[Community Project] 666CRETS - A CP about secrets (PRIVATE ALPHA 0.2 )

[knifeworld]

@Rabbid
I played the most recent posted version of your map, it's decent in the sense that I can see what you were going for! But it's quite rough around the edges.


For starters, many of the rooms are box-like and have the same general light level. Just a little bit of extra effort in giving the rooms different shapes and variation in lighting and height will improve this a lot. The doomcute sector art and the initial guitar and banjo shaped rooms stand out though.


There's no way to tell that you have to press on the black wall to progress, none that I found, anyways. I was wandering around in the guitars + banjo for ages until I just randomly decided to hump the walls in the black area.


80% of the combat in this map seems to consist of being in a thin hallway, opening a door, shooting shotgunners and zombiemen for 1000 years, retreating to grab a medkit every now and then, and eventually getting so bored that you decide to try and run into the room to SSG the shotgunners faster, and then dying.

EDIT: A quick fix around this hitscan fight issue would be adding blue armor pickups somewhere in the hitscan-heavy rooms, one each, or just before entering them.
But in general I'd personally redesign some of these fights to not be so heavy on shotgunners/chaingunners at all, and I'd add an extra way in or out that doesn't have a door, so that it doesn't just become a boring door-fight scenario.



Both of these switches are repeatable, but I don't think I saw any reason for them to be.



I like the BFG fight at the end! But there's so many hellknights left when everything else is dead that it gets kinda grindy and boring, I'd honestly remove a 3rd of them or more.
Also, a bunch of imps appeared or made their way into the guitars at some point near the end of the map, idk what's happening there or where they came from.

The switches before the 2nd secret are a bit too obvious, I'd add more similar looking pillars/crates and darken the room a bit to make it more confusing or adventure-like.


In general, everything works just fine but the rooms could be more interesting and have a bit more effort put into texturing and detailing, like support beams, windows, computers, skylights, pools of liquid, broken walls/bricks, etc.
As for the fights, some of them could use more variety in enemy types and in their general design, for example you could put an archvile on a pillar in a corner, or behind some revenants or imps, some hitscanners could be replaced with some projectile throwing enemy instead.

Edited July 7, 2023 by knifeworld
mentioned placing Blue Armor for the hitscan fights

[Rabbid]

2 hours ago, knifeworld said:

@Rabbid
I played the most recent posted version of your map, it's decent in the sense that I can see what you were going for! But it's quite rough around the edges.


For starters, many of the rooms are box-like and have the same general light level. Just a little bit of extra effort in giving the rooms different shapes and variation in lighting and height will improve this a lot. The doomcute sector art and the initial guitar and banjo shaped rooms stand out though.


There's no way to tell that you have to press on the black wall to progress, none that I found, anyways. I was wandering around in the guitars + banjo for ages until I just randomly decided to hump the walls in the black area.


80% of the combat in this map seems to consist of being in a thin hallway, opening a door, shooting shotgunners and zombiemen for 1000 years, retreating to grab a medkit every now and then, and eventually getting so bored that you decide to try and run into the room to SSG the shotgunners faster, and then dying.

EDIT: A quick fix around this hitscan fight issue would be adding blue armor pickups somewhere in the hitscan-heavy rooms, one each, or just before entering them.
But in general I'd personally redesign some of these fights to not be so heavy on shotgunners/chaingunners at all, and I'd add an extra way in or out that doesn't have a door, so that it doesn't just become a boring door-fight scenario.



Both of these switches are repeatable, but I don't think I saw any reason for them to be.



I like the BFG fight at the end! But there's so many hellknights left when everything else is dead that it gets kinda grindy and boring, I'd honestly remove a 3rd of them or more.
Also, a bunch of imps appeared or made their way into the guitars at some point near the end of the map, idk what's happening there or where they came from.

The switches before the 2nd secret are a bit too obvious, I'd add more similar looking pillars/crates and darken the room a bit to make it more confusing or adventure-like.


In general, everything works just fine but the rooms could be more interesting and have a bit more effort put into texturing and detailing, like support beams, windows, computers, skylights, pools of liquid, broken walls/bricks, etc.
As for the fights, some of them could use more variety in enemy types and in their general design, for example you could put an archvile on a pillar in a corner, or behind some revenants or imps, some hitscanners could be replaced with some projectile throwing enemy instead.

yeah I'm planning on doing a lot of this in the new one (besides secret 5 thats not changing so its funny) because I did kind of feel the combat was... well annoying and the rooms were a little lackluster.

[Rabbid]

Can admit though I should have added a more obvious thing saying this wall is the wall besides the little banjo thing that points directly out of it

[Angry Saint]

On 6/20/2023 at 4:54 PM, RED77 said:

@Angry Saint.

Ok, I've played your map.
fist of all I think it's really well-crafted a full of interesting visual gags.
I love the robots, great touch.
And the torch hunt is another great highlight.

Now, My concern with this map is that have some very specific gimmicks that can lead to frustration for the player:
-a lot of multi-step switch hunts
-a lot of pseudo hints for misleading the player.
-very obscure texture differences for triggers 

So, I'll tone it down a little bit on the dead ends, get rid of the sound dead-end sound triggers misleads in general, and use bigger texture differences for triggers. 

If you want a more in-depth revision let me know (It's not my goal to compromise your creative vision for the map)

Great work.

 

 

Thank you for your kind evaluation of the map.

Regarding your concerns:

 

- I loved to mislead the player - it is incredible how you can manipulate a player playing on the common tropes and expectations. I would like to leave the misdirections: my idea is that once you mislead the player once s/he will never trust you again and s/he will see the map throught other eyes.

- I didn't want to make things too easy for the player, so I choose on purpose very similar textures for "special" areas. I can change to other textures.

 

Spoiler

I think at the area with the 6 or 8 mechas. The blood and dead bodies take you to the switches to go to the "old town" area. It is a detour not needed to complete the level :-). Once back in the mechas area the player should start looking carefully for OTHER differences.

 

Now I'll work on a new version answering your concerns and adding monsters for gameplay.

[RED77]

1 hour ago, Angry Saint said:

 

Thank you for your kind evaluation of the map.

Regarding your concerns:

 

- I loved to mislead the player - it is incredible how you can manipulate a player playing on the common tropes and expectations. I would like to leave the misdirections: my idea is that once you mislead the player once s/he will never trust you again and s/he will see the map throught other eyes.

- I didn't want to make things too easy for the player, so I choose on purpose very similar textures for "special" areas. I can change to other textures.

 

  Hide contents

I think at the area with the 6 or 8 mechas. The blood and dead bodies take you to the switches to go to the "old town" area. It is a detour not needed to complete the level :-). Once back in the mechas area the player should start looking carefully for OTHER differences.

 

Now I'll work on a new version answering your concerns and adding monsters for gameplay.

Hey @Angry Saint. I'm all for misdirection. But bear in mind that too much of it generates white noise and can be frustrating. If all most signals turn out to be misleading, the solution to the secrets just felt random. 
thanks for your work

[Rabbid]

I just realized I could make a like Megawad with the amount of maps I have pointlessly scattered on my PC lol...I might do that, combine them all, fix them up and release them as a Megawad...just so I can get these things off my PC for good lol... could do good but at the same time most are kind of...bad...

anyway I still have no idea for secret 4 but I will say my map is going very well!

though I will admit I'm also treating today is if its the last day, because idk when the last day for me to work on it is, either way I'm gonna try to get it done today...

Update i just remembered how much I hate drawing Letters.

Edited July 8, 2023 by Rabbid

[purple_ruberoid]

@Rabbid, you mean letters as lines and sectors? Have you tried setting up a backgroud picture and  then drawing them with help of that background?

 

Like this ⬇️

Spoiler

 

[Rabbid]

uh no (I didn't even know you could do that) plus I don't want them being so huge XD...like I need them to be less than 32z32

Edited July 9, 2023 by Rabbid

[Rabbid]

Wait I just realized did that guy mean "there is no thing saying you need to open this door at all" because I definitely hid a solution throughout the guitars actually.

[Rabbid]

On 7/7/2023 at 1:46 AM, knifeworld said:

There's no way to tell that you have to press on the black wall to progress, none that I found, anyways. I was wandering around in the guitars + banjo for ages until I just randomly decided to hump the walls in the black area.

is this what you meant by this? because there is like... something in all the guitars saying its in the banjo, I did add an arrow to the specific wall, but if you mean legit none at all you're wrong.

Edited July 9, 2023 by Rabbid

[knifeworld]

17 hours ago, Rabbid said:

is this what you meant by this? because there is like... something in all the guitars saying its in the banjo, I did add an arrow to the specific wall, but if you mean legit none at all you're wrong.

Yeah.

I accidentally opened the door before realizing what all the text on the floor meant anyway. I also didn't see the white banjo icon on the floor on my first playthrough because dead zombies or imps were in the way of it I think.

Just checked and I don't see any arrows in either of the instruments, but I did see this lower wall texture which I didn't notice last time.


The wall on the automap is also white, so I actually think it's too obvious now, I'd personally set it to "appear 1 sided", but keep the lower texture as a clue.

[Rabbid]

I didn't even notice that on the auto map its just... given away XD
either way, its not even a door anymore so what does it matter?

Edited July 10, 2023 by Rabbid

[Rabbid]

Something I'm very confused about though is just... What on earth is the texture "DONTUSE"?

[knifeworld]

8 hours ago, Rabbid said:

Something I'm very confused about though is just... What on earth is the texture "DONTUSE"?

Alien Creature

[Rabbid]

4 hours ago, knifeworld said:

Alien Creature

Yeah I kinda figured... is that why its named "dontuse"?

all I know is that... it looks like many things... and I think Alien Creature is the least scary/gross of them all.

Edited July 11, 2023 by Rabbid

[Rabbid]

all I know is... I don't think I have much more time so I need to hurry.

[Herr Dethnout]

On 7/7/2023 at 1:46 AM, knifeworld said:



Off topic, but how you got that mini auto-map on the upper right corner?

[knifeworld]

2 hours ago, Herr Dethnout said:

Off topic, but how you got that mini auto-map on the upper right corner?

it's Show Minimap in the automap options of newer dsda-doom versions

 

[Rabbid]

huh...

doesn't matter Doom Builder X Just Crashed and I was so close to being done.

update: nevermind I lost like 3 seconds of progress...legit all I did was place a vertice.

Edited July 11, 2023 by Rabbid

[Rabbid]

I feel like I'm slightly over the time, but at the same time I'm gonna get this map done, its like... 99% lol

though I will be honest, my main concern is "is it too easy" and "is it too hard"

Edited July 11, 2023 by Rabbid

[Rabbid]

I guess a version 2 of my map... I don't think I need to say everything again, but if I do...I won't because I need a break and stuff, if its a little too late, well I'm sorry I tried getting it out yesterday but... I kind of got put through a lot of things yesterday, even fell asleep. Something isn't right V2.zip

[RED77]

23 hours ago, Rabbid said:

I guess a version 2 of my map... I don't think I need to say everything again, but if I do...I won't because I need a break and stuff, if its a little too late, well I'm sorry I tried getting it out yesterday but... I kind of got put through a lot of things yesterday, even fell asleep. Something isn't right V2.zip

Hey @Rabbid.
Well, I was expecting just a few corrections but I find almost a brand-new map.
No, complaining, I must say this is a much better experience.
So, to me, this is almost complete, just a couple of notes:

 

Spoiler

Some visual glitches:
 

Spoiler

 A) this happened in the chess room (you can prevent the texture bleeding by drawing a box sector around complex sectors)
 B) Can you add a sector in front of that door so it does not show the upper texture?

 C) There's this missing texture at the end

 D) These two door tracks are not unpegged.

Combat:
- I would recommend against the hot start. let the player start the action.
- on the final fight, the fact that you can drop on the lava without harm makes the encounter a little bit toothless (maybe add a roaming cyber down there?)
- there are a lot of monsters that can't move because of the placement

Secrets:
-my only concern is with the chessboard. I understand the hints point to a specific tile, but you can just shoot in that direction and the door opened the same.
 

 

Other than that' I think it's almost done.
Great work
Hope this helps.
 

[Rabbid]

On 7/12/2023 at 7:08 AM, RED77 said:

 

  Reveal hidden contents

Some visual glitches:
 

  Reveal hidden contents

 A) this happened in the chess room (you can prevent the texture bleeding by drawing a box sector around complex sectors)
 B) Can you add a sector in front of that door so it does not show the upper texture?

 C) There's this missing texture at the end

 D) These two door tracks are not unpegged.

Combat:
- I would recommend against the hot start. let the player start the action.
- on the final fight, the fact that you can drop on the lava without harm makes the encounter a little bit toothless (maybe add a roaming cyber down there?)
- there are a lot of monsters that can't move because of the placement

Secrets:
-my only concern is with the chessboard. I understand the hints point to a specific tile, but you can just shoot in that direction and the door opened the same.
 

 

 

I'm gonna say it now, most of these were... either things I forgot to fix or things I was trying to make look good but ended up not finished, as for the A thing...idk what to do there...I really don't know how to fix it.
The chessboard though I can say is a little like... what am I supposed to do to fix it? rebuild another whole new thing? no I'm not gonna do that.
I will be honest though the monsters not moving thing was apparent, even in GZdoom and honestly idk what to really fix for that anymore, can add a cyber demon (or 2) but at the same time, I don't want it to be too tough...plus yeah the beginning I can agree is a little unfair since... well I mean its a map with a hub after all.

So yes, I can fix most, but things like visual glitch a and probably the chessboard can't be fixed so easily it will require a whole different puzzle for it to work which honestly, I'm out of ideas I don't want to make another puzzle to replace It, I'll just redesign the puzzle a little bit.

Edited July 13, 2023 by Rabbid

[Rabbid]

btw...

On 7/12/2023 at 7:08 AM, RED77 said:

 

  Hide contents

  Hide contents

 

A) this happened in the chess room (you can prevent the texture bleeding by drawing a box sector around complex sectors)

 

what do you mean by this? 

[Rabbid]

btw might I add, I LEGIT DID FIX B, I just forgot to lower the ceiling.

idk its just I'm starting to feel a little like we're getting extremely strict with these, like the map will have issues but I'm not trying to go insane fixing every single little detail man.

Edited July 13, 2023 by Rabbid

[RED77]

18 hours ago, Rabbid said:

btw...

what do you mean by this? 

When you have a sector that has a complicated design some ports of doom have problems drawing around them, which causes the bleeding, but usually can be solved if you contain that sector onto another one.
 

18 hours ago, Rabbid said:

btw might I add, I LEGIT DID FIX B, I just forgot to lower the ceiling.

idk its just I'm starting to feel a little like we're getting extremely strict with these, like the map will have issues but I'm not trying to go insane fixing every single little detail man.

Sorry you feel that way, I ask the same for all the mappers.
 

[RED77]

Hey guys! just a final notice.
We are 48 hours away from the hard deadline.

@Angry Saint, @knifeworld, @Rabbid, @Jakub Majewski, @Azafran, @Worm318.


we are almost there!

[Soulinus]

@RED77
Just want to make sure my map was submitted.

I've been checking here regularly, and the Mappers section in the first page hasn't been updated with my map yet, so I'm not entirely sure if I missed something, or if you just haven't updated it yet.

 

Cheers.

[RED77]

2 minutes ago, Soulinus said:

@RED77
Just want to make sure my map was submitted.

I've been checking here regularly, and the Mappers section in the first page hasn't been updated with my map yet, so I'm not entirely sure if I missed something, or if you just haven't updated it yet.

 

Cheers.

I got your map, don't worry! @Soulinus

[Soulinus]

1 hour ago, RED77 said:

I got your map, don't worry! @Soulinus

Good to know. Cheers.