Doom 64 for Doom II

Played through this a while back via GZDoom, going in with the expectation that this wasn't going to be the spooky ambient experience of Doom 64, but rather a re-interpretation of if this came out years prior as, say, a Doom II expansion of sorts. And for what it is, big thumbs-up on the execution, as it does all feel like what Doom 64 would have been like if it was made with Doom II's engine, assets and visual/musical presentation. We even have some creative QoL improvements that I wish were in the original, such as dioramas near some specific switches showing exactly what hitting it did in another room. Of course the lack of 64's scripting capabilities and the such make some parts of various levels different by necessity, but the workarounds to keep a similar experience work pretty well. One example that stood out to me is the opening area of Dark Entries. Normally going into the large room at the start triggers a volley of homing fireballs you have to take cover from; you don't have that here, and instead there are multiple monster closets full of Revenants that open one by one as you progress through the level and have to cross back through that room again. Creative stuff. The Absolution got a particularly interesting overhaul, with three side areas you now have to figure out your way through to get skull keys to turn off the spawners in the final arena (a replacement for the demon artifacts of the original).

Of course, one of the selling points of 64 was the scarier atmosphere and visuals compared to the previous entries, so I could see the lack of that being a deal-breaker for some. Meanwhile for the Doom II fans they may expect levels that get as crazy in enemy count as those of Hell on Earth, and may be disappointed that 64 even in this incarnation doesn't quite do that either, and is a little more prone to making you backtrack and figure out puzzles. But those who have played the original probably already expect that, and if you know how those levels go you'll find the same flow you knew from before. It's all personal taste whether that's your jam or not, but if it is then this is certainly a fun romp through the levels, in a familiar yet interestingly different flavor.

One additional pro for this wad I'd like to point out: for those who like to throw mods onto their Doom experience, one of the tricky things you may have run into when it comes to other ports/remakes of 64 (GZDoom 64, Brutal Doom 64, Doom 64 CE, etc.) is trying to get them to play nice with mods intended for Doom II wads. Depending on the mod, something always seems to break or glitch out when you try to apply your favorite gameplay mod to 64's levels. So having a version of the levels made all from Doom II assets is great to have from a compatibility standpoint.

Download the file here https://www.doomworld.com/idgames/levels/doom2/megawads/d64d2

Overall I really enjoyed this wad,  It's a good vanilla experience for those that don't enjoy the look or feel of Doom 64.  They did alot of unique and interesting things, to make this work from the vanilla perspective.  I really enjoyed some of the midi's (Map 9 is a personal favorite).  It also has the option of different Huds,  I personally played through with the hellbar Hud.  The spectre imp was a nice addition that was a pain in the ass, where the hell are those fireballs coming from?  It was also cool that they used the Archville as a base for the mother demon, got to see it to appreciate it.  Overall it captured the essence of Doom 64  but made it its own thing. Above there's a link to my Uv Max playthrough on youtube for help, hints, or for just plain viewing pleasure!

Mediocre megawad. There're many puzzles along the maps and the small monster count makes me wonder if it's a puzzle oriented wad instead of an action one. Anyway, not my cup of tea.

A great PWAD . This is vanilla compatible . I've played it using Marine Best Friend 2.04 SNM 10 (made by Sakitoshi). The final version of this pwad is comming to /idgames really soon (not uploaded there yet ) , in the meantime you can download the latest version from here 

I totally recommend playing this PWAD with @TheNoob_Gamer mod Dehacked Doom64 V1.1 

Just make sure to load the PWAD (D64D2) after the Dehacked Doom 64 v1.1 mod

This does have issue in Eternity port repeating map21 forever for no reason with no way to progress unless idcleving to 22, other than that it's perfect in every way, especially later maps from 11 to 28, recreated finale with boss is nice too. You can easily recognize under vanilla assets where these original maps were from, even few Nightmare Cacodemons make cameo appearance on Map32.

Download the REAL file here (rd1.zip is NOT correct) https://www.doomworld.com/idgames/levels/doom2/megawads/d64d2

Shocked to see so many negative reviews. I had an absolute blast with this one, and I'm not sure what Nems was talking about with the Boom stuff as this runs in Doom2.exe with no trouble. In fact, there is a TON of impressive vanilla stuff going on here. I guess it was so well done that it tricked him.

This deserves a high score. It's a lot of fun.

the map looks good visually but what does the have to do with doom 64? and how do I kill an archvile with a pistol? and a cyberdemon with a chain gun?

it should be obvious to those who are playing this that this is NOT another Doom 64 TC. it's recreating the levels of Doom 64 as Doom II levels, which is why you see other monsters and a few changes to layout as well.

i'm not gonna give this a good score though. but this may be because I just don't like Doom 64's levels in general. even when you cut out the atmosphere and enhance the gameplay and layout of the maps here there's still some bashful puzzles to solve and well, the levels are longer than they really are. my Doom 64 opinion of course.

It's bad because it's hard.

Should have been called "Doom 64 for Boom".

I really wanted to like this more. I mean, I do like it but I feel like the gripes I have regarding it just bring my overall rating for it down too much.

It was interesting to see how, at first, the authors recreated the Doom 64 levels in Doom 2 with just vanilla assets. You can still see some of that in the Boom levels like how revenants and arch-viles are used in place of where traps where. That was an interesting touch and I liked that.

As I got further into it though and more of the Boom tricks were used my thoughts wandered from "hey this is a nice vanilla interpretation" to "man I could be playing Doom 64 EX or Doom 64 Retribution". I really wish they would have stuck with vanilla constraints for this reinterpretation. I would have liked to see how they would have handed nightmare monster placement (would a nightmare imp be worth two imps or three, for example). I feel like using Boom and DeHacked cheapened the experience, like they were trying to replicate Doom 64 as close as possible rather than doing a vanilla Doom (2) interpretation.

Additionally, map 30 can fuck right the hell off with that puzzle bullshit.

Anyway, if you don't mind any of the complaints I made, you'll likely have fun with this. I got some fun out of this as well but to me it feels like it's trying to be exactly like Doom 64 rather than simply a vanilla Doom 2 interpretation of Doom 64. In trying to be exactly like Doom 64, it just makes me want to play that more than this.

I agree with BChricton78. Rather than being fun to play, this remake just highlights how massive of a difference good lightning and texturing makes to a level/game. I know this isn't the fault of the makers of this mod since they were merely remaking the original Doom 64 levels, but these levels frankly aren't very great when stripped of the improved Doom 64 graphics. So much in fact that it makes me wonder how important level layouts even are compared to other aspects of the visual presentation such as texturing, lightning and rendering.

Good stuff.  Only giving it four stars because though the new music was good, I just wish there was more of it.  Still, this wad is absolutely worth your time.

Umm... From the brief snippet I played, I'd definitely give them an A for effort... But this just feels... wrong to me. I'm sorry but playing Doom 64, without the lighting, atmosphere, redone sprites and ambient music? No thanks. It just takes away the things that make Doom 64 so special. Still a nice little attempt at recapturing Doom 64, but I'm better off with Doom 64 EX, for my fix.

And thus, oh you know what I'm going to say already, Doom 64 for Doom II has been finished, played through GlBoom+ 2.5.1.5 on UV.

So for an introduction, as the name implies D64D2 is a recreation of the classic Doom 64 originally released as a console exclusive for the N64. It aims to recreate the levels along with their gameplay using mostly vanilla Doom II resources. It features a new menu background, ENDOOM screen, new music, a few new enemies, namely the Nightmare Imp and Cacodemon as well as the final boss the Mother Demon, a few new textures, new intermission messages, a new end level screen, but no custom sounds or weapons, meaning that the unique and iconic Unmaker was not recreated in any way.

For a recreation, I must say that the levels and their gameplay come quite close to the original Doom 64, nonetheless various liberties have been taken in different forms, ranging from new takes on various puzzles to completely new levels, as well as the usage of the enemies who were absent from the original due to memory limitations. The usage of enemies who were absent from the original game comes with mixed results as it doesn't always work, probably one of the most obvious flaws in the game. This is most noticeable primarily in the levels that came closest to their D64 counterpart as the environment was clearly not designed with them in mind. For instance, you'll encounter Revenants on narrow corridors quite often, and sometimes even Arch-Viles. This isn't a problem in larger areas where it's usually quite fun to fight them, but not in those particular areas. Chaingunners do seem to work quite well however since they can easily blend with the rest of the hitscanners.

Compared to the original D64, a major difference is the tone and atmosphere of the game. D64 was slower paced and more atmospheric, whereas D64D2 is faster paced and puts less emphasis of that element, supported by the amazing but more action/fun oriented soundtrack. Perhaps the darker, much more hellish levels such as Unholy Temple are the most atmospheric levels in the entire game, and also the best looking. Unholy Temple is definitely my favorite level in D64D2.

While on the subject of changes, some of them are very interesting. In the Void is probably the most surprising for me. The original map featured a light blue sky and a rather foggy atmosphere while the level itself was pretty bright, how does this map look like in D64D2? Well, it seems to literally take place in a void now. Indeed, the sky is now pitch black but luckily poor visibility in the level itself was avoided, at least for the most part, so there's no difficulty in seeing the enemies and where they are. It's a change that works quite well, unlike others. The most drastic changes were probably done to The Absolution where you can now locate 3 skulls, but in order to reach them you need to complete their own puzzles first, and they're not the exciting or fun type. The room with the yellow skull was probably the only one that was fun, the others? Well, for the red skull you have to go through an awkward platforming section where everything, including the enemies are... cloaked in darkness, while the room with the blue skull features a puzzle similar to the one seen in the room with the red key (Demon Key on the original D64) on Outpost Omega, except that it's longer, more complex, and more tedious. Not exactly changes done for the better. I don't know how exactly they impact the level though, but in my playthrough I didn't even fight the Mother Demon after aquiring all skulls, I just heard her screaming once while I was fighting the teleporting enemies thinking that she finally showed up to the battle, only for the end level screen to appear immediately afterwards, so I assume she died somehow.

D64D2 also comes with some exclusive levels that were not part of the original D64, and I personally think they're little more than filler maps. They're not awful but nowhere near great either, and I'm unable to find any valid reason for their existence. This is primarily due to their nature. Their gameplay style and tone is very different from all the other levels and in consequence, they feel out of place, not mixing well with the rest of the maps. Still, at least they're very short and straightforward so you don't waste much time with them. And while on the subject, some of the secret levels from the original have been turned into regular maps, meaning that you don't have to search for secret exits to access them anymore. One such example is the previously mentioned Outpost Omega.

All things considered, D64D2 manages to capture the spirit of D64 while also making plenty of changes, yet generally remaining faithful to the original. Some changes might have been done for the worse, but there's plenty done for the better as well. It's pretty short and easy, just like the original, so it can be finished in a day, you can't go wrong with it. A collective effort for an ambitious project that should be well worth your time if you like Doom 64 and want to see a different take on it.

Download from the legacy site to get the correct file.

Doom 64 for Doom II is something I expected to happen for many years.
It captures the essence of vanilla Doom II, while covering it all with layers of Doom 64 content.
Alongside new monster variants, great music, and the minor changes here and there, going through every map entirely was a great experience.
For the record, I played this mappack in GZDoom g3.4.1 with Final Doomer+ v2.4, using the optional hellbar(widescreen).
Hoping to see more stuff like this one in the future!