The DWmegawad Club plays: Memento Mori (play at your own pace!)

[dobu gabu maru]

Capellan said:

What do people want to try?

Interception has released a finalize version of their megawad and I think it'd be neat to play through that personally. Otherwise the other one I've wanted to play for a while is 2002: A Doom Odyssey. I'm open to other suggestions of course.

[Capellan]

Map23

Arena slaughter map. Better executed than map07 of Mayhem12, but still an arena slaughter map, and therefore not something I mch enjoyed.

[cannonball]

Map23 - Showdown by Milo Casali
This map is hard until you get bfg, simply because you can get easily overwhelmed by the numbers of large monsters, can't use rockets at close range and plasma just doesn't cut it.
Ok map, defintiely different and felt like Milo Casali was really cutting loose, probably the closest map to a slaughtermap before hell revealed came out (well after go 2 it I suppose)

[Sp00kyFox]

just wanted to tell that this thread is a great idea. reminds me of the "together retro" group at racketboy. I started really late with doom back in 2008 because of nostalgia interest in old games and got hooked by it. Still I never played many of the old classic wads so this is an opportunity for me. Gonna come back with some feedback on MM.

btw are the maps designed to be played with pistol start or not?

[mouldy]

Sp00kyFox said:

btw are the maps designed to be played with pistol start or not?

I've been doing them from pistol start, most are ok - some gave me a tough time with ammo though.

[Phobus]

MAP23: Showdown: It's far from pretty and a few of the monsters were placed in sucky areas (all of those barons of hell up in the cages near the end were very pointless time sinks IMO). It is a slaughter map, IMO, but the art was far from refined at this point, clearly. Loads of ammo and health, groups of monsters and not an awful lot of challenge. The AV room with the two keys in was tiresome due to being blasted about so much - particularly as, with the two invulnerabilities I used for that area, there was no threat.

All in all, not impressed with this one.

[Capellan]

dobugabumaru said:

Interception[/b] has released a finalize version of their megawad and I think it'd be neat to play through that personally.

Works for me.

[cannonball]

dobugabumaru said:

Interception has released a finalize version of their megawad and I think it'd be neat to play through that personally. Otherwise the other one I've wanted to play for a while is 2002: A Doom Odyssey. I'm open to other suggestions of course.

Lets go for interception

[Phobus]

I was thinking "something very modern or new" would be a good contrast to MM, and Interception is fresh off the presses, so that works for me :)

[mouldy]

23 - Showdown by Milo Casali

Lots of stuff to kill here, though it felt a bit grindy in places - mainly because there was never a great feeling of danger, it was just a case of ploughing through the walls of meat. In fact most of the danger came from playing sloppy thanks to all the surplus health lying around. Nice to see some large hordes in such an early map though. Some of the monster placement seemed a bit experimental and didn't always work very well (what were all those imps doing down in the crack?).

Interception sounds good for the next wad, I don't know anything about it so no idea what to expect.

[Kristian Ronge]

Capellan said:
ETA: Scott Lampert did this map, and also did map27, so I guess we will see if that map also has some bad choices in it. The doom wiki doesn't list anything other than these two levels for him, and he didn't take part in MM2. Anyone know of any other levels he did?

Scott Lampert seemed to be mostly into the Deathmatch scene, and his maps in /idgames I've found are maps which were either designed for DM with SP/coop thrown in, or revamped DM maps. There are, at least, three of his maps in /idgames, all named after stars (the light emitting celestial bodies kind of stars):

Ceti Alpha VI
Rigel I
Proxima Centauri

Of these, Proxima Centauri is my favourite. Just grab some weapons and powerups and blast away. They're all pretty fun to play and recommended.

I'm surprised that there are so many negative comments on "Mountain Depot". I've always considered it to be one of the best maps of MM. Maybe it's because I played it for the first time so long ago (and also maybe because I figured out the red key puzzle right away). I'm also a sucker for that type of map (large areas with small installations and buildings to expore). The BFG can be reached by just running towards the platform at full speed, by the way (kind of like the plasma rifle grab in map01 DM). It's not the easiest grab in the world but it's quite manageable. I suspect weapons grabs were common in DM even back then and Scott threw one in.

[vdgg]

Migru grabbed the BFG successfully in his demo dated May '96.

[Capellan]

Map24

The living end done slaughter style.

I am not a fan.

[cannonball]

Map24 - Diehard by Dario Casali
Hmm, the start is pointless, the main area looks cool enough, the gameplay is hard unless you find bfg when it simply becomes BFG spam. I guess monsters are used fairly well but the challenge is nullified by the abundance of health and cells available.

[Phobus]

MAP24: Diehard: I preferred this to the previous Casali map, but it's still overstocked and not much fun. The starting room felt pretty cheap, but as the nukage doesn't damage you it's actually alright. Cyberdemon near the end got the jump on me from a distance, but due to the aforementioned overstocking I actually still survived and came out well. This map is alright, I guess, but I think this theme has been used a lot better.

[LordK]

MAP24 - this was the first slaughter map I played. Back in the day, it was the highlight of the WAD. It was something new and exhilarating, a hard but fair challenge and an unparalleled atmosphere provided by the huge dense monster hordes. The style of the gameplay was something that I had never experienced before.

Of course today it doesn't seem quite as epic and it's not nearly as challenging as it was. Even the once mind-blowingly HUGE spectre/demon horde seems quaintly small. The once panic-inducing archviles released after you walk into the yellow key room are now easily despatched.

I still have a soft spot for this level in my heart and I enjoyed playing it. I do believe it occupies an important place in the history and evolution of Doom levels.

[Capellan]

LordK: did you mean map23?

[mouldy]

24 - Diehard by Dario Casali

Given the grand cavernous setting of this map it seemed to be over surprisingly quickly. I was expecting a lot more convaluted paths and awkward fights on narrow stairways, I guess like people say I was expecting something like the living end, but it was pretty barren other than a few monster set-pieces. Basically one massive room with a few ranged monsters in the middle, once they are dispatched that whole middle section is pretty much unused, and you skirt around the edge of it dealing with a few skirmishes on the way. Getting the plasma rifle early on and bloody tons of ammo makes the going fairly easy after an initial struggle with long range chaingunners. Pain elementals can also be a nuisance in such a large space, but once i got that plasma rifle I hardly needed to switch to anything else - I didn't fire a single rocket and managed to miss the bfg secret. Not a bad map I guess, just felt a bit lacking given the scale of the space involved.

[Capellan]

Map25

Awful.

[cannonball]

Map25 - Cesspool by William Sullivan
It's safe to say that this map has a lot of problems, could only get one key and half the fights at least are made pointless by designing errors. Great you have done a deep water effect throughout your map, one problem, it renders the monsters above you unable to attack. Nithing more hilarious than an archvile attacking you and it doing absolutely no damage as the monsters technically cannot see you. Pretty awful for single player with a timed door which prevents you from getting all the secrets and kills, probably plays a little better in multiplayer, but not by much haha

[Phobus]

MAP25: Cesspool: Why does this suck so bad?! Seriously, was it not tested?

The 30 second timer does kind of force you to pick your secrets unless you know to go for it first, which I did (after a loaded save game) and managed to get all 6 that way. I think the maximum number of secrets legally obtainable in SP is 9 out of the 12 - no idea where two of them are and I know one of them is behind the red skull door, which doesn't seem openable in SP due to the red skulls being inaccesible. Likewise, somewhere around 10 monsters don't seem to be around to find or kill.

At least it's short...


MAP26 looks interesting, what with the Spider Masterminds visible from the map start.

[mouldy]

25 - Cesspool by William Sullivan

haha wow, after seeing Capellan's review I knew I was in for a treat, but really - how on earth did this map manage to exist? I've been fairly harsh on some of the other maps for having dodgy designs, but this.. this effortlessly wins the prize for worst map of the wad so far. The amazing thing about it is the extra work that obviously went into it to make it that bad. Dear me...

[Capellan]

I don't recall hating Cesspool this much when I first played MM (though I thought the timed door for the start room goodies was a stupid trick, even then). I also don't remember it getting a lot of bile from other players back then either. I suspect that the gimmick of the map - the deep water effect - was sufficiently new and rarely seen that people's attention was entirely on that.

(certainly, at the time, I doubt many people knew that the monsters couldn't see in or out of the deep water area)

Look at it now, for me, the real problem with Cesspool isn't even that it is all about a map-making trick, or that the trick has a flaw to it ... it's that the level's gameplay is terrible in every other respect. The afore-mentioned timed door. The bland and featurless exterior which is just a bullet-sink of cacos. The weird switch combos to open doors. The unmarked switches needed for the level exit.

Dreadful, dreadful stuff.

[Kristian Ronge]

100% secrets in map 25 isn't difficult to obtain once you understand the 30-second door trick. Author William Sullivan made a very interesting map named Claustrophobia prior to the one in MM (check it out if you have the time!).

This map is also a concept map (a sort of precursor to Congestion 1024, in fact) and is superior to "Cesspool". I made a casual UV max run of "Claustrophobia" many years ago and noticed it was made by the same guy.

[Capellan]

Map26

This is a map I had fun with. Opening encounter is all about the infighting, with the demons being a surprisingly troublesome part of the equation, as if they sport you, they have the potential to force you out of cover and into the firing line.

This is clearly a Doom level for Doom level's sake, architecturally. Nothing exists here except to set up a particular element of Doom gameplay. Whether it be platforming over pillars, fighting teleporting monsters, or - my favourite - the archvile and pinkies right before the blue key section.

I was mildly annoyed by the fight with the Barons right after that, since it exploits the difficulty of targeting creatures down a slope (and dodging their attacks too), but it's not like there wasn't plenty of health and ammo around.

Got 75% secrets, including the megasphere, which was quite a neat little puzzle. I might have skipped the middle texture myself, but I guess the automap lines are enough of a hint.

[Magnusblitz]

MAP23 - SHOWDOWN

Pretty meh as slaughtermaps go. None of the fights are too challenging, except for some that might just be frustrating because of height differences or unfair traps. The Arch-Vile room just screams to be played by running in, grabbing both keys, hitting the Invuln sphere and then trying to run out while being blasted in the air. Sitting there just killing everything with the BFG... meh. The highlight for me was seeing the walls lower with the texture being improperly fixed so that it looked like the bricks were just slowly vaporizing from the top down.

MAP24 - DIEHARD

I wouldn't really call this a slaughter map since the fights all seem relatively small. Yeah, there's definitely a lot of high-end monsters (barons, mancubi, revenants, some archviles, a cyberdemon, etc) but there's only 132 monsters in UV mode, and ~12 of those are shotgunners/imps/demons in the first room. It does have a Living End vibe, and the map feels oddly short given the cavernous design, though. Decent map.

MAP25 - CESSPOOL

Wow. This map lives up to its name... and not in a good way. First time I played through, I spent more time figuring out how to open the doors to the first pool areas (turns out you need to shoot them) than playing the rest of the map. Once I got them open, jump in the pool, grab the yellow key, jump into the other pool, hit the yellow switch, easily kill some monsters, kill the spider and run into the exit. The imp teleporter worked but the other one didn't do anything and the exit was open. I ran through it a second time and got even more confused, because this time the second teleporter near the exit spat out a bunch of revenants and an Arch-Vile, and none of the exits were open.

And of course, this is all on top of the fact that the deep water trick (which I've always found annoying) is used throughout the entire map, and it makes the map a joke since monsters can't see you inside of it. (Was this not playtested?) And that stupid timed door trick... ugh.

[LordK]

Capellan said:

LordK: did you mean map23?

Oops, yeah I did.

MAP26 - I've always enjoyed the atmosphere in this map. It evokes a sort of lovecraftian horror mood for me.

The gameplay was surprisingly enjoyable and it looks pretty good too even though some areas are a little too low on detail.

One thing that has always bothered me are the alcoves with plasma guns in the beginning that I can't reach because the Doomguy can't jump or climb over knee-high obstacles. It took me this long to realize that the alcoves are unreachable because they are co-op starts...

[cannonball]

Map26 - Between Scattered Corpses by Thomas and Denis Möller
You know what I really like this map.
Yes it looks a little plain and simple looks wise, but it has so many little quirks which brought a smile to my face. Nice fights which are fair but quite violent. The start is pretty wacky and the events after entering the yellow key door are even more so. What a silly little set piece that is haha. Made me laugh.
No real complaints here to be honest, good map.

[mouldy]

26 - Between Scattered Corpses by Thomas and Denis Möller

This was quite an easy map considering the weight of monsters involved. The opening arena of spiders pretty much took care of themselves, and the cyberdemon was easy pickings stuck up on his high plinth. The first corridor ambush half the pinkies teleported somewhere else, the next room had a load of heavy monsters and an invulnerability in the centre in case any of them dared to do you any damage. There was health all over the place, and every fight seemed to have a convenient corner or ledge to hide behind to pick everything off at leisure. It felt like this might have been a fair challenge back in the day but has somehow lost its edge over time. Or maybe it was always piss easy...

[Capellan]

Map27

I enjoyed this a lot more than Lampert's other entry in MM. Solid Dooming experience here, marred only by some mildly unintuitive progression at one point.