Interception III [MBF21 Community Project]

[Moustachio]

5 minutes ago, Amiga Angel said:

I would expect PANUPB to be a flipped PANUPA because its not possible to flip textures in MBF from what I know anyway and PANUPA is more usefull because it aligns with the colors of the panels in doom2.wad

Good point. I'll just include flipped versions of both in the next revision. Are there any more quality-of-life changes that need to be made to the textures?

[CBM]

been working a bit with my old map from 2019 using the inception 3 texture pack... also working on several other maps at the moment so cant promise anything... currently I am simple having fun with the texture pack

 

[Amiga Angel]

12 minutes ago, Moustachio said:

Good point. I'll just include flipped versions of both in the next revision. Are there any more quality-of-life changes that need to be made to the textures?

None that I have found so far based on looking at the textures.

[Moustachio]

I just realized, 250 - 1600 CE is a long span that could encompass a lot of history. Let's just go with 250 CE. The Roman Empire was still unified at this time.

 

Added some extra descriptions to each episode. Hopefully, they'll spark some ideas for everyone. Here's the description for Episode 3 for example: Around 250 CE. Ancient cities, temples, demon-infested villages, Romans, and lost wonders of the ancient world await you.

 

@Amiga Angel I'll make another update in a few days to a week from now. I'd like to let everyone get their hands dirty with the resource pack first in case there are any other kinks to iron out.

Edited May 19 by Moustachio

[Amiga Angel]

messing about with the textures... the void space with flesh stuff sounded interesting... I made this so far, not sure if this will end up as a complete map or not.. time will tell

 

[Amiga Angel]

a little bit of progress on my map also it has a name now

 

[Moustachio]

@Amiga Angel So it would appear that jimmy-tex already had mirrored versions of those textures. The mirror of PANUPA is PANDNA, and the mirror of PANUPB is PANDNB.

[Amiga Angel]

29 minutes ago, Moustachio said:

@Amiga Angel So it would appear that jimmy-tex already had mirrored versions of those textures. The mirror of PANUPA is PANDNA, and the mirror of PANUPB is PANDNB.

oh ok sorry about that, didnt notice that

[Lina]

Hell yeah, I'm gonna pitch in.

Looking through the weapons though, given the lever-action's rate of fire, it and the sawed-off don't really feel distinguished enough in terms of use cases. I'd suggest changing one of them to fire a single slug, something like 100 damage for the lever action or 500 for something to replace the SSG. Since all of the weapons have very efficient damage distribution (pellets/bullets won't overkill, multiple aoe projectiles is a big step up from rockets for crowd control even if the damage is the same), a weapon like that would round out the weapon roster I think.

[Lina]

Making a sprawling city map for episode 1. First room's finished.

[Moustachio]

5 hours ago, Lina said:

Making a sprawling city map for episode 1. First room's finished.

I like the look of that quite a bit!

 

Will make some updates to the resources soon:

• Giving the incendiary rounds a range before they fizzle out. Nerfing the flying and impact damage a bit. Changing their sprites to be distinct from the manc fireball as well.
• Changing the nitro barrels to be as strong as originally intended, with a whopping max damage of 640.
• I can change the sawed-off into a precise slug rifle if that would be more useful than the usual shotgun spread.
• Changing the sprites of the incendiary shotgunners to look more distinct from the plasma zombies.

May also extend or even remove the deadline, since these projects usually take longer than a year one way or another.

[SpaceCat_2001]

Wow, I really like the themes of each episode, I should try making something Interesting for it

[Moustachio]

>> RESOURCE PACK UPDATE (v003) <<

 

Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes:

• Incendiary rounds now have a short lifetime and fizzle out at a certain range. Their splash damage has been nerfed as well. And their mid-air sprites are now distinct from the Mancubus fireball.

• The Sawed-off Shotgun has been swapped for the Sniper Rifle Slug Rifle. Each slug consists of 3 pellets, each dealing 100 damage and each with a random chance of a 2x multiplier. I made it 3 pellets instead of 1 for that sweet collateral damage. The Slug Rifle has perfect accuracy.

• Some new textures for the city environments. I got them from Doom 2 In City Only, but I'm pretty sure they're from Duke 3D. I credited them under 3D Realms.

• The Incendiary Zombie has had its sprite replaced to be more distinct from the Plasma Zombie. Its HP has been bumped up to 

• New enemy added: the Snake Imp, a stronger imp variant with 200 HP. It fires a pattern of two fireballs to either side first, then a single fireball in the center. Probably most fitting in Episodes 3 and 4, but feel free to use it in any episode. Its ID # is 6097.

• The nitro barrel now has a maximum splash damage of 640(!) with a blast radius of 128.

 

EDIT: A little clarification. I accidentally wrote that void/sky floors should do 10% damage. They should instead be an instant death in this wad.

Edited May 26 by Moustachio

[SpaceCat_2001]

9 hours ago, Moustachio said:

>> RESOURCE PACK UPDATE (v003) <<

 

Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes:

• Incendiary rounds now have a short lifetime and fizzle out at a certain range. Their splash damage has been nerfed as well. And their mid-air sprites are now distinct from the Mancubus fireball.

• The Sawed-off Shotgun has been swapped for the Sniper Rifle Slug Rifle. Each slug consists of 3 pellets, each dealing 100 damage and each with a random chance of a 2x multiplier. I made it 3 pellets instead of 1 for that sweet collateral damage. The Slug Rifle has perfect accuracy.

• Some new textures for the city environments. I got them from Doom 2 In City Only, but I'm pretty sure they're from Duke 3D. I credited them under 3D Realms.

• The Incendiary Zombie has had its sprite replaced to be more distinct from the Plasma Zombie. Its HP has been bumped up to 

• New enemy added: the Snake Imp, a stronger imp variant with 200 HP. It fires a pattern of two fireballs to either side first, then a single fireball in the center. Probably most fitting in Episodes 3 and 4, but feel free to use it in any episode. Its ID # is 6097.

• The nitro barrel now has a maximum splash damage of 640(!) with a blast radius of 128.

 

EDIT: A little clarification. I accidentally wrote that void/sky floors should do 10% damage. They should instead be an instant death in this wad.

By the way, you should check Auger Zenith textures, there are quite a lot of good city textures.

I can actually suggest some of my own texture edits from Duke Nukem:

Edited May 26 by SpaceCat_2001

[Treehouseminis]

Shooting for a episode 5 map.  Marble hell temples with tv screens, and flesh accents.  Also the new weapons seem very strong, especially the fire shotgun.  Im looking forward to making fights that make them feel like normal weapons. 

[Lina]

Made some edits to the sniper slugger sprites, it was bothering me that it wasn't moving much in the original. -96/-67 centers them.
Edit: I feel like this thing would be balanced at two shells per shot, it's a beast.

Also, some more progress:

Edited May 26 by Lina

[Heretic926]

8 hours ago, Lina said:

I feel like this thing would be balanced at two shells per shot, it's a beast.

Slug Rifle also consumes one shell, which makes it even more busted with 300 damage it deals. I agree with Lina here, it should fire and also consume two shells - it would be much more balanced.

[Moustachio]

Happy to see some good screenshots being posted in the thread!

 

13 hours ago, SpaceCat_2001 said:

By the way, you should check Auger Zenith textures, there are quite a lot of good city textures.

I can actually suggest some of my own texture edits from Duke Nukem:

Thanks for the Auger;Zenith suggestion. I've added your edits plus a generous selection of Auger;Zenith texture to the resource file:

 

>> RESOURCE PACK UPDATE (v004) <<

 

Changes:

• Changed the ammo per shot of the Slug Rifle to 2 per shot.
• Added a generous selection of city/techno-themed textures from AUGER;ZENITH. Many begin with the DBP_ prefix, but there's also BUBB1-4 and MIDFIR1-3.
• Added SpaceCat_2001's Duke 3D texture edits.
• Imported @Lina's sprite edits for the Slug Rifle (thank you!).
• Renamed SPINE4_1 to SPINE4_2 to prevent overwriting an IWAD texture.
• Added a new sky to go with any ice themed textures. Could be used somewhere in Episode 3 or in a secret level:

SNOWSKY

 

• I made updates to MAP01 using some of the new textures as well.

Edited May 26 by Moustachio

[Treehouseminis]

Think Im starting to cook with something.

[stonedbaroness]

Episode 5 skybox/theme is calling out to me... I love the new content and enemies, makes it feel more quake-ish which I love! Also Odamex needs some more MBF21 multiplayer content so there's that! :P

[Moustachio]

>> RESOURCE PACK UPDATE (v005) <<

 

Small update to the resource pack to fix a bug with the STEP6 texture. The STEP10 patch was renamed to STEP12, which is now available as a texture. STEP10 is still available as a texture, but is now just the bottom half of STEP6. It was trivial to widen the texture by repeating the patch, so I figured why not.

 

STEP6:

STEP10:

STEP12:

 

I'm also working on a map for Episode 3. It's set during dusk. I'll make sure to take time-of-day into account when choosing the map order.

 

[NeedHealth]

Also working on a map, for episode 2 which is a theme i havn't worked with before.

[Treehouseminis]

More progress.  Will I be done by the time Elden Ring dlc releases and I put all hold on mapping for a while?  Probably not. 

 

[bartekmil]

I'd like to make a map or two for this, I have some ideas for an E2 one. The demo map is good at demonstrating the changes and aesthetics and Station to Station has that nice future city thing going that I've only experienced before in Auger Zenith

Very nice resource pack and pallete(I like the bluesteel shade), the arsenal changes are interesting - starting out with just fists on pistolstart is genius, I feel the new weapons make the player very powerful so you have to offset that with hard encounters, and fists/berserk fists/chainsaw now feel very samey in function but that's not necessarily bad

Good enemies too, only thing I feel would be a good addition is something like a naked revenant - a mid to high hp very fast melee enemy with high pain threshold since spectres and pinkies get obliterated with new weapons really fast.

Edited June 8 by bartekmil

[Treehouseminis]

Ok got a working map!  Difficulties are implemented but Ive only tested on UV so far. Map03 slot in wad

Episode : 5 hopefully

Name : "Terminated Bliss"

Author: Treehouseminis

Description : Dark Eldritch Prison, Set piece combat that can get difficult at times.  Make your escape, just dont fall into the void.  Slightly inspired by Prison of Hope from Demons Souls.  I did get overly ambitious and its a longer map, roughly 30 mins without saves and reloads.  But I was enjoying the atmosphere I made and had ideas lol

Music : "Aquifer" - Snaxalotl, Abscission

 

DropBox download

Edited June 17 by Treehouseminis

[Moustachio]

@Treehouseminis TOUGH level. But having fun with it so far. Got up to the part where you get the incendiary shotgun before dying. Will post demos and more feedback once I've got a full run down.

 

Things I can comment on: the atmosphere is insane. The ambient music combined with the visuals and extra use of gory objects makes this level genuinely tense. Even with the weapon set, the challenge is very high (which is good for Episode 5). I like how the start forces you to be attentive in order to make the first bit of progress, and starting the map off with some good ol' berserk action is satisfying (and can go south quick if you don't take out the AV first). Enjoying the slow drip of powerful weapons so far, making you stick to the trusty lever-action and berserk.

 

Small nitpick: the bars at the beginning only break when you punch them from the front, but they don't break when hitting the sides. It confused me a little bit since I could have sworn I hit the bars to try and break them first, but they didn't. Must have just hit them from the wrong angle, but making them break from any side would alleviate this.

 

Demo attempts so far

 

Also, I would like to remove the submission deadline for maps and go with a minimum amount of maps per episode. I think 5 per episode is a good baseline for wad length, since that adds up to a familiar 30 maps. There can be more than 5 maps in an episode, but the bare minimum for release would be at least 5 maps in each episode. I'd like some feedback on this before I go ahead and change the OP however, so I'd like to ask how interested mappers feel about this change.

 

Does removing the deadline help? Is 5 maps per episode a good baseline?

Edited June 19 by Moustachio

[Treehouseminis]

@Moustachio yeah those bars only have the front line def as a trigger, I can tag the sides as well.  Ill wait to make any changes until you give a full review.  About the difficulty, I use saves during my own maps so if that tells you anything lol.  Never been a one run player.   

[Moustachio]

@Treehouseminis Okay, I finally resigned myself to the fact that single-segmenting this thing will take too long, so I recorded a gameplay video:

 

 

I'll start with some complaints I have.

 

Spoiler

First off, my biggest gripe is that the yellow keycard secret is practically impossible to find without pressing use on every wall. If there is a hint as to how to find this secret, I'd really like to know because, for me, every wall in that cell looks exactly the same as the walls around it. I think a better hint would be greatly appreciated by first-time players, as having the Super Slugger actually provided me with a lot more options combat-wise.

 

 

My other main complaint has to do with the fight that unlocks the yellow skullkey, which I found extremely difficult on my first playthrough. On my second playthrough, with foresight (and DSDA’s rewind ability), I was able to complete it with far less attempts. My first playthrough, without the Slug Sniper, I had very limited options for taking care of the arachnotrons, and the amount of revenant rockets, arach plasma, hell noble fire, and cyberdemon rockets was very overwhelming. It took me about 10 tries or less to clear every other fight in the map on my first go, but this fight in particular really took it out of me. It was difficult to the point of frustration, and I wasn’t having too much fun anymore. Luckily the map is a lot more fun once the BFG is gained, but it did strike me as a bit odd that the toughest fight comes in the middle of the map rather than the end. I’d either ease up on the revenants or move the arachnotrons just a tad closer so that there’s an easier chance of taking them out with the Super Slugger.

 

 

Otherwise, there are a few more minor gripes that I had.

 

The rightmost bar at the beginning is too short to duck through, which is just a little annoying when constantly replaying the rest of the map. I’d make it big enough to duck through like the bar next to it.

 

 

At both the beginning of the map and when unlocking the rocket launcher, the Arch-Viles in these fights have a chance of coming out last rather than first. This really threw a wrench in coming up with a consistent strategy for these fights, and I think it would be better to ensure that the Archies always come out first.

 

 

These shotgun shells are placed in a spot where you may be forced to pick them up when you may not want to.

 

 

And these shells toward the end appear stuck in the floor in some ports.

 

 

Last, but not least, these wires are set to be impassable, which caught me off guard and got me killed during this fight. I think it would make more sense to use a fence texture if you wanted to block this linedef, but I genuinely think opening them up for more flexible traversal would allow for more fun strategies to tackle this fight.

 

 

Now onto the good, and IMO there’s much more good to say about this map than bad.

 

Spoiler

The gameplay is really fun. I’m not usually a slaughter type person, but I found the selection of weapons mixed with the choices of horde monsters culminated in a level of intensity and challenge that I enjoyed overcoming (with the exception of the fight to get the yellow skullkey). Each encounter was unique and memorable, and I found myself using a variety of weapons with my main weapon being the incendiary for hordes of mid-tiers.

 

My favorite fight is a tie between the ending fight with the hordes of archies and the fight at the base of the stairs down with the revenant horde + two cybies. None of these fights really felt too slow thanks to having plenty of ammo for the BFG and incendiary shotgun.

 

I particularly liked the very detailed and dark visuals. I found large portions of this map genuinely creepy. The impaled scientists, eye monitors, and eldritch growths all over the base make this feel like some sort of lost outpost. It all feels very similar in mood to DFF’s MAP11 from Interception II, and I love it when maps feel consistent in style, not just with the rest of the wad, but with earlier entries in the series. At the same time, the grandiose architecture (and slaughter) reminded me of other classic challenge sets like Sunder and Sunlust.

 

My favorite visual moment happens right on the other side of the red key door.

 

 

And speaking of this area, you did a good job of slowly taking away scaffolding from the player, exposing them to more risk of falling off of the map. The stairs at the end can be genuinely dangerous, but I love them because all you have to do is take it slow and easy. It’s a great little challenge to psych the player out with after a series of brutal fights.

 

The music does a lot to compliment the visuals and create an overwhelmingly foreboding atmosphere. It really feels like you are exploring some larger than life distortion of a UAC base, and it does fit quite well into Episode 5.

 

If I had to guess, this will probably go towards the end of the episode due to its high difficulty, its length, its scale, and its setting in a black void.

[Treehouseminis]

@Moustachio fair criticisms.  I'll fix those soon and make a V2.  I was wondering if I made a too difficult map.. I am un familiar with the interception series but the resources looked fun to play with.  

 

The yellow skull fight is indeed the hardest, one strategy that always works for me is walk back and forth in the middle and kill the imps, the 2 cybers will Infight well when they spawn.  I did purposely set the arachnatrons far enough away that auto aim won't work so even if you had the super slugger it wouldn't have made that much a difference.  They are on kill floors after you press all the buttons.  I can put them closer so auto aim can work.  Probably too mean anyway as the room so chaotic focusing on those 4 first might get you killed anyway.  

 

The impassable wires I can do something else with, it's just that I didn't want the player to walk on the outside structure and thought that would be awkward 

[Treehouseminis]

Ok fixed everything you mentioned Im pretty sure.  Even found some other alignment errors.  I also hid some lines from the automap for more atmosphere maybe.

 

-Reduced Revs in the yellow key unlock, also moved the arachnos closer to you.

-first room bars easier to break and navigate

-added rails to the first outside arena so navigation wont be as confusing.

-Made secret a little easier to tell, not as "random" now I suppose lol

-Added some shells in the later fights

-ammo shouldnt be clipping now hopefully.  And moved some around in other arenas.  Viles should spawn first now in the other areas you mentioned.

 

https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/jm06b133jx23ynihy3sos/treehouseminis-inter3-TerminatedBliss-V2.wad?rlkey=nrldjwwnpluo8agfu996a87v6&amp;st=k3iaj7v3&amp;dl=0