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The DWmegawad Club plays: KINDa


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Awesome to see this finally make the cut. I've been meaning to play it since release, so now's the time to do so! 

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KINDa - MAP01 Go (HNTR, blind, continuous, w/ saves): K 100% (60/60), I 100% (8/8), S 100% (1/1), D 2, T 11:46

 

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Edited by dei_eldren

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MAP01 - Go

UV | Continuous | GZDoom and Vanilla+

 

NOW I remember this! This map used to be like 10-times harder with a shit-ton more pinkies and an Archie and fuck all ammo. Glad to see things are a lot more balanced. You're still a little starved for ammo and health, but it doesn't feel stupidly unfair like last time. The map has a short, punchy feel to it that keeps you moving all the way through, scurrying around for more ammo without eating too many buckshot sandwiches from the local shotgun chefs. MightyWoosh manages to supply just enough resources to keep you going if you don't play too carelessly. The level design has a neo-classic feel to it with its mixture of old-school layout and modern combat sensibilities. It's a fun, tense and challenging first impression that gives you a pretty good idea of what you're in for going forward. I expect the rest of WAD to be similar as the heat is slowly set to a boil. 

 

 

Edited by Biodegradable

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Important to see megawads that are kinda  there, like this one, it may offer a really nice experence, and show us some hidden gems of mapping here and there.

KINDa.wad  - KIND a -  TheMightyWhoosh:

This is every mappers dream, make a full megawad by yourself, and make it look good/promising, in this month, we will be playing a full megawad by a newcomer at mapping (As far as I'm aware of), TheMightyWhoosh, with a full set of interesting limit removing maps for us to play, every map here is tuned up from an early KINDa entry that was poor in comparison to the final expression of this mapset, both in terms of gameplay and looks, thanks to the community helping the user (and the author accepting feedback/criticism),  TheMightyWhoosh manages to pull up an interesting product.
Some people say this is just like the usual classic Doom gameplay, which I like, as I tend to feel in my confort zone by playing theese.

MAP01 - Go (98%K/100%I/100%S):

Packed action in this first map with a really nice layout and weird usage of textures, I mean weird because it is not usual to see some of those textures in certain way, like that wood texture that looks way to clean for me to be using in a Doomy environment. Everything feels natural, and gameplay may be interesting right from the start, just remember to grab the chaingun at the starting room, right behind you, as it may help you on your journey, the map is harder than most MAP01's, and ammo may be just enough for the deal and little to no margin to miss bullets. You may find some mid-tier enemies roaming around that will set a standard for difficulty right from the first level.
Enjoyable, does the MAP01 job well, makes me want to play even more.

(UV Playthrough - PrBoom+)

Little disclaimer: I won't count deaths this month, as it may get used against the review to imply "map is bad because is hard/easy" which is nothing further from reality than that, also, I won't be using a manual calculator with a "+1" every time I die to keep track of my deaths, which slows down a process of playing and reviewing on times when I don't have much time. (Great, no one will know I suck at games and I died a lot at the very first level , I'm an evil genius.)

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MAP01: Go (UV)

 

The map dropped me into some kind of installation that made me think of original Doom's episode 1. The layout was mostly good and progression clear with challenge that seemed reasonable for an introduction map. No moment left an impression however, so as functional this map is, I found it somewhat forgettable.

No major problems too, a few minor that I think might've been optimized better.

  • Yellow key doesn't really seem to have much of a purpose since yellow door is behind it, essentially.
  • The final squad took too long to teleport in, they could use more destinations, probably scattered between me and the exit
  • It took me more than it should've to find the exit. Making monsters walk in from that direction might've helped.

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Hi guys, I'm back from vacationing and all finished school so I should have a bit more free time to dedicate to mapping and dooming. Looking forward to playing KindA since I've heard good things and it's on my to play list.

 

I'll be playing with GZDoom, Ultra Violence + saves, pistol starting each level.

 

Map01 - Go

Surprisingly meaty first map, lots of enemies. Big ole brown techbase sort of deal, I dig it so far. I like the new skybox texture and the first ladder you see. The initial fight is very fun and frantic. I was able to get through it okay, but a surprise shotgunner drained a good chunk of health halfway through. Was able to take out the revenant no prob. I was able to find the secret EZPZ.  The twin chaingunner closet was pretty devious as well as the teleporter trap near the end. For 1 negative thing to say, I wish the switch past the yellow key door had some sort of indication that that it opened up the last bit of courtyard. Other than that, very solid first map with a bit more teeth than what I’ve come to expect from a first level. Looking forward to more.

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MAP 01 – Go

Doomsday Engine, UV, Continuous, blind run w/saves

 

The only gripe I had with this starting map was that it instantly made me give up UV -fast playthrough. There were just too many hitscanners alerted at once, peeking at the windows and filling me with lead while I was looking the other way. Who cares for the Revenant and the Hell Knights? I can deal with them without the SSG, but squads of former humans and sergeants overlooking an open area and repeatedly placing perfect hits on me, was frustrating. -Fast monsters do not ask if they can pull the trigger, they do it so happily that I could not stand this part and wait to check if the WAD had more in the same vein. Since nobody tests -fast monsters, not even the mapping veterans, it was a safe bet to choose normal UV right off the bat and save myself some pain.

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Go was quite hectic for a MAP01, even on normal UV. The feature I found unusual were the small UAC blazing doors all over the place, which enemies cannot open. They were alerted outside the starting area but could not come in, so I had to open the doors and sometimes be greeted by a point-blank shotgun blast. I found that clearing the outer yard was a cumbersome task for a first step into a new WAD, just because of the constant threat of dire shots from unseen zombies. To add difficulty to that, health was at a premium, and the generous combat armour was offered when I was almost ready for MAP02.  

 

The visuals and detailing of the tech-base were generally well-made. I liked the way the map opened its second half but hoped to find more resistance. Probably it would have made sense to limit the monster count of the first patrol and add more in the second part, which was sedate in comparison, except for the blue switch ambush that caught me off-guard. I can play hitscanner-heavy maps with Sadistic soundtrack all day, but this was a bit rough as an opener. I hope I will not regret the choice to drop -fast monsters, because of the WAD turning KINDa gentle and soft at some point.

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Execellent mapset and incredibly underrated so far. I'm very, very glad the club chose it for the new month, and I'll for sure be following the journey along. Can't wait 'till we get to MAP 26, my personal favorite!

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I didn’t get very far last month. Let’s try this again.

 

MAP01: Go

UV, Pistol-Start, Saveless

 

Despite the name, Go is a lesson in cautious play and ammo conservation. TheMightyWoosh takes advantage of the MAP01 slot to throw a few mid-tier enemies our way before giving us the weapons to fully prepare for them. However the main threat isn’t the Hell knights, nor the revenant lurking outside, but simple resource starvation. With numerous windows peeking into the wooden base, we’re at risk of having our health slowly chipped away by hitscan fire. And careless shooting can leave a player with too little ammo to take on the teleporter ambush towards the end of the level.

 

Luckily, it’s a short map. So it’s hard to resent the several attempts it took me to get the rhythm down. Given the careful construction of the level, I’m fairly certain that the lack of resources isn’t negligence on behalf of the author, but an intentional challenge for the player, and I’m really looking forward to seeing what TheMightyWoosh throws at us next!

 

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MAP01 - “Go”

 

Not overly sold on the texture usage here (Though I might be being a little mean here) and there are a few too many doors. Otherwise a reasonable start with plenty monsters to kill. Ammo is pretty well balanced if the intention was to make the player take care of their ammo conservation and despite the little gripes above this was pretty decent to play. The blue armour you get for free towards the end kind of nullifies the threat of the final couple of groups of monsters though.

Edited by cannonball

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KINDa - MAP02 Hell's Cavity (HNTR, blind, continuous, w/ saves): K 100% (52/52), I 100% (50/50), S 100% (2/2), D 0, T 12:29 &

HMP, continuous, w/ saves: K 100% (78/78), I 100% (50/50), S 50% (1/2), D 0, T 13:33

 

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HMP 1st run:

 

HNTR 2nd run:

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MAP01 - HMP: K 100%, I 100%, S 100%, D 0, T 7:33

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List of five favourite maps this time:

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Edited by dei_eldren
added HMP runs

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MAP02: Hell's Cavity (UV, Pistol-start, Blind with saves)

 

This map has a very interesting layout. Unfortunately the layout also contains switches behind my back, switches with uncertain functions and a pit with monsters in it where infinite height becomes debilitating. However none of it is a deal breaker. Still, I got lost a few times.

The map is remarkable permissive of escaping its ambushes which I, being short on ammo, did a lot. Perhaps I shouldn't have pistol-started? The text file doesn't give a suggestion. I ended the level with 84% kills.

In either case, a good effort. While getting lost I never felt like it's the mapper's fault.

 

Deaths on the level: 5 (Two of which are because of infinitely tall arachnotrons)

Deaths total: 6 (Yes, I managed to die on MAP01, I forgot the hell knight was in the room)

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Blind, Map 01, HMP, Continuous, only save from start of map, Kals Sleek Doom Mod

 

 

 

This was a fun little map. Died 3 times in the video I think. I kept getting this "fake ending" type of feeling after the Blue Key then that getting jumped there.... When were they  going to stop? LMAO

 

Pretty fun first map for a blind play.

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MAP 01: Go

UV / Pistol start / Woof! -complevel vanilla / blind w/o saves

 

100% Kills / 100% Secrets / 2 attempts

 

I had never played this wad before and heard very lil about it, so I decided to play this month with the club!!. I die once this time in the first map :(

 

This was a fun map, and I like it as a first map. I feel that it's a balanced map, with a pretty enemy distribution, I expect a lot from this megawad!!

 

 

Edited by toxic.rat

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MAP01: Go

UV, pistol start, no saves

100% kills, 1/1 secrets

 

The wad begins with a very brown techbase, and a skybox featuring silhouettes of industrial architecture. The textures aren't so much my cup of tea, but there isn't much criticism I can give it and there are some neat little lighting subtleties here and there. The layout of the map pretty open, and can be a bit confusing at times (the exit teleporter felt a little bit strangely placed), but as a vessel for the combat it worked pretty nicely.

 

About the combat, while it's not a super challenging map it is actually pretty dangerous for a MAP01. The map doesn't shy away from throwing the mid-tier monsters at you, and isn't particularly liberal with resources. It's not the kind of map that's out to overwhelm you, but it's well calibrated and intent on not letting you breeze by on the thought that it's "only a MAP01". I enjoyed it.

 

Some mixed feelings about visuals and layout, but the gameplay was strong and I'm curious to see how it progresses from here.

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Map02 - Hell’s Cavity

Very rude start to the map, that shotgun trap ended up draining half of my health. Lots of sneaky monster closets with hit scanners (especially chaingunners) in this one with a very tight ammo squeeze. By the end I ended up having to punch out the remaining imps and shotgunners. If the second map is this difficult I’m starting to wonder if playing on UV+pistol start was a mistake. I ended up finding the secret backpack somehow and after poking around the level I found the megarmor once all the enemies were dead. On a positive note, I liked the consistency with the teleporter entrances and exits, and enjoyed the look and progression in this level. The last wad I played was Zone400 so seeing bigger, more intricately decorated levels is a good change of pace, even though it’s mostly vanilla textures. Also, was that a human BBQ reference in the courtyard area?

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Alright, let's see what TheMightyWoosh has in store for us. I believe they're fairly new to mapping, so making an entire 32-level replacement so soon is a real feat!

 

GZDoom/Blind/UV/Continuous/Saves

Map 01 - GO

100% kills and secrets

Time: 6:32

 

We start off in a brown techbase of sorts. Design reminds me a lot of old school maps, where it doesn't really seem like the structures you're in have a purpose. It's just there to be there. The industrial skybox is very interesting. The black-and-white of it gives this map a kinda surreal feeling to me. When it comes to the level itself, it's actually tougher than I thought it would be. Not as tough as last month's map 01, but only gives you the shotgun and chaingun to deal with monsters that include 2 hell knights and a rev. I also saw rockets, but no rocket launcher, so either I'm blind or they're there for continuous scrubs like myself. There's not a ton of resources, so you'll want to make sure you ration ammo effectively, switching between them when needed to save some bullets and shells. You do get a backpack by the yellow skull door, but it's not like you're going to go over 200 bullets or 50 shells in this level. It is home to a chaingunner trap, which is one of 2 encounters that can mess you up. The second is when you hit the switch behind the blue skull door and 13 enemies spawn directly behind you. You should chaingun them so you can escape and not get cornered, then chaingun the chaingunner by the exit so you can grab his chaingun for more bullets to chaingun the pinkies, imps, and shotgunners that spawned. Pretty good starter to get your toes wet with. (Unrelated, but the .txt said the MIDIs are from the Doom games, so I'm not going to comment on them. I'm probably going to have something else on instead)

 

Map 02 - HELL'S CAVITY

100% kills and secrets

Time: 11:16

 

From brown base, to white caves with some fortress elements to it. Kinda surprising we have a different tone of map already. No biggie though. This one's design is a little more intriguing, with some roundaway paths to locations. That rev sniping you toward the beginning is guarding the SSG, so once you get over there, rush it. The switch gains access to the yellow key, but beware the arachnotrons in this pool area. You'll wanna go down here anyway to lower the walls for chaingunners. I like the design of the red key room. It's nice and big and has some interesting geometry to it with those random ledges around the center. Of course grabbing the key unleashes stuff, but nothing some infighting can't solve. You don't have to worry as much about rationing supplies here, but it's always nice to cause infighting to happen. I'll say that progress after the red door was kinda confusing. After taking out the hell knights, chaingunners, and imps, I hit the 2 switches that were next to each other. One opened up a path out, the other I wasn't sure what it did. The switch up by the imps caused the floor you're on to raise, but I panicked and jumped off. I saw no way to lower the floor again here. I wouldn't say this is a softlock, as I don't think you need to go up there really, there's just some small pickups. It took me a couple minutes wandering around, accidentally finding the mega armor secret in the process (I also found the backpack one instantly. Kinda figured that texture was in prime shooting location), before I noticed another ledge had raised in the pool, allowing access to the other tunnel. The soul sphere was nice, and a few enemies remained, before the same blue platform that took you away from the last level was reached, ending it. Gonna be like Plutonia with distinct ending platforms, it looks like. So yeah, most of the level was pretty solid, but I wish the progression at the end there was a little more clear.

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MAP02 - Hell's Cavity

UV | Continuous | GZDoom and Vanilla+

 

Traversing into a rocky outpost made of wood and sandstone, this map has quite a few sneaky traps that I couldn't even be mad at. They're simple but effective and well-timed, complementing the intensity of MAP01 beautifully. Doomkid taking MightyWoosh under his wing to help with balancing is pretty evident and I love how the Kid's influence has made these opening maps challenging, but not ridiculous like they were originally by springing Archies on you when you've only got a handful of shotgun shells and fuck all health lmao. I found this map's progression slightly cryptic, but not bewildering in any degree. Just that classic cryptic like in D1 and D2 where you're not entirely sure what happened at first, then glance around to see if something's changed. I'd say the red keycard was the most memorable part of this map as it's our first taste of how the WAD may handle big arena fights. While I was still starved for health and ammo throughout the map, I didn't feel desperate or paranoid, which goes to show that the balancing with pick-ups and demon placement has had a great deal of thought and revision put into it to give you an experience that challenges you without the mapper coming across as a sadistic prick. The only moment that REALLY made me sweat was the encounter with a couple of Hellknights, three Chaingunners and a handful of sniper imps. At that point, I had to conserve what little ammo I had left and perform some evasive maneuvers. Perhaps it's too early to say right now, but I have a good feeling about this WAD.

 

 

Edited by Biodegradable

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MAP 02 – Hell’s Cavity

Doomsday Engine, UV, Continuous, blind run w/saves

 

After some more Shotgunner nonsense, the level registered a step down in harshness if compared to Go. The map was built around a water pool surrounded by cave areas, where a linear path allowed to pick up the YK and RK in succession, with some inane backtracking required to reach the red door and open the way to the exit. The free Soul Sphere given when the map was about to end suggested that pistol start was not the author's intended way of playing.

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Arachnotrons were introduced as noisy but unthreatening foes in the water pit. One of them even got stuck when I raised the thin walkways to the YK. Plenty of Chaingunners were used in the monster closets, but their placement was much less problematic than the elevated hitscanners in the open yard of MAP01. My favourite encounter was the RK ambush: a mixed group of monsters tried to surround me in a big room, and prioritising the Commandos was key to success. This was the finest environment in the level, which looked ok in the other areas, but less hellish than its name would suggest. Both western and eastern far end of the map featured a dead end with some pickups, the first one had even a lift that can be raised and jumped off from, thus preventing the upper area from being reached again. These areas were odd, but all things considered Hell’s Cavity fitted MAP02 slot properly. 

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MAP02: Hell’s Cavity

UV, Pistol-Start, Saveless

This map struck me as easier than the previous one, perhaps because the enemies here are better behaved. They’re polite enough to wait patiently in ambush instead of attacking us in a mad crossfire as they did in MAP01. Moreover, most of the traps are gentle. Rarely does the author bottle us in, and enemy counts are consistently small.

 

TheMightyWhoosh is also more generous with the resources, but only slightly. We have to fight for the super shotgun, and, even once we obtain it, shells are never plentiful. But it certainly helps make short work of the Hell knights, cacos, and arachnotrons dotted around the caverns.

 

It’s a fun, short-and-sweet level which hides its linearity by threading its route through a watery cavern cavity. And it’s competently made. But MAP01 left more of an impression on me.

 

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Ranking from favourite to least favourite:

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Edited by Haruspex
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MAP02 - Hell's Cavity (96%K/90%I/100%S):

I struggled a bit with this one because of the low ammo, it's easy to pass by the encounters on bigger areas, only caring about hitscanners. Layout itself feels like I'm  playing through Plutonia's MAP02 for a reason. Again, texture choices are pretty strange than usual, I do not remember this gray wall texture used somewhere in Doom 2, is it a custom texture?  Feels new but at the same time not. Again, avoiding most encounters in big areas, and only caring for hitscanners or imps will be your best choice, as ammo here is lacking, and you will struggle at the very end of the map. Resources in general are sparce, as there isn't that much health either, the only big chunk of health would be a soulsphere sitting there at the middle of the map, also a hard to miss secret with a blue armor, I don't think you can complete this map without grabbing it, as it is heavy on hitscanners. 
The start may be harsh but once you get to steal one shotgun the deal is closed. I feel, in contrary to others, that this map was more difficult for me than the first one, possibly because I can't seem to manage resources well. Still, it was less intense than the previous level.

(UV Playthrough - PrBoom+)

Order of preference:
 

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MAP02 - Hell's Cavity - dsda-doom - skill 4 pistol start

 

Yet again looks great, with good music choice. Wandering around a spooky mountainside outpost.

Tight ammo balance which led to 'punchy' gameplay (sorry)

 The switch to raise the paths toward the yellow key were (probably intentionally) hard to find

 

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MAP 02: Hell's Cavity

UV / Pistol Start / Woof! -complevel vanilla / blind w/o saves

 

100% Kills / 100% Secrets / 3 attempts

 

In certain moments i sensed a poor ammo balance, but probably this was probably for a bad gamethrough :( So far i've liked this megawad, but i would prefered it with another music (i'm already a lil bored of the stock music from doom in pwads)

Edited by toxic.rat

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All maps played from pistol start, UV, saves allowed, going for 100% kills, using ZDoom.

 

MAP 01: Go

First thing you'll want to do is make a 180 and grab the chaingun: it'll greatly simplify the hitscannery start. Even with the chaingun in hand, you don't get a lot of leeway in this map health-wise. I count less than 100 points of recovery items, and that megaarmor comes too late to make much of a difference. The map itself is vanilla flavored but nicely color-coordinated: I like the industrial sky and the open ceilings, and appreciate how the map unpeels itself as you progress. It's been awhile since I've played a level that used "Sadistic," so that was kind of nice. 

 

MAP 02: Hell's Cavity

This one is insistently Plutonic: the malicious sextuplet of shotgunners at the start, the little pocket ambushes with hitscanners, the omnipresent chaingunners, "Dark Halls"...it would fit right into something like PRCP. I think this one is a little easier than MAP 01 but the ammo balance is really tight: I had to punch the last shotgunner to death, and no, you don't get a berserk or a chainsaw. I hid in the corner with the two imps for the red key fight, it's hard to avoid damage from the chaingunners in the open, but they're liable to infight the cacos if you poke your head out and run away. Not a bad map: again, I don't know what the deal is with the late powerups, I definitely didn't need that soul sphere at the end. PS: Check out this stimpack in the wall.

 

 

Screenshot (108).png

stim 01.JPG

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KINDa - MAP03 Toxic (HNTR, blind, continuous, w/ saves): K 98% (70/72), I 85% (24/28), S 0% (0/1), D ~5, T 12:20

 

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Five favourite maps:

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PPS: Seeing Capellan's video, he obviously has much better map-sense and experience than i, but i wish i had had the sense to go back after pressing the first three switches in the nukage, and not continue to the big nukage-filled room full of enemies.  He got lost too, not knowing what the switches did, but he handled the situation much better, knowing when to kill enemies and when to leave them behind (even if he still also ran out of ammo).  Intuitition maybe?  Anyway, learned a lot from watching his run, i hope. 

With my extensive editing (my first version before posting was much more negative, undeservedly so) i ended up saying nothing very clearly, but Book Lord managed to say basically what i should have clarified in summary - obscure progression is not always bad in itself, in fact i often enjoy it as long as there's a feeling of it making sense, but works better in levels where there's freedom to explore.  (Looking at it now, admittedly my gameplay was a total wreck - the progression is too obscure, but not overly frustrating, unless you have a hangover-headache and paying attention is actually painful :P )

Edited by dei_eldren

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