The DWmegawad Club plays: Back to Saturn X E1 & Favillesco E1

[esselfortium]

pizzabob18 said:

Playing a bit of catch-up here due to being away but here's map 12 for now -

Map 12 - Underground Initiations - TraversD/Skillsaw - 100% kills and secrets, 92% items. HMP Skill.

Easily one of the best levels in the pack! I'm a sucker for huge levels, and this one is the biggest so far. I assume this was originally an E3 map because I remember when the game was first announced back in 2011, the picture of this level had the E3 sky and some different textures. It sure feels like a different and more nebulous beast than the previous 11 maps.

At some point early in the map's development, it was tentatively slotted into E3 because traversd liked the sky and because I was trying to balance out the episode lengths at a time when E1 was getting by far the most submissions and E3's concept was still pretty ill-defined. It never would've worked, though: Underground Initiations ended up not being an E3 kind of map at all, and instead just a very cool E1 map :)

The different textures when compared to the early screenshot of this map are probably the result of the major revision that traversd had to put the start area through in order to avoid exceeding the render budget.

[Veinen]

Map13: I’ll Replace You With Machines

Demo. Solonet-Max, final time 16:05. Not my finest piece of work this one, includes all kinds of close calls and suicide attempts but whatever. Around 12:45 the wall on the left eats a corpse of a Sarge, if I’m not entirely mistaken. Weird. Here’s a half-assed UV-Max demo for additional laughs.

This was a rather enjoyable and memorable level. Solonet and UV don’t differ too much difficulty-wise this time, solonet about doubles the AV-count but most of them are placed in fairly non-threatening spots. Obviously they do add some interest though. The extra AV in the blue key battle was the trickiest to deal with if you unleash everything as soon as possible. I got killed a couple of times in this map though, once in the spiral staircase by the Rev horde and then in the final room on the next attempt. Other than the blue key fight there aren’t really any bigger set piece battles present but they are replaced by a constant stream of enemies coming at the player. The action is very fast-paced and the flow in this map was very good in my opinion. Visuals were overall not as impressive as in some of the previous maps but they weren't exactly bad either. There's good variety with the lava and nukage added here and there. The outside areas were definitely the visual highlights in my opinion.

Edit: I have no idea why I thought there was nukage somewhere in there, haha.

[punnyone]

Map 13 - I'll Replace You With Machines - Essel/Skillsaw - 100% kills/secrets, 99% items. HMP skill.

This one I've found to be a bit of a grower, as I found every subsequent playthrough I appreciate this map more and more. The best area visually I've always felt to be the central outdoor lava area which you loop around over the duration of the map. However, I've recently found the south part of the map very reminiscent of Quake 2's mining levels which were among my favorites in that game.

Lots more encounters with Lava (after being teased with it in underground initiations), and quite a few unexpected monster ambushes. This level makes one afraid to open the next door as in one case, there are 3 revenants. The secrets can be tough to find but two of them are teased to the player so it's a matter of "which computer panel opens the way?"

Great tense music as well, (I forgot to mention how much I loved map 12's music track as well, it reminded me of something from Team TNT's Icarus!).

I'll upload my 2 cents on map 14 sometime today as well.

[Tompig]

Map 12 - Underground initiations.

First things first, It could be me being incredibly dumb but I got lost in this and I got lost in this hard.

The romp of trying to find the yellow keycard was nearing unbearable for me HOWEVER...

Detail was nothing short of amazing massive kudos to giving the place a real feel and vibe.

Zombie ambushes were doing well but I can't help but feel the rest of the monster placement was a bit sloppy (Nothing awful just not as good as it should have been for such a beautiful map.)

Lots of lonely mancubi made for easy pickings, imps rocketed the death toll *pun* by clumping together, and the poor revenants just couldn't choose a good sniping spot today.

Archie ambushes were very well done and the end fight scene was nothing short of amazing.

3.5/5 Lots of potential, could use a brush up, but still very fun.

[Moustachio]

I'm loving these later maps...

[Veinen]

Map14: Big Chief Chinese Restaurant

Demo. After the first three-four minutes it's new since I died a few times near the start. UV-solonet, maxkills/66% secrets, final time 21:12. Highlight would be the point blank AV kill with a RL which is, of course, always the right thing to do.

The strangest map title in a while. But sadly other than the title, this map is very forgettable. I recorded the demo about a week ago and I honestly didn't remember a thing about it today. So I rewatched the demo and it actually has some decent fights too. The double AV surprise being one: after the first outdoor area comes a corridor where an Archie is waiting for you and as he wakes up, another Archie teleports behind you. I thought this was a great trap although easily escaped with some quick decision-making. The other standout was the outdoor staircase/arena/whatever area with a whole variety of middleweights on ledges above the player and a few flying monsters added to the mix. There's not much of a safe spot when you enter so moving around is a necessity which makes for an interesting fight. But other than those two occasions, the combat is pretty damn bleh imo. Visuals were alright, the rocky landscapes with nukage flowing here and there does fit well with the techbase theme. The music track is indeed very awesome though!

[dew]

Playtester's War Journal, day09: Some Drilling Implied (travers/essel)

YouTube: UV SoloNet Max in 4:53 (played on v. 099j8)

This map was trav's and essel's dig at fullblown coop mapping, so it's not one of those "someone finish this" pieces. Its task was simple: provide a short and compact map with punchy gameplay. Short and compact is down to a T, punchy gameplay had to be helped a little over time, but it's a fairly action-based map. Its mid-tier monster population and slightly harder difficulty predestined it to be an opener for one of the later E1 clusters once it was decided there would be three separate megawads.

There was quite a lot of back-and-forth over whether SSG should be regular or secret and how (far) RL should appear. A certain equilibrium has been reached, but j4rio was at least partly right in mentioning the RK mancos. They never seemed right to me and they fatten up that ledge without really fighting with anything, they'd probably work better if teleported later - it'd add speed to that area and actually ease up maxing a little. If you watch my very, very aggressive demo, just imagine me falling into the nukage on several occassions just because the mancos blocked me or fireballed me straight in the face. By the way, that's one of my better demos so far and I was getting frustrated from relying on luck too much, heh.

I have an interesting (I hope) idea for the YK fight as well, because the only real thing that closet has going for it so far is the coop vile, heh. Anyways, I think it does provide a kind of a difficulty curve restart for the new cluster (starting a bit higher, of course). Little tweaks should set it just right. It's totally my fault, because the map kept changing a lot and I didn't press the changes far enough, but I guess after a while (a year) your eyes just stop seeing some things, heh.

Fun Fact: Try escaping from the HKs (and vile) in the maze just after RL, try to trap them under the stairs... it's such a stupid little detail, but it didn't stop me from bothering travers with it until he added it, haha.

Also I'm starting to lag behind, so I'll probably write up map10 this evening as well.

[purist]

Still playing... gradually.

MAP06 - “Mix Up The Satellite” by Iori

This is one I particularly liked the texture use in. It has a more grimy, industrial look than the previous levels and had a generally cleaner less detailed I thought as well.

The action in it was quite intense and used multiple directions of attack more frequently and more viciously. A good example was the basically large rectangle area with side recesses and columns, which for a simple structure housed a great, multi-layered battle.

There was also a nifty area with some dead beasties in that I didn't remember killing only for a couple of AV's to appear and explain it all to me enthusiastically :-)

After this area I felt like I'd had my fill but it goes on a little more. One area attack displeased me. An AV suddenly appearing in the wall next to me and wiping out the megasphere I'd picked up earlier.

MAP07 - “Metal Mothers” by Vader

I liked the bravery of theming a map around Masterminds as it's a monster that's hard to use well. However, while they weren't placed terribly, they weren't used in interesting ways in most cases. The last one appearing was fun to provoke into fighting with it's children but the others were plasma spam time sinks.

I got really lost in this level. It took me ages to find the first key so I ran around without anything to kill for a while, which was a drag. Once I'd found the first key the rest of the map seemed over quite quickly in comparison so it didn't do a lot for the pacing.

I like how the rocky outdoors feature a lot on this one. It felt like a recall to some of the nature-based areas in MAP01.

MAP08 - Episode Hub by Esselfortium

I don't know whether or not I like the idea of these hubs. I forgot to load the .deh file so maybe reading the intermission text would have helped but it just feels like a reprise to the exit in MAP01. The emptiness and dour realness of the place contrasted to the regular maps along with the melancholic music (the only music I've really liked so far in honesty) gives it a weighty atmosphere but it would be better if it served more of a purpose.

[punnyone]

Map 14 - Big Chief Chinese Restaurant - Foodles/Essel - 100% Kills, Items, Secrets - HMP Skill

A battle in the UAC's favorite chinese restaurant, featuring mancubi in chef's hats serving up some general essel's chicken.

Corny attempt at humor aside, this level surprised me in its difficulty. There are many deadly and challenging revenant assaults, often in places where you get hit by a homing missile while dodging two others. This has to be one of the few levels in here where arch-viles aren't too big of a thereat.

The drop-off after the blue key area was a nice touch as it added to the tension and makes one question, "will i survive if I jump down?".
Outdoor areas, like the last map, were the best looking. Especially the scenic slime river to the north. There were some neat lighting effects such as the purple lights inside as well, and some hard to find secrets. Nice bass-featured music track as well!

[cannonball]

^I'm sure the revenants would have given you an easier ride if your name was chowmeinbob18 ;)

[scifista42]

My third map-related entry today, but I'll be up to date at least.

MAP14 - "Big Chief Chinese Restaurant" by Foodles/Esselfortium

This map in particular once again reminded me that Doom is quite an abstract game and shouldn't be taken too seriously, because the most important thing is fun gameplay. What I'm talking about is the map name, the music, those teleport gimmicks not common in modern mapping, high jumps down, and the revenant swarm. How often do you see such (similar) things even in the most of the most creative today's shooter games? No, not only them, such things are unfortunately disappearing even from modern-day Doom maps, those which are at least a bit trying to appear professional. Here BTSX showed it knows where its roots are. As I've said, the most important thing is a fun gameplay, and this map provides it, along with great visuals and overall mood as always.

(I've read BTSX map names are taken from song titles by one band, it implies for me that the name might have been chosen before work on the map was even started, is that the case? If it is, I think this is a great way how to deal with the title "Big Chief Chinese Restaurant", I'm not sure how I would like a recreation of an actual restaurant, but a level which emphasizes on a little abstractness delighted me.)

Don't have much more to say about this map. Awesome looking, enjoyable to play, clever secrets, linearity which later changes into interconnectivity, I overally like it a lot.

[Tarnsman]

The title was chosen because FOODles made the map. Yes, we are that lame.

[pavera]

Not even the silliest name in the whole episode ;)

[Demon of the Well]

Esselfortium said:

It never would've worked, though: Underground Initiations ended up not being an E3 kind of map at all, and instead just a very cool E1 map :)

Ah, pray tell, what, in a few words, is an 'E3 kind of map?' Inquiring (and eager) minds want to know...

Map 14 -- Big Chief Chinese Restaurant - 101% Kills / 100% Secrets
Wow, this map is really gorgeous, one of the most aesthetically attractive maps in a set full of attractive maps. Unfortunately, it also didn't seem to play very well on UV (although it does benefit more than a lot of the other maps by the small additions that solo-net makes, in fairness). Again, it's not a question of being bland or same-y; the action does have a distinct feel to it that distinguishes it from the other maps.....it's just that said distinct feel is not particularly compelling, in this case.

Depicted here is some sort of generalized research/admin post (I imagined the 'Chinese Restaurant' deal to just be some sort of wacky UAC codename) rising from a toxic lake in a rocky hardscrabble mined with innumerable smaller toxic pools. From the moment the map loads it makes a striking impression, with extremely classy directional lighting effects, a smooth green/grey color scheme, and a similarly smooth and very distinctive music track, again by (surprise surprise) Stewboy. While the map turns out to be very unusually colorful over its expanse, particularly in its persistent use of bars of colored neon lights (most notably purple) in a number of different detailing roles, it holds things together by keeping green as a baseline standing out in any given scene (even if it's only represented by toxic liquids), with the exception of the heart of the facility, where red becomes the baseline. The combination of the glowing neons and the generally subdued lighting inside of the base gives its interiors a subtly posh, air-conditioned feel; it's a good example of a place that would probably be very pleasant where it not infested with flesheating monstrosities from beyond the veil. Exterior regions are marked by more of Saturn X's characteristically rocky/hilly terrain (again, replete with tortured human corpses to mark the fruits of demonic sport), with a couple of decks overlooking the largest of the bodies of toxic liquid. It's all very classy, and the only complaint I can come up with is that the rocky ridgeline visible from the deck littered with crates appears rather artificial/unnatural in comparison to the rest of the exterior terrain, but I reckon this is probably another unavoidable instance of vanilla limits making themselves known.

On the gameplay front, incidental combat is similar to earlier maps in that monsters are generally placed quite directly/without guile in small assorted groups that confront the marine head-on. Given that we're well into the meat of the game by now, stronger demons are becoming noticeably more consistently represented in these groups (as opposed to appearing in small pockets of their own kind), but the overall approach is the same. As the map progresses and the outdoor areas become more prominent, a distinct theme of ledge-snipers (esp. exterior, but interior as well) emerges, but where in previous entries these were liable to be imps, here there's quite a lot more artillery in the hills, including mancubi, arachs, revenants, and commandos. I can see how the intent might have been to flush the player into the open and create a dangerous Total Exposure-esque crossfire, but unfortunately monster placement here is so one-dimensional that this doesn't pan out much....when almost everything is a frontal assault, it's kind of hard to be flushed forward, you know? In practice what we do is throw a lot of rockets into the hills to clean out the demonic entrenchment, which drags after a time. I suppose they can also just be ignored, given the amount of space the player has, but taking this tack doesn't exactly add much more substance to the proceedings....maybe one of the outdoor sojourns would benefit from having some of its monsters introduced in a different way (e.g. via teleports or fastraise lifts or the like that trigger after the player has already made it well into the area) in order to create a more complicated/pressuring scenario, I dunno. On the upside, arch-vile usage is at least pretty effective, which has been a strength of the mapset as a whole--I particularly like the fellow that phases behind you in the narrow hallway. The multi-phasing hell knight earlier on is a bit comically ineffective, but still not without charm, I suppose.

Pretty? Definitely. Fun? Eh....passable in parts, sloggy in others.

Edit: Oh, yeah, and I just noticed that the sky has darkened considerably. Nice touch, subtle, but makes a real impact on the mood. I reckon the only reason I didn't notice this earlier is that the sky isn't very prominent in map 12, and in map 13 my eyes were more drawn to all of the lava everywhere.

[NuMetalManiak]

I imagine most of E3 being very long, where every level is pretty expansive :). MAP12 being the only map so far which took more than 10 minutes for me to complete probably seems like it could've been an E3 map.

Anyways, time to get up to pace. Still on MAP14! Those goddamned revenants...

[traversd]

esselfortium said:

The different textures when compared to the early screenshot of this map are probably the result of the major revision that traversd had to put the start area through in order to avoid exceeding the render budget.

Heh "underground revisions". Thanks for the feedback, will definitely comb through it and hopefully get some time to improve the maps gameplay. This map has certainly had an interesting dev cycle. It has been revised, rebuilt, discarded, revised, structurally relocated whole areas such as the exit and red key zone, and at one point given up on entirely.

That said I'm happy that the original idea of the 3 key quests, and bonus/shortcuts using prior keys has remained through the entire dev.

Regarding each zone. They are meant to be scaled in terms of size and monster/HP density - with the BK being the smallest(hardest) and YK being the biggest(easiest).

An interesting thing I've realized is that players are more likely (on first attempts) to venture into the BK or RK zones first. I think this is because the door and hallway are more obvious routes than the switch to lower to main platform in the starting area.

Re: imps on ledges. Guilty as charged I guess ;0) I will openly admit that monster placement and fight constructs are something I really need to develop. The idea of the imps was really to provide constant pressure from above but yes, have to concede that for dispatching these foes, it is a negative experience for many.

Re: exit doors not being uniform on both sides. That was deliberate to provide a bit of intrigue but eh I'm not so sure that was the result ;0)

I'm making some updates to map09, but hope to look at this map next.

Travers

[Tarnsman]

Each episode maintains a balance of long and short levels. In fact the longest level is probably the 2nd to last map in E2 and the E2 secret level.

[Crusader No Regret]

So I did a replay of map 9 to find that teleporter out of the final area I missed. I find the backpack secret and it has become one of my favorites for the clever placement.

Onwards to map 10: 100% kills, 100% secrets, 1 death

Mancubi and cacodemons make a tricky combo and I died at the red key from dwaddling. Next time, I explore more and find the rocket launcher before that encounter and I'm better off with health and armor. I rocket out the Mancubi and run out the door leaving everything else behind for later. Ammo proves quite tight; even with infights, I run quite low. The blue key ambush incorporates the level geometry which I find neat. Hit the exit switch with 200/200 which pleases me.
I found a cowardly way to handle the last battle. If one wanted to raise the difficulty, either moving the switches that activate the lifts farther away from them on the lower level or placing them on the upper level in a way so that the player cannot hide on the upper level when lowering the lifts (this is what I did and lured the flying monsters to an archvile free zone) will work.

[dew]

Playtester's War Journal, day10: A Proud and Booming Industry (skillsaw)

YouTube: UV SoloNet Max in 11:50 (played on v. 099j8)

map10 is one of the oldest pieces in the set and as skillsaw himself said, it predates even his Vanguard works. It's one of the most beautiful maps in the episode and certainly looks more like a believable place than what we're used to in Doom, but it doesn't feature some prominent characteristics of the style the author developed since then. Progression is mostly linear with limited looping and backtracking, height variances are present, but mostly for visual and transitional purposes, not to build battle set pieces.

This all contributes to somewhat slower progression with sparser population on a larger area. The map seems to divide people into groups of those who like that, who enjoy Doom even in its calmer incarnations or who simply don't crave hardcore combat or setting the player up at every step - those would probably describe the style as more natural and realistic. Then there are those who find the map a bit of a bore to shoot through, never challenged for life too hard (unless, perhaps, you happen to run into a dickishly placed cyberdemon, eh?), people who only stay in a room as long as they're forced to by the layout or the monsters - those will complain about faulty pacing and lacking gameplay. It's interesting to note that skillsaw himself belongs to the latter group. Like a father ashamed of a bastard child he put into a stripper at a gas station restroom after a drunken prom party 20 years ago, he may love the map in a way, but he wants it out of the house. I may be spending too much time listening to alfonzo.

Anyways, skillsaw revamped the map radically in 2012, although not by restructuring the layout and progression. He replaced the shoddier parts of the map with new, grander areas (the hilly outside part instead of a dark cave, the SSG pit instead of a rectangular tech room with a less impressive pit, a much cooler looking RK area and a redesigned final battle) - so these parts may be more up to date, but overall gameplay changes haven't gone far enough, it seems. It does resemble a run of the mill cchest map, the way it progresses, doesn't it? Well, we'll give the monster placement one more radical reboot and see if we can salvage the lovely map and if it doesn't help, we'll let skillsaw abort it in a toilet basin like he should've done all those years ago before it disgraced him in front of his friends.

As for my demo, I played it fairly casually except for a few high risk moves - the cyberdemon dash was the most suicidal part for sure. Smashing through the final fight was a calculated risk, considering my health stash.

Fun Fact: The map sets the alternative quality criterion, start-to-helipad, to 10.3 maps. That says everything about the project.

[cannonball]

MAP15 - “Tricyclic Looper” by Mechadon
I made it my mission to figure out how to get to the secret exit and after 35 minutes I did. 8/9 secrets found and 1 monster left, which was the cyber.
Long and at times confusing, I have to admit I did get a little lost in this one, though it was my fault after the red key door, I ran straight past where I was supposed to go.
Combat again is pretty easy to be honest. 2 deaths, one at the start which was more down to pr-boom glitching when a hellknight fired at me, and the plasma gun area as I was check-mated by two hell knights.
It took a while to uncover all the elements to grabbing the secret blue key, not the most obvious puzzle to solve but I managed in the end.
There were a lot of zombies and barrels in this one which kind of bloats the monster count quite a bit, not complaining there.
The caco ambush at the red key could have had a bit more punch to it and I handled that relatively easily.
The cyberdemon........ no thanks
Pretty decent map, maybe a bit too long, gameplay is a little easy at times again. There were some interesting areas and set pieces too. Didn't like the cyber placement, unless I missed something here.
Again I forgot a couple of extra things.
I did not like the way you acquired the yellow key, I had to take 3 attempts due to monsters blocking my path in the room with the key.
Also something was iffy with the music in pr-boom. There was about a minutes worth of silence before the track looped back to the start

[Steve D]

Map13 (Continuous) – I’ll Replace You With Machines by esselfortium and Skillsaw – Kills – 101, Items – 99, Secret – 100. Time 41:22. End Health 107, Armor 0. Death Count – 2

I guess my main impression of this map is that it’s less attractive than many of the others. Following the astonishing Map12 doesn’t help, either. In most mapsets, this one would be a style highlight. Its beauty disappoints only because the BTSX standard is so high.

Gameplay was . . . nothing special, I thought. The only thing I worried about on continuous was my ammo. This map has a higher meat-to-hitscanner ratio than most, so not as much ammo to pick up from dead things.

There’s a lot of Mancs here, and you can get in trouble if you let them sneak up on you. I likely would have suffered another 2 deaths if I wasn’t a save-and-reload player, but I’m a save-and-reload player because I don’t want to replay large sections of maps.

My first death came in the first double-Archie fight. It was an easy enough fight, I just played badly on the first try. Second try I managed to rocket one Archie, then play ring-around-a-crate to SSG the second one. It resurrected a Manc, which led to a second ring-around-the-crate battle.

Most of the fights after this were all straight-ahead. You had to be careful about rushing into rooms, though, because there was plenty of real estate on either side of several doors, which almost always had Sergeants waiting to blast you.

I thought this map displayed weaknesses I find common to the meat game, which is mainly that meat can be dodged, so if you keep your wits about you and don’t get flanked, you should be pretty safe, especially from HKs wandering out to be helplessly slaughtered. As usual, Revvies and Archies were the main challenge, though sniping Chaingunners damaged me the most in incidental combat. Indeed, even before the first double-Archie fight, I’d been calmly killing some HKs on a platform when suddenly, an unnoticed Chaingunner raked me in the back. I immediately went from calm to panic and was dropped to 66% health before I could take that jagoff out. That’s why I love the hitscanner game, because I love to get hurt! ;D

There were a few decent fights, though. As you are heading towards the blue key area, you find an open lava pool (Sector 128) and end up locked-in to fight some Cacos, Sergeants and most alarmingly, a Pain Elemental. It was hard to get around everything to take out the PE before a Lost Soul clusterfuck ensued, and I played it twice to get my numbers up. As with all the locked-room traps, I didn’t realize I was locked in until I’d already killed everything. This area also unleashes a pack of 5 Revvies on you, easily rocketed, at the end.

The next notable locked-room battle was for the blue key, which I went kamikaze in because you basically have no choice, and miraculously survived on the first attempt, running around like a nutzo to dodge all those Revvie rockets. I didn’t get good luck on infighting, except for the HK being punched out by a Revvie, and luckily there was a lot of reserve health because this one took me down to less than 30%.

I was killed again right at the end by those 3 Revvies near the exit room. I was very low on ammo and, while fighting the last Revvie, I ran out of shells with my killing shot just as I ate a rocket. Double KO! I love it when that happens. ;D

Archie use was decent in this map, I must admit, and my hair rose when one came out of the exit room with some meat to back it up.

Secrets were odd in this map, and it’s pure luck that I found them all, because the very first wall I pressed lowered a lift. Then the very first console I pressed opened the PG room. I should mention that I really hate press-the-console secret switches. It’s a jagoff move to me. The Soulsphere secret had an auditory clue which I somehow heard over the music. I’m guessing this is one reason Capellan plays with music off, so he can hear this stuff more easily. The structure of this secret is very similar to one I used in Disraeli back in ’97, and I got the idea from some unremembered map I played, perhaps in one of the IWADs, so it’s nice to see this old chestnut still being used.

So basically, this is an alright map. Fights, with a couple exceptions, are super-easy, but at least some monster closets are used, along with, IIRC, 2 locked-room traps. But overall, the combat wasn’t exciting for me. I agree with others who say the big outdoor lava area was the map’s visual highlight. It does work well as a breather map after the enormity of Map12, however. I passed on the pistol start mainly because of time constraints.

[scifista42]

MAP15 - "Tricyclic Looper" by Mechadon

This is another unique map which in my opinion stands out (in the good meaning), because at least for me it isn't forgettable. Right at the start, I remembered my last playthrough and knew: "This is the map which has that great music, which introduces chaingunners very late, has a secret exit which requires a lot of backtracking and jumping and finding the right way, has a cyberdemon at the end, ..." and remembered quite a lot of areas of the map. I can't say I remember so many things about any other BTSX map, even the ones I have played after this one. Had played. Have had played. Arghh I'm getting lost in these English tenses, sorry.

The map actually introduces monsters slowly. I don't think I've encountered a single revenant, and I counted two archviles. Despite that, the map contains much greater amount of monsters than most BTSX does. Anyway the fights are mostly easy, and can be said, mostly even avoidable - but you just feel it's better to not avoid them, as it's better to defeat a swarm of cacos right away than to let them wander around the huge base and surprise you later. Even the end cyberdemon can be skipped. In fact, the only difficult part of the map comes when you decide to defeat him.

Visually this map feels somehow simpler than previous maps, author's different style is apparent there. Quite less emphasize is given to wires/computers/wall details and instead you see more pillars, detailed stairs and generally, not many small and overcomplicated sectors. I like this style.

Gameplay is good. At one part, you have to jump above computers to get a yellow key, nice. Secrets are clever, specially those around the secret exit. I found the secret exit, but only 7 out of 9 secrets. Map is big, and contains several one-way paths, which forces you to search a longer way around, but that's fine with me. Overally the map was enjoyable to play.

[punnyone]

Map 15 - Tricyclic Looper - Mechadon - 100% kills/Items - 8 out of 9 Secrets - HMP Skill

Now this is a major standout level for me. I'd go as far as to rank it in the top 2 or 3 maps in the set. It's also probably the largest in the set, and features amazing architecture, nice lighting effects, and well hidden secrets. Speaking of which...

Despite this being my 4th time playing the map, I still can't find one of the secrets. I already scoured the map as hard as I could (especially since on my initial playthrough, I was determined to find the secret exit!), and yet, one secret still alludes me to this day.

Monster progression is another highlight in that you start off with simpler enemies such as former humans and imps, and some of the more challenging enemies such as arch-viles and revenants are at the very end. It's a nice change of pace, and the first appearance of the arch-vile made me jump, so that's a good enemy placement. The amount of barrels in the map also made taking down the enemies rather enjoyable.

There are quite a few areas I'd consider the best looking in the map, from the inaccessible base area in the right where you can see scenes of a past slaughter, to the indoor areas in the center with moving machinery, to the final area with the revenants attacking you from the distant fields. Add to this one of the best music tracks in the bunch, and you have a classic level, and one that greatly stands out. Being a fan of large levels and this one in particular, I can't wait to play Mechadon's supposedly enormous map in E2!

[scifista42]

After reading pizzabob's suspicious note about revenants, I did a little research and found out that this map has 4 revenants on HNTR, 6 revenants on HMP and NO REVENANTS ON UV! After that I found that the end on lower difficulties actually has revenants instead of a cyberdemon, which explains the barrels. They're on UV too probably just to avoid emptyness and maybe to tease the player.

[Seele00TextOnly]

In response to the 8/9 secrets posts, I ran through again and it is possible to get two secrets without flagging them, I believe. The most likely culprit is the Blue Armor that raises out of the floor on a tiny sector; that sector is substantially smaller than the armor itself. I just pulled that off myself, apologies for that oversight as tester. The other is the Blue Key, which one can snatch while running across the lowering sector without touching the sector I believe.

And lack of Rev's on this map is something I'd not noticed but could probably be corrected (especially on the higher difficulties! I never bother with anything below UV ><). I'm betting those Revs with the Cyber could be there with him, I dunno. We'll talk about that and other ideas for these situations as usual. Thanks!

[scifista42]

I don't think lack of revenants on one map is a bad thing. Quite the opposite. It made me happy. :p

[cannonball]

Seele00TextOnly said:

In response to the 8/9 secrets posts, I ran through again and it is possible to get two secrets without flagging them, I believe. The most likely culprit is the Blue Armor that raises out of the floor on a tiny sector; that sector is substantially smaller than the armor itself. I just pulled that off myself, apologies for that oversight as tester. The other is the Blue Key, which one can snatch while running across the lowering sector without touching the sector I believe.

And lack of Rev's on this map is something I'd not noticed but could probably be corrected (especially on the higher difficulties! I never bother with anything below UV ><). I'm betting those Revs with the Cyber could be there with him, I dunno. We'll talk about that and other ideas for these situations as usual. Thanks!

I got both the blue armour and blue key secrets tagged. I simply missed one secret :)
Heh I never realised there were no revenants on this map. Which pretty much means their absence didn't detract any positive feelings from the map. In that way good job.

[Veinen]

Map15: Tricylcic Looper

I had an FDA recorded but it has a solid 20mins of pause screen so public showing is out of the question. Yes, I’m a demo-newbie and didn’t know that the pause-time would be included. But I guess you learn something new every day so now I know better. So instead I offer you a casual Solonet-UV playthrough (in 32:48) and a UV-Max -demo (in 16:13) for laughs.

The zombie apocalypse is finally here! Or at least that’s what it seemed like. Seriously though, this map was beyond great. Shitloads of bad guys to kill in very good-looking sceneries. And there’s barrels! Barrels are always appreciated. I really don’t have anything substantial to complain about, the map is just very good all around. Nice flow, fast-paced, love the layout, looks great and pretty unique too, clever secrets etc. Love it and having already played through the whole thing I can say that this was my favorite map in the entire wad. It gets a bit cramped at times but those spots come in small doses so it never really manages to get on my nerves. The layout’s also slightly confusing but in this map it doesn’t bother one bit. Awesome work Mechadon!

[Tompig]

Map 13 - I'll replace you with machines.

Now call me crazy but who saw this level design and then got nostalgic for system shock 1?
Random memories aside here we go.

Ammo, good.
Monsters, good.

Detail... GOD DAMN FANTASTIC. Seriously I think this is the prettiest map we've seen yet. Would like to know if that was meant to be a blood fall or a lava fall though.

Ambushes were pretty good, first archie one was a tad too easy.

Blue key ambush was very cunning and well done. "Hey look zombie men *jump* aww crap."

3rd archie ambush was just plain mean but in a good way, close quaters with pinkies pushing me into fires and immortal revs.

Good map.

[cannonball]

MAP31 - “The Hard Way” by Skillsaw
This looks and plays like a Skillsaw map from like Vanguard or lunatic
Basically this was awesome, died a few times in about the same place going after the red key. Plenty of health and ammo to blast into various hordes of monsters.
Good track, good looks. What else is there to say.
Loved it. :)