[NaNoWADMo 2021] Lunar Laceration - An MBF21 Moon Themed Episode (RC2 - Difficulty Settings!)

[finnks13]

 

Hello everyone! I've come out of lurking once again this year to post the project I have been working on for this year's NaNoWADMo.

 

This time, I have made a moon themed episode for MBF21 compatible ports as I have always really enjoyed lunar maps such as those found in Lunatic or Nova 3 (among other WADs).

 

There are 9 maps in total, with Map1-8 forming the main progression and Map9 being a secret level accessed from Map5 (thanks UMAPINFO!), most of which are tech-bases or set outside

on the surface of the moon, though there are a couple of differently themed maps there too.

 

Difficulty should be around that of Speed of Doom E2, Ancient Aliens E3, Valiant E5 and Nova 3 E3 (with the exception of the secret map which is much harder). There are some parts

of the later maps which do get a bit slaughtery but they should all be pretty doable even if you're not a fan of slaughtermaps.

 

Difficulty settings are fully implemented - hopefully, they should provide a similar feel to the experience on UV, but with slightly less intensity across the board.

 

 

 

 

The episode features some weapon changes to the pistol and the chaingun, inspired by a thread I saw a while ago talking about them.

I wanted to see if I could buff them, in a way which kept them in their normal role in the arsenal. The base damage for both the pistol and the

chaingun has been buffed to 8, from 5 (meaning they deal ~60% more damage than normal) and the pistol is much more accurate.

Let me know how these weapons feel as I'm interested in what you think about them. The shotgun's firerate has also been buffed slightly.

 

There are also 5 new monsters which I will detail in this spoiler (in case you don't want to see them before playing the set):

Spoiler

Plasma Trooper - 60HP

A red clad zombie, who fires bursts of three plasma shots.

 

Rocket Zombie - 70HP

A zombie in grey-green overalls, who fires a rocket (different from a cyberdemons rocket, it deals less damage and splash damage).

 

'splodey Boy (or the Suicide Bomber Zombie) - 48HP

A dude in a black vest holding some dynamite who runs at you while screaming and explodes.

 

Toxic Imps - 110HP

A black imp who is a bit tougher and fires Baron projectiles in twos.

 

Nightmare Demon - 300HP

A black demon who can tank two rockets and has a very nasty bite.

 

Cybruiser - 700HP

A splash damage immune bruiser, who fires rockets very frequently.

 

SHORT INFO:

Maps: 01-09

IWAD: DOOM2.wad

Format: MBF21

Tested With: dsda-doom v0.21.0, Woof! v8.1.0, GZDoom v4.7.1

Difficulty Settings: YES!

Co-Op Starts: No.

For texture, sprite & music credits, see the README included in the download.

 

DOWNLOAD:

LLACERATION_RC3.zip

If you are using GZDoom, please play in v4.7.1 or greater - or two of the monsters break!

Any feedback or playthrough videos would be greatly appreciated so I can work on making sure this set of levels is my best yet!

(If you spot any bugs or things that seem like oversights, please let me know!)

Edited April 13, 2022 by finnks13
Sneaky version update (messed up original update)

[A Handsome Fridge]

Definitely one of the NaNoWADMo maps I want to check out in between IRL bothers and mapping (I'll try and record it when I do), screenshots are looking good.

Edited November 1, 2021 by A Handsome Fridge

[galileo31dos01]

I just checked this out, using dsda-doom. Pretty entertaining maps so far, I cleared up to 05, currently holding on 09 because I might wait for HMP, because that first phase though... 

 

My thoughts on the new monsters, take them with a grain of salt:

 

I like what they all got to offer. The suicide bomber is an all-time favorite, and the other troopers come close each in their own way. My one gripe is the HP of the bombers -- just like regular imps, they have a tendency to tank a SG shot (or two) in weird moments (one of the times I got killed in the soulsphere secret in 02 was because the bombers were surviving accurate shots and, consequently, not letting me move anywhere). The plasma and bazooka dude are about alright, I personally find them more satisfying to kill with CG or higher. It's the shotgun's inconsistency being the all-time present issue here and everywhere... perhaps the weapon could use a boost to counterbalance its mediocrity? that would certainly fit along with the better pistol and chaingun.

 

On the other hand, I didn't quite feel the "high" HP of the nightmare demon in earlier maps, felt like a super spongy pinky who couldn't do much in open spaces, although since their frequency was low I didn't care much, and once the SSG was introduced in 03 I was cool with them. I started to like them even more in for example map 05, where coupled with tight RL centric fights they made me wary of my own splash damage, making me change positions regularly. The cybruiser and toxic imp are good.

 

Speaking of fights, I liked that sweet and spicy variety between more open/freewheeling combat and more enclosed "act quick" kind of traps. One of my favorites of the former includes the contiguous series of fights in 03, the pre-final and YK areas in m05 (which, since we're here, may I suggest a few more rockets? I had to SG/CG a lot of the turrets here) reminded me a lot to Valiant, and the part where the plasma dudes were first seen in 01 was a good introductory fight. Of the latter, my favorites were in 04, pretty much most of them, from the first cybruiser and cacos to the whole area with the soulsphere. I unfortunately had to luck it out in the bit with the archvile duo, because there was nowhere to hide. Part of the problem was that I left the stuff on high spots at the start alive, imps, revenant and demon included, and they contributed extra to blocking the only possible escape. I didn't think I really had to slowly snipe them before so I was badly punished later. 

 

Another bit I wasn't very sure of was the RK fight in 05: I tried many things, from early rocket spamming the bruiser/demons, to checking when the mancs arrived and trying to kill one side (the teleportations had delays so that didn't work), to using infight (too rng for my taste), to rocketing cacos while not waking up the demons and archvile (cybruiser is the only who wakes up to sound apparently), and that sort of was the best I could get, not without loosing a chunk of health to stray mancubus fireballs and whatnot. It's a lot of tanks at once in such a cramped place, not much room to work with rockets either. I'm not saying it needs nerfing, because it might go less harsh with the secret plasma guns in hand, but if anything to revise it'd be in the pair of mancubi on each side so one doesn't block and delay the arrival of the other.

 

Anyways, some extra things:

 

- Wrong textures in the RL secret in m04

- In m05, this fence isn't impassable for some reason. I found it out when a bomber clipped through it and killed me, which was a shock. The fight feels less "random" if I kill the PEs before touching the SSG, not sure if that's an intentional option though.

- The final fight, I liked it though I would suggest adding a green vest somewhere before (didn't see one after the RK fight).

- Stuck rev in RK fight

- Projectiles can go through the windows in the final room, not sure if intentional or not (doesn't really matter anyways).

 

Like I said, take my thoughts with a grain of salt, because nothing that I mentioned speaks against the design you went for. I'm very curious what you come up with in terms of lower skills. I remember Geothermal Plant had me sweating throughout and I enjoyed that map, and I'm starting to sense your style, so yeah all good stuff.

[Dusty_Rhodes]

Looks very good! Nice to see people were more productive in NanoWadMo than I was.

 

:D

 

Either way, I've never played an MBF21 wad, I'm excited to check this out.

[finnks13]

Thank you all for the kind comments, I really do appreciate it. Will reply to all of them at once here:

 

15 hours ago, A Handsome Fridge said:

Definitely one of the NaNoWADMo maps I want to check out in between IRL bothers and mapping (I'll try and record it when I do), screenshots are looking good.

Thanks! Glad the screenshots didn't scare you off as I completely forgot to put some in the post until after I had written it so they might not be the best places for them! I'll definitely watch any playthrough videos you make if you link me to them.

 

5 hours ago, Dusty_Rhodes said:

Looks very good! Nice to see people were more productive in NanoWadMo than I was.

 

:D

 

Either way, I've never played an MBF21 wad, I'm excited to check this out.

Glad to be your first MBF21 wad, it's a very cool standard and I'm glad it's actually getting adopted through multiple source ports!

 

9 hours ago, galileo31dos01 said:

(really detailed thoughts, probably a bit too long to not just snip out :P)

Thank you for the detailed feedback, it's really useful for me and I'm happy that you're enjoying it so far. 

- For difficulty settings, I think what I will end up going with is making HMP have very similar monster settings but with more supplies (mostly health but I know I tend to be a bit stingy with ammo), and HNTR having this same buffed ammo but with some removed or replaced monsters. Hopefully I should be able to get them done fairly soon!

 

- I'm interested to see what you continue to think about the custom enemies and weapons in the other maps, but I think you're right about most of them here. I did struggle a bit to use the nightmare demons initially in Map3 - maybe I should have given out an SSG before introducing them, but I could definitely have a look at buffing the shotgun slightly - I honestly quite like the fact that it's not a guarantee to one-shot the suicide bombers with the shotgun, though I can see how it might get  a bit annoying. If there's a listing somewhere of the exact spread values and information so I can buff the damage of it a little bit, I'll probably end up doing something like that.

 

- I reckon I could probably give out another green armour in map 4 so the double archvile surprise is less harsh in cases like yours as it's definitely a bit too mean now (probably for the best I swapped the nightmare demons out for suicide bombers in that fight though!)

 

- From what you say with the red key fight in Map5, I think I might change it so there's just one mancubus on each side teleporting in as that should make it a bit more consistent and also cut down on the projectile hell of it (I may also swap the nightmare demons in that area to regular demons). I'll also probably sprinkle round a few more rockets near the start of that map.

 

- Thanks for the bug reports, not sure how I missed some of these - I thought I had found all the instances where the player and land monster blocking lines stopped working after I accidentally saved the map as a Boom map, but apparently not!

 

- I'm surprised you mentioned Geothermal Plant! I thought basically no-one actually played that map! I'm very glad you liked it.

[A Handsome Fridge]

How is MBF21 support for GZDoom at the moment? Will this mapset work correctly?

[finnks13]

4 minutes ago, A Handsome Fridge said:

How is MBF21 support for GZDoom at the moment? Will this mapset work correctly?

I believe that support for MBF21 was added in v4.7.0 of GZDoom (as a beta), so as long as you have that version or newer, it should work correctly.

[galileo31dos01]

5 hours ago, finnks13 said:

I'm surprised you mentioned Geothermal Plant! I thought basically no-one actually played that map! I'm very glad you liked it.

 

Yeah I have a playthrough too :)

 

5 hours ago, finnks13 said:

If there's a listing somewhere of the exact spread values and information so I can buff the damage of it a little bit, I'll probably end up doing something like that.

 

I'm guessing this is the list? If not, you might want to ask kraflab.

 

So, I played m09 and 06 yesterday.

 

M09 took a while, but I did it all in the end. I liked the theme and the fights seemed effective at giving not much margin of error, from the first phase with bombers and chaingunners filling the entire room (oof, those failed one-shots), to the next phase with very intrusive demons (good demons I'd say, very tricky to carve space), to the pain elementals and archviles behind with very little cover - you kinda have to tank hits here I assume, and with the multiple boosts it's pretty manageable provided the lost souls don't get too affectionate. 

 

The final area would probably benefit from a few more cell packs, rather than SSG/CG ammo which don't fit in such a setup imo. I ran very thin on BFG ammo quite often despite infight and switching back to rockets, and almost didn't make it past the archviles in the exit (those last two cell packs saved my day though). I did need to CG the bruisers on platforms to save rockets. Also the RK sometimes spawned archviles and sometimes didn't, not sure what was going on there tbh.

 

M06 is pretty fine. Tight, slightly frustrating in the RK room (very exposed, SSG reload hurting), but nothing I'd change except maybe block lines around the green pad - the HK would sometimes wreck me immediately or infight with the mancubus. Would probably hand a second armor after the BK grab, because you kinda soak a lot of lava, but I later figured the soulsphere and was good so, no big deal.

 

I started M07 too. I could get to the "church" with barely enough ammo (cells), but I can't go and pick up the BFG without being sandwiched, so I have no other choice than killing stuff from outside, hoping the archvile dies soon because of the ammo situation. All the monsters in the room wake up by gunfire or if you pass next to them, but the cyb is immobile until you go for the BFG, so he's not of any help either. I preferred to leave him alive afterwards and save me the cells. I'm a bit clueless here because I might be missing something...

[finnks13]

13 minutes ago, galileo31dos01 said:

 

Yeah I have a playthrough too :)

 

 

I'm guessing this is the list? If not, you might want to ask kraflab.

 

So, I played m09 and 06 yesterday.

 

M09 took a while, but I did it all in the end. I liked the theme and the fights seemed effective at giving not much margin of error, from the first phase with bombers and chaingunners filling the entire room (oof, those failed one-shots), to the next phase with very intrusive demons (good demons I'd say, very tricky to carve space), to the pain elementals and archviles behind with very little cover - you kinda have to tank hits here I assume, and with the multiple boosts it's pretty manageable provided the lost souls don't get too affectionate. 

 

The final area would probably benefit from a few more cell packs, rather than SSG/CG ammo which don't fit in such a setup imo. I ran very thin on BFG ammo quite often despite infight and switching back to rockets, and almost didn't make it past the archviles in the exit (those last two cell packs saved my day though). I did need to CG the bruisers on platforms to save rockets. Also the RK sometimes spawned archviles and sometimes didn't, not sure what was going on there tbh.

 

M06 is pretty fine. Tight, slightly frustrating in the RK room (very exposed, SSG reload hurting), but nothing I'd change except maybe block lines around the green pad - the HK would sometimes wreck me immediately or infight with the mancubus. Would probably hand a second armor after the BK grab, because you kinda soak a lot of lava, but I later figured the soulsphere and was good so, no big deal.

 

I started M07 too. I could get to the "church" with barely enough ammo (cells), but I can't go and pick up the BFG without being sandwiched, so I have no other choice than killing stuff from outside, hoping the archvile dies soon because of the ammo situation. All the monsters in the room wake up by gunfire or if you pass next to them, but the cyb is immobile until you go for the BFG, so he's not of any help either. I preferred to leave him alive afterwards and save me the cells. I'm a bit clueless here because I might be missing something...

 

Ooh, well I'll definitely watch that playthrough for a start!

 

I may add a bit more ammo to map9 as while there's definitely enough it is probably a bit too stingy, fair enough point with the hell knight on map6 - I never left it alive in my testing so I didn't think to block off the teleporter. 

If you would like a strategy for the church fight in Map7, generally what I do is to run and grab the BFG and then jump off the platform and run down the left side of the room (facing the entrance) with the archvile and shoot one BFG shot on the archvile and then exit the room into the corridor. The fight will probably clean itself up after that, except for the cyberdemon - I normally enter the fight with no rockets and around 80 cells left if that helps (I'm definitely going to add more ammo to this area too as that seems to be an issue for people too). I think I will end up changing the church fight for the next version as everyone who's played it seems to have a lot of trouble with it and it wasn't meant to be anywhere near as difficult as it turned out to be, I meant to change it but I haven't had enough time to do that before this first release.

Edited November 2, 2021 by finnks13
forgot an important detail for my strategy

[galileo31dos01]

8 hours ago, finnks13 said:

If you would like a strategy for the church fight in Map7, generally what I do is to run and grab the BFG and then jump off the platform and run down the left side of the room (facing the entrance) with the archvile and shoot one BFG shot on the archvile and then exit the room into the corridor.

 

Here are various recordings of me using your strategy: llace07.zip

 

What I did was basically arrive at the church in good shape, store a key frame and then restore (or rewind) multiple times to check consistency, whether after dying or not. I added the backup file although I don't know if it's of any use when loading the demo...

 

The good part is I got your trick more times than not, so the fight appears to be more fair in my eyes now that I know what you're going for. There was a slight chance the cyb would knock me off if it shot immediately, specially if something else moved in the wrong way, but it seemed infrequent enough. That could be adjusted for lower skills if you want to. Besides, ammo isn't technically a problem imo, if you can push to the SSG and go back to kill stragglers that's fine. The "bad" part is that I think the multiple attempts weren't stored in the demo but only the last one, so I ended up recording more individual short-ish attempts for funsies. To be fair it was my first time using the function so I have no experience with how it works :l. Make sure to use -skipsec 167 so you don't have to watch the start over and over.

 

I still played a bit more out of curiosity in some of them (llace07 and llace07h) and noticed more passable fences, so there's that too :p

Edited November 3, 2021 by galileo31dos01

[galileo31dos01]

So I played the rest of the wad last week, forgot to keep you updated heh, sorry.

 

- About the rest of m07, actually no complaints, I really enjoyed the stairs fight and the ending mess. I found the secret invulnerability prior the cyb/barons clausterf and breezed through it. I don't know if I'm cool with how cramped the fight is without the invul, since it can get awkward if the infight doesn't start asap (did a few quick tests, as long as the cyb shot and the barons immediately fired back it was fine). Wouldn't change anything in it anyways, but I might hand a soulsphere somewhere before the fight imo.  

 

- Map 08 got me nervous from the get-go. I liked that first fight structurally, even when the lost souls coming from that PE ruined my day a number of times. There's one minor issue though, you can activate the fight by slightly walking over the line, and when the barrier raises, if you fall onto the stairs you can't lower that barrier so you'd be stuck. 

The final timed gimmick was a stellar part, from the presentation to the high part where you can study the crate maze. It took a couple attempts, and in the second I almost didn't get to the exit, I had to skip some kills in the way (including the surprise cyb). Not sure if the timer is too tight for killing everything or I needed to be more aggressive, or perhaps max kills was never part of the plan (valid choice btw), so I'll leave it to you to tell me your strategy. I then realized it was the last (formal) map, so the exit felt a little abrupt to me, but that's okay.

 

- I was curious and checked if there were any hidden maps. Surprised when I found 3, lol, though I suppose they are either unfinished (12 for example doesn't have an exit) or to experiment with/showcase the MBF21 special features. I quite liked that map with death sectors and player-only block lines, legible and simple. Not sure if you mind feedback about it, though if I had to point out one small issue it'd be in the baron/archviles bit -- I'd suggest the switch to also raise the cover along with activating the trap, because it isn't immediately clear that you gotta cross the edge to have the pillars raised, and those pillars are crucial, almost.

 

Anyways, that's about everything I guess. Looking forward that HMP release!!

[finnks13]

Thanks for more feedback, don't worry about it taking some time - I've been taking some time off mapping anyway, as I'm trying not to completely burn out on it like I did after last year's NaNoWadMo.

 

46 minutes ago, galileo31dos01 said:

- Map 08 got me nervous from the get-go. I liked that first fight structurally, even when the lost souls coming from that PE ruined my day a number of times. There's one minor issue though, you can activate the fight by slightly walking over the line, and when the barrier raises, if you fall onto the stairs you can't lower that barrier so you'd be stuck. 

The final timed gimmick was a stellar part, from the presentation to the high part where you can study the crate maze. It took a couple attempts, and in the second I almost didn't get to the exit, I had to skip some kills in the way (including the surprise cyb). Not sure if the timer is too tight for killing everything or I needed to be more aggressive, or perhaps max kills was never part of the plan (valid choice btw), so I'll leave it to you to tell me your strategy. I then realized it was the last (formal) map, so the exit felt a little abrupt to me, but that's okay.

 

Good catch on the first fight, didn't realise it was possible to walk back down the stairs - I'll add a lift action to that side of the blocker. Really happy with the final timed section, it's my second attempt at a section like this and tbh I'd like to finish off most of my mapsets this way from now on. It is definitely possible to get all the kills and secrets (the timer is set off of my first attempt at it, after all of the secrets and monsters were placed so I was sure that it was possible if you're familiar with the section), though it's basically impossible if you don't know exactly what's coming. When I finish the update, I'm probably going to stream a playthrough and give commentary about each of the levels so I'll show off the strategy there. I guess it is a little abrupt, I tried to make the intermission text (and the map name :P) suggest that it's the final map but I suppose that's not the worst thing - my first attempt at a map like this probably signals the final map-ness of the map much better because it's like a Indiana Jones "escape the temple" section.

 

51 minutes ago, galileo31dos01 said:

- I was curious and checked if there were any hidden maps. Surprised when I found 3, lol, though I suppose they are either unfinished (12 for example doesn't have an exit) or to experiment with/showcase the MBF21 special features. I quite liked that map with death sectors and player-only block lines, legible and simple. Not sure if you mind feedback about it, though if I had to point out one small issue it'd be in the baron/archviles bit -- I'd suggest the switch to also raise the cover along with activating the trap, because it isn't immediately clear that you gotta cross the edge to have the pillars raised, and those pillars are crucial, almost.

 

Funnily enough, I forgot to actually add the "reward" for the secret map which was telling you about the existence of Map11, which I decided to add in as a little bonus map because otherwise I'd probably never bother to release it. Map11 was made in September, entirely to mess around with the MBF21 features and see if I could make some cool fights out of them before I had decided on the lunar theme - I meant to add a third arena to it, but I didn't bother in the end. I'll change that small thing about that fight as that's a fair point with it. I'll probably end up removing Map12 because it's entirely unfinished, the only reason it's still in the wad is because I liked what I had so far and wanted to maybe rework it in the future - that was actually the original Map4 before I quickly threw in what's there now!

 

Thanks again for all of the feedback, it's really helping me come up with ideas for the update!

[Caleb13]

Bloody hell, yet another dead link on Dropbox?

[finnks13]

1 hour ago, Caleb13 said:

Bloody hell, yet another dead link on Dropbox?

 

Whoops, didn't realise the link would stop working so quickly. I've updated the download and just attached it to the post directly so it should work fine. Thanks for letting me know!

 

I'll just keep replacing the attachment here instead of using dropbox for future updates (until I end up bunging it on idgames, that is).

[kalensar]

All I'm gonna say is if you're using custom monsters then I'm going to use some better weaponry after what I just seen on Map01. Its not bad by any stretch of the imagination, But the mixture of of being swamped by very high priority targets in a 180* at the first key? I get that they are projectiles, but they're still plasma rounds of the arachnotron type. Mostly I'm just laughing than anything. Looks pretty good.

[Vile]

This was a fun set, thanks for making it!  My favorite was the secret map, but I enjoyed all of the maps and there are some clever setups throughout.

Edited November 18, 2021 by Vile

[Vile]

Galileo asked me to share the gameplay vod for this.  I suppose I should do that more in general if it helps with playtesting and such.

 

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1208511258

 

[finnks13]

9 hours ago, Vile said:

Galileo asked me to share the gameplay vod for this.  I suppose I should do that more in general if it helps with playtesting and such.

 

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1208511258

 

 

Thanks for posting this, wish I'd realised someone was streaming it or I would have turned up to say hi. Ah well, it was a very fun watch anyway and I'm really glad you enjoyed the set!

[finnks13]

Hi everyone,

 

I've been working (and procrastinating!) on this update to Lunar Laceration, with the main focus being on difficulty settings and fixing some problems that arose in GZDoom. The full changelog is included in the textfile, though I will detail the most important ones in this spoiler:

 

Spoiler

- Added difficulty settings
- Added in DECORATE, MAPINFO and SNDINFO patches so the chaingun and pistol actually work in GZDoom (if any gzdoom developer wants the old version to inspect where the DEHACKED didn't work, then please let me know)
- Small edits to the UMAPINFO (swapped maps 10 and 11 around and made them loop forever)
- Removed map12, as it was an unfinished map that didn't really deserve to be a bonus map
- Lowered the health of the suicide bomber to 48, to make 1-shotting them with the shotgun more consistent
- Made the shotgun fire 2 ticks faster (oh baby!)
- Removed the rocket zombie's splash damage immunity

 

In terms of how the difficulty settings should play, here is how I tried to design them:

HMP should play pretty similarly to UV, but with more powerups and ammo to make it a bit easier - in general, I tried not to remove too many enemies on this setting.

HNTR keeps the additional equipment from HMP, but reduces the monster count much more, and I tried especially to remove the most troublesome enemies, so the scale of the fights was mostly preserved.

 

Let me know how you find them, if you end up playing them.

 

As far as I'm concerned, this is the pretty much the final version of the wad, I have some modifications to make to the MAPINFO so the textscreens work in GZDoom, but I decided it was more important to release this update without that. If no bugs or obvious oversights are submitted to me over the next couple of weeks, I will upload the wad to the idgames archive and bring this project to a close.

 

Thanks to everyone who has already given Lunar Laceration a shot, it really means a lot to me, and I hope anyone who gives it a go with this update enjoys it too.

 

DOWNLOAD (here, and in the OP if that's your style):

LLACERATION_RC2.zip

[Death Bear]

Spoiler

 

 

Spoiler

 

 

[JustAthel]

Ahh, Lunar Laceration. The wad where we can finally cut into the moon to see if it's really made of cheese. In all seriousness, with this being the first MBF21 mapset I've experienced (as well as my proper "return" to playing Doom and not just making maps for it), I had no idea what I was stepping into, even after the NaNoWadMo discord explained it to me like the boomer that I am at this point. That being said, some of the new features, such as the new enemies without replacing any of vanilla's roster, as well as the usage of UMAPINFO, came as a pleasant surprise to me. I have to give the new enemies in particular some credit where its due -- for the roles they have, they're integrated quite seamlessly in the original roster and didn't feel too out of place. Honestly, it felt refreshing in a way. The way you've placed them and set them up in certain scenarios definitely helps with this.

The layouts of the maps. The way that each map loops back onto itself and, for the most part, is easy to navigate is something that makes each map have this sort of greater flow and synergy to them. There's enough clues and hints to guide the player on to where they need to go next, and I must say I think I'm more of a fan of the outer areas than the inner ones. Both are done well, don't get me wrong, but there's some odd sense of satisfaction in seeing how "natural" you've made the surface of the moon, and how it just blends in with all of the tech bases and outposts. The visual storytelling you pull off is also just a perfect touch, and I'd love to see more of that in maps.

The combat. Okay, so some encounters are a bit tough for me, then again it could be me just shaking the rust off of playing. I feel as though some areas could do with a couple more medikits, maybe a few more shells and bullets sprinkled here and there, you know just some wiggle room for other players who aren't as good at rationing ammo out, but not enough to make it a complete breeze. The way I played it at least, you're so close to reaching that fine balance. Some maps I had to bum-rush to the exit because I didn't have the confidence to push through. Map 06 is definitely one of the more tougher maps only because of the gimmick you go into with. Speaking of...

The gimmicks. Each map has a sort of gimmick going on for it which contributes to the map's overall gameplay. Whether it be finding your way through the surface to some stronger base, or quickly deciding what trap you'd want to set off first, there's something there that keeps every map fresh and more than just "walk into room, point gun, shoot, repeat." I'm especially a fan of the gimmick in Map 08, where 

Spoiler

you have to step on a little button to proceed, which perfectly foreshadows the big self destruct button you'll have to step into. I'm a sucker for this kind of intuitive stuff. Speaking of Map 08, playing the Ducktales theme whilst escaping from the moon's destruction... it fits so well and I'm so glad you took that opportunity, it would feel rather empty without it.

Overall, I thoroughly did enjoy the mapset. A few of the encounters and traps I ran into were pretty fun to try to bluff my way out of, and though it took me a few tries and I did get a bit frustrated here and there, it was never with any ill-will. This is a fantastic little piece and I am thoroughly excited to see what other works you release. I've got my eye on you, finn! I don't think there's anything else I can really say that I haven't already said, but if you're someone lurking on this thread looking for any interesting wads to try out, give this one a shot. You might be surprised how much fun you can have on the moon!

This is only a formality at this point, but I'm linking my entire playthrough of Lunar Laceration here, though you've already seen it in the NaNoWadMo discord :D

Edited January 5, 2022 by Athel
So like how did I forget to finish a sentence?-