[Boom+UMAPINFO][Doom 2] Intergalactic Xenology Trilogy

[HorseJockey]

Haven't finished the whole wad yet, but wanted to let you know that it is fantastic. Love the texture work and walkable mid tex neon bridges. The little details that you have put into the level are great. The arched doorways are my favorite level design piece, very clever way of doing it. Have played the first 6 maps on UV so far, and while I am finding it challenging it is not unfair and the monster placement is well thought out and shows a great comprehension of how the different monsters interact with each other. Good stuff!

[ProfBloom]

Finished this tonight, totally blown away by the creativity on display.  Great level design throughout, incredible use of Boom features, and a fun story to boot.  The secret level is not to be missed!  Great work!

[spaztacus]

Wow!!!!!   Amazing!!!!  Not having played Episode 1 & 2, I went through all 3 Episodes in order.  Amazing work.  I loved the pacing of the levels, the design and themes and the texture work.  Great stuff.  Hope we get more someday.

[Dreadopp]

Thanks again for playing through the set, everyone!

 

I uploaded a new version of the wad on the first post that should hopefully address the potential softlock on MAP11. As Lord_Z pointed out, that specific conveyor belt sequence is pretty finicky, so there is a chance it may still occur (but at a much lower rate). It works best if the directional keys aren't pressed while on the ride, so sit back and enjoy the sights. :P

[Maribo]

I've been a bit enamored with Altitude Adjustment ever since I played it a couple of weeks ago and today I decided to scrounge around previous Dreadopp & Lord_Z works, since I'm woefully uninitiated.

 

This is one of those rare WADs where it genuinely does nothing but get better as it goes. Not strictly on a map-to-map basis, but each each episode is even better than the previous, and later maps in each episode may change a bit stylistically (Two of the closers are big slow burn arena-based slaughter maps and the third is still quite slaughter-y), but they don't at all fall off or misstep. If anything, they make wacky left turns that benefit them much more than if they stuck to the previous script -- E2 absolutely goes off the rails for the better, E1's closer is a much-needed departure from an otherwise set of enjoyable but quite familiar Ancient Aliens tributes, and E3 is off somewhere on its own, playing completely by its own rules with the Ancient Aliens assets serving as little more than an aesthetic framework by that point. There are so many unique designs that will live rent free in my head for a long time: the aforementioned E2 off-rails adventure, that serene lost world in E1's closer, E3's opener(!!!), that Grow-Me/Shrink-Me map, the defrost sequence in the frozen world... This WAD is a treasure of unique design in Doom.

 

A full set of casual UV -dsdademo demos, plays back in v0.27.5 of DSDA-Doom - ixt-maribo.zip. Better a bit late than never, I suppose.

[Dreadopp]

Thanks for playing, and thanks for the feedback! We're glad you had a good time playing through this project. :)

 

I haven't seen all the demos yet, but more thanks for taking the time to record all of those! They are great to see. It's unfortunate that the dark lift on MAP09 didn't lower properly for you. In hindsight, having a fail-safe switch of some kind at the end of that tunnel would remove that blocker. It's certainly something to keep in mind going forward.

[GarrettChan]

I think the idgames has the wrong file? I downloaded it and it's IX2 and it only has 5 maps.

 

Wait, never mind, I loaded the wrong wad...

Edited December 31, 2023 by GarrettChan

[CacoKnight]

Tried for 10 mins and I already LOVE this wad, anything skillsaw or Ancient Aliens based or designed on is gold in my book.

[DreadWanderer]

11 minutes ago, CacoKnight said:

Tried for 10 mins and I already LOVE this wad, anything skillsaw or Ancient Aliens based or designed on is gold in my book.

 

In that case, I have 2 more recommendations for you:

 

 

 

[CacoKnight]

Hell yeah, both saved thank you!

[DreadWanderer]

Hey folks, I'm surprised that no one has yet posted a full playthrough of this wad so I'll do the honours. UV max playlist:
 

As a big fan of Ancient Aliens, I absolutely loved IXT. It follows in the footsteps of AA but at the same time it's very much its own thing, and I could see the amount of love and effort poured into it. @Dreadopp and @Lord_Z - you've done a fantastic job, hats off to you and thank you for making IXT!

Edited March 23 by DreadWanderer

[Dreadopp]

No problem. :P

 

Thanks a lot for putting all those videos together! And thanks for all the feedback/notes/analyses! Those were fun to read through. We're happy you enjoyed playing through the set. :)

[DreadWanderer]

17 minutes ago, Dreadopp said:

No problem. :P

 

Thanks a lot for putting all those videos together! And thanks for all the feedback/notes/analyses! Those were fun to read through. We're happy you enjoyed playing through the set. :)

 

Thank you very much for reading, my guess is that a lot of people skip them so it's great to know you've gone through them.

[GarrettChan]

Casual UV Maxes

Port: DSDA-Doom v0.27.5 -complevel 9

Total IGT: 2:02:08

Personal Difficulty Evaluation: 1.7 (2 = Ancient Aliens)

Personal Rating: 8.7 (out of 10)

 

 

I rated Episode II 7.8 before and I played Episode II solely due to Map04 (Map09 in the Trilogy pack).

 

I originally liked the AA texture a lot since I'm a pink/purple lover. Trilogy made good use of those texture well and create a similar environmental feeling. I totally see the progression of map quality from Episode I to Episode III.

 

Episode I maps are not at the same level of Episode II and Episode III. Particularly Map05 is the worst since you basically don't even need to shoot in many of the arena fights. Also, you're not limited by the monsters so you can just go around the arena freely and it's almost 0 risk. Only the first fight posts a minor threat.

 

Episode II maps start to have more characteristics in them. Map07 has some icy terrain which is a nice change to most of ancient ruins. Map08 and Map09 stand out the most in this set. I really like the OOB areas of Map08 so you can see how you travel around the "world" even though the maps are just circles. You don't need to do any of those parts since you can't even get there, but you did put a lot of efforts into those just for views, which I appreciated the most. Map09 is the best creative level in the whole set. The surface and the inside of the Cacodemon is well made, though the fights are a bit too simply but I guess it doesn't make sense to have too many monsters inside a monster lol.

 

Episode III is my favorite episode by a large margin. Map11 has that little person big world theme. Map12 and Map13 are those "Wormhole" maps with a plot twist. I liked "Wormhole" maps to begin with and with the plot twist, it's more interesting. I guess you need to make the extra texture just for the smaller part of Map12? That's some work over there.

 

To me the whole difficulty came from Map15. The big fight is a bit annoying since it's very hard to get your cell packs after the Cybers are released. I haven't tried the map without the BFG secret but it seems without the BFG, the whole map would be a bit... grindy and not very fun. All other maps are not even close to as being difficult as Map15.

 

 

(OHHHHHHH Crap, I didn't know there's a Map31... I need to play it in this week...)

Edited March 26 by GarrettChan

[DreadWanderer]

18 hours ago, GarrettChan said:

 

(OHHHHHHH Crap, I didn't know there's a Map31... I need to play it in this week...)

I'm assuming that you either haven't played it in DSDA, or if you did, you didn't check out the level table, which ofc is perfectly fine. At the same time, it's a great argument in favour of reading the intermission texts, where developers sometimes drop clever clues about stuff like that :D

[GarrettChan]

1 hour ago, DreadWanderer said:

I'm assuming that you either haven't played it in DSDA, or if you did, you didn't check out the level table, which ofc is perfectly fine. At the same time, it's a great argument in favour of reading the intermission texts, where developers sometimes drop clever clues about stuff like that :D

I never look at the level table :^)

 

I did read all the texts, and I feel leaving the ending like this is perfectly fine in order to make the players think of however they want the ending, heh.

[Lord_Z]

Thanks for playing and for all the videos!

 

On 3/26/2024 at 1:34 PM, GarrettChan said:

(OHHHHHHH Crap, I didn't know there's a Map31... I need to play it in this week...)

I wouldn't be surprised if there were others that were not aware either, haha.