On the subject of "hell"

I figure this is worth making its own thread for.

Some have been talking about dropping the hell concept. While I support making it more unique, I don't think it should lose its "hellish" feel and aesthetic. You can still have some alternate dimension that is hellish yet isn't hell itself.

A different time or dimension can still look hellish.
http://images.chinatopix.com/data/images/full/6532/hadean-earth.png
Or even current time,
http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2010/07/26/article-1297706-0A924822000005DC-544_634x423.jpg

Removing hell themes only meant getting rid of the satanic symbols and imagery.

I'm not connected with Freedoom anyhow, nor I follow most of its discussions, I'm just curious: Why was there the idea of "no hell" in the first place? I've seen the thread just now and the idea itself seems very odd (not right) to me. Doom... and without such an iconic thing as a concept of Hell? Can anyone explain it for us others who don't follow Freedoom discussions?

I think we wanted to be more science fiction. Also deviate from Doom's story line as well.

The Hell theme is dependent upon following a specific id story line. Duplicating it follows the id story line. I suppose that FreeDoom's trend to not copy any id theme exactly would lead to not copying their story line that leads to Hell. At least not copying it exactly.

Unfortunately, supporting all the PWAD out there that use the Hell theme sprites and textures, requires that they all be present, and sufficiently Hell like.

The FreeDoom Hell could be bent a bit to be less like the id Hell.
It does not have to be the id Hell, with the garish sky. Except for the sky the id Hell looked like any Earth construction, with castles and stone. They had some carved stone wall textures.

If the Hell sky was just more like smoke from a thousand burning buildings or maybe a nearby volcano, then it changes from a literal Hell to a figurative Hell with hardly any other change.
It could be imagined as being near a volcano, or in a war zone (burning buildings), or the destructive phases of an alien invasion.
Some of the Hell textures (like the eye switch) could be bent more in this direction to support these possible interpretations and uses.

We have all the hell textures and decorations in the IWAD but we don't necessarily need to use them, or we can potentially use them more sparingly. There's no reason we can't use elements of it (ie. small amounts of the textures) without going full out "hell theme".

I agree with avoiding the hell theme though. Although we haven't settled on a story yet it seems clear that we're going in more of a generic sci-fi direction than Doom's story is.

as others have pointed out the hellish textures dont have to represent hell, it could be a very volcanic area

i was thinking to make a thread about this too but thanks to sodaholic this point to something i was wondering. so what going to happen with the "hell" levels that freedoom Ep3 and Phase 2 have?

because i can work something new to replace my map28 if it needed, just what i only need to know what direction going to take the maps i mean what we going to have to do instead "hell". travel time related places like medival and aztec? or something hyperdimensional like an alien planet like xen?

Z0k said:

so what going to happen with the "hell" levels

medival and aztec?

All the hell maps are fine. 100,000,000 years into the past or future the earth probably looked similar to those hell maps.
No need for medieval or aztec. Player will be time travelling so far that the current inhabitants of earth are terrible monsters.


Seriously to get rid of the hell theme we only need to remove/replace a pentagram texture or two and some baphomet textures/flats. Tortured bodies on wall is also unlikely for the story.

There is no retexturing of anything, no changes in maps. There is a sector-based pentagram in MAP32, that can easily be changed to a rune.

Prehistoric earth is very hell-like.
http://ak.picdn.net/shutterstock/videos/3171670/preview/stock-footage-cracked-prehistoric-earth-or-terrestrial-planet-on-starry.jpg


EDIT> Another idea that fits story and allows "hell" maps. My original story involved AGM constructing the time portals to save the earth from the sun which was turning into a supernova. The sun cannot be stopped. But earth could be put into a time loop, so that earth will always live on. Those hell maps depict a charred earth and the monsters are the only things that could survive those conditions.

Catoptromancy said:

I think we wanted to be more science fiction. Also deviate from Doom's story line as well.

WAIT, if Freedoom's meant to be more science fiction, why didn't we take the route of seeing what would happen if I'd had made an Aliens game? *Hint hint*

I'm joking, but... yeah.

Does using the hell theme, or the similar story elements of descending into hell have any legal ramifications to it? Or is it just a preference? Because games like Constantine and Spawn all have firey satanic brimstone elements to them too and are in no way connected to Doom.

Since the textures have to somewhat resemble Dooms textures if youre going to play PWADs it, it seems kinda needlessly challenging to be different and the same at the same time.

40oz said:

Does using the hell theme, or the similar story elements of descending into hell have any legal ramifications to it? Or is it just a preference?

I think it would be cool to use an original idea for a story line.

40oz said:

Does using the hell theme, or the similar story elements of descending into hell have any legal ramifications to it?

The concept of hell is public domain and God doesn't seem interested in lobbying for a retroactive copyright extension.

Perhaps freedoom's "hell" could be some sort of depraved Giger-style Alien civilization.

Deciding what to do with the Hell sky is the biggest problem.

That sky is applied automatically for certain level maps. Even if a mapper avoided the most hellish textures, there is this unambiguous twisted garish sky.

A smokey, reddish-glare from fire, kind of sky may be more universal. It could be used for a Hell level as well as the twisted red sky. A real Hell level along the designs of that twisted red sky should not have earth buildings either. Earth style stone buildings are all that we have to work with to make a Hell level, so it looks much like any other earth construction anyway.
The red sky Hell level idea is not very internally consistent to start with, so there is not much loss in changing the sky.

This kind of sky could also be used with volcanos, or a burning city, or a war-zone. Then the mapper can use the elements that the mapper can control to set the map theme.

Is there a way to select an alternative sky texture that really works, without giving up the normal SKY characteristics ??
We would still need the alternative sky texture in FreeDoom.

I am not sold on the time-travel element and would rather not have it a required fixture to rationalize the FreeDoom themes and designs.
It is equally possible to have Egyptian, Aztec, Castle and Tech designs for other reasons. Why it is always the same monsters and the same mix of weapons, the same door and lift mechanisms, and the same everything, hinders any reasonable rationalization. It is more like having wandered into some theme-cities of a single tech-universe.

theres no reason to avoid the hellish stuff, another planet could look hellish (the io moon) and even the earth has looked hellish in the past and in the context of the game could look like that once more

raymoohawk said:

theres no reason to avoid the hellish stuff, another planet could look hellish (the io moon) and even the earth has looked hellish in the past and in the context of the game could look like that once more

As far as I can tell, there's also no particular reason for the skies to look like those of vanilla Doom. That is, unless there are maps that use the sky textures for something strange.

I was thinking along the lines of my previous comment about theme-cities in a single tech-universe.

An Aztec level could easily be set in Mexico where there are Aztec ruins, some of them well restored. Invading monsters would find them unoccupied and could have easily moved in.

Many parts of our cities are preserved with particular styles. Stone castles are not hard to find in any tour of England and France.

High tech buildings can be found in various Company and area development campuses.

The Mauna Loa volcano in Hawaii, Iceland volcanos, and some in Chile could be our Hell-like locations. If the caldera at Yellowstone blew open it would make a sufficient Hell. Only the sky needs to be fixed.

We really do not have to use strange rationalizations at all. Most of it could be set on earth, with some Tech bases set on moons and other worlds.

Note: DoomLegacy (and maybe others) replaces the skies with its own because free-look requires a taller sky texture. This complicates things. Maybe some day I can figure a way to extend a sky texture while keeping the same appearance.