How do you do secrets the "right" way?

[Gez]

On samedi 7 octobre 2023 at 8:23 PM, Jayextee said:

Too late, I already removed sector special number nine from twenty seven entire maps.

Don't forget to also remove all powerups and also all monsters, except lost souls. Lost souls can stay.

 

[Jayextee]

I've already had complaints about my Lost Soul usage without doing that. XD

[DaBigNerd]

- Wall hump as much as possible

- Reach the exit door first, before going back to find secrets

- Recognize secret cliches

- Limit yourself. I usually limit to spend an hour on secret hunting. After that, I would look it up on google.

 

Remember: If you can't find all the secrets, don't push it. Save your game, take a break, and come back later.

[Amaruψ]

On 10/11/2023 at 3:57 PM, Lila Feuer said:

 

Yes, in the next room ahead of you lol. You won't even hear the sector close after a minute of play when you're engaged on your side with monsters.

 

You're being generous :P it only takes it about 30 seconds to close, not even a minute. 

 

But no, really. The arrow pointing at the secret is a good touch. Will always make you wonder what're you actually missing... which is thrown out of the window completely because there's yet another secret there (the lowering bookshelf) so your mind will always think the arrow's pointing at it... so never mind.

[Amaruψ]

On 10/11/2023 at 3:57 PM, Lila Feuer said:

 

Yes, in the next room ahead of you lol. You won't even hear the sector close after a minute of play when you're engaged on your side with monsters.

 

You're being generous :P it only takes it about 30 seconds to close, not even a minute. 

 

But no, really. The arrow pointing at the secret is a good touch. Will always make you wonder what're you actually missing... which is thrown out of the window completely because there's yet another secret there (the lowering bookshelf) so your mind will always think the arrow's pointing at it... so never mind.

[LadyMistDragon]

Not making practically invisible shootable switches? I've seen this in far too many maps and while it has its place...i don't like how my brain's been trained to carefully search walls in locations that I might want to pay attention to other things to be honest.

 

I would say Eternal is someone who has a good method of hiding secrets more often than not.

[Carmelo]

I think that if the secret hides something essential for beating the map, it's a bad secret. However, I might forgive something cryptic if I'm stumbling into something that I know is going to be cryptic or very difficult

[subarashi]

I say most things are fair game when it comes to secrets. This was mentioned before above, but my biggest pet peeve are secrets that are mandatory for progression. Don't do that. 

 

Personally, I believe that following what the commercial releases do a lot of the time (particularly Knee Deep in the Dead) will give you a good idea as to how secrets can help the player whilst also not halting important things like natural progression and flow of a map. 

[treulosetomate]

I might be in the minority (don't know, honestly), but I think Doom is suffering from a wallhumping epidemic. It's so stupid. And I'm doing it too, because most wads are basically telling me, "if you want secrets, you better hump every single wall." Even if there is a hint like a different texture, I still don't like it.

I'm currently playing TPH. It's great. Might even make my top 10, for real. But the first map already has a usable wall in an inconspicuous place without any hints (as far as I can tell), and it makes me lose interest in secret hunting for the other maps as well. Which is a shame, because some secrets are still pretty cool, and I wouldn't want to miss them. But you never know what you're going to get.

I'd be happy if we got rid of usable walls altogether. But that's probably too radical.

 

If anybody knows some wads that have

- only 1 or very few secrets per map which also aren't an afterthought

- no usable walls

- some kind of puzzle to figure out

- big secret rewards like bonus fights, bonus areas, or major map transformation

please let me know. I want to play them.

[DoomGal]

Don't think there no right way too do secrets just make sure they oblivious by having different wall texture or place a body outside of one or something cuddles and kisses 

[Jayextee]

On 10/14/2023 at 9:42 PM, treulosetomate said:

I might be in the minority (don't know, honestly), but I think Doom is suffering from a wallhumping epidemic.

 

I am absolutely right there with you in said minority. I didn't realise it was a thing until I'd started watching DOOM gameplay on YouTube and then some FDAs of my (as yet unreleased) Ultimate DOOM wad. It seems to me that what I thought was the default progression of: start level > get keys 'n' shit > finish level, has been replaced with a new default of: start level > kill everything on sight > get keys 'n' shit > hump walls > get to level exit, don't finish > retrace entire steps humping ALL the walls > consult automap [ > OPTIONAL: open map in UDB for anything *too* secret ] > finish level.

 

I actually want secrets to be secret personally as a map designer. Back when I made The Becoming (a slightly-edited version of which is the E2 of my upcoming WAD) I'd put two secrets behind false walls with sneaky barrels blocking player progress; and with no texture hints either. The idea was that these weren't "humpable" secrets, but actually-hidden ones. Recently I've taken to more-extreme measures;

 

- secrets are now not tagged with special 9 -- so the automap and extended HUD won't be giving you hints as to their existence

- speaking of which, I spent like a week cleaning up the automap to an insane degree. Secrets aren't on there. Extraneous details (like my beloved triangular sky windows, heh) aren't there. Anything that isn't strictly the beaten path or intended route isn't there.

 

I'm well aware that there are some players who are going to cry about this likely-unpopular approach, but I'm going to bathe in those delicious wallhumper tears personally. Because, fucking hell, that's a miserable and downright cursed way to approach a map when playing. A secret is IMO supposed to be a nice little bonus for creative or observant players, not mandatory <sigh> content <deeper sigh> that serves less of a novelty or bonus purpose and more to sate a player's content-hungry FOMO.

Rant over. I could go deeper, but nah.

[Ravendesk]

On 10/14/2023 at 9:42 PM, treulosetomate said:

If anybody knows some wads that have

- only 1 or very few secrets per map which also aren't an afterthought

- no usable walls

- some kind of puzzle to figure out

- big secret rewards like bonus fights, bonus areas, or major map transformation

please let me know. I want to play them.

Fractured Worlds. It's usually more than 1 secret per map, however each map has a secret fight accessible if you find a secret key, and generally secrets are well thought-through. Final map has an even more extensive secret (to say without spoiling it too much).

[rita remton]

i'm terrible at finding secrets in maps, usually discovering only 5-10% of them in maps that i played :P ... so, this is how i currently do secrets:

• instead of different coloured walls, flames, etc, i use the same plaque/marker (eg: a small lion's face) for all secrets.
• not mandatory to be found.
• no one-chance entry or doors with timers.
• if using a switch to open access to the secret area, the entry to the secret location must be seen from switch itself and not deduced by sound. i like hearing music while playing, which usually drowns the sounds of hidden doors opening/closing.
• some secret areas could be seen from the main pathway (but the way to the secret location is left hidden). other secrets however, remain completely out of sight.
• for secrets containing monsters, the monsters must be teleported into the secret areas just before the player reaches the secret locations. if the player nears the level exit, the monsters in secret areas are all flushed out by teleporting them near the level exit door/switch for the player to achieve 100% kills without finding the secrets.
• if the map allows it (due to space constraints, main layout design etc), some secrets have their own small "journeys".
• unmarked secrets = easter eggs. apart from secrets, must have at least 1 easter egg in map.

these are my personal guidelines. i'm still a newbie mapper, so most probably some of the above are inaccurate/wrong. tq :)

[zaratzara]

IMO the worst secret is an invuln or BFG stash I discover just after the borderline impossible center-piece confrontation.

[Mordeth]

On 10/14/2023 at 10:42 PM, treulosetomate said:

a wallhumping epidemic

 

That's mostly because mappers tend to chuck a secret in rather haphazardly because they think it's fun and don't think about the (design) consequences. Say, putting some ammo into a destroyable crate. But that means that once your players find out they can get some ammo from that one particular crate, they will proceed to try and break every other crate they will encounter from there on out, even if that ammo crate was meant as a one-off secret.

[Lila Feuer]

23 hours ago, zaratzara said:

IMO the worst secret is an invuln or BFG stash I discover just after the borderline impossible center-piece confrontation.

 

I did the beginning part of HR2's MAP32: Playground without knowledge of the invul at the start that would've really helped.

 

I've been traumatized and check my immediate surroundings in every new map of a WAD just in case before moving on.

[Deffers]

As the sort of player who gets completely brainwormed by not finding secrets, I will point out an unusually good time I had lately with a pk3 set, even if it's an off-standard one. It was an action RPG GZDOOM mapset called Abysm 2: Infernal Contract. For whatever reason, and I honestly couldn't tell you why, I appear to have found all but three secrets in the whole mapset and almost painlessly at that. For me it's usually the kind of thing where the enemies are long dead and I'm just wandering the halls for forty minutes trying to find the last thing before taking the L and searching DOOMwiki but here it was... easy, somehow? None of that happened. See a puddle of water, dive in, look, there's a secret tunnel, wow. Oh there's this dropoff on the map? Better go check that out and hey, would you look at that, there's some powerups. Off-texture wall? You better bet that's a secret. The pacing of the secrets tended to be pretty nice too-- there'd usually be a bit of level left past the last secret, as if to say "Hey, you're good, you found everything, just focus on having fun killing things."

 

I would say that hints, first and foremost, are the key to making satisfying secrets. With GZDOOM maps it can be a bit difficult, though-- unless the mapper explicitly bans crouching and jumping, you never know quite how much verticality in the form of mantling and platforming over objects is intended as a means of progression. Ditto with slopes. BOOM compatible stuff, though, I am often just kind of floored at how often I can be stumped for hours.

 

Having said this, I don't think there's anything wrong with making ultra-secrets that are nigh-on incompatible with my brain. I generally can't delineate between what secrets I will find easy and which ones will break me for hours and I don't see it as a mapper's perogative to humor my neuroses. Still, though, something about Abysm 2's secret design was very satisfying to me to the point where I'd recommend mappers play it because of how well they hit and how well I'd say they're paced. Maybe because of the RPG design the secrets were very much intended to be found by most players and that made the difference? 

[rita remton]

On 10/26/2023 at 11:42 PM, Deffers said:

the secrets were very much intended to be found by most players and that made the difference? 

 

in other words, secrets which are somewhat easy to find? if so, good idea. i guess, say ,out of 6 secrets, i could assign 2 secrets which are like that. thanks :)

[Lila Feuer]

I'll just say afa secret hunting is concerned that if you include the computer area map on the level, to please not make it useless by revealing nothing, that's my advice.

[DoomGater]

The best way to deal with secrets is ... 
 

Spoiler

...to keep them secret!    :-)

 

Edited October 29, 2023 by DoomGater

[Lofwyr]

I would prefer them unmarked and untallied, and only an (ini file) option would turn that on.

 

They're basically proto achievements and achievements, in my opinion have made gaming worse. I can't use Doom as an example because it has cheat codes, but modern games are treated like holy calves and not the bitches to be made by the player, including cheating, modding, etc.

 

Plus, unmarked achievements (and therefore secrets) would also relieve some OCD like behavior and also add to actual achievements, the kind you can brag about AND the kind you can be mystical about, the mew under the truck, etc.

This, today, is also less possible but I like to think that the gist of my point stands.