2002 A Doom Odyssey - 10th Anniversary Edition

2002 A Doom Odyssey (2002ADO) is a limit removing Doom 1 megawad which while more tedious and difficult than its inspiration, never strays too far from its roots. The biggest bout of difficulty you will encounter are the ever increasing usage of barons and cacodemons that turn the concept of visceral combat into a tedious crawl of shooting while retreating. Of course that is not all! In episode 1 and early episode 2 expect to find plenty of scenarios where the optimal move is retreat out of a room and shoot at the demons through the door you just passed through. I consider episode 4 to be the worst of the megawad. It is at this point where the Baron/Caco spam becomes unreal and has an unsatisfying final three levels. E4M6 is too long, E4M7 starts off as the hardest level in the wad but turns into a joke halfway through, and E4M8 is embarrassingly easy. Overall a fun megawad but I recommend stopping after episode 3.

Pretty good levels overall but some of the episode 4 ones are a bit unbalanced. Having a bunch of barons of hell spawn right behind you at a dead end feels sort of cheap. The two extra secret maps from the 10th anniversary edition (E5M1 and E5M2) are only accessible using ZDoom and feel inferior to their quality compared with the rest.

Some neat tricks and ideas in some areas like the opening cyberdemon doors on e2m9 but the combat is fucking garbage.

Constantly teleporting barons behind you with no way to dodge and no health and ammo so you have to camp and single shotgun them to death and pray to the rng gods. (Picture is your typical 2002 ADO combat scenario, and yes I am directly against a wall and yes that is a 64 unit wide unit walkway you cannot get behind the baron on. Only way to survive is taking a few hits which if you get bad rng will kill you in two hits while hoping he stuns to shotgun and doesnt melee you to death)

When it's not killing you with cheap traps you can beat every fight in your sleep probably without taking damage.

Very few scenarios to create infighting so 100 enemies can take longer than some slaughtermaps with 3000+ enemies and feel more grindy.

Giving it two stars: -5 for garbage combat, +1 for being a full 4 episode replacement for ultimate doom and +1 for some neat mapping tricks and a few okay encounters

Really great adventure!!!
From the get go you are greeted with a pure Ultimate Doom experience.

The .txt said it is a boom megawad, but there are no boom features, it was made in the time when PrBoom was the limit removing port, along with ZDoom, and thus being made with them in mind. But in fact, all maps are almost vanilla, and it is just recommended for zdoom because of the extra maps acceded via mapinfo lump, but it can be played on Crispy Doom, for example, without problems at all.

The maps have a good balance between abstract and realistic architecture, making the experience really good as the adventure unfolds. Love the atmosphere here!!!

Really good maps, really good music, interesting story, and fun gameplay... almost!

Yes, from Episode 1 to Episode 3 we get one of the best Ultimate Doom experiences, but in Episode 4, things start to get out of balance a little.
I know that UD's Thy Flesh Consumed is a great step up on difficulty from the previous maps, but 2002: A Doom Odyssey's Torment Ultimaa grant us not a ramp up on difficulty, but on tediousness!

Almost all maps suffer from cramped spaces and spongy monsters encounters, taking a really long time to end this episode. Ok, Barons spice up the difficulty, but not because they are hard and heavy hitting, but because there are not much ammo per map, it takes almost 100 ammo from the chaingun, and almost 10 to 12 shotgun bulls to end this suckers, put almost 15 per map (I hate you E4M6: Pallai's Dementia, is totally awesome map in layout, but the boring and repetitive gameplay and being really large in comparison to previous maps, makes it a borefest!) and you need a lot of ammo... thats not good at all.

Aside from that, this mapset is a great classic!

Thanks Paul Corfiatis, Kristian Aro, Virgil The Doom Poet (badass name, pal!), Joe Pallai, Chris Hansen. Sam Woodman, Rory Habich and Vick Bobkov.

This megawad for UD is surely the best one!!!

Only shit is the intermission screen and new music (my XG synth doesn't sound a great part of the tracks leaving only percussion). Them both fucked up all the atmosphere of the really doomish wad I think. Better go and play the original odyssey

I had a lot of fun with this one.

Few things that bothered me though:

1. Semi-ammo starvation in some areas.

2. Fighting Barons in tight corridors isn't exactly a challenge, more like an annoyance.

Thankfully, this wasn't frequent.

Recommended.

Done with these settings:

- Crispy Doom 4.2, ZDoom for bonus maps.

- Ultra Violence.

- Continuous combined with a pistol start mindset as much as possible.

- Saves every 10 minutes or so.

Important note: The text file explicitly claims this wad is designed to be played on Boom compatible source ports. Nevertheless, I have not experienced any single symptom with Crispy Doom, so this wad should be perfectly playable in complevel 3 if that's what people want to.  

Hmm, well, sometimes reality beats expectations, this has been a mix of emotions and feelings, positive and negative, ups and downs. My first experience with a project leaded by Paul Corfiatis, whom I understand is a well-known active mapper. A fairly likable mapset, with an approach comparable to the old classic iwad, in many ways. First is the ambient theme, each episode follows the same structure of visuals that we know from Doom I, that is tech-bases for the first episode, then something more fleshy afterwards, an introduction to hell, and finally all the pieces together in the fourth episode. I must say though, initially I had a bad taste about the aesthetics, the couple first maps looked rough and very simplistic, part is because of all the symmetry around, a lot of copy/pasted sections, but then visuals got much better later and in the second episode, where symmetry was at least accompanied with more polished detailing. Things turn even more appealing in the third and fourth: more colours, height and light variation became notable features, less square-y geometry in general, still a few minuses here and there such as invasive torches where doomguy can't avoid to glue himself on them. There're also a few new textures which can be seen particularly in secret maps, not that they add a whole new theme to the wad. The Hexen windows looked a bit out of place in my opinion. The new soundtrack has its moments, I'd have preferred myself to hear some recycled iwad tracks in between instead, which is unfortunate because most of the midis used are fantastic, yet they don't match with their corresponding maps in my opinion. 

Anyways, as far as I'm concerned, the idea here is to get an experience more challenging than in classic Doom, while keeping the overall progression similar to it. Well, it's definitely different, there is a higher level of difficulty, but I can't say the same from quality. The ideas from the main author and guests seemed to be correlated to follow a story behind the episodes but the execution of each map left me the impression of lack of consistency between them. This was notable in every episode except for the first one, which despite being the least appealing, it's also the one where you get most of the same two authors. This first episode brings a lot of samey incidental fights in compact hallways, symmetric rooms and mostly SG/CG combat, traps that lack any energy or rely on dickish moves, like instacrushers. You'll immediately drown in shells in the first maps, so pistol starts are ideal, not that it adds a pinch of difficulty. In the second episode, things get a bit more tricky with the introduction of instapops, the kind that you'll never want to experience blind: shotgunners that teleport behind the player or next to them at any time. There's some more variety with the type of ammo you can use, albeit the cases of strict resource economy in maps from Hansen and Babich. The third episode is where the inconsistency can lead to frustration if you opt to pistol start or complete the maps. It has the best looking maps by Corfiatis, and interesting ideas from the other authors, there is no denial about the progress of quality content in regards to visuals, and to some extent, combat. For instance, SG vs. barons/cacos becomes way more common (says the guy who could have used the RL more often but opted to stay on pistol start-ish mode), but sometimes you get a tasty berserk, points for that. Strict ammo or way too much depending on the author, and I seriously can't for the life of me understand what's the point of the "finale" in the third map... Last but not least, episode four contains a great mixed bag of gems and, other less pretty stones. Once again, an advance in visuals and detailing, like now darkness is a fun factor. The strict economy of resources is still an everlasting topic and now it is paired with cramped, congested rooms with meaty monsters that can shred doomguy in a blink of an eye. Not that tight quarters wasn't a thing before, it's just that this episode took it seriously, particularly in the secret map. To my surprise, any upper-tier weapon here comes with little usage, which is an odd design choice for an episode that's supposed to be the hardest. I would personally suggest continuous in both 3rd and 4th episode to "rise to the occasions", or in other words, kill high-HP enemies in less time. Finally, I'd like to mention how anticlimactic the end-of-episode maps are, maybe the exception is E1M8, but for the rest not a single engaging "boss" encounter, for example, the fact you don't even have to shoot a bullet to kill the spiderdemon in E3M8 says it all. Similar with the bonus maps, nothing there you don't want to miss.

Secret-wise, it starts a bit wall-humpy, then it's a hit or miss, some particularly annoying secret chains to get to the secret maps with no intuitive way to solve, or some juicy weapons and armor that otherwise are nonexistent in standard progression. One thing that seemed confusing to me was all the nukage pits with radiation suits, they all looked like there were some hidden secrets, but there was nothing. For favourite maps I'll pick E3M2, E4M1 and E4M6, while also E4M4 and E4M5 are among the best ones too. I can't say I loved anything from the first two episodes though. 

Overall, maybe memorable, but not legendary, and this is really not an important thing, just try the middle episodes on continuous or surrender to Tommy the Trooper and his army of barons :P. Whatever, my rate is 5/10.  

this has always been a moderately fun wad. there's brand new music for E4 and the new E3M5 seems decent enough (certainly much bigger than anticipated). the old E3M5 became a new secret map. a whole lot of things remain the same, but this is still fun to blast through. the only real hiccup the mapset has is E3M3, which remained unchanged and is a real completionist's nightmare. those damn teleport closets are not done right, and the cyberdemon battle is awful. every other map is still pretty fun in their own way.

EDIT: of course, I have to pinpoint that this actually is one of the easiest megawads I've played. the secrets can be difficult to find at times, but you then find a lot of supplies, even BFGs in places you might not expect, and the going gets easier. Paul's maps can trick some players, as he puts the color bars next to switches that actually lower or otherwise allow access to the keys themselves, be sure to look out for that. while E3M3 is a major hurdle due to how it was made, it remains the only one. while I don't really like Chris Hansen's maps in E4, as well as the epic E4M6 (which made me more lethargic than excited), anything that isn't E3M3 is usually decent.

*** Note: Levels were played in UV-continuous with pistol-starting upon death. No saves. ***

It may not be fair to say that a review for one Paul Corfiatis project is a review for all, but I would be hard-pressed to conduct similarly substantial articles for each of his major works without writing in circles. 2002: A Doom Odyssey seems like a good place to build a cornerstone review because it is considered by many to be the crowning achievement; a full four-episode replacement for Doom that, until the advent of Needs More Detail, DTWiD and other community-based efforts like Switcheroom, dominated the Ultimate landscape as one of the choice selections for nostalgia junkies. This, despite the fact that Paul's contributions amount to just one half of the set.

In fact, if there's an irony to this WAD's distinction, it is the story of its guest contributors — Chris Hansen, Rory Habich, Sam Woodman, Anthony Soto, Joe Pallai and Virgil the Doom Poet — and how their unique works offset and affect the evergreen standards of Paul and Kristian (the latter of whom I'm almost comfortable in naming as a guest, anyway: he mostly goes missing after E1). Throw a stone in any direction from 2002 and you're guaranteed to hit something Paul-shaped with levels that handle much the same as the ones here, or at least conform to a highly distinguishable set of tropes, and so a player that is somewhat familiar with his tendencies will search for differences to champion. In other words — by dint of familiarity — this is a WAD that is known to be Paul's and yet is renowned for its Others. Hansen, especially.

2002 paints itself as a pretty conservative take on Doom for themes and progression, yet with every episode the picture garbles and warps, eventually ending up as a very confused transmission that feels like the half-way point between different products; one good and one bad. Episode 1: Deep into the Code is like some customary re-run of an ABC mid-nineties sitcom; indistinct and far too comfortable in its skin. Its Phobosian skin. The combat is pedestrian, front-on and tied together with "hub-spokes;" the traps are betrayed by Team Paul's telltale design and are rendered useless; and the player is more likely to drown in the oceans of shells provided than be challenged by any one encounter. Identical in many ways to Knee-deep, as intended? Perhaps, but it is a dirge all the same, and continues uninterrupted until Hansen is brought in to upset the practice of using ammo and health as decoration. Throughout Episode 2: The Road to Eternity and Episode 3: The Evil Unleashed the introduction of more authors leads to some standout levels, even as the cohesion established between Paul and Kristian (there is an off-kilter charm to their pairing, for all grievances) begins to break down and the set loses some of its identity. The now pockmark entries by Paul are at least distinct enough on this scale, surrounded as they are, and some bolder design choices begin to appear in a few of them (Caves of Bosnia is perhaps his greatest departure, here), to his credit.

Stealing the show from right out of the hands of this weak-gripped megawad is the middle stretch of levels in Episode 4: Torment Ultima. Specifically, Anthony Soto's Back to Base X through to Hansen's Odious Grounds, although Paul's efforts in the new E4M1 and 8 aren't too shabby, either. These adopt from the Consumed handbook a crafty and devious dearth of ammunition and safe spaces; the tried and tested (and feared!) paradigm of peak difficulty in Ultimate Doom. They are the best maps by some ways, and also look a cut above the rest for their more intricate lighting and level of detail; the murky, latticed entrails of Pallai's Dementia a particular highlight.

Five years after the re-release of this acclaimed WAD, this review is not likely to change the mind of anyone who appreciates what is doubtless a nostalgic piece of work. It is, after all, a feeling around which the project was made. A less misty-eyed pass over what's on display, though, reveals a deeply inconsistent and — to a point — deeply ordinary Odyssey.

Bullet-points of Interest:

• Initially tedious but belatedly evolving into something more varied, challenging and interesting.
• An adherence to Ultimate Doom's progression and ideas that's somewhat muddled by the mix of guest contributors and conflicting new textures.
• Upstaging performances by Hansen, Soto and Pallai.
• A very enjoyable fourth episode, identity crisis notwithstanding.
• A hit-and-miss OST. Some great melodies, but a lot of tunes don't match up with the levels very well.
• Very poor end-of-episode levels/boss fights and super-secret levels.