The DWmegawad Club plays: Down the Drain

[General Roasterock]

Map 08: Deep Tech

 

  My first difficulty spike in the WAD, Deep Tech puts it all on atmosphere, yet my whole takeaway from the map outside of the hellish nukage traversal was the monster closet fight. It felt dare I say uncanny to bounce back and forth between a realistically set up nukage management fight to a rectangular room filled with spheres and teleporters. I’ve never had a fight make use of the monster closet as a playable area, and its honestly inspiring. 

  The rest of the map was painful. Stupidly wide spaces, unavoidable nukage traversal for progression across titanic rivers of green with skintight radsuit economy, and hardly enough ammo to handle the map in more than one route. The last push of Barons and Viles is nasty after having so much map  drain ammo and health from you, and there’s hardly an exit in this WAD that forces you to bother with the opposition because why not? The whole thing is draped in darkness, which hide most of the important pickups, specifically in the slime channels, so not having any foresight will hang you out to dry. This hurt.

 

Map 09: Forts and Alleys

 

  Leaving a Down the Drain map alone for more than a day forces me into a position where I have to open the map again to rush back all the memories associated with it. I do remember almost being indicted to the weird in the meshing of buildings on odd angles. However, once I got to the long canal of caged Revenants, nigh harmless Pain Elementals, and a pit fight that I effortlessly skipped on my first go round, I was able to recollect myself and say “yep, I’m still draining”. Benjo has a mapping tangent that I would go as far as to call “animalistic”, as there are several of these sections in the WAD thus far that are these long curving sectors that are lined with pointy spikes. From: Unknown had it, this map has it, and I’m sure that it’s not the last time I’ll see something that fits this bill.

  I have next to no memory of the combat outside of the fact that there were a bunch of Arch-Viles, a monster that’s now starting to become more common. The ones on the stairs were bastards to whittle down, and the rush after collecting the Rocket Launcher had several options to ruin your day, which is welcomed now. Escaping said rush requires the player to run into a teleporter that takes them directly into a secret sector, which at this point only elicits an “oh whatever” from me. This is the point where I feel that surprises are going to need a lot more zaniness to take me aback. 

 

Map 10: Here n There, Now n Then

 

  Despite bordering on incomprehensible, this map has a fine ring of combat if you know where all the weapons are. Plasma is only bountiful enough, and trying to resupply requires a lot of nukage walking in the eastern vat. I am honestly at a loss for how to describe progression here, as there is not a singular recognizable thing in this level, which I suppose is the ultimate success in this case. I suppose the secret design is satisfying, opening up a comparatively large wing to find a much needed Rocket Launcher. Not like it helps much against a Cyberdemon. 

  Yeah, I’m stuck, it is genuinely difficult to talk about this one without making bullet lists of what’s in it. Here n There, Now n Then is such an anomaly, even in this WAD.

 

Map 11: Cache Raiders

 

  Aggravating, but shapely. I am certainly not a fan of this map dumping monsters with just about every movement I make, as the craftsmanship makes it very easy for a mob of Knights to follow you around the caves. I’m definitely feeling the squeeze that TOTG or Abandon Benjo is definitely capable of creating, and something as memorable as simply lining a bunch of spheres in a row, or dropping an entire ambulance’s worth of meds on the floor makes it clear how necessary the trading of damage is to get through some of these fights. 

  One thing I will mention about the lighting of nearly the entire WAD is how harsh it is. Simply passing underneath an archway will slice the value in half, and most of the caves being so dimly lit allows for any charging Pinkies to emerge into the light with vigor. One of Down the Drain’s best realized strengths is how it doesn’t have to follow any natural lighting convention (or perhaps an artificial one if the intent is a realistic 90s nightmare), which allows the lighting to be take in infinitely many directions to support the atmosphere. Deep Tech did that, but the map hurt so bad to play and replay after dying that it makes the experience harder to take in. I hope it gets more extreme as time goes on.

 

Map 12: Into the Tomb

 

  Woah.

  Pretty much the entirety of the map is unremarkable, but that last thirty seconds is stellar. I mucked around through yet another mesh of dirt, brick, and zimmer, only to be greeted by the entrance to a bunker. Walking down the stairs and taking the plunge into the massive corridor is something that I could have never expected out of this WAD. The title puts the whole thing into a new perspective, whatever happened to warrant this megastructure was terrible, and the entire time period didn’t work out so well. My desires for Down the Drain’s lighting to exemplify its creation are answered in droves, as seeing the doors lit against the murky tunnel, and dropping yet further into the exit is chilling. I truly believe in this WADs ability to deliver this at many more points, and frankly I would feel no different if this was the entire map.

 

Power Rankings

Spoiler

1. Into the Tomb
2. Baloney Town
3. Private Island
4. The Perfect Gerbil Cage
5. Rolling Down
6. Forts and Alleys
7. Cache Raiders
8. Someone's Castle
9. Here n There, Now n Then
10. Kick the Can
11. From: Unknown
12. Deep Tech

 

[Roofi]

Map 12 : Into the Tomb

 

Spoiler

 

After a first episode that was sometimes very sadistic, we find ourselves in a cavernous network leading to a mysterious cement base described as "a tomb".

The difficulty is much less pronounced than in most of the maps so far. Map 12 is more of a transition map to give the player a breather.

 

The cavernous part is both pleasant and not very memorable, because of its omnipresent brown and the lack of a striking visual structure. However, after pressing the partially buried buttons, this is where the magic happens with a sumptuous gradation of light standing out from the surrounding darkness, leading us straight to a huge complex depopulated of any enemy.

 

The architecture at the end of the level is really simple and remarkable. The depth of the ravine as well as the various illuminated doors,  add a lot of mystery, which excite me to play the following maps.

 

"Into The Tomb" is a great transitional map in my opinion and is one of my favorite maps in Down the Drain so far.

 

Grade : A

 

Edited November 12, 2022 by Roofi

[DisgruntledPorcupine]

MAP12: Into the Tomb

UV, pistol start, no saves

100% kills, 1/3 secrets

 

Probably my favourite looking map so far. It starts off with some nice looking cave sections, until you eventually make it to a cliffside with a view of that Doom 2 burning city skybox. The dive into the "tomb" is a long fall into a techbase area, which from my peek ahead seems to be the theme for the next stretch of maps. Very cool little transition between themes in this one. For music we have probably my favourite Radiohead midi translation so far, the classic Airbag. God does it sound good, almost serves to highlight how damn nice the actual track sounds (also kind of fitting in the context of Radiohead's career that it's sort of the first track where they begin to transition from their older Britpop tendencies to the more experimental/electronic stuff that came next, but I won't digress too much).

 

The combat is definitely much more laid back than the last few maps, but definitely understandable in the context of this sort of being a bridge between themes. Your goals are pretty obvious in this one and shouldn't require too much trial and error. Grab that red skull key as soon as you can and then get the rocket launcher, and the cave section is pretty simple from there (the SSG secret can also be thrown in to further simplify thing). That arachnotron trap near the end did actually catch me off guard though, actually took my one death there.

 

Cool little episode transition. Excited to see what lies ahead!

Edited November 12, 2022 by DisgruntledPorcupine

[brick]

GZDoom, blind, continuous with saves, HNTR

 

MAP10 - “Here n There, Now n Then”
I didn't like this one. Progression is incredibly obscure, even when I was making progress it was not clear what anything I did was accomplishing. The yellow key in particular was frustrating, first figuring out how to even lower the lift, then trying to dodge imp and knight fireballs in -20 slime with the barrels blocking the way, and the door opening and closing without rhyme or reason until I figured out that switch that seemed to be doing nothing was a GR. The liberal mistexturing started grating on me here, I was wondering if it was just me but I think Book Lord made a good point about inappropriate texturing with charm vs just plain ugly, and I also agree with the criticism of the other "intentionally bad" designs like the unattainable secret and the dual-purpose switch that eventually leads to area above the YK.

 

MAP11 - “Cache Raiders”
I stumbled on the exit barely 4 minutes in, but I don't like that it's completely hidden behind wanting to pick up those very specific rocket boxes, I got lucky and might've been stuck for a long time if I hadn't done things in this specific order. I stayed for a bit longer to find all the secrets, and I admit that part was a lot of fun, none of them were very difficult to find but they're cleverly hidden and reward observation and exploration. The entire cache aspect, as others have pointed out, makes for fun gameplay overall.

 

MAP12 - “Into the Tomb”
A short map even by the wad's standards, the first part is in an underground complex of sorts. The lowering walls are a nice gimmick, depending on the order you press the switches you either deal with each wave piecemeal or with all of them at once, which is a fun fight. The second part is deceptively simple, the only fight is the triple arachnotron (though that teleporting ambush is quite clever). I loved the look of the "tomb" entrance, there's some truly beautiful lighting work there, but it gets much stranger when you get in and fall into that hall with the four doors (I didn't even think of it, but abandoned underground train station makes so much sense!). Turns out two of them aren't even doors, one gets you a humorous secret full of (now useless) boxes of a bullet (and a teleport forcing you back to the start, since the door cannot be opened from this side), and the last one is the exit proper. Strange but really fun map.

[RHhe82]

MAP11: Cache Raiders. Played on DSDA v0.24, UV, PS. 159/159 K, 3/3 S, 2/2 I. Completion time 14:54

 

Ouch! The start isn't hot, but once the action starts, it's relentless for a long time. My use of saves was bordering scummy, I was on low healths a couple of times, archviles were undoing my hard work... but I made it. I had cursorily eyed through reports on this thread, I was under the impression that people hold it in high regard, and I could see that... but I was ready to write down remarks in a vein that "Would giving an SSG have killed you". Only prior to reaching the exit switch my rocket situation had improved, otherwise I was suffering ammo starvation and killing hell knights with a single-barrel and chaingun.

 

But wait, I was still missing some 40 kills. What was I missing? I searched every crevice (my actual playing time was a lot more than 15 minutes, I reloaded to undo fruitless ventures into nukage areas), I tried traversing the pillars where once revenants reigned... and I just couldn't see the SSG laying in plain sight. No sirree, it was there all along for the grabs, and I can't believe I somehow missed it for so long. Now, knowing that, I suspect the level would be one of the top maps here, although the SSG does bring in hordes of imps and release the revenants onto the battlefield. Infight potential is evident, but the corridors were already quite crowded.

 

Great one!

 

 

MAP12: Into the Tomb. Played on DSDA v0.24, UV, PS. 71/71 K, 3/3 S, 0/0 I. Completion time 10:01

 

A much more laid back level. Someone called it a breather, and I agree. A couple of window dressing imps and a revenant give a flavour of busywork, as do the arachnotrons at the top of the stairs, but that's minor. I like the episode transitiony feel of it, the scale of the tech base exit remind me of (my preconceptions of) Sunder, somehow. A second playthrough of this one would probably benefit from knowing where the SSG is. A solid map.

[Pseudonaut]

Map12:
So much for not worrying about speed. I recorded three full runs while attempting to get a good time, and 2:32 was the best I got. The map is short and sweet, not much else to say about it, aside from the unexpected ending in what appears to be a massive tomb of modern construction.

 

 

Map13:
Deliberately creating ghost monsters in 2021 is, dare I say, absolutely based. Only one of them appeared each time I played this (twice), but with an archvile placed among piles of crushed bodies, anyone should expect this to happen, and I'm surprised there weren't more. The rest of the map is pretty cool too; I particularly liked the big open area with lots of fairly non-threatening enemies. The three invulnerabilities are certainly overkill for casual play, and only one of them felt necessary, but perhaps speedrunning is more fun with them left in. Unfortunately, I completely squandered two of them. Idioteque is one of the best Radiohead songs, so I appreciated the midi.

 

 

Demos:

drn12-13.zip

Edited November 13, 2022 by Pseudonaut

[KickAss]

GZDooM 4.8.2, PB 3.0, HeXeReTiC HUD PB3 v8.3RC2e, Weapon Neural Upscale, Glory Kills v29b, SilentDoomguy, Flashlight, -iwad doom2.wad (ver 1.666), -skill 4 (UV), continuous play, no saves.

 

MAP13 - “Vet and Process”, 9 death, no success so far

 

Totaly frustrating. Very hard start. You have to take out a lot of enemys before you can proceed to the first room but they are not that problem. There is a complete misaligned texture bug in the first room that you will notice on your way to the main battle area. The main battle area is that big room where you have to drop in from the first room with the divider that lowers in the middle and a yellow door on the other end. I have not found any way out of this room because there are too much strong enemys keeping killing me.

[Book Lord]

MAP 13 – Vet and Process

DSDA-Doom v0.24.3, UV, Continuous, blind run w/saves

 

The fast crusher that made short work of the poor Troopers at the start was both a comical relief and a hint of things to come. The group of enemies behind the corner was rather big to tackle with basic weapons, so Doomguy’s best bet was to press on, break into the large tech room ahead and deal with the pursuers from there. The chamber was full of hitscanners on timed lifts, making sure the environment could not be freely exploited for cover. I died twice because I face rocketed on a Spectre, but on the third attempt I bested the Arch-Vile and his numerous minions. I was shocked that he did not resurrect any ghost monster under those crushers, but I might have been lucky.

Spoiler

Vet and Process offered plenty of resources and power-ups, to the point I wondered whether the name hinted at their management or at something else. The second area was a gargantuan high-tech temple, split in two by a sinking walkway and full of beefy monsters, that I decimated without much hassle. The real danger came from the last ambush, triggered by a switch in the eastern tunnels: several compartments released monsters in large numbers, some requiring immediate attention like the Arch-Vile nest. I did not know how many they were and their location, but I stumbled on an Invulnerability and used it to kill as many as possible. A second green sphere was guarded by a Spiderdemon, who was overwhelmed by the Arachnotrons while I was busy elsewhere. Knowing of the Invulnerabilities could trivialise the map’s hardest encounters, and I was shocked to discover a third one in a secret of the first tech room.

Spoiler

The Cyberdemon pair at the end was predictable and not very interesting to fight, unless the player released them before killing the other enemies. Not a simple task, considering the YK was found in a remote tip of the Arachnotron closet. As opposed to most maps in Down the Drain, Vet and Process might lose appeal on second playthroughs. I still think it was a pleasant level, whose square geometries and simple shapes were dignified by height variation and nice vanilla effects.

[KickAss]

GZDooM 4.8.2, PB 3.0, HeXeReTiC HUD PB3 v8.3RC2e, Weapon Neural Upscale, Glory Kills v29b, SilentDoomguy, Flashlight, -iwad doom2.wad (ver 1.666), -skill 4 (UV), continuous play, no saves.

 

MAP13 - “Vet and Process”, 10 death or so

 

 

[Azure_Horror]

Look like some catching up is needed!

 

Map 05 Rolling Down

DSDA-doom, pistol start, UV difficulty

 

I am not a big fan of this map, however it did amaze me on a technical level.

 

The narrow corridors may appear chaotic and random. But they are quite cleverly designed in fact. Those corridors encourage intersting monster behaviour. Staying in one place for long time is deadly, because the monsters are likely to surround you. But quick back-and forth movement is very much possible. Quick fights, as opposed to long drown-out shootouts, should be prioritised. Add to that a hefty pack of medikits in the central hub - and the map encourages some pretty unorthodox decisions, like berserking cacodemons in narrow corridors, or clearing both the left and the right pathes at the same time.

This all is very cool and intersting.

 

However, some aspects of the map feel RNG-dependent, like slipping past two barons and some revs for a crucial SSG, or clearing the turret viles near the end (the autoaim is very ucooperative around those 4 archies). And the final fight feels a bit overkill. It has lots of hell nobles and from 2 to 6 roaming archviles! With relatively limited ammo, and corpse-filled narrow corridors, this fight can easily get completely out of control. For those two reasons, I do not really enjoy the map.

 

All in all, Rolling Down has a very intersting design, but I don't like playing it that much.

 

Map 06 Baloney Town

DSDA-doom, pistol start, UV difficulty

 

Cute, chaotic, silly and a bit deadly, Baloney Town is a fun combat playground. Lots of fun messy fights! For once, most resourses are readily available, if a bit hidden. And monsters appear in mixed groups from many different directions. We have lots of fights, lots of infights, and lots of opportunities for risky plays. Sounds like alot of fun! Rocket launcher secret is my favorite part, but to go for it, you need to have pretty sizable health stash and some powerful weapons. Turret monsters and archvile groups are no joke!

 

Funny map! With parked mancubi in a garage!

 

Map 07 The Perfect Gerbil Cage

DSDA-doom, pistol start, UV difficulty

 

Starting view of a grand stone ark reminded me of Alien Vendetta, while midtier-focused fights brought Speed of Doom to my mind. Hell knight balcony is perfectly set up for a juicy BFG shot, which I really appreciate. Usually, low ammo BFG pick ups do not provide cool power fantasy setups. But here, we have one! Awesome!

 

But the main dish of the map hides in the caves. Huge revenat wave lives down there. Your goal is to maneuver around the revs, to get enough rockets. This can be accomplished in many different ways. You can fight down inside the caves, you can lure the revs to HK balcony and slip behind their back that way. You can use any wepon you want to thin down the skely crowd. Lots of replay value!

 

The Vile ambush at the exit can appear super nasty, but it is not that scary. When the viles get realesed, two cell packs appear in the rocket storage rooms nearby. 5 BFG shots can easily clear most of the Viles, and the rockets will clear the rest.

 

Pretty cool map, however one thing annoyed me a bit: the non-conventional geometry in conjunction with rev homing missiles. Dodging in those angled corridors is harder than it seems. But in the end, the map still felt pretty good to play.

 

Map 08 Deep Tech

DSDA-doom, pistol start, UV difficulty

 

Dark slimy cave systems cause my mind to scream "Speed of Doom!". But gameplay here is its own beast. Lots of swimming in nukage in search of resources, and some fat enemies to defeat. Without pre-knowledge, this map is rather frustrating. But with pre-knowledge it is a bit boring instead.

 

All in all, not my favorite map, but it has its shining moments:

- the map exit can be unlocked early, but you won't have the resourses to fight through the monsters guarding it. This design approach is underused, and it is always fun to encounter a map like this.

- the plasma rifle set up has a pretty funny arena: you can fight inside monster teleport closets there! This is a cool twist for a traditional design element. Personally, I prefer a somewhat similar teleport-closet trick from @Roofi's map 32 in 1000 Lines 3, but Down the Drain version is also very cool.

- the rad suit secret felt pretty interesting. That balcony way was intersting to discover. However, I do not like that the edge is not shown on the automap at all, and it is very hard to see from below.

 

Dunno, what else to say... This is far from my favorite map, but some things here are wonderful.

 

Maps in order of preference:

Spoiler

Map 03   Private Island.

Map 01   From: Unknown.

Map 02   Someone's Castle.

Map 06   Baloney Town.

Map 07   The Perfect Gerbil Cage.

Map 05   Rolling Down.

Map 04   Kick the Can.

Map 08   Deep Tech

 

Edited November 13, 2022 by Azure_Horror

[RHhe82]

MAP13: Vet and Process. Played on DSDA v0.24, UV, PS. 191/191 K, 3/3 S, 8/8 I. Completion time 17:04.

 

When I first encountered the ghost monsters, I thought I'd hate this map. The room with perpetually lowering and raising platforms is not my idea of fun gameplay. Once I get rid of all (but one that follows me well into the second area) ghost monsters and I move on to the big room, things get a little better, I like the grand scale chaos that ensues... especially once I find out about the invul spheres in plural. The final cybers were not that fun, more like busywork. 

[Azure_Horror]

Map 09 Forts and Alleys

DSDA-doom, pistol start, UV difficulty

 

That's a map. It has fun gameplay. Hmmm... What else can I say?...

 

All in all, Forts and Alleys is a very "Normal" map, with almost no wacky shenanigans we remeber from previous levels. It almost looks like it could a have been an early slot Hell Revealed I map: semi-hot strat, prominent archvile ambushes, some risk of resource starvation, unmarked secret weapon, but nothing too crazy compared to, say, 1st half of Plutonia Experiment. Some of the viles can be a real pain, especially when they stumble on mancubi corpses, and careless approach to combat will empty your ammo coffers, but all in all the map feels very approacheable.

 

Fun level, but somewhat umemorable.

 

Map 10 Here n There, Now n Then

DSDA-doom, pistol start, UV difficulty

 

Okay, this level was not fun at all!

The visuals look messy even by Down the Drain standards, lots of fights are grindy, and some parts feel outright anti-fun. Unmarked open-able walls are not a problem in my book, but some other things really annoyed me.

Worst offenders:

- the toxic lift with barrel props. This lift is both damaging and awkward to pass.

- the final cyberdemon in super narrow space. Killing him is an enormous timesink, and his postion is perfectly chosen to kill you right after you open the yellow door.

 

I must say, that I am a big fan of the revenant dispencer at the start, however. Sadly, it is not enough to redeem the map in my eyes.

 

All in all, this is a rare map which I am ready to call horrible. It even has a broken secret! Maybe making "a bad map" was a diliberate artistic decision? But even in that case I can only say "Cool artistic choice, still an unfun map".

 

Map 11 Cache Raiders

DSDA-doom, pistol start, UV difficulty

 

Now, this is a fun level!

Things I love:

- Map has non-linear, interconnected layout. (helped further by secrets, which add some additional paths)

- The zombiemen + lost souls room was very intersting. Two different chip damage specialists work perfectly together!

- Heavy focus on rocket combat against big crowds.

 

The experience is soured a bit by lack of non-rocket ammo and impossibility to get the rocket launcher right at the very start.

But all-in-all, this is a great map!

 

Map 12 Into the Tomb

DSDA-doom, pistol start, UV difficulty

 

The techbase tomb at the end is crazy and monumental!

Other than that, I cannot say anything interesting. Competent combat, small map size, but no memorable gameplay moments at all. The visuals are okay, but outside of the tomb, they are non-memorable either. 

 

Map 13 Vet and Process

DSDA-doom, pistol start, UV difficulty

 

Old review:

Between slow-moving lifts, ghost monster fights with limited rockets, huge open space in the last half, and destroying two cyberdemons without a BFG, playing this map feels like a chore. To me, time spent was not worth the fun obtained. But I must admit that some of design elements feel novel and inventive, unlike with map 10.

 

Edit (14_11_2022):

After watching @Roofi's playthrough, I decided to replay this map once more, and on this playthrough I found it quite enjoable, despite all the above annoyances. The final area offers a lot of opportunities for infighting and direct confronatation, and the ghost monster are less likely to appear, if you rush the rocket launcher ASAP.

 

Maps in order of preference:

Spoiler

Map 03   Private Island.

Map 01   From: Unknown.

Map 02   Someone's Castle.

Map 06   Baloney Town.

Map 11   Cache Raiders

Map 07   The Perfect Gerbil Cage.

Map 05   Rolling Down.

Map 04   Kick the Can.

Edit (14_11_2022)   Map 13   Vet and process

Map 09   Forts and Alleys

Map 08   Deep Tech

Map 12   Into the Tomb

 

Maps I sincerely dislike (in order of preference too)

Map 13   Vet and process

Map 10   Here n There, Now n Then

 

Edited November 14, 2022 by Azure_Horror
some errors fixed, map 13 replayed once more

[Roofi]

Map 13 "Vet and process"

 

Spoiler

 

Once you entered in the gigantic subterrean complex, it's difficult to known what is serves. Is it a lab? A warehouse? And otherwise who could have built this type of building? All those unanswered questions make the level looking a lot more mysterious and therefore fascinating to explore.

 

The first time I played this level on continuous, I figured that's when Down the Drain started to get really good. Of course, the first episode has some great maps such as "Paraside Island" or "Baloney Town" but it was not the most engaging first episode I have ever played. However, I confess that contrary to many maps in this wad, playing "Vet and Process" was a bit less fun experience on pistol-start, exclusively because of the first area with its slow elevators and the ghost monsters generated by the arch-vile and the crushers which make the first fight a lot more obnoxious than needed. At any event, the first room breaks with the rhythmic music, which is a bit of a shame.

 

However, once you managed to get out the room after waiting the elevator and killing the two hell knights blocking your route, things become fantastic with the huge underlit kind of warehouse. Enemies occupy the territory and attack you from all sides but the great freedom of movement and the low monsters density help creating permanent action without overwhelming you with tons of projectiles. Moreover, it's pleasing to see than Benjogami tends to become more lenient concerning ammo and health. The numerous available spheres, shells and boxes make the infighting a lot more optional than in some previous levels.

 

Nevertheless, what I loved the most in this map was its ambiance and especially the soundtrack which is my favourite at this point. The melody is both quiet and entertaining which flows so smoothly with the combats in the last giant room and soft visuals with low-key colors. Also, I want to say that I had fun fighting against the mastermind and the 2 cyberdemons since they don't pose a lot of trouble thanks to the two godspheres.

 

So, I want to give this level an A, but I'm going to be a bit severe with the first room which doesn't emphasize the potential of this map at all.

 

Grade : A-

 

 

 

Edited November 13, 2022 by Roofi

[Crusader No Regret]

map 5: 100% everything  death count: N/A

 

    So I ended up playing this out after finishing map 4 and cleared it on the first try.  I can see how it can become somewhat of a task from scratch though.  Even on continuous, the infinite height fliers that are alerted on the first push of the fire button stay relevant for quite a while.  And coming from pistol start, one is going to feel the absence of the rocket launcher.  Once the fliers have been dealt with one way or another (I preferred to bait them into infights to soften up ledge sentries, it's a straightforward ascent to the top of the cliffs.  Very basic too, if one has played any other map with a similar concept.  (such as one from Deus Vult 2)

    I have exit lines marked on my automap so the exit trap couldn't trick me.  Still hit the wrong one on purpose and hearing who knows how many lost souls teleporting in, hit the correct exit switch soon after.

 

map 6: DNF  death count: 10 so far

 

    A town setting with a higher degree of DoomCute than what I've seen in the set so far.  Pistol starting calls for some thought as some beefy enemies get alerted early on and the tools to handle them early on aren't openly provided.  So one is called to explore the buildings but needs to be careful to do so in a way that they're not trapped.  (one of my deaths came from getting pinned in a house by a roaming baron.  I had fun with this map not really fighting anything myself and using the beefy enemies to take out the various low HP riff-raff that were around.  Finding any of the keys also unlocks more monsters to play so I saw value in keeping beef gates from earlier around and having them take part in the brawl.

    I did find the secret path to the outside house.  Unfortunately for me it's a one way trip, there's archviles within, and I was only at about half ammo when I found it.  Another death.  Lesson learned, don't venture over there before stocking up.

    Feel this is within my skill level to crack with saves or enough attempts but decided to stop after enough fails.  It's one I'd consider coming back to.

[Doomy__Doom]

Sitting this month out, I've played DtD relatively recently. Surprised to see map 10 being so polarizing, so I booted that up with a starting point of "oh yea that map, I don't remember much past immediate start but I think it was alright?.."

 

After a replay, I somehow found myself thinking "this is kind of reminding me of 20x7 map02 a little":

- tyson start? Check.

- confusing progression if you don't know what you're supposed to do? For sure.

- eating damage in the main area you can't really afford via odd sneaky angle you've completely forgotten about? Did happen to me.

- ammo starvation at the beginning feeding into the confusion of wat do? Right there.

- a really nasty cramped fight? HK/PE sandwich vs "it's a trap" qualifies if you don't figure out how to get out of the former asap.

- deliberately un-maxable? Most certainly so.

 

So that's the odd impression I got. DtD 10 is like... a concentrated "baffled until you learn the level" genre, I guess. I wouldn't call it terrible or horrible - for sure "not everyone's interest", and just about anything that leans that heavily into a given trope/style is going to ruff some feathers.

Edited November 13, 2022 by Doomy__Doom

[erzboesewicht]

MAP11: Cache Raiders

 

A spiritual brother of MAP07. We get again several hordes of monsters, every of them "ruling" a certain area. Here they're also assigned to guard some assets, be it weapons or health/armor/ammo. Much room for emergent gameplay here again. The initial ammo starvation makes it almost mandatory to get some infighting going, but it's a bit tricky due to the map's geometry. I enjoyed to try it anyway. Above all the "trickling in" of the hell knights every time you take a medikit or armor from the big cache was an idea I seldom saw in a Doom wad. The other hordes were released more or less at once. Overall enjoyable albeit a little bit tedious perhaps if you play it this "slow" way, carefully releasing the hordes one after another to make them interact. Although with foreknowledge the idea to get the rockets on the imp platforms fast and then the RL, simply allowing you to mow down most of the baddies, seems also a viable option. May replay it :)

 

Rating: 7,5/10
Difficulty: 5/10

 

MAP12: Into your Tomb

 

Breather map with rather standard progression, without too many quirks. The most strange part is the end, when you already have beaten all monsters (not that there are too many in the map), you'll find no less than two secrets here with goodies for continuous players, more than Doomguy can carry over. Standout encounter is the archvile shootout which lets you escape the cave, only to enter the area where "your tomb" is located. May be the easiest map of the wad yet to max, although the start can be a bit tricky if you enter areas too fast you're still underpowered for. In retrospective I see the map more positive now for storyline reasons: it is the last cavern map and introduces the visual theme of the coming maps, techbases with loooong corridors with many doors. We're entering a kind of underground facility, it seems. (I've advanced already to MAP 31 'cause I got really addicted to that shit, and, ladies and gentlemen, I have finally found the pinnacle of 29 years of Doom map design!)

 

Rating: 6,5/10
Difficulty: 3/10

MAP13: Vet and Process

 

Moving floors, lifts and crushers are the main topic of this borderline ugly map with hilarious color combinations. It greets us with a crusher which nicely provides us the first ammo killing some zombiemen. There is a bigger welcome committee very close, including a vile, but it can be dealt with in various ways, two of them trivializing the encounter (one involving a secret, the other one exploting basic monster behaviour and, yeah, the elements I mentioned earlier). The second part is a big, extremely ugly hall (something like a failed lighting experiment) divided by a long lift-corridor. This part has a quite big noble population, but you get lots of rockets and a plasma rifle to deal with them. Later, two invuls will again help you greatly with a little vile invasion, and at the end, two cybers join the party. I found the map quite fun, although it's very easy if you use all resources you're given - after a first death due to not understanding the first area, I made it through without reloading a save.

 

Rating: 7/10
Difficulty: 3/10 (5/10 if you don't find the tricks for the starting area)

 

(UV, pistol starts, saves.  Difficulty scale: 1 - Trivial, 5 - Plutonic, 7 - Hard (AV26/Sunlust15), 10 For Doom gods)

[DisgruntledPorcupine]

MAP13: Vet and Process

UV, pistol start, no saves

100% kills, 2/3 secrets

 

A dimly lit techbase, with a beginning area containing a bloody crusher hallway and raising/lowering computer panels, and a second area looking more like a warehouse. The architecture in the second area is grand as the previous area teased. Really dig the looks of this one. The soundtrack treats us with a Radiohead double header from my favourite album of theirs, Kid A (the tracks being Idioteque and Morning Bell). It's probably their most electronic influenced stuff, so perhaps my little digression last writeup was onto something?

 

The first room in this one has a chance of serving up some ghost monsters, which is always novel to see. I ended up with a ghostly revenant in two of my attempts, maybe the others too only I didn't notice them die to my rockets. Raising up high enough on any of the raising and lowering platforms will trigger a caco trap, probably serving as a way to halt people going for that megasphere. The second area is the really interesting one though. If you don't know where to find the goodies it can be challenging, my first run there I didn't locate the plasma or the secret invuln near the baron hallway, and so the chaos proved too much from there. If you do grab everything you can use that invuln to rocket the archvile crew down, and the plasma obviously makes your life easier afterward. This map is pretty friendly with resources overall, so once you get a good groove going you should be able to maintain it. Just don't choke to those last two cyberdemons.

 

Very fun and interesting map.

[Book Lord]

MAP 14 – The Perfect Human Cage

DSDA-Doom v0.24.3, UV, Continuous, blind run w/saves

 

The journey through abstract and orthogonal UAC bases continued with The Perfect Human Cage, a level that bore no resemblance to MAP07, neither in the visuals nor in the gameplay. I tried to find a logic behind the similar name, but probably Benjogami thought it was just a good name to use twice. The bellowing chorus of the Hell Noble army in the first room might feel intimidating, but any wise Doomer would just ignore them and focus on the zombies on the COMPWERD staircase and the other low tier creatures in the adjacent room. Pressing the switch caused the YK to lower along with the Hell Noble ledges, but they did not join the combat right away. They disappeared in teleport gates that sent them to different parts of the map, ready to appear in due course. Except for a group of Barons that emerged from a distant door and surprised me in the ultra-long hallway with many doors, the rest of the horde could have been used more viciously.

Spoiler

The corridor was a premium example of symmetry and sameness used to disorient the player. Some doors opened, some would open later, others did not open at all. I found two rocket launchers with a load of ammo and fought through straightforward encounters while collecting valuable resources. I did not need a trip in the nukage to guess that some key was required to unlock the exit, so I stayed on the safe side of the hallway and completed the exploration. I collected the RK in the west, facing an army of former humans that hid in the warehouses (the perfect human cages?), then I completed the tour of the eastern side that was interrupted before the room with the staircase. There was an excessive number of Arch-Viles peaking from the nearby BK chamber, but they could be killed through the holes before releasing them in the base. The gaps were broad enough to shoot rockets through them.

 

The last events offered nothing special, and I was astonished at the free BFG and plenty of supplies found in “secrets”, which were just compartments that opened automatically during the progression. The jammed door with the Radiation Suit used a nice vanilla trick that I remember seeing first in Frustration (MAP07 of Memento Mori II), where it was randomised via a crusher. The only real secrets were the Partial Invisibility and Computer Area Map in the small storage, but their trigger was too obtuse to click with me. While I enjoyed some parts, I disliked the lack of purpose of certain encounters in The Perfect Human Cage. The result was an average level, remarkable for its overlong hallway but nothing to write home about.

Edited November 14, 2022 by Book Lord

[RHhe82]

MAP14: The Perfect Human Cage. Played on DSDA v0.24, UV, PS. 215/215 K, 6/6 S, 6/6 I. Completion time 19:21.

 

This is yet another didn't like/did like affair. In the first half the level feels like the kind of high-tier meme challenge level I don't particularly enjoy (because I'm not good enough at the game, and I still haven't had enough of traditionally good levels), but as the ledge barons/hell knights disappear, the level starts to make more sense, and in the end it was just fine. Much of the kill count comes from certain zombiemen encounter that oddly reminded me of my favourite moments of Alien Vendetta, although I suspect no connection here is intended (right?).

 

I dislike the two actual secrets, the computer area map and the other blur sphere, accessed by some random walls nearby. I dislike that in Plutonia, I dislike it here. But I guess that's minor, I didn't have to spend too much time to find them, either.

 

I mentioned Alien Vendetta, but even more this level reminds me of what I've seen about Italo Doom, a wad apparently highly-regarded by Doom Gods, although The Perfect Human Cage is more humane than that. Bonus points for not putting a mandatory cyberdemon encounter here!

Edited November 14, 2022 by RHhe82
clarified language

[KickAss]

GZDooM 4.8.2, PB 3.0, HeXeReTiC HUD PB3 v8.3RC2e, Weapon Neural Upscale, Glory Kills v29b, SilentDoomguy, Flashlight, -iwad doom2.wad (ver 1.666), -skill 4 (UV), continuous play, no saves.

 

MAP14 - “The Perfect Human Cage”, Again a very hard start here with an annoying high amount of strong enemys but if you have taken them out once it is an easy way to the exit and through. Lot of slaughtering and not realy enjoyable imho.

 

 

Edited November 14, 2022 by KickAss

[Pseudonaut]

Map14:
Another one where your route makes a big difference. You'll be a lot better off when you know where the rocket stashes are and what triggers new enemies to appear. With the right strats, none of it is particularly difficult. There is plenty of cell ammo and a BFG at the end, which seems like a good incentive for aggressive play. You could try and get the BFG as early as possible, then clean everything up after. I'm enjoying the wad more now, not sure if it's because the maps are getting better or if it's some adjustment I've made.

 

 

Demo:

drn14m736.zip

[Roofi]

Map 14 : "The Perfect Human Cage"

 

Spoiler

 

Exactly like map 13, map 14 was a great underground tech-base level with an awful start. You start in front of an army of hell nobles perched on their computer towers and you have no true fire power to get rid of them. Moreover, a lot of small enemies go downstairs in order to eradicate you as much they can.

 

Once you managed to escape that mess you end up in a very long hallway with lots of doors. It's an another moment when Down the Drain becomes magical with all those lit doors leading to weird areas with an unknown purpose. The next level is called "Door of opportunities" but I think map 14 deserves more this name.

 

The combats were really easy to deal with since Benjogami offers you a lot more supplies than usual. It's the first time in DtD that I end up with a lot more ammo than needed ! It's a miracle ! Moreover the group of viles can be cowardly cheesed by shooting them between the wired columns. it's a great way to reward patient players like me.

 

Another lovely entry accompanying map 13.

 

Grade : A-

 

 

 

[tmorrow]

Game Mode: gzdoom4.8.0, uvmax, pistol starts, seeking 100% k/i/s, play speed slow

 

Down the Drain, map31

 

The only 2 maps in this wad without demos of any kind on DSDA are map25 and map31, so these 2 maps immediately got my attention. The title of map31 is the same as the wad title, so it piqued my interest even further, without even loading the map for the first time. After firing up the map and having a quick look around, I knew it was a map I wanted to uvmax. It's a map with a gimmick that won't appeal to everyone but perfectly suited for the map31 slot. The gimmick is zones of identical monster types connected with teleporters, each zone with an identical, comically bland layout - 3x3 grids of square rooms. I find this map to be both engaging and challenging from a combat and strategy perspective. This is more my strategy guide than a map review but that's where my interest lies.

 

I'm delighted to have uvmaxed it on my 3rd serious attempt. My first attempt was a colossal fail, dying to the final archvile room with less than 40 monsters remaining due to lack of cells. My second attempt was worse, after unleashing an entire room of 4 cybies and they converged on poor doomguy with expected results. My 3rd attempt was an exhilarating success.

 

You start in the center room in a zone with a 3x3 array of square rooms. There are 13 of these zones, each consisting of a 3x3 array of rooms that make up the map. The zones are inter-connected through teleporters in an intuitive manner. Here's the overall layout of the 13 zones, 07 being the starting zone.

      01         01 = barons       06 = imps          11 = chaingunners
   02 03 04      02 = cacodemons   07 = zombiemen     12 = hellknights
05 06 07 08 09   03 = shotgunguys  08 = demons        13 = cyberdemons
   10 11 12      04 = lost souls   09 = arachnotrons
      13         05 = mancubi      10 = revenants

Each zone is populated by a single enemy type in the outer 8 rooms. All zones except the starting zone has a central room reinforced with archviles guarding 4 switches on a block in the middle of the room. Zones 03, 06, 08, 11 have only 4 archviles, the other zones have 8 archviles. All enemies are oriented to be looking at the central room or central block in the central room. Sadly, there are no pain elemental, spectre, spider mastermind, wolfensteinss, or commander keen zones. Gladly, there is no icon of sin zone.

 

The central room in the starting zone 07 contains the exit. The switches you find in the central archvile room in the surrounding 12 zones are one time switches that build a 48 pillar staircase up to both the normal and secret exits.

 

The earliest weapon pickups are:

---------------  -----
weapons          zone
---------------  -----
shotgun          07
super shotgun    03
chainggun        11
rocket launcher  08
plasma rifle     02/12
bfg              05/09
---------------  -----

Enemies are triggered room by room and are of a single type. Monster infighting is inadvisable because monsters can go anywhere on the map once awake. Their AI leads them to roughly pick a path straight to the player with some fuzziness when they bump into other monsters and obstacles. But if you are not careful, they will open doors you haven't yet (i.e. an archvile room) and cause new enemies to be triggered and things will quickly get out of control. The enemy has to be dragged to another zone to find another monster type to infight with. It's like "herding cats". After a few attempts I completely gave up on the idea of utilizing any infighting.

 

With no practical infighting, doomguy has to take out each and every enemy. Even worse, the ammo situation is tight enough that you need to berserk fist some of the demons and lost souls on the map to keep your ammo at a safe level. Cells are the critical resource required for the dangerous archvile and cyberdemon rooms.

 

This segues into my main criticism of the map. It is too long. Fatigue becomes a factor. After 2 fails, each over 2+ hours in, I started to have second thoughts about uvmax'ing. Mistakes are usually fatal on this map, an unlucky cybie rocket or letting the archviles escape the room you intend to kill them. The map is quite a bit easier and fun with saves though.

 

As another minor criticism, note that during the platforming at the end to the exits, it is possible to fall between the pillars and get soft locked. This happened to me once during practice for the secret exit sequence.

 

Your strategy in triggering each room of enemies and where you kite them to is key to beating the map. Teleport rooms that link zones are critical and should be kept devoid of enemy corpses until you have taken out the archviles in the central room in each of the connecting zones. Here's the strategy I adopted to clearing each zone:

1. The starting zone is a little different than the others. Clear the 8 rooms surrounding the start of all zombiemen but try to drag the zombiemen in the 4 teleporter rooms to other rooms (corner rooms or start room).
2. You start in a cleared zone. Teleport into a new zone. Fist the air and return through the teleporter to the cleared zone. Drag the enemy to one of the 2 corner rooms or the central archvile room for eradication. You want to keep the teleporter room clear for archvile battles.
3. Teleport to the new zone, its first room now clear. Ensure you have enough cells and backup rockets/shells for the archvile room. Clear the archvile room (details below).
4. You can now take a more cavalier approach to clearing the remaining 7 rooms in the zone with one caveat. Drag enemies out of the teleporter rooms before killing them. I tend to open each new room, fist the air once and then drag the enemy back to the previous zone and take them out as they appear.
5. You may have to avoid an archvile room due to temporary lack of cells or when you haven't yet collected the bfg. In this case, step 4 is the play but drag the enemy to a corner room away from the teleport room.

A sound strategy for the archviles is to avoid most of the central rooms in every zone until you have picked up the bfg and then backtrack and clear them out. Then to clear any archvile room, you can use some door trickery to trigger at most 3 of the archviles at a time. Open the door from left side and then retreat through the teleporter. BFG the archviles on arrival. Now repeat by opening the the archvile door from the right side. Now open the archvile door and take out the 2 remaining archviles, facing away from you in the middle. If you fuck up the archviles, your run is almost certainly over. Mistakes include not enough ammo, too many corpses in their path, a triggered enemy opens their door before you are ready, etc.

 

The 32 cyberdemons in zone 13 are a problem. There are 4 in each of the outer 8 rooms in the zone. I can't reliably manage more than 2 cybies at once. Happily, you don't have to. Fortunately, you can avoid triggering all 4 at once in each room with more door trickery. The big clue is that all cybies are facing the switch in the central archvile room in the zone. So here's how to minimise how many cybies get triggered concurrently:

1. The teleport room (north). All 4 cybies are facing away. Trigger them one at a time by bumping one and retreat through the teleporter to take him out. Repeat for the other 3.
2. The NE and NW rooms. You can trigger cybies 1-2 at a time. Open either door from the south side and cautiously move until 1-2 triggers, then retreat and kill. Repeat until the 4 cybies are dead.
3. The E and W rooms. Open these rooms from the north side. The 2 cybies that are furthest away from the center room will usually trigger together. The first of the other 2 can be bumped to trigger. For the last one, just fist the air after opening the door to trigger. Retreat to kill in each case.
4. The SE and SW rooms. It's easy to accidentally trigger more than 2 if not careful. Enter the central room. Open the (east or west) door and then the south door and pull back to the center. Usually 2 cybies will trigger. Retreat to kill. Repeat for the last 2 cybies.
5. The south room. Open their door from the central room, standing to one side. You usually get 1-2 cybies triggered. Retreat to kill. Repeat for the rest of the cybies.

My main cyberdemon retirement room is the central room in the previous zone 11. You can kill a single cybie that you've led into the room, using the central switch block as cover. Cybie ususally requires 4 bfg blasts which is not as efficient as 2-shotting but a hell of lot safer if like me, your 2-shotting is not up to par.

 

If 2+ cybies turn up then there is a backup plan. Retreat to the central room in zone 12 and hope they come at you one at a time there. This area has another advantage too. It turns out that the north door out of the central room is not high enough for cybies to pass through. So if multiple cybies turn up then exit into the north room where they can't get to. You will be stuck with bfg door strafing (fire and strafe across the door and hope a cybie is there to take the blast) which is inefficient but you'll probably live.

 

Here's my winning strategy. Remember, no corpses in teleport rooms and no fighting in a zone where the central archvile room hasn't been cleared. Kite the enemy to a previous zone first.

1. Clear the starting zone 07.
2. Clear the N, E, S, W teleporter destination rooms. This will quickly arm your doomguy with the super shotgun, chaingun and rocket launcher.
3. Take a direct route to either zone 05 (mancubi) or zone 09 (arachnotrons) to obtain the bfg, avoiding the archvile rooms.
4. Take a direct route to either zone 02 (cacodemons) or zone 12 (hellknights) to obtain the plasma rifle.
5. Now equipped with all the weapons, start a more methodical clearing of the zones. First take out the archvile rooms you bypassed earlier as per archvile strategy above then go from there.
6. Note zones 01, 02, 05, 09, 12, 13 contain cells, the most being in zone 01 and 13. You may have to divert from methodical clears to heading in a more direct path to the cells from time to time in order to top up on cells.
7. After all rooms have been cleared and all switches used, return to the start room and climb the stairs to the exits. The secret exit contains the last enemy and item, an archvile and a megasphere.

A note about the secret exit. There is no invulnerability or rad suit on the map. The floor is damaging sector type 16 (-10 or 20% health). When you teleport to the secret cubicle, you are on top of a megasphere. You have to move in order to trigger the exit bars to start lowering and to collect the megasphere. The best I can come up with is to use bfg just before entering the teleporter to kill the archvile on arrival. Then time the damaging pulses and move just after a pulse. Even then it is hit or miss whether the bars lower in time to use the exit level switch. Even worse, if you survive, you will instantly die at the start of map32 on arrival since it has a damaging floor too. This doesn't take away from a map31 clear but the method won't work for continuous play. I'm wondering if I've missed something. I did try keeping the archvile alive and have him blast me on top of the lowering bars but I couldn't gain any advantage. If anyone has found a way to survive the transition from map31-32, let me know.

[NiGHTS108]

MAP11: Cache Raiders

Kills: 63%

Items: 50%

Secrets: 33%

Time: 2:18

 

Man... If there's one thing Down The Drain isn't, it's consistent. Cache Raiders is another pretty small little rocketfest that isn't too hard but manages to be a fair bit of fun. I say just do what you need in this map, if you get too greedy with supplies you'll probably end up answering to more than you can deal with. Though, do remember the pretty obvious soulsphere secret if things along the main path get a little out of hand, as this map's Arch-Viles aren't the nicest. Yet another short but sweet map from this wad.

 

Grade: B
Difficulty: C+

 

 

MAP12: Into The Tomb

Kills: 68%

Items: 100%

Secrets: 33%

Time: 3:17

 

Okay, here's where shit gets real. Into The Tomb in isolation doesn't really have anything to it really, it's a remarkably short cave system map with only really one fight that stuck in my mind. Once you get on the platform with the Mancubi you can handle the ensuing quickie fight anyway you want, personally I like to have it all crash down at the same time, chances are you have enough rockets to deal with the measly ensemble that awaits you either way. The real interesting part comes outside, spoiler alert, this is the only view of the sky in the entirety of E2, and the entire city is implied by the story and architecture of the next handful of maps to be one colossal tech base where almost all of E2 of this wad takes place. The "tomb" in question the map's name is referring to. I love the eerie light at the entrance quickly followed by sinister darkness once you get inside and see the first of Down The Drain's signature long, disturbing corridors. This whole thing honestly raises this map like 3 full grades for me, it's really neat and interesting to see Down The Drain start to commit to a story.

 

Grade: B+

Difficulty: D+

 

 

MAP13: Vet And Process

Kills: 82%

Items: 75%

Secrets: 33%

Time: 4:49

 

The first of the Tomb levels doesn't really go too differently from the typical E1 map unfortunately, the only real spin so far being the darker and more sinister visual style. Vet And Process is one of the most straight-forward maps in this wad, mainly consisting of two semi-large arenas. Believe me, don't shoot when you start the map or you'll most certainly die, get out into the main room, get the weapons you need and then deal with it. I'm not wild with leaving this room unfortunately, it takes a solid 30 seconds give or take for the lift to get you where you wanna go. This is mostly a nitpick however, as the second half is definitely to my liking, I mean I'll admit it's cheap throwing the player two Invulns like it's nothing but you don't need to pick them up and the existence of the Mastermind makes this whole area pretty chaotic and fun. Once again I'd suggest forgetting about UV-max here, those Cyberdemons in the exit are not necessarily kind, Overall Vet And Process is flawed but I have fun with it. I guess that all of this wad's good maps.

 

Grade: A-

Difficulty: C-

 

 

[brick]

MAP13 - “Vet and Process”
I think you're supposed to just run like mad past the initial onslaught of revenants and nobles, but I made judicious use of that corner crusher to soften up most of the opposition and barely had to use my carryover weapons. The opposition in the rise/lower platform room was very manageable since I had no one harrassing me from behind; the caco reward for finding the secret was quite humorous. Most of the map though is that big final room and the adjoining passages, which is the closest the wad has gotten to all-out slaughter, with tons of mancubi, revenants, nobles and even a Spider. The space is used quite cleverly, with some enemies acting as turrets, others on the floor with you, and yet more teleporting around and activating the central walkway as a lift. Benjogami is generous to HNTR, with multiple soul/megaspheres and a couple of invulerabilities; UV pros will have to deal with only the secret invulnerability and the one soulsphere, though there are also plenty of medkits. Speaking of, I didn't anticipate the final cyberdemons (should've saved one of the invulnerabilities!) but one went down quick, and the other wasn't much trouble since there's so much space to run around. Some good frantic fun in this map!
I just realized I haven't seen a single backpack yet. Benjogami really wants us to keep an eye on that ammo counter.

 

MAP14 - “The Perfect Human Cage”
The beginning involves a LOT of dodging around green balls, the plasma rifle and ammo you're given are nowhere near enough to dispose of all the nobles, but then they end up teleporting all over the map, which creates an interesting dynamic since you'll run into most of them as you explore the rest of the map. Once you have the yellow key and are out of the starting area, you're in a very long corridor with doors on both sides (not all are real doors). The other 2 keys are scattered across the map and are not very hard to find. Aside from all the wandering nobles and a gang of archviles, the "required" combat is mostly incidental; almost all the remaining enemies are in areas that you won't even unlock unless you pick up specific supplies. There are so many soulspheres if you're not on UV that the map isn't too hard despite the high enemy density. I'm not sure what I did to unlock the radsuit secret but it was very welcome for that last run to unlock the exit.

[erzboesewicht]

MAP14: The Perfect Human Cage

 

This may be the "worst" map until now if you apply a "modern" quality standard to it, and you'll very often get painted a smile on your face while you play. First you enter a ridiculously overpopulated room. Even if it's quite easy, it's the only part of the map which requires some real "work". Then you reach one of the longest corridors I've seen in my Doom player history (rivaled maybe by some in Magikal's "Citadel at the Edge of Eternity"), with most doors either locked or leading to nowhere. And then, when some of them suddenly open, lots of hitscanners will kill themselves ("Ah, that's where the 200 monsters are!"). You'll then deal with the nobles which disappeared magically from the first room, and finally with a decent group of viles. But the corridor works greatly in favour of your rocket launcher, so the BFG you get near the end isn't really needed. More than the other maps until now, this looks like a parody of some bad shovelware map, but it has its lovable bits as well. I'm not daring to give it a bad rating. For two secrets I had to consult the editor, although they weren't that hard.

 

Rating: 7/10
Difficulty: 3/10

 

MAP15: Doors of Opportunities

 

It's here where real greatness of this wad returns, for me. "Doors of Opportunities" is very aptly named: In another loooong corridor, several doors host pleasant and unpleasant surprises. To play efficiently you'll have to learn how the doors open (and close!) and what's behind, so you can elaborate a plan when to trigger which element to make the fight more manageable or pleasant, and there are several strategies that may work. An excellent puzzle/emerging-gameplay map. The secret exit is unveiled in the most trollish section of the mapset (yet!). A good number of viles is present in this map, but once you know where they are you can (mostly) control when they appear and thus it's your choice how to deal with them.

 

Rating: 10/10
Difficulty: 5/10

MAP31: Down the Drain

 

The pinnacle of Doom map design since 1993! That symmetry! That grandness! These hordes! That strategic depth! And of course: 1337!

 

Seriously: WTF? I think those who think the mapset is a "social experiment" score a big point with this one. :)

 

On the other hand:

 

I have several times thought about how Doom and the ancient game of Chess could be married, not as a cheap Archon clone, but with real Doom gameplay. Something like this map, i.e. a map where homogeneous groups of enemies are first "stored" separately, to be later used to achieve a goal using strategy and infighting, was the idea I had in mind (much more open and with less doors).

 

You can, if you want, play this map in a way you use each monster group's strengths and weaknesses and craft a sort of strategy to massacre a big part of the crowds via infighting. However, unfortunately, the map is simply too cramped to do that comfortably and in reasonable time, and the archvile mobs get easily in the way, as they tend to be released by their friends if you're not careful, and your whole strategy gets busted. It also doesn't help that the strongest infighters are relatively difficult to access in the southern corner of the map and love getting stuck. So "kill the hordes religiously one after another" seems to be the intended, and least tedious way. And if this wasn't enough, I found the BFG only behind the most tedious enemy groups (north + south), no knowing first that there were another two, in the easiest sections (east + west). With this foreknowledge it may be palatable.

 

So, unfortunately, this map wasn't my cup of tea, even if I love weird maps and surprisingly the ammo/health balance seems quite right. Nice trolling attempt :)

 

Rating: 1000/10 * -1
Difficulty: 7/10

MAP32: WW1.WAD

 

In contrast, this is in my opinion a really good secret map. It's a kind of obstacle course, where you have to run in loops chaingunning fooder until you reach the exit, trying not to fall in the inescapable green pits. All health is stored at the start, but returning there is not totally free of charge. Cybies and a mastermind provide some pressure so a bit of dancing is required. Maxing is a bit tedious, even if the mastermind infights with a cyb, as you seem to get only a plasma rifle and not really a good amount of cells. I finished two cybs with the chaingun :)

 

Rating: 8/10
Difficulty: 6/10

Edited November 15, 2022 by erzboesewicht

[tmorrow]

Down the Drain, map32

 

A nasty little map. WW1.wad indeed! It's a pain sector map with 4 cybies, a spider mastermind and hitscanners in an open setting. There are 2 safety trenches, the south one at the start and another to the north where the big guns can't reach you. The area above is made worse by having fences that block free movement and slime pits that you can't escape from if you fall in. Doomguy was looking around for rolls of barbed wire but fortunately didn't spot any.

 

The basic strategy is to run the gauntlet in a circuit to encourage infighting and get back to safety. A couple of runs should remove most of the hitscanners and to cause infighting between the spider mastermind infight and at least one of the cybies. The cybie almost always wins.

 

After that you are left with 4 cybies, one weakened quite a bit. The next step is to pickup the secret plasma rifle. This is not easy. Delayed rockets seem to follow you into the secret and if you linger too long, waiting for the rocket barrage to stop, it's easy to die to the slime damage.

 

Once armed with plasma, it is time to race for the northern trenches, clear it out and then start picking off the cybies. Whenever you can shoot them, they can shoot back, so it's a cat and mouse game. I found that there is enough cells to take out 3 of the cybies but you are stuck with chaingun and shotgun to polish off the last cybie.

[Book Lord]

MAP 15 – Doors of Opportunities

DSDA-Doom v0.24.3, UV, Continuous, blind run w/saves

 

We saw a long hallway with doors in the previous level, so this might just be the continuation of the previous area. The Doors of Opportunities were opened in confusing ways, either triggered by walkover lines or by switches on pillars. I sprinted to the other end of the corridor to see what happened, and I found myself hand in hand with an Arch-Vile. A pistol starter lacked the weaponry to kill him and the other enemies that were alerted in the meantime. The level must be approached in a more careful way, but I was tired of resource puzzles and just responded with SSG and rockets. More than one rocket launcher was available in the side rooms, but a player must know the position and how to access each area.

Spoiler

Once a rocket launcher and enough ammo were collected, the group of Arch-Viles guarding the RSK behind the first door on the left was a formality. Nothing else was necessary to leave Doors of Opportunities, and wise players are strongly discouraged to tempt fate and look for more opportunities in unexplored areas. Benjogami devised appropriate tests for the fools searching for the secret exit. The first was the Invulnerability chamber. The welcome was an invisible Hell Knight shooting through a fake wall, then the power-up must be taken to initiate the switch sequence to escape the room. The blue textures were chosen so that everything looked supremely white in god mode, which was ideal for trapping the player in pits in front of the switches, invisible like the steps to get out of them. If the last switch was pressed, a teleporter became accessible near the now open door, but if the Invulnerability had expired, Doomguy will be disintegrated by barrels. Prescience played a great role in Down the Drain, but here trial and error were taken for granted.

Spoiler

The newly revealed passage was another seizure-inducing, overlong blue tunnel with pulsating light, ending with a BFG and a horde of Arch-Viles. Pumping rockets into their foreheads was possible, but there was a concrete risk that their attacks hit without the warning of flame sprites. I wonder if the intense ordeal was concocted to keep people away from excruciating secret maps, or to hide the very best part of the megaWAD. Judging from the intermission text, I seriously doubt it is the second.

[Book Lord]

MAP 31 – Down the Drain

DSDA-Doom v0.24.3, UV, Continuous, blind run w/saves

 

A map presented as “the most regrettable” and featuring an exaggerate monster count of 1331 on UV cannot be anything up my alley. The megaWAD’s eponymous level was a network of symmetrical hubs of 9 square rooms, connected between them by symmetrical doors, and with teleport pads to move players and monsters to the nearby hubs. The only difference between each section was the featured enemy (1 type per hub), the texture pattern (useful to differentiate the areas, but consistently horrible and misaligned on purpose), the available ammo & weapons, and the number of Arch-Viles in the central room. The layout could resemble the 2D development of a Rubik’s Cube, if only it had 6 hubs instead of 13, and if drawing such a comparison were not disrespectful of a better time killer than this map.

Spoiler

Each hub had four switches at the centre, which must all be pressed to raise a rather intricate staircase to the exit in the starting room. I cannot tell why I forced myself into playing this level, as it was boring as hell, pure grind that was either breezy or unfair. The resources were enough but not plentiful, and on several occasions I revisited empty areas to pick up ammo or a Soul Sphere. I cannot describe how repetitive this was, it wasted more than 1 hour of my precious time, and eventually I realised I would never win without cheating. I could not face those Cyberdemons in a cramped space without cells for the BFG, which I unfortunately wasted in other places (e.g., to vanquish those Arch-Vile nests that made me so nervous). Cell packs were stashed in the corner rooms, but my patience raised the white flag at that point. I IDDQD’s to the last switch column, then bid farewell to the grind and directed myself to the central staircase. Probably devising that prop took Benjogami more than the rest of the map. The Computer Area Map hint and the way to access the super-secret level were good ideas, but the execution was questionable and irritating.

Spoiler

This was an obnoxious MAP31, something that a hardcore slaughter fan might enjoy. Ordinary Doomers must devote themselves to the puzzle and must not care about wasted time, needed to grind through hundreds of pointless enemies. For me, Down the Drain it goes. Flush.

 

MAP 32 – WW1.wad

DSDA-Doom v0.24.3, UV, Continuous, blind run w/saves

 

At least in the super-secret level the BS was short and to the point. WW1.wad aimed at recreating World War I trench warfare within the limitations of the Doom engine and with 90s speed mapping quality. Doomguy began in an underground shelter, stocked with lots of bullet boxes, a chaingun, Medikits, a suit of Combat Armour, and former humans already trying to break in. The outside hosted an army of Former Humans and Sergeants, fighting for survival under the bombardment of four Cyberdemons (cannons) and one Spiderdemon (the machine gun). Staying in the trenches was not safe, as hitscan attacks, splash damage or even rockets could hit me there, but to survive the level it was mandatory to visit the shelter again to restore health.

Spoiler

If starting on a -20% damage floor was not enough to label WW1.wad as a joke level, the player need not more than getting out of the first trench to fall in a slime pond without any chance of escape. The battlefield included eight of such deadly traps, a fence broken in several points, and a few concealed items. The plasma rifle and 700 cells were provided, so good luck trying to max out the kills. The furthest of the inescapable pits was the exit, a Sector Effect 11 (-20% damage until health goes below 10%, then exit level); needless to say, this is the exact opposite of what a continuous player hopes to find in the secret levels. What a great prize for discovering the legitimate way to MAP32! Play with IDCLEV only; avoid at all costs on continuous play.

Edited November 16, 2022 by Book Lord

[Pseudonaut]

Map15:
This one's kinda hard to memorize where all the important stuff is since the main area is a samey-looking hallway where invisible linedefs open many of the doors. As annoying as that was, I have to admit there's a lot of depth here, and I did have a good time overall.

 

 

Demo:

drn15m916.zip

 

Map31:
Hahahaha, I'm not recording a demo for this. It's probably inspired by TimeOfDeath's Nostil Caverns somewhat (though I've only played the first few minutes of that one), and I admire the ridiculousness of it all. Someone made a sarcastic remark about strategic depth, but I think tmorrow's post demonstrates that there's plenty of it in this map, especially if you want to finish it saveless. However, IMO, it's not much fun to actually play through for its length. It's quite a long grind. Even so, it will definitely make you think about the placement of corpses due to archviles, partly because the danger of ghost monsters is quite serious in some spots. As tmorrow mentioned, continuous players will die at the start of map32 and there's nothing they can do about it. Lol. Lmao.

 

 

I'll play map32 later.

Edited November 15, 2022 by Pseudonaut