Operation Biowar demos [-complevel 2]

TendaMonsta · July 12, 2010

I have been working on a demopack for a little bit of a wad called Biowar.

The reason I posted a new thread is because I really want an opinion on how these demos look and if I should continue to finish the pack and upload it to DSDA. I never really got any comments from Forum users...so here you go.

Biowar is a fun classic wad but its a bit easy. It is only 18 levels plus a secret level. Anyway leave some constructive criticism and comments if you like.

biowartm.zip

vdgg · July 12, 2010

I saw MAP01-05 so far. I don't know these maps very well so I can't comment on routes chosen, but from what it looks, this is quality stuff. I released several demopacks without any hesitation even though most of them (probably all of them) are less impressive.

If you don't like comparison with my demos, I'd say your ones are on par with those of STRAIN demopack by Lost Heretic.

In particular, I liked ammo management in MAP01, low healths in MAP03 and MAP05 as a whole (I think I never finished it when I was playing biowar because I got completely lost in this one).

Do you count your number of exits? (= successful attempts with max kills and secrets?) These are my example numbers.

Ruinbros
MAP02 - 22
MAP03 - 18
MAP04 - 8
MAP05 - 5
MAP06 - 8
MAP07 - 3

SID
MAP01 - 15
MAP02 - 10
MAP03 - 5
MAP04 - 12

P:AR
from 2 to 8
E1M4,E1M5,E1M6 had 2, E1M1,E1M7 had 8, E1M8 had even more, but the 8th one was the fastest.

On another topic, do you know what happened with your pl18 demo? Please see PL2 thread, page 8.

TendaMonsta · July 12, 2010

This is my first demopack so I want to make a good impression that this isn't some bullshit waste of time.

MAP05 had the most time spent in it because it is one of my favorite maps. I tried keyboard and got 6minutes then I attempted the same route using mouse and got 5:30. Eventually My target time was 5minutes and I realized that I could leave some retarted demons and kill them later or have them kill each other.

I don't count the number of exits.

I have no clue what happened to my PL2 18 demo...I think I paused the game for some reason, but it never desyncs when I do that. I don't want to do that map over again, but if no one is willing to fill that gap I will retry it again and lose all patience with that map. Damn you Gusta!! :)

myk · July 12, 2010

Since it's pertinent to judging the results of a demo and you haven't noted it anywhere, what executable was used for these? If PrBoom or PrBoom+, what features do you use beyond vanilla settings?

TendaMonsta · July 12, 2010

Prboom-plus2.5.0.6 was used for all of these demos

Complevel 2
320x200 resolution
No Advanced HUD
Skill 4 (all demos)

I made a full attempt to emulate Vanilla Doom as closely as possible. Some of the older demos (not added to the pack) I recorded used Chocolate-Doom1.3.0 instead of the port I am using now.

None of these demos will desync in Prboom-plus2.5.0.6 so this is the recommended port to playback the demos.

vdgg · July 12, 2010

You missed two monsters (a cacodemon and an imp) on MAP09. As for PL18, I can try it, only it rather won't be done this month.

Hitherto · July 12, 2010

I made a full attempt to emulate Vanilla Doom as closely as possible. Some of the older demos (not added to the pack) I recorded used Chocolate-Doom1.3.0 instead of the port I am using now.

Then why you switched from Chocolate to Prb+?

entryway · July 12, 2010

Hitherto said:
Then why you switched from Chocolate to Prb+?

Because prb+ adds demo footer and you can watch these demos with just two clicks from browser. Do not need to save, extract, write command line, delete.

TendaMonsta · July 12, 2010

Hitherto said:
Then why you switched from Chocolate to Prb+?

I just tried a different port for this. Also the final pack will probably be done in Chocolate-Doom1.3.0, but I still want to use Prboom-plus for something because it is THE BEST demo port to me. It has many features and counting that help me with practice when coming up with routes.

TendaMonsta · July 12, 2010

entryway said:
Because prb+ adds demo footer and you can watch these demos with just two clicks from browser. Do not need to save, extract, write command line, delete.

I figured out a way for my computer to recognize all demo lumps and they play when I double click them (no command line needed) even for Chocolate-Doom.

Although prb+ is just faster overall.

entryway · July 12, 2010

TendaMonsta said:
I figured out a way for my computer to recognize all demo lumps and they play when I double click them (no command line needed) even for Chocolate-Doom.

Really? You just double click on bw01-056.lmp and Chocolate-Doom starts biowar.wad with the demo? Then you double click on tnt202na.lmp and Chocolate-Doom magically recognizes this demo again and starts with -iwad tnt.wad -file tnt2.wad? That's nice!

TendaMonsta · July 12, 2010

entryway said:
Really? You just double click on bw01-056.lmp and Chocolate-Doom starts biowar.wad with the demo? Then you double click on tnt202na.lmp and Chocolate-Doom magically recognizes this demo again and starts with -iwad tnt.wad -file tnt2.wad? That's nice!

Maybe I worded that wrong. I can record a demo with any Port(thats doom2 compatible) and just click it and it plays on prb+...I apologize

Although now I am curious to find out if its possible to get a demo to playback on choco-doom without any command lines.

entryway · July 12, 2010

TendaMonsta said:
Maybe I worded that wrong. I can record a demo with any Port(thats doom2 compatible) and just click it and it plays on prb+

For correct playback you still need to specify used WADs (IWAD, DEHs and complevel) via command line or launcher if you recorded with Chocolate-Doom.

If you recorded with prboom-plus, you do not need anything. Just double click.

myk · July 14, 2010

TendaMonsta said:
Although now I am curious to find out if its possible to get a demo to playback on choco-doom without any command lines.

To play demos outside the "run from" directory or folder vanilla and chocolate need to add the demo as both -file filename.lmp and -playdemo filename. The former is easy with %1, but for the latter Windows needs a variable for adding files without their extension. (Is there such a thing? I'm not familiar with it.) With that, one could make shortcuts with any necessary parameters to drag demos to, for Chocolate Doom to play them.

Memfis · August 10, 2013

:o What is this new scary warning? Hope I'm not doing something bad here...

MAP15 UV-Max in 2:48

bw15-248.zip

vdgg · August 10, 2013

In the Demos forum, you can completely ignore these warnings if you are posting a demo. I don't know if this can be disabled just for the Demos forum. The reason of introducing the warnings is to reduce the number of stupid thread bumps.

Memfis · May 19, 2014

MAP01 Pacifist in 0:11

bw01p011.zip

TendaMonsta · May 24, 2014

I almost forgot this wad existed. I might improve some times when I feel like killing time on this game.

elmle · June 14, 2018

MAP02 Pacifist in 0:08 bw02p-008.zip

Minor strategy difference, not sure if that is what made it faster.

MAP06 UV Speed in 0:57 bw06-57.zip

Same wallrunning technique used to grab the blue key.

MAP14 UV Speed in 1:53 bw14-153.zip

Some glidin' action.

elmle · October 20, 2018

D2ALL UV-Speed in 33:26

bwall-3326.zip

Grazza · October 20, 2018

Good stuff. I am really impressed by your work on "pioneering" movie demos - that is, ones where you need to work out the routes and risk/reward options largely from scratch. BTW, some comments in the txt about the planning and execution would help bring the process alive too - people would read them!

elmle · October 23, 2018

I like the challenge of doing entire wads in one go much more than just grinding a single map over and over, and there are so many of them no one has done yet so you get to have some fun routing too.

As for biowar: I routed it back in june and did a few attempts then I didn't touch it until a few days ago. Played through it with saves which took an hour or so and six attempts later I finished with that 33 run.

Lets have a look at the demo shall we...

Spoiler

MAP01: Nothing too special.

MAP02: If your health is low you need to grab some stimpacks so you can survive long enough to die when you want to.

MAP03: I needed to not shoot after opening the door at the start to avoid some enemies spawning in the last room.

MAP04: Played it a bit safe because of all the hitscanners.

MAP05: Very long map with no skips to be found, gotta leave some enemies in one of the rooms so they can open a door for me(possible softlock).

MAP06: Its not really necessary to kill the revenant but I made a mistake by shooting early after pressing the switch that opens the room hes in.

MAP07: Some spectre troubles in the rocket launcher room.

MAP08: This map had a potential skip, it is possible to glide through the bars directly to the right at the start but you would also need to glide to get back to finish the level. Seeing as the bars are rotated 45 degrees it didn't seem worth the trouble.

MAP09: Another skip was possible here that I didn't really attempt, you can release the archvile from the BFG secret and lure it down to the blue key to jump up and grab it.

MAP10: Pretty straightforward, I could maybe have skipped the blue armor secret.

MAP11: There may have been a possibility of zero pressing a switch and bypassing the blue key but I couldn't get it to work. Blocked the closing door in the red key room to avoid the 30 second wait. Messy elevator room.

MAP12: Slightly scary map that went fine.

MAP13: Another long one, a bit scary too. Almost went terribly when my BFG ball was consumed by the wall.

MAP14: That one deadly room with the chaingunner cage is a little concerning.

MAP15: Probably my second most feared map.

MAP16: The placement for that switch sure was fortunate for speedruns.

MAP17: The toughest map of the wad, played quite slowly just to make it through, I was lucky the cyberdemon didn't start shooting after getting stuck in the teleporter.

MAP18: I have a habit of trying to conserve BFG ammo even when it isn't necessary which is why I didn't just blast those barons immediately.

Now I could try to go for sub 30 or I could move on to the next wad, most likely gonna choose next wad.

Spoiler

h2hxmas btw

I will try to remember to write some notes for my future runs.