The DWmegawad Club plays: Hell Revealed

dobu gabu maru · February 1, 2016

What is the DWmegawad Club?
This is a place where we settle down, have a cup of tea (or drink of your choice) and take a month to play through a megawad on our own, together! Any keen observations, criticisms, or frustrated ranting about it goes here in the discussion. As long as you want to say something about what you've played, feel free to speak your mind.

Can I join?
Sure. The only rule is that you have to play at least some of the levels in our monthly megawad to contribute, but you're generally encouraged to finish the whole thing, even if you've played it before.

What levels am I allowed to post about?
Whatever day of the month it is, is the upper limit for the map you can post on. So if it's the 6th, you may discuss up to MAP06.

Do I have to post an entry every day?
Nope, not at all. This is only for our more enthusiastic members. As long as you play through it with us you’re part of the club.

When do we vote on the next month’s megawad?
Voting begins on the 25th of the current month.

----------

>>>]DOWNLOAD HELL REVEALED HERE<<<

Hell Revealed is a 1997 megawad by Yonatan Donner and Haggay Niv that boasts an "extreme challenge" on UV. It's rather famous nowadays for being one of the first slaughter wads developed, though such a term would only develop years after its release. There's also over 1000 demos for it over at DSDA if you find yourself with a little extra time on your hands!

Author & maplist for Hell Revealed:

Quote

MAP01 - "Into the Gate" by Yonatan Donner & Haggay Niv
MAP02 - "Gateway Lab" by Yonatan Donner & Haggay Niv
MAP03 - "The Dumpster" by Yonatan Donner
MAP04 - "The Garden Terminal" by Yonatan Donner & Haggay Niv
MAP05 - "Core Infection" by Yonatan Donner
MAP06 - "The Round Crossroads" by Yonatan Donner
MAP07 - "Arachnophobia" by Haggay Niv
MAP08 - "The Jail" by Haggay Niv
MAP09 - "Knockout" by Yonatan Donner
MAP10 - "Chambers of War" by Haggay Niv
MAP11 - "Underground Base" by Yonatan Donner
MAP12 - "Great Halls of Fire" by Yonatan Donner
MAP13 - "Last Look at Eden" by Yonatan Donner
MAP14 - "City in the Clouds" by Yonatan Donner
MAP15 - "Gates to Hell" by Yonatan Donner

MAP31 - "The Descent" by Yonatan Donner
MAP32 - "'Mostly Harmful" by Yonatan Donner

MAP16 - "The Path" by Yonatan Donner
MAP17 - "The Black Towers" by Yonatan Donner
MAP18 - "Hard Attack" by Yonatan Donner
MAP19 - "Everything Dies" by Yonatan Donner
MAP20 - "Judgement Day" by Yonatan Donner
MAP21 - "Siege" by Haggay Niv
MAP22 - "Resistance is Futile" by Yonatan Donner
MAP23 - "Ascending to the Stars" by Yonatan Donner
MAP24 - "Post Mortem" by Yonatan Donner
MAP25 - "Dead Progressive" by Yonatan Donner
MAP26 - "Afterlife" by Yonatan Donner
MAP27 - "Cyberpunk" by Haggay Niv
MAP28 - "Top Hell" by Haggay Niv
MAP29 - "Temple of Fear" by Haggay Niv
MAP30 - "Hell Revealed" by Yonatan Donner

BONUS CONTENT
Doomwiki
Other Hell Revealed Stuff (Infopack & demos)
Automap Names Dehacked
kmxexii’s review
Lingyan203's playthrough
Suitepee plays: 1 2 3 Post Mortem Redux
DSDA
----------
OLD THREADS
2012

2013

2014

2015

2016

50 Shades of Graytall & Erkattäññe

Edited May 9, 2023 by dobu gabu maru

antares031 · February 1, 2016

I usually don't like slaughter maps... but man, this is "Hell Revealed". I'll give it an exception. Okay, here goes nothing. Every levels will be played with pistol start.

MAP01 - Into the Gate
ZDoom, UV - Pistol Start, KIS(%): 100/100/100

The level starts with kickass music from Rise of the Triad. In fact, this wad uses lots of soundtracks from RotT which are really good. This map looks not that harsh since this is the first level... and you find tens of demons ready to get you, damn. Fortunately, the demons can't pass through a burning barrel, so get your berserk powerup and just punch these pinkies. And keep in mind that the teleporter which spawns a demon platoon also brings some zombies and imps. So take your time to that teleporter if you want to clear the level with perfect kills.

EDIT: Just in case you need a dehacked for automap names.

Dylan Jarvis · February 1, 2016

Oh hell yes! Count me in on this one =)

plums · February 1, 2016

Alright, DWMC! I'm back around these forums and really looking forward to playing some Doom and discussing it with oth-

Hell Revealed

Hm.

I don't hate Hell Revealed. I can certainly appreciate why people like it and its historical value, and I've watched a fair number of HR demos from DSDA. But when it comes to actually playing it for myself, I don't love it either. The aesthetics and production values are quite rough even for its time, though they do get better as the wad progresses, and the gameplay is something that I think has been improved upon by other wads.

It's been a long time since I've played it though -- it's been a long time since I've played much Doom at all, but even moreso with HR -- so I'll give it a go and see if my opinion has changed. Certainly I'm a much better Doomer than when I first tried it, and maybe that combined with some active discussion will give me a newfound appreciation for it. Or maybe not!

Crispy Doom, UV pistol starts until it gets too frustrating at which point I'll drop down to HMP or keep my weapons or both.

dobu gabu maru · February 1, 2016

antares031 said:
Just in case you need a dehacked for automap names.

Thanks. I originally had an HR.wad file with the music and map names included that I was gonna post, but I didn't realize the legalese forbade that :P

So, I've played Hell Revealed waaaay back when I first discovered Doom wads, and IIRC it was like the 4th or 5th pwad I played. Back then I was interested in playing "the hardest Doom maps ever!!!!!" after having my difficulty bloodlust kindled by Plutonia, so naturally I had to play through this SOB. In retrospect all I really remember is MAP24 being an absolute nightmare to play, so I'm super interested in seeing how it holds up, especially since 1) I know the ins and outs of Doom way better now and 2) I'm playing from pistol start.

MAP01: A silly little map this one. I vividly remember the petrified pinkies in this level because that was the first time I had seen that and thought it was a neat effect, but other than that this map was mostly meh. If you stay and fight the pinkie/imp warp-in you’ll get a good indication of where this mapset will go, but other than that it’s too easy and mindless to be of value.

Salt-Man Z · February 1, 2016

Won't be joining this month, but here's today's Fun Fact: the first time I played this I only got through MAP10, and thought it wasn't as rough as I'd heard. Little did I know (until I replayed it a couple years later) that the tough stuff starts right at MAP11. I still do really enjoy those first 10 maps, though.

Lingyan203 · February 1, 2016

Here's my playthrough of Hell Revealed if anyone wants to check it out:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLgS1ZoidySwO-G6Qo5pma6DHrXaKY2yep

I redid this playthrough to prepare for Resurgence as I used way too many quicksaves on every map after 10, as well as 7 and 9 in my first video playthrough of it. This one only has quicksaves on 30 and the secret exit section of 31.

baja blast rd. · February 1, 2016

How can you bear that terrible default prBoom+ soundfont? Yuck.

Suitepee · February 1, 2016

Well I'll be playing this after I finish A.L.T, especially since this is one of the 3 wads I want to play this year. (the other two being Sunlust and the Community Chest series)

Budoka · February 1, 2016

Suitepee, I hope you realize that totals six full megawads, most of them less than friendly...

I don't know rdwpa, it seems like Ling is actually a fan of SoundBlaster audio for some reason. I don't get it either.

So, an update corrected my explorer problem yesterday morning, but then today my OS just decided it didn't count. I've beaten Hell Revealed twice already, so if I can't fix this in time, I'll just watch demos and do the rest of my commentary from memory if that's alright. In the meantime...

As I mentioned in the Revolution! thread, Hell Revealed is a long-time favorite of mine in spite of its controversial reputation. Since I did an Ultra-Violence/Pistol starts only of this Megawad only a couple months ago, which was successful with the exception of maps 23 and 24, I thought I would do this playthrough in the form of UV-Fast demos, which I will upload on YouTube for you people to watch along with my commentary for this thread (which itself will be in written format as usual).

Now, do I as a player possess the skill to go through all of Hell Revealed doing only UV-Fast demos? I think we’re all aware that the probable answer to this question is “no”. So, if I make substantial progress on a map but then fail to beat it about twenty more times, I will do what I always do and reduce the challenge. First by switching to UV-Max demos, then by allowing the save function, then carryovers, and finally downgrading to Hurt Me Plenty. I hope I don’t have to resort to any of these options until as late as possible though.

With all that out of the way, it’s time to start climbing this mountain.

MAP01: Into the Gate by Yonatan Donner and Haggay Niv

Link to demo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rihyl7WXzy8

One of my favorite opening maps ever, in spite of how simple and short it is. The techbase structure here is very basic, but as far as the early maps of Hell Revealed are concerned, this is one of the better-looking ones. The pack of shotgunners that greets you upon starting is a good sign of the brutality to come, especially in the context of 1997. The other standout moment is of course the final room when the formerly frozen pack of Demons start warping in and swarming you. It is unfortunate that the excessive detailing in the Berserk room provides an easy safe retreat. I guess it’s a beginner’s mistake, of a kind that will be less and less frequent as the Megawad progresses. I couldn’t punch the demons in this case as I am playing –fast, but there’s easily enough ammo around for that sort of thing not to matter. By the way, at the start of the map, if you go into the entrance gate four times, you will find a neat Easter egg.

TheOrganGrinder · February 1, 2016

All right, let's do this. ZDoom and continuous play as usual, and I hope it's not against the spirit of the thing that I'm sticking to my usual Hurt Me Plenty comfort zone rather than the boasted "extreme challenge" of Ultraviolence.

MAP01: Into the Gate

Short and simple - take a corridor to the end of the complex, pop into a side room to hit a switch that opens the exit, done. But "simple" is not synonymous with "easy," and the most memorable and defining moment of this map is the vast onslaught of zombies, demons, and imps that emerges between the player and the exit once the path to the latter has been opened. The berserk pack is perfectly placed for demon/imp mashing, and by the time I was done with the horde I swear the space under the door looked like a spill in a ketchup factory. The berserk mostly liberates you from ammunition concerns during that particular encounter, which is good since you're almost entirely dependent on zombie kills to keep you topped up with bullets and shells. Strong opening, fun stuff.

joe-ilya · February 1, 2016

1

An opener that doesn't exactly promises what's at stake, but it's not a complain, I guess you're gaining skill as you play increasingly harder map each time untill you beat MAP30 and become a master.

Anyways, this map is harsh for what it is, it's non-linear and there are completely optional areas just to kick your own ass when you're bored.
I didn't like the lame teleporting monsters, they were a drag.
Short map, I do like the demon trap and the secret credit room that you teleport to when you go to the starter teleporter several times.

3/5

gaspe · February 1, 2016

The first time I played this in continuous, so it's a nice chance to pistol start all the levels. UV on GZDoom. Though I'm not sure if I will replay all the wad.

MAP01 - Into the Gate

Kills: 100% | Items: 44% | Secrets: 100%

A quite easy opener, and extremely short if you want just to exit the level. Not intentionally but I used the teleport behind you at the start to avoid to get hit by the shotgunners. I'm not sure why they put that cacodemon, also the imps that teleport before you step into the exit portal seem kinda pointless.

T-Rex · February 1, 2016

Well, it's about time we get to Hell Revealed! I'll be getting to playing one of the best megawads in Doom as soon as I can, but for now, I want to give my thoughts and introduction of Hell Revealed.

The Plutonia Experiment is regarded to be one of the most important wads in Doom history. While Doom and Doom 2 had left such profound influences for many within the Doom Community, the Plutonia Experiment was even more influential, moreso than its other half of Final Doom, TNT Evilution. This is because Plutonia was very unique for its time. It offered such astonishing, beautiful, and well-designed architecture in its mapset, but the one major factor that many have noticed in Plutonia is the difficulty.

Doom, Doom 2, and even TNT had a difficulty curve where it starts off easy and gets harder as you progress. Plutonia, on the other hand, is hard, and I mean ULTRA HARD. Dario and Milo Casali, the revered brothers who created the entirety of Plutonia, pioneered the concept of an extremely difficult megawad which ranges from nasty monster placement to brutal slaughter (like Go 2 It, for example). This style of gameplay left a huge impression that many wads followed Plutonia's footsteps like its unofficial sequels (Plutonia 2 and PRCP), Speed of Doom, and the Scythe series, but there was also one that many overlooked as Plutonia's first and foremost successor, and that is this megawad, Hell Revealed.

Hell Revealed has made quite a reputation that resulted in divided opinions within the Doom community. Some enjoyed its wild and frantic gameplay while others criticised it for being nothing but "mindless slaughter" from the very first map to the end. Whether the reception HR gets as overblown hype or a mere exaggeration of its difficulty is all up for debate.

Needless to say, I think it's unfair and somewhat ironic that Plutonia doesn't get flack for its intense difficulty while HR does when it is really no different to Plutonia. In fact I felt that HR and Plutonia are like brothers to each other, and this couldn't be farther from the truth as both megawads were handled by two people respectively. True, Plutonia doesn't have as high of a monster count as HR, but think about it, most of the maps in Plutonia are short while HR offers a bunch of larger ones, especially at the mid to late maps. So I feel the monster count in HR is really justified, and while some maps' body count get to within the 300 range, it really doesn't get higher than that, save for Maps 18, 24, 26, and 32, with map 24 having the highest body count of nearly 600, Arch-Vile resurrections and Pain Elemental Lost Soul spawns notwithstanding. Besides, what is there to dislike about HR? I mean, it's got beautiful architecture, interesting level scenarios, and of course, the usage of Rise of the Triad's soundtrack in most of the maps, which makes this megawad a lot more fun and enjoyable.

With that said and done, I will start my rundown of HR once I get to it. I remember playing this megawad back in 2004 (the year I started checking out custom Doom wads) after reading some reviews of how similar the gameplay is to Plutonia. It sure delivers a slightly harder challenge than its predecessor, no doubt, but nothing that is so overwhelming. As I will be playing through the maps, there will be many instances when I will be comparing HR to Plutonia. This is going to be a wild and fun ride all the way.

To anyone playing HR, do play it under the Plutonia game, as some of the intermission text between episodes make some sense (especially Maps 31 and 32), and the soundtrack for Plutonia's Map 21, 28, and 30 actually seem quite fitting for the maps since they don't have a RotT track in place.

joe-ilya · February 1, 2016

I'll try to post a playthrough to youtube of each map.

NuMetalManiak · February 1, 2016

100% kills, items, and secrets attempted for this gift.

MAP01 Into the Gate

to ze gaet! or whatever.

this might actually be harder on ITYTD because of the fact that there aren't any shotgunners, so shotgun ammo ends up being hard to come by. that teleporter near the end gives us several enemies, but I think the imps that appear just after a line before the exit are filler. oh well, fun start.

Cynical · February 1, 2016

dobu gabu maru said:
In retrospect all I really remember is MAP24 being an absolute nightmare to play, so I'm super interested in seeing how it holds up, especially since 1) I know the ins and outs of Doom way better now and 2) I'm playing from pistol start.

Post Mortem is one of two truly difficult maps in the wad, IMO (the other is Afterlife, map 26). You won't have any major difficulties with the rest of it, but those two *will* kick your ass.

scifista42 · February 1, 2016

I've copied the contents of HRMUS.wad and the automap names DEHACKED into my copy of HR.wad, and ready to go!

Zandronum, UV, continuous play.

MAP01 - "Into the Gate" by Yonatan Donner & Haggay Niv

Nice looking little map with mostly "spammy" placement of monsters, although I have yet no idea how "spammy" this is in comparison with other HR maps. The teleport ambushes in particular were all needlessly too long, though. Architecture composed of (mostly rectangular-like) blocks wasn't any great either, but I didn't mind it here.

baja blast rd. · February 1, 2016

Pretty much all of these maps look like boxes with things in them from the overhead. Hopefully they subvert that impression in-game.

Cynical · February 1, 2016

rdwpa said:
Pretty much all of these maps look like boxes with things in them from the overhead. Hopefully they subvert that impression in-game.

They won't. But some of the maps have really well placed things in those boxes!

(And then there's some like "Last Look at Eden" or "Top Hell" that are just tedious as fuck.)

Lingyan203 · February 1, 2016

rdwpa said:
How can you bear that terrible default prBoom+ soundfont? Yuck.

what do you mean? It's in Adlib/Soundblaster format, just like it is in Vanilla.

Budoka · February 1, 2016

T-Rex said:
To anyone playing HR, do play it under the Plutonia game, as some of the intermission text between episodes make some sense (especially Maps 31 and 32), and the soundtrack for Plutonia's Map 21, 28, and 30 actually seem quite fitting for the maps since they don't have a RotT track in place.

You can't if you use a vanilla source port, because the compatibility doesn't fit (HR being -complevel 2 and Final Doom being -complevel 4), which carries the potential of creating some issues. This strikes me as a very superfluous and arbitrary thing to add in anyway...

T-Rex · February 1, 2016

Budoka said:
You can't if you use a vanilla source port, because the compatibility doesn't fit (HR being -complevel 2 and Final Doom being -complevel 4), which carries the potential of creating some issues. This strikes me as a very superfluous and arbitrary thing to add in anyway...

I've done it before using vanilla Doom, but never experienced any issues that broke the game. It plays just as fine.

Cynical · February 1, 2016

The differences between cl2 and cl4 are so minor that it shouldn't really matter much.

That said, I also don't see "more fitting between-level texts" as a terribly compelling reason to go out of one's way to pick one IWAD over another. Especially in something as "story-free" as HR.

scifista42 · February 1, 2016

Cynical said:
The differences between cl2 and cl4 are so minor that it shouldn't really matter much.

That, and also it's technically no problem to play a wad with Plutonia IWAD and use PrBoom-plus -complevel 2 or (I think) even vanilla Doom (non-Plutonia) engine if you don't care about speedrunning traditions and conventions. And since HR has its own TEXTURE1 and PNAMES, you shouldn't even get texture errors.

T-Rex · February 1, 2016

Cynical said:
That said, I also don't see "more fitting between-level texts" as a terribly compelling reason to go out of one's way to pick one IWAD over another. Especially in something as "story-free" as HR.

With the exception of the secret and super-secret exit texts, of course, especially in Map32 when you have to exit the level when you're close to death, unless you're playing on ITYTD/HNTR.

"Betcha wondered just what was the hardest map we had ready for ya? Now you know. No one gets out alive..."

Ironically, Map24 is the hardest map of HR, while I find Map32 to be the second-hardest, followed by Map22, 31, and then 26.

yakfak · February 1, 2016

I've always likened Hell Revealed to an amateur D&D campaign, where the dungeonmaster thinks their role is to kill as many of the PCs as possible, eschewing setting, mystery and warmth for cell after dungeon cell of hordes plucked from the manual, with little reprieve to separate them and no real end in sight. Sorry =P

Budoka · February 1, 2016

I find that kinda funny yakfak when the Megawad as a whole is so much easier than just about every single one of its spiritual successors (and there are a lot). The proof is that I can already beat most of it on UV. Alien Vendetta, HR2, Scythe, Resurgence...? Not so much, and yet most people like those more. Just to be clear, I like them too, extreme difficulty or not. I will say that some maps in HR require a little thinking outside the box, despite all appearances.

Cynical · February 1, 2016

Most of HR's successors are difficult in a "different way" than HR itself.

HR requires heavy planning and foreknowledge, since a lot of the maps have such tight resources; it's more of a test of your ability to come up with good routes than a test of moment-to-moment combat skills. Most of its successors require more moment-to-moment dodging skill, but are more forgiving when it comes to route planning.

Salt-Man Z · February 1, 2016

I found a lot of the later levels just to be more tedious than anything else; there's a lot of meat to plow through. "Post Mortem" is difficult, yes, but "Afterlife" is the only level that I recall giving me absolute fits. Not to say the WAD isn't hard: I thought Plutonia on UV was far easier (and more fun) than HR on HMP.

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