Alpha Accident: Terra Nova - uploaded to idgames

[Sokoro]

I like what I see... vanilla maps with some custom textures and even objects.. also plenty of curved architecture. I hope you finish this some day because I really want to play it, should I toss some money on screen?

[kmxexii]

Alpha Accident is coming along quite beautifully, if slowly because Wraith makes huge, gorgeous maps. E1M1-M3 are very cool and if they're any indication of the quality of the rest of the maps, I'm stoked.

[nicolas monti]

I've played the demo, just amazing, all the stuff I like in classic doom, nice work creating new textures from the available alpha doom patches, nice non-90° angles for the sectors, good atmnosphere and layout interconnection, I hope the alpha theme becomes more prominent in the future. keep the good work!

[Wraith777]

Yes, not so often I have time for peaceful and quiet mapping..

Here are some screens of e1m9




Buy the way, there will be some more interactive objects not shown in demo (I've made them recently), one of them looking quite promising for increase of DM fun :)...

[cortlong50]

hey man, i just played wd13 and it was a blast. i actually rehashed the forum because i was so stoked haha.
anyway, i have music if youre still looking for some. just give them a download and a listen...theyre all pretty super metal.

http://forum.zdoom.org/viewtopic.php?f=37&t=40060&p=729486&hilit=music+resource#p729486

[axdoomer]

I've never seen alpha-style levels before. I tried the demo level and it was quite fun (also: fixed and flying turrets as enemies is something I've never seen in vanilla). Art and textures from the alpha versions give a unique feeling that only the alphas had. The screenshots look amazing. I will definitively play through the entire WAD when the full version will be released. You're doing a good job. I like WADs made for Doom 1.

[Avoozl]

This is looking quite good, I can't wait until it's completed.

[Wraith777]

Well, it's been quiet here for too long, but I have some free time again to work on it. Moreover, I hope to finish this episode till the end of summer.

Screens from e1m4




I also decided that wad will be limit removing. But it still can be played without sourceports - it uses Doom+ patch for AA.exe.

[Memfis]

So is it now limit removing just because of the savegame limit, as you said to me? If that's it, I think you can still call it vanilla because there are many well known vanilla projects that don't support saving on some levels (Epic 2, Plutonia 2, Back to Saturn X and so on). It's more or less accepted in the community.

[Wraith777]

Well, if you say so, then yes, savegames are the only problem.

But there is reverse problem: not all of the source ports support some of the new objects which are working in vanilla...

[scifista42]

Wraith777 said:

But there is reverse problem: not all of the source ports support some of the new objects which are working in vanilla...

This is odd at least, as ports that support DEHACKED should behave the same, at least mostly. But even then, I don't think it has to be an unsolvable problem.

If the problematique ports are (G)ZDoom or Zandronum, any game object problems would be fixed via a DECORATE patch, which would be included in the wad and will be ignored by vanilla / other ports. DEHACKED->DECORATE conversion needs to be done by hand and I don't know how much do you know DECORATE, but I'm possibly willing to help you with that. EDGE and Eternity ports also have their own thing scripts which would be used as "patches" to fix compatibility, although I don't have any experience with them.

[Wraith777]

scifista42 said:

This is odd at least, as ports that support DEHACKED should behave the same, at least mostly. But even then, I don't think it has to be an unsolvable problem.

If the problematique ports are (G)ZDoom or Zandronum, any game object problems would be fixed via a DECORATE patch, which would be included in the wad and will be ignored by vanilla / other ports. DEHACKED->DECORATE conversion needs to be done by hand and I don't know how much do you know DECORATE, but I'm possibly willing to help you with that. EDGE and Eternity ports also have their own thing scripts which would be used as "patches" to fix compatibility, although I don't have any experience with them.

I hope those problems will be solved during public testing. I'll show 3 maps per demo: first 3 maps may be shown now, following 3 (e1m9,e1m4,e1m5) - when e1m5 will be finished and so on.

[Wraith777]

And here it is - Episode 1 Demo 1
http://rghost.net/56848684

Demo includes 3 levels - E1M1,E1M2,E1M3.

Later demos will come out the same way: 3 levels done = next demo.

[EffinghamHuffnagel]

Wraith777 said:

And here it is - Episode 1 Demo 1
http://rghost.net/56848684

Am I the only one getting a "This webpage is not available" error? I tried pinging it in a DOS window and got 100% loss. Is this maybe a country-specific problem?

[plums]

EffinghamHuffnagel said:

Am I the only one getting a "This webpage is not available" error? I tried pinging it in a DOS window and got 100% loss. Is this maybe a country-specific problem?

Works for me just now. But perhaps a secondary mirror is a good idea.

[EffinghamHuffnagel]

Since it's not a country-specific issue, it has to be a site that Comcast blocks, though I thought they weren't supposed to do that. I have the same problem with anything on 2shared.com. Used an anonymizer. Got it.

[plums]

Comcast isn't supposed to do a lot of things! Glad you got it in the end.

[scifista42]

Wraith777 said:

And here it is - Episode 1 Demo 1
http://rghost.net/56848684

I've played through it all. I was very impressed by those extensive layouts and architecture in the spirit of (Alpha) Doom 1. You did a great job on this part. New objects were a nice touch too (I've been familiar with them since your tech demo).

I was slightly displeased by the slower pace of gameplay (specially in first levels). But I agree that it is understandable, Doom 1 usually feels slower compared to Doom 2 and nothing much can be done about it. I could deal with it and enjoy the maps well.

Can I ask you, since you already have new game objects, would you consider replacing the pistol with an (alpha) rifle which would fire faster, or perhaps simply editing the pistol to be faster? Default pistol has a delay of 14 game tics between shots, which feels pretty slow. I recommend a basic weapon with delay of about 10 tics, I've personally found it a nice compromise between weakness and usefulness. In addition, if the weapon's aim would be perfect (not randomized like normal pistol/chaingun), it would stay useful even after finding a chaingun. I've recently coded such a weapon in DEHACKED, and really liked the result. I'm giving you this recommendation for the sake of improving pace of gameplay, take it just as a suggestion. Because you know, E1M1 was rather uncomfortably slow for me, so many monsters to take down with a pea-shooter.

Again, I admire the alpha-styled design in this mapset, good luck with continuing the episode!

[Wraith777]

scifista42 said:
Can I ask you, since you already have new game objects, would you consider replacing the pistol with an (alpha) rifle which would fire faster, or perhaps simply editing the pistol to be faster?[/B]

I hadn't planned any changes in original content. Besides, pistol's "pea-shooter" nature really stimulates player to search for something better (e1m1 has a shotgun hidden in the secret near the start).

About your weapon coding: if it's a hitscan weapon then did you really improved its aim?

[scifista42]

Okay.

Wraith777 said:

About your weapon coding: if it's a hitscan weapon then did you really improved its aim?

Yes. As you can notice, when you start firing the pistol, the very first shot is always perfectly accurate. Pistol's firing sequence contains a Refire codepointer, which (if the fire button is still pressed) causes the firing sequence to repeat. In addition, this codepointer is responsible for pistol's aim randomization - each next shot is slightly inaccurate. If you remove this codepointer (frame 16 in DEHACKED) from pistol's animation, you can get an always accurate pistol. And don't worry, the firing sequence will be repeated like normally, no need to tap the fire button. Weapon bobbing codepointer (WeaponReady) will take care of it the same way like Refire would, only without the randomization.

The same thing can be done about the chaingun, too. But not the shotgun or SSG. Also, a similar workaround can be used to make a pistol/chaingun which is always inaccurate. That would require hacking the weapon's idle animation, to constantly call WeaponReady along with Refire on a frame with 0 duration.

[Wraith777]

scifista42 said:

Okay.
Yes. As you can notice, when you start firing the pistol, the very first shot is always perfectly accurate. Pistol's firing sequence contains a Refire codepointer, which (if the fire button is still pressed) causes the firing sequence to repeat. In addition, this codepointer is responsible for pistol's aim randomization

So, inaccuracy is cauced by a Refire, thanx for tip. I've never experimented with weapons because I can't add them in vanilla. But maybe a little improvement still could be done to pistol (speed or accuracy improvement).

[Wraith777]

Well, maybe it's going somewhat slow, but there is some progress - another map is finished (E1M5)




Now there are only 3 maps left to beat this episode. They are smaller and not so complex, so they should take less time to finish.

[axdoomer]

I love it. I can't wait to see it finished. It's slow but seems like quality work.

[Wraith777]

Episode 1 Demo 2 - Ready for testing (6 maps):
http://rghost.net/58439426

I really hope to finish the remaining 3 maps in observable future...

[General Rainbow Bacon]

These maps are awesome. Keep it up.

[kmxexii]

alpha accident has no real relation to doom alpha projects besides using its textures. it has some DEH work that makes some alterations to doom's gameplay. the big ones that were noted when wraith demoed this way back when were

[] items that are stuck in crates that you have to break open
[] bastard flying brain drone robots
[] barrels that are not filled with explosive toxins but still block your movement, but you can knock them over
[] tech pillars that you can shoot to destroy and which explode pretty violently

since then i've seen a couple things added

[] tech pillars that block your progress and can only be blown up by rocket splash damage, making the rocket launcher another way to gate player progression
[] low-profile turrets that are still way less threatening than those bastard flying brain drone robots

if alpha accident has any real failing, and its not something that bothers me, it is that the levels are really big and may break players not used to eternal doom-length doom levels. that said i really love these so it would be cool if wraith got more focused feedback from someone who will actually criticize him because all i have been during this project is a cheerleader

[scifista42]

Congrats to the (demo) release and to the decision of speeding-up the pistol, even if just slightly. :)

kmxexii said:

if alpha accident has any real failing, and its not something that bothers me, it is that the levels are really big and may break players not used to eternal doom-length doom levels.

I have to agree. That's a problem of UD wads in general - they're lesser appealing to the player because of lesser gameplay variety and hecticity compared to Doom 2. Alpha Accident is a bit better, as it adds custom objects, but the fights and environments still feel very same-y, slow, and stop to be exciting after a short while. I'm currently not in a mood to spend a lot of time playing this way, but I can't dislike the mod either. Design of rooms and entire layouts is certainly pretty good. Sorry if the feedback isn't helpful, it's how I feel at the moment. I'd try the new 3 maps sometime later.

[kmxexii]

scifista42 said:

I have to agree. That's a problem of UD wads in general - they're lesser appealing to the player because of lesser gameplay variety and hecticity compared to Doom 2. Alpha Accident is a bit better, as it adds custom objects, but the fights and environments still feel very same-y, slow, and stop to be exciting after a short while. I'm currently not in a mood to spend a lot of time playing this way, but I can't dislike the mod either. Design of rooms and entire layouts is certainly pretty good. Sorry if the feedback isn't helpful, it's how I feel at the moment. I'd try the new 3 maps sometime later.

yeah. if you get tired during any og doom megawad, i doubt this will make you a convert. if you just love doom to death tho, alpha accident is phenomenal. you cant really take the slow feel out but wraith has mastered the art of "dungeon crawler doom" as it were and there are still these bigass fights and attrition-based shootouts that keep it fresh, just not with the vibrancy of doom ii.

[Wraith777]

kmxexii said:

art of "dungeon crawler doom"

Or, maybe "TECH dungen crawler" )).

Yes, it plays slower than most of DooM wads, but it opens itself more and more as player advances thru the maps. More powerfull weapons, monsters and new objects start appearing with each new map. Atleast this episode is intended to be a tech thriller and tech dungeon crawler. Others, with no doubt, should differ considerably.

----------------------

Overall, I'm starting to believe in curses... Maybe it's the wad's title, because I have a suspicion that after seeing it most people consider this wad to be another 'DooM Bible project'. //lightning strikes, thunder rolles//

Well then, I want to say it LOUD: this project has absolutely nothing to do with DooM Bible ! //lightning strikes, thunder rolles again//. It just has some texture patches and a temporary title pic from alphas and nothing more.

[Sokoro]

The file in link is deleted :( Anyone has it? So that I can at least try the unfinished version