of shotgunning Pinkies and other walls of meat coming from a single direction.

Most of the difficulty comes from a lack of ammo, and having you wander around very long, cramped maze-like layouts in a search for resources, which, in my opinion, is very boring and leaves too much up to luck.

The realism that the author tried to achieve really hurts the levels overall, mostly from a gameplay point of view. The attempt at logic into level progression and layout lead to repetitive patterns visible throughout the whole journey. The harsh management of resources lead to unsatisfactory progression, as played from pistol starts. That was not 'challenging', but annoying and repetitious.

There was a desperate attempt at innovation, but when the general idea is no more than a copy, there's not much originality here.

The lack of a new soundtrack may as well have hurt the atmosphere of levels very much, for so often the music is unfitting to the level's flow. And, damn, did the author really think we had not heard these midis enough, after Doom 2 had been released for over a decade by the time of this megawad's release? At least try to have personality.

This is a wad that took me months to quit procrastination and decide to beat a bit over half of the amount of levels featured, and with every completed level I'd sigh at how much of a waste of time it felt, a feeling which came a few levels before the end of the first episode.

The definition of "monotonous".

1/5 would still rather play over Doom 2.

Like Doom 2 but better...kinda.

Don't get me wrong, this wad is amazing. I recommend you play it just to see how awesome it looks. Thats one of the best things this wad does. The way the levels are constructed, they all feel like a real place that would reasonably exist (aside from the two secret levels, but that's what makes them special). This adhesion to reasonability does come with it's fair share of problems however. Some of the secrets are just way too obtuse. I get that they are secrets, but secrets are placed in the level with the sole purpose of being found. Sadly, some of the secrets, I could not open for the life of me. I knew exactly where they were, but no matter what I did, I could not access them. I find this mainly to be a problem with the entrance to the first secret level. I played through this wad several times on various difficulties and not once have I found the intended path to the secret level. I'd always resort to noclipping out of frustration. There's also an issue with some levels when you pistol start them. Most levels have a shotgun sitting somewhere within the first minute of a map, but there are some levels where you are put up against unfair odds before you can reach that shotgun. A good example of this is the level that holds the entrance to the first secret level, where you are pitted against two hell knights in an enclosed space that has a lot of different geometry you can easily get stuck on with just your pistol and three ammo pick ups. I get that this is far from an impossible challenge, but 1: its not a fun challenge and 2: I was playing on Hurt me Plenty. I can understand putting me up against two hell knights with just a pistol if it was UV, but in Hurt me Plenty, 1 would be a much more fitting challenge. You could say that the map just wasn't designed for pistol starts, but you can find a shotgun in the very next room from the hell knights. Maybe I just need to get good, but for a mid game map on the average difficulty setting, I have a hard time justifying it.

However, these complaints are nothing but nitpicks when you look at the whole picture. Every level is amazing and some of the level ideas are incredible. My top 3 levels have to be Map09, 18, and 32. 

Map 09 is catharsis incarnate. Watching the demons flood into the crusher room and slowly turn into bloody pulp was awesome. My only complaint is that the hit scanners can still take potshots at you through the viewing window.

Map 18 is a really cool concept and is pulled off really well, although the effect is somewhat lost if you don't pistol start. Also, punching really should be allowed but thats more a problem with Doom itself and not the wad.

Map 32 is a secret hunter's dream/nightmare. This one will take several attempts to 100%, but its a rush when you finally find out how to proceed. Even if you aren't interested in the rest of the wad, I would still recommend giving this level a go just to see how far you can get.

It's not bad but decent at best, first off let's look at the map design: its good better then anything i could come up with but the enemy placement on ultra violence straight up outta plutonia and i love it.

Since secrets aren't my thing mainly because i don't need validation from miserable c*nts on the internet but they were fun to find however the lack of custom midi tracks ticks me off because of d_runnin making me want to slice my wrists mainly because i've heard it a thousand f**king times from making maps or playing sh*t maps, so really at worst it's boring.

This is a fairly decent megawad; good level concepts, and funny secret levels. For me, though, it's a three. Not cause it's overrated or anything, but because it's very one-timey. I actually got stuck on some levels because of this.
Overall, it's a good wad if you like taking chances and looking at architecture and the neat little touches the author put in the levels.

Quite satisfactory with simple but entertaining representations of the levels, with a good plan that manages to fulfill the idea of '' reinventing '' the original Doom 2 bases, entertaining and nostalgic, I like it a lot.

Overall, a nice and enjoyable megawad.  Textures and architecture are very well placed, you got very rich map design in every corner with added custom textures and patches.  The elevators shafts really catched my attention, I don't think I've seen something like that on other maps.  The office/labs textures and spaces really add up to a quality megawad.

Great re-imagination of Doom 2, the levels look and play good with each having they're own theme and / or different progression style, keeping things fresh, definitely recommended.

An excellent re-imagining of Doom2 with quite a bit of difficulty progression and nice finely-honed map detailing, all while being reminiscent of the original game. This is definitely a favourite.

Took me a while finishing this megawad. I dig the city maps. Good for reference although map 30 is just another Icon of Sin clone. Maybe that's what trending that time. Not a fan of map29 as well. I spent like 2 days to figure out where should I go. 4*

really well-designed and pretty-looking starbases and city-levels in here. the music pack on DSDA makes this mod a lot more enjoyable too. it falls flat at the end with a kind of lackluster Hell episode though, and even on HMP the gameplay is a bit tedious. but for the first two thirds of the mod, it's really enjoyable to see all the pretty texture-work and level-design, and it's still fairly enjoyable to play. stick to HMP and lower, don't bother with UV, and you might find something to like if you craved Doom 2 to have a more realistic set of starbases and urban cities.

Except for that one level wherein you have to use your fists to avoid Arch-Viles, this megawad is a good alternative to the original levels of Doom 2.