The DWmegawad Club plays: Requiem

[Demon of the Well]

Map 27 -- Cursed Kingdom - 100% Kills / 66% Secrets
Earlier in the month, someone said of map 16 that it seemed to them like an earlier Keränen map, from before his penchant for pushing the engine in a 'realistic' direction came into its own. That's kind of the feeling I get from this map, although I suspect it's probably not an older map at all but simply one that was produced more quickly and had less time spent on it in general. Again, the length of the map is of some note, but this time we're looking at the other side of the coin....I've said many a time that I like bigger, more expansive epics best of all, but this should in no way be taken as an endorsement of length/size for their own sake. Longer maps need to have enough content to justify their runtime, and this one simply...doesn't.

Looking on the bright side, I think it is probably true that this map is a lot more playable/traversable in a traditional sense than most of Iikka's other maps (both within and without Requiem), largely a function of its significantly more open scale, although I still maintain that map 03 plays better--'Poison Processing' is a lot more cramped/stuffy in comparison to 'Cursed Kingdom', true, but it also uses mostly small monsters that can be mown down quickly even with lighter weapons, and so tends to have a much more kinetic pace. And indeed, as in so many of his other maps, it is the monster placement here that is the greatest failing. The majority of the opposition is mid/upper-tier enemies, and despite the more open scale the nature of the action is more or less identical to that of earlier maps: you grind through largely nonthreatening meatballs that attack from the front. The more spacious aspect of the construction means that sometimes you'll get several monsters attacking at once as opposed to the constant mano-a-mano of 'Town of the Dead' et al, but they're almost always of one single type, and essentially always attacking from one direction and usually from the same vertical plane, and so it's really just more of the same of what we've been seeing all this time--it just takes longer to plow through, is all.

The presence of relatively early plasma weapons plus the greater amount of space in the rooms and yards means that at least you don't have to do it all with the SSG this time, and the ability to run around and dodge stuff in the open feels a little less stultifying than the constant door-marshalling and two-stepping of past maps, but really, these small graces can't save the map, especially considering that it goes on for quite a bit longer than anything that came before. If anything, the length exacerbates the various foibles by way of affording them a higher rate of incidence--for example, one thing that a lot of other players have mentioned about all of Iikka's maps thus far but that really gets hammered into the fucking ground here is how frequently the bigger monsters are comically ineffective in their placement (arachnatrons where they can't move/fire easily, groups of cacos stuffed into low-ceiled boxes whose doors are too small for them to pass through, etc.) until they decide to camp out at the top (or bottom) of a blind lift. Even this quickly loses its relative effect as soon as the player figures out that it's wise to have the PR or BFG in hand when riding a lift, and so the map is left with nothing. Nothing but one churlish (but telegraphed!) chaingunner trap and some baffling Baron-spam in its final third. Nothing worth remembering. Looking at this kind of thing, I find myself wondering what kind of player Iikka was....did he generally prefer a leisurely walkabout and just didn't have a good grasp on how to thing-place for higher difficulties? Did he pattern his placement after some other game he admired? Was he one of those engine savants who didn't actually play the game purely for leisure much at all? Questions, questions.

The feather in Iikka's cap was generally in the depictive qualities of his finished works, as seen at their best in 'Town of the Dead.' Not much of that going on here, though, certainly not enough to compensate the dimwitted, corpulent gameplay. In aspect the presentation here most reminds of 'Karmacoma' from the original Memento Mori: big, looming, chunky brick buildings set in somewhat featureless yards, with very flat lighting and little in the way of surface detail (which I don't feel to be terribly crucial in this particular style, granted)--and with fewer interesting concepts at play. While 'Cursed Kingdom' does benefit from a fairly intricate route, its intricacy only really becomes apparent if you plot it out on the overhead map or the like--the visual interchangeability of the buildings plus the 'brutalist' style of arrangement means that's it never terribly apparent when you're looking at someplace you're going to be eventually, and you almost never have to look back at anywhere you've been, given that it's just as unrelentingly linear as all of the author's other maps.

Dire.

[Capellan]

I'm pretty sure map13 was the last one Iikka made: not sure about the order of his others.

[Crusader No Regret]

Revisiting Requiem

map 24: completed on HMP from scratch 4/4 secrets
Did a scouting run without monsters to refresh my memory on what switch does what at first. When playing for real, cleared it on the first attempt. Granted, I had looked at this map in an editor way back when so advance knowledge plays a large factor here.
Playing from scratch, I treat this map as an evil puzzle map. Feels like I'm forced to tackle the map in a certain way to complete it. Failure to do so results in ammo issues and/or death. That aspect didn't bother me since I already know "the solution" so to speak. I can see how this would cause players to wring their hands in frustration though. To add insult to injury, 2 out of 4 secrets are behind a one time door and another I'm not sure how anyone would discover without an editor or a maxdemo.
I finished with 65 bullets, 10 shells, 1 rocket, and 67 cells. 5-6 revenants died to infights and I chainsawed most lost souls. So ammo is definitely tight. The custom graphics do contribute to the atmosphere but with gameplay that will put off a large portion of playstyles...

map 27; DNF
Maybe the only interesting feature of the map is a secret early on that grants access to an alternate (and faster) path to the exit. Without it, the map plays really linearly. Enter room, kill monsters, repeat 70 times until exit. Also present is a tight ammo balance. I ran into issues on HMP so it's likely worse on UV. Real life intervened before I finished the map but I cared so little that I quit even though it would be simple to pause the game.
Have a story from the past. When I played this map blind, I took the alternate path and ended up approaching the cyberdemon from the other side. In such close confines, death soon followed.

[Lingyan203]

Hey guys, what wad do you think we should play for next month? I was thinking Valiant.

[scifista42]

@Lingyan203: It's been discussed a lot on the previous page.

[Lingyan203]

Oh, in the previous thread? It would be really nice if it can be done here.

Also, as for the wad last month, Resurgence, I finally finished my full continuous playthrough on Ultra-Violence with 100% kills and secrets, with no quicksaves halfway through any of the maps.

My playthrough can be found here:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLgS1ZoidySwPvnhzn6_j25vjJhIiSjU9F

Enjoy! :)

[dobu gabu maru]

Lingyan203 said:

Oh, in the previous thread?

Previous page, not previous thread. So far we're sitting on 4 votes for ConCERNed and 2 for Valiant, though I know a couple of you mopes haven't voted yet. My vote may lean towards ConCERNed just for a decisive winner, as I'm likely going to be doubling up on these next month anywhoo.

MAP28: This was so much more enjoyable than MAP24 considering it was an actual playable level. Granted, there’s not enough ammo to chew through the gigantic baron horde later in the map, but it made for an interesting “puzzle” in how you kill the AV sandwiched between all of them. The gameplay otherwise is alright (the revs are particularly nasty), although the map ends on a bit of a dud. Great visuals too.

[cannonball]

I would certainly like to do a playthrough of Valiant at some point as I have only been able to play through in drips and drabs. Maybe it might be best to leave it a month and hence a final release will be present. That said revisiting a megawad made by me fills me with a little dread :P

So my vote will be a complete waste - Perditions gate.

As for requiem, I rage-quit after breaking map06 several times. As for the wad itself as a whole, whilst there are some interesting ideas and trickery, this just doesn't live up to MM2 in my opinion and potentially now rate this lower than MM. Whilst MM is very rough in parts and has some terrible levels, it was still an era of learning which later progressed to the much better sequel. This seems like a step in the wrong direction, some levels are pretty poor in my opinion and the maps which do something interesting often sacrifice the gameplay. There are some good or even very good maps though.
Adam Widsor's maps are probably some of the stronger ones in the set, especially Map 11 and 26. So you can leave this thread in my opinion with your head held high.

[Salt-Man Z]

cannonball said:

So my vote will be a complete waste - Perditions gate.

I'll give Perdition's Gate a hearty second: it's already on my list of WADs-I-Mean-To-Replay-On-UV for this year. It's true that I'm itching to play Valiant, but I'm happy to wait for the next major release, and it's probably a little more "weighty" than what I typically prefer for Club fare.

[TheOrganGrinder]

Throwing my vote in for the ConC.E.R.N.ed/Draft Excluder combo meal for whatever it's worth. :)

[NuMetalManiak]

I kinda hope that one month we could play through Hell Ground by Eternal. such magnificence in that wad even though it's just 7 maps. if we do that then we might as well try some of Eternal's other stuff too.

MAP29 Downer

this whole map is a downer.

rule of thumb: if you're gonna make an endgame megawad level, do not stuff it with lots of fodder monsters like hitscanners in literally every part of the map. we expect bigger meat out of the later maps and this did not really provide it as much.

at least Adam Williamson's only contribution here is hard enough, the map is almost as long as Cursed Kingdom (I actually took a lot longer with this map than MAP27, but still managed to get through both without dying). the amount of hitscanners in a lot of places made things quite cheap, again do not stuff an endgame map with them. other stuff, well, I've never really used the crusher behind the arch-vile in the big room. it's a really open area with practically nowhere to dodge except behind the northern switch, and it's more fun killing him with my weapons for me. there's the secret that "cancels" if you raise the bridge to it, but this is fixed in ZDoom ports it seems. there's the section with the yellow key where the ceiling is TOO LOW and makes getting through the crushers a nightmare. then there's the somewhat overdetailed brick and blood channel area. I really hate this area, as I end up confused with the teleports and where to go. I even contemplated using the arch-vile to jump myself back over there. this particular guy was a pain because of the baron who spawns before him, that could be resurrected and used as a shield. after that, the spiderdemon encounter at the end almost killed me, but I managed through. still, a long, annoying map that I can't like as much.

the wiki states that this map is the second-largest in the megawad. while I'm inclined to agree, I must disagree with what they think was the largest, MAP21. I can get through that one pretty quickly as opposed to this one or MAP27, which both took me a while to beat. heck, this one took me longer than MAP27, but that's probably because I'm not acquainted with it as much (sometimes when I play through this wad, I stop at MAP29 because I don't like it at all).

[vdgg]

MAP28 The best part is the red key-put-on-altar trick. So I guess the map was just okayish... Very short for MAP28 (MM, MM2 had Mastodons). Looper discovered a speedrunning trick which is hard to pull off even according to him: http://www.doomworld.com/vb/post/1214860
MAP29 The best map ever (lifetime achievement) from this author who is better known as a speedrunner. Still, underwhelming. I think the big room with an arch-vile, mancubi, PEs, BFG, etc. was awesome. The rest was from average to good.

[Capellan]

MAP29
Well, I thought this was really dull. Flick switch, kill monsters. Flick switch, kill monsters. Flick switch, kill monsters. Flick switch, kill monsters. Flick switch, kill monsters. Flick switch, kill monsters. Flick switch, kill monsters. Flick switch, kill monsters. Flick switch, kill monsters. Flick switch, kill monsters. Flick switch, kill monsters. Flick switch, kill monsters. Flick switch, kill monsters. Flick switch, kill monsters. Flick switch, kill monsters. Flick switch, kill monsters. Flick switch, kill monsters. Flick switch, kill monsters. Flick switch, kill monsters. Flick switch, kill monsters. Flick switch, kill monsters. Flick switch, kill monsters. Flick switch, kill monsters. Flick switch, kill monsters. Flick switch, kill monsters. Flick switch, kill monsters. Over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over again.

The tedium is interrupted only by the level's other exciting innovation: monsters in little cubby holes. Over and over and over and over and over and you get the idea.

Perhaps, if the architecture or texturing was more exciting, there would be something to distract from the boring stop-start gameplay, but it's not. It's bland and blocky and frankly needed another editing pass to fix all the misalignments.

Adam Williamson was a prolific author of deathmatch levels (which I haven't played and can't give any comments on). I only know of two specifically single-player maps he did: this one and MM2 map06. That latter map I recall getting a less than enthusiastic reception when it came out, though I don't recall the map itself. Based on this one though, I don't have high hopes the negative response was unfounded.

[scifista42]

Map29 - “Downer” by Adam Williamson

This map wasn't terribly bad, but not specially great either. The visuals, layout and gameplay were generic, with too much focus on SSG-action only (plus sometimes chaingun), and encouraging sniping from behind a corner more than anything else. On the other hand, some parts had relatively nice details, lighting or structure. I liked how the crushers could only be run through with a momentum gained from a little run-up, and not just by pushing one's own body into the raising wall.

In my view, the map is an average 3/5.

[Memfis]

Adam also has some stuff in Insertion, it is worth a look.

[Magnusblitz]

MAP29: Downer
99% kills, 1/2 secrets

Not terrible, but it is pretty boring, and the same design cues do certainly get repeated over and over again - thin corridor staircases, monsters in cubby holes, square rooms, lot of switch flicking. There's a couple good fights (I like the revenant ambush in the outdoor white rock area) but there's also some that are pretty much drudgery (shooting mancubi at long range without a RL, dealing with the Arch-Vile/barons trapped behind the short wall in the red key area). Definitely longer than it needed to be, and with the blocky architecture and lots of misalignments, really feels like an amateur effort.

[TheOrganGrinder]

MAP29: Downer

I'm normally a fan of expansive maps, but oh man, I ended up not caring for this one at all, and I think it would have worked better as a smaller map; the same tricks and architectural elements are used repeatedly and it gets old quickly.

The progression here is very stop-and-start; the map's not difficult to navigate, but gameplay consists mostly of getting crammed into one small section of the map to flick a set of switches before moving rapidly to another section of the map where the same shoved-into-a-box feeling dominates. The map has enough large, open areas to avoid a purely claustrophobic feel, but a lot of the subsections come very close, and coming back to one of the major areas (the blue key room, say, or the vile press) is a major relief from that unpleasant feeling.

There are a lot of neat little areas and pieces of design work that would stand out better in a smaller map, but here they contribute to (rather than detract from) the sense that the whole thing doesn't hang together well... that the focus is too much on each individual little challenge and area, and not enough on the big picture of layout and the player's overall flow through the level. The Crystal Maze, Doom Episode 3 style.

I don't know if the level is more generous with cells and rockets on higher difficulty levels but on HMP I found myself sticking to the super shotgun and chaingun for most of the map simply because I wasn't given the ammunition to make much use of anything else.

And I totally just booked it past the various spider gribblies at the end because sticking around to fight those guys looked like no fun at all.

[Memfis]

Hmm, I've always liked map29. Imo it has good action, it is rich with cool trigger sequences and for some reason I find the use of red rock texture very appealing. It's like, the rooms are "normally" shaped with smooth angles everywhere, but yet they look like caverns because of that graphic. It is interesting.

[Sui Generis]

I was away over the weekend and have fallen behind

Map21 - “Den of the Skull” by Anthony Galica
This map compounds the feeling that Requiem has started to take a dive in quality. I dislike this map less than some of the previous ones, but I really don't care for the room, then corridor style of this map. The individual rooms/areas are kind of interesting when taken on their own, but the way they are atomised into separate, discrete encounters connected by long, boring "I am creatively bankrupt" corridors really knocks it down. I find this lack of much area reuse and integration of the disparate areas undermines the sense of progression. I can live with the hell noble grinding, but this map feels sterile and does not exceed the sum of it's parts. I can certainly agree with the characterisation of this as a '94 map with "me too!" engine hacks.

But I did kind of like the titlular sector skull though.

Map22 - “Arachnophobia” by Iikka Keränen
This is much better. A good beating sound track with an intricate progression and layout. It's also a little less linear and more open than the earlier Iikka maps. It does however feature more of those close-quarter meat-grinder SSG slogs Iikka tends to favour towards the end; the one-way teleport is a negative too. It looks generally good though and the 3D floors integrated into the progression far more subtly; compare this with Town of the dead, where that level occasionally feels like the layout was designed to facilitate the 3D bridges rather than vice-versa.

I do feel the random reuse of the Map08 style mineshaft/tunnels and the Map16 style areas does start to make it feel as though Iikka is running out of ideas. It's almost like a "Iikka's greatest hits compilation".

Map23 - “Hatred” by Dario Casali
Casali map with recognisably Plutonia looks and difficulty. I'd probably enjoy the map more if I was less out of practice with doom. As it was I kept getting splattered by the dual cyb duel. (I didn't think to ledge camp like Capellan) I agree it gets easier once the city style part of the map opens. Part of me would agree about the SS wofies looking out of place, but then in the context of '97, ghosts would have been unusual anyway so after a fashion it makes sense.

Map24 - “Procrustes Chambers” by Anthony Czerwonka
I played through continuous and therefore initially missed the furore about the necessary non-secret secret. (Surely if a mapping trope requires such a cackhanded name, you can tell it's a bad idea. I completely agree that it's a bullshitty design decision. But once you know where the secret is, the map remains tricky but ok. Certainly it looks excellent although the long gangwalk is a notable drop in the looks department. It's a pity that the textures were reserved by Adelusion for this one map, as if used well they could've made for some nice late maps.

I do quite find the use of revvies as the primary enemy to be interesting and kind of endearing, as was the the 'monster jail'. Attractive but only modestly satisfying gameplay on continuous. Oh and that brown switch that blends in is poor.

Map25 - “Chaos Zone” by Adam Windsor
This just looks and plays like an extended Map32 and similar comments apply to this as did to that map. For what it's worth the teleport in ambushes are reasonably well designed and fairly entertaining, though it does boil down to hitscanner sniping with the chaingun a lot of the time. The arch-vile adds a welcome shot of adrenaline though later on. I'm not quite so keen on the hell knight corridors, as this seemed like a have more level style time-sink. I'm not complaining much though as it's short and on the whole fun. Playing it pistol start is more interesting with the beginning ambush as the option of killing the chaingunner early to appropriate his armament becomes relevant.

Oh and I was actually a little bit disappointed when I lowered the secret pillars at the start; I was expecting a much more elaborate secret, given Map 11 by the same author.

Map26 - “Excoriation” by Adam Windsor
Now this little level is to my mind superior to Map 25, in terms of both looks and gameplay. On continuous this is fairly trivial, but on pistol start the cunning in the map design comes to the fore. The main issue is dealing with the pain-elemental and Arch-viles at the beginning with limited rockets. There would be a few different possibilities of tackling this, with different ways to the SSG. Layout wise it's extremely simple, but it does manage to wring quite a lot of fun (and even re-playability) out of such a tiny map.

As with Capellan's Map 20, I believe that a monster repopulation later on could've done even more for the map and made it more substantive. Nonetheless I think this was a good little map.

I will have to try and catch up the rest of the maps later

[Demon of the Well]

Map 28 -- Fetals' Remains - 108% Kills / No actual secrets
Coolest thing about this map is definitely the bit where you return the red skull to the altar in order to finish up--I think this map was the first place I ever saw the idea done, one of those 'elegant in its simplicity' sort of deals. It also feels like the only really distinct idea in the map, a bit unusual since many of Adelusion's maps (within Requiem and without) seem to be focused around experiments with gameplay, in much the same way Iikka tended to fixate on experimenting with the engine's depictive capabilities. The rest of it seems sort of....impromptu? Adel's usual ammo stringency is in effect, which is the only thing really lending the encounters much structure (others have mentioned the arch-vile behind a wall of Barons), otherwise it's all chip damage and a slow steady trickle of heterogeneous evil that acts as serviceable filler (e.g. nothing takes particularly long) without leaving much of an impression after it's all over.

The small scale tends to obscure the fact a bit, but the map essentially plays out as a series of discrete 'islands' floating in a small reservoir of some sort--each island has its own look and I suppose you could say its own little concept (that Baron/powerup pedestal island, the revenant/souls cage, etc.), but most of the encounters are too small/simple to really assert themselves, and progression through the islands is strange--linear, yet piecemeal. Early on you visit the little nukage pool to get a blue key (strange, since you can't normally learn the blue door exists before you have the key), go on a straight trek from bridge to bridge through most of the islands, then stop dead and backtrack a waypoint or so, then backtrack from there to where you originally started backtracking from, then you backtrack again to an innocuous stream in the first area that eventually sees you teleported to the squidgy little island you've been skirting along the whole time....weird, feels like it was laid out in a 'stream of consciousness' way or something, with very little sense of planning or rationale. The kicker is that the whole setup with the red key/altar isn't something you see until the very end--getting the red skull to put it on that altar is the whole point of your quest in 'Fetals' Remains', but if you hadn't read the textfile you would have no idea you were even on a quest until the very moment of its completion. It's like the level is backwards....seems like you should see the altar at the start, and then return to it later, something like that. But alas, not to be.

A bit messy-looking from a visual standpoint as well. It's a motley mix of several different themes (dungeon, cave, base, Mario-nightmare, etc.) using quite a few different textures, with the small scale meaning that you can travel from theme to theme in a matter of instants. I can think of all sorts of maps that are able to pull off the juxtaposition of many seemingly contradictory themes quite well, but here the effect is more like an indistinct slurry that robs the level of much real sense of location--there are lots of different textures used, but they're all some shade of grey or some shade of brown (including a really crappy-looking brown forkswitch used on a couple of bailout lifts) despite lots of variation in material, with the only real splashes of color coming from the water in the reservoir and the nukage in the cave--the end result is something that's somewhat ugly and unappealing despite a sound/finished construction.

Strange map, really strange, even--seems more like something haphazardly stitched together out of bits and pieces than a full concept, I wonder if the name is a reflection of that in some way? It's a wonder I manage to forget it between each playthrough of the WAD, but then, I suppose its actual moment-to-moment gameplay isn't very charismatic....

[scifista42]

Map30 - “Nevermore” by Adam Windsor

Very simple generic map, not feeling like a finale one. Strange mixture of techbase, "gothic" and hell elements on a small area, also with an inconsistent usage of detal. Short and straightforward path with random weak / medium-tier enemies, then an ambush where the monsters telefrag each other, and then a rather stupid IOS setup. Fine, but unappealing. 1/5

[Salt-Man Z]

MAP29: Downer
Eh. Not really a bad map, per se. I enjoyed it for the most part, though I was low on health for the bulk of it (thank goodness for that secret soulsphere.) It was fun when I finally recognized the level, in the outdoor whiterock section. But, length aside, it didn't particularly feel like the penultimate map of a megawad. Not a fan of the Mastermind at the end: I had to camp behind one of those sometimes-she-can-see-through-them pillars and plink away at her with the SSG. Also, the completely-optional red key archie was silly (being completely optional.)

[Magnusblitz]

MAP30: Nevermore

Mostly agree with Scifista on this one. I love the opening room - great color balance, I like the 'flesh' teleporters, good lighting. And the 'moving eye' effect on the skull texture is really cool too. But then it switches full-swerve into a techbase, which is a bit confusing - there's nothing to really make it feel like it's a techbase Hell has taken over or corrupted, it just feels like straight up techbase, and a somewhat garish one at that. Some of the imps telefrag themselves (not sure if that's intended or meant to be a cool trick, either way it feels kinda like Epic 2's telefrag section - an engine trick that makes little sense and is in there 'just cause'. And then the IOS section itself which isn't that fun either. Blowing up a reactor in front of a giant Icon head just isn't as fun as blowing up the Icon itself.

I don't think this is one of Adam's last-minute fill-ins; even if it was it's a mis-step though.

[NuMetalManiak]

MAP30 Nevermore

and here we are at the finale. although I usually don't play this level due to me not liking MAP29, this one is not bad. the teleporting ambush in the rocket launcher room could be better though (imps could telefrag each other, being MAP30 and all). the boss isn't so hard and I found out the rocket launcher isn't exactly necessary (but it's nice to have). it's short and sweet I guess.

[dobu gabu maru]

MAP29: Didn’t care for this one. Long, grindy, meandering, filled with hitscanners, found no other weapons.

MAP30: Yowee this one was nasty. It’s a pretty rough encounter until you learn to just throw your life away and try to rocket the core has quickly as you can. I think it’s a pretty neat IoS idea, and I far prefer the “shoot the core as quickly as you can” as opposed to the dumb lift raising stuff.

Overall it was an interesting experiencing returning to Requiem after so long. Even though I didn’t enjoy Keranen maps, I’m glad he has an extremely distinctive style. Windsor steals the show in gameplay, though Casali would’ve made him run for his money if more of his maps were included. Best maps were MAP11, MAP23, & MAP26, and worst were MAP12 & MAP24. The mapset itself earns a Chris Hansen Hot 'n Cold reward from me for having the high points right next to the low points coincidentally

[Capellan]

MAP30
When I joined Requiem, no-one had yet taken on the map30 slot, and I immediately put my hand up because I wanted to try making an IoS level. I wasn't really a fan of any of the map30s I'd tried before then (the IWAD and both MMs) and wanted to take a different approach to it. It occurred to me that rather than the the 'you have to get into the single right place to hit the target' I could create a level where there were multiple places you could attack the Romero Head successfully, but balance that by spawning monsters at twice normal speed. The player would have to kill the Icon quickly, or be overwhelmed. Essentially, it made the level into a speed trial.

The effort's not entirely successful. It retains some of the artificiality and contrivance that I dislike about the original concept. And it's probably too easy as a climax. On the other hand, I quite like the stuff before the final battle: in particular, the teleport trap on the rocket launcher is good fun.

So Requiem is done. It's a deeply flawed map set in my opinion: even ignoring the 'drafting' of three Demonfear maps into the level, there are a few pretty ordinary maps, and many more levels where I'd say that visual design or engine trickery were prioritised over actual gameplay. That was something of a theme in 1997, really: as tools improved, it became much easier to make really cool-looking maps. And frankly, making cool-looking stuff is in many ways a more simple thing to do than to create really good gameplay. Particularly since what people consider 'good gameplay' can vary widely. For my tastes though, the action in this set is on average … well, average.

Favourite levels, other than my own, are 05, 06 ... and I guess 28. I think the second half of the wad is definitely weaker than the first half.

After Requiem came out, and I'd played it, I took my first long break from Doom – over 12 months – before returning to participate in The Darkening and to finally complete Demonfear. I've taken a few more breaks since then, and may again in the future ... but I think sooner or later I'll always cycle back to this wonderful little game from iD.

[TheOrganGrinder]

MAP30: Nevermore

I've never been a big fan of IoS maps and that feeling hasn't changed here. Though the map does get points for having a very different feel to the original Icon of Sin, for being short and sweet, and for not requiring lift-climbing, shot-timing tomfoolery. Still not my favourite type of fight at all.

[Capellan]

All these IoS complaints make me want an "Icons of Sin" community megawad. All IoS, all the time :-)

[Linguica]

Capellan said:

All these IoS complaints make me want an "Icons of Sin" community megawad. All IoS, all the time :-)

SHUT UP YOU FOOL

[Capellan]

Linguica said:

SHUT UP YOU FOOL

Oh, you know you want it, Ling. Wall to wall iconic action! And the music for every level can songs with the word "Icon" in the title or from albums with the word "Icon" in the title*. It'll be awesome! :-)


* that, or "Iko Iko" 32 times. Your call