original Eternal Doom music, graphics

[Soundblock]

To jog the old memory banks I'd like to hear the tunes out of Eternal Doom again, made by Rich Nagel. Anyone know if there are any tools to convert Doom music to formats playable outside of the game, or do I have to run the mod & idclev around the place?

Also, anyone know if the Eternal graphics (HUD, textures, etc.) were ever used in mods outside of the official TNT-endorsed releases? Only curious, since I did the original art for it, back in the day...

[Creaphis]

You could use XWE to export the music files from eternal.wad. I'm not sure if the music in that wad is in .mus or .midi format, but if they're .midi, then your computer should be able to play them right away. If they're .mus, then look for a utility called mus2midi to convert them.

Also, it's likely that someone has already done all of this, or would be willing to do it for you if you asked really nicely.

The graphical resources for Eternal Doom were packaged up in retres.wad, and they still see use in new wads from time to time. I borrowed some wall textures from it when making crea_one.wad. It's cool to see the original artist turn up here. Welcome!

Edit: I just read the text file for retres.wad... are you Kvernmo? If so, know that your Master Levels are my favourites :D

[myk]

I remember Rich released the music in MP3 format a long time ago (like in 2000). Here's a post on the net where he mentions that.

XWE will extract translate the MUS tracks into MIDI, although issues can occur, but you can also extract them in raw format (lumps) and get one of various MUS2MIDI apps (some work better than others on different systems) to translate them. See this thread.

As for the graphics, I recall seeing the status bar in some WAD on an online server. I think that, aside from the texture set, they're not used too often because the text file says not to.

[Creaphis]

myk said:

I think that, aside from the texture set, they're not used too often because the text file says not to.

Does it?

"You can extract the portions of the resource you wish to use as long as you give proper credit."

[myk]

I was thinking about Eternal Doom, but didn't recall the resource pack also included menu graphics and the like.

Hmm, I just checked my DOOM folders and incidentally I have the Eternal Doom tracks in MIDI format right here in a folder. Check your private messages, Soundblock.

[Soundblock]

Thanks a bunch for the help guys, that was fast! Yeah Creaphis, Kvernmo here. Thank you for the kind words on Master Levels - still wish we'd made an episode of it once we were at it. A miniscule regret on an otherwise very rewarding experience, of course. ;-)

In the spirit of Doom editability, those graphics should IMO be no more limited for usage than the original Doom textures are. Not that its likely to make that much of a difference this many years down the road, but seeing as the community here is still alive and kicking (I used to think the .wad scene would die once Duke 3D came out - hah) I guess it doesn't hurt to mention my point of view on the subject.

myk, that made my day. :-)

[Mad Butcher]

A bit off-topic, but do you still have your Deadlock WAD for Hexen? I can't find it anywhere.

[Soundblock]

Not at my current location, but I might be able to dig it up on the new year...

[Mad Butcher]

Thanks. It was at Dr. Sleep's old website but the link no longer worked.

[Soundblock]

Mad Butcher said:

Thanks. It was at Dr. Sleep's old website but the link no longer worked.

/brushes the dust off the thread.

I have now battled the Balrog and located that Deadlock.wad. I've posted it to my webpage, so you can get it there:

http://www.monstercute.com/1/post/2013/11/deadlockwad.html

Btw, I don't have Hexen set up at home at the moment, so if you do play - feel free to take a screenshot, post it and then I'll add it to the monstercute blog post. It looks best with pictures. Anywhere within the next five years will be fine...

Sorry it took so long, I clean forgot. Hope you're still out there.

NOTE: Yeah, I miss that old site of Sleep's too...

[plums]

Massive 5 year bump! I wasn't posting around here at all until recently but I just played your level, pretty fun. ZDoom doesn't put the Wings of Wrath at the right height unfortunately so I had to cheat.

I took a few pictures if you want them:
http://i.imgur.com/4mwbSkn.png
http://i.imgur.com/wTrHl5f.png
http://i.imgur.com/VIxVj8c.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/g6a7kpZ.png

[Devalaous]

Oh wow, the maker of CABAL? I remember reading you had updated versions of those somewhere.

I still wish that ended up as a full megawad, so many of those levels are brilliant, especially the Master Levels ones.

The giant devil face map was one I found on a disc somewhere and was one of the coolest things I had seen period, one of the big things that got me interested in the Doom modding community.

If your interested, theres a thread in this forum wher your Master Levels have been converted into PSX levels, engine limitations and all, as if they were made for the PSX Final Doom but cut. Im sure they'd get a kick out of your opinions on them. At one point there was talk of converting your other CABAL maps for the fun of it (Along iwith the other levels that were part of a series that Master Levels was in, like Dr Sleep's maps), but I havent seen anythinmg more about that.

EDIT: I was about to be all disappointed when I saw it was a bump, but it was a bump by Sverre himself, so its a little less awkward

[Soundblock]

plums said:

Massive 5 year bump! I wasn't posting around here at all until recently but I just played your level, pretty fun. ZDoom doesn't put the Wings of Wrath at the right height unfortunately so I had to cheat.

I took a few pictures if you want them:
http://i.imgur.com/4mwbSkn.png
http://i.imgur.com/wTrHl5f.png
http://i.imgur.com/VIxVj8c.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/g6a7kpZ.png

Goodness gracious - that sure is pre-Gothic! My alignment finger itches. I'd update it, but I guess I better not - other projects to tend to. Thanks a bunch for the comments & screens - I've update my blog with the chasm shot. :-)

Ragnor said:

Oh wow, the maker of CABAL? I remember reading you had updated versions of those somewhere.

I still wish that ended up as a full megawad, so many of those levels are brilliant, especially the Master Levels ones.

The giant devil face map was one I found on a disc somewhere and was one of the coolest things I had seen period, one of the big things that got me interested in the Doom modding community.

If your interested, theres a thread in this forum wher your Master Levels have been converted into PSX levels, engine limitations and all, as if they were made for the PSX Final Doom but cut. Im sure they'd get a kick out of your opinions on them. At one point there was talk of converting your other CABAL maps for the fun of it (Along iwith the other levels that were part of a series that Master Levels was in, like Dr Sleep's maps), but I havent seen anythinmg more about that.

EDIT: I was about to be all disappointed when I saw it was a bump, but it was a bump by Sverre himself, so its a little less awkward

The only bad thing I've got to say about the evil face map (the_evil.wad, or "The Image of Evil") is that a Mickey Mouse map beat me to the punch of the overview face map idea! I was feeling all original until I found out about mickey.wad... <:)

Someone actually converted the "lost" Master Levels to PSX? That's totally rad - I felt like I had done something wrong, like been too knit-picky with my vertexes when I found out they'd been cut from the PSX version. Thread link? Yes please!

In retrospect, its somewhat a shame (of minor proportions) that we didn't spend the time and effort on Master Levels to pace and place them in sequence, though playing them chronologically would certainly have taken away from the notion we had at the time, that they should each be an individual challenge, tough but fair. I think the powers that be at the time didn't want to allocate resources away from Quake, though the (external) mappers involved were largely dying to create a 32-level map fest. Obviously. From what I understand, id at the time wanted to keep the fruit-of-the-community-loom feel of the project, rather than approach anything that smacked of an official "Doom III". Branching Doom into Plutonia and Final wasn't on the horizon yet, from what I know.

It might help to put this in perspective to be reminded that the expansion model for games wasn't really established back then - I think the only other add-on (requiring the original game to play) that existed prior to ML was one made for Wing Commander... Things were happening fast and the road pretty much being made as we all went along.

Sequential Master Levels play would have been cool as an option though. You could always have opted to play the maps individually if you were so inclined. But as things played out the maps didn't get fine tuned towards sequential inclusion, so juxtaposing them after the fact (and/or adding some of the authors' other levels into a whole) is unlikely to yield automatic good results. You'd have to re-balance the lot to get optimal gameplay, since every level except whichever map is placed first in the series would become a great deal easier. Some ML authors might not want their maps fiddled with for all I know. Personally I don't mind - for me the spirit of Doom was always in the sharing, even if some kid took the lines of the_evil.wad and passed it off as his own there for a while... :o

Ultimately, although I think an unofficial 32-level ML authors wad would be fun to see, there are so many other exceptionally good maps and mappers out there that deserve the attention, that I would be more likely to play those. The Master Level authors were really lucky to get a light shined on their creations. That's not to say that it was blind luck. But there were certainly other takers out there, just as worthy, who didn't get noticed or wasn't available.

Finally, I no longer have a copy of the super-trimmed Cabal-levels, ever since Compuserve shut down and the 8-character file name limit was removed to allow for sequential file naming. To be honest they were too damn hard anyway. You were required to have regular punch-outs with revenants to get through some areas, so I went a bit overboard with those. Still, there were a couple of new implementations in there, when compared to the original Cabal levels; like the "fake exit-switch encounter" that was added to Watchtower. If anyone has a copy and reads this, I'd love a copy for me backups. No biggie though, the original wads are probably better - even if they are certain to include more misaligned textures. :-)

[Devalaous]

Here is the Lost Levels thread: http://www.doomworld.com/vb/wads-mods/62396-psx-doom-the-lost-levels/

The project is nearly done, but all your levels are done, although maybe not finalised and bugfree.

Thanks for the insight on Master Levels, its been the most intriguing official level set for me for quite a while, due to the strange way it was handled and thinking about "what could have been". Master Levels is playable sequentially on the PS3, every official level set was put into one big collection, the very first time all 21 levels were available on a console. You'll be happy to know that TEETH is the finale :D

I made a few attempts to compile my own 32 level Master Levels wad, the biggest problem was trying to order the levels to have a reasonable difficulty curve. Naturally, yours ended up near the end. I remember putting We Who Are About To Die early on, only to find out about the caco army. Still cant get past that :D

The thing I loved about your levels over the others, was each one had an amazing amount of atmosphere and wordless storytelling, like how many of the levels had a random monster that had a special purpose. The Archvile on the throne in Bloodsea Keep, the Cyberdemon you climb the Black Tower to kill, the AWESOME lone Revenant rising from the coffin to signify Mephisto's body. Even with no reading beforehand, you can tell in game theres a story there and whats going on.

Always made me wonder how the full megawad would be if it had come to be. With the rise of "Doom the Way id Did" and its sequel for Doom 2, Ive been hoping one for Master Levels gets done, to see how people emulate the level styles of the ML authors.

But anyway, thanks again for replying, sorry if I'm a bit too fanboyish, your maps really did have such an effect on my early Dooming. I had the same response to Aubrey Hodges, creator of the PSX Doom soundtrack when he showed up on Doomworld :p

[Gez]

Soundblock said:

It might help to put this in perspective to be reminded that the expansion model for games wasn't really established back then - I think the only other add-on (requiring the original game to play) that existed prior to ML was one made for Wing Commander... Things were happening fast and the road pretty much being made as we all went along.

Hey, we actually had a thread recently that was about this topic and there were actually already more than a few expansion packs for games by the time Doom II happened. In addition to examples given in that thread, there's also Star Wars: X-Wing (released 1993, with both expansion packs -- Imperial Pursuit and B-Wing following in the same year).

[Soundblock]

Ragnor said:

Here is the Lost Levels thread: http://www.doomworld.com/vb/wads-mods/62396-psx-doom-the-lost-levels/

The project is nearly done, but all your levels are done, although maybe not finalised and bugfree.

Thanks for the insight on Master Levels, its been the most intriguing official level set for me for quite a while, due to the strange way it was handled and thinking about "what could have been". Master Levels is playable sequentially on the PS3, every official level set was put into one big collection, the very first time all 21 levels were available on a console. You'll be happy to know that TEETH is the finale :D

I made a few attempts to compile my own 32 level Master Levels wad, the biggest problem was trying to order the levels to have a reasonable difficulty curve. Naturally, yours ended up near the end. I remember putting We Who Are About To Die early on, only to find out about the caco army. Still cant get past that :D

The thing I loved about your levels over the others, was each one had an amazing amount of atmosphere and wordless storytelling, like how many of the levels had a random monster that had a special purpose. The Archvile on the throne in Bloodsea Keep, the Cyberdemon you climb the Black Tower to kill, the AWESOME lone Revenant rising from the coffin to signify Mephisto's body. Even with no reading beforehand, you can tell in game theres a story there and whats going on.

Always made me wonder how the full megawad would be if it had come to be. With the rise of "Doom the Way id Did" and its sequel for Doom 2, Ive been hoping one for Master Levels gets done, to see how people emulate the level styles of the ML authors.

But anyway, thanks again for replying, sorry if I'm a bit too fanboyish, your maps really did have such an effect on my early Dooming. I had the same response to Aubrey Hodges, creator of the PSX Doom soundtrack when he showed up on Doomworld :p

Woah, that's totally unexpected... I wonder if that flying imp still hovers up under the exit in TEETH... What an excercise in claustrophobia that level was! I don't think I could ever map like that again... :-)

I agree with you on the point that if anything, the one thing ML would have over the other Dooms would be a certain what-if factor and added mystery for the Doom connoisseur - though I wouldn't be surprised if it was viewed as the least of the official Dooms by the average player. Less cohesive, a steep user interface, etc. I'm hella proud to have had the honour to work on it though, and always will be no matter how much times and game engines change. It was an exciting time, a huge load of hard work with pretty raw tools, where only a few were fortunate enough to get their work on display, or even considered. I'm sure there were some very interesting maps on the cuttingroom floor from that project, that didn't get done, through to id or wasn't made available in time, not to speak of wads that might have been made by other authors if the word about the project had reached wider channels than it did, while it was still in the beginning stages.

I appreciate your generous insight on those levels of mine - it is still amazing what a few strategically placed lines and things can get across with ye olde Doom engine... And I never could make a map just for the sake of creating cool geometry - to create a complete map I always had to have something to gravitate towards thematically, setting or story- wise. Its heartwarming to know that some of that actually carried across in the map.

Needless to say, but worthy of repetition, it is all standing on the shoulder of the original giants, who paved the way for the rest of us map making mortals. I've played my share of maps where I also felt a strong connection to the level designer's mood, sense-of-humor, spirit-of-the-map, or call it what you will - there's a real sense of presence in the best maps, and not just about technical prowess. For example, I always wished Shawn Green would have made more maps - there's a real sense of personality to the two efforts of his that I know of (Barrels of Fun from Doom 2, and one from the Ultimate Doom batch). Romero, Petersen and McGee have already been praised to high heaven, and as the pillars and girders of Doom architecture they deserve to be - but I always thought it was a shame Shawn didn't make more maps. I guess he was too busy getting the other guys' to beat their maps into shape or something - at least on Master Levels he gave really good advice and input throughout his active time on the project, making sure ammo counts weren't too stingy and that gameplay didn't become too author-centric, possessing a really good eye for balance, and always pushing for bravura. It was a pleasure to work with him as a person, but to me his maps stood out based on their own strengths, their inherent congenial playability, one-of-a-kind offerings that leave a subtle yearning for more.

To a lesser extent, I also wonder how Tom Hall would have developed as a Doom level designer had he stayed the course. I guess these are the type of things us doomies always return to and will never know the complete answers to. It seems he was creating maps when the toolset was brand new and the now established mapper styles hadn't solidified yet - they have an.... airy... quality anyway.

Just my personal ponderances about these things... the mind keeps leaping where reality abruptly stops.

I'll go check that thread now, though I don't immediately think I want to go hippo-in-a-glass-house all over it, if you know what I mean. Thanks for the link though - I'll definitely want to check this out if I can get my hands on it!

Gez said:

Hey, we actually had a thread recently that was about this topic and there were actually already more than a few expansion packs for games by the time Doom II happened. In addition to examples given in that thread, there's also Star Wars: X-Wing (released 1993, with both expansion packs -- Imperial Pursuit and B-Wing following in the same year).

Thanks Gez, I often find there are more gaps than actual knowledge to the things I thought I knew, and you have proven me right (uh, I mean, wrong) once again! ;-)

[kmxexii]

It's great to see you still checking in from time to time. Loved your Master Levels - as punishing as TEETH was - and your Eternal Doom works are among my most memorable plays. "Darkdome" rules my world.

[Soundblock]

kmxexii said:

It's great to see you still checking in from time to time. Loved your Master Levels - as punishing as TEETH was - and your Eternal Doom works are among my most memorable plays. "Darkdome" rules my world.

Thanks! You know, in retrospect I wonder, just as a theory, if there isn't more than one shade of the cathedral of Notre Duck in that map, as drawn by the hand of old master Carl Barks, blessed be his memory. It was probably my favorite Donald Duck story, growing up...

[Devalaous]

I never finished Eternal Doom. It was....too big (and too hard)...for me. But it is on my to do list someday. I only found out you had worked on the project (Along with Jim Flynn, ironically) when I read Kmxexii's Eternal Doom review. While I only got up to level 3 or 4 legitimately back then, I did level skip around to see bits of what would come later..and I was blown away by the Time Gate level. The alternate apocalypse ending, oh wow.

I dont know when I'll get time to play it again though, with my much improved skills since then, since being recruited as a TNT2 Devilution playtester I've only really had time for that.

By the way, take a look at the two "Way ID Did" projects, they have imitations of Tom Hall and Shawn Green's styles if you'd like to see how his style is interpreted. Ive only had time to play one level from the first one, but it felt like an official ID level.

[Dragonsbrethren]

Hey, just wanted to say that the beginning of Bloodsea Keep is still one of my favorite Doom map areas from an aesthetic standpoint, and Black Tower is another favorite of mine. I didn't play the Master Levels until a few years ago, and I can only imagine how the massive tower must've felt to someone playing in '95. I actually recently played through Master Levels again and those two definitely stand out from the rest.

Shawn Green did Barrels o' Fun? Everything says it was one of Sandy's maps, but I figure working that closely with him you'd probably know better than anyone if it was his.

[Gez]

Dragonsbrethren said:

Shawn Green did Barrels o' Fun? Everything says it was one of Sandy's maps, but I figure working that closely with him you'd probably know better than anyone if it was his.

Yeah, the wiki has it as a Sandy Petersen map. It only credits three maps to Shawn. It might be wrong though.

[Searcher]

This thread is a fun read.

Thanks for the historical insight Soundblock

[Soundblock]

Gez said:

Yeah, the wiki has it as a Sandy Petersen map. It only credits three maps to Shawn. It might be wrong though.

Hmm... My memory might have failed me on that one, or I may have mislabeled a memory of Shawn's map as "BoF". Still, out of the maps I've played (and there's a lot of good maps I haven't played), I would claim that his Ultimate Doom map has the best Spider Mastermind encounter on record. It sure is a tough boss to build a map around, compared to the singing and dancing cybo...

Apologies in advance if I screwed up on the Barrels author... I'd hate to unnecessarily have contested the wiki! :-)

Ragnor said:

I never finished Eternal Doom. It was....too big (and too hard)...for me. But it is on my to do list someday. I only found out you had worked on the project (Along with Jim Flynn, ironically) when I read Kmxexii's Eternal Doom review. While I only got up to level 3 or 4 legitimately back then, I did level skip around to see bits of what would come later..and I was blown away by the Time Gate level. The alternate apocalypse ending, oh wow.

I dont know when I'll get time to play it again though, with my much improved skills since then, since being recruited as a TNT2 Devilution playtester I've only really had time for that.

By the way, take a look at the two "Way ID Did" projects, they have imitations of Tom Hall and Shawn Green's styles if you'd like to see how his style is interpreted. I've only had time to play one level from the first one, but it felt like an official ID level.

There was maybe too many obscure switches, in retrospect, but oodles of atmosphere. New and on-par music certainly helped. I've got more of a mind for byte-size maps these days, I guess we were really trying to see exactly how expansive we could make things on that project. I mean, memory limits had just gone from straight-jacket to comfy sweater on the PC, so previous boundaries were looking near limitless. Still haven't tried ED II and III - I saw some video on youtube of someone playing III with all kinds of other cool mods thrown into the mix and it looked and sounded great, a lot of new stuff, but I think it was with a source port I'm unfamiliar with - I could never reproduce it on my machine anyway, and there are other projects I guess I'd like to try first. After I'm done with this plasmaplant.wad (originally a Cabal concept, it's in final stages of testing right now), which should if all goes well coincide with December 10, I've got Jägermörder 2 first on my list of unplayed maps to check out.

I really love the initial idea behind "Doom the way id did it" and the fact it actually turned into two great looking megawads. From what I've seen of the screenshots it recaptures that priceless original feeling. I'm currently of a mind to give it a swirl after checking out JM2, but its hard to find time for everything you'd like.

I started checking out the (gargantuan) PSX ML link btw - those guys have done a really good job under the massive vertical constraints of the PSX Doom engine. Just checking Mephisto's Maosoleum on youtube I'm amazed at how much of the original experience is intact, despite slower monsters and less reduced geometry and at how much the new effects bring to the table; that fiery sky defines apocalyptic! Hats off to that team, I hope they reach the finish line some day.

Dragonsbrethren said:

Hey, just wanted to say that the beginning of Bloodsea Keep is still one of my favorite Doom map areas from an aesthetic standpoint, and Black Tower is another favorite of mine. I didn't play the Master Levels until a few years ago, and I can only imagine how the massive tower must've felt to someone playing in '95. I actually recently played through Master Levels again and those two definitely stand out from the rest.

Shawn Green did Barrels o' Fun? Everything says it was one of Sandy's maps, but I figure working that closely with him you'd probably know better than anyone if it was his.

Thanks for the Bloodsea plug - I early on started mapping out a lot of piers and docks, guess because I grew up on the coast around a lot of rustic marine/fishing industry. Quickly found out back in the day that the viscounts couldn't support my first jab at detailing my maps - the very first few saves of bloodsea.wad had per-floorboard sectors on the starting pier (!), but I don't think I even made it off the wood and onto the marble before the engine crashed.

Also, Black Tower's contours looked more like a stand-alone tall tower in some of the early builds, but the starting sector became so humongous to allow for this view that a long and uneventful walk became necessary to even get to the entrance. Had to ditch that and go for a much shorter tower (so you could see the jagged top, in pre-freelook days), even though more than one of the beta tester on that map then noted that the insides of the tower seemed taller than the visible outside. I kind of explained it away interdimensionally, "oh... there's teleporters between each floor, so there's no telling where those other floors actually are!". Its a weird map, but pacing and playability ultimately shaped it, more than the initial name and concept. I guess I could have gone for "Black Stub", or "Half a Tower" but it didn't quite have the same ring to it.

EDIT: formatting, sizeable post.

[Soundblock]

Ragnor said:

Oh wow, the maker of CABAL? I remember reading you had updated versions of those somewhere.

Looking around the dark corners of my backups, I just found those trimmed cabal wads in a box with no label. I had put them together sequentially, which is why their difficulty was ramped up, sort of for testing, meaning to get around to expanding/finishing them later - and then 18 years or so went ahead and happened in the meantime, so they haven't been altered since then.

I've uploaded them to my website, placing them near the bottom of my Works page - they shouldn't be so hard to locate from now on.
http://www.monstercute.com/works.html

[Devalaous]

Oh cool!. Last week I actually finished off the PSN Master Levels episode, after reading this thread. Black Tower, TEETH and Bad Dream for the three finishers. Sadly, the secret exit was broken, and sent you to Attack, meaning Bad Dream was actually the final level of the episode. Your magnum opus, clearly :D

Black Tower looks pretty good in the episode 2 city sky. I wonder why the PSN port has special coding to allow Mephisto to use the Map 7 tags, yet Bloodsea Keep's mancubus secret was broken. Oh well. By the way, the soul sphere ands megarmour at the end of Black Tower, while redundant as a single wad, REALLY helps in the PSN continuous episode, you start TEETH with just that extra bit more room for error.

Once I'm done with playtesting TNT2 Devilution;s current test mapset, I'll give these a go.

[Soundblock]

Ragnor said:

Bad Dream was actually the final level of the episode. Your magnum opus, clearly :D

I'm still amazed Shawn let me append that hackjob (though a good enough puzzle-map) to Teeth('s admittedly half-impossible to find secret exit). I hope the Cybos have stopped blinking in and out of existence with all these new fancy versions of Doom. If the universe loops and your high point thus meets your low point somewhere out there, then maybe. ;-)

Over the phone, Karasjok-Dallas:
Shawn Green: "We're not paying you for that secret level by the way."
Me: "Ok."
Shaw Green: "But you can keep it in."
Me: "Ok."