[GZDoom] DipSwitch - An Arcade-ish take on Doom!

[Dwimepon]

 

 

About two years ago, I started learning DECORATE, ACS and UDMF to see if I could do silly stuff with it. After experimenting for a bit, I started working on a MASSIVELY overambitious project: A 5-stage partial conversion of Doom inspired by arcade games of yore, with revamped weapons, enemies and mechanics. Needless to say, I didn't go far: I pretty much finished the gameplay part, but mapping on such a scale was just too much for me. So I sat on it for a while, until I decided to retool it to make it work with the sole level I had completed, adding a bit more meat to it as well as a proper ending... ladies and gentlemen, I present to you DipSwitch!

 

 

Download (Only for GZDoom, requires doom2.wad) Map tested in GZDoom 4.5.0 and 4.10.0, no big problem noted! Jumping and freelook are both required.

 

What's DipSwitch?

 

Spoiler

• Relentless, nonstop action! There is no such thing as ammo management in DipSwitch. You start with the shotgun and chaingun and the one you don't use quickly regains ammo! Coupled with the quicker weapon switch time, you can just hold left click and go back and forth between the two weapons at light speed. Every second you waste worrying about how many shells you have left is one you could spend unleashing hot lead upon the legions of hell!
• Quick movement in all dimensions! Having virtually infinite ammo doesn't mean combat in this mod isn't tactical - far from it! Jumping is mandatory, with the map being designed around it. You'll have to hop around the arenas to get over obstacles and dodge tricky patterns, while doing your best to keep those guns aimed at the baddies!
• Bombs, bombs, BOMBS!!! While your weapons have virtually infinite ammo, you can also find grenades lying around the battlefield. One press of Fire2 and you'll throw them at mach speeds towards your target, obliterating it and others in a MASSIVE range (Seriously, the hitbox is huge - don't let the explosion graphic fool you!). They're like shmup bombs, allowing you to get out of a sticky situation while dishing a lot of pain to the tankier demons!
• High-stakes combat with the Credit system! The map is meant to be played without saving (Though I'm not your boss - if you want to quicksave, go for it!). As such, you have twice the health as normal, coupled with arcade-like "Credits"! Press the Reload key at any time to spend one credit, fully healing you and making you invincible for a few precious seconds! When dying means restarting the whole map again, knowing when to use a credit or not becomes a vital skill! (Though again, feel free to save and reload if you really want to.)
• A short but highly-replayable map! DipSwitch can be completed in about 10 minutes, and a first playthrough probably won't take much longer. But there's more than meets the eye here - As per arcade tradition, play well enough and you might be rewarded with something nice...!
• Horrible-looking buildings! I'm bad at mapping leave me alone

 

 

 

It's the first time I release such a big project, so I'd love to get feedback on it! It's still pretty rough around the edges in some parts so I'm definitely planning to update it some more.

 

Thanks so much!

Edited May 31, 2023 by Dwimepon
Added 1.06. Whoops.

[horselessheadsman]

 

The roof-top back of the elevator has a graphical error you can only see from a higher building. Also, the rocket launcher ammo doesn't seem to regenerate, don't know if this was intentional.

It was fairly fun otherwise; though the hell-knight (and cacodemon to a lesser extent) was rather bullet-spongy, which didn't seem to fit the intended theme.

Maybe reduce them from the Doom default?

[Dwimepon]

12 hours ago, horselessheadsman said:

 

The roof-top back of the elevator has a graphical error you can only see from a higher building. Also, the rocket launcher ammo doesn't seem to regenerate, don't know if this was intentional.

It was fairly fun otherwise; though the hell-knight (and cacodemon to a lesser extent) was rather bullet-spongy, which didn't seem to fit the intended theme.

Maybe reduce them from the Doom default?

 

Aaaah, nice catch. I'll try to fix that right away - it just shows as a normal sky in UDB's Visual Mode but looks like This in action so I'm not sure how I'm going to make it look better, but I'll find a way. The rocket launcher not regaining ammo was intentional though, for balance purposes!

 

And yeah, I probably should have made Hell Knights less tanky. I'll reduce their health so they can be killed with 2 grenades, same as the Cacos. Thanks!

[Dwimepon]

Released update 1.05! Here's the changelog:

 

Spoiler

- Reduced the Hell Knight's health to be similar to the Cacodemon - they're both still bullet sponges, but at least he will always die in 2 grenade throws now.
- Modified the final rooftop arena and teleporter zone so you can't see the elevator (and the rendering errors that come with it) from it
- Slightly adjusted the camera on the TITLEMAP
- Added a version number on the TITLEMAP
-(Hopefully) Fixed a bug where you could end up starting the Extra Stage script without actually getting teleported
- Added two new intro warnings and Extra Stage boss subtitles

 

Edit: Quickly pushed version 1.06 because I forgot to set TITLEMAP to "fade to black" initially. Whoops!

Edited May 31, 2023 by Dwimepon

[Lone Courier]

Excellent little map with a pretty decent amount of replay value, had a blast playing it and hope you can add more levels in the future. 

[Dwimepon]

14 hours ago, Lone Courier said:

Excellent little map with a pretty decent amount of replay value, had a blast playing it and hope you can add more levels in the future. 

 

Thank you! I'm not planning on making additional levels since that's kind of the reason I initially abandonned the project. Still, much appreciated!

 

I'm starting to learn ZScript right now, so I might actually do something more with DipSwitch one day. Maybe a gameplay mod...?

[Lone Courier]

On 6/4/2023 at 2:07 PM, Dwimepon said:

 

Thank you! I'm not planning on making additional levels since that's kind of the reason I initially abandonned the project. Still, much appreciated!

 

I'm starting to learn ZScript right now, so I might actually do something more with DipSwitch one day. Maybe a gameplay mod...?

Awesome, i look forward to the updates when they come out. 

[LadyMistDragon]

Ok, that was really nice! Not sure how one gets the first key (i picked up on accident earlier) but the Streets of Rage thematics are so cool, and I like how the immortal eyes show up when a map is cleared. Did seem just a little bit easy, not as if that's a huge problem. Funny end text too.

 

 

 

Edited June 6, 2023 by LadyMistDragon